Musical respite: Skylark

Skylark

Have you anything to say to me?

Won’t you tell me where my love can be?

Is there a meadow in the mist

Where someone’s waiting to be kissed?

Skylark

Have you seen a valley green with spring?

Where my heart can go a journeying

Over the shadows and the rain

To a blossom covered lane

And in your lonely flight

Haven’t you heard the music of the night?

Wonderful music

Faint as a will o’ the wisp

Crazy as a loon

Sad as a gypsy serenading the moon

Skylark

I don’t know if you can find these things

But my heart is riding on your wings

So if you see them anywhere

Won’t you lead me there

NonVeni Mark crosspost: a delightful Derby allegory of cognitive dissonance and the Bergoglian Antipapacy

Brilliant post by NonVeni Mark. Shamelessly lifted in full. -AB

Derby Day: Looking back on an instructive display of cognitive dissonance

It’s Derby Day! You may remember last year’s Derby was quite remarkable, with Rich Strike, the longest of long shots, tearing down the stretch for the win. First, take a look at an aerial shot starting from the far turn:

Notice anything interesting, besides the unbelievable finish? Larry Collmus, the track announcer, who is presumably the best in the world at what he does, doesn’t see Rich Strike thundering down the rail, clearly in the open. Or rather, his eyes are taking in the information, but his intellect refuses to process the data, because it “does not compute.” His intellect says this can’t be happening, and ignores the data. This is known as Cognitive Dissonance.

Next, watch Collmus make the call. Video should be queued up to start at the top of the stretch. Watch as Rich Strike is fully neck and neck with Epicenter before Collmus finally comes to terms with reality, and calls his name for the first time. Then watch after the finish, as Collmus shows signs of physical disbelief over what he just witnessed:

And so it goes with those who think a raging heretic Argentinian usurper barreling down the Appian Way could possibly be the legitimate Pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church.

Somehow, they just can’t see it.

The Bergoglian Antipapacy is right there out in the open, upending doctrine as if such a thing could be done, spewing heresy on a near daily basis, and they just can’t see it. Now don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of people and prelates who DO see it, and choose to do nothing, which is far worse. But I’d say the multitude just can’t bring their intellect into conformity with the obvious, obvious, reality staring them in the face. Of course, the ’58 Sedes would say the same, which puts them more in the right than anyone who would cede authority and obedience to this demon worshipper in white.

In your charity: Crowdfunding for a young unjabbed mother of five with sudden heart failure in Lubbock, TX

On April 26, 2023 Angela Asher, a young mother with 5 children (including a 2 month old baby) went to the hospital in Lubbock because she couldn’t breathe and was having extreme chest pain. She was diagnosed with acute heart failure and on the 28th she was transferred to Baylor hospital in Fort Worth. The doctors at Baylor in Fort Worth are hopeful that no surgical intervention will be needed but the road to recovery will be long and it may be months before she sees much improvement.

CLICK HERE TO DONATE TO MRS. ANGELA ASHER & FAMILY FOR HELP WITH MEDICAL BILLS AND CHILD CARE EXPENSES

Mailbag Q&A: St. Monnica Edition

Okay, Ann, here’s one for ya.

I started reading your financial column when ‘the letter’ got published. I found that interesting, but what I found mesmerizing was the information about Catholicism. I am a 60 year old married woman with no religious training in my background at all other than what I have picked up from walking around on the planet.

I asked my husband if he would attend a Catholic service with me which he did. I have told him ‘I think those Catholics have it right’. However, he was born, raised and confirmed into the Lutheran church – he emigrated from Sweden to the USA as an adult. He says if we ever attend a church, it will be Lutheran.

So now what? Do I do the Ephesians 5:22-33 thing or what?

L

Dear L,

You do the First Commandment thing. God is first. If the hypothetical choice is hell for all eternity with your husband, or heaven for all eternity with God, which do you think God wants you to choose?

Hear this now: God does not will or expect anyone to choose hell out of “loyalty” to another person. Even their spouse.  Or their child.  Why did God make you?  What is your purpose? What is the meaning of life?  The answer is literally the first paragraph in the Catechism:

You exist to know, love and serve God in this world, AND BE HAPPY WITH HIM FOREVER IN THE NEXT.

Read that over and over again until you get it.

Receive instruction and enter the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. Do this through a Latin Mass parish, if possible.  Not only are the odds exponentially higher that the instruction you receive will be CATHOLIC, but the old rites of initiation are vastly superior to the Novus Ordo watered-down rites.  I so rue not entering the Church in the Old Rite, but now realize that it was all 100% in the Divine Providence, both in terms of people that I did meet, AND people that I was specifically prevented from meeting until after I was safely in the Barque.  But my blanket advice is: However far the drive might be to a Latin Mass parish, it is worth it.

www.fssp.com

https://institute-christ-king.org

https://sspx.org/en

Pray for your husband, and enjoin the assisstance of St. Monnica.  Here is a link to a little piece that does a good job of recounting St. Monnica’s conversion of her husband, Patricius. (And her mother-in-law!!) When we read between the lines, we realize that Patricius was almost certainly a Diabolical Narcissist and possible psychopath. And we also know that the healing of such people is a FAR greater miracle than merely breaking the laws of physics by levitation, or altering the weather. To heal the heart and soul of a DN is… beyond words.

So, for those of you with DNs in your life, KEEP PRAYING, as I do, as St. Monnica did.

St. Monnica, pray for us. 

St. Augustine and his mother, St. Monnica St. Augustine and his mother, St. Monnica

Happy 10th Van Down By the River Day!

Today, April 30, is the the Feast of St. Catherine of Siena, and also the TENTH (!!) anniversary of my vacating of my old real estate holdings and officially entering into my status of living in the proverbial “van down by the river”.

Here are just a few of the illiterate laywoman Catherine’s words to remind us why she is a Doctor of the Church, defender of the Papacy, and our dear patroness:

“Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire.”

Yes, Ma’am.

“Start being brave about everything. Drive out darkness and spread light. Don’t look at your weaknesses. Realize instead that in Christ crucified you can do everything.”

Yes, Ma’am.

“You are rewarded not according to your work or your time but according to the measure of your love.”

Yes, Ma’am.

He will provide the way and the means, such as you could never have imagined. Leave it all to Him, let go of yourself, lose yourself on the Cross, and you will find yourself entirely.

Yes, Ma’am.

Preach the Truth as if you had a million voices. It is silence that kills the world.

Yes, Ma’am.

A soul cannot live without loving. It must have something to love, for it was created to love.

Yes, Ma’am.

It is only through shadows that one comes to know the light.

Yes, Ma’am.

To the servant of God… every place is the right place, and every time is the right time.

Yes, Ma’am.

Nothing great is ever achieved without much enduring.

Yes, Ma’am.

We are of such value to God that He came to live among us… and to guide us home. He will go to any length to seek us, even to being lifted high upon the cross to draw us back to Himself. We can only respond by loving God for His love.

Yes, Ma’am.

We’ve had enough of exhortations to be silent! Cry out with a hundred thousand tongues. I see that the world is rotten because of silence.

Yes, Ma’am.

Strange that so much suffering is caused because of the misunderstandings of God’s true nature. God’s heart is more gentle than the Virgin’s first kiss upon the Christ. And God’s forgiveness to all, to any thought or act, is more certain than our own being.

Yes, Ma’am.

You must believe in truth that whatever God gives or permits is for your salvation.

Yes, Ma’am.

Do not be satisfied with little things, because God wants great things!

Yes, Ma’am.

And of what should we be afraid? Our captain on this battlefield is Christ Jesus. We have discovered what we have to do. Christ has bound our enemies for us and weakened them that they cannot overcome us unless we so choose to let them. So we must fight courageously and mark ourselves with the sign of the most Holy Cross.

Yes, Ma’am.

Enrich your soul in the great goodness of God: The Father is your table, the Son is your food, and the Holy Spirit waits on you and then makes His dwelling in you.

Yes, Ma’am.

Proclaim the truth and do not be silent through fear.

Yes, Ma’am.

The devil fears hearts on fire with love of God.

Yes, Ma’am.

Of course you are unworthy. But when do you hope to be worthy? You will be no more worthy at the end than at the beginning. God alone is worthy of Himself, He alone can make us worthy of Him.

Yes, Ma’am.

Dear St. Catherine of Siena, mystical bride of Christ, and our most admirable, exemplary and charitable patroness, pray for us.

The Mystical Marriage of St. Catherine to Christ Jesus, at the behest and witness of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Clemente de Torres. ARSH 1700