Yesterday at 3:45 I went to confession at St. Bernard’s Parish at St. Camillus Church in Fitchburg as I have for the last 8 weeks. What was different was that instead of a few people waiting for confession, the church was ope proper with people in pews preparing for the 4:15 Saturday vigil mass which hasn’t been celebrated publicly since the 3rd week of Lent.
It was very different in some ways, there was police tape taping off every other pew and in the long pews there was tape on them marking off three spots, each end and the middle, so people knew to space out. There was also tape on the center aisle marking off 6 foot distances for communion. There was no collection, simply baskets at the entrances to put envelopes in, no missiles in the pews and the “sign of peace” was skipped (although some folks noting this turned and waved).
And of course there were the masks, everyone had masks. It was like a bank robbers convention.
But when it comes down to it, the liturgy the homily , the consecration and the Eucharist was that of the Holy Mass.
It wasn’t anything near a full church. There are many who generally attend the three Sunday masses (2 morning one afternoon) that returned today. I’m sure those who were ill stayed away, I didn’t see some of the older members of the parish, who would most risk, I’m sure a few more didn’t want to take any risks and of course given that the lifting of the obligation for Catholics in our diocese to attend weekly mass is still lifted, I’m sure a more than a few decided to take advantage of a lovely day.
I suspect every week the numbers will grow and as I heard the congregation led by our pastor finish with the Prayer of St. Michael and felt the power of that prayer declared publicly by dozens of Christian throats eager to glorify God it’s clear that no matter what the numbers the Mass IS back and Hell will tremble because of it.
I oppose the whole sanctuary City business as a violation of the rule of law, however if there is one thing you can say about the Sanctuary City movement is that it is in keeping of the American Tradition of completely ignoring laws that they don’t like.
We’re now seeing a glimpse of this in NYC:
Upper East Side bars and restaurants allowed patrons to drink on sidewalks, and in some cases dine in. Tonight's lead story on @NBCNewYork at 11p—shot by photojournalists Danny Ojeda and Alex Plasencia. pic.twitter.com/RBvZqUUimu
When you have a one party state or city it usually takes an “I’m mad as hell and can’t take it anymore moment. I’m wondering if this might become the case in blue states that remain locked down as other places open.
“A resolution of the city council of the city of Atwater affirming the city’s commitment to fundamental rights of life, liberty, and property, and declaring the city of Atwater a sanctuary city for all businesses,” the resolution read.
A statewide shelter-in-place order has been in effect since March 19, with gradual easements happening this month. While some counties were reportedly approved to move to “Phase 2” of the state’s reopening plan, which would allow some non-essential lower-risk business to reopen, Atwater’s Merced County was not included.
It will be fun to see the left object to these thing as they’ve objected to sanctuary gun counties. Perhaps they should have thought about the “new rules” as Kurt Schlichter calls them, before imposing them.
The same thing applies to liberals rushing to cheer Judge Sullivan who is doing all he can to pretend that he’s in a Soviet Courtroom rather than an american one. In one respect given how this entire Mike Flynn business has gone such actions by the left should be unsurprising but I’d remind our friend on the left that Donald Trump has appointed a 3rd of the judiciary at this point and you might not like the Sullivan Standards if they are applied to their allies.
The left will not consider these tactics an outrage until they are used against them and under a Jacksonian president, I’d not be surprised to see it, except for the fact that he’s not to my knowledge appointing Jacksonian judges. As Razor put it on twitter:
This won’t be a shocking scandal impacting democracy and undermining the rule of law until the moment a Republican copies it.
It’s not often that I disagree with President Trump but I think this is a VERY bad idea:
I think it would set a really bad precedent for him to be called because frankly I would expect a Democrat administration to use it as a precedent to go after a GOP @POTUS
A good general rule is never set a precedent that you don't trust your foes to abuse
It’s worth noting that the reason why President Trump has been able to so effectively pack the courts with conservatives is that Harry Reid changed the rules when he presumed that the left would hold the Senate forever.
It’s also a bad political move. I suspect that while Black Americans intellectually know that Barack Obama was a disaster in the White House for America in general and them in particular they cling to the myth of the light-bringer culturally to the point where they might actually turn out to defend that fantasy.
Turned on a livestream of a Sunday Mass on the Roku (I keep ending up finding different ones) and I noticed that there was a chat option.
I thought this was odd considering you aren’t supposed to be talking in Mass but if nothing else said option is an exercise in realism.
Yesterday in my Under the Fedora column I joked that all of this Corona Virus, Wuhan Virus, CCP Virus stuff could be because some Redsox fan made a deal with the Devil who promised that by May 1st the Redsox would be undefeated and the Yankees would yet to have win a game. That reminded me of something I meant to write about a week ago that I mentioned in the podcast last week
Remember back at the start of the Trump Administration there were a bunch of stories about Witches in New York all Hexing Donald Trump. If you do a google search of it you can find stories like this:
Most of Donald Trump’s opponents believe they will have to wait four more years to see him leave the White House.
But America’s witches are more optimistic.
At the stroke of midnight on Friday, followers of witchcraft across the US performed a mass spell designed to stop the president doing harm.
A Facebook group devoted to the ritual has attracted over 10,500 likes, and coined the hashtag #magicresistance.
Groups of witches across the country are preparing to cast a coordinated “binding spell” on President Donald Trump on October 25. It will be their third concerted attempt to make the magic happen.
Now you might not be a Christian or believe in witches but given the events of the last month don’t you think it’s odd that reporters who thought this was so cool and so wonderful aren’t following up with any of these people to ask: “Hey Trump’s numbers are doing better but the country is in the grip of a pandemic, do you feel at all responsible for this?”
I think it’s a valid question and I’ve love to hear the answer on this, but the press will never bother with it because as long as they are the media’s allies in their fight against Trump, as interesting as this story might be, nobody is the press is going to write it
People never cease to amaze me. I am used to reading Chinese, North Korean and Russian propaganda. It’s comical to read, but sad when you think that 20% of the world’s population has to read this garbage due to censorship.
So imagine my frustration when a friend sent me this:
And I’m pouring myself a glass of plentiful water being like
How are you supposed to respond to these things? It’s not the first time, and over the years, I’ve tried various strategies. The three I’ve settled on I like to call Truth, Ridicule and Instigation.
Watch Baghdad Bob in action at about the 7 minute mark!
The invasion of Iraq exposed many Americans to the Iraqi Information Minister, Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf, or more commonly known as Baghdad Bob. During the invasion, we were inundated with interviews where Baghdad Bob would deny claims that any American forces had entered Iraq or Baghdad, with such memorable quotes as “They’re coming to surrender or be burned in their tanks.” and “There are no American infidels in Baghdad. Never!” Americans, in typical American fashion, were not impressed, and soon al-Sahaaf was featured on countless memes, YouTube videos and even had a website devoted to him.
Instead of fighting the allegation, you force it one level deeper. When someone asked me whether 5G caused COVID-19, I told them “Only the Huawei 5G. That’s why we have to build 5G from Verizon.” Or when someone claims that climate change is a government conspiracy, I tell them “It’s worse than that. Ever since the U.S. captured the Nazi weather machine in Svalbard, our scientists have been making all sorts of dangerous changes!”
A good instigation has a kernel of truth that is easy to find on the Internet. In the 5G case, its the push by the U.S. to build their own 5G infrastructure. In the climate case, its the (true) fact that the Nazi’s had a weather outpost on Svalbard that was one of the last places to surrender during the war. Heck, the Nazis even had a weather station in Canada! Maybe the Inuits were working with the Nazis to overthrow the Canadian government…nah, couldn’t be true, could it?
You can easily do your own instigation, and you should! The best format is:
Hyperbole – Actor – Kernel of Truth – Outright Lie –
My favorites are:
Hypberole: It’s worse than you know… I have insider information… A study that was covered up said… I found this site on the Dark Web that said…
Actors: The radical left The vast right-wing conspiracy The underground Communist movement Russian spies Vatican II The Nazis The Illuminati
Instigation seems cruel, but the more I used it, it made me realize two things. First, when you learn about history, you realize that governments are made of people that are flawed. Conspiracy theorists will connect a few dots of information to come up with some wild accusation, while the reality is a lot more mundane. I tell people that the golden rule for government conspiracy is “Never attribute to government conspiracy what is better left to incompetence, greed or lust for power.“
Applying that to the current status of Michigan’s COVID-19 shutdown is perfect. The current Governor is a jerk. She’s using the crisis to push her own agenda, beat down on people she doesn’t like, and it wouldn’t surprise me if she profits from it in some way. But is she part of a bigger conspiracy? Doubtful. You’d be giving her too much credit by saying that.
The other thing I realized is that we’re all sucked into conspiracy. Plenty of people reading this will think they are somehow too smart to be fooled by conspiracy. To that I say, you’re not. Lots of people believed Bernie Sanders and/or Donald Trump was being funded by the Russians. People doubted whether Barack Obama was a U.S. citizen, despite the FBI having investigated the matter. People still believe there are UFOs at Area 51.
On a small scale though, we all fall victim to this. How many people think drinking 8 glasses of water a day is recommended? Or that flossing your teeth is a good thing? Despite living in the information age, we’re terrible at actually challenging our beliefs. We could read about vaccines and flossing, sift through campaign finance records, and learn about unique history…or we could share social media posts that appeal to our emotions instead of reason.
Humans are unique for many reasons, but perhaps the biggest is our ability to reason and logically question the world around us. Social media makes it too easy to be lazy, put people in stereotyped boxes, and accept old-wives tales as truth. We could all do better.
This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Navy, or any other government agency.
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