THESE images are from @basicoptimism on Instagram.

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 It is rather as if a man had found an inner room in the very heart of his own house, which he had never suspected; and seen a light from within. It is if he found something at the back of his own heart that betrayed him into good. — G.K. Chesterton

FROM G.K. Chesterton’s essay “The God in the Cave” (The Everlasting Man):

[N]o other story, no pagan legend or philosophical anecdote or historical event, does in fact affect any of us with that peculiar and even poignant impression produced on us by the word Bethlehem. No other birth of a god or childhood of a sage seems to us to be Christmas or anything like Christmas. It is either too cold or too frivolous, or too formal and classical, or too simple and savage, or too occult and complicated. Not one of us, whatever his opinions, would ever go to such a scene with the sense that he was going home. He might admire it because it was poetical, or because it was philosophical or any number of other things in separation; but not because it was itself. The truth is that there is a quite peculiar and individual character about the hold of this story on human nature; it is not in its psychological substance at all like a mere legend or the life of a great man. It does not exactly in the ordinary sense turn our minds to greatness; to those extensions and exaggerations of humanity which are turned into gods and heroes, even by the healthiest sort of hero worship. It does not exactly work outwards, adventurously to the wonders to be found at the ends of the earth. (more…)

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      FROM New Heaven, New War
–           —- by Robert Southwell, S.J. (Above, the poem is part of Benjamin Britten’s Ceremony of Carols)

This little babe, so few days old,
Is come to rifle Satan’s fold;
All hell doth at his presence quake.
Though he himself for cold do shake,
For in this weak unarmèd wise
The gates of hell he will surprise.

With tears he fights and wins the field;
His naked breast stands for a shield;
His battering shot are babish cries,
His arrows looks of weeping eyes,
His martial ensigns cold and need,
And feeble flesh his warrior’s steed.

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FROM “30 Clues that Let Us Know Covid Was a Planned Operation:“ at The Arts and Sciences:

I oftentimes encounter those who argue that it would take so many people who were “in on it” to pull off a massive operation like COVID. This is simply wrong. It takes a handful of people who know how all the pieces fit together—all of whom are likely carefully monitored and possibly even blackmailed (remember Epstein?). Everyone else falls victim to compartmentalization. They might notice something is wrong—and may even speak up about it—but their failure to connect all the dots to see the big picture won’t lead to some grand realization about the operation. If they do get too close to the target, they can be banished to the dark corners of the internet or even physically targeted. When false paradigms and bad business practices are normalized over time, operations like COVID naturally feel like some kind of blunder when they’re anything but that.

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[Reposted]

“TALES OF CHESTER” continues here with a few words from my husband, A. Wood, on the season of Advent:

EVERY self-respecting kid in Chester was a school resister, possessing an instinctive and deeply-rooted sense of the dignity of human freedom. But Sonny Trenjic [pronounced TRENCH-ick] raised the art of dodging school to a new level.

One day in early December, Sister St. Reginald (they called her “Reggie”) asked Sonny’s sister, Babe, why he was absent from his eighth-grade class. Babe said that a terrible mishap had occurred at home. Sonny was conducting an extra-curricular science experiment. He was attempting to electrocute a spider — for the greater cause, of course — and the spider bit him, seriously injuring his hand.

           In the annals of truancy, this was a dazzling masterpiece.

But, even artistry at this exalted level could not disarm the hardened prejudices of Sister Reggie. She stopped what she was doing and left her class in the charge of a student proctor.

She marched to the Trenjic house. She knocked on the door. Without further ado, she snagged the un-injured Sonny by the collar. The fugitive was then escorted back to class. This was all part of a nun’s job profile. She physically, as well as spiritually, battled the forces of evil. The profane waged its ceaseless war with the sacred in the streets and living rooms of this small industrial city by the rat-gray Delaware River. Reggie and the other sisters were the shock troops.

The profane weakened during the four-week liturgical season of Advent. Our small, darkened minds were uplifted with greater frequency to the supernatural as the lamps in row houses brightened the encroaching night. Expectation was in the air. Let’s be clear: It was anticipation, not fulfillment. Thanksgiving was still Thanksgiving. It wouldn’t have remotely crossed our minds to go shopping for Christmas on the day after Thanksgiving. Black Friday was not yet black. We didn’t put up Christmas trees or wreaths during Advent. We didn’t have parties until Christmas week. (more…)

“THERE is surely something inexpressibly touching in this presence of the inferior animals at the nativity of the Incarnate Creator. In the Incarnation God has been pleased to go to what look like the uttermost limits of His divine condescension. He has assumed a material, although a rational, nature; and, according to our understanding, it would not have been seemly that He should have assumed an irrational nature. Nevertheless He is not unmindful of the inferior creatures. Their instincts are in some sort a communion with Him, often apparently of a more direct character than reason itself, and bordering on what would commonly be called the supernatural.

“At times there is something startling in the seeming proximity of the animal kingdom to God. Moreover all the inferior animals, with their families, shapes, colours, cries, manners, and peculiarities, represent ideas in the divine mind, and are partial disclosures of the beauty of God, like the foliage of trees, the gleaming of metals, the play of light in the clouds, the multifarious odours of wood and field, and the manifold sound of waters. (more…)

THE CHRISTMAS CARD
— by Laura Wood

TWO became three, then four and five.
What joy, every year, they all seemed so alive
On a holly-decked card that came in the mail.
Five Christmas grins were proof without fail,
That all was well with the Stumper-McLeans,
Despite hidden tensions and financial strains.
The babies in time became soccer players,
Riders of bikes and violin slayers.
The family grew taller and the cards still came.
The haircuts grew crooked, but who was to blame?

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The Boy Who Laughed at Santa Claus
by Ogden Nash (1902-1971)

In Baltimore there lived a boy.
He wasn’t anybody’s joy.
Although his name was Jabez Dawes,
His character was full of flaws.

In school he never led his classes,
He hid old ladies’ reading glasses,
His mouth was open when he chewed,
And elbows to the table glued.
He stole the milk of hungry kittens,
And walked through doors marked NO ADMITTANCE.
He said he acted thus because
There wasn’t any Santa Claus.

Another trick that tickled Jabez
Was crying “Boo” at little babies.
He brushed his teeth, they said in town,
Sideways instead of up and down.
Yet people pardoned every sin,
And viewed his antics with a grin,
Till they were told by Jabez Dawes,
“There isn’t any Santa Claus!”

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WEDNESDAY, Friday and Saturday in the third week of Advent are known as “Ember Days” in the Catholic Church and are traditionally days of fast and partial abstinence from meat (full abstinence on Friday).

Every person who fasts or abstains even a bit from food at this time makes a mockery of the deluge of materialism that surrounds us. Feed the body less; feed the soul more.

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PEGGY HALL once again does a bang-up job analyzing fakery in major news stories, this time with the recent Brown University and Bondi Beach, Australia incidents. We see many ridiculous, implausible details; smiley actors and the same-old political talking points immediately spouted by newscasters, politicians and a college president.

It’s all so tiresome and obvious — much worse than propaganda in the Soviet Union because then most people knew it was propaganda, but Hall writes:

My goal is to help you see that there are NOT random, crazed gunmen running around shooting at random people for no reason.

You don’t need to live in fear.

The media and government love to terrorize people with the threat of danger and violence. (more…)

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“OF ALL the modern notions generated by mere wealth the worst is this: the notion that domesticity is dull and tame. Inside the home (they say) is dead decorum and routine; outside is adventure and variety. This is indeed a rich man’s opinion. The rich man knows that his own house moves on vast and soundless wheels of wealth, is run by regiments of servants, by a swift and silent ritual. On the other hand, every sort of vagabondage of romance is open to him in the streets outside. He has plenty of money and can afford to be a tramp. His wildest adventure will end in a restaurant, while the yokel’s tamest adventure may end in a police-court. If he smashes a window he can pay for it; if he smashes a man he can pension him. He can (like the millionaire in the story) buy an hotel to get a glass of gin. And because he, the luxurious man, dictates the tone of nearly all ‘advanced’ and ‘progressive’ thought, we have almost forgotten what a home really means to the overwhelming millions of mankind. (more…)

GABRIEL’S MESSAGE, a Basque carol about the Annunciation, is performed here by Voces8.

The angel Gabriel from heaven came
His wings as drifted snow his eyes as flame
“All hail” said he “thou lowly maiden Mary,
Most highly favored lady,” Gloria!

“For known a blessed mother thou shalt be,
All generations laud and honor thee,
Thy Son shall be Emanuel, by seers foretold
Most highly favored lady,” Gloria!

Then gentle Mary meekly bowed her head
“To me be as it pleaseth God,” she said,
“My soul shall laud and magnify his holy name.”
Most highly favored lady. Gloria! (more…)

“WHEN the youth who had asked her hand in marriage heard of this, his love was changed into hatred, and he accused her to the Governor, Paschasius, as well for refusing to become his wife, as also for being a Christian and despising the gods. Paschasius called Lucy into his presence, and admonished her to sacrifice to the gods, as well as to keep her promise to the young nobleman. “Neither will be done,” replied the virgin; “I sacrifice only to the true God; to Him have I given my faith; not to any man.” “I obey the command of the Emperor,” replied Paschasius; “you must sacrifice to the gods, and keep your word.” “You obey the command of the Emperor,” said Lucy, “and I obey the command of God. You fear a mortal man, I fear an immortal God, and Him I will obey.”

The story of St. Lucy’s life and martyrdom can be found here.

“No one’s body is polluted so as to endanger the soul if it has not pleased the mind. If you were to lift my hand to your idol and so make me offer against my will, I would still be guiltless in the sight of the true God, who judges according to the will.” (more…)