Mr. Charles Coulombe — Why Blessed Emperor Charles Persevered

“How do you persevere? How do you keep doing your duty in very dark times?” To answer these questions that torment so many Catholics today, Mr. Charles Coulombe, author of The Pope’s Legion, shines the spotlight on the tragically heroic life of Bl. Karl von Hapsburg. Inheriting the throne of the Austro-Hungarian empire in 1916, thirty-nine-year-old Karl immediately sought to make peace between countries that ostensibly put peace as their lowest priority. Refusing to abdicate despite universal pressure to do so, defeated by treason in two separate attempts to reclaim his throne, Emperor Karl lived bravely in exile until he caught pneumonia and died in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, his life is a monument to perseverance. What was his secret to bearing these awful trials without bitterness? “He always saw them in their right perspective,” Mr. Coulombe explains. We, too, should look at our external struggles as part of a greater battle. “The devil wants us to despair and to hate the way he does. But if you manage not to hate the man who stabs you in the back, you have defeated him. And what is more — you have defeated the devil.”

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