‘WISDOM preacheth abroad, she uttereth her voice in the streets. At the head of multitudes she crieth out; in the entrance of the gates of the city she uttereth her words, saying: O children, how long will you love childishness, and how long will fools covet those things which are hurtful to themselves, and the unwise hate knowledge? Turn ye at my reproof. Behold I will utter my spirit to you, and will show you my words.’

— (Proverbs i. 20-23)

The Crucifixion, Jacopo Di Cione; c. 1365

“THE spirit of Christ is a spirit of martyrdom, at least of mortification and penance. It is always the spirit of the cross. The remains of the old man, of sin and of death, must be extinguished, before one can be made heavenly by putting on affections which are divine. What mortifies the senses and the flesh gives life to the spirit, and what weakens and subdues the body strengthens the soul. Hence the divine love infuses a spirit of mortification, patience, obedience, humility, and meekness, with a love of sufferings and contempt, in which consists the sweetness of the cross. The more we share in the suffering life of Christ, the greater share we inherit in his spirit, and in the fruit of his death. To souls mortified to their senses and disengaged from earthly things, God gives frequent foretastes of the sweetness of eternal life, and the most ardent desires of possessing him in his glory. This is the spirit of martyrdom, which entitles a Christian to a happy resurrection and to the bliss of the life to come.”

— Rev. Alban Butler, Lives of the Saints (1866 Edition)

YOU gotta admit, Paula White is one heck of a fundraiser.

For only $1,000, she’ll arrange “seven supernatural blessings.” She’s got some powerful connections.

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MANY more examples from social media here.

ALAN writes:

Thank you for posting portions of the Motion Picture Production Code. What a difference nine decades have made in the lowering of standards.  Observe the moral-philosophical frame of mind reflected in motion pictures from the 1930s-’40s, and then compare it with the palpable hatred of moral standards depicted in today’s motion pictures.  Two things could not be more different, yet both are called entertainment. The word applies properly to the former.  But for the latter, the right word is Junk.

We are fortunate indeed that old movies are still available in which we can see concrete expressions of the good advice reflected in that Code: Uplifting stories brought to life by actors like Ronald Colman, James Stewart, Walter Pidgeon, and Fred Astaire, and actresses like Greer Garson, Claudette Colbert, Loretta Young, and Irene Dunne.  What they created represents a moral-philosophical-esthetic world of entertainment as different from today’s degradation-called-entertainment as day from night.  That was my world.  I cannot stand anything in or about the indescribable junk that is now called entertainment.  Friends and acquaintances are shocked when I tell them this.  They cannot imagine that anyone could be so untrendy and uncool as not to appreciate any motion pictures made since the 1960s (and very few in that decade).

S. H. writes:

If you study the Movie Production Code, you can interpret recent movies and see where they go wrong.

Look at this scene from the 1990 film Misery. Look at how Katherine Bates is dressed, she’s practically the trad-wife meme wearing a cross. Since she lives in the wilderness, in a way she represents the pioneering independence of heritage America.

She complains about the profanity. He defends the profanity saying, “that’s how we talk.” The code says it doesn’t matter if some people talk that way, it’s the effect on the souls of the viewer.

So the Bates character goes crazy — proving to the viewer that Christian traditional women are evil.  They are pent up authoritarians.

Read too in the code how powerful they knew theater to be. And how people confuse the characters with the actors and real life.

Do you have to “early- life” the guy who wrote the screenplay to Misery? Cause you shouldn’t have to! Read More »

I WANDERED LONELY AS A CLOUD
By William Wordsworth

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. Read More »

A beautiful musical recording of the Angelus can be found here.

Annunciation, Sandro Botticelli;1450

WHERE Eve was pride, she was humility.

Where Eve was action, she was surrender.

Where Eve was novelty, she was birth.

Where Eve was outward, she was inward.

Where Eve was death, she was life.

Where Eve was self, she was compassion.

Where Eve was shame, she was modesty.

Where Eve was materialistic, she was maternal.

Where Eve was wealth, she was poverty.

Where Eve was doubt, she was trust.

Where Eve was foolishness, she was wisdom.

Where Eve was liberation, she was restraint.

Where Eve was impulse, she was thought.

Where Eve was confusion, she was clarity.

Where Eve was virtue signaling, she was virtue.

Where Eve was slave, she was queen.

Zanobi Strozzi; The Annunciation; The National Gallery, London (1438-1447)

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“At that time: the angel Gabriel was sent from God into a city of Galilee, called Nazareth, to a Virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the Virgin’s name was Mary. And the angel being come in, said unto her: Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women. Who having heard, was troubled at his saying, and thought with herself what manner of salutation this should be. And the angel said to her: Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God.” [St. Luke, Chapter 1]

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

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Archangel Gabriel, Luca Signorelli; 1490

FROM 1934 to 1968, most movies produced by major studios in this country complied with the Motion Picture Production Code of 1930. Known as the Hays Code, it provided moral standards for the industry, regulating how everything from murder and vulgarity to dress and religion were portrayed on screen. Cruelty to children and animals, prostitution, executions, “gruesomeness” and the demonizing of other nations were among the things it condemned.

All in all, the code represented benevolent and paternalistic protectiveness of the minds and souls of movie viewers.

Did you ever read the code? You might find it a profound statement on the importance and influence of film. You might also be amazed from the vantage point of today that such thoughtfulness ever existed.

Below is an excerpt from what is considered the most complete version:

GENERAL PRINCIPLES

I. Theatrical motion pictures, that is, pictures intended for the theatre as distinct from pictures intended for churches, schools, lecture halls, educational movements, social reform movements, etc., are primarily to be regarded as Entertainment.

Mankind has always recognized the importance of entertainment and its value in rebuilding the bodies and souls of human beings.

But it has always recognized that entertainment can be of a character either helpful or harmful to the human race, and, in consequence, has clearly distinguished between:

Entertainment which tends to improve the race, or, at least, to recreate and rebuild human beings exhausted with the realities of life; and Entertainment which tends to degrade human beings, or to lower their standards of life and living.

Hence the moral importance of entertainment is something which has been universally recognized. It enters intimately into the lives of men and women and affects them closely; it occupies their minds and affections during leisure hours, and ultimately touches the whole of their
lives. A man may be judged by his standard of entertainment as easily as by the standard of his work. Read More »

“THE holy season of Lent is fast advancing; the choicest graces are daily being offered us; woe to the man whose mind is distracted by the fashion of this world that passeth away, and takes no thought for eternity and heaven, and even in this time of grace, is like tamarick, a worthless weed of the desert. Oh, how numerous is this class! and how terrible is their spiritual indifference! Pray for them, of ye faithful children of the Church, pray for them without ceasing. Offer up your penances and almsgivings for them. Despair not; and remember that each year, many straying sheep are brought to the fold by such intercession such as this.”

— Dom Prosper Guéranger, The Liturgical Year

                          St. Augustine, Bernini

“BUT the worshipers and admirers of these gods delight in imitating their scandalous iniquities, and are nowise concerned that the republic be less depraved and licentious.

“Only let it [the Roman Empire] remain undefeated, they say, only let it flourish and abound in resources; let it be glorious by its victories, or still better, secure in peace; and what matters it to us? This is our concern, that every man be able to increase his wealth so as to supply his daily prodigalities, and so that the powerful may subject the weak for their own purposes. Let the poor court the rich for a living, and that under their protection they may enjoy a sluggish tranquility; and let the rich abuse the poor as their dependants, to minister to their pride. Let the people applaud not those who protect their interests, but those who provide them with pleasure. Let no severe duty be commanded, no impurity forbidden. Let kings estimate their prosperity, not by the righteousness, but by the servility of their subjects. Let the provinces stand loyal to the kings, not as moral guides, but as lords of their possessions, and purveyors of their pleasures; not with a hearty reverence, but a crooked and servile fear. Let the laws take cognizance rather of the injury done to another man’s property, than of that done to one’s own person. If a man be a nuisance to his neighbor, or injure his property, family, or person, let him be actionable; but in his own affairs let everyone with impunity do what he will in company with his own family, and with those who willingly join him. Read More »

JEWISH WOMEN played a prominent role in the spread of feminism.

The significant presence of Jews in the movement is not surprising. Indeed, their zeal for feminism was a natural reaction to the misogyny inherent in the sacred Jewish texts of the Talmud. Just as Jewish capitalism, or the unleashing of the profit motive on society, bred the reaction of Jewish communism and its dream of economic equality, so Jewish disdain for women naturally bred the reaction of Jewish-led feminism and the extreme denial of essential differences between the sexes.

Underneath these polar opposites is a common thread: a dissatisfaction with the natural order and a restless desire to topple it.

Tragically, Jewish-influenced feminism was imposed on a society that did not historically possess the same views of women. As he walked and sailed through the lands of ancient Palestine, Jesus Christ did not disdain women. He healed them, he reasoned with them, he reproached them, he loved them. His mother stood at the foot of the cross, unafraid of Jewish retribution. The first person who saw him rise from the dead was a woman. The Catholic Church later exalted women in their feminine roles. It even offered an honored place for the non-married woman as a consecrated virgin. The birth of a girl was always celebrated every bit as much as the birth of a boy (except perhaps in cases where a king or nobleman wanted a male heir). No woman has been more revered than the Blessed Mother of God. Protestantism lessened this reverence and led to a commercialization of society that women would inevitably be pressured to join. Radical Protestants were the first promoters of feminism in this country. The difference between Protestant feminism and Jewish feminism was that the latter had financial fortunes behind it — and the Jewish talent for word games, for spinning the truth in a web of audacious sophistries that blast common sense to smithereens. It was no accident that Christian women writers were shunted from women’s magazines in the 1960s and replaced by Jewish women, whose every thought against men was broadcast throughout the land.

Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem were understandably dissatisfied and lacking in feminine pride. They did not come from a world that honored women and their varied abilities. They could not help, I suspect, of being jealous of the security of the Christian woman in her traditional place. This dissatisfaction was not the only motivation behind Jewish feminism, which was also a psychological weapon against non-Jewish society, but it surely accounts for some of the passion behind it.

Madonna and Child, Fillippo Lippi; 1465

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“I GREW up in an Orthodox community. I know that when I was born my father said, ‘What a shame, it’s a girl.’ I know that there were no ceremonies to welcome my arrival within the community. I know that no matter how hard I worked in Hebrew school and how many prizes I won, it didn’t really matter. At the age of thirteen, only the boys would have the official ceremony of the Bar Mitzva, which welcomed them into the world of men. And I have spent hours in synagogue sitting watching the men read from the scrolls, organize the services, and ignore the women completely. ….

“… I recently saw a photograph of a Hasidic celebration for the anniversary of the rabbinic scholar, Maimonides. Again, I found myself looking at the newsprint on the page trying to find someone who might look like me, a grown woman and a mother. But along the rows and rows of blackbearded men with dark hats and white faces I didn’t see a single woman. Once again, they had simply disappeared, as if they didn’t exist at all.

“That’s how the extreme Orthodox and Hasidic men like to have their women. They believe that women are wicked, unreliable, sexual temptresses, who are put on earth to lead men into evil ungodly ways and tempt them to stop observing the laws and commandments of Judaism.”

— The Hole in the Sheet: A Modern Woman Looks at Orthodox and Hasidic Judaism, Evelyn Kay (Lyle Stuart, 1987)

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