Have you ever loved someone who hates you?

If you haven’t, or don’t, then you’re missing out on one of the greatest graces in the earthly human experience.  I’m not sure how one could even begin to understand Christ Crucified if they have never shared in the foundation of His Passion, what I will henceforth call “non-contingent love”.  To look upon a crucifix is to look upon Love, but not just reciprocal love as most people experience it:  I love you, but ONLY IF you love me back.  If you don’t return my love, then I will stop loving you.

That is NOT love.  That is egoism, in all of its narcissistic glory.  And yes, here is where Ayn Rand’s “rational self-interest” gets smashed to dust and why her little world is every bit as disordered and doomed to failure as the Marxist world.

Let’s go through examples that everyone can easily relate to.  First, the love of parents for children.  Infants do not love.  Infants are completely self-centered and are incapable of self-sacrifice for another.  They are totally, completely dependent on others for their survival, and are incapable of feeling or showing gratitude, and beyond that will keep the people who provide for their survival up all night with no thought for their reciprocal well-being.  Any yet… parents love their children.  Grown adults in their prime feel such profound love for these screaming little poo factories that they would without hesitation die in order to save the lives of their children who as of yet do NOT reciprocate their love.  This is a form of non-contingent love.

Even as children grow older and become adults and fall into drugs and crime and perversion, some of whom viciously betray their parents in the process, most parents report that a wounded yet unshakable love always persists.  They can never, ever truly hate or be completely indifferent to their children, no matter how horrific the childrens’ descent and betrayal may be.  Sadly, many children are put on the path to ruin by parents who do indeed inordinately desire reciprocal love from their children and thus do not properly form and discipline the children in their formative years.

Now you might be wondering how this could possibly apply to marriage.  How could spousal love NOT be contingent upon reciprocity?  Isn’t reciprocal love the point in marriage?  Not according to the vows.  Proper, traditional marriage vows actually STRESS non-contingent love between spouses.  For better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, ’til death do us part. 

If your spouse comes down with Alzheimer’s Disease and in the early-to-mid stages becomes cruel and hateful toward you (as is not uncommon among Alzheimer’s patients), do you stop loving them?  Once your spouse is incapable of returning your love due to some physical limitation does your love for them then automatically evanesce?  The answer should be “no”.  “Divorcing” a stricken spouse is, of course, morally illicit and betrays the deeply flawed nature of the love between the two when both were in full health.

I heard a very moving anecdote once about a traditional Catholic woman who was stuck in a Novus Ordo parish with, naturally, an extremely poorly educated priest.  As is sadly common these days, the woman’s husband left her out of the blue after 30 years of marriage and took up with another woman.  This woman’s parish priest urged this lady to get an annullment and join the parish’s “mature singles” club and “move on”.  This was the woman’s reply:

Father, I am still married and will be married until the day either I or my husband die.  Just because my husband has chosen to not honor our perfectly valid marriage vows and no longer loves me does not alter the validity and permanence of those vows or my love for him.  Just because my husband has chosen to commit adultery within our marriage, this does not void our marriage and certainly does not give me some imagined “right” to also commit adultery.  I am Mrs. John Q. Smith, Father, and I would appreciate it if you would kindly remember that.

Pow.  While reciprocity in marital love is certainly a wonderful thing, even marital love should NOT be contingent upon reciprocity.

And this brings us to the true manifestation of caritas (charity, or love) in the world.  We must love people in TRUTH and in HONESTY, not allowing our desire for our love to be reciprocated to prevent us from loving in ways that appear or seem “unkind”.  If your toddler child is about to drink from a bottle of drain cleaner, do you not lunge at the child, yelling, and then smack the bottle out of the child’s hand – even though the child will speciously perceive your actions to be “mean” or even “violent” and then cry in anger at your reaction, which was borne completely on love?

In the same way, do we not tell the drug addict, the sodomite, or anyone else engaging in physically and/or spiritually lethal behavior that what they are doing is wrong and it is imperative that they stop even if that admonition means a reduction or elimination of their esteem for us?  How is their reciprocal esteem for us even relevant at that point?

True, non-contingent love yields honesty.
False, narcissistic love is a seedbed of lies and manipulations.

We cannot properly understand Christ’s admonition to “turn the other cheeck” unless we understand non-contingent love.  “Turn the other cheek” does not mean that we must allow evil and lies to run unchecked.  “Turn the other cheek” does not mean commit de facto suicide before stating harsh truths, and this includes imposing justice, which is itself a fully-enclosed subset of Truth.

“Turn the other cheek” means that we do and say what we must in true charity, and then KEEP LOVING even when our love is returned with a blow, be it physical or emotional.  The emotional blow can be either in the form of hatred, or in the form of indifference.  The point is, the more you love someone in truth, the more likely it is in this fallen world, and particularly this day and age, that your love will NOT be reciprocated, and then *THE MORE YOU MUST LOVE THEM* with no expectation or demand that they ever love you back.

Given all of this, consider our current political and social system.  Is our culture not totally contingent upon reciprocal esteem and quid pro quos?  Is not every word and every action measured by the amount of popularity it generates, with power and wealth coming behind as corollaries?  Is the need to be “liked” not central to most people’s existence?  No one will do the right thing or stand up for the truth because to do so would mean public scorn and ridicule, followed by loss of wealth and property, and THAT is the worst possible outcome according to this horrificly perverted culture.

Oh, it hurts.  It hurts, it hurts, it hurts.  It hurts when your beloved is indifferent toward or hates you.  But think of how Christ feels, and then realize that YOU are the one who callously and maliciously refuses to return His love with every sin and every ingratitude.  Then realize that He still burns with unquenchable love for you, and use that realization to turn around and love others without requiring or demanding reciprocity.

He told us.  Repeatedly.   He told us that we would be hated by the world.  He told us that we would be persecuted, both in macro contexts and in little ways in our individual day-to-day lives.  And then He showed us by dying for us at our own hand, never for a second depriving any of us of our freedom to choose our own actions or whether or not to Love Him.  Only tyrants demand reciprocal “love”, which is no love at all, and is at its core, extremely cowardly.  Be brave.  Love.  Ferociously.  And when your love is not reciprocated, persevere, love more.  That’s how you know it’s genuine.

Our Father, Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy Name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

St. Nicolas. Wielder of assault weapons and righteous puncher in the mouth of heretics. Sigh….

For all of you cattle people who have been to my Cattle Marketing School (or bought the DVD – still on sale by the way!), do you remember my mini-rant about the importance of domestic ownership and control of food production?  Do remember my other mini-rant about the dangers of vertical integration and how extreme concentration of essential industries (er, like FOOD) makes a nation vulnerable to overthrow and takeover?

Um, yeah.

China just bought Smithfield.

No bacon for you, Gweilo.

Back to finance.  Poland did exactly what I and a few others have been warning about for years with regards to private retirement accounts and pensions.  Poland confiscated 50% of all private pension funds last week.  PRIVATE pensions.

As Warren Pollock and I have been screaming, one of the largest chunks of collateral left in the system is private retirement money, both in the form of 401(k)s and IRAs and in private pension accounts.  In the U.S., the latest data for 2012 shows that there are now $10.5 Trillion in private 401k and IRA holdings, with another $9 Trillion in pensions and annuities.

The regime has been fairly open about its plans to “nationalize”, read CONFISCATE, this collateral and implement a system of “mandatory retirement savings accounts”, which will be just another confiscatory redistribution into the hands of the oligarchs and their cronies.  This what Poland just did.  This is what MF Global was in its essence.  This is what Cyprus was, except the Cypriot confiscation was done to demand deposit accounts instead of retirement accounts, which is now termed a “bail-in” – but it is all of the same stripe, namely the utter destruction of the notion of private property and the redistribution of all wealth into the hands of the oligarchs.   In Poland, the private pension paradigm has now also been destroyed because no one will want to put money into a private pension after this knowing that it can and will be stolen by the government at any time with zero redress.

ZeroHedge has a piece up on this that is very good, but allow me to riff on it a bit.  Poland has a “debt ceiling” that prevents it from issuing debt over 55% of GDP.  By confiscating and stealing (“nationalizing”) the Polish citizens’ private pension money, they are now booking that money as a straight-up cash asset on the government’s balance sheet, thus “freeing up room” against the GDP-to-debt threshold so that the Polish government can … issue more debt and spend, spend, spend.

Now here’s the terrifying part.  The US debt-to-GDP ratio is over 100%.   $15.5 Trillion dollar economy; $16.0+ Trillion in debt.  The day Obama usurped in January 2009, that ratio was 70% or so.  This massive increase in debt is 100% intentional, being executed will full malice of forethought, and is called the “Cloward-Piven Strategy”.

As I have written recently, the Obama regime is already using pension money to manipulate the so-called debt ceiling, namely the Thrift Savings Plan money, which is the government 401(k) equivalent for government employees, government retirees and the U.S. military.  Yeah, all of these US military officers who are “going along to get along” so they can “make it eight more years until I get my pension” are chasing money that is already gone.  Morons.  The regime has already taken it, and all that is sitting in those accounts are worthless IOUs issued by neo-Stalinist oligarchs.  They’re just too uninformed and deluded to understand this.   This is why the national debt figures published by the government have not changed in months and months.  They are using the TSP money to fraudulently offset public debt on the balance sheet.

Now let’s tie everything together.  Let’s talk about DETROIT.

If you have watched my 8-part YouTube presentation on the economy, you already have a working knowledge of what I am about to discuss.  If you haven’t, I really do recommend it.  A time investment of 2.5 hours is not a lot to ask in order to understand how and why your civilization is about to collapse.  Really.  My YouTube channel link is at the top of the page.  It’s right there.

Because of the zero interest rate policy (ZIRP) forced upon us by the Federal Reserve, pension funds are holding an enormous amount of derivatives, namely Repurchase Agreements (“repos”) and credit default swaps (“CDS”).  I explain what these instruments are in the YouTube presentation.  The reason pension funds and everyone else are holding these derivatives is because these are the only instruments that are actually quoting a return.  Since interest rates are at zero, traditional top-level instruments generate almost zero yield.

Now, for every derivatives contract, there must be a counter-party.  Someone is selling these derivatives to these pension funds, brokerage firms, state and local governments and other smaller banks.  It is basically FOUR banks selling these derivatives:  JPMorgan, Citibank, Bank of America and Goldman Sachs.  These FOUR BANKS are carrying on their books $208 TRILLION in notional value derivatives contracts.  All US banks together are holding $223 TRILLION, so these FOUR banks are holding 93% of the total.

To put this in perspective, it is estimated that the total of all assets in the US, public, private and corporations, the total value of absolutely everything in the United States is $217 TRILLION.   These FOUR banks are holding on their books notional value in derivatives contracts roughly equal to 96% of ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING in the United States of America.  Even if you give the value of these derivatives held by these FOUR banks a 90% haircut, these FOUR banks are still booking 135% of the US GDP ($15.5 Trillion per year GDP vs. $21 Trillion in derivatives after the haircut).   Are we feeling this?

As MFGlobal proved, derivative counterparties (in that case JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs) now enjoy a bullet-proof, legally protected but utterly morally illicit super-priority.  The derivatives counterparties go to the front of the line BEFORE THE LINE EVEN FORMS.  Bankruptcy doesn’t even begin until AFTER these counterparties move on a failed company, government, bank or fund and have looted it for any remaining collateral AND have terminated all non-beneficial contracts with said entity completely outside the conventional Rule of Law.   Dodd-Frank is what set this up.  THIS is what Dodd-Frank is all about and why it exists.  Everything else is window dressing.

Not only does this benefit the big banks qua counterparties, is massively incentivizes them to knowingly go after and sell these derivatives to extremely weak parties.  When a failure happens, the big banks have carte blanche to go in and loot everything they can.  They are ROOTING FOR and now ACTIVELY FOMENTING DEFAULT among their counterparties.  Not only do they have essentially zero risk, the big banks actually MAKE OUT BETTER if their counterparty defaults!

Note that I said that state and local governments are a huge holder of these derivatives.  Detroit is the poster child for this dynamic.  Detroit was massively allocated into interest rate swaps which were marketed to them as a hedge against rising interest rates.  We now know that the LIBOR rate has been manipulated for years by these very banks, and we also know that the big banks, especially Goldman and JPMorgan, send their own people into the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department in order to do their will.  So, the big banks sell interest rate swaps as a “hedge” against rising interest rates and then make @#$% sure that interest rates move to and then stay at zero, thus guaranteeing a massive profit on the interest rate derivatives they have sold to their prey.  In Detroit, now utterly insolvent, the big bank counterparties are at the front of the line and the Detroit city employee pension funds have been confiscated and sent to the big-bank counterparties who now have statutory super-priority thanks to Dodd-Frank.

Guys, it isn’t just Detroit.  Detroit, like MFGlobal, is the first major municipality to go because it was run by psychopaths and imbeciles.  This is every major city.  This is every state.  This is every bank (as I cover in the YouTube presentation), every brokerage house, every pension fund, both public and private.  They’re all up to their eyebrows in these derivatives.  It’s the only game left in town – engineered with full malice of forethought by the bankster oligarchy.  These big banks are the counterparty to all of these entities and they have given themselves a super-priority claim to all collateral via Dodd-Frank, and their agents in the FEDGOV will back their morally illicit “legal claims” until they are PHYSICALLY MADE TO STOP.  Yes, that means counter-revolution and almost certainly war.  Aside from a truly supernatural Divine Intervention I can see no other possible way out of this.  This is math.  Only God – ONLY GOD – can trump math.  These people are never, ever going to peacably walk away.  Ever.

Here is a detailed source citation over at The Automatic Earth.

I’m going to go scrub some calcified fecal matter out of toilet bowls now, and praise God with every scrub.

An old post from Jesse’s Cafe Americain in which Jesse compiled Newman quotes into a new whole.  Bold emphases mine.  Most excellent.——-

“We are slow to master the great truth that even now Christ is, as it were, walking among us, and by His hand, or eye, or voice, bidding us to follow Him. We do not understand that His call is a thing that takes place now. We think it took place in the Apostles’ days, but we do not believe in it; we do not look for it in our own case.

God’s presence is not discerned at the time when it is upon us, but afterwards, when we look back upon what is gone and over. The world seems to go on as usual. There is nothing of heaven in the face of society, in the news of the day.

And yet the ever-blessed Spirit of God is there, ten times more glorious, more powerful than when He trod the earth in our flesh.

God beholds you. He calls you by your name. He sees you and understands you as He made you. He knows what is in you, all your peculiar feelings and thoughts, your dispositions and likings, your strengths and your weaknesses. He views you in your day of rejoicing and in your day of sorrow. He sympathizes in your hopes and your temptations. He interests Himself in all your anxieties and remembrances, all the risings and fallings of your spirit.

He encompasses you round and bears you in His arms. He notes your very countenance, whether smiling or in tears. He looks tenderly upon you. He hears your voice, the beating of your heart, and your very breathing. You do not love yourself better than He loves you. You cannot shrink from pain more than He dislikes your bearing it; and if He puts it on you, it is as you would put it on yourself, if you would be wise, for a greater good afterwards.

There is an inward world, which none see but those who belong to it. There is an inward world into which they enter who come to Christ, though to men in general they seem as before. If they drank of Christ’s cup it is not with them as in time past. They came for a blessing, and they have found a work.

To their surprise, as time goes on, they find that their lot is changed. They find that in one shape or another adversity happens to them. If they refuse to afflict themselves, God afflicts them.

Why did you taste of His heavenly feast, but that it might work in you—why did you kneel beneath His hand, but that He might leave on you the print of His wounds?

God has created me to do Him some definite service; He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another. I have my mission — I may never know it in this life but I shall be told it in the next.

I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons. He has not created me for naught.

I shall do good, I shall do His work. I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place while not intending it if I do but keep His commandments.

Therefore I will trust Him. Whatever I am, I can never be thrown away. If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him; in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him. If I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him.

He does nothing in vain. He knows what He is about.

He may take away my friends. He may throw me among strangers. He may make me feel desolate, make my spirits sink, hide my future from me — still He knows what He is about.

Let us feel what we really are–sinners attempting great things. Let us simply obey God’s will, whatever may come. He can turn all things to our eternal good. Easter day is preceded by the forty days of Lent, to show us that they only who sow in tears shall reap in joy.

Contemplate then yourself, not as yourself, but as you are in the Eternal God. Fall down in astonishment at the glories which are around you and in you, poured to and fro in such a wonderful way that you are dissolved into the Kingdom of God.

The more we do, the more shall we trust in Christ; and that surely is no morose doctrine, that leads us to soothe our selfish restlessness, and forget our fears, in the vision of the Incarnate Son of God.

May the Lord support us all the day long, till the shades lengthen, and the evening comes, and the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done.

Then in His mercy may He give us safe lodging, and a holy rest, and peace at last.”

John Henry Newman

*This is a collection of quotations from John Henry Cardinal Newman woven into a whole cloth by Le Proprietaire (Jesse) as a young man for a small circle of friends.

Yep.  Honest, intelligent discourse is now the domain of a 17 year old homeschooled lad and a ten-bucks-per-hour toilet scrubber woman.  It’s completely perfect.

We cover mostly Syria and political dynamics.  I hope the audio format helps reach more folks than the written format does.

This was recorded on Monday, September 2nd.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5CHDRHgmWo

“As the astronauts soar into the vast eternities of space, on earth the garbage piles higher; as the groves of academe extend their domain, their alumni’s arms reach lower; as the phallic cult spreads, so does impotence. In great wealth, great poverty; in health, sickness; in numbers, deception. Gorging, left hungry; sedated, left restless; telling all, hiding all; in flesh united, forever separate. So we press on through the valley of abundance that leads to the wasteland of satiety, passing through the gardens of fantasy, seeking happiness ever more ardently, and finding despair ever more surely.”
-Malcolm Muggeridge

The Estate Liquidation Elves in Colorado report that they wanna get my junk cleared out… er, excuse me, that they are ready to sell the hot beverage mugs!  Thank you in advance for your kind consideration.

**All buyers from Ann Barnhardt’s eBay account go straight to the top of some FEDGOV list somewhere.  Guaranteed.  So you’ll have that going for you, which is nice.

My eBay handle is 720ann.

HERE IS THE EBAY LISTING!

This Buy-It-Now sale is for one random hot beverage mug from the Ann Barnhardt estate.  Each mug has been thoroughly imbued with Ann Barnhardt’s slobber, cooties and possibly trench mouth (aka Acute Necrotizing Ulcerative Gingivitis).  Not liable for loss of teeth or any other manifestation of cranial rot resulting from the use of these mugs.  Buy-It-Now price is $75 for ONE RANDOM MUG.  Some are ceramic, some are glass.  When you receive yours, it will be a surprise – just like Christmas except with trench mouth.  Free shipping within the U.S.  Ann Barnhardt prays daily for her benefactors and receives Holy Communion for them not infrequently. Mmmm. Is that nutmeg? No! It’s trench mouth. The trench mouth makes it good….

Too good not to post.

All I’m going to quote is the opening.  The rest is 1500 words of standard musloid ranting jibberish in keeping with the, er, unfortunate situation vis-a-vis the whole musloid gene-pool-IQ-bellcurve situation.  IYKWIMAITYD.

From:  Sai ferrero   [email protected]
Re:  Your current circumstance is enouth proof for you

In the name of allah the most gracious full of mercy
Peace be upon those who walk the divine path

How does it feel to live the way you do? After all you put yourself in this situation.

Dear Sai ferrero,
Absoluthely, posithively fanthastic.  So good that there is no way I can thake the credith for ith.  There thimply aren’t wordths.
Thanks for athking.
Cheerths-
Ann

Our Father, Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy Name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

Dialogue, dialogue, dialogue. Encounter. Who am I to judge? Encounter dialogue. The poor! Dialogue encounter. The poor.

So I came across a fascinating piece about the liturgical rubrics for the pontifical blessing of military armor, swords, and military banners.  But how can this be?  War is never the answer!  Oh, except when it is.  Anyway, here is what a bishop is to say when blessing a sword:

Let us pray. Deign Thou to + bless this sword, we ask Thee, Lord; and with the guard of Thy holiness defend this Thy servant, who at Thy inspiration desires to receive it, and keep him from every harm. Through Christ, our Lord. R. Amen.

The bishop sprinkles the sword with holy water, then hands it to the person who is to receive it as the latter kneels before him, saying:

Receive this sword, in the name of the Fa+ther, the + Son and the Holy + Spirit, and may thou use it for thy defense, and that of the Holy Church of God, and to the confounding of the enemies of the Cross of Christ, and of the Christian faith: and as far as human frailty shall permit, may thou harm no one with it unjustly. And may He deign to grant this to thee, Who with the Father and the Holy Spirit….

How ’bout them apples.