Wisdom of Venerable Fulton Sheen

Well, this one is not canonized. But it is from the Venerable Servant of God Peter John "Fulton" Sheen, sent to me by [a friend]. It is something to ponder in the face of the situation in the world and the Church today.

"Our Lord tells us that he [the Antichrist] will be so much like Himself that he would deceive even the elect... He will talk peace, prosperity, and plenty not as means to lead us to God, but as ends in themselves. . . The third temptation, in which Satan asked Christ to adore him and all the kingdoms of the world would be His, will become the temptation to have a new religion without a Cross, a liturgy without a world to come, a religion to destroy a religion, or a politics which is a religion–one that renders unto Caesar even the things that are God’s.

In the midst of all his seeming love for humanity and his glib talk of freedom and equality, he will have one great secret which he will tell to no one: he will not believe in God. Because his religion will be the brotherhood of man without the fatherhood of God, he will deceive even the elect. He will set up a counterchurch which will be the ape of the Church, because he, the Devil, is the ape of God. It will have all the notes and characteristics of the Church, but in reverse and emptied of its divine content. It will be a mystical body of the Antichrist that will in all externals resemble the mystical body of Christ.”

- Fr. D.B. Thompson