TORONTO, September 2, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) – InÂhis thought-provoking editorial in September’s Catholic Insight magazine, editor Rev. Alphonse de Valk puts the same-sex “marriage” onslaught into a perspective that perhaps many have been thinking but have not voiced. Writing about the recent enactment of gay “marriage” legislation in Canada, Fr. de Valk writes, “But let us not be despondent. Instead, let us set this latest defeat in its proper context so that at least we may understand what we are facing.”
The editorial quotes the Roman Catechism (Council of Trent, 1546) as teaching that “the general judgment will be preceded by these three principal signs: the preaching of the Gospel throughout the world, a falling away from the faith, and the coming of the Antichrist.” It notes that the “first has been fulfilled”. Indeed on February 21, 2001, in an address which received scant attention, Pope John Paul II, speaking of the “signs of the times,” announced that the Gospel was “spread now in all corners of the planet.”
With regard to a falling away from the faith, Rev. de Valk says, “It is now recognized within the Catholic Church that the loss of faith among the peoples who once constituted Christendom is well advanced. Recently, Pope Benedict spoke of Europe as a Godless society. ‘Europe,’ he said, ‘has developed a culture that, in a manner unknown before now to humanity, excludes God from the public conscience, either by denying Him altogether, or by judging that His existence is not demonstrable and therefore uncertain and belonging to the realm of subjective choices, something, in any case, irrelevant to public life.’”
The editorial adds, “The heartland of Christianity, Europe, while retaining pockets of strength as in Poland, has essentially apostasized, and so have overseas settlements such as Australia and Canada and, to a lesser extent, the United States.” The article does not come to any conclusions or make any predictions regarding these facts and how they appear, for the first time in history,Âto complete the first two conditions for the “general judgement”.Â
Particularly striking about the editorial is the fact that Rev. de Valk has never been prone to apocalyptic suggestion. Rather, as an academic, political analyst and historian, he has in the past been known to disparage any such suggestions.Â
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