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Italy has been a popular tourist destinations for privileged Americans this week, including Democrats.
Google Camp was also there.
The privileged few flew in from thousands of miles away to discuss climate change.
As many have noted online, couldn’t they have conducted their business via Skype?
Remember, these are the same people who tell you and your family that you shouldn’t be flying … anywhere.
It’s another case of ‘for me, but not for thee’.
Veteran British journalist Andrew Neil tweeted:
His readers were not happy (language alert):
I remember the US winter of 1977 clearly. It was unpleasant.
Someone mentioned Prince Harry …
… and Greta:
Is little Greta going to row her way there?
Wouldn’t online technology have served them better?
Apparently not.
On July 30, the Daily Mail reported on the ancient Greek city Selinunte in Sicily and those attending. Brief excerpts follow, emphases mine. Check the link for photos and more. Note the use of cars and yachts, too, which are taboo for the rest of us. Errgh:
A select group of billionaire businessman, world famous pop stars, doyennes of design and Hollywood A-listers have once again descended upon the ancient Greek city of Selinunte for Google Camp.
The annual event is once again in full swing, with private planes and megayachts shuttling guests Harry Styles, Katy Perry and Orlando Bloom, Stella McCartney, Barry Diller and Diane Von Furstenberg, Gayle King, Leonardo DiCaprio and Bradley Cooper to the Verdura Resort in Sicily.
And as per tradition, guests on Monday enjoyed dinner and a concert under the stars in the ruins of the Temple of Hera on the island.
Cars could be seen taking guests to the bacchanal bash, where Google decided to disperse Jeff Koons’ orbs throughout the ancient archaeological ruins.
Independent journalist Paul Joseph Watson tweeted from London, noting that Obama was there, too:
He received these replies, among others:
It’s hardly a surprise that members of the general public views these people with ever increasing degrees of suspicion:
Private planes, jets, yachts and cars. Do these people really express legitimate concern about climate change?
No wonder people are ignoring Hollywood and other world famous celebrities.
The Earth is in God’s hands, not ours. Yes, let’s live responsibly but let us also avoid gullibility.
If people can travel across an ocean for a climate change conference and not think a thing about it except for the party that awaits them, what other resources do they personally waste? Clothes? Food? Water? I think we should be told.
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We all know that Democrats are the voice of the people, right?
I’m being sarcastic, but that is the image they project:
Meanwhile, the once beautiful city of Baltimore, Maryland has been in the news over the past few days. The district’s congressman, Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Maryland), has been roundly criticised by residents, Republicans and President Trump for allowing it to deteriorate. He cannot take full blame, but he would do well to focus on his constituents rather than trying to impeach Trump.
This lady is a member of the Baltimore County Republican Central Committee:
While the controversy over Baltimore rages …
… Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and selected Democrat congresscritters stayed in Venice — yes, Italy — over the weekend in five-star accommodation at the Hotel Danieli (be sure to click on that link)!
Yes, Pelosi and the Democrats truly are of the people (not):
Over the weekend, various people, including Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Florida), thought that Rep. Elijah Cummings was among Pelosi’s delegation, but he was not:
The Washington Examiner reported (emphasis mine):
Pelosi was joined on the trip to by several other black Democrats, including Majority Whip James Clyburn, Congressional Black Caucus Chairwoman Karen Bass, Rep. Barbara Lee, Rep. Ilhan Omar, and Rep. John Lewis.
The Democratic delegation is visiting the U.S. Army Africa headquarters in Italy. They will also visit Ghana, a trip that coincides with the 400th anniversary of the first enslaved Africans landing in America. Pelosi will be the first speaker of House to address the Ghanaian Parliament.
One wonders how much this junket cost and how many family members accompanied them. The mind boggles.
Meanwhile, Baltimore and other Democrat-controlled US cities are in chaos.
By chance, I saw this tweet from France 3 television about one of their documentaries:
This clip shows a French patient who has Alzheimer’s. Rose is in assisted living (EHPAD), and her facility has implemented ‘train ride’ therapy.
The video shows a room with a mock SNCF (French railway network) departure board. Rose and her therapist go into another room which is set up as a train compartment. The window is a screen showing a film of the countryside just as one might see it from a train.
There seem to be a few choices of railway scenes for patients: countryside, the sea and so on.
This therapy is used for patients who become troubled or troublesome. In this case, Rose is often on the verge of tears.
Therapists say the ‘train ride’ calms the patients down. They ask the patients what they see as they are ‘travelling’, what they are reminded of and so forth. The experience generates a conversation about what patients remember from their past. Rose’s husband used to work for the SNCF, so she would have taken quite a few train journeys during her marriage.
This a brilliant idea. The therapists interviewed say it came from Italy, where it has been implemented on a larger scale. It is said to be in use not only for Alzheimer’s patients but also other mental diseases and traumas.
I like the creativity going on here, which really seems to work. I hope this brings out more interesting types of therapy for Alzheimer’s patients.
Between Thursday, May 23 and Sunday, May 26, European voters let their leaders know what was on their minds.
The 2019 EU elections were quite the eye-opener, as nationalist parties and the Greens did very well indeed:
Like them or not, interesting trends emerged:
Italy
Matteo Salvini was thrilled:
France
Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National (RN) — National Rally — edged past Emmanuel Macron’s LREM — Renaissance — list:
Politico reported that Le Pen’s party:
scored about 24 percent of the vote, compared with roughly 22.5 percent for Macron’s centrist-liberal party, according to two initial projections.
United Kingdom
The biggest news came from the United Kingdom. The six-week old Brexit Party won nine out of ten regions.
The Telegraph reported (emphases mine):
The Brexit Party has won nine of the 10 regions to declare their results in the European elections, claiming 28 of 64 seats in the European Parliament.
Nigel Farage’s party came top in the North East, North West, East of England, Wales, West Midlands, East Midlands, Yorkshire & Humber, the South West and South East.
This came largely at the expense of the Conservative Party. Theresa May’s party have lost a huge share of the vote across all regions, so far losing 15 MEP seats to leave a total of three. The party is in fifth place, with its lowest vote share in a national election since they formed in 1834.
Good grief!
However, The Brexit Party is represented in 10 out of 10 regions, as this Scottish result came in early on Monday morning:
It seems that Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party will now hold one more seat than Angela Merkel’s CDU Party: 29 to 28!
Nigel Farage gave his MEP acceptance speech in Southampton, saying:
These are some of the regional results (click on image to enlarge):
Here are the other new Brexit Party MEPs.
Hearty congratulations, ladies and gentlemen!
What an amazing result!
Like the Conservatives, Labour also suffered. The Liberal Democrats received a lot of Remain votes from Labour voters, as did the Greens. In Scotland, the SNP took a substantial share of Labour votes.
You can read more about the EU election results on the BBC’s website and at the Daily Mail.
When globalism goes too far, people will eventually react.
Matteo Salvini, Italy’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior took office on June 1, 2018. Italy currently has a coalition government comprised of the Northern League (Lega Nord) and 5 Star Movement (Movimento 5 Stelle) parties.
Since then, he has been making waves. He is particularly anti-EU, especially with regard to illegal immigration via the Mediterranean, which has plagued Italy for several years. Italians are fed up:
One globalist voiced his concern, which Salvini took as a compliment:
A June 25 article in the Gateway Pundit, ‘”CRIM-ITALIE” — Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini Wants to Make Italy Great Again‘, is about the endemic crime in Italy. It says, in part (bold emphases in the original, purple one mine):
The disaster that exists presently is simply unacceptable. The centre-right, Lege and its partners deserve a chance to Make Italy Great Again! They have actually borrowed that very phrase.
Matteo Salvini, their leader, is now the new Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior. He wants to make Italy safe, to make Italy prosperous, to make Italy crime free and unencumbered by the straightjacket of the European Union and its unelected bureaucracy that rules by fiat, with the help of their crooked cronies. He rightly asks, why should Germany or Brussels run a free and sovereign Italy?
Italy can be defined by its notably glorious past. Now it must change course, decriminalize, and cast a shadow on what can be an even brighter future. Friends of Italy should support its turn in the right direction.
Although Salvini is anti-EU, and with some justification, he wants to bring nationalist parties together across Europe. Hmm …
Right now, he is building up for a major legislative shake-up with a comprehensive bill he has written which will tackle organised crime, illegal immigration and street crime. The bill also aims to boost Italians’ rights with regard to self-defence:
He says in the October 14 video below that his proposed legislation, which will be debated in the Italian parliament starting on Tuesday, October 23, received unanimous ministerial approval and that of Italy’s president, Sergio Mattarella:
This is one of the best political videos ever.
Love the ideas or hate them, this is a must-see.
The English subtitles provided by YouTube account holder Cassius are very good.
Salvini has a go at the socialist EU leadership:
who impoverished and frightened an entire continent …
He says that his proposed legislation follows the Italian constitution and international conventions. It will support genuine refugees, especially women and children:
but we won’t be made fools of.
Those who engage in criminal activity whilst having asylum status will be told:
my dear, you’re not a refugee, you’re a criminal, and first plane, first boat, first pedalo, first hot air balloon, back home.
There are also provisions for immigration agencies and their lawyers who bring frivolous cases.
He has a section on organised crime, too, which he is eager to eradicate.
I won’t say anything more other than to say that this is one of the best 12 minutes you’ll ever spend watching a video. Special credit goes to Salvini’s assistant Daniele.
I hope the bill passes the Italian parliament.
Si, Make Italy Great Again!
How many people know about the Battle of Lepanto?
In the 1970s, when Western education was still decent, I took a year of World History in high school. If we covered it, it must have been a footnote.
I read about it in depth only six years ago, when someone from the West Indies had a WordPress blog, since deleted. The writer was Catholic and explained the religious, historical and cultural significance of October 7, 1571, the date of the victory over the Ottoman Empire.
The victory was important to Mediterranean Europe. Inland, the Battle of Vienna took place just over a century later, on September 12, 1683, led by the indomitable King Jan (John) III Sobieski of Poland. Lepanto was to the Mediterranean what Vienna was to the rest of Europe.
On to the Battle of Lepanto and October 7, which Catholics venerate as the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary. In 2017, Polish Catholics assembled nationwide to pray the Rosary on that day. The Daily Mail has more (emphases mine):
Hundreds of thousands of Polish Catholics are expected to descend Saturday on the country’s borders to recite the rosary “to save Poland and the world” from the dangers facing them, organisers say, but others claim the event is aimed at protecting Europe from what they term a Muslim onslaught.
The episcopate insists that the “Rosary to the Borders” is a purely religious initiative, but some Catholics view it as a weapon against “Islamisation.”
The date was not chosen at random. October 7 is when Catholics celebrate the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, marking the 1571 victory of Christianity over the Ottoman Turks at the Battle of Lepanto.
A victory attributed to the recital of the rosary “that saved Europe from Islamisation”, the Solo Dios Basta foundation said on the website of the event it is organising.
Many Poles see Islam as a threat. The conservative government, which enjoys the backing of a sizeable portion of the population, refuses to welcome migrants to Poland, which has very few Muslims of its own.
Twenty-two border dioceses will take part in the event, whose faithful will congregate in some 200 churches for a lecture and mass before travelling to the border to say the rosary.
The goal is to have as many prayer points as possible along the 3,511 kilometres (about 2,200 miles) that make up Poland’s borders with Belarus, the Czech Republic, Germany, Lithuania, Russia, Slovakia, Ukraine and the Baltic Sea.
Fishing boats will join in at sea, while kayaks and sailboats will form a chain along rivers and lakes. Prayers will also be said at the chapels of a few international airports …
The goal is to pray for world peace, according to Father Pawel Rytel-Andrianik, spokesman for the Polish Bishops’ Conference.
“The initiative obviously received the approval of Poland’s bishops,” he told AFP, emphasising that it would be wrong to view the event as a prayer against the arrival of Muslim refugees.
“It is not a matter of closing ourselves off to others. On the contrary, the point of bringing the rosary to the borders is to break down walls and open ourselves up to Russians, Belarussians, Slovaks, Ukrainians and Germans,” he said …
In 2018, on October 7, Italy’s interior minister, Matteo Salvini, appeared on a talk show saying that the influx of immigrants arriving by boat are not true refugees. He estimates that only 10 per cent are. He recommends taking in only women and young children. He objects to turning Italy’s public housing over to immigrants arriving by boat and says that local and regional governments should continue to reserve these flats and houses for Italians. Currently, Angela Merkel is trying to transfer immigrants who had arrived in Germany via Italy back to Italy:
RMC (French talk radio) had a lengthy segment on immigration from Africa on the morning of Monday, October 8. Opinion was strongly divided as to whether and how many more immigrants France — especially Paris — should accommodate. It was a lively discussion with no conclusion. One point that did stand out was that French people were being pushed down the queue for social housing for recently-arrived immigrants. So, the French housing situation is like Italy’s, which is like Germany’s and Sweden’s.
Besides the religious and 21st century significance of the Battle of Lepanto, there is a historic one. It took place at a time when the invasion of hordes of groups of people — not just those from the Ottoman Empire — were invading not only Europe but also Asia.
I had always wondered how these groups had been stopped. A considered essay, ‘The Significance of Lepanto’, explains what happened from that point through to the 18th century.
First, we need to consider the main group of players in Europe’s Holy League. These nation-states also controlled various parts of the Mediterranean, including islands such as Corsica, Cyprus and Crete. Trade and strategic ports were important to the Spanish, the Venetians and to the Vatican, which also controlled territory in this part of the world:
The Battle of Lepanto has a major place in the symbolism of the Western-Islamic relationship, and Niccolò Capponi’s recently published Victory of the West: The Story of the Battle of Lepanto treats the battle as a major encounter between the Islamic Ottoman empire and the forces of Western Christendom.
Lepanto was the last great battle that could be described as a simple clash between Christendom and Islam. Fought on October 7, 1571, it saw the fleet of the Ottoman empire pitted against an alliance of Spain, Venice and various other minor players to form a Holy League under the leadership of Don Juan of Austria, the illegitimate half-brother of Philip II of Spain.
The battle was the response of the Christian powers to the invasion of the Venetian possession of Cyprus. At stake was control of the Mediterranean. If the Ottomans had won then there was a real possibility that an invasion of Italy could have followed so that the Ottoman sultan, already claiming to be emperor of the Romans, would have been in possession of both New and Old Rome. The Pope could have become as much a tool of the Ottoman sultan as his Orthodox counterpart the Patriarch of Constantinople already was.
Yet, as Capponi points out, the Holy League was hardly a model of Christian solidarity. The Spanish and the Venetians had different strategic objectives—the Spanish were concerned primarily with Italy, North Africa and the Western Mediterranean, while Venice was anxious to recover Cyprus and protect its interests in the eastern Mediterranean. The Spanish were not keen for a battle that might lose them precious resources, particularly as Philip II, with interests as well in northern Europe, was usually on the verge of bankruptcy. The Spanish were also concerned that the Venetians were in the process of cutting a deal with the Ottomans. Just a few days before the battle there was a conflict between the Spanish and Venetians that almost tore the fleet apart. Nevertheless the alliance held and the League fleet scored a stunning success.
Lepanto reshaped the religious bent of the Mediterranean:
The cultural shape of the lands around the Mediterranean was confirmed with a largely Islamic East and South staring across the waters at a Christian North and West.
The Ottoman Empire gradually lost territory and influence from that point until it collapsed with the Great War (1914-1918). That said, we are still dealing with the aftermath a century later:
The Ottoman empire, like the ancient Roman empire and the Byzantine empire before it, was left with the task of defending its ever diminishing borders over the next three centuries. When it did finally “fall” after the First World War the ramifications were enormous, and we are still attempting to cope with them from Bosnia to Iraq.
The Europeans defeated the Ottomans because of advanced naval battle tactics and weaponry. They also had more advanced trade and inventions, such as the printing press, which the Ottomans were slow to adopt:
The League won because it used innovative tactics. The usual form that galley warfare took was to ram the enemy ships and then take them by storm. The Venetian ships attempted a new and different tactic. Using a larger and modified form of galley known as galleasses, they filled these ships with cannons and attempted to blow as many of the Ottoman galleys as possible out of the water. League ships carried many more cannon and its troops made much greater use of firearms. Many of the Ottoman troops preferred to use bows, although these were not necessarily inferior to the clumsy arquebus of that time …
In the longer term, however, the future belonged to the new commercial instruments of the West rather than to the bureaucratic machinery of the Ottomans. In her study of seventeenth-century Crete, A Shared World, Molly Green demonstrates that the commercial techniques and practices used by the Venetians were much more sophisticated and developed than those of the Ottoman regime that replaced them in mid-century. It was also the case that the Ottomans were slow to take to make use of printing, with the “printing revolution” that swept the West in the sixteenth century not really taking off in the Islamic world until the nineteenth century.
Europe and Asia had been beset by invaders for centuries, especially during the perilous Dark Ages.
In Europe, during the latter days of the Roman Empire:
Rome, and the Roman empire, had to face an almost continuous set of threats, beginning with the Celts, then moving through to the Germans, Huns, Avars, Arabs and Turks. The Ottoman Turks simply delivered the coup de grâce to what had become little more than a living corpse.
In Asia:
China built its “great wall” to protect itself from nomadic predators, while the damage inflicted by the Mongols on the settled Islamic world, including the sack of Baghdad, was staggering.
These invasions happened because invading tribes of people envied the civilisation of settled societies:
A settled civilisation, by creating a measure of comfort and a settled way of life, makes itself a target for those living outside their boundaries who are drawn by what it has to offer.
Large-scale invasions ended in the 18th century, probably thanks to the Chinese:
… the Qing Chinese empire in the eighteenth century successfully conquered and subdued the last of the great nomadic empires of Eurasia. For the first time in millennia no barbarian horsemen, no Huns, no Avars, no Mongols, surged across the great plains of Eurasia to sack and pillage Europe, China and the great civilisations of the Islamic world and India.
When a new barbarian empire emerged powerful enough to threaten the Ottomans, and by this I mean the Russian empire, it was successfully checked by the jealousy of the other European powers. It was also into this world … of empires that were not revitalised by new sets of barbarians, in the Middle East, in India and in China, that the European empires were able to make such inroads from the eighteenth century onwards.
Lepanto, as with so many other advances of that era, helped to usher in modernity to Europe with an emphasis on trade rather than war:
Lepanto can be seen as symbolic of that transition, described by the nineteenth-century French liberal philosopher Benjamin Constant, from the age of war to the age of commerce. Or as others might say, it can be considered as the birth of modernity. Even the overwhelming use of firepower can be found in the pages of Constant as a feature of the utilitarian approach to warfare favoured by commercial nations. The irony was that the somewhat ramshackle empires of sixteenth-century Europe, with their disorganised finances and administrative apparatuses much inferior to those of the Ottomans, would within 300 years come to dominate the world not because of their superior asabiya or virtue but because of their capacity to create modern efficient institutions far superior to the slave bureaucracy of the Ottomans, and because of their ability to deliver superior firepower.
This new European and commercial form of empire supplanted an older, more traditional imperial form. What this meant was that the old rules of empire, of an imperial expansion dictated by the need to conquer to attain booty and slaves and a decline governed by the need to protect its settled possessions from new predators, would give way to a new set of rules. These are the rules of the export and import of capital, as described by Niall Ferguson in his recent studies of the English and American empires.
Looking at present day developments in Europe, there does seem to be an envy of others to have what we Europeans have without contributing to our respective nations. When well-intended private and state generosity is met with Marxist-driven violence and disregard for the host citizenry, it is no wonder that many think of Lepanto.
If you have been reading my Forbidden Bible Verses series over the past few weeks, you are acquainted with Acts 10, starring St Peter and a Roman centurion named Cornelius.
Gerbrand van den Eeckhout, a student of Rembrandt’s, painted ‘Vision of Cornelius the Centurion’ in 1664. Eeckhout learned well from his master. (Image credit: Wikipedia)
If you are a newer subscriber, here are the posts about Cornelius and Peter:
Acts 10:1-8 – Cornelius, divine vision, angel, Peter, God-fearer
Acts 10:9-16 – Peter, divine vision, allegory, animals, Gentiles, forbidden food is now clean
Acts 10:17-23 — Peter, Holy Spirit, obedience, Gentiles, hospitality
Acts 10:24-29 — Peter, Cornelius, Jewish converts, Gentile converts
Acts 10:30-33 – Peter, Cornelius, Jew, Gentile, Jesus Christ
Acts 10:44-48 — Peter, Cornelius, the Holy Spirit, baptism, Jew, Gentile
Acts 10 formally brought Gentiles into the Church, beginning with Cornelius, his family and friends.
John MacArthur tells us that Cornelius was a powerful man who believed in the God of Israel before he met Peter, who preached about Jesus Christ (emphases mine):
Now, Cornelius is a Gentile, a ruler, really in a real sense, because he ruled over a hundred men in the army of Rome …
Cornelius was stationed in Caesarea and was part of the Italian Cohort (Acts 10:1).
It is strange that, having attended Catholic schools for nearly all of my academic career, I never heard of Cornelius — until I read the Bible in its entirety a few years ago.
I am not alone. Many Catholics have not heard of him.
Angelo Stagnaro wrote an article for the National Catholic Register in February 2017. I highly recommend reading ‘What Do We Know About St Cornelius the Centurion?’ It’s factual as well as being witty and warm.
Stagnaro opens by describing what happened at a Sons of Italy meeting he attended wherein the men and women assembled were thinking of a name for a new chapter of the organisation. The chapter had to be named after an Italian or an American with Italian ancestry.
Stagnaro offered what he thought was a brilliant suggestion:
“How about St. Cornelius the Centurion?” I suggested.
“Who’s he?” came back the reply.
That’s not an uncommon question considering the Church has more than 17,000 saints and beati―no one could know all of them. So, I explained.
“St. Cornelius the Centurion is the first gentile, that is, non-Jew, who converted to Christianity. He’s Italian.”
All one-hundred people in the parish hall froze amid cannoli and snapped around to look at me. The gentleman leading the meeting had an almost panicked look on his face.
“Wait! What!?!” he demanded.
“The first non-Jew to convert to Christianity was Italian,” I reiterated.
More accusatory silence.
“Where did you get this information?!” asked the group’s elected leader.
I was half expecting someone to yell out, “Leave the gun―take the cannolis.”
“From the Bible,” I replied, surprised at the crowd’s reaction.
Stagnaro read them Acts 10 from his tablet.
The upshot is, how could so many Catholics — especially those with Italian heritage — not know of Cornelius? Stagnaro describes what it was like after the meeting ended (emphases in the original):
… twenty people came up to me after the meeting to verify what they thought I had said.
“Why didn’t anyone tell me this before?
“I went to a Catholic school in an Italian parish and no one told me this!”
I know the feeling! I agree! How could it be?
Back to the life of Cornelius now. There was a lot of information for St Luke to put into the Book of Acts, so we do not hear any more about the centurion after Acts 10.
Wikipedia tells us (emphases mine):
Cornelius was a centurion in the Roman Empire’s Cohors II Italica Civium Romanorum which was stationed in Caesarea, the capital of Roman Iudaea province, to keep the Pax Romana.
Coptics believe that Cornelius retired from the Roman army after receiving the Holy Spirit and baptism:
Afterwards, Cornelius left the military service and followed the Apostles. St. Peter then ordained him a Bishop over the city of Caesarea of Palestine. He went there and proclaimed the Name of Christ, showing them the error of worshipping idols. Their minds were illuminated with the knowledge of God and they believed in Him. He strengthened them with the signs and miracles he performed before them and he baptized them all and among them was Demetrius the Governor. Then he departed in peace and received the crown of glory of the apostles.
We have no way of verifying if Cornelius performed these miracles, although the Orthodox Church in America also believe that he left the Roman army for ministry. Their site has a longer story about the conversion of Demetrius the Governor — or prince — excerpted below:
When the Apostle Peter, together with his helpers Saints Timothy and Cornelius, was in the city of Ephesus, he learned of a particularly vigorous idol-worship in the city of Skepsis. Lots were drawn to see who would go there, and Saint Cornelius was chosen.
In the city lived a prince by the name of Demetrius, learned in the ancient Greek philosophy, hating Christianity and venerating the pagan gods, in particular Apollo and Zeus. Learning about the arrival of Saint Cornelius in the city, he immediately summoned him and asked him the reason for his coming. Saint Cornelius answered that he came to free him from the darkness of ignorance and lead him to knowledge of the True Light.
The prince, not comprehending the meaning of what was said, became angry and demanded that he answer each of his questions. When Saint Cornelius explained that he served the Lord and that the reason for his coming was to announce the Truth, the prince became enraged and demanded that Cornelius offer sacrifice to the idols.
Cornelius asked to see the idols. Upon entering the temple, Cornelius said a prayer. Then:
There was an earthquake, and the temple of Zeus and the idols situated in it were destroyed. All the populace, seeing what had happened, were terrified.
Demetrius was furious and had Cornelius imprisoned. One of Demetrius’s servants told him that his wife and child had perished under the temple rubble. Some time later, a pagan priest, Barbates, told Demetrius that his wife and child had survived and could be heard praising the Christian God.
Demetrius, relieved and happy, rushed to the prison, said that he, too, believed in the one true God and freed Cornelius, asking him to try and rescue his family from the temple ruins. Cornelius went and prayed until Demetrius’s wife and child were able to emerge from the rubble.
Demetrius asked Cornelius to baptise him, his family and his entourage:
Saint Cornelius lived for a long time in this city, converted all the pagan inhabitants to Christ … Saint Cornelius died in old age and was buried not far from the pagan temple he destroyed.
Again, we have no way of verifying this, except that he must have done something very special, because his feast day is commemorated in the Orthodox churches (September 13), the Catholic Church (February 2) and the Episcopal Church in the United States (February 4 or 7). In fact:
When Governor’s Island, New York, was a military installation the Episcopal Church maintained a stone chapel there dedicated to him.
These are the lessons that the Episcopal Church has for Cornelius the Centurion:
The Collect: O God, by your Spirit you called Cornelius the Centurion to be the first Christian among the Gentiles; Grant to your Church such a ready will to go where you send and to do what you command, that under your guidance it may welcome all who turn to you in love and faith, and proclaim the Gospel to all nations; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Isaiah 56:6-8: The foreigners who join themselves to the Lord,
to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord,
and to be his servants,
all who keep the sabbath, and do not profane it,
and hold fast my covenant–
these I will bring to my holy mountain,
and make them joyful in my house of prayer;
their burnt offerings and their sacrifices
will be accepted on my altar;
for my house shall be called a house of prayer
for all peoples.
Thus says the Lord God,
who gathers the outcasts of Israel,
I will gather others to them
besides those already gathered.
Psalm 67: Deus misereatur:
1 May God be merciful to us and bless us, *
show us the light of his countenance and come to us.
2 Let your ways be known upon earth, *
your saving health among all nations.
3 Let the peoples praise you, O God; *
let all the peoples praise you.
4 Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, *
for you judge the peoples with equity
and guide all the nations upon earth.
5 Let the peoples praise you, O God; *
let all the peoples praise you.
6 The earth has brought forth her increase; *
may God, our own God, give us his blessing.
7 May God give us his blessing, *
and may all the ends of the earth stand in awe of him.
The Epistle is Acts 10:1-18, which is the account of both Cornelius’s and Peter’s visions.
The Gospel reading is Luke 13:22-29:
Jesus went through one town and village after another, teaching as he made his way to Jerusalem. Someone asked him, “Lord, will only a few be saved?” He said to them, “Strive to enter through the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able. When once the owner of the house has got up and shut the door, and you begin to stand outside and to knock at the door, saying, `Lord, open to us,’ then in reply he will say to you, `I do not know where you come from.’ Then you will begin to say, `We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’ But he will say, `I do not know where you come from; go away from me, all you evildoers!’ There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrown out. Then people will come from east and west, from north and south, and will eat in the kingdom of God.
Bill Kochman has a good article about Cornelius’s life and purpose. He points out that not many people in the Bible received visions. Therefore, God had a plan:
How often is it that people receive a heavenly visitation? The Scriptures seem to indicate that such events are reserved for those who have a very special calling from the Lord such as Moses, Gideon, Joseph and Mary, Zechariah, John the Baptist, Paul, etc. Another point worth considering is that Peter was the chief of the Apostles, yet the Lord didn’t think him too big or too busy, or too important to send to these lowly Gentile believers. In fact, the Lord specifically gave Peter his vision to convince him of the importance of his mission to Caesarea. The Lord knew that Cornelius and his family were an important part of His overall plans. Another fact to consider is that this family received the gift of the Holy Ghost. This is very important.
I hope we remember Cornelius’s faithful devotion to God, which brought him into contact with Peter.
I also hope we can draw inspiration from Cornelius’s example as a Christian.
Watching children with their parents in southern France fascinates me.
Even toddlers there are well behaved.
Families walk along the beach together late at night, and it’s a beautiful sight to behold.
The children are also good in restaurants. They eat an amazing variety of seafood and know how to use their utensils properly.
So I was fascinated to read an article in The Telegraph, ‘No kids allowed: is Britain becoming an anti-child society?’
Excerpts follow:
Eileen Potter, owner of Treacle’s Tea Shop in Winchmore Hill, north London, recently found herself in hot water when she banned pre-schoolers, to the fury of many parents. In response, she explained: ‘We can not continually afford to replace crockery. We are not a family establishment’ …
Italy is famed for being especially family-friendly, but Marco Magliozzi of Rome fish restaurant, La Fraschetta del Pesce, imposed the same restriction. ‘Children throw olive oil on the floor, they send the salt cellar flying across the room and, above all, they hate fish,’ he complained.
Well, I have not seen that in the south of France.
Part of the problem perhaps is letting children rule the roost at home. Another is not eating at the kitchen or dining room table every night. I can remember pretty far back and recall eating with my parents at table from the time I was three. I had my dad’s children’s cutlery set so I could eat properly. No special meals. I ate what my parents ate. Mom did have to cut my pork chops up for a while, but other than that I never had a problem.
However, there is another difficulty here with children since the smoking bans came in force across much of Europe. Every adult establishment now seems to be child-friendly. Pubs and continental cafés are no longer for adults.
The Telegraph points this out:
Several of my London friends (in their 40s and 50s, with no kids) complain that their long-held ritual of a quiet, lazy weekend pub lunch is now impossible.
‘Every decent pub in my neighbourhood is full of children running wild, and that’s if you can get through the door, which is invariably barricaded by buggies,’ says one who wants to remain anonymous. She now eats out only in the evening: ‘But even at 8pm or 9pm, there are often loads of children. Is nowhere sacred?’
Another seethed her way through a recent restaurant outing: ‘There was a toddler on his scooter, whizzing around the dining room, weaving between the tables, tripping up the staff. His parents ignored him and carried on drinking their wine.’
Those ladies would be fine in Cannes, where, somehow, even in the most cramped restaurant, no one notices buggies since they are always thoughtfully placed. Children also look forward to the restaurant experience there. It seems to make them feel more grown up.
The solution is for parents to bring up their children from infancy to be as quiet and calm as possible so as not to be a nuisance to others.
Unfortunately, most parents think of their children as entertaining little darlings when many certainly are not.
The Telegraph gave several examples of places in Britain and Italy that are going child-free. It is regrettable that well-behaved children will have to wait several years before they can enjoy such places themselves, but indulgent parents have only themselves to blame for this inevitable outcome.
Leo Lyon Zagami is a Freemason living in Italy.
He often uses his middle name as his mother was related to the Queen Mother’s family, the Bowes-Lyons.
I first heard him on The Alex Jones Show on July 11, 2017 discussing the conflicts currently going on in the Vatican. It is unclear whether Zagami is still a practising Catholic — and, yes, I am aware of the Catholic Church’s proscription on being a Freemason. Regardless, he takes a keen interest in what is going on in Rome.
N.B.: This post explores adult themes and is not for children.
Zagami told Jones that there are two factions operating at the Vatican: Pope Francis’s group and the traditionalists. Paedophilia is common in both groups, and orgies take place in the Pope’s circle.
Today, July 26, 2017, Cardinal George Pell — a traditionalist — appeared in Melbourne Magistrates’ Court in Australia on charges of sexual abuse. US News reports:
Pell, Australia’s highest-ranking Catholic and Pope Francis’ top financial adviser, is accused of sexually abusing multiple people years ago in his Australian home state of Victoria, making him the most senior Vatican official ever charged in the Catholic Church sex abuse crisis. Details of the charges have yet to be released to the public, though police have described them as “historical” sexual assault offenses — meaning crimes that occurred years ago.
Pell has not yet entered a plea. But on Wednesday, his lawyer told the court that the 76-year-old cardinal plans to formally plead not guilty at a future court date.
“For the avoidance of doubt and because of the interest, I might indicate that Cardinal Pell pleads not guilty to all charges and will maintain the presumed innocence that he has,” lawyer Robert Richter told the court.
The court appearance lasted only minutes. Initially, it was believed these crimes were all committed by priests in his diocese. However, after Australian detectives flew to the Vatican in 2016 and as recently as last month to interview the elderly cardinal, it is thought that Pell, too, might have been directly involved.
Although members of victim advocacy groups were outside the court, so were Pell supporters who believe he has been unfairly targeted. Pell has long been a controversial figure at the Vatican for theological reasons. His defenders among the Catholic faithful believe he is shoring up the one true faith.
We shall see.
Leo Zagami writes (emphases mine):
The two men who made abuse allegations against Cardinal George Pell say they are “over the moon” about the decision to lay charges. But their lawyer stated to the Herald Sun, they were not confident the case would be successful. It is up to us, the alternative media to build pressure around this very important case. So please dear readers, share this information on your social media accounts, before the largest disinfo operation in history, could send it into oblivion
Clergy sexual abuse survivor Andrew Collins stated that the fact that Cardinal George Pell had finally been charged, was something he never thought he would hear as “Cardinal Pell … is one of the most powerful men on the earth,”.
Well if Cardinal Pell falls, it’s only a matter of time before the Vatican pedophile network goes down with him, so let’s pray for this very important day for the future of humanity, the 26th of July 2017.
On July 19, Zagami wrote about the two paedophile factions in the Vatican, a topic he discussed on The Alex Jones Show:
One faction, closer to Pope Francis, and the Gay lobby, wants a more liberal Church, ready to embrace homosexuality for priests, and an open support for Islam and the upcoming One World Religion, that will gradually push for the acceptance of pedophilia. This faction is represented by Cardinals such as Coccopalmiero, involved in the Gay Orgy raid, or Godfried Cardinal Danneels of the St. Gallen Mafia.
St Gallen is a secret group of Catholic clerics from the Vatican that meets annually in that Swiss town. Zagami says it is a rogue Masonic lodge.
Then there is the traditionalist faction — Pell’s:
The other faction, the more conservative one, mostly controlled by Pope Ratzinger the Pope Emeritus, is instead contrary to any liberal change imposed on the Catholic Faith by the Jesuit Pope, but still hides terrible compromises and links to the infamous pedophilia rings that hide behind the Catholic hierarchy.
However, there is also a secular aspect to paedophilia outside the Vatican. Zagami alleges that a longtime Italian educator Rodolfo Fiesoli, arrested in 1985 and again in 2011, is a good friend not only of Prime Minister Matteo Renzi but may also have links to the Democratic Party in the US. Zagami alleges that Fiesoli is:
an influential figure in the international pedophile network connected to the US Democrats.
Fiesoli spoke at a TedX conference in Florence just a few weeks before his 2011 arrest:
After his arrest, Zagami says:
references to this pedophile monster connected to Matteo Renzi, head of the ruling Democratic Party, and the US Democratic Party, disappear from the online site of the initiative, and from YouTube but fortunately we still have a surviving footage of the event.
In 2015, Fiesoli was sentenced to 17 years in prison, but has not yet spent a day behind bars because of his powerful connections not only in Italy, but also, perhaps, in the United States.
Fiesoli first gained broad attention in Italy during the 1980s (emphasis in the original):
Fiesoli participated as a supposed “educator”, despite being condemned several times since the mid 80’s, for sexual abuse to minors, at his community called Forteto di Vicchio, established in 1977, to support his bizare theories on family, and the recovery of minors in distress. In the audience was the then-Mayor Matteo Renzi, who was smiling during Fiesoli’s speech, nodding his head several times and clapping to show his approval.
Zagami believes that President Donald Trump is the only person who can break this network wide open.
The Vatican’s opposition to Trump might be evidence that they also think he can expose the network, which is why they are taking such strong objection to him and his Christian supporters. An article appeared earlier this month in the English edition of La Civiltà Cattolica (Catholic Civilization), a Jesuit publication. The editor-in-chief is Antonio Spadaro SJ.
On July 14, Zagami wrote about Spadaro’s diatribe and translated some of it into English. An excerpt follows (more in Zagami’s post):
After reading the article I will add that the Jesuits are declaring war not only on Trump, but on American Christianity. Jesuits write about American Christians in the following way:
…
Theirs is a prophetic formula: fight the threats to American Christian values and prepare for the imminent justice of an Armageddon, a final showdown between Good and Evil, between God and Satan. In this sense, every process (be it of peace, dialogue, etc.) collapses before the needs of the end, the final battle against the enemy. And the community of believers (faith) becomes a community of combatants (fight). Such a unidirectional reading of the biblical texts can anesthetize consciences or actively support the most atrocious and dramatic portrayals of a world that is living beyond the frontiers of its own “promised land.”
They also attack Steven Bannon – a Catholic – and accuse him of being a “supporter of an apocalyptic geopolitics.”
This is the final declaration of war against real America made by the Jesuits and Pope Francis, so it’s about time we openly declare war on their pedophile networks and Vatican Money Laundering Schemes.
Only a small percentage of Trump supporters think that way. In fact, most Americans who think like that are anti-Trump because he is not godly enough.
As for Steve Bannon, he would be the last to think in terms of apocalyptic geopolitics. He just wants people destroying America to be identified and dealt with through the proper legal channels.
Now we come to Zagami’s interview with Alex Jones from July 11, wherein he discusses the evil inside Vatican City. This is the segment I saw as it aired:
The following day, Zagami included it in his post ‘St Gallen Mafia Exposed!’ which also includes a video of the aforementioned Cardinal Godfried Danneels from Belgium discussing his time as a member of the St Gallen Mafia (subtitled in English):
The video is well worth watching and has a lot of information, considering it is less than three minutes long.
Zagami tells us that the St Gallen Mafia:
is leading the Church towards a schism pushing the the LGBT agenda into the hearts and minds of Catholics worldwide….
Godfried Maria Jules Danneels a Belgian cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church openly involved with the St. Gallen Mafia wearing a rainbow inspired religious garment to celebrate mass.
On June 30, Pope Francis sacked German Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller from his position as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF). Pope Benedict XVI appointed him to that post in 2012 and Pope Francis made him a Cardinal in 2014.
Zagami says that Müller and Pope Francis did not see eye-to-eye:
because he opposes pedophilia and the Jesuits’ liberal agenda for the CDF.
Heading the CDF is probably the most important position next to the pope. Pope Benedict had held that post years ago. It involves ensuring that Catholic doctrine stays unaltered. Of course, that wasn’t exactly the case decades ago when Benedict Ratzinger was pushing forward with post-Vatican II reform, but the principle remains.
Zagami explains the sacking:
The following information that will help us understand more comes from the report of a trustworthy German source, who spoke to the site OnePeterFive, on condition of anonymity. He quotes an eyewitness who recently sat with Cardinal Müller at lunch in Mainz, Germany. During that meal, Cardinal Müller is alleged to have disclosed in the presence of this eyewitness …
According to this report, Cardinal Müller was called to the Apostolic Palace on 30 June 2017, and he arrived with his work files, assuming that this meeting would be a usual working session. The Pope told him, however, that he only had five questions for him:
Are you in favor of, or against, a female diaconate? “I am against it,” responded Cardinal Müller.
Are you in favor of, or against, the repeal of celibacy? “Of course I am against it,” the cardinal responded.
Are you in favor of, or against female priests?
“I am very decisively against it,” replied Cardinal Müller.
Are you willing to defend Amoris Laetitia?
“As far as it is possible for me,” the Prefect of the Congregation for the Faith replied: “there still exist ambiguities.”
Are you willing to retract your complaint concerning the dismissal of three of your own employees?
Cardinal Müller responded: “Holy Father, these were good, unblemished men whom I now lack, and it was not correct to dismiss them over my head, shortly before Christmas, so that they had to clear their offices by 28 December. I am missing them now.”
Thereupon the Pope answered: “Good. Cardinal Müller, I only wanted to let you know that I will not extend your mandate [i.e., beyond 2 July] as the Prefect of the Congregation for the Faith.”
Without any farewell or explanation, the Pope left the room, leaving Cardinal Müller in utter astonishment. He stood in shocked silence, waiting for the Pope to return, but strangely enough, it was Archbishop Georg Gänswein, who had to force him to leave the meeting, completely shocked by what had just occurred.
One week later, another German Cardinal made the news, Joachim Meisner, who was born on Christmas Day in 1933. Cardinal Meisner died mysteriously on July 5 at the age of 83. Zagami tells us that Meisner was a traditionalist:
He was considered a leader of the conservative wing of the German episcopate, and was one of the four cardinals who orginally presented the controversial letter “Dubia” to Pope Francis in September 2016, seeking up until June 2017, a clarification on the modernization of the Church in matters of faith, and the infamous Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation issued by Pope Francis called, Amoris Laetitia, without ever receiving an answer.
The aforementioned Cardinal Müller spoke to his colleague on July 4:
As the Passauer Neue Presse reports:
Müller had spoken over the phone with the former Archbishop of Cologne [Cardinal Meisner] the previous night [before he died the next morning]; and they also had spoken about the non-renewal of his former position. Meisner had shown himself to be “deeply saddened” by this dismissal. “That moved him personally and wounded him – and he considered it to be a form of damage for the Church,” as the Curial Cardinal [Müller] himself described the reaction of Meisner and 1 well-informed source within the Vatican say[s] that perhaps Cardinal Meisner “died of a broken heart.” Or was he killed in traditional Vatican fashion with a poison coffee? …
Interestingly enough, Archbishop Georg Gänswein, personal secretary of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, and Prefect of the Papal Household very close to Pope Francis, and Obama, and a member of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith since 1996, also happened to meet Cardinal Meisner shortly before his death. Only a coincidence? Of course not, nothing is a coincidence in the Vatican, but a well orchestrated maneuver.
According to the Passauer Neue Presse, Gänswein visited Bad Füssing (near Passau), on the 2nd of July, in order to give a talk at the “Bad Füssinger Gespräche” [Bad Füssing Talks]. Cardinal Meisner had been staying in Bad Füssing for a period of time for vacation, as his health was not considered at all a problem. So the two influential Vatican figures met in person there, but unfortunately, no details have been revealed about their conversation that eventually led to Joachim Meisner’s death, a mystery that needs further investigation, as it seems Pope Francis is clearing up the scene from any unwanted opposition before his summer vacation, and Meisner was on his hit list for a long time.
On July 2 — between Müller’s sacking and Meisner’s death — Monsignor Luigi Capozzi, Secretary of Cardinal Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio, was arrested in a raid on what Zagami says was:
a drug-based gay orgy.
Zagami tells us:
The police later proved that Capozzi, who was on his way to becoming bishop, is now being forced to retire in a monastery by the Vatican. Capozzi used a car from the Holy See with a Vatican number plate to bring in big quantities of cocaine to the Holy City. Monsignor Capozzi is a big fan of Pope Francis, as is his boss Cardinal Coccopalmiero, who is one of Bergoglio’s biggest supporters and collaborators, and wrote an important essay on the 8th Chapter of Amoris laetitia, the Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation of Pope Francis, on love in the family …
In closing, Zagami offered this insight as to Trump’s lack of concern about visiting the UK:
The liberals are desperate to bring down Trump using any and all means, but now that the CIA and other agencies are finally tackling the pedophilia problem, because of Potus’ orders, he could be risking his life even more. LGBTQ rights advocates should support the president in this endevour, and distance themselves from the pedophilia reality.
In the meantime, President Trump has told Theresa May that he does not want to go ahead with a state visit to Britain, a country that as we know is the driving force of the global Pedophilia Network. UK children in the care of British institutions, are six times more likely to be assessed for abuse, than a child in the general population. Scotland Yard detectives were removed from a pedophile investigation, after naming politicians, so maybe the British public should change their brainwashed attitude and support his visit to the UK.
The world — and the Catholic Church — are in a deep mess right now.
Hence my warning the other day — Michael Crichton’s Gell-Mann Amnesia effect — about paying too much heed to what the media are telling us.
Oh, the hypocrisy!
George and Amal Clooney are leaving the UK because of this year’s terror attacks in London and Manchester. Their English hideaway is in Sonning-on-Thames, Berkshire, which is safe as houses.
They are also selling their Lake Como house and will look for another property in Italy. A migrant camp is near their lakeside mansion. The Clooneys want a place which is ‘less accessible’.
But, wait, the Clooneys are open border people. Furthermore, Amal Clooney is a human rights lawyer.
Only last year, both had plenty to say against Donald Trump.
In April 2016, Amal gave an interview to the BBC. Among other things (emphases mine):
the 38-year-old criticized “the leading candidate on the Republican side” for proposing “building walls” and a temporary pause on Muslim immigration into the United States.
She then paraphrased Trump and defended Muslims who she says are “not extremist or violent.”
“If you actually look at what [Trump] specifically says in that now infamous speech about Muslims, he kept saying, ‘They only want jihad; they don’t believe in our way of life; they don’t respect our system,’” she said.
She continued: “And when he says ‘they’… And, you know, you watch the media coverage afterwards and people should’ve been saying, ‘Do you mean the 1.5 billion people around the world who fit that description? Do you mean the people who are U.S. citizens, who are members of your military, the vast majority of whom are not extremist or violent in any way?’” Her mother is a Sunni Muslim.
Amal Clooney added she is “perplexed” by the success of Trump’s campaign.
In March 2016, George Clooney, an active Hillary Clinton supporter, told The Guardian:
He’s just an opportunist. Now he’s a fascist; a xenophobic fascist …
With regard to refugees, the actor said:
Right now we are dealing so much with domestic politics that no one talks about real world issues. No one is talking about the Syrian refugee thing in the US – nobody. You might hear little snippets of it, five seconds on the news. It’s a big worldwide issue, and it needs to be talked about. If the press covered it more, we would be more involved, and do more.
Therefore, some of us are perplexed that the couple do not wish to live alongside the migrant camp near Lake Como:
Instead, the Clooneys are moving away.
The English countryside, where the Clooneys have a home, is also no longer suitable, even though it is miles away from any terror target:
On June 30, Life&Style empathised with the Clooneys’ plight:
“He doesn’t feel like Amal and the twins are safe living in the English countryside,” an insider says. “He’s determined to move his family to LA, where he feels much more secure.”
George’s safety concerns had been growing for years. The Oscar winner “has been subject to very serious threats in the past,” reveals the source, because of his humanitarian efforts in Darfur, Sudan. And Amal’s work as an international human rights lawyer, along with her public pleas for foreign governments to prosecute terrorists, has made her a potential target.
Yes, one can understand. Or not:
On July 6, Westmonster reported:
The celebrity power couple have used their fame and fortune to push for open borders and even sat down with Angela Merkel herself to express their support for her refugee policy.
But now it seems, like all luvvies, they don’t actually mean they support it for themselves …
Isn’t that the truth.
Furthermore, the Clooneys don’t even want Italians around them.
In 2015, Time reported:
The mayor of Laglio, Italy has warned that anyone who sets foot within 100 meters of George and Amal Clooney’s twin luxury villas overlooking Lake Como will be fined up to €500 ($550.)
Robert Pozzi, mayor of the small picturesque village in northern Italy, issued the ordinance to protect Clooney, his wife Amal and their guests’ privacy while they vacation in their glitzy properties, reports the Telegraph.
Anyone who leaves their car or boat within 100 meters of Clooney’s Villa Oleandra and adjoining Villa Margherita will be liable to pay the hefty fine.
Fans and photographers were also a worry:
The Gravity and Oceans 11 star bought one of the exclusive villas in 2002, but after fans and paparazzi flooded the town and set up camp near his home, Clooney bought the adjoining property to ensure his privacy.
No walls — but clear borders, with fines attached.
With regard to migrants, makeshift camps near the Clooneys started appearing in July 2016. I empathise somewhat with the residents of Lake Como but not with the Clooneys.
It is difficult to empathise completely because most Lake Como residents ascribe to the ‘for thee, but not for me’ philosophy.
One wonders if the residents’ voting patterns and general outlook will change as a result.
Regardless, the next time the Clooneys pontificate on socio-political issues, please remember this news story.
