From the Mail

Well, not the mail precisely.  The twitter feed in fact.  But it's sort of like email. What it was, was a quotation from GKC, is what it was:

Men are ruled, at this minute by the clock, by liars who refuse them news, and by fools who cannot govern.-- G.K. Chesterton

God bless us.  Pretty perspicacious 21st century opinions from someone who died in 1936.  This may be my new email sig line.

Civil War

No, nothing to do with the War of Northern Aggression.  I mean the one in the conservative media.  A citation to this arrived in this morning's mail.   How are the neocon commentariate going to handle a Trumpean win in November?

It will be interesting to see how some of the conservative "NeverTrump" commentators handle the blowback in the days and months ahead. This soon after the last of his challengers threw in the towel, it looks like Trump is going to be supported by the vast majority of GOP elected officials and a large number of PACs and major party contributors. 

If, as expected, Clinton is the Democratic nominee and the race tightens, the pressure on those elements of the conservative intelligentsia who are pledging not to support Trump will be immense. So immense, in fact, that it's not clear whether their futures would look better if Trump subsequently wins or loses. If he wins, they lose access to the White House (and the Republican Party), and if he loses (and particularly should he lose narrowly), they will be held responsible for every objectionable thing subsequently done by President Hillary Clinton.

Interesting  stuff.  Will the rhetorical decibel level ratchet down a few clicks?  Will this make a difference:

. . . . the guess here is that many of Trump's most vocal critics will persevere in their opposition, though their rhetoric and tactics will undoubtedly be molded somewhat by the opinion polls as Election Day approaches. After all, many of the conservative outlets of news and opinion, funded as they are by wealthy benefactors like Philip Anschutz (The Weekly Standard), are not dependent financially on marketplace factors like advertising or subscription revenue.

Indeed.  Why reduce the bombast when you're not really an organ of conservative thought anyway but a mouthpiece for the oligarchy?

From the Mail

And in the said mail this morning was a catalogue.  (You thought this was going to be some sort of political commentary, didn't you.  Or about divorced and remarried deaconesses receiving communion or something.  Well it isn't.)

Not just any catalogue, either.  A  J.Peterman catalogue. And after all these years.  You'll be delighted to know it's still a great read.  I always enjoyed those things but I thought J.P. went belly-up years ago.   And yet here a new catalogue is in my mailbox.  A short search reveals that according to Wikipedia - which you can read for yourself here -- J.P. did go bust.  Not once but twice.  Yet phoenix-like, here it is back again with a new catalogue.

Not that I'll ever actually buy anything from it.  A hundred bucks or so for a short sleeve shirt?  That'll be the day.  But I do hope J.P. has loads of customers with far more cash than this impecunious musician and pensioned-off scribbler.  The J.Peterman catalogue is more fun than anything else the postman is likely to bring me.

16 May -- St Simon Stock, a.k.a. Simon Anglius

16 May is the traditional feast of St Simon Stock, an early Father General of the Carmelite Order and the one to whom Our Lady gave the Carmelite scapular.  The Inn has had something to say about St Simon most years. Here's the post from 2005.

The old collect for today from the Discalced Carmelite propers:

Plebs tibi, Domine, Virginique Matri dicata, beati Simonis, quem ei Rectorem et Patrem dedisti, solemnitate lætetur : et sicut per eum tantæ protectionis signum obtinuit; ita prædestinationis æternæ munera consequatur. Per Dominum. Amen. 

O Lord, Thy people dedicated to the Virgin Mother rejoice in the solemnity of Blessed Simon whom Thou didst give to them as guide and father; may they receive the eternally predestined reward the sign of which protection was received through him. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

(The picture shown above is a bit more accurate than most illustrations of St Simon in that it shows the original striped cloak of the Order.)

Not Your Usual Encomium

"He is vulgar, abusive, nasty, rude, boorish and outrageous."  The quote is from Paul Johnson and he means it as A Good Thing.  No, honestly.  You can read it for  yourself here.

Politics, Religion, and the Ruling Class

That's the title of the article in Catholic World Report - which you can find  here - which consists of an interview with Dr. Angelo M. Codevilla who gives a very good explanation of where we are now politically and culturally.  Well-worth a read.

(My only reservation would be the shot at The Donald.   Seems a bit unfair considering what else was - and is - on offer.)

A sample:

 In the common sense of humanity, and hence in dictionaries, the word “family” is defined by biology as augmented by marriage (which is a mingling of biologies) and adoption. The very essence of Progressivism’s many forms is to imagine and to treat individuals as if they existed without irrevocable biological connections—as neither son nor daughter, husband or wife, father or mother. Progressivist regimes—ours no different from that of Sweden or the Soviet Union—demand that we regard all human relationships as the result of revocable choices. All, except the relationship between each and every individual and the regime itself. That, we are to consider our parent, our spouse, our progeny.

The Merry Month of May

The happy birds Te Deum sing,
'Tis Mary's month of May;
Her smile turns winter into spring,
And darkness into day;
And there's a fragrance in the air,
The bells their music make,
And O the world is bright and fair,
And all for Mary's sake.

Where'er we seek the holy Child,
At every sacred spot,
We meet the Mother undefiled;
Who shun her seek him not:
At cloistered Nazareth we see.
At haunted Bethlehem,
The throne of Jesus, Mary's knee,
Her smile, his diadem.

The Daughter, Mother, Spouse of God,
None silence her appeal
Who long to tread where Jesus trod,
What Jesus felt to feel.
O, Virgin-born, from thee we learn
To love thy Mother dear;
Her teach us duly to discern.
And rightly to revere.

To love the Mother, people say,
Is to defraud the Son.
For them, alas, there dawns no May,
Until their hearts are won:
Then, when their hearts begin to burn.
Ah, then, to Jesus true,
And loving whom he loves, they learn
To love Saint Mary too.

How many are the thoughts that throng
On faithful souls to-day!
All year we sing our Lady's song,
'Tis still the song of May:
Magnificat! O may we feel
That rapture more and more;
And chiefly, Lord, what time we kneel
Thine altar-throne before.

'Tis then, when at thy feet we pray,
We share our Lady's mirth;
Her joy we know who hail to-day
Thy Eucharistic birth;
That trembling joy to Mary sent,
Ah, Christians know it well,
With whom in his dear sacrament
Their Saviour deigns to dwell.

Yes, Mary's month has come again,
The merry month of May;
And sufferers forget their pain,
And sorrows flee away,
And joys return, the hearts whose moan
Was desolate erewhile
Are blithe and gay - once more they own
The charm of Mary's smile.

Thy Son our Brother is, and we,
Whatever may betide,
A Mother, Mary, have in thee,
A guardian and a guide;
Thy smiles a tale of gladness tell
No words can ever say?
If but, like thee, we love him well,
The year will all be May.

All hail! An angel spake the words
We lovingly repeat;
The song-notes of the singing birds
They are not half so sweet:
This is a music that endures,
It cannot pass away,
For Mary's children it ensures
A never-ending May.

The above is an old Anglo-Catholic hymn which I have pilfered from Watts and Co.'s FB post this morning.  We are, of course, well into Mary's month of May and it's past due time that I crank up The Inn and take it for a spin around the block to make sure the battery is still charged.  I'm told the hymn is best sung to the tune "O Little Town of Bethlehem".  Although some have seen fit to use "The Lincolnshire Poacher" and, mirabile dictu, "British Grenadiers".  I'd stick with "Little Town".

This is probably not a bad post in which to link again to "Come Pray the Rosary".  It's here.  It's the best of the "recite along" options on the web.  I very much doubt that it counts as prayer-with-others for purposes of getting the indulgence but I find it a great help.