Vote for St Martin

Election day in Louisiana will arrive soon, and we are hearing the usual grab-bag of worldly, utopian promises:  better health care, more jobs, lower insurance rates, and so on.  A just economy is a good thing, but it is also a secondary thing.  What is of the utmost importance is the spiritual health of the people of Louisiana.  What are candidates for office promising in this regard?  Nothing.  We are reversing the command of the Lord Jesus, ‘But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you’ (St Matt. 6:33).

What could political officials do to help Louisianans seek and find the Kingdom of God?  One of the most foundational is to lead the people in devotion to God.  Immediately upon their being sworn in, they should convene a statewide gathering of Protestants, Roman Catholics, and Orthodox at the holy bone relic of St Martin of Tours at the St Martin de Tours Church in St Martinville to ask the Holy Saint to pray for their salvation and for the salvation of all in this State.  St Martin is one of the main patron saints of France but who also did much to enlighten all of Western Europe and who was likely influenced in his monastic practices by the Desert Fathers of Africa; he is therefore a good choice for a patron saint of Louisiana as well.  St Martinville ought to be the spiritual capital of Louisiana just as Baton Rouge is the political and New Orleans the economic. 

Every year they should lead the people on pilgrimage to St Martin’s bone relic on his main feast day, Nov. 11th.  They should install holy crosses and icons in public schools and in all other public buildings for the people to venerate, to sanctify our communal life.  Days of major feasts of the Lord Jesus (not just Christmas and Easter, but also feasts like the Lord’s Baptism and Transfiguration, and the Elevation of the Holy Cross), His Most Pure Mother, and other major saints should become holidays.  Local officials whose towns and parishes are named after saints or angels ought to make sure they are honored in a very public way.  Monasticism should be encouraged to give the folk examples of the Christian life lived to its fullest extent (i.e., renunciation of the world) by the monks and nuns.

Things like this are being done in other countries:  by Salvini in Italy, Orban in Hungary, Dodon in Moldova.  The Polish government recently began phasing out commerce on Sundays.  Louisiana ought to imitate them.  For without a healthy Christian faith statewide, there will be no health in politics or economics, either.

Louisiana already has a religious ritual she follows, but it is not Christian.  Its main centers of devotion are the Superdome and Tiger Stadium and the Governor’s Mansion, and its saints are Drew Brees, Zion Williamson, and Edwin Edwards.  Its times and cycles of worship follow the ebb and flow of the sports and the political calendars.  What we are proposing is therefore nothing new, only a re-orienting of the religious focus of Louisiana to proper objects of devotion. 

So, then, next time you hear a political candidate talking about tax policy or roads or Medicare, ask him what he thinks of St Martin of Tours instead.

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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!

Plain Folk and Secession

In an encouraging sign, secession is being talked about seriously by a mainstream news site in an interview with a rural Pennsylvanian named Chris:

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/political-confessional-the-man-who-thinks-the-u-s-is-better-off-as-a-bunch-of-separate-countries/

We don’t agree with all of his views, particularly that a post-[u.] S. South would be a bad place for black folks to live.  Prof Brion McClanahan dealt with that issue briefly here:

https://www.abbevilleinstitute.org/blog/the-republic-of-alabama/

That said, a conversation about secession couldn’t come at a better time, as political opponents in the States are nearing each other’s throats:

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-08-07/death-camps-trump-supporters-fliers-posted-new-york

https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2018/october/anti-trump-posters-in-new-york-depict-evangelicals-trump-supporters-as-trash

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/ads-pulled-for-violent-film-the-hunt-after-recent-shootings

https://oathkeepers.org/2017/11/coming-civil-war-lose/

https://www.naturalnews.com/2019-08-07-ex-cnn-host-calls-for-eradication-of-all-trump-supporters.html

There is no need to try to hold the union together if the peoples of the various States no longer want one another’s company.  That was the tragedy of Lincoln’s War:  He tried to hold two different and diverging cultures together by force of arms.  The superficial peace he and his successors created by burning the South to ashes, looting what was left, and then having Yankee culture run rough-shod over everyone (in the South and the West) is now coming to an end.  Let us not make the same mistake this time; we ought to let those who want to leave the union do so peacefully and with all goodwill.

And with the American Deep State Elite breaking up into factions, now might be as good a time as any for secession (since there is less likely to be a common, united will to crush the efforts of a State or States to leave the union):

https://gizadeathstar.com/2019/08/the-factional-infighting-has-been-noticed/

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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!

Offsite Post: ‘Silverwood, the South, and What’s Normal Anyway?’

We live in a day and a time when nearly every Christian norm once taken for granted has come under withering attack, whether the family, sexuality, hierarchy, or what have you.  This was amply illustrated earlier in the year by Coach McGraw of Notre Dame and here recently by Megan Rapinoe of u. S. soccer fame.  But we in the South do have a source of strength and guidance to help us navigate through this murky miasmal time, to remind us of what it means to be a normal human being:  our literature.  It has within it the sort of down-to-earth spirit that is necessary to help us live good lives in a world that has lost its moorings. 

One such book from the Southern literary canon is the novel Silverwood: A Book of Memories by Mrs Margaret Junkin Preston (1820-97).  Even in its opening pages, we find a very important means of keeping our wits about us:  holding on to our connections with the past.  The South is not trying to create a utopia based on new principles uncovered in theoretical speculation.  Rather, she has always tried to remain faithful to the old ways of her ancestors, to carry them over and adapt them here in her new homeland in North America as best she can.  Speaking about a painting in the house to her son Lawrence, Mrs Irvine, the matriarch of the story whose husband had died some years before, gives voice to this, saying,

“ . . . It was always full of interest for me, principally, perhaps, from home associations. One of the earliest memories of my childhood is, being held up before it by my father, while he told me the sad story it delineates, with all the touches of pathos which Chaucer introduces into his version of it. I can recall even yet," continued Mrs. Irvine, musingly, “the very tones in which he used to recite some of the lines:

--'Father, why do ye weep?

Is there no morsel bread that ye do keep?

I am so hungry that I cannot sleep!'

As I grew older, I was, perhaps, more interested in it from the fact that it used to hang on the wall in the old ancestral home of our family, on the southern border of Scotland. Your great grandfather, ‘the Laird of Newton,' as he was called, looked on that picture many a time as you do now, no doubt; so that the associations it furnishes, make me prize it more than its own intrinsic merit as a work of art.  . . .”

--Silverwood, Derby & Jackson, New York, 1856, pgs. 10-11, available online

Developing an identity fixed in the history of one’s forefathers is a guard against the anxiety and despair caused by a lack of roots in anything other than the shallow, toxic, never-settled culture of Modernity.

One of the virtues that grew out of this veneration of the past in Dixie was the centrality of the family in her life, and the great affection of the members for one another - in particular, the love of sons for mothers, part of the code of chivalry held dear by Southrons.  Mrs Preston illustrates:

A laughing group entering the parlor, interrupted the conversation. Josepha, a child not much over ten, installed herself upon her brother's knee; Eunice, the next older sister, couched herself upon the rug, and took the head of the little grey-hound into her lap; Zilpha sat on a low seat beside her mother: and to the cheerful voices that floated through the twilight room, the music, tender and soft, which Edith's fingers awakened, formed a subdued accompaniment, as she played and listened.

 . . .

There was something very beautiful in his [Lawrence’s] manner towards his mother. He loved to choose his seat near her; he addressed to her the most of his conversation; he anticipated her minute wants,—the stool for her feet,—the cushion for her head,—the books she liked best near her,—the first flower of Spring,—the first tinged leaf of Autumn: there was no limit to the unobtrusive manifestations of his thoughtful love. He never overlooked her presence in a room; and many a time would he leave the group of interested talkers, if he chanced to observe her sitting apart, and address himself to her entertainment. His attentions were more than the dictates of filial devotion,—more than the simple homage of graceful youth to riper age. Had she been a young beauty, whose fascinations had enthralled him, there could not have been a more delicate mingling of what might be termed the chivalry of the heart with the tenderness of his love. The language of look and action was,—"others may do much for me,—but no suffering in my behalf,—no ministrations,— no devotedness, can be like a mother's!" And as he now sat with his arm over the back of her chair, talking with her of his plans and prospects, and the eyes of each strayed to the circle about the table, animatedly discussing what particular thing they would like best to have brought them from abroad,—the gaze of the mother and son was simultaneously raised to the grim canvas on the wall, with an inward ''thank God," that, as yet, the home-picture was shadowless.

--pgs. 14, 16-7

Yet shadows do come for the family, some very dark ones in fact, but those events serve to bring out one of the main themes in the story, which is also another one of those Southern virtues that can help us much in life:  a deep trust in God’s providence to direct our lives to good ends, no matter how bad the present looks.  A conversation between Edith and Dr Dubois brings this theme into the open for the reader at one point:

 . . .

The rest is at https://www.reckonin.com/walt-garlington/silverwood-the-south-and-whats-normal-anyway .

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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!

Violence Begets Violence

Part of Pres Trump’s statement regarding the shootings in El Paso and Dayton went as follows:

My fellow Americans, this morning, our nation is overcome with shock, horror, and sorrow. This weekend, more than 80 people were killed or wounded in two evil attacks.  . . .

We will stand by their side forever. We will never forget. These barbaric slaughters are an assault upon our communities, an attack upon our nation, and a crime against all of humanity. We are outraged and sickened by this monstrous evil, the cruelty, the hatred, the malice, the bloodshed, and the terror.

Our hearts are shattered for every family whose parents, children, husbands, and wives were ripped from their arms and their lives. America weeps for the fallen. We are a loving nation, and our children are entitled to grow up in a just, peaceful, and loving society. Together, we lock arms to shoulder the grief, we ask God in Heaven to ease the anguish of those who suffer, and we vow to act with urgent resolve.

--https://factba.se/transcript/donald-trump-remarks-mass-shooting-el-paso-dayton-august-5-2019

These are some high-sounding words, but they are very hypocritical in light of Pres Trump’s foreign policy.  Because of it, how many tens of thousands of men, women, and, yes, children have suffered hunger, chemical burns, and death in Yemen, Syria, Venezuela, Iran, and elsewhere?

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/larison/233000-have-died-in-the-war-on-yemen/

https://kurtnimmo.blog/2019/08/03/trump-ponders-deadly-blockade-of-venezuela/

https://www.globalresearch.ca/the-united-states-did-it-again-its-warplanes-use-white-phosphorous-munitions-in-syria/5657057

And yet there are never any calls from the President to ‘weep for’ these ‘fallen’, to ‘lock arms to shoulder’ their ‘grief’.  There is no ‘outrage’ for these ‘barbaric slaughters’.

Pres Trump went on to blame hatred for one of the shootings:

The shooter in El Paso posted a manifesto online consumed by racist hate. In one voice, our nation must condemn racism, bigotry, and white supremacy. These sinister ideologies must be defeated. Hate has no place in America. Hatred warps the mind, ravages the heart, and devours the soul.

--https://factba.se/transcript/donald-trump-remarks-mass-shooting-el-paso-dayton-august-5-2019

This is quite true, but again he undermines his own argument.  While all loss of life is tragic, the ideology of Americanism is fueling far more violence around the world than white supremacy.  Why is it permissible to offer the blood sacrifice of thousands of lives on the altar of not just American exceptionalism but American supremacism?  Those also are ‘sinister ideologies’ which ‘must be defeated’ if there is to be a reduction in violence in the world.

He said further,

Second, we must stop the glorification of violence in our society. This includes the gruesome and grisly video games that are now commonplace. It is too easy today for troubled youth to surround themselves with a culture that celebrates violence. We must stop or substantially reduce this, and it has to begin immediately.

Cultural change is hard, but each of us can choose to build a culture that celebrates the inherent worth and dignity of every human life.

--Ibid.

Here again, if he really believes this, why is the [u.] S. military under his command glorifying violent video games and turning military service itself into a video game?

https://www.theguardian.com/games/2018/oct/09/unmanned-video-game-drone-warfare

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/01/army-video-games/

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/army-military-video-game-fortnite-battlegrounds-call-duty-esports-defence-a8648656.html

https://www.stripes.com/news/uncle-sam-wants-you-to-play-video-games-for-the-us-army-1.555885

Pres Trump closed with these remarks:

May God bless the memory of those who perished in Toledo. May God protect them. May God protect all of those from Texas to Ohio. May God bless the victims and their families. May God bless America.  . . .

--https://factba.se/transcript/donald-trump-remarks-mass-shooting-el-paso-dayton-august-5-2019

We should pray for God’s blessings for the departed and for the survivors, but we should not pray for God’s blessing on the world-scourge of America.  It needs to break apart.  The more people try to hold it together, the more the internal cultural differences and stresses will cause violence to increase.  The only way to keep the fake construct of America ‘united’ will be a totalitarian government, and we are well on our way there.  The better course is to allow each cultural region and/or each State to go her own way.

The larger point, however, is that the peoples of the States are turning a blind eye to the violence their own armed forces are inflicting on innocent people around the world.  Abraham Hamilton on American Family Radio makes the link between abortion and the culture of violence.  Fine.  We agree.  But he and others like him need to go further and make the connection between Washington City’s endless wars abroad and the culture of violence this encourages back home as well.

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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!