2023 and the Great Interior Reset

Our interior life is just that – a life all its own.

With the benefit of hindsight and reflection we can recognize different “seasons” of our interior life.  We see how God was working in different ways at different times. As has been said many times, He meets us where we are, and moves us to something better.

I’m certain you can recognize that in your life.  For my part, I can recall times of “tough love” – God allowing me to flounder when I was moving away from Him.  Then came a season of God placing the right people in my path when I was finally in a place where I would benefit from their wisdom.

The same is true in the Church and the world as a whole. There are different spiritual seasons, and different movements of the Holy Spirit.

Right now, I have a sense that we are moving into a season that is intensely focused on our interior.

To all things there is a season…

There is a general understanding of the “ages” of the Church.  Venerable Bartholomew Holzhauser, as one example, proposed seven ages of the Church.  The first five, to one degree or another, conform to broadly agreed divisions of Church history, and bring us to our present time:

1. Apostolic age
2. Age of martyrs
3. The Patristic age
4. Christendom
5. Post-Christian, modern era

Holzhauser’s final two ages are associated with the chastisement and Christ’s second coming (more on that later).

In each age, one can see the Church, and the Holy Spirit acting through her, guiding the faithful through the circumstances of time.

The Apostolic Age was a time of tremendous charismatic activity. It was a time of signs and wonders as attested to in Acts of the Apostles.  It set the stage for the deep faith and courageous sacrifice of the Age of Martyrs.

This second age gave us martyrs like St. Ignatius of Antioch.  He boldly went to his death in the jaws of wild beasts for the sport of the Roman audience.

With the arrival of the Holy Roman Empire came theological leaps of the Patristic Age. It then set the stage for the Age of Christendom.  Yet even during the Protestant revolution, the Holy Spirit responded.   He brought about authentic reform, notably in such Saints as Teresa of Avila, Ignatius of Loyola and Catherine of Siena.

And here we are, neck-deep in the post-Christian modern age.  It begs the question, What is the Holy Spirit up to now?

Seasons within Seasons

In a similar way to the broad strokes of Church history, there are different seasons within our current age. And once again the Holy Spirit is responding to the prevailing spiritual movements of the world.

Take, for example, the cultural revolution that broke free of all moorings in the 1960’s.  The revolutionary underpinnings had been laid decades prior.  But with the “summer of love” in 1967, it erupted into brazen cultural rebellion.

Just so, the countervailing action of the Holy Spirit was equally outward and bold.  It came in the form of the Charismatic Renewal and Pope John Paul II’s New Evangelization.

Our Present Moment

Where the 1960’s had a boldly exterior rebellion, today’s secular attacks have turned inward – setting their sights on our interior lives.  Consider the unfolding of these trends:

The New Age movement brought a new “enlightenment.”  New Agers say we can unite our interior to some manner of universal consciousness.

The New Atheists and their religion of scientism have risen to prominence. Their often-testy refutation of religion and their science-as-god determination says we are nothing more than clumps of molecules.  It was only by a lucky role of the Darwinian dice that learned to walk and talk.  There is no human soul and there is no free will.

Post-modernism is now taking center stage with claims that we can’t even rely on science (“men can have babies”) or reason (“you define your own truth”).  In this post-modern age there is no objective reality and there is no fundamental meaning to life.  Not only do you not have a soul, you don’t even have “you.”

Transhumanism and the soul-killing agenda of the Great Reset are shaping up to be the final stage of the enemy’s attack on humanity.  Scientism and post-modernism attempted to do away with the human soul by way of science and philosophy.  Transhumanism seeks to permanently separate us from our soul by deforming us with all manner of technological “enhancements.”

What all these movements have in common is that they are direct attacks on our interior life.

No Exterior Solution to an Interior Problem

What will stand between us and these insidious attacks on our interior?

There is no fundamentally exterior solution to an interior problem.

For example, we cannot stop this slide through politics – at least not directly and not anytime soon.  Even if the political system weren’t rigged (which it is – the mail-in-voting charade is just the tip of the iceberg) within a few more election cycles the leftists won’t need to cheat.

We now face a demographic tsunami.  With the rise of Millennials and Gen-Z, in the next 10 years or so the flood of un-churched, woke, socialists pouring out of our public schools and universities will finally overwhelm the culture at all levels, from the voting booth to the boardroom.

I don’t say this lightly about our younger citizens, but how else shall it be put?  As the above links affirm, two-thirds to three-quarters of those generations think we should have even more government intervention than we have now.  That means putting more power in the hands of individuals who seem to be in lock-step with the globalists and the Great Reset.

We Need a ‘God Thing’

As a friend of mine often puts it, if our country (let-alone the world) is going to turn around it will have to be a “God thing.”

St. Thomas Aquinas teaches the principle of natural causation (or, efficient causation).  He says that most of what happens in the world is simply the course of natural events.  If I toss an egg in the air, as sure as you are born, I’m going to have a scrambled mess on the floor.

What is true of physics is also true of culture.  If we are left purely to the forces of demographics and human behavior, our cultural goose is cooked.

But God can step in as He has in the past.  He did at the battle of Lepanto.  And He probably would have stepped in and stemmed the evil of Communism, following Mary’s apparition at Fatima.  If only the world had followed Mary’s instructions for prayer and sacrifice.

This brings me back to the main point – the solution to the attacks on our interior is also found in our interior life.  We can only do our part to bring about a “God thing” by growing our interior life.   And in the event that God does not step in, leaving society to “drink its cup to the dregs, foaming and fully spiced” (cf Ps 75:9), our only haven will be our interior life.

Interior Renewal

Just as the nothing-is-sacred 1960’s was matched by the Charismatic Renewal, it seems the soul-destroying 2020’s are bringing about the Interior Renewal.

When I started the Interior Life apostolate a few years ago, not very many Christians were familiar with things like mental prayer, spiritual combat and redemptive suffering.  There were also not many mainstream resources focused on bringing the rich tradition of ascetical and mystical theology to life for ordinary Catholics.

Now there is an ever-growing abundance.  Christian meditation is a mainstay for many.  More and more laypeople are praying the Liturgy of the Hours.  Asceticism is being seen in a new light through apostolates such as Exodus 90.

About that Chastisement

The Chastisement, as you’re probably aware, is a time of great trial.  It may include a period of three days of darkness and tremendous purification of the world.  But the Chastisement will be followed by a period of peace. This peace is sometimes referred to as the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart or the Eucharistic Reign.

There is a compelling basis for the Chastisement in scripture, particularly Revelation and from Marian revelations.  But there is no dogmatic teaching on the topic.  Is it imminent?  Are we in the opening acts?  Is it still generations away?   Who is to say?  But whatever else we might make of the Chastisement, what would it be other than God’s supernatural intervention to bring about an interior renewal for the world?

Interior Renewal and Societal Renewal

And, so, there is great hope for the world.  The increasing focus on interior renewal, by a growingly devout cohort in the Church, is part of the engine for grace to raise us from our cultural nosedive.

That’s how it works; the interior precedes the exterior.  It’s not for nothing that St. Therese of Lisieux, who rarely left the confines of her convent, is the Patron Saint of missionaries.

The Vatican quotes St. Therese in the context of the spiritual power released by cloistered nuns:

“The insight of the Saint of Lisieux is the conviction of the Church, repeatedly voiced by the Magisterium: ‘The Church is deeply aware and, without hesitation she forcefully proclaims, that there is an intimate connection between prayer and the spreading of the Kingdom of God, between prayer and the conversion of hearts, between prayer and the fruitful reception of the saving and uplifting Gospel message’.”

We should certainly still show up at the voting booth and support great Christian civic organizations.  We should also serve our neighbor and spread the Gospel, especially in the corporeal and spiritual acts of mercy.  But the real transformation will happen through the grace released by our individual interior renewal – growing in holiness and living a Sacramental life.

As far as those ranks of “un-churched, woke, socialists,” God can pierce their hearts in a New York minute.  Let us hope and pray that He does.   Better yet, let us pray and sacrifice that He does, as part of our interior renewal.