Your Excellencies,
I write today to offer my pleas that you, as defenders of the faith, stand with us, the faithful in America, in refusing to allow the immorality of man to shutter the doors of our good works. Every hospital, every adoption agency, every shelter, every college, every school, etc… needs to remain open.
We must stand firm against the tyranny of a government that is no longer for and by the people, but rather for and by a group of elitists who have an agenda so very different from our beliefs. Stand up for our faith and for all that we hold dear. Do not let the HHS Mandates also be a death sentence to all that is good and holy in our practice of our faith.
We must not be timid. The early saints fought and died for their right to believe in Jesus Christ and his message of faith, hope and love. How can we, almost 2,000 years later, close our doors with barely a whimper? Yes, whimper. For 40 plus years the majority of bishops of the Catholic Church in America have been silent and accommodating as progressives attempted to break us by convincing us that we didn’t need our communion rail, our nuns’ habits, our reverence for the Mass, our Sundays, our Confession, our love of the Blessed Mother, our St. Michael Prayer, our traditional priests, or even the truth of what it really means to be Catholic. No more!
We need to return to our roots as a Church and remember that which makes us the beacon for the world. We also need to stand, arm in arm, in front of our hospitals, adoption agencies, shelters, colleges and schools and force the government (yes, FORCE) to come and close us down. We cannot go quietly into that good night.
Put out the rally cry. Ask the faithful in every congregation to sign up to peacefully protest on the first day of the mandate’s effectiveness for faith based organizations. Let us be there to stand for what is right as one, united Catholic Church.
FORCE them into either releasing us from this mandate or creating a firestorm when they have no choice but to pull our priests, nuns, doctors, nurses and caregivers out of our buildings to enforce their anti-Catholic mandate.
Let our children and our children’s children know that we did not give in to tyranny, but instead chose to stand and defend our faith in the light of day, no matter the cost. It is our right as Catholics and Americans to protect the freedoms and protections granted to us by God and recognized by the founding fathers of the United States of America.
As Abolitionist Frederick Douglass said in his speech at Canandaigua where he reminded his fellow countrymen of the cost of freedom,
| “The general sentiment of mankind is that a man who will not fight for himself, when he has the means of doing so, is not worth being fought for by others, and this sentiment is just. For a man who does not value freedom for himself will never value it for others, or put himself to any inconvenience to gain it for others. . . .” |
If we value our freedom to be both Catholics and Americans in this great country of ours, we must put forth the effort, through peaceful but visible protest to overcome the tyranny and injustice being imposed upon us.
I pray for us all, that we may have the courage of our convictions in this matter.
Your daughter in Christ,
Mrs. Summitt
Chris,
Thank you for your comments and the JFK quote!
I appreciate the reminder of how our founding fathers attempted to protect us from just what we see happening today. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights were constructed to protect us from tyranny. I continue to pray that we are still just on the edge with room to pull back.
Mrs. Summitt
Mrs. Summitt – you inspire me! We need to do whatever we can to protect religious freedom (and freedom in general) from the overreach of our government. The founding fathers ratified the Bill of Rights soon after the Constitution for a reason…they are critical to the American view of governance. Big Government supporters OF BOTH PARTIES have forgotten that, and we need to get back to God and our founding principles. And thanks for including the quote by Frederick Douglass. Although he was speaking on the issue of slavery, his focus on liberty and bold action resonates today.
I appreciate you stepping out in faith on this issue.
“Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men.” — John F. Kennedy