The Battle Goes to the Pure of Heart

Dear Friend, 

Although her feast day is not celebrated in the universal calendar, very few saints of the Church are more universally loved and admired than St. Joan of Arc (1412-1431 AD). 

Her feast day occurs on May 30th each year and serves as a reminder of the brutal way she was treated by the bishops of her day. They condemned her as a heretic and handed her over to the secular authorities to be burned at the stake. 

It’s hard to imagine anyone going through that kind of martyrdom of body and soul. But she did. And she did it as all saints do: forgiving her murderers as she was being led to the fire. 

That fact alone puts her in the category of “heroic” in virtue—charity, above all—in addition to all her other heroic acts for her country. 

But, believe it or not, when Joan was canonized in 1920, she was not proclaimed a martyr. (She was a kind of secular martyr for her country, but not technically a martyr for the Catholic Faith. It was churchmen who put her to death!) 

Rather, Joan of Arc was canonized for her virginity, which symbolized the purity of her soul as well as her body.

Without trying to recount her whole complex story, I’d just like to point out a few episodes that I think make it clear what kind of a warrior of purity she was. 

• She was never known to have used a curse word in her life. In fact she abhorred cursing in her troops and even rebuked the officers of her army for cursing. 
• There is a famous story about her absolute intolerance of the “ladies of the night” who followed the army. She expelled them all and allegedly broke her sword over the back of one woman she was driving away from the camp!
• Before her troops went into battle, she insisted that they go to Confession and attend Mass so that they would be spiritually prepared for battle and even prepared for death if that should occur. She modeled the same habits in her life. 
• In her second day of battle she was wounded by an arrow that penetrated the front of her chest and stuck out her back. One of the soldiers wanted to say some kind of occult incantation over her for healing, but Joan refused. She told him she would rather die than commit a sin like that. She then proceeded to rip the arrow out of her body with her bare hands and returned to battle!

There are many more incidents of her ferocious purity of soul that I could add to this short list (including all of her mystical visions), but the point is not to make this into a biography. My point is to encourage the Church Militant to imitate Joan of Arc’s purity in battle. 

We need that same kind of ferocious purity in these times, don’t we? 

“Our struggle is not with flesh and blood but with the principalities, with the powers, with the world rulers of this present darkness, with the evil spirits in the heavens,” said St. Paul to the Ephesians (6:12).

The spirits Paul was referring to are the unclean minions of the Evil One, unleashed into the modern world in unprecedented ways through the radically contaminated media machine and myriads of corrupt institutions that seduce people into sin every day.

They are spirits which attack the very foundations of our faith, our morality, and our families. And the only way to fight that level of spiritual uncleanness is through purity. 

If Joan of Arc understood the importance of purity for secular battles, how much more should we marshal the resources of purity for our own spiritual battles? The battle goes to the pure of heart, and by God’s grace, the Church is a treasure house of such purity. 

Above all, like Joan of Arc’s troops, we must stay close to the sacraments and constantly pray for all our needs. When we are persecuted, we pray for our enemies. On a daily basis we must pray for all those close to us as well as those in the public forum who are suffering great bouts of persecution for their faith. In this, the Holy Rosary is our greatest spiritual weapon. 

But we can do even more. We can stay close to the holy angels and call on them in our needs. Angels are the first warriors of God’s Kingdom!

We don’t have Joan of Arc’s extraordinary blessing of St. Michael the Archangel at her side to help her conduct her battles, but God has given us all guardian angels to be with us night and day. They give us discernment, virtues, and clarity about our missions. 

Most of all, let us ask the intercession of St. Joan of Arc herself for the purification of our Church, which has been invaded in many sectors by unclean spirits of immorality and doctrinal compromise. Joan knew battle in this life and now in heaven she lives to assist the Church Militant in its warfare against the world, the flesh, and the devil. She will help us drive out these spirits. 

When Joan of Arc won the Battle of Orléans by expelling the English invaders from that city, she must have recalled the words of Scripture given to every warrior who takes up the Cross in defense of the faith: “The gates of hell shall not prevail” (Mt 16:18) against those who love and defend the Church!

Blessed feast day of Joan of Arc to all of you and your families! Let us keep each other in prayer for the many needs of our warfare!

Sincerely in Christ and Our Lady,

Thomas J. McKenna  
Founder and President
Catholic Action for Faith and Family

P.S. If you have not submitted your intentions for Operation Storm Heaven June 1, please take this opportunity to do so now.