PEOPLE diet to lose weight and to look better. But judging from the evidence, it often doesn’t work. Perhaps they are dieting from the wrong motives. In a spiritual fast, one learns to control the appetite — not for any worldly gain but for other-worldly gain. The spiritual fast strengthens the will. The modern world needs fasting and abstinence more than ever:
But, alas! the generality of men consider these observances as duties incumbent indeed on persons in a retired or religious state, but wholly inapplicable to those, who take an active part on the theatre of the world. In opposition to this so fatal an error, I assert, that the practice of penance is, to persons in the world, above all others, of the most imperative obligation. The man of contemplation might possibly find, in the constant meditation of the truths of eternity, in the undisturbed application of his mind to prayer and celestial things, in the sacred and sublime occupations of his state, wherewith to combat his inordinate appetites. In the world, on the contrary, all things tend to excite and augment their violence. In the world, besides the evil propensities of nature, you have to struggle against the force of general example, against the seductions of pleasure, artfully decked out in its most attractive garb to enchant and captivate. There the passions are soothed and flattered; there virtue is without honour; there vicious indulgence, in almost all its shapes, is excused, in many is even applauded. In the world, then, the practice of self-denial is of the first necessity; there, if you are not mortified, your ruin is inevitable.
ANTI-TRUST laws have not prevented the sometimes intense consolidation of retail businesses to the detriment of the consumer. A good example is eyeglasses:
This week, the Los Angeles Times spoke with two former executives of LensCrafters: Charles Dahan and E. Dean Butler, who founded LensCrafters in 1983. Both admitted that today, glasses are marked up nearly 1,000 percent.
“You can get amazingly good frames, with a Warby Parker level of quality, for $4 to $8,” said Butler. “For $15, you can get designer-quality frames, like what you’d get from Prada.”
Butler added that shoppers could get “absolutely first-quality lenses for $1.25 apiece.” When hearing that some glasses sell for $800 in the US, he laughed. “I know. It’s ridiculous. It’s a complete rip-off.”
Butler and Dahan confirmed what shoppers have already suspected: There’s price gouging in the optical industry. The main culprit? The eyewear giant EssilorLuxottica, which essentially controls the industry. [Source]
THERE are but few social questions which have not been ably and spiritedly treated of by the public writers of the age, who have devoted their talents to the study of what is called Political Economy; and it has often been a matter of surprise to us, that they should have overlooked a subject of such deep interest as this,–the results produced on society by the abolition of Lent, that is to say, of an institution, which, more than any other, keeps up in the public mind a keen sentiment of moral right and wrong, inasmuch as it imposes on a nation an annual expiation for sin. No shrewd penetration is needed to see the difference between two nations, one of which observes, each year, a forty days’ penance in reparation of the violations committed against the Law of God, and another, whose very principles reject all such solemn reparation. And looking at the subject from another point of view,–is it not to be feared that the excessive use of animal food tends to weaken, rather than to strengthen, the constitution? We are convinced of it,–the time will come, when a greater proportion of vegetable, and less of animal, diet, will be considered as an essential means for maintaining the strength of the human frame.
The entire “Catholic Church abuse story” has long ago ceased about being about “justice for victims” and “bishop accountability.” The actions of law enforcement, the media, tort lawyers, and so-called “victims groups” are now nothing less than a full-on assault against the Church because of its teachings on sexual ethics. The issue of sex abuse committed decades ago is just a pretext for this attack, and the absurd criminal conviction of Cardinal George Pell on ludicrous abuse charges is simply the latest proof of this.
See Pell’s police interview above.
Clerics truly guilty of the sexual abuse of minors deserve the death penalty. There is cause for grave doubt, however, of the charges leveled against Pell.
[Note: While this website does not accept the legitimacy of cardinals who embrace Vatican II, it recognizes that sex abuse media stories and prosecutions in many cases amount to defamation of the true Catholic Church. The many charges against Pell and others, whether true or false, also amount to a chastisement against the modernist, phony religion which has supplanted the Catholic faith in churches across the land.]
TODAY IS ASH Wednesday, the first day of the penitential season of Lent, the day when ashes are placed on the foreheads of the observant as an act of self-abasement and a recognition of mortality:
“For dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return.”–Genesis 3: 19
Or as Johnny Cash would say, “Sooner or later God’ll cut you down.”
There is no mention of this custom of ashes in the New Testament, but it is found in the Old Testament, mentioned in Esther iv. 1, and Dan. ix. 3. The English abbot Ælfric of Eynsham describes the observation of Lent in the 10th century:
On that Wednesday, throughout the world, as it is appointed, priests bless clean ashes in church, and then lay them on people’s heads, so that they may remember that they came from earth and will return again to dust, just as Almighty God said to Adam, after he had sinned against God’s command: ‘In labour you shall live and in sweat you shall eat your bread upon the earth, until you return again to the same earth from which you came, for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.’ This is not said about the souls of mankind, but about their bodies, which moulder to dust, and shall again on Judgement Day, through the power of our Lord, rise from the earth, all who ever lived, just as all trees quicken again in the season of spring which were deadened by the winter’s chill.
While Ash Wednesday seems filled with gloom, it is no accident that it occurs as spring approaches, as Ælfric notes. “Lent” is from an Old English word “lencten” meaning spring. As this beautiful French Lenten hymn, found at The Clerk of Oxford, suggests, Lent has its own gladness:
To bow the head In sackcloth and in ashes, Or rend the soul, Such grief is not Lent’s goal; But to be led To where God’s glory flashes, His beauty to come nigh, To fly, to fly, To fly where truth and light do lie.
Lent also is a time of military preparation. The great army of Christ strengthens itself to do battle. Pope Benedict XIV said in an encyclical on May 29, 1741,
The observance of Lent is the bond of union in our army; by it we are distinguished from the enemies of the Cross of Christ; by it we turn aside the chastisements of God’s wrath; by its means, being guarded by heavenly succours during the day, we fortify ourselves against the prince of darkness. If this observance comes to be relaxed it is to the detriment of God’s glory, to the dishonour of the Catholic religion and to the peril of souls; nor can it be doubted that such negligence will become a source of misfortune to nations, of disaster to public affairs and of adversity to individuals.”
The Pope’s words are prophetic, and we can rightly blame the state of the world today on the failure of many Christians to observe Lent. It’s interesting to note that every “white nationalist” alive today is a descendant of people who observed Lent. And yet how many white nationalists will be fasting today?
The First Prayer from the Mass for Ash Wednesday in the Saint Andrew Daily Missal:
O ALMIGHTY AND ETERNAL GOD, spare those who are penitent, be merciful to those who supplicate Thee; and vouchsafe to send Thy holy Angel from heaven, to bless and sanctify these ashes, that they may be a wholesome remedy to all who humbly implore Thy holy name, and accuse themselves as a result of the consciousness of their sins, deploring their crimes before Thy divine clemency, or humbly and earnestly beseeching Thy sovereign mercy: and grant through the invocation of Thy most holy name that all who may be sprinkled with them for the remission of their sins, may receive health of body and safety of soul. Through Christ our Lord.
THE Virginia governor’s wife leading students around the governor’s mansion made the mistake of asking a teenager to imagine the experience of a slave:
The tour guide handed raw, prickly cotton to some young black students who were part of a group visiting the oldest operating governor’s mansion in the country, one that was built with slave labor. She asked them to imagine what it would be like to be a slave picking the crop.
What made the request only more shocking, a mother of one of the children said, was who was asking it: Pam Northam, the wife of Ralph S. Northam, the embattled governor of Virginia, who is trying to repair his relationship with African-Americans after a scandal over a racist yearbook photo and an admission of wearing blackface.
But, taking all this seriously if you can (more and more the news reads like it was written by bright 14-year-olds and the normal adult has to strain to adopt the same mentality and immaturity just to understand what is going on), wouldn’t Mrs. Northam have been wrong to have handed the cotton to a white student?! Read More »
Photo Courtesy of Architectural Revival on Twitter
“THE thing now with modernist art that has dominated for so long is that we have no more art. Most museums of modern art for me could be closed down without any interest. My test is always this: if you take a piece of so-called modern art and you put it next to the dumpsters and rubbish in the courtyard and it is taken away, it’s not art – because anyone with any sensitivity or any intelligence will recognize a work of art. It has something more about it than just rubbish.
This is where I come to the parallel of music and architecture. Building a very large complex is symphonic work. If you build a large complex over twenty or thirty years – like building a town – you need some discipline which is going to ensure that there will be harmony of parts despite the contrarianism of the users who are going to inhabit it. You need some simple discipline, which can be understood and shared by a large number of people. That is what traditional architecture was about; and that is why we have these incredible treasures of traditional architecture still surviving, despite the will to deform or to destroy them or to wipe them out.”
Vincent Van Gogh; ‘Street in Auvers-sur-Oise ,’ 1890,
“[T]HE DIVINE must work within me in the same conditions as the human does now. Like the needle of a compass the soul must be set and magnetized so as to point constantly towards God, and finally to be fixed on Him. Then I shall have reached perfection, and I shall go to God as easily, as readily, I was about to say, as naturally, as I now go towards myself. Oh, when will this be? . . .
In fine, there is almost an entire subversion to be made. My whole life has to be more or less revolutionized: my thoughts, feelings, and actions have to be turned upside down. It is the deep and radical modification of my hitherto too human manner of seeing, loving, and
acting. I must form new notions about everything, new feelings about everything, and a new behaviour with regard to everything. The old man must be stripped off once for all and the new man must be put on. How deep are these simple words : seeing, loving, and seeking God in all things, and all things for God ! . . .
Without knowing or reflecting on it, by the inclination of my nature, I have come to see, love, and seek everything for self. The place unduly assigned to my own satisfaction must now be given to the glory of God. What a work ! It is only when the latter has been put in the first place in my thoughts, in the front rank of all my affections, at the root of all my actions, that I shall be able to say : I have reached perfection. When shall I attain it, my God?”
IN RECOGNITION of Black History Month, let’s remember just how tragic the effects of revolutionary music, degenerate movies and pornography have been on American black communities since these musicians of the 1940s performed. Warning: There is immodesty from minutes 1:30 to 1:40. (Don’t miss the harpist at the end!)
Because I am not insane, I assumed the Jussie Smollett caper was a hoax as soon as it made the news. It ticked all the boxes of a hoax. The alleged victim was a black Jewish homosexual, who makes a living as a drama queen. The alleged incident happened in Chicago, where the last racist redneck was last seen in the 19th century. The incident happened in a part of town that caters to deviants like Smollett, not MAGA hat wearing Trump supporters. Again, only a nut would accept the story at face value.
Similarly, once the hoax was made plain, I knew the believers on the Left, by which I mean everyone on the Left, would go through the usual phases that they always pass through when confronting disconfirmation. Read More »
BY TODAY’S STANDARDS, my husband’s early childhood was intensely boring. When he was growing up in the industrial town of Chester, Pennsylvania — now a shadow of its former self — he did not have many of the opportunities very young children have today. He hardly had any toys, no gym classes for toddlers, no music lessons or early sports. He didn’t go to reading hours at the local library or children’s museums. There was no children’s TV. He didn’t even have play dates.
From the ages of three to six, his three older brothers and sister were out of the house and at St. Michael’s School. So he was mostly alone at home with his mother. He spent the day following her around as she did her chores. She had plenty to do, with a husband, five children, two boarders, a dog, a large, ramshackle house and a coal furnace that needed to be fed.
She began her main chores after everyone had left for the day, but first she had a cup of coffee and a cigarette. He remembers her staring straight ahead and blowing steam off the coffee. These were usually her only moments of leisure and peace. She would quickly read yesterday’s newspaper. She preferred yesterday’s paper because viewings of the local deceased were usually publicized a day ahead. These evening gatherings were a significant part of her social life.
The coffee break did not last long. She would move about the house — cleaning the one bathroom shared by nine people, straightening the bedrooms, doing dishes, preparing food, hauling coal, etc. My husband would stay by her side as she did all this. He was more a spectator than a helper. Read More »
IN a health food supermarket the other day, I noticed in front of me in the check-out line a woman with a huge assortment of of organic vegetables and fruits. There were turnips and sweet potatoes and apples and avocados, to mention a few, each one picked out separately. Everything was blameless. There was not a single transgression against healthy eating. The woman was very thin and spent more than $170. She looked to be in her late fifties, so it was unlikely she was feeding a whole family. And yet there was one jar of baby food — mashed, organic carrots. Perhaps that was for some vegetarian elixir, a magical potion that when mixed with other virtuously-produced vegetables and fruits could extend life indefinitely.
Two days later, I had breakfast in a diner — one of those highway restaurants where each plate of food would be enough to feed four people in bygone years. The chicken and waffles came with a mountain of sizzling, fried drumsticks. Most of the items on the menu would supply half the recommended daily calories for a grown adult. One adorable boy sat before his huge platter of eggs and potatoes. He was about eight and he looked happy, very happy. He was also seriously over-weight. A couple who had eaten got up to leave as we were waiting for our food. They were wearing tent-like T-shirts and sweatpants. What else could they wear? They were each close to 300 pounds and they struggled to walk. They looked like slow-moving human trucks.
The health-conscious and the health-unconscious. For one, the body is a temple to fitness. For the other, it’s a kind of trash heap.
I’ll take the fat couple over the ascetic. The waddlers are probably secretly ashamed. I doubt it has ever occurred to the consumer of edible jewels that she might be a glutton too.
PERSONS who keep themselves low in their own estimation and love to be considered of little account and despised by others please God in the highest degree; and, therefore, He willingly lowers Himself to them, pours upon them the treasures of His graces, reveals to them His secrets, invites and draws them sweetly to Himself. Thus, the more one lowers and abuses himself before men, the more he rises and becomes great in the sight of God, and the more clearly he will, one day, behold the Divine Essence.
THE interesting Victorian advice book, Home Whispers to Husbands and Wives (The American Female Guardian Society, New York; 1859) by “Melva” contains some wise words on the important subject of the “fretful wife.” Victorian writing is flowery and effusive compared to modern style, but it often expresses passion and common sense. How many fretful women have given homemaking a bad image — and indirectly encouraged the feminist revolt? We will never know. Surely many. The only appropriate response to this essay for fretful women is — to fret about being fretful.
FRET, fret—scold, scold, from morning to night, in haste or leisure, when it rained or the sun shone; Mrs. More always found something to find fault about, something to dislike.
She began it when she was a child; her mother fretted and she learned the art. She practised her lessons well as she grew up. She carried the habit with her into the home of her married life, and scarcely kept it out of sight during the honey-moon. After she became a mother, she found occasion to fret every day and almost every hour of her life, till she came to be the most accomplished fretter that we knew.
She was handsome—at least she might have been, but fair and regular features will look ugly, when the scowl of peevishness mars them. She was smart, and efficient in the management of her domestic afi’airs. Her house was a model of order, and the Ways of her household were well looked after, but I have seen more comfort, where there was less system. She was intelligent and when the demon, that enthralled her, slumbered for a little, and her fine features were irradiated with the smile and glow of social cheerfulness, she would seem to be a most engaging woman. She was self-sacrificing. Her ease and preferences she would yield to the good of others, but the most precious offerings she laid on the altar of love, she would baptize with the unholy waters of fretfulness and complaint, till the valueof the benefaction was wholly lost, or greatly marred to the recipient. Read More »
