FROM The Christmas Book by Francis Weiser (St. Augustine Academy Press, 1952), p. 152:

One of the most beloved of all the Saints long ago was St. Nicholas of Myra. In many parts of Europe children still believe St. Nicholas appears to them on the eve of his Feast (December sixth) laden with gifts. His role is that of a heavenly messenger, coming at the beginning of Advent and admonishing little children to prepare their hearts for properly welcoming the Christ Child at Christmas. He is usually impersonated by a man wearing a long white beard, dressed in the vestments of a bishop, with miter and crozier, a friendly and saintly figure, who comes down from heaven once a year to visit the children, whose patron saint he is. He examines them, questioning them on their Catechism and hearing their prayers. After entreating them to be good boys and girls and to get ready for a devout and holy Christmas, he distributes candy and fruit and departs with a loving farewell, leaving the little ones filled with holy awe and joy.”

In America, his image has, as Fisheaters put it, “been mixed up with a lot of traits and imagery from sources as disparate as the poetry of Clement Moore, pagan Norse mythology, and American advertising.”

A wealth of information about St. Nicholas, both legendary and real, can be found at the St. Nicholas Center:

Was St. Nicholas real?
Yes, he was a real 4th century Greek bishop who lived in Asia Minor, along the Mediterranean coast.

Was St. Nicholas a Turk?
No, Nicholas was Greek, living in a Greek province (Lycia, Asia Minor) that was part of the Roman Empire, centuries before Turks came. The region was Lycia, now in modern-day Turkey.

Was Santa/St. Nicholas a pagan god?
The Germanic god Thor may have influenced Santa’s characteristics somewhat, but Santa primarily developed from the real bishop St. Nicholas.

An ancient English hymn, a Bulgarian song and a popular American tune, all dedicated to the saint, are sung below. From Godes Druth, written by the English hermit St. Godric of Finchale in the 12th century:

Saint Nicholas, God’s beloved,
Build for us a fair bright house;
At the birth, at the bier,
Saint Nicholas, bring us safely there.

 Saint Nicholas, glorious Confessor of Christ, assist us in thy loving kindness.

(Indulgence 100 days)

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"WHY, we ask, ever since men have been men -- or rather since they became civilized -- why have men in all times and places been irresistibly borne to differentiate and divide the functions of the two sexes? Do we not have here strict testimony to the recognition by all mankind of a truth and a law above man? "To sum up, wherever women wear men’s dress, it is be considered a factor, over the long term, in disintegrating human order." [bold added] --- "Notification Concerning Men’s Dress Worn by Women," Giuseppe Cardinal Siri, 1960  

"NON-Whites in our society are all in agreement that White 'supremacism' and White 'racism' are evils. "This is because they see White people as tribal competitors and want to weaken us. "It is not because they think 'supremacism' or 'racism' are bad things - quite the contrary." -- Wyatt Stagg  

Angelus ad virginem is a medieval carol that has been sung continuously for about 700 years. It was brought to Britain by French friars in the 13th or 14th century. The oldest surviving appearance of the carol is in a manuscript from 1360.

Based on the Hail Mary, this cheerful carol remains popular with choral ensembles today. To be fair, it truly deserves the title of popular music.

(I’m sorry, but I do not know who is performing this wonderful version.)

Translation from the Latin:

Angelus ad virginem

The angel came to the Virgin,
entering secretly into her room;
calming the Virgin’s fear, he said, “Hail!
Hail, queen of virgins:
you will conceive the Lord of heaven and earth
and bear him, still a virgin,
to be the salvation of mankind;
you will be made the gate of heaven,
the cure of sins. (more…)

TODAY is the feast day of St. Barbara. Like many Catholic women in history, this saint of the third century was no stranger to controversy: Barbara -- one of the Fourteen Holy Helpers -- was the beautiful daughter of a rich and powerful pagan named Dioscuros. She grew up in Nikomedia (in modern Turkey). To keep her a virgin, her father locked her in a tower when he was away, a tower with only two windows. Upon his return from one journey, he found three windows in the tower instead of two. When he asked Barbara about this, she confessed that she'd become a Christian after being baptized by a priest disguised as a physician, and that she'd asked that a third window be made as a symbol of the Holy Trinity. She was then denounced by her father, who was ordered by the local authorities to put her to death. She escaped from her tower, but her father caught and killed her. When he dealt the death blow, he was immediately struck by lightning. (Source) St. Barbara is a patroness of the dying. For approved prayers for her intercession, go here. St. Barbara, pray for us!

"MONIKA Schaefer, a Canadian citizen of German descent, spent 10 months in a German prison in 2018. Her crime? Making a six minute video that went viral and says things forbidden in Germany. Her brother, who lives in Germany spent 5 years in prison, much of it in solitary, also for the crime of saying what is forbidden. She has a big heart and big courage to keep speaking the truth in the face of a most pervasive and universally believed lie and this lie is very much tied to the events unfolding in the middle east right now." Link  

"YOU know you are a defeated people when your conquerors say the way you have lived for hundreds of years is an evil political ideology." -- Mr. S. (a reader of this site)  

COME, thou Redeemer of the earth, and manifest thy virgin-birth: let every age adoring fall; such birth befits the God of all. Veni, redemptor gentium; ostende partum Virginis; miretur omne saeculum: talis decet partus Deum. From Veni, Redemptor Gentium  

"A BLACK or an Arab with a piece of paper that says they’re Irish is Irish in the same way that a man with a piece of paper that says they’re a woman is a woman. "Blacks and Arabs will never be Irish and trannies will never be women. This used to be common sense." --- Apolitical  

“THESE words were composed by Spencer the Rover
Who’d travelled Great Britain and most parts of Wales.
He had been so reduced which caused great confusion
And that was the reason he went on the roam.

“In Yorkshire near Rotherham he had been on his rambles,
Being weary of travelling he sat down to rest.
At the foot of yonder mountain there runs a clear fountain;
With bread and cold water he himself did refresh.

“It tasted more sweeter than the gold he had wasted,
More sweeter than honey and gave more content.
But the thoughts of his babies lamenting their father
Brought tears in their eyes which made him lament. (more…)

Video link

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IN memory of the late Henry Kissinger, who died this week at the age of 100, some relevant reflections by Sufyan Jan:

Although South American jungles and the sands of the Middle East might reflect the general public view of the communist image, perhaps this is a ‘desert sands mirage’? Contemporary ‘Commies’ wash and dress well, and attend Georgetown University in between martinis and formulating America’s domestic and foreign policies. They fly business or first class to London or Bern Switzerland and sit in the cool smooth leather of Chesterfield lounge chairs at the local Gentleman’s Club. These pseudo-Roman literati, travel ‘long haul’ to charge the batteries of the sagging ‘culture war tension machine’. The current urgency is palpable and some ‘blunt force’ revisionism will be required to set the record straight on the top end of town ‘commies in suits’. (more…)

WILLIAM Makis, MD features several Japanese videos at his Substack about the rise of sudden deaths in the country, including a very moving video about relatives of these people.  

Video link (more…)

IS there any political agenda in this lovely Russian folk song? Not at all. It's about simple pleasures and real life. (Click on captions for translation.)  

SINCE we’ve been discussing folk music lately, I’d like to examine this famous ‘Hilltop” Coca-Cola ad of the 1970s. It features a great example of what might be called anti-folk music, created with the specific intent of destroying the distinctive, life-giving traditions that create folk music. (Thank you to a reader for sending this and noting its significance.)

But first, what are “folk?”

Briefly, the folk are living and breathing communities, extended families, peoples, existing over the course of successive generations and over enough time to create their own traditions and their own communal spirit. In Latin, they are gens — clans, tribes, peoples and nations connected by blood and place. Folk are always changing. They are never stable and yet there are threads of consistency made up of ideas, experiences, and historic events, but also of the inherited, collective personalities of different peoples based both in biology and the supernatural as experienced collectively. That’s why we can speak of the folk as possessing a soul.

One of the oddest things about modern advertising is that commercials often have seemingly little to do with the products being sold. What in the world does this sentimental anthem sung improbably on a hilltop have to do with a sugary soft drink?

Let’s think about that.

The video with its repetitive, slow-moving melody features people of different folk in traditional dress — clothes which have been replaced in the real world by the universal, Marxist uniform of denim and T-shirts. They wear dreamy smiles and vacant looks, as if drugged. Unsurprisingly, young and beautiful whites take the lead. They are naturally at the forefront of the song’s utopian dream — a dream of “perfect harmony.”

Apple trees and honey bees and snow-white turtledoves …

How cleverly these words imitate real folk music. They are not used, however, to evoke everyday life, but a one-world paradise.

The song takes things fundamentally good — the natural affinity of different folks and the worthy ideal of peace among them — and twists them, promoting a dream that ironically results in the destruction of different peoples.

Dr. Jop Pollman wrote in the outstanding little songbook, Laughing Meadows (Grailville Publications, 1947): (more…)