AMERICA, right down to its modern-day versions of gladiators and slaves, is similar in important ways to the world of ancient Rome when Saint Peter, the first pope, arrived there during the reign of Emperor Nero. He arrived without a security detail and without the imprimatur of the emperor. He brought his courage and the truth. He brought the facts of the Resurrection. He brought the love of the true God to a place of philosophical chaos, multiculturalism and moral relativism. Yes, America is similar. It has a similar air of permanence to the Rome of that time. It has similar dazzling luxury and forms of cruelty that are simply taken for granted. Fr. Michael Muller in his 1880 book The Church and her Enemies describes the scene which greeted the first pope in Rome:

One thousand eight hundred and forty odd years ago, a poor, meanly-clad wanderer went to the capital of the world, the wealthy, magnificent city of Rome. He passes its gates, and threads his way, unobserved, through populous streets. On every side he beholds splendid palaces, raised at the expense of down-trodden nationalities; he beholds stately temples, dedicated to as many false gods as nations were represented in Rome; he beholds public baths and amphitheatres, devoted to pleasure and to cruelty; he beholds statues, monuments, and triumphal arches, raised to the memory of blood thirsty tyrants. He passes warriors and senators, beggars and cripples, effeminate men and dissolute women, gladiators and slaves, merchants and statesmen, orators and philosophers of all classes, all ranks, all conditions of men, of every language and color under the sun. Everywhere he sees a maddening race for pleasure. Everywhere the impress of luxury, everywhere the full growth of crime, side by side with indescribable suffering, diabolical cruelty and barbarity. (more…)

READ the full text of "Pope" Francis's speech before Obama here. It's appalling revolutionary boilerplate crammed with every cliché of the world controllers. Not a single mention of Jesus Christ. Once again, Jorge Bergoglio abandons Catholics everywhere for the religion of man. "American Catholics are committed to building a society which is truly tolerant and inclusive." He warmly speaks of Obama's efforts to control air pollution. Mr. President, I find it encouraging that you are proposing an initiative for reducing air pollution. Accepting the urgency, it seems clear to me also that climate change is a problem which can no longer be left to a future generation. When it comes to the care of our “common home,” we are living at a critical moment of history. We still have time to make the changes needed to bring about “a sustainable and integral development, for we know that things can change” (Laudato Si’, 13).

WHEELER writes: The most arresting thing about this photo is not Miz Rodham Clinton's smug, faux-imperious gaze. It's the two men sitting in the front row. Note the shorts. Note the knees held close together and the hands clasped in the laps. There, there, now. Good little geldings.

NOVUS ORDO WATCH writes: All bets are off as Mr. Jorge Bergoglio, the Argentinian apostate layman claiming to be the Pope of the Catholic Church, meets Barack Obama, the infanticide-promoting, Kenyan-born Socialist dictator claiming to be the President of the United States. Obama has long outed himself as an admirer of “Pope” Bergoglio, joining other high-profile leftists such as Hillary Clinton, Elton John, Madonna, Bernie Sanders, and others. After visiting fellow-revolutionaries Fidel and Raul Castro in Cuba earlier in the week, Francis now marches on Washington, New York City, and Philadelphia to further promote his show of “humility”, “mercy”, and “love” that are nothing of the sort. Nevertheless, we dare make some predictions ... Read more here.   Follow the Novus Ordo Watch live twitter feed for outstanding, ongoing commentary on Francis's visit to the United States.

MICHAEL HOFFMAN, author of Judaism Discovered, writes at his website:

In 2015 Yom Kippur begins Tuesday evening, September 22, wherein the western world will watch in awe as “pious Jews” allegedly “beg God for forgiveness” while supposedly “striving for righteousness.” No doubt that the pope of Rome and the heads of the Protestant fundamentalist churches will convey their esteem for the Yom Kippur ceremony as performed by “God’s people.”

On Yom Kippur the infamous Kol Nidrei takes place, almost always explained away to the public as a blessed ceremony of begging God for forgiveness for oaths that were violated, contracts that were broken and promises that were not kept in the past year. The trouble is, that pious picture is a phony. (more…)

ED H. writes:

Being inherently skeptical of almost everything produced by the mainstream media networks, I was a bit suspicious of recent reports about a 14-year-old boy in Texas who was treated quite poorly by police due to “Islamophobia” on behalf of school administrators and law enforcement. However, all initial reports were mostly from the big media outlets and the reports I read from smaller news outlets or individual bloggers which contradicted the “Islamophobia” narrative either appeared somewhat biased (i.e., neocons) or had no references to back up their opinions. Whenever I observe the big media networks use any word with the “phobia” suffix (homophobia, Islamophobia, etc.) it seems they’re usually pushing a false narrative, aside from being annoying, as with the post-Watergate trend of naming all scandals with the “gate” suffix. If media reports are to be believed, this budding genius had “invented” some type of electronic clock or similar device and put it into a suitcase to transport it to his school. Then after arriving at school, the horrible, bigoted Christians immediately suspected the boy of bringing in a bomb because Christian, bigoted bigots are big on bigotry. Especially in Texas dontcha’ know. (more…)

In March 2011, [Muammar] Gaddafi warned that without unified and stable Libya there would be no one to control countless migrants from Africa and the Middle East from fleeing to Europe. Unlike Western leaders, he apparently understood that millions, not thousands will come, should Tripoli fall.

Read more here. (more…)

IN A 2010 essay on "The Art of Verbal Swordsmanship," sent in response to the verbal duel in this entry, the writer Caryl Johnston makes an important point about the role of women as listeners, a role undermined by the busyness and extrovertedness of the feminist way of life: What if the relative historical silence of women has existed in order that the faculty of hearing might become spiritualized? It is the principle of reculer pour mieux sauter -- hold back in order to leap forward. Both to hunger and to hear enable us to form an empty space, a silence, fit for reception and waiting. Such a contrast to the spilling of our substance in the moment, the consumption and wastage of the spirit in fitful politics. Here is an entirely different thought from that offered by the vulgar cause of Feminism. Feminists would detest to hear me say that a woman’s highest possibility lies in Obedience (which means, by the way, hearing, being able to hear)-- that is, to the solar principles of thinking. But the woman who embarks upon the Path of Honor has already left feminism far behind. It is but a new theory of repletion, and she has learned it is much more interesting not to be

 FRANCIS met with Fidel Castro but dissidents were blocked from seeing Francis.

THOMAS DROLESKEY writes at Christ or Chaos:

Going just a step or two beyond what “Saint John Paul” or “Pope Benedict XVI” did upon their own respective visits to Cuba in 1998 and 2012, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, aka “Pope Francis,” expressed his “respect” for a mass murdering Marxist-Leninist thug, Fidel Castro, doing so when giving his welcoming address upon arriving at Jose Marti International Airport in Havana, Cuba, on Saturday, September 19, 2015, the Feast of Saint Januarius and the Commemorations of Ember Saturday in September and of the Vigil of Saint Matthew the Apostle.

Here’s what Jorge Mario Bergoglio said upon his arrival in Havana, Cuba, a nation that has been imprisoned by the torturing likes of Fidel Castro and his brother Raul, who succeeded him as President of the Council of the Ministers of Cuba on February 24, 2008:

My gratitude also goes to Cardinal Jaime Ortega y Alamino, Archbishop of Havana, the Most Reverend Dionisio Guillermo García Ibáñez, Archbishop of Santiago de Cuba and President of the Episcopal Conference, the other bishops and all the Cuban people, for their warm welcome.

I thank, too, all those who worked to prepare for this Pastoral Visit.  Mr President, I would ask you to convey my sentiments of particular respect and consideration to your brother Fidel.  I would like my greeting to embrace especially all those who, for various reasons, I will not be able to meet, and to Cubans throughout the world. (Antipope Jorge rrives in Cuba, encourages reconciliation.)

Respect for Fidel Castro?

Respect for an avowed Marxist-Leninist?

Respect for a mass murdering atheist?

[ ….]

There will be many in the “conservative” and semi-traditional blogosphere who will claim that Bergoglio is attempting to convert Fidel Castro by giving him a book written by a former teacher of his, Father Segundo Llorentea, S. J., whom Castro sent into exile shortly after he overthrew Battista in 1959, a little fact ignored by the news report from the Vatican Propaganda Office, and a compact disc with Fathr Llorentea’s voice. Such a contention, however would fall into the “nice try” category as any such “conversion” would be premised upon Fidel Castro’s coming to understand that there is little difference between his version of “social justice” and Jorge’s own beliefs, which is why the false “pope” gave the Jesuit-educated butcher a copy of Laudato Si, May 24, 2015, and Evangelii Gaudium, November 26, 2013. To believe that Jorge Mario Bergoglio is attempting to “convert” Fidel Castro to what almost everyone alive today believes is the Catholic Church and to abjure his support for Marxism-Leninism, is illusory. [cont.] (more…)

Traditio writes of U.S. Congressman Paul Gosar's boycott of Francis's upcoming speech before Congress: Gosar originally thought that Bergoglio was going to address the persecution and execution of Christians and by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and other terrorist Mohammedan Infidel organizations, condemning their heinous slaughter of Christians, and the rape and enslavement of Christian women and children. Gosar also expected Bergoglio to address the infanticides being perpetrated by Planned Parenthood, currently a hot topic in the United States because of its public funding. Instead, Francis is expected to talk about global warming.

KARL D. writes:

All is now right with the world. Our glorious leader has nominated Eric Fanning as our first openly homosexual Secretary of the Army. Besides this, as far as I can tell, he has never served in uniform in any branch of the service. I don’t know if that is the norm or not, but I would think that that at least would be a must? Anyway, while morale goes down the toilet this nomination will make up for it. As long as there are female toilets on submarines, women and transexuals in combat positions, and homosexuals running the Army, we have nothing to be concerned about.

Every day brings Rome just a little bit closer to collapse. (more…)

  A not-very-nice exchange between a reader and me can be found here. Read Christopher Bollyn's book, Solving 9/11: The Deception that Changed the World.

WHEELER writes:

In the entry “Before the ‘Happy’ Church,” Alex writes with power and precision of his memories of the traditional Roman Catholic Church of his boyhood. I say “power” because of the evocative nature of his descriptions, and also because of the melancholy his words engender in my own heart when I think on the vast difference between his experiences and my own.

With apologies to Alex, may I describe the Protestant world in the South, during my boyhood in the late ’60s? (more…)

A NEW PODCAST on "Catholic" divorce and the Kim Davis case can be found here.

EARLIER this year, Abby Johnson described at Lifesite News the frightening medical condition she has suffered since taking "birth control" injections of Depo Provera. Anti-Woman Feminism strikes again. I thought for a long time that my headaches must have been related to my Depo Provera use, but I didn’t have that confirmation until I was diagnosed. My neurologist told me that he very often saw this condition manifest after women took hormonal birth control…particularly birth control containing progestin. So I had to deal with the fact that because I was so desperate not to get pregnant, I put something in my body that gave me a life-long disorder, and could make me go blind. Bill and Melinda Gates are spending some of their immense fortune in bringing Depo Provera to women in 69 "developing" countries. Their foundation aims to give this toxin to a staggering 225 million women. How's that for global, oligarchic ambition? Aside from harming women, preventing births and undermining social order, this evil plot will inevitably create a backlash against the West once women in the "developing" world realize they have been poisoned.  

THE break up of the Anglican Church is very, very complicated. I think the bottom line is: We'll all go our own way but pretend we are still affiliated.