Description
Our end-of-year edition of Calx Mariae focuses on the major areas of concern for us in 2020, also evident in some of the effects of the coronavirus crisis on faith, life, and the family. In this issue, we consider the power of the family to renew society. We have also included some of the talks from our recent online conference “Fathers’ call to Bishops: help us to defend our children’s purity”, addressing the terrible and widespread corruption of children by the introduction of compulsory sex education in all schools in Britain, including Catholic schools. The presentation delivered by His Eminence Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke “The rights of parents as primary educators of their children and the obligation of parents to oppose a curriculum contrary to the moral law” is one of the talks featured in this edition.
Reviewing this year in the light of our apostolate, it stands out, above all, as a tremendous opportunity to evangelise. This is why Voice of the Family has launched an entire online video catechism course, Our Lady of the Rosary Family Catechism. This is a unique opportunity for children and their families to learn the timeless truths of the Catholic Faith according to the classic Baltimore Catechism, completely free of charge and wherever they are. The easily accessible lessons are presented by Fr Anthony Pillari JCL, MCL, STB with a view to children and families committing the Baltimore Catechism to memory, as generations of Catholics used to do, in order to really know and love our Faith. The importance of the family catechism is discussed in Fr Pillari’s interview with Bishop Athanasius Schneider.
At Christmastime, we contemplate the story of a family. The Word became flesh in a family and so it is the family that God has chosen to be the bulwark of the Truth Incarnate. The mystery of the Incarnation gives the ultimate mission to all families: to welcome and nourish the Truth of God.
Even at this time of great crisis of faith and the family, this is the never-failing reason for us to take heart: just as Christian faith and civilisation, its fruit, were nourished in the family, they are to be restored through the family.
And when we contemplate how the Truth became flesh in a family, let us not think only of the peace of the Newborn Child in the manger, with beasts and kings alike on their knees in adoration. Like the Holy Family, let us also prepare ourselves, in the year ahead, for the arduous flight across the desert, the fight for the life of Truth and the Infant Body of our Church.
