Msgr. James Lisante's Tough Love # 1 of 2

Msgr. James Lisante’s Tough Love # 1 of 2
Wednesday, Nov. 7, 2007
From a talk given at Medjugorje Peace Conference – 2000
“Jubilee Year: Witness to Faith” (AC2007) given in Orange County, California
Follow Me Communications, Inc.

“Very often with the exception of priest we see at this conference, most of our priests sadly are afraid and unwilling to address the issues that truly matter and that are a shame.

“In my job in my diocese for eleven years as pro-life director, my job was to go to every parish and to speak on life. And I went to almost every parish but one. And I would call the pastor all the time. He would say to me no we are not interested right now. Call me next year. I called and I finally said, Al, what’s the story? What’s the problem?

“I have been to every parish in the diocese but not yours. He said I am going to be really straight with you, Jim. I have to tell you that in my congregation, I’d say that one half the people are pro-life and the other half are pro-choice. And I want to be honest with you because some of those people who are pro-choice are some of my biggest financial contributors.

“And I am afraid if you come and get them all stirred up that they are not going to give to his parish as they are used too. I said Al do you realize what you are saying? You are saying that our beliefs are for sale. Al what in the world would Jesus say to that.

“You know we don’t want to get people angry even in our own churches. And I think we need to take a good hard look at it as a wimpy quality within our own souls. The wimpy quality that allows to believe that you can follow Jesus who got angry as heck very often and not get angry and take a firm and convicted stand.

“You know when I think to myself when people say I am sorry I want to confess I got angry. I want to say well good for you. Because anger is not necessarily a sin because you and I base our Faith on a man who walked into the temple and saw the money changers and said: Get our of here and knocked down the tables and threw them out and you know what he did. He didn’t say: Oops I am sorry.

“And you and I call ourselves Catholic – Christians because we believe in a man who looked into the eyes of the power elite, the Pharisees, Scribes, and lawyers, Sanhedrin, he looked them into the eyes and said you whitener sepulchers, you people are going to hell, you people are leading people astray. You people have so much to answer for and he didn’t say, “Oh wasn’t that politically correct.”

“Now listen if Jesus saw that here are times when you got to say I am mad as heck and l am not going to apologize for it. Then how can you and I call ourselves as followers and be such wimpy, wimpy people. Why in God’s name won’t we say I would like you to like me but you know what I am not going to lose sleep if you don’t? (Continued tomorrow)
George H. Kubeck, Duplicate and or translate into Spanish. Cinops Be Gone