(www.RemnantNewspaper.com) My how things have changed in the course of fifty years! Take, for instance, the fictional figure of Batman as portrayed by Hollywood, who went from a comic crime fighter in the 1960’s to the Dark Knight in the third millennium.

The original Batman television show was a silly, campy adaptation of the comic book series. In the one hundred twenty episodes produced, only three villains were ever killed, and never with blood and gore. Instead, fight scenes were enhanced with visual sound effects that flashed across the screen, such as Bam, Zap, and Ouch!

Batman and Robin were ever polite and always law abiding, even to the point of the absurd. While racing to a crime, for example, they would sometimes stop to assist pedestrians in crosswalks and upon arriving they’d often take time to put coins in parking meters. While scaling walls of high-rise buildings they conversed with citizens who poked their heads out windows, including stars such as Art Linkletter and Jerry Lewis.

The young, excitable side-kick Robin used the adjective Holy more frequently than a Novus Ordo sacrament. The TV series may have inspired a few chuckles but never acts of violence.

The same cannot be said of the more recent Batman-theme movies produced by Hollywood. In order to critique the third millennium Batman, I obtained a copy of the 2008 movie, The Dark Knight. I chose this earlier movie rather than the newly released film for two reasons: watching Batman movies in theaters can be lethal (now to the body and not just the soul), and the chief villain from the earlier film, The Joker, appears to be the inspiration behind the recent Colorado movie theater massacre by a madman. In fact, the violent connection between these two jokers is as readily apparent as a red nose on a clown. But please, take my word for it and avoid this movie. This is the darkest PG-13 rated film I have ever seen, and it lives up to its title.

The great confessor Saint John Vianney warned mothers that if they allowed their daughters to attend local dances in France, they would dance with their children in hell. Imagine what he would say about parents who knowingly bring their children to view dark movies like, The Dark Knight.

The Joker is a psychotic sociopath clown with absolutely no conscience, who brags that he prefers to kill his victims slowly with a knife, so that he can uncover their character. In one scene he blows up an entire hospital filled with the innocent sick and suffering, while he looks on and laughs.

His greatest triumph is to utterly corrupt the most righteous citizen of Gotham City, turning him so evil that he would murder a child while the family looks on.

It is known that the actor who played The Joker suffered from insomnia and depression throughout the filming and he died shortly after from a drug overdose. Saint Paul tells us to put on the mind of Christ; perhaps this actor put on the mind of the devil.

But this reflection is not so much about Batman as it is about the increase of evil all around us these days. It is said that the random sort of shooting that we saw in Colorado started in the sixties. That would not surprise a Catholic traditionalist, who cringes at the mere mention of those troublesome sixties, which decade opened wide a window to the smoke of Satan. As they say, where there is smoke there is fire, and the fires of hell are now heating up the Earth big-time, much more than a world-wide warming from a depleted ozone layer.

Who is to blame for this spiritual global warming? Hollywood and other corrupt secular elements, to be sure; but also—and in large part—the institutional Church is to blame. How so?

A commission of Christ to the Church is to sanctify the faithful, and, by extension, the nations, through the preaching of the Gospel. But just when the faithful and the world needed the protection of sanctification the most, the institutional Church set aside its spiritual weapons and opened a window into hell. Despite warnings from Heaven, in mystical visions, locutions and apparitions to popes and peasants, that Satan would assault the Church in the twentieth century in a manner akin to the attack upon Job, the guard was let down. A military tribunal would judge this as dereliction of duty—it is!

As the twentieth century approached, Pope Leo XIII was so terrified by the mystical vision he had of Satan being granted one hundred years to attack the Church that he turned ashen white and directed that the powerful Prayer to Saint Michael the Archangel should be recited by the clergy and faithful at the end of every low Mass.

That protective practice was suppressed, however, by the institutional Church in 1964. Why?

The Mass itself and the sacraments of the Church, for that matter, were also radically reformed and stripped of the words and weapons against the Evil One.

The multiple exorcisms of baptism were abandoned.

The minor order of exorcist was suppressed and the rite of exorcism itself was replaced with an impotent ritual that experienced exorcists refused to use.

The Roman Ritual was replaced with a Book of Blessings, which in reality contained no sacramental blessings at all.

We can add to this litany the failure of any pope to fulfill the mandate to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

So too, the rosary was lengthened with new mysteries, while the Fatima prayer was dropped.

It is no wonder that so many Catholics no longer believe in hell or the existence of Satan. Their disbelief in the praeternatural realm and activity confirms the validity of the ancient principle, lex orandi, lex credendi (the law of praying is the law of believing).

Some have awakened and now smell the smoke. A handful of bishops and many more pastors have reinstituted the Prayer to St. Michael in their dioceses and parishes. Disillusioned Novus Ordo refuges are seeking out the Mass and sacraments in the traditional form.

Will there be a widespread call to arms for spiritual warfare or is it a remnant preparing for persecution? Time will tell and quite soon, for just as The Joker unleashed mayhem upon Gotham City, so it seems that the full fury of hell is about to be unleashed upon the Earth.