As the 2022 midterm elections approach, who will stop our descent into collective poverty, division—and self-inflicted madness?
By Victor Davis Hanson
American Greatness
January 19, 2022
In modern times, as in ancient Rome, several nations have suffered a “systems collapse.” The term describes the sudden inability of once prosperous populations to continue with what had ensured the good life as they knew it.
Abruptly, the population cannot buy, or even find, once plentiful necessities. They feel their streets are unsafe. Laws go unenforced or are enforced inequitably. Everyday things stop working. The government turns from reliable to capricious if not hostile.
Consider contemporary Venezuela. By 2010, the once well-off oil-exporting country was mired in a self-created mess. Food became scarce, crime ubiquitous.
Radical socialism, nationalization, corruption, jailing opponents, and the destruction of constitutional norms were the culprits.
Between 2009 and 2016, a once relatively stable Greece nearly became a Third World country. So did Great Britain in its socialist days of the 1970s.
Joe Biden’s young presidency may already be leading the United States into a similar meltdown.
Hard Left “woke” ideology has all but obliterated the idea of a border. Millions of impoverished foreigners are entering the United States illegally—and during a pandemic without either COVID-19 tests or vaccinations.
The health bureaucracies have lost credibility as official communiques on masks, herd and acquired immunity, vaccinations, and comorbidities apparently change and adjust to perceived political realities.
After decades of improving race relations, America is regressing into a premodern tribal society.
Crime soars. Inflation roars. Meritocracy is libeled and so we are governed more by ideology and tribe.
The soaring prices of the stuff of life—fuel, food, housing, health care, transportation—are strangling the middle class.
Millions stay home, content to be paid by the state not to work. Supply shortages and empty shelves are the new norm.
Nineteenth century-style train robberies are back. So is 1970s urban violence, replete with looting, carjackings, and random murdering of the innocent.
After the Afghanistan debacle, we have returned to the dark days following defeat in Vietnam, when U.S. deterrence abroad was likewise shattered, and global terrorism and instability were the norms abroad.
Who could have believed a year ago that America would now beg Saudi Arabia and Russia to pump more oil—as we pulled our own oil leases, and canceled pipelines and oil fields?
Our path to systems collapse is not due to an earthquake, climate change, a nuclear war, or even the COVID-19 pandemic.
Instead, most of our maladies are self-inflicted. They are the direct result of woke ideologies that are both cruel and antithetical to traditional American pragmatism.
Hard-Left district attorneys in our major cities refuse to charge thousands of arrested criminals—relying instead on bankrupt social justice theories.
Law enforcement has been arbitrarily defunded and libeled. Police deterrence is lost, so looters, vandals, thieves, and murderers more freely prey on the public.
“Modern monetary theory” deludes ideologues that printing trillions of dollars can enrich the public, even as the ensuing inflation is making people poorer.
“Critical race theory” absurdly dictates that current “good” racism can correct the effects of past bad racism. A once tolerant, multiracial nation is resembling the factionalism of the former Yugoslavia.
The culprit again is a callous woke ideology that posits little value for individuals, prioritizing only the so-called collective agenda.
Woke’s trademark is “equity,” or a forced equality of result. Practically, we are becoming a comic-book version of victims and victimizers, with woke opportunists playacting as our superheroes.
Strangest in 2021 was the systematic attack on our ancient institutions, as we scapegoated our ancestors for our own incompetencies.
The woke have waged a veritable war against the 233-year-old Electoral College and the right of states to set their own balloting laws in national elections, the 180-year-old filibuster, the 150-year-old nine-person Supreme Court, and the 60-year-old, 50-state union.
The U.S. military, Department of Justice, FBI, CIA, Center for Disease Control, and National Institutes of Health until recently were revered. Their top echelons were staffed by career professionals mostly immune to the politics of the day.
Not now. These bureaus and agencies are losing public confidence and support. Citizens fear rather than respect Washington grandees who have weaponized politics ahead of public service.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley, Attorney General Merrick Garland, former FBI heads like James Comey and Andrew McCabe, retired CIA director John Brennan, and Anthony Fauci head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases—politicalized and vastly exceeded their professional purviews.
They sounded off in public fora as if they were elected legislators up for reelection. Some lied under oath. Others demonized critics. Most sought to become media darlings.
This governmental freefall is overseen by a tragically bewildered, petulant, and incompetent president. In his confusion, an increasingly unpopular Joe Biden seems to believe his divisive chaos is working, belittling his political opponents as racist Confederate rebels.
As we head into the 2022 midterm elections, who will stop our descent into collective poverty, division—and self-inflicted madness?
___________
Posted inUncategorized|Comments Off on YES!!! IT WOULD SEEM AS THOUGH AMERICA IS HEADED FOR A TOTAL COLLAPSE OF THE GREATEST FORM OF SELF-GOVERNMENT THE WORLD HAS EVER KNOWN
As the 2022 midterm elections approach, who will stop our descent into collective poverty, division—and self-inflicted madness?
By Victor Davis Hanson
American Greatness
January 19, 2022
In modern times, as in ancient Rome, several nations have suffered a “systems collapse.” The term describes the sudden inability of once prosperous populations to continue with what had ensured the good life as they knew it.
Abruptly, the population cannot buy, or even find, once plentiful necessities. They feel their streets are unsafe. Laws go unenforced or are enforced inequitably. Everyday things stop working. The government turns from reliable to capricious if not hostile.
Consider contemporary Venezuela. By 2010, the once well-off oil-exporting country was mired in a self-created mess. Food became scarce, crime ubiquitous.
Radical socialism, nationalization, corruption, jailing opponents, and the destruction of constitutional norms were the culprits.
Between 2009 and 2016, a once relatively stable Greece nearly became a Third World country. So did Great Britain in its socialist days of the 1970s.
Joe Biden’s young presidency may already be leading the United States into a similar meltdown.
Hard Left “woke” ideology has all but obliterated the idea of a border. Millions of impoverished foreigners are entering the United States illegally—and during a pandemic without either COVID-19 tests or vaccinations.
The health bureaucracies have lost credibility as official communiques on masks, herd and acquired immunity, vaccinations, and comorbidities apparently change and adjust to perceived political realities.
After decades of improving race relations, America is regressing into a premodern tribal society.
Crime soars. Inflation roars. Meritocracy is libeled and so we are governed more by ideology and tribe.
The soaring prices of the stuff of life—fuel, food, housing, health care, transportation—are strangling the middle class.
Millions stay home, content to be paid by the state not to work. Supply shortages and empty shelves are the new norm.
Nineteenth century-style train robberies are back. So is 1970s urban violence, replete with looting, carjackings, and random murdering of the innocent.
After the Afghanistan debacle, we have returned to the dark days following defeat in Vietnam, when U.S. deterrence abroad was likewise shattered, and global terrorism and instability were the norms abroad.
Who could have believed a year ago that America would now beg Saudi Arabia and Russia to pump more oil—as we pulled our own oil leases, and canceled pipelines and oil fields?
Our path to systems collapse is not due to an earthquake, climate change, a nuclear war, or even the COVID-19 pandemic.
Instead, most of our maladies are self-inflicted. They are the direct result of woke ideologies that are both cruel and antithetical to traditional American pragmatism.
Hard-Left district attorneys in our major cities refuse to charge thousands of arrested criminals—relying instead on bankrupt social justice theories.
Law enforcement has been arbitrarily defunded and libeled. Police deterrence is lost, so looters, vandals, thieves, and murderers more freely prey on the public.
“Modern monetary theory” deludes ideologues that printing trillions of dollars can enrich the public, even as the ensuing inflation is making people poorer.
“Critical race theory” absurdly dictates that current “good” racism can correct the effects of past bad racism. A once tolerant, multiracial nation is resembling the factionalism of the former Yugoslavia.
The culprit again is a callous woke ideology that posits little value for individuals, prioritizing only the so-called collective agenda.
Woke’s trademark is “equity,” or a forced equality of result. Practically, we are becoming a comic-book version of victims and victimizers, with woke opportunists playacting as our superheroes.
Strangest in 2021 was the systematic attack on our ancient institutions, as we scapegoated our ancestors for our own incompetencies.
The woke have waged a veritable war against the 233-year-old Electoral College and the right of states to set their own balloting laws in national elections, the 180-year-old filibuster, the 150-year-old nine-person Supreme Court, and the 60-year-old, 50-state union.
The U.S. military, Department of Justice, FBI, CIA, Center for Disease Control, and National Institutes of Health until recently were revered. Their top echelons were staffed by career professionals mostly immune to the politics of the day.
Not now. These bureaus and agencies are losing public confidence and support. Citizens fear rather than respect Washington grandees who have weaponized politics ahead of public service.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley, Attorney General Merrick Garland, former FBI heads like James Comey and Andrew McCabe, retired CIA director John Brennan, and Anthony Fauci head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases—politicalized and vastly exceeded their professional purviews.
They sounded off in public fora as if they were elected legislators up for reelection. Some lied under oath. Others demonized critics. Most sought to become media darlings.
This governmental freefall is overseen by a tragically bewildered, petulant, and incompetent president. In his confusion, an increasingly unpopular Joe Biden seems to believe his divisive chaos is working, belittling his political opponents as racist Confederate rebels.
As we head into the 2022 midterm elections, who will stop our descent into collective poverty, division—and self-inflicted madness?
Posted inUncategorized|Comments Off on YES, IT WOULD SEEM AS THOUGH WE ARE HEADED FOR A SYSTEMS COLLAPSE AS LONG AS THE BIDEN REGIME REMAINS IN POWER IN WASHINGTON, D.C.
St. Catherine’s Advice to Cdl. Burke: Do Correction even if it brings Schism
St. Catherine of Sienna was in the same situation that Cardinal Raymond Burke is now.
Catherine knew what Cld. Burke knows which is that if God’s will is done, in terms of speaking the truth and reforming the Church, there will be a schism.
He fears that if he does God’s will and issues the correction to Francis that there will be a schism.
The Cardinal needs to take the advice of St. Catherine who is not only one of the greatest saints in history, but a Doctor of the Church.
Do God’s will no matter the consequences. Do God’s will even if it brings about a schism.
She knew that if she did God’s will and got the French Pope Gregory XI to leave the French court of Avignon and return to Rome that there would be a schism.
Catherine knew that as long as Gregory stayed in France that would be no “reform” of “the morals of the clergy” and that the corrupt inner circle of the papacy would get more corrupt leading to the loss of more souls.
In Nobel Prize winner Sigrid Undset’s biography “Catherine of Sienna,” Undset reports:
“Catherine replied: ‘Who knows God’s will so well as your Holiness, for have you not bound yourself by a vow—‘ Greatly shaken, Gregory stared at the young woman. He had made a vow that he would return to to Rome if he were chosen to be Pope— it was while he was still cardinal. But he had not told a living soul. From that moment he knew he would leave Avignon.” (Page 210)
Undset’s biography shows the saint knew that her getting the Pope to leave Avignon would bring about a schism:
“Catherine replied… ‘When the Pope really begins to reform the morals of the clergy they will rebel and split the Church.’ No, there would be no new heresy, there would be schism. And she said to Raimondo and his friends that they would live to see this horror.” (Page 194-195)
“Catherine had foreseen the schism. When she received the news of it, she must have known that her longing to throw herself into the tumult of battle would soon be fulfilled… she had still much to do here on earth. Because she knew the time was approaching when she should depart from this life.” (Page 259)
St. Catherine reveal to Cardinal Burke that he will soon be departing from this life to meet the Living God. He must do God’s will and not fear a schism.
Pray that the Cardinal correct Francis so more souls are not lost.
St. Catherine we ask you to pray that Cardinal Burke correct Francis.
Pray an Our Father now for reparation for the sins committed because of Francis’s Amoris Laetitia.
Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church as well as the Triumph of the Kingdom of the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Stop for a moment of silence, ask Jesus Christ what He wants you to do now and next. In this silence remember God, Father, Son and Holy Ghost – Three Divine Persons yet One God, has an ordered universe where you can know truth and falsehood as well as never forget that He wants you to have eternal happiness with Him as his son or daughter by grace. Make this a practice. By doing this you are doing more good than reading anything here or anywhere else on the Internet.
Francis Notes:
– Doctor of the Church St. Francis de Sales totally confirmed beyond any doubt the possibility of a heretical pope and what must be done by the Church in such a situation:
“[T]he Pope… WHEN he is EXPLICITLY a heretic, he falls ipso facto from his dignity and out of the Church, and the Church MUST either deprive him, or, as some say, declare him deprived, of his Apostolic See.” (The Catholic Controversy, by St. Francis de Sales, Pages 305-306)
– If Francis betrays Benedict XVI & the”Roman Rite Communities” like he betrayed the Chinese Catholics we must respond like St. Athanasius, the Saintly English Bishop Robert Grosseteste & “Eminent Canonists and Theologians” by “Resist[ing]” him: https://www.thecatholicmonitor.com/2021/12/if-francis-betrays-benedict-xvi.html
– LifeSiteNews, “Confusion explodes as Pope Francis throws magisterial weight behind communion for adulterers,” December 4, 2017:
The AAS guidelines explicitly allows “sexually active adulterous couples facing ‘complex circumstances’ to ‘access the sacraments of Reconciliation and the Eucharist.'”
– On February 2018, in Rorate Caeli, Catholic theologian Dr. John Lamont:
“The AAS statement… establishes that Pope Francis in Amoris Laetitia has affirmed propositions that are heretical in the strict sense.”
– On December 2, 2017, Bishop Rene Gracida:
“Francis’ heterodoxy is now official. He has published his letter to the Argentina bishops in Acta Apostlica Series making those letters magisterial documents.”
Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church by the bishops by the grace of God.
Conservative Steve Bannon declared that RINOs are “the real enemy”:
“We’re never gonna beat Democrats until we beat the real enemy, which is the establishment Republicans. All they stand for is money and power.”
I founded and ran a pro-life crisis pregnancy center and was on the Fr. Paul Marx Human Life International speakers bureau. I know the pro-life movement better than most people and say the pro-life establishment is the real enemy:
“We’re never gonna beat abortionists until we beat the real enemy, which is the pro-life establishment.”
Just like RINOs, they do some good, but will always in my experience compromise. They like the RINOs know how to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. The pro-life establishment adopted a so-called “pragmatic” rather than principled approach a very long time ago, marginalizing the prophetic voices within its own ranks and permitting the goal posts to be moved in order to save face, time and time again. If they are not defeated we will keep reaping their compromising defeats just when victories are at hand, over and over again.
I’ll step off my soap box, now. Here is a plan I proposed when Donald Trump was in office before the Joe Biden Steal:
On August 18, the U.S.News headline was:
“If Joe Biden Wins the Election, He’ll Have Women to Thank”
The news outlet reported:
“A separate poll commissioned by Fox News had similar results, with Biden winning 51% of female voters and Trump getting 39%. Again, men were divided – 46% to 46% – between the two candidates. Overall, Fox has Biden ahead with 49% of the vote, compared to 42% for the president.”
“Should those numbers hold, the 2020 election will mark the biggest gender gap in modern history, according to data compiled by the Center for the American Woman and Politics at Rutgers University. The previous record was set in 1996 and again in 2016, when the gender gap – the difference between how many women support the winning candidate compared to the losing candidate – was 11 percentage points.”
Are these pro-abortion women just evil or are they part of a nightmare and horror culture which has psychologically wounded them because they were “traumatized by their own abortions”?
Dr. Theresa Burkes’s book “Forbidden Grief: The Unspoken Pain of Abortion” shows that abortion has brought us a nightmare and horror culture:
“If you examine the women’s movement you can see that many of the women who laid the groundwork were women traumatized by their own abortions. They believed that legalizing abortion would take away the trauma.”
Instead as Dr. Burkes shows they created trauma, which brought us the nightmare culture.
She applies psychology to cure this trauma, but says that the abortion-trauma can only be completely healed if one asks for and receives God’s mercy.
If the grief of abortion is not healed then the world becomes a Freddy Krueger-like horror culture.
Burkes maintains that the horror icons of the United States such as “Freddy Krueger” and the “evil child movies” are symbols of a culture running away from its guilt.
“I think that evil child movies are all around us. The child is the victimizer, the one who torments. Other movies, like Freddy Krueger, illustrate the horror of being tracked down by an “abortionist” figure who is out to kill her baby,” Burkes said:
“I’ve watched MTV where baby dolls are thrown off cliffs, discarded, abused and unwanted – revealing the unconscious conflict shared by all who have rejected children or been abused themselves after having been used for sexual pleasure.”
Forbidden Grief’s thesis is that when one represses guilt one creates even greater monsters in the unconscious.
One example is when Lorena Bobbitt cut off her husband’s penis.
Bobbitt did this monstrous nightmare-like aggression on her husband because he forced her to abort their child.
This is only one example of what happens to a culture when millions of men and women have the memory of an aborted baby haunting their unconscious.
Burkes tells us in story after story of “bizarre” behaviors. In one account we find a dorm party in which the students, many post-abortive, played “baby soccer.”
The “baby soccer”story reminds one of a Stephen King novel with it’s broken heads of dolls being kicked around, their eyes gouged out, doll cheeks burned with cigarette butts and a boyfriend burning cigarette holes between the doll’s legs as well as ripping off their legs, leaving only a scarred vagina hole.
This account and others convinced Burkes that abortion is connected to the horror games that our culture plays.
“The college students I witnessed playing “baby soccer”were actually trying to master their trauma by belittling it through a game with decapitated baby doll parts,” Burkes said, “This amusement and mesmerizing allure to engage in the traumatic play is a symptom of our cultures need to overcome the horror-like the baby in the blender jokes, which all surfaced coincidentally after Roe v Wade passed.”
The baby soccer game and other horror genre are symptoms showing that millions of Americans need to overcome the “collective guilt” associated with abortion. Burkes says, “As the group’s enthusiasm for this game demonstrated, the acting out of post-abortion trauma can be contagious…collective guilt and trauma have the capacity to disguise massive injustice. ”
According to Life Dynamic’s Mark Cruther, this massive injustice-in which millions are killed- can be stopped by ending access to abortion bound women. His booklet “Access” states between 40 to 60 percent of American women of childbearing age have had at least one abortion. There are also a similar percentage of males who are post-abortive as well.
The booklet claims that the reason for our increasingly pro-abortion elective government is these percentages of persons who are in internal conflict. After violating the moral commandment of thou shall not kill, they vote pro-abortion seeing the stance of the pro-life politicians as a personal attack on themselves.
“What I’m saying is that since the vast majority of elections are decided by slim margins, anything which influences even a small percentage of voters can be a powerful force,” Cruther said:
“The point is that the potential impact is staggering. Moreover, this force grows considerably more powerful everyday as another 4,000 abortions are racked up.”
His booklet says studies have found that these women do not have abortions unless there is easy and local access to abortion.
The vast majority of these women, according to these studies, will not travel long distances or pay large amounts of money for an abortion. Access says:
“Our opponent’s ability to continue fighting comes from a high abortion rate. That is what fuels their political machine. As long as they have $64,000 an hour to draw on, and the potential for at least 4,000 new pro-abortion voters every day, the legal status of abortion will not change.”
The way to defeat the abortion nightmare on the political front, according to Cruther, is to sue doctors. And Steve Mosher, head of the Population Research Institute (PRI) says there are many legitimate reasons to sue. He said:
“The failure to stop an abortion procedure on request, or even depriving women of their right to full information, can be construed as a denial of a woman’s freedom of access to reproductive health.”
Access says very few new doctors want to be abortionists so malpractice suits makes the abortion medical business even more unattractive. As fewer young doctors enter the aging field, access to abortions becomes costly and inaccessible.
The abortionists and the pro-abortion media seem to agree. According to Access abortionist David Gritmes said:
“Distance clearly matters in women’s reproductive choices…abortion rates were found to be inversely related to the distance to a provider.” In 1998, The New York Times Magazine said, “… abortion is retreating into a half-lighted ghetto of pseudonyms, suspicion and fear… today 59% of all abortion doctors are 65 years old…nearly two thirds are beyond legal retirement age.”
Access presents 81 such quotes from abortionist and pro-abortion publications to show as it says ”access doesn’t just influence abortion politics; it is the determining factor in which side wins and which side loses.”
Along these lines, another way to end the abortion government is to reach out to the millions of post abortion trauma voters with God’s mercy as Dr. Burkes is doing.
If even a small percentage changes sides, as Cruther said, these slim margins in elections may start going to pro-life politicians. And it is never too late to start reaching out to persons in post abortion trauma.
“We had one woman come on our retreat who was 87 years old. She suffered over half a century with this secret that she had never revealed to anyone until she came to Rachel’s Vineyard. She was so relieved to be with others and to finally receive God’s forgiveness,” Burkes said:
“We can offer the Lord’s mercy by not seeking to judge or condemn them, but by inviting them to thoughtfully reflect on their experience – by being the one ear that will listen, or the one heart that cries with them for the loss.”
That 87-year-old woman’s conversion represents millions of voters who could convert to voting for pro-life Republicans because the Democrats have steadfastly “positioned” themselves as the abortion party. The problem for the Republicans is that those women swing voters must be reached with psychological and religious help as happened to our 87-year-old.
The way this can be done is for President Donald Trump to attempted to pass legislation, which offers psychological assistance to women with abortion trauma.
The Democrats and media would go crazy, but if this legislation were positioned as a woman’s right to reproductive health; then the Republicans would have the moral high ground.
Even if the legislation doesn’t pass the mere publicity would get it into the consciousness of millions of woman in abortion trauma. The pro-life movement and conservative churches could then get into action and start offering those women the help they need.
After this is done then the Trump’s Justice Department must prosecute all abortionist who as PRI’s President Steve Mosher said fail “to stop an abortion procedure on request, or even depriving women of their right to full information.”
PRI‘s pro-life conference introduced legal campaigns to sue abortionist doctors that fail to provide complete information about the risks of abortion to their patients.
“We’re working with these attorneys to inform more and more Americans of their rights,“ Mosher said:
“It’s time America does an ‘about face’ on the abortion industry. Women deserve genuine health and human rights, not violations so routinely committed by the abortion industry.”
According to Pennsylvania’s Chris Kahlenborn MD, there are 28 out of 37 studies that show induced abortion increases the risk of breast cancer. 13 out of 15 of those are done in the United States. And 13 out of 15 of those are positive [http://abortionbreastcancer.com/].
So the risk of an abortion to develop beast cancer is 50% if it’s your first baby. And if you’re under 18 it goes to 150%. If you’re under 18 and your baby is more than nine weeks old it goes up to 800%.
“As soon as there comes a woman who has breast cancer who has had an abortion and takes it to court. She‘s got a very strong case,” Kahlenborn said, “The problem is a lot of young women when they do get breast cancer die from it so quickly -because it’s so aggressive when you’re young- they might not make it to court.”
As Kahlenborn showed this is not just about winning election, but about doing the right thing. Unfortunately or fortunately, for the Republicans this is also all about politics. Any increase in abortion- as Cruther graphically shows- is to demise of their party.
The California and other liberal state elections show that the Democrats will not hesitate to play baby soccer-type mind games with women voters in order to win.
But, the Republicans are running out of time. Their base is the conservative religious voters, so they can not allow the abortionists to have the “$64,000 an hour to draw on, and the potential for at least 4,000 new pro-abortion voters every day:” As Cruther said, “it is the determining factor in which side wins and which side loses.”
The Party of Lincoln must make a choice.
They can become the like the Whigs- who kept compromising on the issue of slavery until they were- replaced before the Civil War by the Republicans. Or they can stand firm like Lincoln and limit the spread of a great evil.
Lincoln never attempted to abolish slavery directly, before the war, because he knew if he limited its spread like a disease so that it was only in the South, then it would die a natural death.
The Democrats- the slavery party- knew this too. That is why they started the Civil War.
The Democrats- the abortion party- knows also that abortion will die a natural death if limited in its ability to exploit women. They will not start a civil war because they are cowards and have no moral high ground.
So Trump can go down in history as another Lincoln.
All that Trump has to do is pick pro-life Supreme Court justices to overturn Roe vs. Wade and limit its spread by allowing pro-life states to protect the unborn children as well as by protecting women’s health and human rights in abortion pro-death states like California.
The President needs to let women in abortion trauma know that he and others are there offering help to free them from their nightmare of abortion.
Related bonus post:
30-Seconds to End Abortion by Identifying the Unborn Child with the Unborn Baby Jesus
For a long time I have been experimenting with a 30-second program to save unborn babies from being aborted by identifying them with the unborn Baby Jesus.
Some years back, I hosted a local TV show which lead me to think that a pro-life campaign using techniques that work in our video cultural could be helpful. But the most important thing to remember is that methods without Christ are a waste of time.
In our video age, people, at most, have a 30-second attention span. Television and smart phones have made it impossible to keep anyone’s attention without a visual effect. So, our home-visiting program has created a 30-second commercial using a model of an unborn baby as a visual prop.
The purpose of the recited 30-second presentation is to identify the unborn child with Jesus Christ.
The inspiration for the program came when I was a sidewalk counselor in California. In front of an abortion clinic, a female Planned Parenthood employee proclaimed herself a Christian to me. So, I asked her if she would abort the unborn baby Jesus.
She said, “I would.”
Shocked, I just walked away from her fanaticism to think. I knew that mainstream America would not be willing to kill the unborn baby Jesus.
In two model programs, one in California and the other in New Mexico, over 2,000 homes were visited, with 90 percent to 95 percent saying “yes” to the pro-life message.
In this model programs, three volunteers going out a couple of hours a week visited 1,000 homes in six months.
Imagine if there were 3,000 volunteers across the nation. In six months we could visit 1 million homes.
Imagine if tens of millions identified the unborn baby with Jesus. Abortion would be doomed, first in America and then worldwide.
Imagine that by the grace of God it might only take:
30-seconds to end abortion by identifying the unborn child with the unborn Baby Jesus.
Remember that identifying the unborn Baby Jesus with all unborn babies is true because Jesus said:
“Whatever you do to the least of my brethren you do to me.”
A Complete Guide for Running a Successful Pro-life Home Visitation Campaign
Archangel Instructions
Introduction
We are Archangels in imitation of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Gabriel said to the Blessed Virgin Mary, to all future mothers and all mothers:
“Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found grace with God. Behold you shall conceive in your womb and shall bring forth a Son and you shall call His name Jesus.”
The babies you help save by home visitation are the Baby Jesus because Jesus said:
“Whatever you do to the least of my brethren you do to me.”
Each mother should be thought of as a new Blessed Mother of Jesus.
What is an Archangel?
An Archangel is a person who spreads the good news that God was an unborn baby and therefore all babies in the womb are of infinite value along with their mothers and fathers.
What is Home Visiting?
Step 1:
Ring the bell or knock on the door. While you’re waiting for a answer, say a “Hail Mary” for the home. If by the end of the “Hail Mary” no one has answered leave the pro-life and Traditional Latin Mass literature (especially information about crisis pregnancy centers and where they they can attend the Mass of the Ages) as well as chastity literature and go to the next home. Remember when you say the “Hail Mary” that it is the prayer of Gabriel to the Blessed Mother of Jesus. When they answer the door, say, “Hi, do you have 30 seconds?”
Step 2:
When someone is interested (as are the vast majority in the model programs), gently hold up the eleven-old-week unborn baby model and say the following:
“This is an eleven- to twelve-week baby in the mother’s womb. The vast majority of babies killed in abortions in the United States are this old or older. This baby is already a boy or girl. His heart is already beating. His brain waves already work and he has fingerprints like you and me. This is the baby Jesus because Jesus said, “Whatever you do to the least of my brethren you do to me.” In fact this is what Jesus looked like when He was in his mother’s womb. Do you think this little baby has the right to live?”
If they say “NO,” say “Thank you” only and go to the next home.
The vast majority, however, say “Yes” (as shown in two model programs).
When they say “Yes,” say “May I give these (pamphlets) to you in case you might know a young lady who might need help?” They almost all take the pamphlets.
Finally, say “Thank you” and keep following the Archangel Gabriel until you get to heaven.
Notes:
1. Pamphlets can be gotten from your local crisis pregnancy centers, pro-life groups and Traditional Latin Mass church.
2. To get the models of unborn babies just google 11- to 12- week unborn baby model.
3. The presentation can also be made into PSAs or commercials for the Internet or television.
Pray an Our Father now for reparation for the sins committed because of Francis’s Amoris Laetitia.
Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church as well as the Triumph of the Kingdom of the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Stop for a moment of silence, ask Jesus Christ what He wants you to do now and next. In this silence remember God, Father, Son and Holy Ghost – Three Divine Persons yet One God, has an ordered universe where you can know truth and falsehood as well as never forget that He wants you to have eternal happiness with Him as his son or daughter by grace. Make this a practice. By doing this you are doing more good than reading anything here or anywhere else on the Internet.
Francis Notes:
– Doctor of the Church St. Francis de Sales totally confirmed beyond any doubt the possibility of a heretical pope and what must be done by the Church in such a situation:
“[T]he Pope… WHEN he is EXPLICITLY a heretic, he falls ipso facto from his dignity and out of the Church, and the Church MUST either deprive him, or, as some say, declare him deprived, of his Apostolic See.” (The Catholic Controversy, by St. Francis de Sales, Pages 305-306)
– If Francis betrays Benedict XVI & the”Roman Rite Communities” like he betrayed the Chinese Catholics we must respond like St. Athanasius, the Saintly English Bishop Robert Grosseteste & “Eminent Canonists and Theologians” by “Resist[ing]” him: https://www.thecatholicmonitor.com/2021/12/if-francis-betrays-benedict-xvi.html
– LifeSiteNews, “Confusion explodes as Pope Francis throws magisterial weight behind communion for adulterers,” December 4, 2017:
The AAS guidelines explicitly allows “sexually active adulterous couples facing ‘complex circumstances’ to ‘access the sacraments of Reconciliation and the Eucharist.'”
– On February 2018, in Rorate Caeli, Catholic theologian Dr. John Lamont:
“The AAS statement… establishes that Pope Francis in Amoris Laetitia has affirmed propositions that are heretical in the strict sense.”
– On December 2, 2017, Bishop Rene Gracida:
“Francis’ heterodoxy is now official. He has published his letter to the Argentina bishops in Acta Apostlica Series making those letters magisterial documents.”
Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church by the bishops by the grace of God.
Posted inUncategorized|Comments Off on WE WILL NEVER MAKE PROGRESS IN THE FIGHT TO PROTECT INNOCENT HUMAN LIFE FROM ABORTION UNTIL WE IDENTIFY AND DENOUNCE THE WOLVES IN SHEEP’S CLOTHING WHO ARE PRO-ABORTION
(LifeSiteNews) — In light of the very troubling developments in the Catholic Church in Germany and her “Synodal Path,” which is out to question and reform the Church’s long-standing teachings on different topics such as homosexuality, contraception, female ordination and celibacy, a counter-group called Maria 1.0 has been founded.
LifeSite reached out to this group in order to get to know them better and present them to our readers. (See full interview below)
The group was originally founded in 2019 in response to the movement Maria 2.0, which called for female ordination, women’s rights in the Church, and for a strike by not going to Holy Mass for an entire week, a call that even received the support of the German bishops.
Maria 1.0, therefore, is an anti-feminist group that shows that “there are women who have found their home in the Catholic Church, although many media constantly claim the opposite,” as Clara Steinbrecher, the leader of the group Maria 1.0, told LifeSite. These Catholic women work “for the unity of the universal Church and fidelity to the Catholic Magisterium,” she added.
“We see in the Catholic faith a great treasure that needs to be rediscovered,” Steinbrecher went on to say, adding that “our central concern is to bear witness to it – for us, this means ‘evangelization.’”
With refreshing clarity, this Catholic group wishes to defend the faith and spread it. As its speaker told LifeSite:
The Church in Germany needs to wake up, it needs to realize that it is on the wrong track with the Synodal Path, and turn back to Christ and the teachings of the Church. It needs renewal and reform, but in the Holy Spirit. It is necessary to proclaim the faith and the existing doctrine authentically, only then can there be conversion and a growth in the Church.
In response to the current controversial discussions taking place in the Church in Germany, Maria 1.0 wishes to remain faithful to the Church’s Tradition. She calls the Synodal Path a “a frontal attack on the Church.” “We are Marian, Eucharistic, faithful to the Pope, and simply Catholic,” Steinbrecher explained. “We think it is right that God only called men be ordained priests, recognize the meaning and necessity of celibacy, and see Catholic sexual teaching as fulfilling and bringing happiness.”
For this group, it seems out of question for the Catholic Church in Germany to teach the rest of the world on how the Catholic Church should be: “The Church in Germany and pretty much every sacrament is down,” Steinbrecher told LifeSite. “Seminaries are empty, divorce rates are high, very few people receive the Sacrament of Confirmation, and in international comparison, German confessionals are largely deserted. In view of these poor results, it borders on pitiful hubris that we want to show the Universal Church how things can be done better.”
For this Catholic laywoman, it is important that the “Church in Germany needs to wake up, it needs to realize that it is on the wrong track with the Synodal Path, and turn back to Christ and the teachings of the Church.”
With the progressivist spirit so abundant in Germany that seeks to appease the world and not God, Mrs. Steinbrecher foresees a diminishing Church in Germany, “much smaller and simpler in the future. If it comes to that, it will be a salutary process of purification.”
In light of the extreme reform proposals coming out of the Catholic Church in Germany, this group of Catholic laywomen would wish for a clearer intervention of Pope Francis: “Given that Rome is currently more than clear in other contexts without fear of resistance and revolt, we nevertheless hope for a tougher crackdown by the Pope on the Synodal Path.”
SUBSCRIBE TO OUR DAILY HEADLINES US Canada Catholic
Please see here the full interview with Clara Steinbrecher, the leader of the group Maria 1.0
LifeSite: When was Maria 1.0 founded and why? Clara Steinbrecher: Maria 1.0 was founded in May 2019 by Johanna Stöhr, originally as a response by Catholic women to the Maria 2.0 protest movement. Because when Maria 2.0 called for a women’s strike (not to go to a place of worship or a church service for a week) in May 2019, we were irritated that the DBK (German Bishops’ Conference) even advertised it on their homepage. Maria 2.0, with its slogan “Maria two point zero,” advocated a reform of Catholic positions that must necessarily be implemented so that the Church can still claim a raison d’être in the 21st century. In doing so, they acted as if they spoke for all Catholic women. We had to set that straight: On the one hand, Mary 2.0 by no means speaks for all women, nor are most of the demands things that could ever be implemented in the Church. Furthermore, a strike against the Holy Mass [by staying away for a week] shows a lack of knowledge and understanding of the Faith – how can one strike against that which is supposed to be the source and culmination of our entire lives? We also see in the instrumentalization of the Mother of God (taped mouth, vulva representation at the University of Freiburg, rainbow saint, etc.) an anti-church positioning, which cannot be reconciled with the Catholic faith. With these actions, the religious feelings of not a few Catholics were also hurt.
LifeSite: What are the main goals of your work? Steinbrecher: Maria 1.0 works for the unity of the universal Church and fidelity to the Catholic Magisterium. The initiative is carried by believers of different spiritualities who, united by the universal teaching of the Church, know themselves represented by it. We want to show that there are women who have found their home in the Catholic Church, although many media constantly claim the opposite. We see in the Catholic faith a great treasure that needs to be rediscovered. Our central concern is to bear witness to it – for us, this means “evangelization.” Our initiative is based on four pillars: We are Marian, Eucharistic, faithful to the Pope, and simply Catholic. We think it is right that only called men be ordained priests, recognize the meaning and necessity of celibacy, and see Catholic sexual teaching as fulfilling and bringing happiness. In order to implement our concern, we try to shape the discourse around the Catholic Church through media presence, in addition to a classic apostolate of prayer and information. We try to publish articles in the Catholic media and beyond to draw attention to our positions and our concerns. With different actions (e.g. “Thank you priests” postcards designed by Maria 1.0 with personal words to thank priests for their service) we succeed better and better to encourage many priests and to spur the faithful to live their faith anew and to grow and progress as disciples of Jesus, so that we do not become lukewarm, but full of zeal to bring the message of Christ to the people through our different charisms and in our often very different circumstances. Most recently, we launched a networking opportunity for Catholics throughout the German-speaking world and are also planning theological conferences for the future. In a positive way we want to make clear that the classical church positions do not need a rework as Maria 2.0 demands and try to make the beauty and truth of Catholic teachings accessible and thus newly accessible to people of all ages and of both genders. In doing so, however, we are by no means ignoring the problems that exist in the Church, but rather we want to show that many reforms that are being called for will not at all solve the problem that is being called for. Necessary church reforms do not arise from divisive demands or from attempts to pander to politics and the spirit of the times. Necessary reforms arise from an attitude of inwardness and prayer and can only be sought WITH the Church, WITH an orientation to the Gospel and WITH the truths revealed by Christ, which the Holy Spirit has preserved unbreakably in the Church.
LifeSite: How do you see the Synodal Path? Where does it lead? Steinbrecher: We must call the so-called Synodal Path what it has become: a frontal attack on the Church. At the very latest after the second Synodal Assembly of October 3, 2021, it is clear that this non-binding body wants to decide on the truths of faith of the Church by majority vote, as in the case of any association. But the Church is not an association, it is the Body of Christ; about sexual morals, sacraments and the structure of the Church one cannot decide democratically. The Church in Germany and pretty much every sacrament is down. Seminaries are empty, divorce rates are high, very few people receive the Sacrament of Confirmation, and in international comparison, German confessionals are largely deserted. In view of these poor results, it borders on pitiful hubris that we want to show the Universal Church how things can be done better. With the Synodal Path, the Church in Germany will sooner or later abolish itself. You must see it this way, of the 22.2 million baptized (Catholics) in Germany, only 1.3 million (as of 2020, but after corona really low) regularly attend Mass. The reforms are welcomed by many people, but the vast majority of them have already finished with the Church and they will not come back by the Church’s becoming even more secular. On the contrary, the Church is more likely to lose the rest of those who are still there. For these people who are faithful to the faith and doctrine are looking for their spiritual home elsewhere, not in their local parishes, which are becoming more and more secular and hostile to the faith.
LifeSite: Given that there is such a large majority in the Synodal Path that is in favor of the reforms, what is your hope for what you can accomplish with your work? Steinbrecher: Our work is very loosely related, if at all, to the Synodal Path. Apart from that, what the majority represents is not decisive. Truth is not dependent on majority decisions, but on God’s Revelation in Holy Scripture, Tradition and the Magisterium. Quite apart from the Synodal Path, we hope our work will draw attention to the fact that there are still Catholics who are faithful to the Magisterium of the Church. Even if they do not enjoy the media attention as progressive forces of the Synodal Path do, they are a group of faithful people that should not be underestimated. We want to network and contribute to the new evangelization through our witness and information. In many places there is a lack of knowledge of the faith and of convincing models of the faith. We want to make up for this lack so that more people will learn to love their Church again. Reform should always represent a return to the origin, a reconsideration of the Apostolic foundation, not its erosion. Church is ultimately not what we make for ourselves, but what Christ has given us and what the Apostles have handed down to us.
LifeSite: How do you see the future of German Catholicism? Steinbrecher: The Church in Germany needs to wake up, it needs to realize that it is on the wrong track with the Synodal Path, and turn back to Christ and the teachings of the Church. It needs renewal and reform, but in the Holy Spirit. It is necessary to proclaim the faith and the existing doctrine authentically, only then can there be conversion and a growth in the Church. There are also already awakenings and organizations in Germany that strive for this, there you can see the fruits of the Holy Spirit. These oases will blossom and flourish with the help of the Holy Spirit, everything else will perish. In the end, only a Church can endure that asks what God wants and not what people want. All too often the latter becomes the motto – a spiritless and purely human being of the Church. But this will not get the Catholic Church in Germany very far. It may be that the Catholic Church in Germany will be much smaller and simpler in the future. If it comes to that, it will be a salutary process of purification.
LifeSite: What do you think about Pope Francis’ position on the Synodal Path, and would you like to see more intervention from him? Steinbrecher: Of course, we would like Pope Francis to set clear boundaries for once and make it clear where reform efforts leave the Catholic sector. This has been done to some extent through Roman documents such as the pastoral instruction “The Pastoral Conversion of the Parish,” the Pope’s letter “To the Pilgrim People of God in Germany or the Responsum ad dubium on the question of the blessing of same-sex partnerships. However, the question also arises as to how well he is informed about the Synodal Path in detail. We are aware that a harsh crackdown by the Pope could backfire on him: There could be accusations of reform fatigue on Rome’s part, and even of a deficient correction, since the nuncio attends Synodal Path meetings. Thus, if this were to fail, the blame could again be placed on Rome. Given that Rome is currently more than clear in other contexts without fear of resistance and revolt, we nevertheless hope for a tougher crackdown by the Pope on the Synodal Path.
Dr. Maike Hickson was born and raised in Germany. She holds a PhD from the University of Hannover, Germany, after having written in Switzerland her doctoral dissertation on the history of Swiss intellectuals before and during World War II. She now lives in the U.S. and is married to Dr. Robert Hickson, and they have been blessed with two beautiful children. She is a happy housewife who likes to write articles when time permits.
Dr. Hickson published in 2014 a Festschrift, a collection of some thirty essays written by thoughtful authors in honor of her husband upon his 70th birthday, which is entitled A Catholic Witness in Our Time.
Hickson has closely followed the papacy of Pope Francis and the developments in the Catholic Church in Germany, and she has been writing articles on religion and politics for U.S. and European publications and websites such as LifeSiteNews, OnePeterFive, The Wanderer, Rorate Caeli, Catholicism.org, Catholic Family News, Christian Order, Notizie Pro-Vita, Corrispondenza Romana, Katholisches.info, Der Dreizehnte, Zeit-Fragen, and Westfalen-Blatt.
Posted inUncategorized|Comments Off on THERE IS NEW HOPE FOR THE CHURCH IN GERMANY; PRAY THAT IT SUCCEEDS
Giraffes produce “humming” vocalizations at an average frequency of 92 Hertz.
SHARE
Until now, giraffe caretakers had reason to believe that their long-necked vegetarian friends were strictly silent beings. A 13-foot-long trachea isn’t exactly conducive to easy vocalization.
Scientists assumed that, if anything, giraffes—like elephants—might produce infrasonic (ultra-low) sounds below the range of human hearing. But without the data to back it up, researchers couldn’t guarantee that giraffes weren’t simply producing audible noises out of human earshot. So a team at the University of Vienna painstakingly gathered 947 hours of giraffe noises over an eight-year period at three European zoos and measured their spectral characteristics, with the goal of finding out once-and-for-all whether giraffes’ socially-structured society lends itself to vocal communication.
What they found was that at night, the giraffes produced a harmonic and sustained “humming” that varied in frequency over time. Not only were they humming, but these vocalizations were within the frequency range that humans can hear (albeit on the low side, at an average of 92 Hertz).
“Based on their acoustic structure,” the scientists report in the journal BMC Research Notes, these vocalizations might function as “communicative signals to convey information about the physical and motivational attributes of the caller.”
Giraffes have excellent vision, so their primary means of communication is thought to be visual signals during daylight hours. As prey animals, it also makes sense that they might not want to make loud noises that can attract the attention of predators. But when vision is impaired at night, low frequency humming might be a great way to make sure the herd stays together.
Though the scientists have not yet correlated these sounds to behavior (that will require more extensive research involving night-vision technology), they do know that vocalizations in other species with similar social structure is known to convey information about age, gender, sexual arousal, dominance, and more. The specific qualities of giraffe sounds could lead to further insights on how these animals interact with each other and with other species.
Receive emails about upcoming NOVA programs and related content, as well as featured reporting about current events through a science lens.SUBSCRIBE
For the second time in two months, the Supreme Court has rejected a request from Big Abortion to help it overturn the Texas abortion ban that protects unborn babies with beating hearts.
In a 6-3 ruling today, the nation’s highest court rejected a request from Texas abortion companies to move their lawsuit from the Texas Supreme Court and place it in the hands of a federal judge that would overturn the ban. All of the Republican appointed justices voted in the majority against Big Abortion while each of the three liberal justices voted with the abortion businesses.
In the unsigned opinion, the Supreme Court rejected a request for an order directing the 5th Circuit federal appeals court to send the case back to U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman.
In a victory for the Texas abortion ban in early December, the Supreme Court allowed the pro-life law to continue saving babies from abortion and it dismissed Joe Biden’s lawsuit against it. It also rejected the Texas pro-abortion groups’ request to temporarily block the law while their legal challenge continues through the courts. While the high court ruled that the Texas abortion businesses may continue with their lawsuit, it also watered down their case by allowing them to sue state licensing officials but not the state judges and clerks who are charged with handling lawsuits spurred by the law.
“The unresolved questions of state law must be certified to the Texas Supreme Court,” wrote Judge Edith Jones, an appointee of President Ronald Reagan, in an opinion joined by Judge Stuart Kyle Duncan, who was appointed by President Donald Trump.
“With no limit placed by the Supreme Court’s remand, this court may utilize the ordinary appellate tools at our disposal to address the case—consistent with the Court’s opinion,” Jones wrote.
The statewide pro-life group that has been fighting for the ban applauded the decision.
“On Monday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit certified the Supreme Court of Texas to take over Whole Woman’s Health v. Jackson, the one remaining federal lawsuit challenging the Texas Heartbeat Act,” Texas Right to Life officials informed LifeNews.
“This is great news for Texas because such action is more likely to ensure a just and favorable ruling, compared to that which could be expected from a pro-abortion federal district judge, to whom the abortion industry asked to send the case. Beyond this, sending the lawsuit to the Supreme Court of Texas is appropriate because the only defendants left in the case are stateagencies,” the pro-life group added. “Most exciting of all is that the Texas Heartbeat Act has withstood another court decision and is continuing to save an estimated 100 preborn lives every day!”
The Texas heartbeat law bans abortions when an unborn baby’s heartbeat begins and it has saved as many as 10,000 unborn babies’ lives so far.
A Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals panel considered the two sides’ arguments earlier this month involving the unique private enforcement mechanism in the law and the court that should be next to consider the case. Abortion activists want the case to be sent back to a federal judge who previously blocked the law, while Texas health officials want the Texas Supreme Court to hear it next. Pro-abortion groups were angry when the U.S. Supreme Court refused to block the law in December and sent it back to the Fifth Circuit, instead of U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman.
At this point, the court battle is not about the abortion ban itself but the private enforcement mechanism that allows private citizens to sue abortionists who violate the ban on abortions once an unborn baby’s heartbeat is detectable.
Though the legal wranglings are complex, Texas Right to Life pointed out that abortion activists’ goal is simple: Convince a court to block the law.
“Beneath the abortion industry’s legal maneuvers is deep desperation to move quickly to stop the law,” the pro-life organization responded Friday after the hearing. “Abortionists recognize that they are running out of time with an impending decision from the U.S. Supreme Court in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health that could overturn Roe v. Wade.”
Since Sept. 1, the heartbeat law has stopped almost all abortions in the state. Texas Right to Life estimates as many as 100 unborn babies are being spared from abortion every day. And if the law remains in effect much longer, many Texas abortion businesses may close.
Abortion advocates have slammed the courts every step of the way in the legal battle, including griping about the high court’s decision.
“The Supreme Court left only a small sliver of our case intact, and it’s clear that this part of the case will not block vigilante lawsuits from being filed,” Marc Hearron, a lawyer with the Center for Reproductive Rights, told the AP at the time. “It’s also clear that Texas is determined to stop the plaintiffs from getting any relief in even the sliver of the case that is left.”
Texas abortion businesses admitted a likely defeat as well. They essentially have no way to stop Texas citizens and pro-life groups from filing lawsuits against them, abortionists and abortion staff who help abort unborn babies in violation the law.
A recent study from Texas Policy Evaluation Project at the University of Texas at Austin the found that, in just the first month, abortions in Texas went down 50 percent. Since then, Texas abortion facility directors have reported even bigger drops in their abortion numbers, as high as 80 percent compared to the previous year, according to the Texas Tribune.
The heartbeat law has the potential to save tens of thousands of unborn babies from abortion every year. In 2020, about 54,000 unborn babies were aborted in Texas, and about 85 percent happened after six weeks of pregnancy, according to state health statistics.
Posted inUncategorized|Comments Off on THANKS BE TO GOD!!!!!! THE Supreme Court REJECTS BIG ABORTION’S ATTEMPT FOR THE SECOND TIME TO BAN TEXAS ABORTION BAN
The bishops who came home from Vatican II (or the “liturgist” wolves they failed to stop) initiated acts of violent destruction and iconoclasm in the name of the Council. The zeal for change disparaged the Church’s heritage and liturgical tradition and naturally influenced its architecture and design. This ended up destroying the monuments that our fathers sacrificed to build and pass down to us. The saga of the two Cathedrals of the Diocese of Oakland, California is a clear example.
Built in 1893 (photo above), the neo-gothic St. Francis de Sales was built
With funds from an Irish immigrant, Mrs. Mary J. Canning, the church had already served its growing population for many decades as a lively hub in central Oakland.
The parish became an early center of ethnic richness during World War II, when shipbuilders and servicemen and women of many backgrounds settled there with their families.
Exterior, 1893
InteriorAdvertisement – Continue Reading Below
This beautiful monument built by our fathers to God’s greater glory and the salvation of souls would eventually have the honor of becoming “…the first cathedral in the United States to be completely remodeled according to the liturgical spirit of the Second Vatican Council.”[1]
Bishop Floyd Begin had attended every session of the Council, claiming even to have participated in authoring some of its documents. Burns and Bautista report that when he returned after its conclusion, he had a bold plan for redesigning his cathedral:
With the priest now facing the people, the bishop found the venerable stained-glass windows behind the altar distracting. ‘The rather colorful windows in the sanctuary impeded the vision of the service, just like the headlights of an oncoming car do.’ The stained-glass windows were covered over by redwood paneling. The interior was whitewashed, and the exterior [brick] was painted in a creme color. The altar rail was removed as were all the statues, except for that of Jesus. In sum, the remodeled building followed Vatican II directives and created ‘…an atmosphere conducive to participation, worship, and prayer’ (p.51). [emphasis added]
Renovation
Unsurprisingly, the council’s “liturgical spirit” led to the incorporation of elements from contemporary society:
Dance, slide presentations, photography, innovative preaching [?], all became regular features in the Cathedral liturgies. …In late 1969, the Cathedral featured an Advent series entitled ‘We Hold a Strange Hope’ to explore how to maintain hope in the midst of the social chaos that was engulfing the United States. The first week featured four blown-up portraits hanging in the sanctuary — Che Guevara, Joan Baez, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and Neil Armstrong [?] (p.52).
A strange hope indeed. The organ was replaced by an ensemble of strings, brass, piano, and various musicians. These liturgical innovations attracted national attention and were featured in Time Magazine:
Twice each Sunday, the music runs the scale between such unlikely extremes as Gregorian chant and rock. On one recent Sunday, the mixture embraced both Bach’s Aire for the G-String and Amazing Grace. On another, included a Hayden trio, Bob Dylan’s The Times They are A-Changin’ and Luther’s A Mighty Fortress is our God.’[2]
Advertisement – Continue Reading Below
Burns and Bautista triumphantly conclude, “In short, the Cathedral liturgy was achieving what the council had mandated” (p.53). [Emphasis added]
Of course, the council never mandated such nonsense; it just left the door open to it. According to the specific document dealing with the reform at the local level, Sacrosanctum Concillium, there were strict, but vague limitations on what the bishop could approve:
…[T]here must be no innovations unless the good of the Church genuinely and certainly requires them; and care must be taken that any new forms adopted should in some way grow organically from forms already existing (Article 23).
St. Francis de Sales was eventually destroyed in an earthquake, which would leave the diocese without a cathedral for twenty years.
But then it happened again!Advertisement – Continue Reading Below
The post-modernist Cathedral of Christ the Light was finally completed in 2008 at a cost of almost 200 million. While in the case of St. Francis de Sales it was the bishop’s interpretation of the council’s reforms that guided his remodeling of the Cathedral, the design of the new structure was left to a competition among professional architects. A thoughtful critique came from the respected architectural theorist Nikos Salingaros:
In the Oakland Cathedral I find imagery and architectural fashion used in a gratuitous manner, despite the apparently good intentions. …Excitement is fine for good times, but does it help you in the long term? Does not the same concept hold for the Church itself?
Exterior
Interior
The professor described the cathedral as both modern and postmodern, with deconstructivist elements throughout, a style known as “controlled chaos.” The intentional break with the past was most evident in the use of “brutalist concrete,” which Salingaros called “the dead giveaway”:
This material is, in my opinion, fundamentally unholy. Gray, damp, and acoustically hard, it represents the opposite of the welcoming surface of a place of worship. For millennia, church surfaces were finished in materials that conveyed a love for the Creator. I see no love in this most unfriendly material.
Instead of bishops insisting on the incorporation of Christian typologies in their architectural designs, writes Salingaros, “…architects have resorted to using typologies from the modernist form language.”
Regarding modern church architecture, New York Times columnist and Catholic convert Ross Douthat observed that it ultimately lacked spirituality:
I have never seen a church or cathedral executed successfully in any of the architectural styles that have prevailed since the 1920s and ’30s. From Italy to San Francisco, the showpiece modern churches tend to succeed as monuments but fail as spaces for prayer and worship; their smaller imitators, scattered across the American suburbs, are almost always blights on whatever religious community is unhappy enough to occupy them.
Advertisement – Continue Reading Below
Fortunately, as Salingaros points out, the modernist trend is not universal, as the recently built Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Houston proves:
Those who support tradition over innovation in Church architecture (and in the Church itself) see no need for any further justification. The human being is tied to God through ritual over millennia, and the best architectural solutions are those developed over time. An intelligent and sensitive architect can use them in a contemporary context with great success, and that is what has been achieved here. Tried-and-true methods are used to design a building that is solid on tradition, reassuring in presenting the Church of tradition to the faithful.
[1] Jeffrey M. Burns and Mary Carmen Bautista, We are the Church: A History of the Diocese of Oakland. Strasbourg: Editions du Singe, 2001, p. 51.
[2] “Troubadours for God”, Time (May 24, 1971).Advertisement – Continue Reading Below
Posted inUncategorized|Comments Off on ICONOCLASM IS ALWAYS THE SAME: DESTROYING WHAT OUR FOREFATHERS DID SIMPLY BECAUSE WE BELIEVE THAT WE CAN DO IT BETTER !!!!
Allison Eck
ABYSSUS ABYSSUM INVOCAT / DEEP CALLS TO DEEP 
You must be logged in to post a comment.