TURN FOR TURN
— Benjamin Dionysius Hill, C.S.P.

Jesus, my King, I have crucified Thee:
Now it is Thy turn to crucify me.
Make Thou the cross —- be it only like Thine:
Mix Thou the gall —- so Thy love be the wine.

Shrink not to strip me — of all but Thy grace.
Stretch me out well, till I fit in Thy place.
Here are my hands (felon hands!) and my feet:
Drive home the nails, Lord: the pain shall be sweet.

Raise me, and take me not down till I die.
Only let Mary, my mercy, stand by.
Last, let the spear while I live do its part: —
Right thro’ the heart, my King — right thro’ the heart!

“WITHOUT the grace of God, no one can attain eternal life: in neglecting the practice of mortification, in giving way to sensual indulgence, in leading a life of softness, of pleasure and dissipation, you are directly opposing the influence of divine grace; you are throwing down the arms, which were given you for combat, and are placing yourselves defenceless in the power of your mortal enemies. As you value, then, your salvation, my dear friends, let your notions and conduct on this vital subject be, from this moment, reformed. Resolutely undertake the mortification of your sensual appetites, the conquest of your rebellious will, the destruction of the empire of self-love.

Undertake it as men, lest indulgence should strengthen, and render irresistible those evil propensities, of which you are the inheritors. Undertake it as christians, lest you degrade that sacred character which you bear, and break the solemn engagements, into which you have entered. Undertake it as sinners, lest, by failing to satisfy the injured justice of God in the present life, you come to feel the weight of His indignation in the life to come.

“Let the holy season, on which we are entering, be to you the commencement of a new life. Courageously join with all the true children of the Church of God in declaring war upon the flesh and its concupiscences. If you are terrified at the prospect of privations and restraints, know, that God Himself will render the rough way of penance smooth and agreeable, in proportion as you advance.

“To animate yourself to the task, often extend your views beyond the present order of things. Often, in imagination, anticipate the moment, when you are to stand before the awful tribunal of an omniscient God: then, if you shall have deserved a favourable sentence, how pleasing will be the retrospect of the little crosses and momentary tribulations, by which you have purchased for yourselves above measure an exceeding weight of glory: but, should you unfortunately be cast at that momentous trial, how bitter the reflection, that for a few, fleeting, base, and deceitful gratifications, you have lost your title to eternal happiness, and incurred a condemnation to eternal woe.”

— “The Necessity of Mortification,” 1855

HERE is a great list of resources for the season of Lent, which begins today Ash Wednesday. There is nothing more important than to give yourself to prayer and penance during the next 40 days and to capture some of that collective spiritual energy of the season, a vitality that still exists in these nihilistic times.

While exterior works of penance are important, inner mortification is superior.

From Dom Prosper Gueranger’s The Liturgical Year:

“Our Redeemer would not have us receive the announcement of the great feast as one of sadness and melancholy. The Christian who understands what a dangerous thing it is to be behindhand with divine justice welcomes the season of Lent with joy; it consoles him. He knows that if he be faithful in observing what the Church prescribes, his debt will be less heavy upon him. These penances, these satisfactions (which the indulgence of the Church has rendered so easy), being offered to God unitedly with those of our Savior Himself, and being rendered fruitful by that holy fellowship which blends into one common propitiatory sacrifice the good works of all the members of the Church militant, will purify our souls, and make them worthy to partake in the grand Easter joy. Let us not, then, be sad because we are to fast; let us be sad only because we have sinned and made fasting a necessity. In this same Gospel, our Redeemer gives us a second counsel, which the Church will often bring before us during the whole course of Lent: it is that of joining almsdeeds with our fasting. He bids us to lay up treasures in heaven. For this, we need intercessors; let us seek them amidst the poor.”

O Lord, rebuke me not in Thy indignation, nor chastise me in Thy wrath. Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I am weak: heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled. My soul also is troubled exceedingly: but Thou, O Lord, how long? Turn Thee, O Lord, and deliver my soul: O save me for Thy mercy’s sake. For in death, there is no one that remembereth Thee: and who shall give Thee thanks in hell? I have labored in my groanings: every night I will wash my bed, and water my couch with my tears. Mine eye is troubled through indignation: I have grown old amongst all mine enemies. Depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity: for the Lord hath heard the voice of my weeping. The Lord hath heard my supplication: the Lord hath received my prayer. Let all mine enemies be ashamed, and sore vexed: let them be turned back, and be ashamed very speedily.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

Psalm 6, The Penitential Psalms

FROM The Last Refuge:

Justin Trudeau and Chrystia Freeland essentially broke the financial code of Omerta, by highlighting how easy it is for government to seize your bank accounts, credit cards, retirement accounts, insurance, mortgages, loan access and cut you off from money (without due process).

The unintended consequence was an immediate and clear reference point if government did the same action with a digital ID in place.

However, this undermined confidence and faith in the banking system cannot be restored quickly.  The toothpaste cannot be put back into the tube. The horse has left the barn.

Quickly this becomes a moment for immediate damage control by the Canadian government. This explains why Justin Trudeau dropped the declaration of the Emergency Act.

It all makes sense now.  All of it.

Read more.

PROPAGANDA is the conscious manipulation of the thoughts and feelings of the multitudes. Covid propaganda has involved endless verbal manipulation, both subtle and not-so-subtle.

Consider one small element in this mass campaign — one drop in the tsunami of words.  Searching for the term “Covid measures” in Google, I came up with 333** million results. In the last few days alone there were dozens of news stories that referred to Covid “measures.” Read More »

LAURA L. M. writes:

I’ve kept up with your work in the last two years as somewhat of a lifeline. I homeschooled my sons before and during the “lockdown” and did my level best to keep life as normal for them as possible. Still, the pervasive fear tactics made me grateful for your site to remind me there was more to the story than met the eye.

As the insanity winds down, I find myself looking at our nation. What a spoiled bunch of children we are. Such shallow lives we’ve led, with our focus on shiny objects and entertainment. I have lost interest in mass entertainment because I find it dull and filthy. No wonder we allowed this charade to continue for so long. It’s like being in a horror movie and our society enjoys horror movies.

I move forward, though. I prefer that to the alternative. Thank you for the dose of reality along the way. Read More »

THE FEDERAL Writers Project collection of slave narratives in the Library of Congress is a national treasure.

These first-hand accounts, assembled from 1936 to 1938 by interviewers hired by the Works Progress Administration, offer a realistic view of slavery in America, of a time when blacks and whites lived and worked together, for better or for worse.

Many slaves, while condemning slavery, attested to being well-treated by their masters. Many attested to being whipped. Many were honest about the faults and bad habits of their fellow slaves. In general, it’s hard to imagine these raconteurs partaking of the whiny tears and tantrums of today’s agitators. They often come across as earthy and wise personalities who tell their stories of slavery, war, greedy Yankees and post-war chaos without self-pity, envy or hatred. An early director of the oral history project was John Lomax, a white Southerner, who deserves great credit for insisting the narratives not be edited or censored in any way.

Ex-slave Millie Barber, of Winnsboro, South Carolina, was among those who shared her story. The most egregious part of her colorful narrative relates to her parents being separated on different plantations:

“Hope you find yourself well dis mornin’, white folks. I’s just common; ‘spect I eats too much yesterday. You know us celebrated yesterday, ’cause it was de Fourth of July. Us had a good dinner on dis 2,000 acre farm of Mr. Owens. God bless dat white boss man! What would us old no ‘count niggers do widout him? Dere’s six or seven, maybe eight of us out here over eighty years old. ‘Most of them is like me, not able to hit a lick of work, yet he take care of us; he sho’ does.

“Mr. Owens not a member of de church but he allowed dat he done found out dat it more blessed to give than to receive, in case like us.

“You wants to know all ’bout de slavery time, de war, de Ku Kluxes and everything? My tongue too short to tell you all dat I knows. However, if it was as long as my stockin’s, I could tell you a trunk full of good and easy, bad and hard, dat dis old life-stream have run over in eighty-two years. I’s hoping to reach at last them green fields of Eden of de Promise Land. ‘Scuse me ramblin’ ’round, now just ask me questions; I bet I can answer all you ask. Read More »

WERE the “police” who brutally attacked protestors in Canada not Canadian police at all? (Language warning.)

Gaspare Traversi, ca. 1758

“IN times of desolation, God conceals Himself from us so that we can discover for ourselves what we are without Him.” – St. Margaret of Cortona

LAST MONTH, the unnamed man pictured above was approached by an armed 18-year-old in the Fairmount neighborhood of Philadelphia. In one of three attempted carjackings that night in the city, the teenager demanded his car.

Instead, the driver pulled out a gun and fired five times. His action may have saved his life. The teenager fled and was later treated at a hospital.

Too bad 60-year-old, military veteran George Briscella who was shot and killed by a carjacker this month while leaving his mother’s home in Northeast Philadlephia; 70-year-old Chung Chin who was savagely beaten to death by carjackers in December; 25-year-old Milan Longcar who was shot and killed last year in Philadelphia while walking his dog; and 21-year-old Samuel Collington who was shot and killed two months ago in a carjacking near Temple University were all not armed and ready. They might all be alive today.

America’s cities are more dangerous than ever, now with frequent and unbelievably brazen carjackings, which have reportedly risen by more than 500 percent in major cities and which Philadelphia Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw (bad enough that she’s a woman, but the name!) attributes in part to the normalization of face masks, which have predictably provided thugs with a new level of anonymity.

In the case of Longcar, his sister said that she and his friends were so shaken by his murder that they would be moving out of Philadelphia.

Are these neighborhoods going to be left to criminals? Will the people who cannot move to another location become more and more threatened?

Whites such as Longcar’s sister and Collington have learned complete passivity in the face of mortal threats to their existence. The answer is not for everyone to move, but for an armed and ready citizenry to emerge. Most teenagers engaging in acts of theft do not want to risk their lives and the police alone cannot possibly prevent these crimes. Only when criminals know that they may endanger themselves will our cities ever be reasonably safer.

It is essential not only for law-abiding adults to learn to wield a gun, but also to familiarize themselves with the laws in each state so that they themselves are not arrested after justified self defense. In the case of the driver above, he understood how to explain his action: his life was in danger.

Just a reminder on the morality of gun use:

“…the act of self-defense may have two effects, one is the saving of one’s life, the other is the slaying of the aggressor. Therefore this act, since one’s intention is to save one’s own life, is not unlawful, seeing that it is natural to everything to keep itself in ‘being,’ as far as possible. And yet, though proceeding from a good intention, an act may be rendered unlawful, if it be out of proportion to the end. Wherefore if a man, in self-defense, uses more than necessary violence, it will be unlawful: whereas if he repel force with moderation his defense will be lawful, because according to the jurists [Cap. Significasti, De Homicid. volunt. vel casual.], ‘it is lawful to repel force by force, provided one does not exceed the limits of a blameless defense.’ Nor is it necessary for salvation that a man omit the act of moderate self-defense in order to avoid killing the other man, since one is bound to take more care of one’s own life than of another’s.”

— St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Q. 64 murder, Article 7

These crimes are committed — possibly without exception — by blacks, incited and emboldened no doubt by the orchestrated war against social order. They encourage anger to be displaced from those committing the incitement, who are engaging in a controlled demolition of our economy and society at large, to the savage and powerless. The majority of victims in cities like Philadelphia are black and most of the perpetrators end up with ruined lives in jail.

                                                              Howard Pyle

“A GENTLE KNIGHT was pricking on the plain,
Yelad in mighty arms and silver shield,
Wherein old dints of deep wounds did remain,
The cruel marks of many a bloody field;
Yet arms till that time did he never wield.
His angry steed did chide his foaming bit,
As much disdaining to the curb to yield:
Full jolly knight he seem’d, and fair did sit,
As one for knightly jousts and fierce encounters fit.

But on his breast a bloody cross he bore,
The dear remembrance of his dying Lord,
For whose sweet sake that glorious badge he wore,
And dead as living ever him ador’d;
Upon his shield the like was also scor’d.
For soveraine hope, which in his helpe he had:
Right faithful true he was in deed and word,
But of his cheer did seem too solemne sad;
Yet nothing did he dread, but ever was ydrad.

— Edmund Spenser, The Faery Queen

HE didn’t go so far as to acknowledge that Covid isn’t even a distinct contagious disease, but Ontario Premier Doug Ford committed a remarkable act of apostasy earlier this week by saying that the entire prevention paradigm has been a failure and most people want to move on. Kudos to Mr. Ford for his honesty. Read More »

“IF ever you have a fit of sadness or trouble, remember that it is because you are still attached to life, or health, or some comfort, or person, or thing that you ought to forget and despise, that you may desire Jesus Christ only.”

— St. Claude de la Colombière

(H/t: @TempusFugit4016)

THOUGH I oppose the systematic defamation of the white race that is growing ever more intense by the day, especially now that even “nice whites” are considered racist and lacking in moral legitimacy as human beings, now that even a painting of apples or pears in a bowl is considered an expression of disgraceful domination of humanity, and though I believe it is my absolute duty to oppose this systematic defamation and that those deracinated whites who support it are committing nothing less than treason against their ancestors, I do not consider myself or call myself a “white nationalist.”

Not that anybody cares what this unimportant blogger calls herself. But let me explain. For the record.

To call myself a “white nationalist” would imply that 1) I hold the white race above all else 2) that my devotion to my nation is a kind of religion.

I call myself a patriot. That’s all, a patriot. Read More »

ALAN writes:

When the central St. Louis Public Library opened in 1912 and for many years afterward, there were thousands of books in the building, but there were no screens in the modern sense of that word.  The only “screens” in the building were those that people — staff and patrons alike — carried with them in their head:  The “screen” of imagination, a phrase I use with extreme reluctance because it is so unfair to the capacity of imagination, which includes the capacity for conceptual thought, comprehension, reason, and memory.

Today, a century later, there are more than 150 screens in that building, including those for staff, reference and catalog, those with Internet access for patrons, and six oversize screens used for cutesy, colorful, trendy, and always-politically-correct signs and scenes, the purpose of which is to “catch the eye” (or to assault the imagination, depending on one’s perspective).

To glamorize the Here, the Now, the Concrete — represented on screens, is effectively to diminish the abstract, the conceptual, the past — represented in books with words.

That is why Americans are now taught to incorporate screens into every part of their homes and lives.  It is all part of the calculated dumbing down that the late American patriot Charlotte Iserbyt chronicled extensively in her excellent work.  It is why books and magazines are increasingly designed to resemble comic books, and why libraries and bookstores are overstuffed with picture books for children:  To get them accustomed first to looking at pictures in books and then at pictures on screens.  It is the Lure of Gadgets against the Capacity for Thought.  The unstated mandate is:  You must not remember.  You must not think.  You must gape.  You must be receptive to what the screen tells you.

The goal is to prevent or minimize the development of the capacity for independent, conceptual thought.   What you must learn is that whether and what you think will be determined not by you but by those who control the screens.

I remember watching early episodes of television’s “The Outer Limits” in 1963.  At the outset of each episode, the Control Voice said:

“We are controlling transmission.  We will control the horizontal.  We will control the vertical.  For the next hour, we will control all that you see and hear.”

But that was modest.  The Control Voices have now increased and expanded their power across the culture.  Omnipresent screens are their levers for controlling people who think they are being informed and entertained.

COVID is not a contagious virus and it is not a bioweapon out of China. Timothy Fitzpatrick debunks the Wuhan bioweapon propaganda and explains its purpose.

The real biological weapons, by the way, are the toxins in our air, water, food and pharmaceuticals, things which no one talks about — conveniently for those who profit from poison.

Read More »