All About Power and Corruption and Death

What has happened to the Democrat Party? At one time, and not so very long ago, it claimed to be the party of the people, the party of common men and women who worked hard, struggling to ensure a better life for their families. 

Many of my relatives, my recent ancestors, were Democrats because they bought into the party's emerging gospel that only big government could solve big problems. But it's all bread and circuses, folks, a lie that's been accepted by far too many in the past. The result has been a near continuous stream of authoritarian and totalitarian slave states throughout history. Of course, as the power of government grows, the people become politically impotent. 

One of my heroes, Lord Acton, recognized the inherent evil of big government when he wrote:

"Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority; still more when you superadd the tendency of the certainty of corruption by authority.”

In effect, he's telling us it's hard, perhaps impossible, for career politicians to resist the attractions of great power exerted over others. Unfortunately, in our nation neither party is immune. Both Republican and Democrat politicians fall prey to these attractions. 

In recent years, however, the Democrat Party has too often been the party most enamored of government power. In the South, many Democrats used the power of government to ensure the continuation of segregation well into the mid-twentieth century. LBJ is a perfect example of the Southern Democract who was an avid racist but came to realize the political advantages of repackaging himself as a civil rights leader. 

Northern Democrats often leaned far to the left, grasping the failed ideas of the European socialists. But they soon realized that the majority of freedom-loving Americans would not accept authoritarian rule by elites, something that true socialism demanded. And so they toyed with the subtle and gradual implementation of socialist principles, introducing them as progressive means to a better life. 

But at its core, the left has always sought power, always looked for ways to control the masses. And so they must lie about their aims and the means to achieve them. The welfare state, radical environmentalism, open borders, confiscatory taxation...it's all about power. 

Today the far left has pulled off a successful coup d'etat and taken near complete control of the Democrat Party. Abandoning all restraint, they have come to realize that ultimate power is the power of God, the power over life and death. And the perfect means to exert this power is through abortion. With abortion human life is no longer sacred, no longer a gift of God, but becomes the ultimate object of  manipulation and control. Once the people come to accept abortion and infanticide, and embrace the culture of death, they will be less likely to resist the application of government power to other aspects of their lives.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, "It's all about abortion." Abortion has become the ruling principle, the sine qua non, of the left. If you are against abortion, the left will do all in its power to destroy you politically. If you support abortion, the left will forgive a multitude of sins. 

Embracing the politics of death, politicians now push legislation that will permit the brutal killing of the most innocent human life for any reason whatsoever. And once again, Lord Acton sums it up for us:

"Despotic power is always accompanied by corruption of morality.”

Yes, indeed, morality becomes something the powerful can adjust and redefine to conform to the prevailing zeitgeist. Pope Benedict XVI called it the "dictatorship of relativism," and warned the Church and the world to cast it aside and embrace the truth. And what is the truth? Nothing less than Jesus Christ Himself:

"I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through me" [John 14:6].

Today our politicians strive to distort the truth by destroying life and denying that Jesus Christ is the way. This is why I have no doubt that Satan is pulling all their strings. He began his evil work in the garden by tempting our first parents to embrace the power of God Himself: "and you will be like God, knowing good and evil" [Gen 3:5]. And he continues that work today using the same tempting words. 

In recent weeks he has unleashed the killing of our most  innocent, but immediately followed it up with a series of bizarre environmentalist proposals to distract us from his deadly aims. Just read the idiocy offered as policy yesterday by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) to turn our weak 21st-century minds from the real sin against the Holy Spirit. And, yes, I label abortion a sin against the Holy Spirit, After all, in the Nicene Creed, which we pray together every Sunday, we proclaim the Holy Spirit as "the Lord and giver of life." Through abortion we toss that aside and attempt to assign that title to ourselves. 

Whether you're a Republican, Democrat, Independent, or nothing, please pray for our politicians. Pray that they come to accept God as a giver of life. Pray that in all that is good they give glory, not to themselves, but to God.

"Non nobis, Domine, non nobis, sed nomini tuo da gloriam" [Ps 115:1]