St. Augustine on the necessity and advantage of rebuke

“I ask you not to remain silent when you meet with wrongdoing, but to speak out and act to correct a situation that is offensive to your God and destructive to your soul.” - Our Lady of the Roses, November 20, 1979

Rebuke Must Not Be Neglected.
“Then,” say they, “let those who are over us only prescribe to us what we ought to do, and pray for us that we may do it; but let them not rebuke and censure us if we should not do it.” Certainly let all be done, since the teachers of the churches, the apostles, were in the habit of doing all,—as well prescribing what things should be done, as rebuking if they were not done, and praying that they might be done. The apostle prescribes, saying, “Let all your things be done with love.” [1 Cor. xvi. 14] He rebukes, saying, “Now therefore there is utterly a fault among you, because ye have judgments among yourselves. For why do ye not rather suffer wrong? Why are ye not rather defrauded? Nay, ye do wrong and defraud; and that, your brethren. Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not possess the kingdom of God?” [1 Cor. vi. 7 et seq.] Let us hear him also praying: “And the Lord,” says he, “multiply you, and make you to abound in love one towards another and towards all men.” [1 Thess. iii. 12.] He prescribes, that love should be maintained; he rebukes, because love is not maintained; he prays, that love may abound. O man! learn by his precept what you ought to have; learn by his rebuke that it is by your own fault that you have it not; learn by his prayer whence you may receive what you desire to have.

Objections to the Use of Rebuke.
“How,” says he, [i.e. the objecting Pelagian.] “is it my fault that I have not what I have not received from Him, when unless it is given by Him, there is no other at all whence such and so great a gift can be had?” Suffer me a little, my brethren, not as against you whose heart is right with God, but as against those who mind earthly things, or as against those human modes of thinking themselves, to contend for the truth, of the heavenly and divine grace. For they who say this are such as in their wicked works are unwilling to be rebuked by those who proclaim this grace. “Prescribe to me what I shall do, and if I should do it, give thanks to God for me who has given me to do it; but if I do it not, I must not be rebuked, but He must be besought to give what He has not given; that is, that very believing love of God and of my neighbour by which His precepts are observed. Pray, then, for me that I may receive this, and may by its means do freely and with good will that which He commands. But I should be justly rebuked if by my own fault I had it not; that is, if I myself could give it to myself, or could receive it, and did not do so, or if He should give it and I should be unwilling to receive it. But since even the will itself is prepared [Prov. xvi. 1] by the Lord, why dust thou rebuke me because thou seeest me unwilling to do His precepts, and dust not rather ask Him Himself to work in me the will also?”

The Necessity and Advantage of Rebuke.
To this we answer: Whoever you are that do not the commandments of God that are already known to you, and do not wish to be rebuked, you must be rebuked even for that very reason that you do not wish to be rebuked. For you do not wish that your faults should be pointed out to you; you do not wish that they should be touched, and that such a useful pain should be caused you that you may seek the Physician; you do not desire to be shown to yourself, that, when you see yourself to be deformed, you may wish for the Reformer, and may supplicate Him that you may not continue in that repulsiveness. For it is your fault that you are evil; and it is a greater fault to be unwilling to be rebuked because you are evil, as if faults should either be praised, or regarded with indifference so as neither to be praised nor blamed, or as if, indeed, the dread, or the shame, or the mortification of the rebuked man were of no avail, or were of any other avail in healthfully stimulating, except to cause that He who is good may be besought, and so out of evil men who are rebuked may make good men who may be praised. For what he who will not be rebuked desires to be done for him, when he says, “Pray for me rather,”—he must be rebuked for that very reason that he may himself also do for himself; because that mortification with which he is dissatisfied with himself when he feels the sting of rebuke, stirs him up to a desire for more earnest prayer, that, by God’s mercy, he may be aided by the increase of love, and cease to do things which are shameful and mortifying, and do things praiseworthy and gladdening. This is the benefit of rebuke that is wholesomely applied, sometimes with greater, sometimes with less severity, in accordance with the diversity of sins; and it is then wholesome when the supreme Physician looks. For it is of no profit unless when it makes a man repent of his sin. And who gives this but He who looked upon the Apostle Peter when he denied [Luke xxii. 61.], and made him weep? Whence also the Apostle Paul, after he said that they were to be rebuked with moderation who thought otherwise, immediately added, “Lest perchance God give them repentance, to the acknowledging of the truth, and they recover themselves out of the snares of the devil.” [2 Tim. ii. 25.]

Further Replies to Those Who Object to Rebuke.
But wherefore do they, who are unwilling be rebuked, say, “Only prescribe to me, and pray for me that I may do what you prescribe?” Why do they not rather, in accordance with their own evil inclination, reject these things also, and say, “I wish you neither to prescribe to me, nor to pray for me”? For what man is shown to have prayed for Peter, that God should give him the repentance wherewith he bewailed the denial of his Lord? What man instructed Paul in the divine precepts which pertain to the Christian faith? When, therefore, he was heard preaching the gospel, and saying, “For I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it from man, nor did I learn it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ,” [Gal. i. 11.]—would it be replied to him: “Why are you troubling us to receive and to learn from you that which you have not received nor learnt from man? He who gave to you is able also to give to us in like manner as to you.” Moreover, if they dare not say this, but suffer the gospel to be preached to them by man, although it cannot be given to man by man, let them concede also that they ought to be rebuked by those who are set over them, by whom Christian grace is preached; although it is not denied that God is able, even when no man rebukes, to correct whom He will, and to lead him on to the wholesome mortification of repentance by the most hidden and mighty power of His medicine. And as we are not to cease from prayer on behalf of those whom we desire to be corrected,—even although without any man’s prayer on behalf of Peter, the Lord looked upon him and caused him to bewail his sin,—so we must not neglect rebuke, although God can make those whom He will to be corrected, even when not rebuked. But a man then profits by rebuke when He pities and aids who makes those whom He will to profit even without rebuke. But wherefore these are called to be reformed in one way, those in another way, and others in still another way, after different and innumerable manners, be it far from us to assert that it is the business of the clay to judge, but of the potter.

Why They May Justly Be Rebuked Who Do Not Obey God, Although They Have Not Yet Received the Grace of Obedience.
“The apostle says,” say they, “‘For who maketh thee to differ? And what hast thou that thou hast not received? Now also if thou hast received it, why dost thou glory as if thou hadst not received it?’ [2 Cor. iv. 7] Why, then, are we rebuked, censured, reproved, accused? What do we do, we who have not received?” They who say this wish to appear without blame in respect of their not obeying God, because assuredly obedience itself is His gift; and that gift must of necessity be in him in whom dwells love, which without doubt is of God [1 John iv. 7.], and the Father gives it to His children. “This,” say they, “we have not received. Why, then, are we rebuked, as if we were able to give it to ourselves, and of our own choice would not give it?” And they do not observe that, if they are not yet regenerated, the first reason why, when they are reproached because they are disobedient to God, they ought to be dissatisfied with themselves is, that God made man upright from the beginning of the human creation, [Eccles. vii. 30.] and there is no unrighteousness with God [Rom. ix. 14.]. And thus the first depravity, whereby God is not obeyed, is of man, because, falling by his own evil will from the rectitude in which God at first made him, he became depraved. Is, then, that depravity not to be rebuked in a man because it is not peculiar to him who is rebuked, but is common to all? Nay, let that also be rebuked in individuals, which is common to all. For the circumstance that none is altogether free from it is no reason why it should not attach to each man. Those original sins, indeed, are said to be the sins of others, because individuals derived them from their parents; but they are not unreasonably said to be our own also, because in that one, as the apostle says, all have sinned [Rom. iii. 23]. Let, then, the damnable source be rebuked, that from the mortification of rebuke may spring the will of regeneration,—if, indeed, he who is rebuked is a child of promise,—in order that, by the noise of the rebuke sounding and lashing from without, God may by His hidden inspiration work in him from within to will also. If, however, being already regenerate and justified, he relapses of his own will into an evil life, assuredly he cannot say, “I have not received,” because of his own free choice to evil he has lost the grace of God, that he had received. And if, stung with compunction by rebuke, he wholesomely bewails, and returns to similar good works, or even better, certainly here most manifestly appears the advantage of rebuke. But yet for rebuke by the agency of man to avail, whether it be of love or not, depends only upon God.

"... when a priest tells you that you do not have to speak up ... because you are judging another person, and you should love your neighbor, and therefore never set him up to be judged, you are not judging. If a person is doing wrong, and you tell him in a kind manner, a charitable manner, that they are committing a sin, and that they will lose their soul and go to purgatory, or even hell, that is not judging. You are helping and loving your neighbor. What is love?" - Our Lady of the Roses, June 18, 1982

The awesome Bayside Prophecies... https://www.tldm.org/Bayside/default.htm
These prophecies came from Jesus, Mary, and the saints to Veronica Lueken at Bayside, NY, from 1968 to 1995:

COUNSEL
"In charity, you will counsel, but you must also, My child, admonish the wrongdoer." - Our Lady, April 9, 1977

THE “BUCK-PASSER”
“I see, My children, a great evil transpiring upon earth. Those who have the power to stop the evil have chosen to go downstream like ducks upon water, letting everything slide off their backs, neither caring nor visualizing the future. And why? Because they have given themselves to the world.
     “Just as My Son stood before Pilate and he washed his hands and said: ‘This man is innocent; I see no wrong in him,’ however, in his heart he knew of innocence but he feared reprisal from the crowd, My children; he valued his life, he loved his sin, and he was too much involved with the pleasures of this life and the world.
     “You see, My children, it is taking place all over again for those in command in rule. They go along ‘passing,’ as you say, ‘the buck,’ each one not willing to admit his error or his participation in evil, but only too willingly allowing others to take the blame or the responsibility. And I assure you, My children, if evil is being allowed, the ‘buck passer’ is just as guilty as the original one who had started the evil.
     “If you know in your hearts, O pastors, that souls are in danger of being corrupted, misled, and even destroyed, and you do nothing about it, because you do not wish to offend your superiors, because you value your life in this world too much and your good living; I assure you, O pastors, you shall stand before My Son and He shall not know you. You will be disowned, banished from eternal life in Heaven, and you shall join your father who is the father of all liars, satan, and the prince of darkness.” - Our Lady, March 18, 1977

SIN OF OMISSION
“The sin of omission shall condemn many to hell, be they layman or hierarchy. I repeat: not the sin of commission, but the sin of omission will commit many to hell. Among them there will also be mitres.” - Our Lady, October 6, 1980

NECESSARY TO REPEAT?
“My child, is it necessary for Me to repeat My words? Have I not reached the world with an essence of the truth? The truth lies in every man's heart, for every man has been given an inbuilt conscience from the Father. However, of your own will can you shut off your contact with your Father, for you give yourself to the world.” - Our Lady, February 1, 1974

NOT ONE PERSON
“You will always remember, My child and My children, that when the struggle to remain on the narrow path has 'taken all out of you,' as you say, you must remember that eventually you will all be held accountable for your soul. There is not one person who can follow you at the same time over the veil and stand up for you when you are being judged. For every man, woman, and child of conscionable age will be their own master towards their soul. In other words, My children, you must have your God-given conscience forward and placed before you always.” - Jesus, March 18, 1983

TARNISHED
“You must realize, My children, that he who does not recognize My Son as his Savior shall not be given the keys to the Kingdom. My Son has given you all in the Father an inborn conscience and guide. You will not be misled by satan or his agents or by his enticements if you do not throw away the graces that have been given to you. Your souls will only become tarnished if you fall from this grace or cast it willfully away. Then you will become blind, My children. All of you can become blind where you will no longer recognize truth.” - Our Lady, March 25, 1972

NO OTHER RECOURSE
“There is no other recourse, My children. You have all been given an inborn conscience. You must reject the plan of satan and not succumb to his lures. The world about you has become the playground of satan and his agents. Your world is in darkness; Our Church is in darkness. But We still carry the light. And all who follow Me, My children, will be led out of this darkness.” - Our Lady, April 1, 1972

SIN AGAINST THE HOLY SPIRIT
“The greatest sin that man has on his weakening conscience is a sin against the Holy Spirit. And this is being committed not only in lay life but in the ranks of My clergy.” - Jesus, May 13, 1978

THE PLAN
“You cannot in your human nature understand the plan of your God, your Creator, but you can with your inborn conscience know in your hearts that you have misled, O bishops and cardinals, Our sheep! Turn back, I say unto you, for you shall be punished.” - Jesus, May 20, 1978

The electronic form of this document is copyrighted.
Quotations are permissible as long as this web site is acknowledged through hyperlink to: https://www.tldm.org
Copyright © These Last Days Ministries, Inc. 1996 - 2005 All rights reserved.
P.O. Box 40
Lowell, MI 49331-0040
Revised: September 02, 2018

We encourage everyone to print or email copies of this web page to all the Bishops and all the clergy. Also, send this page to as many people as possible.

St. Augustine on the necessity and advantage of rebuke...