"The Catholic Church is the only thing which saves a man from the degrading slavery of being a child of his age. " (G. K. Chesterton, "The Catholic Church and Conversion," Chapter 5: The Exception Proves the Rule)

 In his incisive and compelling work, "The Catholic Church and Conversion," G. K. Chesterton presents the thought processes that led him to convert from the Unitarianism into which he was born to the Roman Catholic faith and religion which he freely chose. Of the many qualities of the traditional Catholic Church which drew his love and allegiance, one powerful attraction was that Catholic faith and moral principle transcend the foolish and fleeting fads of the momentary "modern world." He even referred to the infatuation with the mentality of the times as a kind of "degrading slavery." Those who are beguiled into worshipping the spirit of the time are as mere children of the age in which they are born, as though they are spawned by the spirit of the world and its contemporary illusions and delusions. Of course, in the word contemporary emphasis must be placed upon the 'temporary" and thus the ever-changing, the "here today, gone tomorrow." But the fads of today, as admired or even adored as they may be, will soon be considered quaint, even ridiculous and old-fashioned  Thus, G. K. Chesterton embraced the timeless truths of the traditional Catholic Church because he saw that "the Catholic Church is the only thing which saves a man from the degrading slavery of being a child of his age. "

 It is interesting to note that the entire novus ordo, the new order of religion that came out of the Second Vatican Council which began in 1963, started on the basis of "discerning the signs of the times" and "updating the Church" to bring it into line with 'the modern world." When we read the words of G. K. Chesterton given above, we can easily see that the idea expressed by Chesterton in 1926 about the strength and timelessness of the Catholic Church was utterly rejected by Vatican II, which declared the formation of a time-bound church fit for modern times. The Modernists who drove Vatican II and now drive the church it generated, with modernism as its "faith" and the new order as its "religion," might insist that contemporary man demands a contemporary church, but that will not be the Church as established by Our Lord Jesus Christ. It will be a church of their own making, with its false christs and its false prophets.

The very timelessness of the Catholic Church, its faith and its practice, are rooted in eternal truths. Chesterton saw that. It is what prompted him to say: "The Catholic Church is the only thing which saves a man from the degrading slavery of being a child of his age. "