History of the Christian Altar

 

From Shawn Tribe at The Liturgical Arts Journal:

Altars are (or ought to be at least), architecturally and liturgically, the central focal point of the interior of our churches. Given their evident importance, it is no surprise that there can be much in the way of disagreement as to what the ideal form of the altar is. Debates rage about free-standing altars versus altars with grand reredoses attached to them.

It was through the consideration of the different forms of the altar, particularly through the pursuits of the Liturgical Movement, that the idea arose of taking a brief look at the history and development of its forms. I. Early Christian Antiquity If we look to the earliest time of Christian antiquity, there are two early forms of altar that can be identified. One is those of the house-churches, which were wooden and in table form. Some of the Eucharistic frescoes of the Roman catacombs may give some sense of this form:

The "Fractio Panis" fresco in the Capella Greca of the Roman catacomb of St. Priscilla

The second form was the use of the stone tombs of the martyrs as altars. This custom is thought to trace to the first quarter of the 2nd century. Marble tops were placed upon the tombs for the Mass to be celebrated upon.

The Fractio Panis fresco of the Capella Greca, which belongs to this period is located in the apse directly above a small cavity which Wilpert supposes to have contained the relics of a martyr, and it is highly probable that the stone covering this tomb served as an altar. (The Catholic Encyclopedia)

(Read more.)

At San Clemente in Rome, although the church was built facing west, Mass was offered facing east. The congregation would face east as well. From Shawn Tribe at The Liturgical Arts Journal:

I cannot definitively explain why the church was laid out this way as a glance at the property would suggest that it could easily have been orientated, which is to say, designed so that one's movement through the church was from west to east, toward the rising sun. All the churches built by Constantine in Rome were laid out "backwards" this way (except Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, which was built into an existing building), and I can only guess that this was done in part to imitate the Temple at Jerusalem.

There are other possibilities as well. The priest offering the Holy Sacrifice is facing east, of course--the design of the altar makes it impossible for Mass to be offered any other way. It is thought that in antiquity the assembly would actually turn around and face east with the celebrant, putting the Sanctuary behind them. This is not as strange as it might at first sound. A shepherd is always behind his flock. This is why the celebrant always comes last in procession. Furthermore, the church building symbolizes the Barque of Peter. In fact, the word nave derives from the Latin navis, which means boat. So the Sanctuary is where the helm in an ancient ship would be--at the back.

We have a dual movement, then. We move into the church building toward the west, and then we turn around at a certain point in the liturgy and proceed east. Now consider for a moment St. Germanus' text. He says that the Sanctuary is an image of the tomb in which Christ was buried; the Altar is "the spot in the tomb where Christ was placed"; and the apse corresponds to the cave in which He was buried. So perhaps our movement from east to west toward the Sanctuary, toward the setting sun, is actually a representation of our burial with Christ. And turning around and proceeding east, toward the rising sun, represents our sharing in His Resurrection. (Read more.)

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The President You Elected Can Finally Run the Government You Voted For

 From Alexander Muse at The Enterprise:

Today the Supreme Court did something rare. It admitted a mistake that had stood for ninety-one years, and it corrected it. In Trump v. Slaughter, a 6-3 majority overruled Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, the 1935 decision that allowed Congress to wall off the commissioners of the Federal Trade Commission from the President who is supposed to direct them. Chief Justice Roberts, writing for the Court, did not nibble at the edges of that old precedent. He buried it. “If anything more is left of Humphrey’s,” he wrote, “we overrule it.” The sentence is worth pausing on, because finality of that kind is unusual from a Court that prizes its own continuity. The Chief Justice was telling the country that a structural error had at last been set right.

To see why this is restoration rather than revolution, begin where the framers began, with a single sentence. Article II opens by vesting “the executive Power” in a President, and it later commands that he “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.” Read those two clauses together and a simple question follows. If a President is charged with seeing that the laws are faithfully executed, what happens when the officers actually executing those laws defy him, or simply ignore him, and he cannot remove them? The answer is that the duty becomes a fiction. A man held responsible for an outcome he cannot control is not truly responsible at all. The framers understood this, which is why they did not scatter the executive power among boards and commissions. They concentrated it in one person who could be watched, praised, blamed, and ultimately voted out.

Alexander Hamilton made the point with characteristic bluntness in Federalist No. 70, a passage the majority quotes today. A “plurality in the executive,” Hamilton warned, not only weakens government but “tends to conceal faults and destroy responsibility.” Consider what he is describing. When power is divided among many hands, and something goes wrong, each hand points to another. The citizen who has been harmed cannot find the person to hold accountable, because accountability has been diluted to the point of disappearance. Hamilton thought this the great vice of committee government, and he designed the presidency precisely to avoid it. A single executive cannot pass the buck, because there is no one to pass it to. (Read more.)

 

 

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Nixon Threatened to Reveal the CIA's Involvement in the Kennedy Assassination

 From Stone Cold Truth:

A stunning, long-overlooked Nixon Watergate-era tape shows Richard Nixon warning CIA Director Richard Helms that he knows of CIA involvement in the murder of John F. Kennedy- “I know who shot John.” This shocking new tape depicts Nixon increasingly besieged by Watergate but unaware that at least four of the Watergate burglars were still on the CIA payroll at the time of the break-in, and that the CIA had thus infiltrated the burglary team. Recently declassified documents reveal that Watergate Special Prosecutor Nick Akerman was aware of both the CIA’s advance knowledge and involvement in the break-in — but said and did nothing.

Senator Howard Baker, the Republican Leader on the Senate Watergate Committee and his counsel Fred Thompson himself, a future U.S. Senator from Tennessee, like Baker, stumbled on the CIA's deep advanced knowledge and direct involvement in the Watergate break-in. Baker and Thompson both knew that at least four of the Watergate burglars were on the CIA payroll at the time of the break-in and that through CREEP Security Director James McCord, had infiltrated the burglary team. Senate Watergate Committee Chairman Sam Ervin stoutly refused to allow Baker and the Committee Republicans including Edward J. Gurney of Florida the right to publish a Minority Report which noted this stunning information regarding the CIA.

Nixon deeply distrusted the CIA because he knew that President Eisenhower had ordered the agency to give top secret briefings to both Nixon and Kennedy after both were the certain nominees of their parties. Nixon was sore that Kennedy utilized the information in their debates, attacking Nixon for being "soft" on communist Cuba, knowing full well that Nixon had chaired a working group as Vice President overseeing preparations for the "Bay of Pigs" invasion. Nixon, of course, could not reveal this upcoming attempt to topple Castro in the details. (Read more.)

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Petit Trianon and the Hamlet Revisited

 The grand salon at Petit Trianon from East of the Sun, West of the Moon.

 More pictures, HERE.

From the dining room at Petit Trianon

 The Queen's house at the hameau has been restored. It is interesting to me that Napoleon gave the hamlet to his second wife Marie-Louise, who was the Queen's great niece. He was really unabashed in his fascination with Marie-Antoinette. From France Today:

Left to rack and ruin for the best part of two centuries, the Maison de la Reine, Marie Antoinette’s country retreat on the fringes of the Château de Versailles, has finally been restored to its former glory, thanks to a major £326 million renovation. Built between 1783 and 1787 as the extravagant centrepiece of the Hameau de la Reine, a model ‘village’ and folly of epic scale complete with a (decorative) windmill, sheep trussed up in silk ribbons, a cluster of farmers’ cottages and working farm, the Queen’s House had lain empty since 1848 when the Dior Foundation stepped in three years ago intent on rescuing it from certain ruin and giving it the regal makeover it so begged for.

Secreted in the sprawling gardens of the Petit Trianon, away from fawning courtiers’ prying eyes, the Hameau was Marie Antoinette’s refuge from Versailles’s folderol – for the two short years she got to enjoy it – and only a handful of her closest confidantes were allowed in its inner sanctum, the Maison de la Reine. Conceived with little thought for longevity, the hamlet fared poorly in the post-Revolution years and was all but a crumbling heap when Napoleon ordered a full restoration in 1810. Never one for sentimentalism, the emperor had the most ramshackle structures summarily torn down. Another renovation followed in the 1930s, courtesy of John Rockefeller. Part of the complex was refurbished in the late 20th century and the farm rebuilt in 2006. (Read more.)

From the Queen's house at the hameau

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The Party of Algae and 'Our Democracy'

 From James Howard Kunstler:

Okay, convince me that gay-Islamic-race-communism is a “progressive” political program America is going to buy like corn flakes. The Lefty-left wants to think so, as it lurches from one peak of mental illness to an even greater one in the 130 days to the midterms. Look how successful they’ve been with open borders, defunding the police, men in the girl’s swim lane, no cash bail, sex-change surgery for kids, free-for-all elections, hatin’ on white people, and open Medicare fraud. The new re-branding strategy as “Democratic Socialism” only tells you that reality has ceased to interest them.

No, winning electoral districts stuffed with illegal aliens in bright blue cities with tiny overall voter turnouts won’t sweep the nation like love. More likely it’s a harbinger of the party’s approaching death, like the Whigs going down the drain in 1852, gurgle-gurgle. Advocating to destroy American society is a poor sales pitch. The party’s old-line leadership frantically seeks some way to neutralize the rising influence of Zohran Mamdani and his disciples, but so far nothing works. An odor of desperation fills the air.

One thing you can say about the gay-Islamic-race-communists is that they are well-organized, which is understandable since their political program resembles an ant farm, a dis-individuated collective with insectile characteristics, workers and soldiers toiling in mindless solidarity to occupy more electoral territory so as to vanquish their “oppressors,” Trump and the big feet of his capitalist minions. (Read more.)

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Why the Blood-Red Cross of St. George Terrifies Britain’s Elite — and Muslims

The entire article is available to subscribers only but it is still interesting. From Raymond Ibrahim:

As Britain enters yet another moment of political upheaval following the announced resignation of Prime Minister Keir Starmer, a deeper question remains unresolved: what exactly is England’s national identity — and who gets to define it?

Take England’s oldest national flag: the red cross of St. George on a white field. It has become the center of controversy in recent years and is seen as one of Britain’s most contested symbols.

For those raising the flag through campaigns like Raise the Colours, it represents pride in England’s heritage, unity, and unapologetic patriotism. Critics, however, brand it a symbol of “far-right” extremism, racism, and hostility toward migrants (the vast majority of whom are Muslim).

Indeed, just a few days ago, a Liberal Democrat-led Oxfordshire County Council sought a High Court injunction to ban the flying of St. George’s Cross and Union flags on or near public roads — claiming they “intimidate residents,” create safety risks, and cause “fear and division.” Many Britons see this as the latest front in a broader effort to suppress English identity amid the nation’s ongoing migrant crisis.

Yet the St. George flag’s true origins reveal a deeper irony largely forgotten by both sides.

Born in the crucible of the crusades, it originated as an emblem of holy war.

The Knights Templar, founded in the early twelfth century, were the first to adopt its colors. As monks, their white mantles symbolized purity; as warriors sworn to fight Muslims to the death in defense of Christendom, the blood-red cross symbolized their readiness for martyrdom (which many experienced). (Read more.)

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Meditation on the Tree of Knowledge

 

 From Justi Andreasen at Reclaiming the Biblical Worldview:

What if the fruit in Eden was never meant to remain untouched, and the transgression lay in the manner of its taking?

Most readers approach Genesis 3 as a simple account of disobedience. The command is given, the boundary is crossed, and the punishment follows. Yet this familiar reading leaves one question largely unexplored: What was the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil for? In other words, why would a good God place a forbidden tree in Paradise?

St. Ephrem the Syrian offers a different vision. He describes the Tree as a veil, a living boundary akin to the curtain separating the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies. Its presence did not signal permanent exclusion. It marked a space into which one must be worthy to step. Adam and Eve were not barred forever. They were being formed for a gift.

“He planted the Tree of Knowledge, endowing it with awe, hedging it in with dread, so that it might straight way serve as a boundary to the inner region of Paradise.” -St. Ephrem, Hymn III, 3

A boundary implies not absolute prohibition but ordered approach. The Temple clarifies the pattern. The veil did not exist to enforce distance but to protect what was holy until the priest was ready to enter. Entry required preparation. When King Uzziah (a ruler who unlawfully entered the Temple to perform priestly rites reserved for consecrated priests) forced his way past the boundary, his presumption disfigured him. The Tree functioned in the same way. It stood as a threshold within creation, a sign that maturity unfolds in time. The fruit was to be received when the creature had grown into obedience.

This holds true in ordinary situations as well. Consider claiming a driver’s license without undergoing formation. You would place yourself and others at risk, because you would be exercising responsibility without the formation required to carry it safely. Or consider falsifying your CV to obtain a high position. The title might come quickly, but the strain would follow just as quickly. You would find yourself overwhelmed, and the team around you would feel the instability of leadership that has not been earned. Had the role been the fruit of your labour, had you been promoted through recognition of real competence, the weight of it would rest on something solid, and the order of the group would hold. (Read more.)

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Why Your Vote Is More Important Than You Think

 From Tierney's Real News:

Some people tell me that they are not interested in discussing “politics.” They see it as a dirty, divisive distraction—something beneath them or separate from their faith.

They stay home on Election Day, convinced that God is sovereign so their vote doesn’t matter, or that both sides are equally bad. I understand the impulse. Politics can feel exhausting and corrupt, particularly in Minnesota where I come from. But here’s the uncomfortable truth: not voting is still a political decision. It shapes the world your children and grandchildren will inherit.

I decided to write this newsletter today because God put the post below in front of me. It inspired me to write about it…The truth is, every person makes political decisions every minute of every day that decide their future.

Every family is a political unit. Every business is a political unit. Every group is a political unit. Every church is a political unit. Every county, city and state is a political unit. Every country is a political unit.

Politics is simply how people in groups—families, churches, schools, businesses, cities, and nations—make decisions about how we live together. Every law, every school curriculum, every cultural norm reflects someone’s values winning out. If Christians disengage, others will gladly fill the vacuum. (Read more.)

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Why Mark Twain Wrote a Novel of St. Joan of Arc

Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc (1896) by Mark Twain is brilliant and well-researched historical fiction. From Jennifer Gill at The Distant Meadow:

St. Joan of Arc lived in the 15th century. A century known for civil upheaval, knights, peasants and wide divides between land holders, money and poverty.

She broke all the strict codes of her day, holding the record as the only person – male or female — to hold supreme command of military forces of a nation at the age of 17.

She led men to battle, acquired victory for France and required every solider to pray and go to confession. Her life and witness inspired some of the greatest thinkers and writers to honor her in various literary forms and honors:

• The famous French poet Charles Peguy illustrates her life in The Mystery of the Charity of Joan of Arc. One of Peguy’s plays reached the Vatican causing former Pope Benedict XVI to proclaim that Peguy’s work “is so famous that has been offered to us also showed us that Joan’s pathetic cry, which betrays her distress and helplessness, reveals above all her ardent and lucid faith, marked by hope and courage.”

• The famous Twain, sometimes openly hostile to the Catholic Church, writes the definitive biography on the saint stating it is the best of all his books. He travels to France and researches the saint for 14 years and took two years to write his famous chronicle of her, The Personal Recollections of St. Joan of Arc.

• The great conquer Napoleon reinstated celebrations in St. Joan of Arc’s honor after they were prohibited following the French Revolution.

• St. Therese of Lisieux, known world-wide as the Little Flower and a Doctor of the Church wanted to emulate St. Joan of Arc. The Little Flower portrayed her in a play at the convent.

 (Read more.)

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