Tea at Trianon: Open Letter to the Pope on Immigration

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

Wednesday, February 19, 2025

Open Letter to the Pope on Immigration

Pope Francis recently wrote a letter criticizing Trump’s deportations of illegal immigrants. Let me say, as a Catholic, that the both the Catholic catechism and writings of past popes and even the American bishops have upheld the right of every nation to maintain a border and make laws about who comes in. If a nation allows immigrants to come in, it has a right to make laws creating an orderly process of immigration. It has the right to turn people away, and it certainly has a right to deport illegal immigrants who not only violated the laws by coming in, but further broke the law by committing violent crimes or drug-dealing, human-trafficking, etc. And all this about Mary, Joseph and Baby Jesus being migrants, they may have been migrants but they were not breaking the law, they did not break any border laws as they never left the confines of the Roman Empire. Plus they were obviously not dealing in contraband goods or other criminal activity. Now I know many non-Catholics think that Catholics believe that every utterance of the Pope is directly from Heaven; we do not believe that. When the pope speaks ex cathedra, which is rare, the he speaks infallibly. However, Catholics are supposed to respect what the Pope says and look to him for guidance, but when he says something that is just plain false, which contradicts both Scripture and Tradition, then a person must follow their conscience. Here is the letter which I sent via @Pontifex on X:

Holy Father, the American people, and most especially American Catholics, have bent over backwards to help immigrants, even illegal immigrants, for decades, sometimes at great cost to themselves. Americans have been assaulted and killed by illegal aliens. Huge amounts of our tax money have gone to assist them. We have even sent money to their home countries. Many American missionaries, some from my own parish, have risked their lives and their health to minister to the needy in countries in Latin America. There is no lack of generosity here. While lecturing President Trump, Holy Father, I would hope you also have words for the leaders of the countries from which the migrants are fleeing. The leaders of Guatemala, Colombia, Venezuela, Honduras, etc have created unlivable situations for their people. The immigrants I know love their homelands and would rather be there except the circumstances were horrific. Please Holy Father, help those immigrants to stay in their beloved homelands by guiding their leaders in the path of justice. President Trump does not need such guidance but there are plenty of tyrannical dictators in Mexico, Latin America and South America who do. And I wish, Holy Father, that you might offer some words of sympathy for the American women and girls who have been murdered and raped by migrants who entered illegally. OR sympathy for the family of Dave Funk who was killed by an illegal alien driving drunk just last January. We have a growing number of homeless people who should come before non-citizens. Americas are suffering, too.

More, on the podcast, HERE.