In the book he speaks of how other “deficient” [my wording not Father Fahey’s] typical civil societies are as opposed to the one Body of Christ – The Catholic Church, and since they only exist on earth, their chastisement will be earthly. What he says is:
“ Leo XIII and Pius X spoke In the same way: Among Bishops Cardinal Mercier raised his voice in a pastoral letter of lasting fame, The Lesson of Events. In it he stated “public crimes will sooner or later be punished.” In the same pastoral he wrote: “Violation of the Lord’s Day, abuses of the marriage law, most certainly offend God, my brethren, and justify his punishments, but for all that we cannot doubt that the chief crime which the world is expiating at this moment is the official apostacy of nations and of public opinion.”
And again: “At the present day, men, to whom has been entrusted the government of peoples, are, or show themselves, with very few exceptions, officially indifferent to God and to Christ. I make no charge against those worthy officials who, for fear of provoking worse evil, submit loyally to the unfortunate situation which is imposed on them: it is the situation itself that I have in mind, and in the name of the Gospel, in the light of the Encyclicals of the last four Popes, Gregory XVI, Pius IX, Leo XIII, and Pius X, I do not hesitate to affirm that this indifference to religion which puts on the same level the religion of divine origin and the religions invented by men in order to include them all in the same skepticism, is the blasphemy which, far more that the sins of individuals and families, calls down on society God’s chastisements.”
STUDENT: Can we have any accurate idea as to the nature of the punishments that God inflicts on guilty nations?
TEACHER: All disasters which can bring communities to reflection serve for the accomplishment of God’s designs War, plagues, disasters of every sort, more particularly calamities of the intellectual and moral order, can touch them and bring them back to repentance.
Our Lord speaks of scourges of this sort, in particular of the great misfortune of spiritual blindness. Of the Jews he says, “this people will not understand because it cannot understand, and cannot understand because it does not wish to understand.” We must understand these words to refer to a social punishment. Nothing is so dreadful as that man should be, as a result of his failures to understand, the cause of his own misfortunes. The Jews, as our Lord told them reproachfully, do not understand that He is the Messiah and the Son of God. Now for the Jewish nation there is only one means of salvation, to realize and to profess that Jesus Christ is the Messiah the Son of God. Nevertheless, the Jewish people remain immovable in the determination not to understand that this is so, and thus God Speaks to them. “O you, formerly My chosen people, for you there is but one way of salvation, Jesus Christ. Accept Him and you are saved;” and the people reply, “I do not wish to understand that it can be so;” God replies, “Since your will is set against understanding, I accept it. You will not understand. That is the punishment I inflict upon you.” It is exactly the same with Catholic society in our day. To save the social order and peoples, Catholics must begin by realizing that Christ alone is their salvation. Their will is set against realizing it, God accepts their obstinate will. They do not understand, they do not see and they can no longer see in Jesus Christ their only salvation. That is their punishment.
To this general truth, we may add certain others more particular in their nature. Men do not realize that the principles of modern Jurisprudence and the great modern liberties which it involves must be suppressed in the social order. It is not understood that to each man must be denied liberty of opinion. No more is it realized that, whatever happens, the growth of false principles should be checked and that only Catholic truth should be favored. All this condition of things bears the sign and seal of threat divine punishment which brings nations to their ruin. Leo XIII said in 1881, “as an inevitable result of the war waged against the Church, civil society finds itself facing the most serious dangers, for since the very basis of the social order has been overturned, nations and their rulers see nothing before them but disasters and threats of disasters.” The same Pope writes, “from such attacks made on the Catholic religion serious evils have arisen for the nations in great numbers and will continue to arise.”
I think this an excellent book in a question and answer catechism type format, on “The Social Rights of Our Divine Lord Jesus Christ the King.” The contents are as follows:
Forward
Chap I The supreme authority of God over all Society 1
Chap II Necessary Consequences of that Created State Which is the Essence of Human Society 4
Chap III The Sovereign Lordship of Jesus Christ over Every Society and Every Nation 10
Chap IV The Conditions and Exact Meaning of the Kingship of Jesus Christ 12
Chap V Spiritual Nature of the Kingship of Christ 16
Chap VI Power of the Church in the Social Order Established by God 20
Chap VII A Fundamental Error of Our Day 24
Chap VIII Inalienable Rights of Truth and Goodness 34
Chap IX The Sin of Liberalism: The Sin of Europe and of the World 39
Chap X Punishments Inflicted by God on countries Which Abandon Him 48
Chap XI Remedy for Present Ills 54
Chap XII Action 65
Chap XIII On the Organization of the Apostolic League 83
Chap XIV The Declaration of the Rights of Man of 1789 88
Chap XV Recapitulation: the Feast of Christ the King 98
Encyclical Letter of Our Most Holy Father Pope Pius XI 101
Appendices 126
Traditional Thomistic Catholic 