Angelus Press Conference, Fr. Sean Kilcawley and a little confirmation bias

JMJ

There's a whole lot of electrons being spilt over the invitation of Fr. Kilcawley to present at the Angelus Press Conference.

When I saw the article by Louie Verrechio and the angst that was being caused ... I suspected that they didn't listen to the whole 2 minute presentation and place what they deemed offensive to their ears in context.

Frankly, I doubt that they would do that because it goes against the belief that the Novus Ordo Priests are actually members of the Catholic Religion and priests.

How did they alter the perception of the act? By employing confirmation bias and poor grammar they succeed in altering the perception of the action by excluding the key point that Fr. Kilcawley was making: That OLJC dispels the temptation.

First here's what Louie quoted:

… simply invite Our Lord into our temptation and into our thoughts in the present moment. To say, “Jesus, I want to look at pornography right now.” Or, “Jesus, I’m having an impure thought right now. You’re welcome into my imagination. You’re welcome to watch these thoughts with me.”

One commentator that I saw was that this priest was telling people to ask OLJC to watch pornography with them. If a person missed the two highlighted words, they would probably come to that conclusion.

So ... having been burned before, I wanted to see the entire clip and judge for myself.

Here's my transcript and interleaved comments / thoughts:

In the opening words Fr. sets the stage - a person is undergoing a temptation. In other words they are still fighting and have turned to Our Lord in prayer for help. While some might take issue with being 'worthy of God's love', fundamentally God created us and He doesn't make mistakes so as creatures of God we are worthy as if we weren't He wouldn't have created us.

Whenever somebody comes to me when they're struggling with habitual sin or with pornography and masturbation I ask them how are you praying in the midst of your temptation and they'll say things like I'm praying that Jesus will come and take this temptation away or they'll say I'm praying that I'll have the strength to fight this temptation off or maybe even I'm praying that I'll be worthy of God's love and at that point I have to say stop you are already worthy of Our Lord's love

Father is correct, the thought that we can fix ourselves is pelagianism.

and a better way of approaching our temptations instead of asking Our Lord to take them away which gives us the impression that Jesus enters into our life to take away our temptations so that we can then fix ourselves and eventually be worthy of him to come back and enter in is simply

The following section contains the 'offensive' section - which needs to be linked to the next one. Note, he's not saying to ask OLJC to watch pornography, but the temptations that the person is undergoing.

invite Our Lord into our temptation and into our thoughts in the present moment to say Jesus I want to look at pornography right now or Jesus I'm having an impure thought right now you're welcome into my imagination you're welcome to watch these thoughts with me

The following is the proper conclusion of the thought: OLJC dispels the temptation by His presence.

because as we do that the light of Christ can enter into our imagination and His light scatters the darkness in that moment in which we're feeling unlovable or we're feeling a need for love that need is responded to by he who is love the person who is love Our Lord Jesus Christ

The final phrase -

and it's with his help that we can put our lives back in order again and live and love as we should it's a reminder to us that we're never alone that we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us and we can do nothing without Him.

So while Father uses the 'modern' manner of speech, there isn't anything truly offensive in what he stated.

I also found it interesting that Louie Verrecchio ended his article with this phrase:

We’ll keep an eye on this situation and follow-up next week as warranted.

Really, it is a non situation and I think Louie could put his time to better use.

P^3

Auctorem Fidei

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kamOctober 7, 2019 at 11:59 AM
You nailed it.
GullibleOctober 21, 2019 at 9:32 AM
Hi Tradical
If you are suffering from temptations and you ask Our Lord Jesus Christ to take them away how in the world do you get the impression you are going to fix this yourself?
AthanasiusAugust 21, 2022 at 12:31 PM
Fr. Kilcawley is at odds with Traditional moral teaching in this matter. It has always been the teaching of the Church and her saints that when tempted to any other sin Catholics may fight manfully, but when tempted to impurity the victory lies in cowardice. We should flee these temptations at once, not invite Our Lord to view them with us. Although no clarified, St. Paul wrote of a particular temptation of the flesh that may have been impure temptation. He says that he was given a sting in his flesh, an angel of Satan to buffet him, for which thing he thrice besought the Lord to deliver him. And how did Our Lord respond? He said "my grace is sufficient for thee". In other words, Our Lord will never allow us to be tempted beyond our strength, for adequate grace is given at the time for us to triumph with effort. He will not step in and relieve us of every opportunity to prove our love for Him. Indeed, He did not even receive such comfort Himself in the agony of Gethsemene. If I recall correctly, St. Bernard, when impurely tempted, had recourse to the thorns of an exceptionally thorny bush, in which he rolled about covering his body in wounds. His was the bravest act of cowardice I ever read about, but the point is he took measures by the grace of God already in him to win the victory. That's what we're called to do when tempted to impurity, to run away from it by distraction ourselves. The worst thing any Catholic can do is open the door to bad thoughts, even under the pretext of asking Our Lord to view them with us. Our success lies in flight, pure and simple.

Tradicat

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