I went up to the priest at Theology on Tap many years ago and said, Father, the mystics teach that before the end of the world there will be a minor apostasy and conditional tribulation after which will occur a glorious renewal and age of peace. He said, But there have been many apostasies. He must have been under the impression that even partial assaults on the Church are apostasy. Well, what the mystics mean by minor apostasy is not just any opposition to the Church. What it means is that a great portion of the world, but not the whole world, which was originally Christian traditionally will descend, in one way or another, into a widespread culture that is basically TOTALLY opposed to all the Church proposes, and not just SOME of it. In that vein, no such condition has ever existed since pagan Rome until now. Let us demonstrate.
The heresies immediately following Pagan Rome are mainly assaulting God and His special nature as Triune and Incarnate. Arianism was really the first big one of these. It was not an apostasy, it was a heresy, like the other main heresies after it until Islam, Ariians still had most of the Gospel in a certain sense, if even pseudo. Therefore, Arianism is not apostate; it is heresy.
Islam was not an apostate religion. It was a religion of infdelity, and at that, SUPERNATURALLY inclined infidelity. Islamics are monotheists, and they believe in the notion of Divine Revelation and Assistance. They even believe in some revelational elements of Judaism and Christianity. Therefore, Islam is not apostate, it is supernatural infidelity.
The Orthodox are not apostates, they are schismatics. They have like 90% of Catholciism. Therefore, the Great Schism was not an apostasy; it was a SCHISM.
The Protestant Rebellion was NOT an apostasy, it was a HERETICAL rebellion. Heresy is not apostasy, Apostasy is the TOTAL refutation of the Christian faith. Protestants still have most of Scripture and two sacraments validly, usually, setting aside what THEY think they have: Baptism and Marriage. Therefore, the Protestant Rebellion was not an apostasy, it was a HERETICAL rebellion.
The Enlightenment is more or less an apostasy, however, the deists and rationalists, first wave of so-called Enlightenment, are more properly infidels, not utterly depraved persons. They are not pagans, for they use reason to accept the existence of a General Supreme Being, a Maker, and they also use reason to see a certain natural law, analogues to some principles of the decalogue. Admittedly, they have rejected supernatural religion, no longer believing in Divine Revelation or Intervention, but they are still really infidels, if even merely natural.
But today is an APOSTASY: Even reason is scrapped. Once reason is scrapped, the last vestiges of the Gospel are gone. When one no longer lives according to reason, their beliefs are usually one of two forms of a beast: atheism, or relativism. Both are devoid of reason, since reason assumes objective truth can be known, against the relativist, and proves monotheism, against the atheist.
And when faith is fully extinguished, morals follow: artificial birth control, divorce, adultery, fornication, same sex, bestiality, abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, materialism, greed, corruption.
So, sorry pals, the modern assault on the Church is back to pagan Rome times, the beast is back, back in black. It isn't just another age.
Which therefore means, only a renewal can stop the world from ending.
And even if it will eventually repent in this age, the consequences of error and sin are starting to catch up, to the point that a minor apocalypse will descend on the world of its own volition. We can only hope, and rightly so by most approved Private Revelation, that the world will repent before they destroy themselves, and an era of Catholic spiritual peace reign before a final falling away that is not cured occurs.
