Nazi Germany sets its military sights on the Russian bear (June 1941)

"Germany’s invasion of Russia with more than three million men was the largest surprise attack in military history." 


The Nazis and the Communists had been allies for almost two years. Joseph Stalin ignored repeated warnings about a possible German attack.

"German troops killed or wounded 150,000 Soviets in the first week of the campaign, while the Luftwaffe—the Nazi air force—destroyed over 2,000 Russian planes in just the first two days... Most outside analysts began predicting that a Russian defeat was only weeks or even days away. Despite these early setbacks, the Soviets’ seemingly inexhaustible supply of troops ultimately proved too much for the Germans to overcome...

"In addition to the might of the Red Army, German troops were also worn down by 'General Winter'—the nickname used to describe the deadly Russian frost."

Victor Davis Hanson says that the best tank design of WWII, by far, was the Russian T-34: "The Germans invaded Russia without knowing that the Russians had T-34 tanks—proof of how threadbare their pre-invasion intelligence was."

             

UPDATE: More here on what made that tank so good.

A short video of a recent demonstration at a war show.

Religion and Geopolitics Review: Saturday, June 16

By Dr. David Pence and A. Joseph Lynch

THE FACTS SHOW GUILT; THE CONCLUSIONS AND HEADLINES SAY "NOT GUILTY"

The Inspector General Report on the role of the FBI in the Hillary Clinton email case and the Russian collusion investigation of Donald Trump is a lot like the James Comey press conference on the initial FBI investigation of Hillary Clinton's use of a private server as Secretary of State. The initial FBI investigation was full of details about crimes and then Comey made a stunning public conclusion that no prosecutor would prosecute them. The July 2016 headline in the NYTimes was  "FBI Director James Comey recommends no charges against Hillary Clinton on email."  The recent IG report documents pages and pages of animus toward Donald Trump and bias for Hillary Clinton. And yet it concludes there was no bias. The Times headline on the IG report is "Report criticizes Comey but finds no bias in FBI decision on Clinton." 

BLESSED ARE THE PEACEMAKERS: BANDWAGON WITH THE BIG GUYS DON'T ENCIRCLE WITH THE LITTLE ONES

When Donald Trump took office, Barack Obama told him the greatest immediate danger to the US  was North Korea and their nuclear weapons. The Trump-Kim summit has walked back that threat in a dramatic breakthrough after direct one on one meetings between: 1) Kim Jong-un and the President, 2) South Korean leader Moon Jae-in and the President; 3) Chinese Supreme Leader Xi Jinping and the President, and 4) Prime Minister Abe of Japan and the President.  This dramatic display of nation-to-nation, leader-to-leader discussions may redraw the entire encirclement alliances of the post WWII world.  The Asian equivalent of tearing down the Berlin Wall that reunified Germany has just happened for the ancient civilization of Korea. Of course there is great uncertainty but it is the incertitude that precedes a risk for something big. Why is the minuscule so trumpeted and the profoundly significant so ignored?  This can be attributed to the stunning geographical illiteracy, religious blindness, and historical ignorance of our very good looking modern journalists. The significance of this story cannot be discovered during pillow talk with cultivated sources. It can only be recognized by one who studies and reflects on strategic perspective and historical memory.

Politics is about organizing protection. Mao Tse Tung said governance comes out of the barrel of a gun. That is a well received majority opinion. Only in a handful of developed Western lands protected by agreements forged in the blood of  their grandfathers is politics a continuation of high school student council campaigns and elections. Most leaders in a "rough world" came up rough.  It is far better for the real leaders of the true major powers to sit down with one another and talk then stay in outmoded multinational alignments that keep the principals from talking face to face. Much more is learned and much more can be settled by Donald Trump sitting down with Vladimir Putin than making toasts with the feminist "defense minister" of Sweden while she badmouths Russia. Donald Trump's breakthrough in Korea has happened because he is developing relations with all the national leaders in Asia including Xi Jinping. It is far better to meet with the leaders of China and North Korea than organize a human rights conference with tough guy Marco Rubio so he can talk against China showing us his jutting presidential jaw in its best campaign mode against the latest threat to our way of life.

President Trump is actually proposing diplomacy over war games. He is talking to a nation man about inter-national relations before lecturing on human rights. He joins Lincoln who didn't free all the slaves at his first inauguration;  Richard Nixon who didn't talk forced abortion with Mao; Pope Francis who is not lecturing the Chinese; and Ronald Reagan who spoke with the Soviets about tearing down the prison wall before listing the individual prisoners.  President Trump left the white multilateralists of G7 to talk to the nationalist strong men of Asia. The diversity media scolded the President  for talking to Asian bad boys instead of soothing the more familiar metrosexual leader of Canada. President Trump dared suggest that US troops in Korea are not forever. This is a strategic (and debt slashing) tsunami. President Trump  met with President Kim in Singapore and evoked the independent Singapore model as a new way for Korea. The greatest international thinker of our time was the Father of Singapore. This is a serious time that would benefit if a few journalists studied the biography and speeches of Lee Kuan Yew.  It would also help if religious leaders and the antiwar movement could find their old songbooks...because "All we are saying is, 'Give peace a chance'."

I. SOLZHENITSYN'S HARVARD SPEECH AT 40

SOLZHENITSYN HARVARD SPEECH - 40 YEARS LATER: An excellent speech about the speech by Peter Kreeft. The speech itself.

Solzhenitsyn sees materialist capitalist individualism and Communism as two fruits of the Renaissance then Enlightenment - "rationalistic humanism, humanistic autonomy - it could also be called anthropocentricity - that man is the center of all." These are the roots of the West - which years later will be expressed in Communism and Libertarian Capitalism. Unless man returns to his spiritual roots, he will decay. Liberty must be grounded in the understanding of man as "a creature of God with obligations as well as rights." The greatest deficit in the West is civic courage. Two years later, Ronald Reagan would answer that call with a civic courage that led to the fall of the Berlin Wall. But no baby boomer President could recover from the "spiritual exhaustion" which Solzhenitsyn named that day. Thus we are meeting the other cultures and civilizations which he said are more real than the bipolar construction of the Cold War. China and the Muslim World were real then and are prominent now. How shall we meet them? But what is missing for Americans is a renaissance of Christianity as the answer to the Enlightenment and the calamity of a despiritualized humanism. Solzhenitsyn concluded, We will have to rise to a new level - there is "no way left but upwards."

"Even if we are spared destruction by war, life will have to change in order not to perish on its own. We cannot avoid reassessing the fundamental definitions of human life and society. Is it true that man is above everything? Is there no Superior Spirit above him? Is it right that man’s life and society’s activities should be ruled by material expansion above all? Is it permissible to promote such expansion to the detriment of our integral spiritual life?" —Alexander Solzhenitsyn, in his June 7, 1978 Harvard University Commencement Address.  In the address, Solzhenitsyn encouraged the West not to lose its soul to the powerful temptation of materialism. This address was delivered 40 years ago this week. Solzhenitsyn died 10 years ago, in 2008, at the age of 90

"If, as claimed by humanism, man were born only to be happy, he would not be born to die. Since his body is doomed to death, his task on earth evidently must be more spiritual: not a total engrossment in everyday life, not the search for the best ways to obtain material goods and then their carefree consumption. It has to be the fulfillment of a permanent, earnest duty so that one’s life journey may become above all an experience of moral growth: to leave life a better human being than one started it." — Alexander Solzhenitsyn, from the same address.

"The turn introduced by the Renaissance was probably inevitable historically: the Middle Ages had come to a natural end by exhaustion, having become an intolerable despotic repression of man’s physical nature in favor of the spiritual one. But then we recoiled from the spirit and embraced all that is material, excessively and incommensurately. The humanistic way of thinking, which had proclaimed itself our guide, did not admit the existence of intrinsic evil in man, nor did it see any task higher than the attainment of happiness on earth. It started modern Western civilization on the dangerous trend of worshiping man and his material needs. Everything beyond physical well-being and the accumulation of material goods, all other human requirements and characteristics of a subtle and higher nature, were left outside the area of attention of state and social systems, as if human life did not have any higher meaning. Thus gaps were left open for evil, and its drafts blow freely today." — Alexander Solzhenitsyn, from the same address.

SOLZHENITSYN REFLECTS ON HOW TO TEACH THE WEST THAT MOTHER RUSSIA IS NOT THE EVIL SOVIET UNION. THE "THIRD WAVE OF EMIGRATION" FROM RUSSIA IS PAINTING THE NATION AS EVIL: "And how was I to conduct such a battle, calling for a fight to the death against Communism, yet without in any way targeting Russia? And this in a situation where wily polemicists of the Third Emigration [the wave of émigrés allowed to leave in the 1970s — NR] were not only clouding the realities of Russia with their lies, but, in an unexpected turn, were spreading the credo that the true Russia, as opposed to the Soviet Union, is a far greater danger to the West than the current benign Communist regime, which must be supported, though kept in check by maintaining adroit negotiations." -Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

II. CULTURE OF LIFE, CULTURE OF PROTECTION

THE COSMIC RACE: The Americas (North and South) are meant to be the continents of the fifth race and the culmination of our human destiny as a spiritual species. The very influential Mexican thinker originating La Raza is Jose Vasconcelos (d. 1959). He wrote the Cosmic Race in 1925. With Our Lady of Guadalupe, this is the antidote to the ethnic nation.

THOSE ASIANS ARE TAKING UP ALL THE SEATS IN THE BEST SCHOOLS - FROM NYC HIGH SCHOOLS TO CALIFORNIA COLLEGES: This has to stop.

AMERICAN CULTURE IN TROUBLE: Blame it on 1968 by Steve Young. Or the assassinations of 1963-1968 by AOA.

FOR ADULTS ONLY: Daughter of sci-fi author tells her tale inside a very twisted world.

A COWARD DIES A THOUSAND TIMES, A BRAVE MAN ONLY ONCE: From William Shakespeare's Julius Caesar:

“Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste of death but once. Of all the wonders that I yet have heard, It seems to me most strange that men should fear; Seeing that death, a necessary end, Will come when it will come.”

JACK JOHNSON PARDONED AND MORE ON THE MANLY ART OF BOXING: Monsignor Rutler writes.

III. PRESIDENTIAL POLITICS AND AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY

KOREA - PRESIDENT TRUMP AND PRESIDENT KIM JONG-UN MEET IN SINGAPORE. AN INCREDIBLE MOMENT. SOME BACKGROUND AND ANALYSIS: Christians in Korea see unification as ultimate goal. AOA on Korea: Geography. Whats at Stake? Asia, Armistice and Nations: A century of Korean Division. Korean Strategy in the Asian Context (Scroll down to North Korea and American Foreign Policy in an Asian context). A World of Nations: A truth at the Olympics.

IF THE GLOBALISTS' FAVORITE NATION IS ONLY IMAGINED, THEN ITS REFUGEES WILL BE FOREVER PERMANENT: Palestine as a nation is truly an "imagined community." The "refugees of Palestine" also have a very special status in the alternative universe of globalism and its conceits. Does this make sense given the huge refugee problem that besets a world still at war?

THE TRANSATLANTIC WEST IS NOT THE HEART OF OUR NATIONAL ALLIANCES: Should we be breaking up the old West or realigning the globe? Talking tough to Justin Trudeau and demanding respect for Vladimir Putin is a lot more realistic than thinking the center of our alliances should run through London, Ottawa, Brussels, and Paris instead of New Delhi, Moscow, and Bejiing. President Trump is not just a strong nationalist. He also has a much more reality-based view of the power relations with nations around the globe. President Trump acts differently toward strong leaders. He could realign our major alliances with much stronger countries than the confused Europeans. But he is not there yet. His policymakers are still organizing the West against the Great Powers (Russia, China, Iran). See below.

THE TRANSATLANTIC ALLIANCE IS THE HEART OF OUR NATIONAL ALLIANCES: A State Department official outlines a policy built on European nations accepting geopolitical realities - which name Russia, China, and Iran as chief dangers. What is the West? "...democracy, individual liberty and rule of law, ordered liberty, strong alliances separation of powers. The West is community of democracies - - Ukraine and Georgia are part of west." This is the three encirclement policy of the old foreign policy establishnent. Many people work for the President who still don't understand his very new approach to other nations.

JIMMY HOFFA SON AND HEAD OF THE TEAMSTERS IS WITH THE PRESIDENT: On steel and aluminum tariffs.

HATING TRUMP AND THE DEMISE OF JOURNALISM: Love is sometimes blind; hate is always blind and sometimes drunk. The widespread antipathy toward Donald Trump among media and government employees has deeply retarded the whole culture of the East Coast. There is outrage about FBI surveillance of NYTimes reporter twenty-something Ali Watkins showing her as a conduit for leaking by a 50+male staff member of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee. But the outrage is about government spying on reporters and curtailing their unbridled freedom to disclose (which Alexander Solzhenitsyn criticized so eloquently 40 years ago at Harvard). Ms. Atkins' competitive advantage over other reporters has not yet been labeled "cultivating sources as the new casting couch." But we know that sooner or later some sexist will so besmirch the enterprising young lady careerist. No outrage on that as of yet.

Abe Rosenthal, legendary editor of the NYTimes, immediately fired a woman reporter once he found out she was having an affair with a politician she reported on. (Barbara Walters, call your office or at least examine your conscience.). Women reporters complained to the old man. Rosenthal answered, "I don't care if you are f--- an elephant but if you are, that means you won't be covering the circus for my newspaper." The introduction of erotic interpersonal relations in the res publica is a debilitating feature of the sexually integrated publics of the power couple era. But the discreet power couples of extra marital affairs, the hidden interests and secret information is a world unto itself. Is journalism really about cultivating secret sources to get inside tales? Maybe that is why very big stories right in front of our faces like the role of Saudi Arabia in 9/11 and world wide terror are so poorly reported. It really is much more difficult to bring historical perspective, matured religious sensibility and geographical knowledge to a story than a whispered phone conversation.

ROBERT DE-NIRO AND HOLLYWOOD: A short video showing the eloquence and courage of our decadent culture makers.

POLITICS IS ABOUT CITIZENSHIP - A COVENANT OF DUTY OR A CLAMORING FOR RIGHTS: In France the debate is on as President Macron rewards an illegal immigrant with citizenship for his great bravery. Merit and duty tied to citizenship was too much for some leftists who explain things this way: "Citizenship once represented a set of rights to be demanded from the state as a form of emancipation, for example, in the civil rights and suffrage movements.”

FROM SAME ARTICLE: "Obviously, this is the polar opposite of the classical understanding of citizenship. To the ancient Greeks, and then the Romans—the latter having given us the concept of res publica, the public thing—citizenship was closely held and much prized." We would add that citizenship defined by duty was a kind of bond among men like marriage is a kind of bond between man and woman. That male bond still holds and is the real social glue under the wider citizenship shared by all men, women, and children in republics. Politics and citizenship is a religious, territorial and masculine reality especially in America.

IV. AROUND THE WORLD R&G ROUND UP

THE WAR ON YEMEN IS A WAR BY SAUDI ARABIA AGAINST NEIGHBORING SHIITES - A GOOD ONE FOR THE US TO STAY OUT OF: Blockading their last serious port to the world is going to cost a lot of lives.

ITALY FROM LEFT AND RIGHT FAVORS RELIGION AND NATION OVER EURO-GLOBALISTS: From First Things magazine. The post-WWII/post-Cold War alliances and formulations must be transformed.

Religion and Geopolitics Review: Saturday, June 9

By Dr. David Pence and A. Joseph Lynch

WEEKLY BRIEF
      THE ASSASSINATIONS THAT DEFINED A GENERATION
Fifty years ago this week, Senator Robert Kennedy was killed in Los Angeles after winning the Presidential Democratic Primary in California. The four greatest public orators in American life in the 1960's were all assassinated. John Kennedy was killed in November of 1963; Malcolm X was killed in February 1965; Martin Luther King was killed in April 1968, and Robert Kennedy was killed in June 1968.  John Kennedy was the first  Catholic President of a Protestant nation. He had convinced his countrymen he would be the best commander in chief in the American war against atheist communism. He had argued for an end to civic racism which violated morality  "as old as Scripture and clear as the Constitution."  Three weeks after he had allowed the murder/coup of Catholic nationalist Ngo Diem in Vietnam, Kennedy lost his mandate from heaven. He was murdered by an atheist communist in Texas. He was not killed by a southern racist. He was not killed because America is a violent country. He was killed by a soldier in the atheist movement who thought murdering the charismatic warrior-leader of the free nations would help the cause of Communism. So it did. Malcolm X was killed by members of the Black Racialist Nation of Islam. Malcolm X had gone to Mecca and seen that Islam was not the color bound religion preached in the American sect under Elijah Muhammed. Malcolm resigned from the Black Muslims, and exposed the leader of the organization as a serial abuser of young women. He repudiated the racist theory of separate black origins. He was killed by black racists covering up sexual abuse and protecting racial huckstering. Robert Kennedy was a strong supporter of a racially integrated America and a free Israel. Israel had gained control of Jerusalem and a defensible eastern border in the Six Day War one year earlier in June, 1967. A Palestinian nationalist from a Christian family shot him in retaliation for his support of that now viable Israeli nation. His killer was not a Muslim but a nationalist of a nation that did not exist in rebellion against a nation that did.  Martin Luther King was killed by a failed pornographic movie maker who had more success as a racist assassin. The assassin aimed to derail a Christian America animated by interracial brotherhood. He eliminated the most dynamic Christian preacher for that movement.
  The assassins of that decade were a white racist, a black racist, an atheist Communist and a Palestinian nationalist. A body needs its head who can speak its soul. Men who can form civic community with the transcendent word well spoken are not easily replaced. The assassins left their mark. In a certain way, their actions still rule.
The baby boomer generation felt these deaths in their late teens and early twenties. Since then, their revolutionary cultural achievement has been the destruction of religious and political patriarchy. They have buried the corpse of national politics and patriotism as a protective interracial Christian brotherhood. That horrible half decade left the baby boomers a fatherless cohort deeply confused and disoriented. Four political fathers--all men of a former generation-- were cut down performing their public duties before their trusting eyes. Will they pass along by choice what they lost by fate before they pass away?     

I. POPE FRANCIS AND THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

THE CHURCH HAS NO AUTHORITY TO CHANGE THE SUBSTANCE OF THE SACRAMENT - THE MALE PRIESTHOOD: Head of CDF appointed by Pope Francis, Jesuit Luis Ladaria, makes a clear no forever on female priests and says those who say this could be decided differently in the future are causing serious confusion among the faithful. The male priesthood is the fundamental living form by which Christ makes himself present in the Eucharistic church. This male group is the template for the brotherhood of men under God the Father lived out in the 2000 dioceses of the Church and the 200 nations of the world.

POPE FRANCIS ON RUSSIA UKRAINE THE PATRIARCHATE AND CHURCH UNITY: The text. The best person to read on these matters is Robert Moynihan of Moynihan Letter from Inside the Vatican. These came from letter 31:

"And before you I would like to reiterate — in a special way before you, my dear brother [referring to Russian Orthodox Metropolitan Hilarion, the leader of the group he was addressing], and before all of you — that the Catholic Church will never allow an attitude of division to arise from her people. We will never allow ourselves to do this, I do not want it. In Moscow — in Russia — there is only one Patriarchate: yours. We will not have another one." —Pope Francis, in Rome on May 30, greeting a delegation of Russian Orthodox led by Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev.

"We must continue to study theology, to clarify the points, but in the meantime let us walk together, let us not wait for these things to be resolved in order to walk, no." — Pope Francis, in the same May 30 greeting.

"The Catholic Church, the Catholic Churches must not get involved in internal matters of the Russian Orthodox Church, nor in political issues. This is my attitude, and the attitude of the Holy See today. And those who meddle do not obey the Holy See." —Pope Francis, in the same May 30 greeting.

POPE FRANCIS ON HOMOSEXUALS IN PRIESTHOOD: His statement , "Who Am I to Judge?" made a distinction between the inclination and "the gay lobby" within the Vatican. He said "the lobby is not good" but then the gay lobby took his words about the inclination and reported it as an acceptance of "gay priests". He does not think one should be "defined by his tendencies.' If a priest has these tendencies as fundamental to his personality--if he is gay-- then he said in Italy, "Do not admit them to the seminary." Pope Francis has been deeply shaken by the well known practice in Chile of turning over formation in seminaries to known homosexuals. Francis' reply appears in a new book The Name of God is Mercy to be released Tuesday;

"On that occasion I said this: If a person is gay and seeks out the Lord and is willing, who am I to judge that person?" the pope says. "I was paraphrasing by heart the Catechism of the Catholic Church where it says that these people should be treated with delicacy and not be marginalized."

"I am glad that we are talking about 'homosexual people' because before all else comes the individual person, in his wholeness and dignity," he continues. "And people should not be defined only by their sexual tendencies: let us not forget that God loves all his creatures and we are destined to receive his infinite love." "I prefer that homosexuals come to confession, that they stay close to the Lord, and that we pray all together," says Francis. "You can advise them to pray, show goodwill, show them the way, and accompany them along it."

THE 12 SIGNS OF ANTICHRIST: Fulton Sheen thought the anti-Christ would stress the brotherhood of men without the Fatherhood of God.That was the liberal progressive atheism of a century ago. Now the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of men must fall to the humanity of all and the individual autonomy of each. Ordered Publics are shared masculine relationships. The crowd-- the mob--- the masses--they are not ordered masculine publics but sometimes the mob is definitely overtly MALE.

ARCHBISHOP ROMERO TO BE CANONIZED OCTOBER 14: He is not a saint of the left but of the Church. Looking for a good profile that understands his life in terms of Christ not Marxism. Charles Curran won't be our source for what or why but he supplies the when.

MINNESOTA DIOCESE PAYS RECORD $210 MILLION TO ABUSE VICTIMS AND ATTORNEYS: 15 of the 200 American diocese have filed bankruptcy because of sexual abuse claims. Minnesota has 6 Diocese. Minneapolis-St Paul, Duluth and New Ulm have filed bankruptcy. Winona will soon announce. St Cloud has announced. Minnesota 5/6 diocesan level of corruption is stunning. No priest pensions will be affected. All the major priest and bishop actors in the coverup side of the multi diocesan scandal remain clerics in good standing. Archbishop Nienstedt of Minneapolis and St Paul was a truly minor player in the multi decade corruption. He was a non Irish outsider-- a solitary closeted homosexual enemy of the large homosexual mafia he came to "reform". He was forced to resign after excellent reporting by MPR about his role in covering up homosexual priest abuse. 170 million of the settlement will be paid by insurance and 40 million by the parishes and archdiocese. The Church did not do this. Parishes did not do this. Individual priests and bishops abused and covered up abuse and allowed a huge homosexual network to take over the state clergy. Archbishop Hebda should stop saying the Church failed these people. That is attorney Jeff Anderson's line..and he despises the Catholic Church. The problem is a corrupt clergy not a corrupt Church and the corrupt clergymen have not been judged or punished yet. The civil institutions cannot and will not punish the clergymen by Catholic standards. They imply that an all male celibate clergy is the problem. But the problem is that priests were not masculine enough. They did not behave like a brotherhood of fathers because they has become dispersed as careerist cliques and gossiping friendship groups. Celibacy was not the problem-massive impurity and sexual depravation was.

It's a tough story for Minnesota's progressive gay friendly media to tell. When they had a female whistleblower (Jennifer Hasselberger vs. Kevin McDonough) angle, MPR did a fine job of exposing the closeted Archbishop Nienstedt who they also despised for his shrill ineffective voice against gay marriage. Vicar General Kevin McDonough, Catholic Charities icon Msgr Jerome Boxleitner and Archbishop Harry Flynn were responsible for much more of Minnesota's corruption than Nienstedt. Their friendly ties with the Minnesota DFL party and homosexual/feminist media make their stories much harder for the media to tell.  In Philadelphia,there is more aggressive approach from a man in the statehouse.

CHILE HANGS BISHOPS IN EFFIGY: What Crux calls a "fringe group" aims for the nationalist center. The Social Patriotic Movement - anti-communist, anti-capitalist, against the gay-feminst trend. Sounds pretty interesting.

II. CULTURE OF LIFE, CULTURE OF PROTECTION

STOP DOMESTIC VIOLENCE - END ABORTION: The best pro-life video EVER! The Magical Birth Canal.

NO MORE SWIMSUITS: GREAT! BUT NO MORE BEAUTY PAGEANTS? Should a growing reluctance to parade the naked female form mean no more "Beauty Pageants"? Gretchen Carlson (Miss America 1989) says there will be a competition not a pageant. That seems not quite a celebration of the feminine. It is mindful of Title IX decisions that did not allow dance lines or cheerleading as female sports. The fact that girls enjoy vigorous physical activity quite differently than male war games was  - NOT ALLOWED BY GENDER POLICE.

Uncovering the female form is no way to celebrate female beauty since hiddenness is actually a fundamental feminine attribute. Putting forth beauty as an ideal to honor seems a great way for society to celebrate the woman. Grace, talent, physical beauty, interiority, a personal history of acts of mercy are all feminine attributes--they all make her beautiful. The most Mary-like woman should be publicly celebrated. Let it be feminine. Let it be more a pageant than a competition. {On this day in the Catholic calendar, the Immaculate Heart of Mary is acknowledged. Catholic culture has from the beginning presented the male ideal inside the patriarchal fraternity of the Apostolic priesthood while presenting the feminine model in terms of the purity and mercy of the Virgin Mother.}

THE BAKER AND THE SUPREME COURT: Not exactly a victory for natural law or sanity but the baker artist is free from a fine if not his legal bills. Supreme Court decision.

GERMANS APOLOGIZE FOR WRONGS TO HOMOSEXUALS. NO MENTION OF SA HEAD ERNST ROEHM AND ROLE OF VIOLENT HOMOSEXUALS IN THE NAZI MOVEMENT: Misguided German guilt drives a lot of bad history and a disastrous immigration policy. Ernst Roehm and the violent depravity of the Nazis.

HOW DID LIFE BEGIN? A Catholic looks at a few theories. There are three particular moments in the 13.7 billion year history of matter which demand acts of God. 1) The movement from something to nothing. 2) The first living cell. 3) The creation of man.

For those of us who see every human soul as a deliberate interventionist act by God and every Mass as a Divine communication with man. ---it is not so intellectually difficult to admit when a transcendent purpose and Actor is necessary to best explain phenomenon. The man who shoots with one eye closed may see a certain target more clearly but he will never see the big picture needed to  explain in a plausible narrative the story of the world.

DON'T TREAT THE LADY LIKE A TRAMP: A lady soccer star passes up the rainbow jersey - to a chorus of boos.

STUDENT AT PROVIDENCE COLLEGE TALKS TO FEMALE VP AND IS SERVED RESTRAINING ORDER: Part of her fear is that the student's father has access to weapons. Dad is a police officer. You have to hear it to believe it.

THE FRATERNITY OF FATHERS FRACTURED. THE SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE DEFILED. THE DUTY OF MOTHERHOOD ABROGATED. THE STORY OF IRELAND IS A PRIESTHOOD CORRUPTED AND THE SOUL OF A NATION ECLIPSED: Ireland is a nation of 4.8 million people. 64% of eligible voters turned out on May 26, 2018 and 2/3 of them voted to repeal Ireland's Eight amendment which severely restricted laws on abortion.

In May 2015, Ireland became the first country to allow homosexual marriage by popular referendum. 1.2 million voted at that time to amend the constitution so the marriage bond could be made irrespective of sex. For fifty years The Roman Catholic priesthood in Ireland has been massively corrupted by huge homosexual networks in seminaries, schools and the episcopacy. The Irish homosexual alcoholic priest is not a stereotype but a character type that has been shared with many other countries influenced by Irish clergy- most notably the United States. Ireland is a Catholic nation. To regain her soul she needs a return of fatherhood and fraternity in her disgraced episcopacy and priesthood. It is not the electorate who should be lobbied but the priesthood which must be washed clean. If the 26 bishops of the Irish National Conference can not clean itself of the homosexual ideology which has perverted a nation, then they should resign and the global Church should send missionaries.

MALCOLM MUGGERIDGE: A short profile.

III. AROUND THE WORLD - NATION'S ROUND UP

ETHIOPIA - AFRICA'S OLDEST NATION SHOWS THE IMPORTANCE OF THE NATION-STATE: Africa's China?

DUTERTE OF PHILIPPINES ALLIES WITH CHINA: But the media military establishment is for deepening ties with the US and challenging China in the South Sea. Duterte like Trump was elected to change the nation's course but the governing and cultural institutions are set against him. This struggle to define lines of possession in the South China Sea is as fundamental as the Korean negotiations.

HUNGARY - THE NATION FIGHTS THE "OPEN SOCIETY": Hungary's Orban vs Globalist Soros.

THE UNMANNED AIR WAR - WHILE THERE ARE FEWER MEN WHO WILL DIE FOR OUR COUNTRY, THERE ARE PLENTY WHO WILL KILL FOR IT: Drone Deaths from Obama to Trump.

BEN RHODES AND BARACK OBAMA: The globalists are a tribe too and they are being eclipsed.

GERMANY AND RUSSIA: Better than we think.

QATAR VS SAUDI ARABIA: Is Qatar winning the battle for US approval? Thy have certainly won everyone else over against the anti-nationalist schemes of MbS of Saudi Arabia. A meeting coming up to reevaluate. The Saudis seem weak and desperate - not a good combination. We have long argued that the future in the Mideast should belong to Sunni nations who accept Shiite nations as well in the region. Qatar is much better in this respect than Saudi Arabia. One of the great contributions of Secretary of Sate Rex Tillerson was his understanding of the stabilizing role of Qatar. He put the breaks on treating as  pariah the nation where our fleet and al Jazeera News reside.  One of the contributions of the Obama presidency and Secretary of State Kerry was their understanding that the the US would not be served by joining a war alliance against the Shiite nation of Iran orchestrated by Saudi Arabia and Israel. Getting your allies and enemies straight is fundamental in international relations. Misunderstanding the religious movement which is the real enemy of the United States and the civilized nations has been the great intelligence failure of our times.

ARREST OF TOMMY ROBINSON: Britain, Muslim Crime, and Freedom.

Uganda Martyrs, pray for us

by David Pence

                                               

Uganda is an independent (1962) African nation with 38 million people (84% Christian). Parliament recently passed an anti-homosexuality bill roundly condemned by activists in the northern white churches. Denmark, the Netherlands, America, and the World Bank have all threatened Ugandans with severe economic repercussions for their law.

The motto of their flag is "For God and my Country." A formative event in their history is celebrated today to commemorate the martyrdom of Charles Lwanga and his companions. From 1885-1887, King Mwanga II of Buganda was responsible for the execution of a group of young Christian males who had been employed as court pages. They would not submit to his depraved desires. The king knew, in fact, that if a boy was taught the Christian faith and converted, that was one service he would no longer offer the sovereign. Both Anglicans and Catholics were martyred.  Almost 80 countries have laws against sodomy which was a felony  in all 50 U.S. states before 1962. The Ugandan celebration of these recently canonized saints reminds us that Christ has offered all men a share in the deepest and widest of all brotherhoods. All Christian men from the Asian islands to the African heartland know that we are forming a protective brotherhood of cities and nations in imitation of Christ's bond with his Apostles.  Violence, racism, and war can break this bond; and so we must seriously and constantly pursue high and holy brotherhoods to form a public life which glorifies Christ.
       
Just as incest pollutes the love of sons for their  fathers and brothers for their brothers, the brave young pages of Mwanga's court knew what he was asking of them was no insignificant call to duty. The 27 young men who were marched over twenty miles -- and then burned to death -- leave a bright light for our own so-darkened times.

Saint Charles Lwanga, pray that Americans may display the courage of sexual purity that you and your companions showed this day 130 years ago.

                                         FROM TODAY'S OFFICE OF READINGS:
                      POPE PAUL VI SERMON CANONIZING UGANDAN MARTYRS

"These African martyrs herald the dawn of a new age. If only the mind of man might be directed not toward persecutions and religious conflicts but toward a rebirth of Christianity and civilization."

Religion and Geopolitics Review: Saturday, June 2

By Dr. David Pence and A. Joseph Lynch

I. POPE FRANCIS AND THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

POPE FRANCIS AND THE DRAMA IN CHILE: A persistent critic of the pope sees real good in the necessary and dramatic reshaping of a whole national episcopacy. Phil Lawler, another Pope Francis critic, thinks he sees a light as well - maybe. AOA sees this as the renewal of priestly fraternity over careerism and predation. The synodal strategy of Pope Francis takes a whole new form.

ON FORM AND TRADITION - THE TRUTH IS PASSED DOWN IN A CERTAIN FORM: The Catholic Mass - the Incarnation through time.

THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY AND BIG CITY CATHOLIC CHANCERIES TURNED LAVENDER IN THE SAME DECADES: From the National Catholic Reporter:

"Matt Flynn, a prominent Wisconsin Democrat running for governor, has come under attack by critics who say he participated in allowing abusive priests to continue in ministry and for aggressively pursuing legal fees against their victims who sued the Milwaukee Archdiocese. Flynn was the chief counsel handling sex abuse matters for the archdiocese from 1989 until 2004."

What they don't add is that the archbishop during his employment shared his disdain for sodomy victims. Archbishop Rembert Weaklind took $450,000 from the archdiocese to pay off one of his longtime male boyfriends. He was the archbishop of the archdiocese from 1977-2002. Flynn was his hardball lawyer helping him make life very difficult for those who tried to complain about sodomy. Weakland said reporting abuse by Catholic priests or employees was "squealing." There has not been a great Tom Wolfe essay yet on how the Democratic Party moved from being the party of soldiers and workingmen and turned to the coalition of feminists and homosexuals. The large urban Catholic chanceries were also dominated by homosexuals in that era. It was a toxic mix that destroyed the soul of the Democratic party and the Christian character of the civil rights movement.

POPE FRANCIS ON HOMOSEXUAL SEMINARIANS: From Fr. John Zuhlsdorf (May 23, 2018):

"At Vatican Insider I spotted something interesting. Each Spring the Italian bishops have a plenary meeting at the Vatican’s Paul VI hall, in the smaller hall where the Synod usually meets. The Pope attends at least part of the meeting. This year was no exception. This year the Pope told them… my fast translation from the Italian original:

“If there’s a doubt about homosexuality, it’s better not to have them enter the seminary.” The words of the Pope in the closed door session with the Italian bishops: “Discernment is needed”. Reaffirmed what was in the Vatican documents of 2005 and 2016

With the pastors of the CEI (Italian bishops conference) – Vatican insider learned – Francis, speaking about the downturn in vocations, one of his “three worries” for the Italian church, he was, instead, more straightforward and, inviting the bishops to oversee more the quality of future priests, then the quantity, explicitly mentioned cases of homosexual persons who desire, for various motives, to enter into the seminary. Then he invited the bishops to a “careful discernment”, adding: “if you have also the slightest doubt it’s better not to let them enter”.

One indication, from the Pope, that expresses his deep concern: these tendencies, which are “deeply rooted”, and the practice of “homosexual acts”, can compromise the life of the seminary beyond that of the young man himself and an eventual future priesthood. They can generate those “scandals” of which the Pope had spoken in his discourse at the opening of the assembly of the Italian bishops in the new hall of the Synod, that disfigure the face of the Church.

Between the lines one can read what was already put in black and white by Pope Francis in a letter of meditation given brevi manu [directly] to the Chile in bishops during their meeting in the Vatican. In a note added to the text. The Pontiff denounced verified problems in seminaries where – as he wrote – bishops and religious superiors have entrusted control to “priests suspected of practicing homosexuality”.

There’s more, but it mainly reviews what previous documents say about homosexual candidates or seminarians. I suspect someone will translate the whole thing soon… for the sake of general Jesuit reading. To the bishops: “If you think that the guy is homosexual, don’t put him in the seminary.” The Pontiff – the Pontifex… “Bridge Builder” – says that “This bridge is closed!” I wonder what that means for those who are already ordained.

II. AMERICAN POLITICS AND FOREIGN POLICY

THE REAL FOREIGN COLLUSION AND INTELLIGENCE FAILURE OF THE AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY ESTABLISHMENT: The Saudi lobby stirs up hate against Iran and Shiites everywhere. The article is an excellent survey of Saudi manipulation of our foreign policy. As usual, there is no explanation of how this is tied to the religious ideology and particular form of Islamic law that drives the Kingdom. The Saudi-Iran dispute is not so much a conflict between two nation states as a royal family in collusion with an anti-nationalist, anti Shiite religious movement. Iran as a Shiite Persian nation has no goal to replace nation states with a caliphate. Wahhabi Islam does. Iranian Shiites do not propose that the Sunnis are not part of the Islamic umma and thus can be killed. Wahhabi Islam does propose that Shiites are a betrayal to the umma to be rectified by the sword.

INTELLIGENCE FAILURE:  THIS ISN'T "FAKE NEWS" BUT AN INDIVIDUAL SWEPT INTO  A MASS DELUSION. THIS MAN WAS CHIEF OF  NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE. IT GIVES ONE PAUSE.
From Fact and Fear by James Clapper:

"Of course, the Russian effort affected the outcome. Surprising even themselves, they swung the election to a Trump win. To conclude otherwise stretches logic, common sense, and credulity to the breaking point,"

"Less than eighty thousand votes in three key states swung the election," ... "I have no doubt that more votes than that were influenced by this massive effort by the Russians."

HOSTILITY FROM NORTH KOREA WAS REAL: President Trump called off the talks with North Korea because of the tremendous hostility which he detected in the most recent statements from North Korea. That hostility was real, justified and generated by John Bolton and then from Mike Pence. Their unfortunate repeated references to the "Libyan model" was a threat against the life of the very leader we were supposed to negotiate with. That was not the only problem. China has to be part of any overall solution and does not want a separate peace concluded with their neighbor while hostility toward them is on the rise. President Trump believes that after a second meeting with China's Xi JinPing, North Korea's Kim Jung Un took on a different face. There are many voices from the right working to portray China as the principal implacable future foe of the United States. This includes Marco Rubio and Steve Bannon.  President Trump and Secretary of State Pompeo then put the talks back on schedule. Mainstream media depicts this remarkable  diplomacy as negotiating with evil men illegally because we are still in a state of war with North Korea. What if President Obama or Secretary Clinton had made such a breakthrough? How would their grinding swords into ploughshares be reported?

THE PRINCES AND THE PRESIDENT: ...and the fundraiser who allied with UAE and Saudi Arabia against Qatar and Rex Tillerson.

III. CULTURE OF LIFE, CULTURE OF PROTECTION

A MALE TEACHER PROTECTS HIS OWN: Every male from 18-55 has a duty to protect the community he lives in. Living the militia ideal is teacher Jason Seaman of Indiana.

FOR FIFTY YEARS BIOLOGY CLASSES AND NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUMS HAVE TAUGHT AS DOGMA THAT HUMANS ARE ANIMALS: President Trump fumed that the vicious MS13 gang members are "animals" and suddenly America's left wing media was arguing for the unique presence of the human soul. Remember, next time you are in biology class - don't call humans animals! Actually there is a horrific demonic component to some of the most violent Latin gangs and their anti-Marian cult of Santa Muerte - Holy Death. Animals don't torture their own. It is more a signature of the Evil One.

MS13: The best documentary we found.

SOUTHERN BAPTIST SEMINARY DISCIPLINES TOP MAN FOR FAILING TO PROTECT
Two of the most important men in the Southern Baptist "conservative resurgence" of 1979-1990 were  Paige Patterson and advisor  Paul Pressler. Patterson has been ousted from the Board of Southwestern Theological Seminary for failing to deal with the rape of a Southern Baptist woman at a college he headed years before. It is a stunning fall from grace.  This instance of leadership failure may be the tip of an iceberg. The other chief architect of the Conservative resurgence, retired Texas judge Pressler appears (like so many still concealed Catholic clerics) to be a homosexual predator. Pressler is a wolf garbed as a shepherd. Did Patterson know that too?  Part of the deal in the sexual order of male headship is that the males in authority provide protection.  Males are leaders not because they are males but because they are mature effective men who provide the best protective icon of the Father God. In an evil world the mission of men is to make deep protective agreements under God and protect the widows and orphans and outcasts as well as the church members. It is very healthy to shine the light on predators posing as protectors. Male leadership is not inherent in the y chromosome but the covenanted male soul. These men hid behind their chromosomes but their souls were twisted indeed. Rod Dreher excellent review at American Conservative.

ROSEANNE--WEEP NOT FOR SHE
Roseanne Barr who plays a Trump supporting housewife on a popular TV sitcom has had her program cancelled because she tweeted that Valerie Jarret, an Obama advisor was a cross between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Planet of the Apes. The Ape comment felt like that old Darwinian notion that black people look like apes and are not as evolved as white folks. Roseanne Barr is a foul mouthed atheist who has disrespected every symbol of America that "Trump women" would respect. She performed a garish rendition of the national anthem just to remind people her very un-Trumpian ways. Her interview with Dave Rubin is repulsive. She is not the Evangelical woman who voted for Donald Trump and who says grace before meals in real life. She is irreverent Hollywood making a buck by being a rebel. She is their version of a Trump supporter as Archie Bunker was Hollywood's Richard Nixon supporter. Good riddance to her masquerade as the female face of the forgotten American. God and Country-not quite Rosie's standards.

PHILLIP ROTH: The dead end of Jewish Angst and American Identity.

IV. NATIONS R&G ROUND UP

RIGHTS OF AN ENGLISHMAN - EXCEPT WHEN REPORTING ON GROOMING PRACTICES OF AN ISLAMIC GANG: The strange and troubling case of Tommy Robinson. More reporting on the unreportable.

NATIONALISM: Not universalist, not ethnic, but cultural.

SHIA AND NATIONALIST: The winner in Iraq election is no Western idealist nor is he an Iranian puppet.