Tea at Trianon: It’s Not Paranoia If It’s True

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Sunday, August 25, 2019

It’s Not Paranoia If It’s True

And they shall say to him: What are these wounds in the midst of thy hands? And he shall say: With these I was wounded in the house of them that loved me. Zacharias 13:6

From Rod Dreher at The American Conservative:

Back in the early 2000s, the Legionaries of Christ, a hyper-conservative Catholic religious order, spent a lot of money and effort in an attempt to crush a group of men who accused the order’s founder, Father Marcial Maciel, of having abused them sexually. Like lots of journalists, I was lobbied hard by the Legion to stand by poor, persecuted Father Maciel. It sounded completely crazy that the founder of this super-orthodox Catholic religious order beloved by Pope John Paul II could have done all these horrible things.

Guess what? It was all true. He even fathered children, and abused them. He was also a drug addict. Benedict XVI forced him out of leadership of the order in 2006. Maciel died in 2008, refusing on his deathbed to make a confession or repent. Read this long, detailed piece by journalist Jason Berry, detailing how the wicked Maciel made his fortune and manipulated people.

I hardly need to go into detail here about what we discovered over the ensuing years about the networked corruption in the Church. For me, one of the great lessons is that in any institution, corrupt men will take advantage of it, especially if they can work beneath a canopy of presumed innocence. It can happen in a police force. It can happen in the military. This is not just a church thing, not by any means.(Read more.)

From Michael Hichborn at the Lepanto Institute:

Given the recent accusation and the history of scandalous behavior, it should not be shocking to find that Bp. Hubbard helped found, and currently sits as Vice President of the Board of a pro-abortion, pro-homosexual communist front-organization whose affiliates receive funding from the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD). In fact, this organization’s ties to the CCHD are so intimate, it immediately calls to question how the CCHD is even allowed to exist. The organization is called Interfaith Worker Justice (IWJ), and as can be seen here, Bp. Hubbard was not only a member of the founding board, he is currently its vice president. (Read more.)