The Maccabees and the Antichrist
"Let us go and make a covenant with the heathens that are round about us: for since we departed from them, many evils have befallen us," (Mach. I,1:12).
The first chapter of the Book of Maccabees opens immediately upon all the evils that preceded the reign of Antiochus, the Old Testament prefiguration of Antichrist, and the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem. In a nutshell, we have the bare facts of the Church's own destruction, for here we read how first men became evil, then how they gathered to make a covenant with the heathens, (opening quote). And this describes the convening of what is erroneously styled as Vatican II, for it was anything but a continuation of that first holy council.
The chronicler of Maccabean times goes on to relate how Antiochus, accompanied by this army of unbelievers, eventually went against Israel and desecrated the Temple there, breaking every one of the ceremonial objects used in Jewish worship into pieces.
"And they shed innocent blood around the sanctuary and defiled the holy place...Jerusalem...was made the habitation of strangers, and she became a stranger to her own seed, and her children forsook her. Her sanctuary was desolate like a wilderness, her festival days were turned into mourning, her Sabbaths into reproach, her honors were brought to nothing...They sacrificed to idols and profaned the Sabbath...And the kings sent letters to all the cities of Juda that they should follow the law of the nations and of the earth...and King Antiochus set up the abominable idol of desolation upon the altar of God, and they built altars throughout all the cities of Juda about them...They sacrificed upon the altar of the idol that was over against the altar of God...They cut in pieces and burnt with fire the books of the law...And there was very great wrath upon the people.," (Mach. I, Ch.1:39-67).
What in these verses has not happened to us, the spiritual Semites of the Latter Days? For first there was the unholy covenant, then they defiled the holy places by their very presence, lying "in wait against the sanctuary," (Mach.I, Ch. 1:38) with their proposed liturgical innovations, waiting for the death of Pope Pius XII. We have here the wilderness into which the woman, (taken as a figure of the Church) of Apocalypse 12 flees following the first assault of the dragon, for that wilderness is desolate without the Sacraments and the Holy Sacrifice. All the Church's grand festival/holydays were turned into mourning and Her Sabbaths into reproach once the Novus Ordo was instituted, something that happened only after the declaration of the V2 "covenant." They sacrificed to idols, for how could the Novus Ordo be pleasing to God? And they profaned the Sabbath by all the many disgraceful abuses that became commonplace during the reign of Montini, (Paul 6). They fed what was holy to dogs, and this by the order of "king" Montini, who in his April 6, 1969 letter to the bishops of the world, forbade the Latin Tridentine Mass be celebrated anywhere in the Church. They worshipped at altars set up against the main altar, established for their abominable services. They violated Jewish Law just as Montini violated Divine and Canon Law, (although it would later be Karol Wojtyla (JP2) who issued the "revised" version of Canon Law). And the people, like the Israelites before them, were driven away into "lurking holes, and the secret place of fugitives," (Mach.I, Ch. 1:56).
So great was this desolation to the Jews that they lamented much as cast off Catholics lamented in the wake of V2 and the Cessation of the Holy Sacrifice:
"Woe is me, wherefore was I born to see the ruin of my people, and the ruin of the holy city, and to dwell there, when it is given unto the hands of the enemy? The holy places are come into the hands of strangers; her temple is become as a man without honor. The vessels of her glory are carried away captive...All her ornaments are taken away... And behold our sanctuary and our beauty...our glory is laid waste and the Gentiles have defiled them. To what end then should we live any longer?," (Mach. I, Ch. 2:7-13).
And here, unfortunately, is where the resemblance to the people of the Old Covenant times ends. For immediately the priest Mathathias and his sons fled to the desert in the shadow of Mt. Modin (desert being yet another prefiguration of Apocalypse 12). There they raised up an army to reclaim the holy places and restore the Temple. Refusing to concede defeat, fall prey to fear and faintheartedness, or make excuses that all they could do was pray and continue as best they could, they valiantly set forth to do battle against Antiochius. It was accomplished within 42 months time, according to the prophecy of Daniel. This seems to be a marker of some sort for the length of time necessary to restore the Church (1969-1972), a time now long since expired. That the desolation occasioned by the abomination has continued even into the 21st century is undoubtedly a punishment meted out to Catholics for failing to rise up against the Man of Sin immediately in defense of the faith, and destroy the altars of abomination. Daniel's prophecy, that the desolation would last only three years and a half, pertained, perhaps, only to his own people. St. Thomas Aquinas teaches that this time period of Daniel's is to be interpreted only as an indefinite period for the time of Antichrist proper.
Invited to be counted among the king's friends if only they would obey his evil laws, Mathathias,"with a loud voice," proclaimed: "My sons and my brethren will obey the law of our fathers...It is not profitable for us to forsake the law and the justices of God; we will not hearken to the words of king Antiochus neither will we sacrifice and transgress the commandments of our law, to go another way." And having assembled an army by invoking a zeal for the law, the Maccabees left all they had in the city and fled further into the desert near Mt. Modin. Thus was the first call to Catholic Action raised by a priest of the old law, and on his death taken up by his sons. It was Judas Maccabeus, son of Mathathias, who actually restored the sacrifice, razed the former, violated temple and rebuilt the Temple of Jerusalem. It would not be until the year 27 B.C. that the temple would finally be restored in all its glory, only to go to its destruction in 70 A.D.
Where is the Mathathias of our day, and the armies that followed him? What is lacking in those claiming the name Catholic that allows them to be overshadowed by those who experienced not the glory of God's covenant with His people, fulfilled in the New Testament? Like the Apostles following Christ's arrest and Crucifixion, all have fled save a few. The zeal exhibited by Mathathias has grown cold. All speak of charity, but none invoke their "duty in charity as laymen," (Tanquerey's The Spiritual Life) to exercise zeal for the salvation of souls; or the professional obligation of Traditional "priests" to promote and model such zeal.
It must be remembered that Our Lord exhibited one of the prime examples of holy anger and zeal for the sacredness of God's House when He drove the moneychangers out of the Temple. Those tepid souls who wait for a miracle or expect "George to do it," exempting themselves from defending Christ's truth and the law, should also expect to be cast into the external darkness when Christ comes to demand a reckoning. For those who accept the operation of error and believe lying, or bury their talents in the earth, or make excuses for not attending the wedding feast cannot expect to share in the glory of the Church's restoration. Lest we soil our wedding garments, let us then repeat with the Holy Maccabees the cry of Mathathias: We will obey the laws of our fathers...we will (not) sacrifice or transgress the commandments...to go another way."
Michael Fighting
"Michael…who standeth for…thy people," — Dan. 12:1-12
