Live 4 The LORD

THE saints have always lived in peril of excommunication. Even canonized saints have been acquainted with the formal censures of ecclesiastical authority.

It’s Every Catholic’s Vocation To Be Mistreated in the Church

But every member of the Church down through the ages, from Peter the first pope all the way to you and me, is sinful – terribly sinful, even. So of course our Church, filled with sinners, is a place where people get hurt. It’s not right, and it’s not pretty, but it’s pretty consistent. Sometimes, the worst enemy of the Catholic Church is Catholics themselves, whether it be the person in the pew next to you, your priest or bishop, the Pope, or even yourself. When we sin, we hurt ourselves and those around us, and we impede the mission of the Church in the world – the salvation of souls.

St. Alphonsus did not simply suffer silently. He wrote: “At present the Church is not persecuted by idolaters, or by heretics, but she is persecuted by scandalous Christians, who are her own children.”

But he didn’t dwell on resentment and bitterness and left us great advice.

First: Focus on doing good. “The past is no longer yours; the future is not yet in your power. You have only the present wherein to do good,” he said.

Second: Focus on God’s presence everywhere, not the sins of his representatives: “When we see a beautiful object, a beautiful garden, or a beautiful flower, let us think that there we behold a ray of the infinite beauty of God, who has given existence to that object.”

Above all, pray. “Were you to ask what are the means of overcoming temptations, I would answer: The first means is prayer; the second is prayer; the third is prayer; and should you ask me a thousand times, I would repeat the same,” he said.

Some Catholic saints who were persecuted by their own church include:

• Saint Athanasius: Condemned by multiple councils and deposed from his position as Pope of Alexandria 

• Saint Damasus: Faced opposition from his brethren, which led to the deaths of 137 electors 

• Saint Epiphanius: Interrupted during a sermon and told to leave the pulpit 

• Saint John of the Cross: Imprisoned by his religious superiors 

• St. Teresa of Avila (1515-1582) was persecuted near the end of her life. Her enemies were threatened by her success and opposed her efforts to reform the Carmelite order
  

• Saint Alphonsus Ligouri: Persecuted by Church leaders 

• Joan of Arc: Burned at the stake with the approval of bishops 

• St. Thomas Aquinas: His works were suppressed by the Church 

• Saint Benedict had hardly begun to work as Abbot of Vicovarro, when the monks tried to poison him. 

• Saint Chrysostom was excommunicated, and driven out of Constantinople. 

• St. Lawrence
He was persecuted by the Roman emperor Valerian in 258 

• Saint Damasus was so energetically opposed by his brethren that, upon the adjournment of the meeting at which he was elected Pope of Rome, a hundred and thirty-seven bodies of dead electors were found on the church floor.