St. Francis, or How To Be Meek Without Being a Pacifist

“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” What does this verse from the Beatitudes mean? As Steven rightly recalls in a recent post at his blog The Metaphysical Peregrine, most people think this beatitude means that Christians are, or should be, “weak and submissive.” On the contrary, he notes, “it takes a lot of strength and discipline to be meek.” Then he goes on to explain why such an interpretation is wrong and over-simplified. Now, not only do I agree with him, but I would take the point even further, because I think this is a major religious and cultural issue. Therefore… let’s talk about St. Francis of Assisi, the meek par excellence.

St Francis of Assisi is known for his humbleness and for his amazing love for nature and all creatures. But he is also known, above all in these days, for his love of peace, to the point that he has become an icon of peace, an obvious point of reference—if not a kind of legitimizing myth—for pacifists and non-violent (left-wing and radical) anti-war activists. Yet, though St Francis certainly was “a man of peace,” these images are incomplete and somewhat misleading, because they ignore other equally important aspects of his life: the severity of his character and his (mostly unknown) stubbornness… In other words he had a strong personality, bordering sometimes on harsh (he had occasion, for instance, to reproach himself in his last years for the harshness with which he had treated his own body), and was what might be called a man of character.

The cause of such misunderstanding is due, at least in part, to the fact that the Legenda Maior Sancti Francisci, the official biography of the Saint from Assisi written by St Bonaventure of Bagnoregio on commission of the Order of Friars Minor and approved by the General Chapter of Pisa in 1263, was intended to reshape Francis in the apostolic and Christic mould, multiplying the parallels between Francis and the characters of sacred history, citing copiously from the Bible. Thus, St Bonaventure smoothed over the rough edges in Francis’s life, deleting whatever did not correspond to the image he wished to give. He based his Legenda maior primarily on three texts of Thomas of Celano (a Franciscan Friar and disciple of St Francis, and his first biographer): the Vita prima, the Vita secunda, and the Tractatus de miraculis. Thomas himself, in turn, wrote his books at the request of Pope Gregory IX and presented a saint in accordance with hagiographical topoi. But the reader, as John Tolan notes in his Saint Francis and the Sultan. The Curious History of a Christian-Muslim Encounter,

has the impression that Francis’s strong personality, with his uncertainties, his fits of righteous anger, his enthusiasm, his charm, continually overflows the hagiographical frame.

Bonaventure instead

allows the saint no doubts, no spontaneity: he confronts all with serenity, sure that he is following the holy life clearly laid out in the Bible. Hence the disappointment of many of Bonaventure’s modern readers, from Paul Sabatier in the nineteenth century to Jacques Dalarun, for whom the excision of the primitive hagiography and the consecration of only Bonaventure’s text constitutes a ‘Misadventure (malaventure) of Francis of Assisi’.

As for St Francis “the pacifist” (in the age of Crusades), it is to be said that this is a “legend” built up over recent years with the complicity of some scholars such as James Powell, Chiara Frugoni, and Giulio Basetti-Sani. Here is an example of their “strange” method: in his Vita Secunda Thomas of Celano relates that Francis predicted the crusaders’ defeat in a particularly bloody battle (traditionally identified with that of 29 August 1219). Well, for Powell this means that Francis certainly did preach against crusading in general, but Thomas modified his warnings, so as not to offend the church authorities. Yet, the episode from Thomas’ book does not lend itself to this interpretation. In fact,

for Thomas, Francis spoke out not against crusading, nor against war in general, but against fighting on one specific day, a day (as God revealed to him) that was particularly unlucky.

Thomas also claims that during the defeat Francis cried hot tears for the crusaders who fell in battle, particularly for the Spaniards, who had fought ferociously, “but he does not seem to have shed a single tear for the Muslim dead.”

Yet, according to Chiara Frugoni, “Francis, in silent disagreement with the Church, which had taken the side of the armed crusaders, championed the peaceful conversion of the infidels…”

Here is how John Tolan demolishes their reasoning:

How can we suppose, along with Powell, Basetti-Sani, and others, that Francis actively preached against the crusades in the midst of the crusader camp, and did so until the capture of Damietta, yet that no chronicler mentions this? Powell and the others have a strange method: they form an idea of Francis, a pacifist like those of the twentieth century, then affirm that Thomas of Celano hid this reality so as not to offend papal sensibilities.

Franco Cardini, in turn, argued in several articles and books against the idea that Francis represents a passage from the age of crusading to the age of mission. This idea, according to the Italian medieval historian (and renowned Arabist), rests on a false dichotomy. The two coexisted in the thirteenth century and were in no way incompatible. According to Cardini, Francis perhaps criticized the actions of some crusaders, but he was in rupture neither with the fifth crusade nor with the idea of crusading. And Benjamin Kedar, in his Crusade and Mission: European Approaches to the Muslims (1984), showed how in the thirteenth century there was no incompatibility between crusading and missionary preaching, the two being seen as complementary rather than contradictory. He rejected the idea that Francis was opposed to the crusades, and this for the simple reason that there is no source to prove it.

The truth is that, though “Francis the pacifist” is increasingly evoked in a troubled world in the aftermath of 11 September 2001, Francis participated in the fifth crusade “as a chaplain to the troops” and “not as a man of peace.”

He sought by all means to obtain martyrdom in order to reconquer the Holy Land and fell into a depression when the crusaders lost. He did not go see the sultan to dialogue but to convert him and he defied him to walk on burning coals to see who was the more powerful, Christ or Muhammad.

But, if Francis was not, by any means, a pacifist like those of the twentieth century, he was certainly a man of “great firmness” and “strength of soul.” This is how Thomas tells the story of the encounter between St Francis and Sultan Malik al-Kamil:

Now in the thirteenth year of his conversion, he journeyed to the region of Syria, while bitter and long battles were being waged daily between Christians and pagans. Taking a companion with him, he was not afraid to present himself to the sight of the sultan of the Saracens. Who is equal to the task of telling this story? What great firmness he showed standing in front of him! With great strength of soul he spoke to him, with eloquence and confidence he answered those who insulted the Christian law. Before he reached the sultan, he was captured by soldiers, insulted and beaten, but was not afraid. He did not flinch at threats of torture nor was he shaken by death threats.

Please note that at that time a cruel edict had been issued by the Sultan that whoever would bring him the head of a Christian should receive as a reward a gold piece. But the intrepid knight of Christ, confidently chanted that prophetic verse: “Even if I should walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I shall not fear evil because you are with me” [Ps. 23: 4].

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First written for The Metaphysical Peregrine

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Benedict at the Synagogue

And to think that even the day chosen for the visit, was not that smooth. In fact, first of all, for Roman Jews January 17 is the day in which they commemorate the fire that, back in 1793, was ignited in their ghetto out of hatred—the so-called “Moed di piombo,” with the fire timely extinguished by a violent rainstorm that fell out of a “lead” (“piombo”) colored sky.

In the second place, January 17 is also, in Italy, the “Day for the exploration and development of dialogue between Catholics and Jews,” but last year the Jews retracted their participation in the day, above all at the urging of Rabbi Giuseppe Laras, of the Jewish community of Milan, blaming Benedict XVI and his decision to introduce into the ancient Roman rite for Good Friday the prayer that God “may enlighten” the hearts of the Jews, “that they may recognize Jesus Christ as Savior of all men.”

And yet, in spite of all this, Benedict XVI’s visit to the Synagogue of Rome has been a success, or as Mordechay Lewy—Israel’s ambassador to the Holy See—put it, “a help in the fight against anti-Semitism” and “a pleasant surprise.” In turn, the chief rabbi of Rome, Riccardo Di Segni, had words of hope about Jews and Christians being “brothers:”

The narrative of Sefer Bereshit, Genesis, gives us some precious suggestions for understanding. As Rabbi Sachs explains, from the beginning to the end of the book, there is leitmotif tying together the different stories. The relationship between brothers starts out badly, with Cain killing Abel. Another pair of brothers, Isaac and Ishmael, live separated, the victims of an inherited rivalry, but are united in their gesture of compassion when they bury their father Abraham. A third pair of brothers, Esau and Jacob, have an equally conflicting relationship, they meet for a brief reconciliation and an embrace and then their roads separate. Finally, there is the story of Joseph and his brothers, which begins dramatically with an attempted murder and sale into slavery but is resolved with a final reconciliation when Joseph’s brothers admit their error and give proof of their willingness to sacrifice themselves one for the other. If ours is a relationship of brothers, we should ask ourselves quite sincerely what point of this journey we have reached, and how far we still have to travel before we recover an authentic relationship of brotherhood and understanding, and what we have to do to achieve this.

And here is what pope Benedict XVI had to say (full text of the speech in the Synagogue of Rome at www.chiesa website. In addition, an introductory article by Sandro Magister). Read also the speech addressed to the pope in the synagogue by the president of the Jewish community of Rome, Riccardo Pacifici, and that of the chief rabbi of Rome, Riccardo Di Segni.

Is a US default inevitable?

Imagine four hurricanes hitting the East Coast in a single season. Well, according to Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein, that’s what the financial crisis of 2008 was all about. And that’s how “they” happened to be blindsided. Yeah, they never saw it coming, and somehow they “just missed … that home prices don’t go up forever,” in Jamie Dimon’s (JP Morgan) words. Ok, there were also those birds of ill-omen who warned a housing bubble was being created like the dot-com bubble, and a few others Cassandras who predicted the Empire of Debt was coming down—um…, just as, today, there are those warning that the US, with consecutive deficits running 10 percent of GDP, is risking an eventual default on its national debt...

Consider the five largest elements in the budget—Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, defense and interest on the debt—and ask yourself how one shouldn’t believe it imperative to stop the exploding national debt from surging above 100 percent of GDP… even though, unfortunately, it is not possible to see how, politically, this can be done. Well, it’s somewhat paradoxical, but that’s more or less how Pat Buchanan puts it. Which is the same as to say that a US default is (perhaps) almost inevitable. [Thanks: Tom Carter]

The growing threat

              by Mirino

Following Rob's article about the sailor and survivor, Harold B. Estes.  This would also be pertinent. It's been around for some time but deserves to be widely read simply because it's true.
Almost every day we are reminded of this without even having to look for such reminders. For example yesterday I read that the Algerian actrice 'Rayhana' was attacked in Paris, drenched with white spirit before a lit cigarette was thrown at her.
Fortunately the white spirit didn't ignite. But she is among many in danger, even in Paris- as well as constantly threatened in Algeria.
Recently I read another article in Le Figaro of an Islamic group in the UK who was planning to demonstrate against the 'assassination of Muslims by British troops in Afghanistan'. The demonstration was set to take place in a village that has become the symbol of British soldiers killed in action. It's where the coffins arrive from Afghanistan. Over half a million Brits protested against the planned demonstration via Facebook.
The fanatics also predict that the Sharia will be imposed in the UK. The group has since been banned by government authorities, but they will simply change their name and continue..


Dr. Emanuel Tanay, A German's view on Islamic extremism.

Dr. Tanay's family was of German aristocracy prior to World War II. They owned a number of large industries and estates. When asked how many German people were true Nazis, the answer he gave can guide our attitude toward fanaticism.

'Very few people were true Nazis,' he said, 'but many enjoyed the return of German pride, and many more were too busy to care. I was one of those who just thought the Nazis were a bunch of fools. So, the majority just sat back and let it all happen. Then, before we knew it, they owned us, and we had lost control, and the end of the world had come. My family lost everything. I ended up in a concentration camp and the Allies destroyed my factories.'

We are told again and again by 'experts' and 'talking heads' that Islam is the religion of peace and that the vast majority of Muslims just want to live in peace. Although this unqualified assertion may be true, it is entirely irrelevant. It is meaningless fluff, meant to make us feel better, and meant to somehow diminish the spectre of fanatics rampaging across the globe in the name of Islam.
The fact is that the fanatics rule Islam at this moment in history. It is the fanatics who march. It is the fanatics who wage any one of 50 shooting wars worldwide. It is the fanatics who systematically slaughter Christian or tribal groups throughout Africa and are gradually taking over the entire continent in an Islamic wave. It is the fanatics who bomb, behead, murder, or honour-kill. It is the fanatics who take over mosque after mosque. It is the fanatics who zealously spread the stoning and hanging of rape victims and homosexuals. It is the fanatics who teach their young to kill and to become suicide bombers.
The hard, quantifiable fact is that the peaceful majority, the 'silent majority,' is cowed and extraneous.

Communist Russia was comprised of Russians who just wanted to live in peace, yet the Russian Communists were responsible for the murder of about 20 million people. The peaceful majority were irrelevant. China's huge population was peaceful as well, but Chinese Communists managed to kill a staggering 70 million people.
The average Japanese individual prior to World War II was not a warmongering sadist. Yet, Japan murdered and slaughtered its way across South East Asia in an orgy of killing that included the systematic murder of 12 million Chinese civilians; most killed by sword, shovel, and bayonet.
And who can forget Rwanda, which collapsed into butchery. Could it not be said that the majority of Rwandans were 'peace loving'?

History lessons are often incredibly simple and blunt, yet for all our powers of reason, we often miss the most basic and uncomplicated of points:
Peace-loving Muslims have been made irrelevant by their silence.
Peace-loving Muslims will become our enemy if they don't speak up, because like my friend from Germany, they will awaken one day and find that the fanatics own them, and the end of their world will have begun.
Peace-loving Germans, Japanese, Chinese, Russians, Rwandans, Serbs, Afghans, Iraqis, Palestinians, Somalis, Nigerians, Algerians, and many others have died because the peaceful majority did not speak up until it was too late. As for us who watch it all unfold, we must pay attention to the only group that counts--the fanatics who threaten our way of life.

Lastly, anyone who doubts that the issue is serious is contributing to the passiveness that allows the problems to expand. So, extend yourselves, think about it, and pass on the word - before it's too late.'

Emanuel Tanay, M.D.

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Beyond comprehension

Most of us really can’t begin to imagine what it must be like to lose everything in a natural disaster. The sheer weight of loss and the accompanying despair is overwhelming. Looking through the pics of the devastation wrought in Haiti by yesterday’s earthquake, every good soul must feel kinship with those suffering in grief.

It is truly beyond comprehension.

Father Philip is right, and there is very little to add to what he has said. Let’s pray for the victims. Let’s help them as much as we can and in whatever way we can. Here are some links for organizations providing relief in Haiti:

United States
Episcopal Relief and Development
Anglican Relief and Development
Food for the Poor
Catholic Relief Services
American Jewish World Service
Salvation Army
(thanks: Chris Johnson)

Italy
Caritas Italiana
Medici senza frontiere
Croce Rossa Italiana
See also here.

World
Caritas.org
International Committee of the Red Cross
Médecins Sans Frontières
Save the Children

The WWII vet and the Holocaust survivor: a telephone conversation about President Obama

Harold and Esther are both in their 90s, and they are amazed, angry, and determined not to see the US die before they do. And they both are not fans of Obama’s apologetic attitude towards nations classically hostile to both America and Israel. Sara K. Eisen—Esther’s granddaughter—got the crazy idea that they should meet...

'The Pillage Idiot Guide to Offensive Statements by Public Officials'

It’s one thing for Barack Obama to grant absolution for an ally's dubious racial remark, but when Al Sharpton absolves the offender, you just know there are different standards at work.

Here is a flow chart mapping out the politics of offensive statements. Via Instapundit.

Burma: a culture lost in translation

“We Are Because They Are: A Culture Lost In Translation” (part 1/part 2) is an interesting documentary film about Burmese living abroad (in this case in Norway). Once home away from home, Burma is destined to become a foreign land to them. It’s worth looking at and thinking about.

How Tibet was sold out for a fistful of pounds and a few dollars more

Last week, Christopher Booker, columnist at the Sunday Times, reported on “the strange eagerness” of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office “to appease the murderous regime in Tehran.” But now we have learned that David Milliband’s appeasement of Tehran has a strong precedent,

Another example of the FCO's willingness to kowtow to nasty regimes has been flagged up in another newspaper, where a columnist researching ahead of a recent visit to China came across a remarkable statement from the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, slipped out on the FCO website on October 29 2008, just before representatives of the Dalai Lama were due to hold talks in Beijing on the future of Tibet.
Buried in the statement was Britain's recognition for the first time that, like "all other members of the EU… we regard Tibet as part of the People's Republic of China".

It’s just what Barack Obama said last November, soon after his meeting with China’s president Hu Jintao. Unfortunately, the “recognition” has become a very popular motto in the language of international relations, since in a diplomatic note to Beijing issued one month ago by the Danish government it was made clear that Denmark—ruled by a center-right coalition—would oppose Tibetan independence and carefully considered China’s reaction before inviting the Dalai Lama again.

So, apparently it all started from David Miliband, the would be leader of the Labour party (and possibly Prime Minister of the UK), and above all the Foreign Secretary of a country which for over a hundred years has studiously not conceded that Tibet is part of China. He even apologized that Britain had not done so earlier… As Robert Barnett, the director of the Modern Tibetan Studies Program at Columbia University, wrote in November 25, 2008 New York Times,

The British concession to China last month was buried within a public statement calling on Beijing to grant autonomy in Tibet, leading some to accuse the British government of hypocrisy. It is more worrying if it was a miscalculation. The statement was released two days before the Dalai Lama's envoys began the eighth round of talks with Beijing on their longstanding request for greater autonomy, apparently because the British believed - or had been told - that their giveaway to Beijing would relax the atmosphere and so encourage China to make concessions to the Dalai Lama.
The result was the opposite. On Nov. 10, China issued a damning attack on the exile leader, saying his autonomy plan amounted to ethnic cleansing, disguised independence and the reintroduction of serfdom and theocracy. The only thing that China will henceforth discuss with the exiles is the Dalai Lama's personal status, meaning roughly which luxury residence he can retire to in Beijing.

Barnett also reported that

The official press in China has gleefully attributed European concessions on Tibet to the financial crisis. "Of course these European countries are at this time not collectively changing their tune because their conscience has gotten the better of them," announced The International Herald Leader, a government-owned paper in Beijing, on Nov. 7. It added that the financial crisis "has made it impossible for them not to consider the 'cost problem' in continuing to 'aid Tibetan independence' and anger China. After all, compared to the Dalai, to as quickly as possible pull China onto Europe's rescue boat is even more important and urgent."

Would the International Herald Leader have ever imagined that about one year later even the President of the United States would sell out Tibet by rewriting history to get support in the financial crisis?

But, as the old saying goes, “Never say die!” In fact His Holiness the Dalai Lama today said he was optimistic about China giving autonomy to Tibet, and this, paradoxically, just because of a matter of money... Asked about the chances of China giving autonomy to Tibet, he said, “Since Jiang Zemin came to power, there has been a big change in China; now money is very important. Therefore, I am optimistic.” But then again, as another old saying goes, “Money comes and goes...”

St Paul's Cathedral

“ St Paul’s is, as I remembered it, a very handsome noble architectural exploit, but singularly unaffecting. When I formerly came to it from the Italian cathedrals, I said, “Well, here is New York.” It seems the best of show-buildings, a fine British vaunt, but there is no moral interest attached to it. ”


~ Ralph Waldo Emerson [from his journals, April? 1848], in EMERSON IN HIS JOURNALS, selected and edited by Joel Porte, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Massachusetts) - London (England), 1982.

That’s just (si parva licet componere magnis) what I always thought about London’s cathedral…

The thousand faces of the real Islam

Her name is Anna Mahjar-Barducci, she is a young journalist and writer living in Italy, born to a Moroccan mother and Italian father, and married to an Israeli Jew. In the eyes of orthodox Islam, as well as of her fellow Muslim immigrants, her marriage and that of her mother are an apostasy. “When I see a Maghrebi on the street,” she says, “I have to change direction. He starts to greet me in Arabic, and stares at me as if I were his property. One time I was in a pizzeria with a classmate, and a Moroccan called me “sharmuta,” prostitute, and told me that I couldn’t go out with an Italian. The owner of the pizzeria had to intervene, to kick him out. Nothing like that would ever happen in Morocco.”

“Nothing like that would ever happen in Morocco,” in fact, in 2006 the most widely viewed film in Morocco was a love story (Marock) between a young Muslim woman and a Jewish young man. This means that in Morocco predominant opinion is not at all so rigid. How could this difference be explained?

In an autobiographical account—entitled Italo-marocchina. Storie di immigrati marocchini in Europa—which was released a few weeks ago in bookstores in Italy, Anna Mahjar-Barducci—who is also the founder and the president of the Associazione Arabi Democratici Liberali, the website of which is also in English—tries to solve the enigma, and to answer many other questions about the reality of today’s Muslim communities both in the West and in the non-Western world. What emerges from the book is a multiform, unknown and “individual Islam,” made up of love, ruin, passion, fanaticism, and Europe as an unfulfilled dream.

Go to Sandro Magister’s website to read a chapter of the book (in English translation).

Here are some articles in English by Anna Mahjar-Barducci:

1. The Burqa: “I Am Not A Candy” (July 9, 2009, The Daily Star)
2. What happened in Omdurman, and who is Khalil Ibrahim? (May 27, 2008, The Daily Star)
3. A step backward in Moroccan freedoms (February 18, 2007, The Daily Star)
4. Turning Abbas into a missed opportunity (July 11, 2006, The Daily Star)
   
5. Fatal attraction: the Hamas-Iran alliance (May 8, 2006, The Daily Star)

International complicity

And now there is also a defence of the Islamic Republic of Iran posted at Socialist Unity today. As an eloquent example of how far certain sections of the British (and European) Left have sunk. Hat tip: Harry's Place (the “other” Left).

The 'Religion of Peace' strikes again

He is a 28-year-old Somali with a regular residence permit in Denmark, but with close links with Somali terrorist group al-Shabaab and possibly al-Qaida militants in East Africa. He broke into Kurt Westergaard’s home armed with an ax and knife, shouting threats of “blood” and “revenge.” Yet, fortunately Westergaard and his granddaughter, who was in the home on a sleepover, succeeded in fleeing into a specifically created safe room. Westergaard is the Danish cartoonist whose 12 caricatures named “Faces of Muhammad,” published by Danish Jyllands-Posten, ignited riots and outrage across the Muslim world.

The Danish Muslim Union condemned the attack. They said in a statement: “We strongly distance ourselves from the attack, and any kind of extremism that leads to such acts.”

Here is what I had to say at the time about both the cartoons and the riots.

Happy New Year!!!

“ The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul and a new nose; new feet, a new backbone, new ears, and new eyes. Unless a particular man made New Year resolutions, he would make no resolutions. Unless a man starts afresh about things, he will certainly do nothing effective. Unless a man starts on the strange assumption that he has never existed before, it is quite certain that he will never exist afterwards. Unless a man be born again, he shall by no means enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. ”

~ Gilbert Keith Chesterton

Iran: what should the West think & do?

What’s going on in Iran isn’t that different from what happened in Eastern Europe just before the wall fell. It also reminds us what happened in South Africa just before P.W. Botha decided that he must cede power to avoid a civil war and national bloodbath, or 1992 and Boris Yeltsin facing down the tanks prepared to overthrow the regime. Yet, at the same time, it could also be China just before the Tiananmen Square crackdown.

What should the West (especially the US) think & do? There are those—especially among the neoconservatives—who do not believe there is any difference between radical leaders and reformers in Iran. According to them it is foolish to make a distinction or to modulate policy to benefit one side or the other. I respect their opinion, but I’m not sure they are right. What I’m quite sure about is that it would be ineffective and possibly counterproductive for the US and its Western allies to take punitive actions against Iran (new sanctions would just hit the people and, by consequence, would throw a lifeline to Khamenei and further enrich the Iranian regime and the Revolutionary Guards), while supporting human rights and civil liberties, and denouncing those violations that have occurred would speak louder about what the Western true priorities are than any threats of punitive action.

Merry Christmas!

Imagine a snowy Christmas Eve, a small church in a little mountain village, deep inside a pine forest. Inside the church a kids choir is singing an unknown but amazing song … It might just have been better if I hadn’t already told my readers the wonderful story of Silent Night, because I could still have the chance to tell it right now! Yet, there is still something to be done to complete the good work: if you haven’t already heard it sung by the Thomanerchor, one of the oldest cultural entity in Europe (founded in 1212!), may I take the liberty of suggesting that you do so right now:



One more suggestion: in order to understand better the significance of the Nativity of the Lord, here are some brief remarks by Pope Benedict XVI on the historical origin of this solemnity.

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU ALL!

BUON NATALE A TUTTI!

The winter of our discontent? No, it's Christmas time...

It has been snowing these last few days in North-Eastern Italy, and Christmas is a-coming. And to be sincere I would have no wish to talk about politics, but, just like nature, politics has its own times and seasons, and these are special and challenging times—no way to escape from the battlefield (believe me, you people who don’t like war movies, the term is not exaggerated!), nor would I wish this, neither should anyone else in my opinion. So here I am with an end-of-year thought.

While I was reading what Steven (The Metaphysical Peregrine) had to say right here in this very blog last Friday about the US at the end of the year 2009, sometimes I wondered whether he was talking about America or Italy. He denounced what he calls the Obama tyranny, but that’s just the way the Italian and European leftists talk about Berlusconi, the media tycoon who owns or controls most of Italy’s major national newspapers and magazines, TV stations and radio…, which is only partially true, but it doesn’t matter because nobody listens, except for the usual haters.., masters in the art of lying and deceiving, proscribing and despoiling, under a cloak of legality. And that’s what both makes Berlusconi stronger, beyond his real merits, and “the haters” more and more unreliable, beyond their faults (which aren’t exactly child’s play, though). It’s the Nemesis, or, as the old proverb goes, “The devil makes the saucepans, but not the lids.”

What is certain is that both Obama and Berlusconi are not uniters but dividers. Which makes life difficult for us moderates of both trenches (I mean, I consider myself a conservative on many issues, and a liberal on a few, but overall I support conservative parties around the world). In fact, moderates dislike the way some people tend to extremize their views, which often leads them, in the worst cases, to what I would call the intellectualization of political hatred (you know, it’s always the same story: never concede an inch to your opponents, whom must be seen as inherently “evil” or “stupid,” whatever they think, say and do, etc.). But I concede that both in Obama’s case and in that of Berlusconi a certain Manichaeism is somehow more understandable. They are symbols, “representative men,” and that’s what can make them automatically worthy of love or hatred, without half-measures.

Yet, there is a difference between those who target Obama as an American traitor and a “tyrant,” and those who have a similar attitude towards Berlusconi: while the formers fight a political war (which I believe to be well-founded, by the way), the latter prefer ad hominem attacks to serious analysis and a sensible discussion of the issues, which is something I cannot stand, nor do I believe such a “political” approach should ever be acceptable in a civilized country.

So if my American conservative friends have the right to be furious, there are even more reason why their Italian counterparts should be so. That’s why I might say, along with the Poet, “Now is the winter of our discontent,” if it were not that Christmas is so close, and Christmas time
comes once a year… a time to be joyful and happy. So Merry Christmas everyone, conservatives and liberals alike! May God bless you and keep you from harm’s way!

Changing how we view Islam

How sad! The civilized world is exposed to the truth of the brutality of Islam. Meanwhile many Muslim converts in the West are finding it more and more difficult to find excuses for the actions of their fellow Muslims. Well, never say die! Here is a handy reference for our Western Muslim readers to help them deflect the charges leveled against Muslims and to help convince others that Islam is the religion of peace.

(From the series “And Brutus is an honourable man,” which is much in the spirit of this blog… though I have lost some friends along the way because of my passion for William Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar—my great admiration for the bifurcated tongue of Marc Antony included. But then again, if you don’t want to take any risks, just don’t blog about Islam and other sensible phenomena, such as Climategate, Obama, Berlusconi, etc...)

The US at the End of the Year 2009

~ “LETTERS FROM AMERICA” - by The Metaphysical Peregrine ~

This has been a mean and combative year in the US.

It didn’t get into full meanness until late summer. The House of Representatives tried to ram their takeover of the health insurance and health care industries before their summer recess, and failed. The reason they wanted to hurry up and get it done was because the American people were overwhelmingly against it. People jammed into Town Hall meetings with their Representatives and made it clear they didn’t want this legislation passed. These “representatives” of the people then denounced and called these citizens
names: Nazis, stupid, fascists, racists (you’re a racist if you oppose the polices of Obama) etc. Many of these Citizens are part of the “Tea Party” movement against high taxes, Cap and Trade legislation, and the government take over of the health industry. That we have government officials, elected representatives, insulting the citizens of this country is an outrage. They should all be fired.

All this week the Senate, which was designed to slow the political process, by reviewing the potential consequences of legislation, are doing exactly the same thing. About 60% of the American people, shown in several polls, do not want this legislation. Last night Senate Majority leader Harry Reid kept Senators until after midnight. Even if this government take over succeeds, it won’t go into effect until 2014, so what’s the rush? It hasn’t even been released out of committee; no one has read it expect for Harry Reid and his oligarchy. We do know this is part of it; if you don’t buy health insurance you will be fined and or imprisoned. If you change insurance companies or coverage, you will be forced to buy government insurance. Insurance companies to stay in business will have to comply with government mandates, ultimately making all insurance government insurance. Taxpayers’ money will be used to finance the elective procedure, abortion.

This has been the primary battle since May of this year.

The secondary battle is Cap and Trade. It’ll raise energy costs for the average American family of four by $1500-$4500. In an interview prior to his election, Obama said energy costs under his proposal will “necessarily skyrocket”. Nearly 60% of the American people are against this legislation.

This ties into climate change, which had its name changed from global warming because the earth has been cooling for over a decade. Plus lots of people have pointed out the year 1000 CE was warmer than it is now, and there was no industry; and that Greenland was once green. Copenhagen comes to a close today, I think. Worst storms there in decades, and I’m laughing. They should have held it in August! Duh. I didn’t hear any scientists’ speeches; just government functionaries from socialist countries demanding money from the US; then Communist dictators denouncing the US and capitalism, which got the loudest and most extended applause. Nothing was agreed on, except, baby it’s cold outside, the US is evil, and give us money.

Our president went to Cairo and softly denounced Christianity and strongly praised Islam. No effect on foreign relations there. Bowed to a Saudi king. No effect on foreign relations there. Went to Europe and talked about something not memorable at all on economics and climate. No effect on foreign relations there. Went to Asia, bowed before the Emperor of Japan with no effect on foreign relations there. In China couldn’t get help controlling North Korea, no human rights issues were addressed, no trade agreements, couldn’t get them to stop cheating on the valuation of their currency. Obama sided with dictators Chavez, Castro, and Ahmadinejad with the overthrow of the Constitutional government of Honduras by a dictator.

Meanwhile, no new businesses were started in the US. Unemployment is at 17%. The value of the dollar is plummeting. Tax revenues are way down. The number of government jobs is up, as is their pay, while pay in the private sector is frozen or reduced.

An Islamofacist yelling ‘Allah Akbar’ slaughters people in Fort Hood, Texas, and gets a pass, with excuses made by the Administration and the Main Stream Press. Three Navy Seals are facing Court Martial because a murdering terrorist claims he got roughed up when captured. This terrorist is the guy that captured American civilian workers in Falujah, dragged their dead bodies through the streets, burned their bodies, and hung them from the bridge over the Euphrates River. Meanwhile, the murderer Kalid Mohmmed and his fellows that planned 9/11 and killed 3,000 Americans are getting full US citizen’s legal rights. Not so our brave Seals. The primary job of President of the US is Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces. He’s letting the Seals be unjustly prosecuted, sending men and women into combat in Afghanistan without the goal of Victory. Also against the will of the American people he’s closing Gitmo, putting them in a prison in his home state, and giving them all full US Citizen’s judicial rights.

Everything this president and his Democrat Party have done this year is against the will of the Citizens. This is the definition of tyranny. It has not been a good year for the American Citizen. Fortunately his approval rating has dropped from the high sixties about nine months ago to about 47%. Congress’s approval has dropped to the twenty percentile.

We have a huge national election next November. We can turn this dismal performance around, and stop tyranny in its tracks. The Republican Party though, is the Party of Stupid, so any optimism is cautious.

This year end report is sad; sad for my country, and by extension the rest of the world. America until now has been the engine for the world economy, the ‘city on the hill’ for freedom. Everyone on the planet that wants fiscal strength and Liberty, had best pray and hope, that the Citizens of the United States stand up against Tyranny this coming November.

What spiritual freedom is all about

I have a great story to share with you today, dear readers. It’s a simple quote, but it truly speaks volumes about what freedom, in a spiritual sense, is all about. But please allow me a few lines to introduce the Source and Author (both not very well-known).

The Book of Ecclesiasticus, also known as The Book of Sirach or Wisdom of Jesus son of Sirach, or the Wisdom of Ben Sira, is a work from the early second century BC, originally written in Hebrew (but afterwards translated into Greek, by another Jesus, the grandson of the author). It is not in the Jewish canon, but is received as canonical and divine by Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, and most Oriental Orthodox, but not by most Protestants.

Ecclesiasticus is a collection of ethical teachings. Thus it closely resembles Proverbs, except that, unlike the latter, it is the work of a single author, not an anthology of maxims drawn from various sources. Many of the teachings are advices and instructions as to the duties of man toward himself and others, as well as toward society and the state, and most of all toward God. One of them is the one I have chosen for today. I love it for its essentiality and effectiveness:

Do not say, ‘The Lord was responsible for my sinning,’ for he does not do what he hates. Do not say, ‘It was he who led me astray,’ for he has no use for a sinner. The Lord hates all that is foul, and no one who fears him will love it either. He himself made human beings in the beginning, and then left them free to make their own decisions. If you choose, you will keep the commandments and so be faithful to his will. He has set fire and water before you; put out your hand to whichever you prefer. A human being has life and death before him; whichever he prefers will be given him. For vast is the wisdom of the Lord; he is almighty and all-seeing. His eyes are on those who fear him, he notes every human action. He never commanded anyone to be godless, he has given no one permission to sin.
[Ecclesiasticus: 15, 11-20]

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First written for The Metaphysical Peregrine

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