Tuesday, June 17, 2025

'Queen Lucy & Queen Mary'

 

The South came into being during the age in Western history when the idea of man’s ability to participate directly in the life of the Holy Trinity, to know God through an actual union with His divine energies, had been rejected (see Fr. John Strickland’s very helpful book The Age of Division for an elaboration of this time period in Church history).  Nevertheless, since God Himself is, as St. Dionysius the Areopagite (+1st century) says, Beauty Itself (The Divine Names, chapter IV, section VII), man has a natural inclination toward what is beautiful; he is drawn toward it and desires it, having an intuitive sense that it is connected mystically to God, the Source of all being and goodness (sections IX and X).  But because of Dixie’s ignorance of the reality of participation and union found in the Orthodox Church, she, like the rest of the West after the separation from the Orthodox, had to find a way to satisfy her natural hunger and longing for beauty.  She did this by trying to capture beauty in an earthly container of some kind.

Southerners found various ways to capture and express beauty:  rhetoric, gardens, architecture, literature.  But the most potent embodiment of beauty for Southerners by far is woman.  Southern society has always been down-right enchanted by them.  From Alexander Meek of Alabama’s chivalric antebellum poetry (“A Soldier’s Love Dream,” for instance, pgs. 119-20), to Poe’s mixing of death and womanly beauty in his poem The Raven (“The Philosophy of Composition,” Poe: Essays and Reviews, Library of America, New York, 1984, pgs. 16-19), to the beauty pageants and cotillions that still go on today in parts of the South, the fair and comely woman is at the heart of Dixie’s culture.

Perhaps the most beautiful of them all is Lucy Holcombe Pickens, who has been called the “uncrowned queen of the Southern Confederate States.”  Born on 11 July 1832 in Tennessee, related to Austrian royalty through her Grandmother Holcombe, nearly everything about her life breathed royalty, wealth, and virtue.  It also intersects with the Orthodox Church, as we shall see.

There was jewelry, silverware, and travel along the Mississippi when growing up.  A visit to the Mississippi State Legislature with her family when she was 17 led to its adjournment:  So many of the legislators felt it necessary to escort her to the dock as she left for New Orleans that not enough were left to gather a quorum.

Her first love, a Lt. Crittendon, was killed in an attempt to begin a revolution in Cuba to free the island from Spanish rule in 1851.  She wrote a well-received fictional novel describing the events, The Free Flag of Cuba.

Her second suitor appeared in 1858, Francis W. Pickens.  He was one of the South’s planter politicians, and had married twice, only to have both wives die.  He was struck at once by her beauty, which was described by someone at this season of her life as “[t]all, willowy, with titian hair said to resemble a woof of sunbeams spinning out like a flower at the ends, with eyes to shade that two men could never agree upon.”  He was soon asking Lucy’s father for permission to wed his daughter.  She herself was agreeable to the proposal, but asked Mr. Pickens, as some stories relate, to get an ambassadorship in a foreign country out of a desire to see the wider world.  He asked President Buchanan for such a one, and was appointed ambassador to Russia.

 . . .

The rest is at https://southernorthodox.org/queen-lucy-queen-mary/.

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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!

Friday, June 13, 2025

‘A Message of Hope for Gen Z’

 

Feelings of frustration and betrayal are prevalent in Gen Z (those born between the years 1996 and 2010), and this is understandable.  Many of the institutions and ideals in which they were told to place their trust have not provided them what was promised.

The political system of Americanism – Voting in elections, supporting a political party, checks and balances, etc., are supposed to bring about a peaceful and stable social order.  It has brought the opposite:  polarization, anger, and instability.

Capitalism – The invisible hand of the free market is supposed to distribute goods and wealth in a way beneficial to all.  All too often it allows them to concentrate in the hands of a few to the detriment of most.

Scientism – The Enlightenment trust in rationalism and the scientific method is supposed to dispel lies and usher in an era of human flourishing.  Instead, it actually serves to advance lies (sophisticated propaganda/psychological operations), smother truth (AI to fight ‘misinformation’), and promote products that are harmful to living creatures in this world (mRNA shots, genetically modified crops, etc.).

Gen Z really has been brought into the world at a difficult time, when so many things are going awry.  And yet, in their quest for solutions, many of them are doubling down on the very things that are causing them so much loneliness and anxiety in the first place:  burying themselves more deeply in the ‘hyper reality’ of the digital online world, embracing faddish ideologies, and so forth.

The answers they are seeking lie in the opposite direction, in something that has been vilified for many years now in the West – in a word, tradition.

There are many aspects to it that will help give stability and meaning to Gen Z (and every other generation that is wise enough to embrace it).

Family – This is the primordial society, the most basic social unit.  It is usually presented in a truncated form, as the nuclear family (mother and father + children), but it is much more than that.  It extends horizontally to embrace all living relations (aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, etc.) and vertically to embrace all the departed generations.  In the meaning of one’s last name, in the journey of ancestors from one place to another, in the knowledge of one’s country of origin; in inheriting family heirlooms, learning about the lives of one’s forebears, hearing the stories and jokes they told; walking in the old house of one’s relations – in all of these and similar things there is deep meaning and satisfaction.  One will find practical help in the family also, such as a job or a gift or a loan when faced with financial hardships, care when sick, and so on.

Ethnos and Monarchy – All the extended families that share a common land, a common history, common speechways and other folkways, and a common religion form an ethnos.  This is distinct from modern nations, which are usually artificial constructions based upon loyalty to a pseudo-religious ideology of some kind.  The united States, China, France – these and others are examples of modern nations built upon ideas: the Declaration of Independence, socialism with Chinese characteristics, and Liberty-Equality-Fraternity, respectively.  These are not organic ethnoi, the outgrowth of the family.  There are places within them that meet this criteria, however.  In France, Celtic Brittany is an authentic ethnos.  In the uS, there are many, from the large cultural zones we have mentioned before (Pacific Coast, Spanish Southwest, Dixie, Great Plains, etc.), to the individual States, to the smaller subcultures within the larger ones (Ozarks, Acadiana, upper peninsula of Michigan, etc.).  These are all authentic ethnoi in the uS.

And just as the father is the head of the little family, and the patriarch the head of the extended family, so too is the king the head of the great family, the ethnos.  . . .

The rest is at https://orthodoxreflections.com/a-message-of-hope-for-gen-z/.

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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!

Wednesday, June 11, 2025

Recent Whoppers on American Family Radio

 

Folks on American Family Radio were treated to some extraordinary audio today (Wednesday, 11 June 2025).  On Exploring the Word, the final question was about cremation:  Is it okay for Christians to cremate instead of bury?  The hosts, Misters Harper and McFarland, both said that it is for each Christian to decide, there being no hard and fast rules to go by.

They are both exceptionally wrong.  Both the Holy Scriptures and Church history proclaim that cremation should not be done:

http://www.orthodoxresearchinstitute.org/articles/misc/john_shahovskoy_church_cremation.htm

https://www.saintjohnchurch.org/can-orthodox-christians-be-cremated/

http://orthodoxinfo.com/death/cremation.aspx

This is the latest illustration of why Protestantism isn’t a safe place for Christians to work out their salvation; we once again invite folks, particularly Southerners who are seeking to deepen their connection with Christ by listening to religious broadcasts like AFR, to experience life in Christ in the Orthodox Church, which is in truth the Church of the Apostles.

The second rather unfortunate event on AFR was on Washington Watch with Tony Perkins.  In the interview of Mr Perkins with federal Rep Scott Perry of Pennsylvania, one will see just how bloodthirsty the war-vangelicals are as they slobber all over themselves for war against Iran and Russia, and conjure up numerous lies and misconceptions about thm.  When it comes to understanding those two countries, people like Tucker Carlson and Ben Dixon have a better grasp any day of the week than Misters Perkins and Perry ever will, so long as they cling to their idol of Americanism:

https://tuckercarlson.com/the-tucker-carlson-show

https://responsiblestatecraft.org/tucker-carlson/

https://dixonb.substack.com/

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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!

Tuesday, June 10, 2025

‘Rebuking Rowley’

 

The Freedom Caucuses are amongst the better things happening in State politics today.  Louisiana is blessed to have one, and they have done some good work so far.  Much of the legislation they have written and passed has been excellent, but we cannot say the same thing for some of the resolutions they have written.  The Louisiana Freedom Caucus’s (LFC) condemnation of London (England) Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley is a case-in-point.  It fails rhetorically and strategically.

Sir Mark has threatened to extradite anyone in the US who shares footage on social media of the immigration riots that have plagued England recently that he deems forbidden.  The LFC rightly objected and issued a stern reply to Sir Mark.  But the rhetorical form they chose doesn’t fit the situation at all.  They used a device suited for a cold, dispassionate legal brief (a repetitious list of ‘Whereas’ statements), not for bidding fiery defiance to a would-be tyrant.  Examples:


WHEREAS on the 4th of July, 1776, the 13 British Colonies declared independence from England . . .

 

WHEREAS in 1787, the colonies adopted a Constitution . . .

 

WHEREAS given the fact that English laws related to the infringement of free speech have no effect in the United States . . .

This is the sort of thing that makes peoples’ eyes glaze over, rather than rise up in indignation against the oppressor and in solidarity with the oppressed.

A better example of rhetoric against a tyrant comes from a martyr celebrated on 14 August, St. Eusebius of Palestine (martyred near the end of the 3rd century).  Here is some of the dialogue between him and the Roman judge:


Maxentius, whom the people stirred up by furious clamours against the servant of Christ, said to him: “Sacrifice to the gods freely, or you shall be made to do it against your will.” The martyr replied: “There is a greater law which says, Thou shalt adore the Lord thy God, and him alone shalt thou serve.”

 

Maxentius urged: “Choose either to offer sacrifice, or to suffer the most rigorous torments.” Eusebius answered: “It is not consistent with reason for a person to adore stones, than which nothing is viler or more brittle.”

 

MAXENTIUS: “These Christians are a hardened race of men, to whom it seems desirable rather to die than to live.” EUSEBIUS: “It is impious to despise the light for the sake of darkness.”

Had St. Eusebius answered as the LFC did – ‘Whereas there is a greater law…; Whereas it is not consistent with reason…; Whereas it is impious…; and so forth – such statements would not have been nearly as effective as the brief, direct responses he actually gave.  We hope the LFC will keep things like this in mind in their future resolutions.

Rhetoric aside, there is also the problem of strategy.  In condemning Comm. Rowley, the LFC took too big of a swing and landed some blows on the English people at large with lines like these:


WHEREAS the rights of Americans have been inviolate since that time, though we readily acknowledge England’s failed attempt to retake the colonies, we respectfully remind the Commissioner how that fracas ended---with an enormous defeat of England’s Army at the Battle of New Orleans.  English casualties were high and the Royal Army was sent home without the treasure or property it craved; . . .

If the LFC really wants to make Sir Mark uncomfortable, they need to undermine his position of strength in England.  That is done by making common cause with the plainfolk of England, the people he is threatening just like Louisianans and other Southerners and the rest of the States with jail time for sharing videos on social media.  However, one does not make allies by mocking the history and valor of those English people, saying in effect ‘We kicked yo’ hineys once, and we’re ready to do it again.’

The LFC ought to say instead that they understand and value the deep cultural ties Louisiana and all the other States share with the English people.  . . .

The rest is at https://identitydixie.com/2024/08/19/rebuking-rowley/.

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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!