Ilhan Omar: Trump Knows He’s Failing. Cue the Bigotry.

Ilhan Omar: Trump Knows He’s Failing. Cue the Bigotry.

Dec. 4, 2025

Credit...Farah Abdi Warsameh/Associated Press

By Ilhan Omar


Ms. Omar is a Democratic congresswoman from Minnesota.


On Tuesday, President Trump called my friends and me “garbage.”


This comment was only the latest in a series of remarks and Truth Social posts in which the president has demonized and spread conspiracy theories about the Somali community and about me personally. For years, the president has spewed hate speech in an effort to gin up contempt against me. He reaches for the same playbook of racism, xenophobia, Islamophobia and division again and again. At one 2019 rally, he egged on his crowd until it chanted “send her back” when he said my name.


Mr. Trump denigrates not only Somalis but so many other immigrants, too, particularly those who are Black and Muslim. While he has consistently tried to vilify newcomers, we will not let him silence us. He fails to realize how deeply Somali Americans love this country. We are doctors, teachers, police officers and elected leaders working to make our country better. Over 90 percent of Somalis living in my home state, Minnesota, are American citizens by birth or naturalization. Some even supported Mr. Trump at the ballot box.


“I don’t want them in our country,” the president said this week. “Let them go back to where they came from.”


Somali Americans remain resilient against the onslaught of attacks from the White House. But I am deeply worried about the ramifications of these tirades. When Mr. Trump maligns me, it increases the number of death threats that my family, staff members and I receive. As a member of Congress, I am privileged to have access to security when these threats arise. What keeps me up at night is that people who share the identities I hold — Black, Somali, hijabi, immigrant — will suffer the consequences of his words, which so often go unchecked by members of the Republican Party and other elected officials. All Americans have a duty to call out this hateful rhetoric when we hear it.


The president’s dehumanizing and dangerous attacks on minority immigrant communities are nothing new. When he first ran for president a decade ago, he launched his campaign with claims that he was going to pause Muslim immigration to this country. He has since falsely accused Haitian migrants of eating pets and referred to Haiti and African nations as “shithole” countries. He has accused Mexico of sending rapists and drug peddlers across our border. It is unconscionable that he fails to acknowledge how this country was built on the backs of immigrants and mocks their ongoing contributions.


While the president wastes his time attacking my community, my state, my governor and me, the promises of economic prosperity he made in his run for president last year have not come to fruition. Prices have not come down; in many cases, they have risen. His implementation of tariffs has hurt farmers and small business owners. His policies have only worsened the affordability crisis for Americans. And now, with Affordable Care Act tax credits set to expire, health care costs for American households are primed to skyrocket, and millions of people risk losing their coverage under his signature domestic policy bill.


The president knows he is failing, and so he is reverting to what he knows best: trying to divert attention by stoking bigotry.


When I was sworn into Congress in 2019, my father turned to me and expressed bewilderment that the leader of the free world was picking on a freshman member of Congress, one out of 535 members of the legislative body. The president’s goal may have been to try to tear me down, but my community and my constituents rallied behind me then, just as they are now.


I often say that although Minnesota may be cold, the people here have warm hearts. Minnesota is special. That is why when so many Somalis arrived in this country, they chose the state as home. I am deeply grateful to the people of Minnesota for the generosity, hospitality and support they have shown to every immigrant community in our state.


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We will not let Mr. Trump intimidate or debilitate us. We are not afraid. After all, Minnesotans not only welcome refugees, they also sent one to Congress.


Ilhan Omar is a Democratic congresswoman from Minnesota.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/04/opinion/ilhan-omar-somalia-trump.html


Terrence K Williams

Wednesday, December 3, 2025 at 1:13 PM

Ilhan Omar says Somalis are going to stay in the United States regardless of what President Trump says. 

"He's always been racist. He said he was going to stop Muslim immigration. We're going to be here regardless of what the president says."

https://www.facebook.com/terrencekwilliams/posts/pfbid0kswnqfjUzw5meNqYE7GhAcmEPLM79VEVqH6eBEkkEStbFdVRhwccsinyWa6ju5Fwl


Muslim is a religious identification not an ethnicity.


Muhammed Fethullah Gülen (27 April 1941 – 20 October 2024) was a Turkish Muslim scholar, preacher, and leader of the Gülen movement[8][9] who as of 2016 had millions of followers.[10] Gülen was an influential neo-Ottomanist,[11] Anatolian panethnicist,[clarification needed][12][13] Islamic poet, writer,[14] social critic, and activist–dissident developing a Nursian theological perspective[15] that embraces democratic modernity.[13] Gülen was a local state imam from 1959 to 1981[16][17] and he was a citizen of Turkey until his denaturalization by the Turkish government in 2017.[18] Over the years, Gülen became a centrist political figure in Turkey prior to his being there as a fugitive. From 21 March 1999 until his death on 20 October 2024, Gülen lived in self-exile in the United States near Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania.[19][20][21]


Gülen said his social criticisms are focused upon individuals' faith and morality and a lesser extent toward political ends,[22] and self described as rejecting an Islamist political philosophy, advocating instead for full participation within professions, society, and political life by religious and secular individuals who profess high moral or ethical principles and who wholly support secular rule, within Muslim-majority countries and elsewhere.[23] Gülen was described in the English-language media as an imam "who promoted a tolerant Islam which emphasises altruism, hard work, and education" and as "one of the world's most important Muslim figures".[24][25]


In 2003, a number of Gülen movement participants allied with Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's right wing Justice and Development Party (AKP), providing the AKP political and sorely-needed administrative support.[26][27][28] This political alliance worked together to weaken left-of-center Kemalist factions, but fractured in 2011. Turkish prosecutors accused Gülen of attempts to overthrow the government by allegedly directing politically motivated corruption investigations by Gülen-linked investigators then in the judiciary,[29][30] who illegally wiretapped the executive office of the Turkish president,[9] and Gülen's alleged instigations of the 2016 coup attempt.[31][32] Gülen denied the accusations.[33][34]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fethullah_G%C3%BClen


Hajj Amin al-Husayni meets Hitler

In this German propaganda newsreel, the former Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husayni, an Arab nationalist and prominent Muslim religious leader, meets Hitler for the first time. During the meeting, held in in the Reich chancellery, Hitler declined to grant al-Husayni’s request for a public statement—or a secret but formal treaty—in which Germany would: 1) pledge not to occupy Arab land, 2) recognize Arab striving for independence, and 3) support the “removal” of the proposed Jewish homeland in Palestine. The Führer confirmed that the “struggle against a Jewish homeland in Palestine” would be part of the struggle against the Jews. Hitler stated that: he would “continue the struggle until the complete destruction of Jewish-Communist European empire”; and when the German army was in proximity to the Arab world, Germany would issue “an assurance to the Arab world” that “the hour of liberation was at hand.” It would then be al-Husayni’s “responsibility to unleash the Arab action that he has secretly prepared.” The Führer stated that Germany would not intervene in internal Arab matters and that the only German “goal at that time would be the annihilation of Jewry living in Arab space under the protection of British power.”

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/film/hajj-amin-al-husayni-meets-hitler


The Gehlen Organization is a post-war agency, and the predecessor of the BND (Bundesnachrichtendienst).


Major General Reinhard Gehlen headed the Foreign Armies East section of the Abwehr, directed towards the Soviet Union. Gehlen had begun planning his surrender to the United States at least as early as the fall of 1944. In early March 1945 a group of Gehlen's senior officers microfilmed their holdings on the USSR. They packed the film in steel drums and buried it throughout the Austrian Alps. On 22 May 1945 Gehlen and his top aides surrendered to an American Counter-intelligence Corps [CIC] team.


After the War, the United States recognized that it did not have an intelligence capability directed against the Soviet Union, a wartime ally. Gehlen negotiated an agreement with the United States which allowed his operation to continue in existence despite post-war de-nazification programs. The group, including his immediate staff of about 350 agents, was known as the Gehlen Organization. Reconstituted as a functioning espionage network under U.S. control, it became CIA's eyes and ears in Eastern Europe and in the Soviet Union.


Hundreds of German army and SS officers were released from internment camps to join Gehlen's headquarters in the Spessart Mountains in central Germany. When the staff grew to 3,000, the Bureau Gehlen moved to a twenty-five-acre compound near Pullach, south of Munich, operating under the innocent name of the South German Industrial Development Organization. In the early fifties it was estimated that the organization employed up to 4,000 intelligence specialists in Germany, mainly former army and SS officers, and that more than 4,000 V-men (undercover agents) were active throughout the Soviet-bloc countries.


Under Operation Sunrise, some 5,000 anti-communist Eastern European and Russian personnel were trained for operational missions at a camp at Oberammergau in 1946, under the command of General Sikes and SS General Burckhardt. This and related initiatives supported insurgencies in areas such as Ukraine, which were not entirely supressed by the Soviets until 1956. Operation Rusty encompassed gathering positive and counterintelligence information concerning the activities and organizations of an Intelligence Service and activities of various dissident German organizations. The operation involved close coordination and cooperation with foreign and other US intelligence organizations.


The Gehlen Organization played a role in the creation of the "missile gap," providing CIA with reports on Soviet missile developments, supposedly based on contacts with German scientists captured by the Russians at the end of the war.


But by the mid-1950s it became increasingly apparent that many of the assets of the Gehlen Organization were in fact controlled by Soviet intelligence. Dozens of operations, hundreds of agents, thousands of innocent civilians had been betrayed, many at the cost of their life.


In 1948 contact was established with a supposedly anti-Communist Polish underground organization known as WIN. The group provided evidence of actions conducted against Soviet troops, and provided secret documents to Western intelligence. WIN was provided with money, weapons, equipment and intelligence data. But by 1952 people entering Poland to help WIN were disappearing and its information was becoming less reliable. Late that year the underground was suddenly disbanded and a radio broadcast by the Polish Communist government demonstrated, in detail, that WIN had been created by the Soviet secret police and had received Soviet help in deceiving the West. The documents provided had been disinformation, the program had been financed with Western money, and the episode had distracted from other efforts to undermine the Polish regime while it was consolidating power.


In April 1956 control of the Gehlen Organization shifted to the newly-sovereign West German Federal Republic as the BND (Bundesnachrichtendienst, or "Federal Intelligence Service"). Gehlen remained chief of the West German Intelligence service until he retired in 1968.

https://irp.fas.org/world/germany/intro/gehlen.htm


Himmler used the Jesuits as the model for the SS, since he found they had the core elements of absolute obedience and the cult of the organisation.[59][60] Hitler is said to have called Himmler "my Ignatius of Loyola".[59] As an order, the SS needed a coherent doctrine that would set it apart.[61] Himmler attempted to construct such an ideology, and deduced a "pseudo-Germanic tradition" from history.[61] Himmler dismissed the image of Christ as a Jew and rejected Christianity's basic doctrine and its institutions.[62] Starting in 1934, the SS hosted "solstice ceremonies" (Sonnenwendfeiern) to increase team spirit within their ranks.[63] In a 1936 memorandum, Himmler set forth a list of approved holidays based on pagan and political precedents meant to wean SS members from their reliance on Christian festivities.[64] In an attempt to replace Christianity and suffuse the SS with a new doctrine, SS-men were able to choose special Lebenslauffeste, substituting common Christian ceremonies such as baptisms, weddings and burials. Since the ceremonies were held in small private circles, it is unknown how many SS-members opted for these kind of celebrations.[65]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideology_of_the_SS


The large Latin inscription on the façade reads: Clemens XII Pont Max Anno V Christo Salvatori In Hon SS Ioan Bapt et Evang. This abbreviated inscription translates as: "The Supreme Pontiff Clement XII, in the fifth year [of his Pontificate, dedicated this building] to Christ the Savior, in honor of Saints John the Baptist and [John] the Evangelist".[5] The inscription indicates, with its full title (see below), that the archbasilica was originally dedicated to Christ the Savior and, centuries later, rededicated in honor of Saint John the Baptist and Saint John the Evangelist. Christ the Savior remains its primary dedication, and its titular feast day is 6 August, the Transfiguration of Christ. As the cathedral of the pope as bishop of Rome, it ranks superior to all other churches of the Catholic Church, including Saint Peter's Basilica.


Name

The archbasilica's Latin name is Archibasilica Sanctissimi Salvatoris ac Sancti Ioannis Baptistae et Ioannis Evangelistae ad Lateranum,[6] which in English is the Archbasilica of the Most Holy Savior and Saints John the Baptist and John the Evangelist at the Lateran, and in Italian Arcibasilica [Papale] del Santissimo Salvatore e Santi Giovanni Battista ed Evangelista in Laterano.[4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archbasilica_of_Saint_John_Lateran#Lateran_Palace


From modest beginnings the SS (Schutzstaffel; Protection Squadrons), became a virtual state within a state in Nazi Germany, staffed by men who perceived themselves as the “racial elite” of Nazi future.


In the Nazi state, the SS assumed leading responsibility for security, identification of ethnicity, settlement and population policy, and intelligence collection and analysis. The SS controlled the German police forces and the concentration camp system. The SS conceived and implemented plans designed to restructure the ethnic composition of eastern Europe and the occupied Soviet Union.


From 1939, the SS assumed responsibility for “solving” the so-called Jewish Question; after 1941, its leadership planned, coordinated and directed the so-called Final Solution of the Jewish Question. This “solution” was the annihilation of the European Jews, which we now refer to as the Holocaust

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/ss


2 §1. The character and charism of the Society of Jesus arise from the Spiritual Exercises which our holy father Ignatius and his companions went through. Led by this experience, they formed an apostolic group rooted in charity, in which, after they had taken the vows of chastity and poverty and had been raised to the priesthood, they offered themselves as a HOLOCAUST to God,[2] so that serving as soldiers of God beneath the banner of the cross and serving the Lord alone and the Church his spouse under the Roman Pontiff, the vicar of Christ on earth,[3] they would be sent into the entire world[4] for the defense and propagation of the faith and for the progress of souls in Christian life and doctrine. [5]

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


The ratlines (German: Rattenlinien) were systems of escape routes for German Nazis and other fascists fleeing Europe from 1945 onwards in the aftermath of World War II. These escape routes mainly led toward havens in the Americas, particularly in Argentina, though also in Paraguay, Colombia,[1] Brazil, Uruguay, Mexico, Peru, Guatemala, Ecuador, and Bolivia, as well as the United States, Canada, Australia, Spain, and Switzerland.


There were two primary routes: the first went from Germany to Spain, then Argentina; the second from Germany to Rome, then Genoa, then South America. The two routes developed independently but eventually came together.[2] The ratlines were supported by rogue elements in the Vatican, particularly an Austrian bishop and four Croatian clergy of the Catholic Church who sympathized with the Ustaše.[3][4][5] Starting in 1947, U.S. Intelligence used existing ratlines to move certain Nazi strategists and scientists.[6]


While consensus among Western scholars is that Nazi leader Adolf Hitler died by suicide in 1945, in the late 1940s and 1950s the U.S. investigated claims that he survived and fled to South America.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratlines_(World_War_II)


The Operation Paperclip was a secret United States intelligence program in which more than 1,600 German scientists, engineers, and technicians were taken from former Nazi Germany to the US for government employment after the end of World War II in Europe, between 1945 and 1959; several were confirmed to be former members of the Nazi Party, including the SS or the SA.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip


The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was created under the National Security Act of 1947, which President Truman signed on July 26, 1947. The CIA officially came into existence on September 18th that same year, which is when we celebrate our birthday.


With the passage of the 1947 Act, Truman achieved his goals of modernizing and unifying America’s armed services, and, by creating a centralized intelligence agency, reformed our intelligence capabilities. To protect American’s civil liberties, he made sure to clearly divide intelligence roles between domestic and foreign: FBI would handle anything domestic, while CIA was limited to foreign intelligence only. Furthermore, the Act specified that CIA would have no police, subpoena, or law enforcement powers.


President Truman appointed Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter as the first CIA director, known as the Director of Central Intelligence. He had been the Director of one of our immediate “ancestors,” called the Central Intelligence Group. The CIG was a bureaucratic anomaly with no independent budget, no statutory mandate, and staffers assigned from other departments of the government. America needed a peacetime, centralized intelligence agency with its own budget and mandate. That’s why Truman replaced the CIG and created the CIA.


The 1947 Act loosely defined CIA’s mission into four broad tasks:


The 1947 Act was relatively unchanged until 2004. President Bush, after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, made major updates to the 1947 act, including the creation of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.


If you’re interested, you can find out more about what is called “the National Security Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of December 2004” on the DNI’s website.


The importance of the 1947 National Security Act cannot be overstated. It created our Nation’s first peacetime intelligence agency, reflected America’s acceptance of its position as a world leader, and it remained a cornerstone of our national security policy for 75 years… and counting.


~ Molly

https://www.cia.gov/stories/story/ask-molly-the-national-security-act-of-1947/


Molly

fem. proper name, a diminutive of Moll, which is a familiar form of Mary.


molly (n.1)


a common 18c. colloquial term for "homosexual man" or "man who is deemed effeminate, a sissy," by 1707, perhaps 1690s. The fem. proper name Molly or Moll served as a type-name of a low-class girl or prostitute in old songs and ballads (perhaps in part for the sake of the easy rhymes).


But the colloquial word also resembles Latin mollis "soft," which also had been used classically in a specific pejorative sense in reference to men, "soft, effeminate, unmanly, weak," in Cicero, Livy, etc. A 1629 publication from the Catholic-Protestant theological disputes, "Truth's triumph ouer Trent," written in English with swerves into Latin, at one point describes the denizens of Hell as fideles fornicarios, adulteros, molles, and so forth, and molles is translated parenthetically in the text as "effeminate." Molly House as a term for a brothel frequented by gay men is attested in a court case from 1726.


also from 18c.


molly (n.2)


seabird, 1857, short for mollymawk, mallemuck, from Dutch mallemok, from mal "foolish" + mok "gull."


also from 1857

https://www.etymonline.com/word/molly


Operation Mockingbird is an alleged large-scale program of the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) that began in the early years of the Cold War and attempted to manipulate domestic American news media organizations for propaganda purposes. According to author Deborah Davis, Operation Mockingbird recruited leading American journalists into a propaganda network and influenced the operations of front groups. CIA support of front groups was exposed when an April 1967 Ramparts article reported that the National Student Association received funding from the CIA.[1] In 1975, Church Committee Congressional investigations revealed Agency connections with journalists and civic groups.


In 1973, a document referred to as the "Family Jewels"[2] was published by the CIA containing a reference to "Project Mockingbird", which was the name of an operation in 1963 which wiretapped two journalists who had published articles based on classified material.[3] The document does not contain references to "Operation Mockingbird".[4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird


Kodashim (Hebrew: קׇדָשִׁים‎, romanized: Qoḏāšim, lit. 'holy things') is the fifth of the six orders, or major divisions, of the Mishnah, Tosefta and the Talmud, and deals largely with the services within the Temple in Jerusalem, its maintenance and design, the korbanot, or sacrificial offerings that were offered there, and other subjects related to these topics, as well as, notably, the topic of kosher slaughter.


Topics

This Seder (order, or division) of the Mishnah is known as Kodashim (“sacred things” or “sanctities”), because it deals with subjects connected with Temple service and ritual slaughter of animals (shehitah). The term kodashim, in the Biblical context, applies to the sacrifices, the Temple and its furnishings, as well as the priests who carried out the duties and ceremonies of its service; and it is with these holy things, places and people that Kodashim is mainly concerned. The title Kodashim is apparently an abbreviation of Shehitat Kodashim ("the slaughter of sacred animals") since the main, although not the only subject of this order is sacrifices.[1][2][3]


The topics of this Seder are primarily the sacrifices of animals, BIRDS, and meal offerings, the laws of bringing a sacrifice, such as the sin offering and the guilt offering, and the laws of misappropriation of sacred property. In addition, the order contains a description of the Second Temple (tractate Middot), and a description and rules about the daily sacrifice service in the Temple (tractate Tamid). The order also includes tractate Hullin, which concerns the slaughter of animals for non-sacrificial use, as well as other dietary laws applying to meat and animal products. Although Hullin is about the slaughter of animals for non-sacrificial, and therefore unsanctified purposes, because the rules about the proper slaughter of animals and birds, and their ritual fitness for use were considered to be an integral part of the concept of holiness in Judaism, they were also included in the order regarding “holy things”.[2][3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodashim


Zevachim (“Sacrifices”), with FOURTEEN chapters, and originally called Shehitat Kodashim ("slaughtering of the holy animals") deals with the sacrificial system of the Temple period, namely the laws for animal and bird offerings, and the conditions which make them acceptable or not, as specified in the Torah, primarily in the book of Leviticus (Lev 1:2 and on).[1][2][4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodashim


Lunar Day

The duration of a single day on the Moon, from sunrise to sunrise, is approximately 29.5 Earth days. However, this is broken down into roughly 14.75 days of daylight followed by 14.75 days of nighttime, due to the Moon's synchronous rotation with Earth.

When we refer to the "life of one lunar day" in the context of a moon mission, it usually pertains to the duration of sunlight (daytime) that the mission equipment can operate within. This is because most moon missions, including rovers and landers, rely on solar panels for power. During the lunar night, temperatures can drop drastically (to below minus 200 degrees Celsius), and without sunlight, there's no power generation from solar panels. This extreme cold can also be damaging to equipment.

So, when a mission states its operational life as "one lunar day," it typically means it is designed to function during the approximately 14 Earth days of sunlight on the Moon, after which it may go into a dormant state during the lunar night, or it might cease operations altogether due to the harsh conditions.

https://www.sriramsias.com/upsc-daily-current-affairs/lunar-day/


Osiris, one of the most important gods of ancient Egypt. The origin of Osiris is obscure; he was a local god of Busiris, in Lower Egypt, and may have been a personification of chthonic (underworld) fertility. By about 2400 bce, however, Osiris clearly played a double role: he was both a god of fertility and the embodiment of the dead and resurrected king. This dual role was in turn combined with the Egyptian concept of divine kingship: the king at death became Osiris, god of the underworld; and the dead king’s son, the living king, was identified with Horus, a god of the sky. Osiris and Horus were thus father and son. The goddess Isis was the mother of the king and was thus the mother of Horus and consort of Osiris. The god Seth was considered the murderer of Osiris and adversary of Horus.


According to the form of the myth reported by the Greek author Plutarch, Osiris was slain or drowned by Seth, who tore the corpse into 14 pieces and flung them over Egypt. Eventually, Isis and her sister Nephthys found and buried all the pieces, except the phallus, thereby giving new life to Osiris, who thenceforth remained in the underworld as ruler and judge. His son Horus successfully fought against Seth, avenging Osiris and becoming the new king of Egypt.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Osiris-Egyptian-god


Genesis in the Land of the Pharaohs

Isis ("Aset" in the native language) had her start as a comparatively minor deity of Egypt. She was a protector of the throne of Egypt, perhaps in some ways the personification of Royal Power. But she had been subordinate in the official Egyptian pantheon to deities more intimately connected with the great king, like Ra and Horus.


AD


The collapse of the Old Kingdom brought about several sweeping changes in Egyptian religion. Eternal life, which had once been viewed as the sole province of the King, came to be seen as the reward for all those willing to submit to the proper cults.


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In this new paradigm, Isis took center stage and became the central goddess in the popular religion of the Egyptian people.


Myth tells how Osiris, the first god-king of Egypt, introduced laws and agriculture to humankind. He was then deceived and murdered by his scheming brother Seth, god of chaos. Seth hacked Osiris' body into pieces and scattered them across Egypt, intending to rule Egypt himself.


Isis collected the pieces and magically revived her brother-husband Osiris, who became King of the Underworld. She also magically conceived a son, Horus. Isis and her supporters warred against Seth for the throne of Egypt. A council of gods eventually decided that Horus, as son of Osiris, was the rightful ruler, and Seth was demoted to fighting nocturnal demons.


A new paradigm emerged in which Osiris ruled the underworld, Horus ruled Egypt (and the Pharaohs were considered the incarnation of Horus) and Ra the sun god ruled the heavens.


But Isis as mistress of magic resurrected Osiris, and thus was superior to him. She conceived her son Horus magically and was superior to him. With her magic, she even had power over Ra the sun god.


In short, she was the real power behind the universe, which lead her cult adherents to proclaim her as Mistress of Heaven. More importantly, she had the power over life and death and could resurrect her followers in the same manner that saved her husband from oblivion.


As the myth of Isis and Osiris grew, Isis began displacing other deities in the loyalties of the Egyptian population.


The Hellenes Conquer and are Conquered by Egypt

The conquest of Egypt by Alexander the Great opened a new era for the cult. In trying to find a religious cult that would unite both Egyptian and Hellenic subjects, Ptolemy Soter crafted the Isis cult as it would be introduced into Greco-Roman society.


AD

Osiris was renamed Serapis and identified with a variety of Egyptian and Hellenic gods (Osiris, Apis, Dionysus, Hades). He became a god of healing and the underworld.


Isis was identified with Hellenic deities such as Demeter or Aphrodite.


Greek iconography was introduced to the cult which made it visually appealing to the Hellenes. In those days when the provincial city-states of the Hellenic world fell to Alexander's universal empire, the traditional gods of the city-state no longer sufficed. Gods like Isis and Serapis were not connected with any specific town and were truly universal in scope.


More importantly, the exotic Egyptian mysticism could offer the Greeks of the Hellenistic age something their own gods could not: a way to cheat fate and death.


Isis and Osiris were honored by the Greeks and by Egyptian emigrants as a kind of holy trinity, but always it was Isis who was the dominant member of the trio.


Isis became the protector of family (especially women), the protector of newborns, the goddess of fertility and good fortune, and the goddess whose magic could cheat fate and death.


She was also thought to be a protector of sailors, and sailors sailing from the great port of Alexandria took her cult all over the Mediterranean.


Backed by the Ptolemaic regime, the new cult spread throughout the Hellenistic Kingdoms.


The Nile Flows into the Tiber

The Roman Senate was not amused with Ptolemy's attempt to craft a universal religion.


When the cult of Isis swept into Rome via Hellenistic sailors and Egyptian emigrants, it became extremely popular with women and the lower classes, including slaves.


AD

Fearing a religious unification of the lower strata of Roman society, and fearing the loss of piety in the traditional Roman gods of the state, the Senate repeatedly placed restrictions on the new cult.


Private chapels dedicated to Isis were ordered destroyed. When a Roman Consul found that the demolition team assigned to him were all members or sympathizers of the cult and refused to destroy their chapel, he had to remove his toga of state and do the deed himself.


How Did Different Roman Emperors View the Cult of Isis?

Augustus found the cult "pornographic," though the cult was known to proscribe periods of sexual abstinence to its adherents.


The real reason for Augustus' wrath was that the cult was linked to Egypt and thus the power base of his rival, Mark Antony. Cleopatra had even gone so far to declare herself Isis reincarnated.


Nonetheless, Augustus' scorn did little to stem popular opinion. Officials and servants of the imperial household were members of the cult. It seems even his own infamous daughter was a member; whether her belief was genuine or merely another aspect of her defiance against her father cannot be determined.

https://www.unrv.com/culture/isis.php


The Islamic State (IS),[a][b] is a transnational Salafi jihadist group and unrecognized quasi-state. It is designated as a terrorist organisation by the United Nations and many countries around the world, including Muslim countries.[162]


IS gained global prominence in 2014, when its militants conquered large territories in northwestern Iraq and eastern Syria, taking advantage of the ongoing civil war in Syria and the disintegrating local military forces of Iraq. By the end of 2015, its self-declared caliphate ruled an area with a population of about 12 million,[117][118][163] where they enforced their extremist interpretation of Islamic law, managed an annual budget exceeding US$1 billion, and commanded more than 30,000 fighters.[164] After a grinding conflict with American, Iraqi, and Kurdish forces, IS lost control of all its Middle Eastern territories by 2019, subsequently reverting to insurgency from remote hideouts while continuing its propaganda efforts. These efforts have garnered a significant following in northern and Sahelian Africa,[165][166] where IS still controls a significant territory.[167][168]


Originating in the Jaish al-Ta'ifa al-Mansurah founded by Abu Omar al-Baghdadi in 2004, the organisation (primarily under the Islamic State of Iraq name) affiliated itself with al-Qaeda in Iraq and fought alongside them during the 2003–2006 phase of the Iraqi insurgency. The group later changed their name to Islamic State of Iraq and Levant for about a year,[169][170] before declaring itself to be a worldwide caliphate,[171][172] called simply the Islamic State (الدولة الإسلامية, ad-Dawlah al-Islāmiyya).[173]


As a caliphate, IS demanded the religious, political, and military obedience of Muslims worldwide,[174] despite the rejection of its legitimacy by mainstream Muslims and its statehood by the United Nations and most governments.[175] During its rule in Syria and Iraq, the group "became notorious for its brutality".[173] Under its rule of these regions, IS launched genocides against Yazidis and Iraqi Turkmen; engaged in persecution of Christians, Shia Muslims, and Mandaeans; publicised videos of beheadings of soldiers, journalists, and aid workers; and destroyed several cultural sites. The group has perpetrated terrorist massacres in territories outside of its control, such as the November 2015 Paris attacks, the 2024 Kerman bombings in Iran, and the 2024 Crocus City Hall attack in Russia. Lone wolf attacks inspired by the group have also taken place.


After 2015, the Iraqi Armed Forces and the Syrian Democratic Forces pushed back IS and degraded its financial and military infrastructure,[176] assisted by advisors, weapons, training, supplies, and airstrikes by the American-led coalition,[177] and later by Russian airstrikes, bombings, cruise missile attacks, and scorched-earth tactics across Syria, which focused mostly on razing Syrian opposition strongholds rather than IS bases.[178] By March 2019, IS lost the last of its territories in West Asia, although its affiliates maintained a significant territorial presence in Africa as of 2024.[167][168]


Name

Main article: Names of the Islamic State

See also: Name changes due to the Islamic State

The Islamic State, abbreviated IS,[179] is also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL /ˈaɪsɪl/ EYE-sil), the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS /ˈaɪsɪs/ EYE-siss),[180][181] and by its Arabic acronym Da'ish[182][183] or Daesh (داعش, Dāʿish, IPA: [ˈdaːʕɪʃ]),[184] and also as Dawlat al-Islām (دولة الإسلام).[185] In April 2013, having expanded into Syria, the group adopted the name ad-Dawla al-Islāmiyya fī l-ʿIrāq wa-sh-Shām (الدولة الإسلامية في العراق والشام). As al-Shām is a region often compared with the Levant or the region of Syria, the group's name has been variously translated as "Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham",[186] "Islamic State of Iraq and Syria" (both abbreviated as ISIS),[187] or "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant" (abbreviated as ISIL).[181] In 2014, Dar al-Ifta al-Misriyyah dubbed ISIS as QSIS for "al-Qaeda Separatists in Iraq and Syria", arguing that ISIL does not represent the vast majority of Muslims.[188]


While the use of either one or the other acronym has been the subject of debate,[181] the distinction between the two and its relevance has been considered less important.[181] Of greater relevance is the name Daesh, which is an acronym of ISIL's Arabic name ad-Dawla al-Islamiyya fī l-ʿIrāq wa-sh-Shām, or Daesh. This name has been widely used by ISIL's Arabic-speaking detractors,[186][189] for example when referring to the group whilst speaking amongst themselves, although—and to a certain extent because⁠—it is considered derogatory, as it resembles the Arabic words Daes ("one who crushes, or tramples down, something underfoot") and Dāhis (loosely translated as "one who sows discord").[184][190] Within areas under its control, ISIL considers use of the name Daesh punishable by flogging.[191]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_State


Ignatius of Loyola: Apostle to the Muslims

Posted on: 26th July 2016  |Author: Damian Howard SJ

Category: The Jesuits

Tags: Feast of St Ignatius, Ignatius, Islam, interreligious, Jesuit history


To educate the youth of Europe? To fight the spread of Protestantism? While many people would guess that one or both of these ambitions drove Ignatius of Loyola to found the Jesuits, he actually had something else in mind: a mission to the Muslim world. For the feast of St Ignatius, Damian Howard SJ considers how ‘Islam haunted Ignatius’s understanding of his calling’ and celebrates the fruitful work of the many Jesuits who have tried to realise Ignatius’s vision in their engagement with Muslims.


Ask the average Catholic why St Ignatius of Loyola founded the Society of Jesus and they will likely say one of two things. First, remembering the Jesuits as bastions of the Counter-Reformation they might assume that Ignatius, militant Catholic that he was, had set out with a dream of a new religious order capable of defeating Protestantism. But whilst it was the case that the Jesuits would be active in efforts to reform the Catholic Church from within and to take on the growing power of Protestant theology and culture as it spread across Europe, this was never Ignatius’s underlying vision. Second, they might suppose that Ignatius had planned from the start a vast network of new schools which would revolutionise education throughout the continent. It’s true that this is indeed what Jesuit schools ended up doing, earning the order’s members the epithet of the ‘schoolmasters of Europe’, but this huge and innovative project came about as the result of a proposal made to Ignatius after he had already become Superior General of the new order; it was never education per se that he saw as its prime mission.


So the following claim may be unexpected: Ignatius’s original apostolic orientation was actually defined in relation to the Muslim world.


This shouldn’t be entirely surprising given the state of Europe at that time in history. Ignatius was born in the Basque country in 1491. Just one year later, the Reconquista reached its conclusion with the Catholic Kings finally ousting the last Muslim rulers from their vestigial Andalusian states, giving Christian princes possession of the whole Iberian Peninsula. The year 1492 was also notable for another major geopolitical event involving Spain: the European discovery of the New World. It was all but impossible to avoid the thought that America was the reward for Spanish triumph against the Moors. Now, the energy which had propelled the Spanish conquest of the Iberian Peninsula would be released outwards; the colonial age of conquest and exploitation was dawning for a new Catholic Spain and it was to be a golden age for Spanish Catholicism. We may rightly harbour ambiguous feelings about this aggressively Christian state but this was a moment when Spanish Catholics must have felt like masters of the world.

https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/ignatius-loyola-apostle-muslims

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid02cHwpM3bvMstqrdYHk6f4dqURHPYDRXaYeuekmkc4Gg1QpmpNFzVx5MB6NmK213Rel


The Kingdom of Jerusalem was created in 1098, when the members of the First Crusade captured Jerusalem and elected Godfrey of Boulogne, or Godefroi de Bouillon, duke of Lower-Lorraine, as king of Jerusalem. The city was itself finally taken back by the Muslims in 1291, although the title continued to be claimed for centuries.


The Corpus Inscriptionum Crucesignatorum is online, listing inscriptions from the Crusader times that have been found in the Middle East.


The Arms

The Arms of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem are well-known: Argent a cross potent between four crosses or. It is the most well-known violation of the rule of tinctures.


Insignia or the Order of the Holy Sepulchre

Insignia of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre (from Diderot's Encyclopédie. They are A cross potent between four crosslets gules.

Whether these arms were ever used by the kings of Jerusalem is another matter. According to an article by Hervé Pinoteau in the Cahiers d'Héraldique, vol. 4, the earliest representation of the cross potents between crosslets is on the seal of a nephew and ward of John of Brienne, king from 1210 (the seal is from 1227). The arms of Jerusalem also appear on a reliquary called "la cassette de Saint-Louis" which he dates to 1236. (See also an article by Elliot Nesterman on early evidence of the Cross of Jerusalem).

Claimants to the Throne

The arms of Jerusalem pop up in a number of places. The reason for this is the rather tortuous history of the throne and title. The short version is this: three lines stemmed from Queen Isabeau (d. 1206), the eldest of which ruled in absentia until 1268, at which time the two other lines entered in dispute over the succession. From this dispute stems the claims of (1) the kings of Cyprus and (2) the kings of Sicily. The claim to Cyprus (1) became object of dispute in 1474 as the result of an usurpation: the claims of the usurper (1a) passed to Venice, while those of the displaced ruler (1b) passed to Savoy. As for the claims of the kings of Sicily (2), it became part of the dispute in 1434 between the duke of Anjou and the king of Aragon. The claims of the former (2a) passed briefly to the kings of France (1494-1515) and were later resurrected by the dukes of Lorraine in 1700 (whose descendants became emperors of Austria), while the the claims of the latter (2b) passed along with Sicily itself to the kings of Spain (1506-1700), then becoming the object of yet another dispute until returning to a younger son of the king of Spain in 1738; henceforth the title was used both by the kings of Spain and those of the Two Sicilies.


The kingdom of Jerusalem was founded as a consequence of the 1st crusade of 1099. Godefroi de Bouillon died in 1100 and was succeeded by his brother Baudoin I (+ 1118) and a great-nephew Baudoin II (+ 1131), who left an eldest daughter Mélissende. She passed the throne to her husband Foulques d'Anjou (+ 1147), and to her sons Baudoin III (+ 1163) and Amaury or Amalric (+ 1173). Amaury had a son and successor Baudoin IV (d. 1185), and two daughters, Sybille and Isabeau (1169-1206).


Sybille married in 1176 William of Montferrat (+ 1177), by whom she had a posthumous son Baudoin. She was then married in 1180 to Guy de Lusignan (d. 1194), count of Jaffa and Ascalon who was also appointed regent of the kingdom by the invalid Baudoin IV. But Baudoin IV then changed his mind, took away the regency, and abdicated in 1182 in favor of Sybille's son Baudoin V. This child died in 1186, soon after his uncle, and Sybille became queen of Jerusalem, and was crowned with her husband Guy de Lusignan. However, a rival in the person of Conrad of Montferrat, brother of Sybille's first husband, rose up. In the end an agreement was reached: Guy would retain the title for his life, Conrad would marry Sybille's sister Isabeau and succeed as well as his posterity. By that time, the city itself had actually been lost. Sybille had died in 1190, Conrad was murdered in 1192, leaving only a daughter Marie (1191-1212), and Guy renounced his claim in 1192 and bought the island of Cyprus from Richard Lionheart who had just conquered it from the Byzantine empire.


This left only Isabeau as the heir, and she became queen in 1192. All subsequent claims to the throne of Jerusalem stem from her. She married the same year Henri de Champagne (1166-97), who became king with her and died in 1197, leaving two daughters Alix and Philippa. Queen Isabeau next married Amaury de Lusignan (1145-1205), elder brother of Guy and his successor as king of Cyprus, by whom she had Sybille (married to Leo II of Armenia) and Mélissande. Isabeau died in 1205 and was succeeded by her eldest daughter Marie (1191-1212), married to Jean de Brienne (d. 1237) in 1209. Their only daughter Isabeau (1211-28) was married to the Emperor Frederic II who forced his parents-in-law to turn over the throne to him in 1225. Frederic was succeeded as Emperor and king of Jerusalem by his only child of that marriage, Conrad (1228-54), himself succeeded by his only child Conradin of Hohenstaufen 1252-68), who lost his throne of Naples and his life to Charles of Anjou. With him the issue of queen Isabeau's first daughter died out.


The Hohenstaufens were ruling in absentia, and their rule was not liked. The local barons managed to induce various people to claim the regency. Alix de Brienne, second daughter of queen Isabeau, had married Hughes de Lusignan (d. 1218), son of Amaury by a previous wife, and king of Cyprus. Alix died in 1246 and her son Henri (1218-53) succeeded her as regent of Jerusalem. At his death, his son grandson Hugues II (1252-67) was a minor and the widow Plaisance (d. 1261) was regent of both Cyprus and Jerusalem. At her death, a new regent was required; the late king Henri had two sisters Marie (d. 1252) married to Gauthier de Brienne, and Isabelle (d. 1264), married to Henri de Poitiers. The elder one's son, Hugues de Brienne, was passed over in favor of the younger one's son Hugues d'Antioche as regent of Cyprus, while Isabelle herself was accepted as regent for Jerusalem. On her death in 1267, Hugues de Brienne's attempt to claim his rights was rebuffed and the throne of Cyprus, along with the regency of Jerusalem, passed to Hugues d'Antioche, whose descendants assumed the name of Lusignan and reigned over Cyprus.


At the death of Conradin, the issue of Queen Isabeau's eldest daughter became extinct. Hugues III of Cyprus, descended from her second daughter and already regent, now claimed the throne. But another claim emerged through the third daughter of Queen Isabeau, Mélissende, who married Bohémond IV of Antioch (uncle of Hugues III) and whose only daughter Marie of Antioch claimed the throne as being closer in kinship to Isabeau. She was unsuccessful and Hugues III was crowned king of Jerusalem in 1269. She went to Rome to plead her case with the Pope, and was eventually induced to cede her rights in 1277 to Charles of Anjou, whom the pope had established as king of Naples and Sicily (the same who had defeated Conradin in 1268). Henceforth there were two lines of claimants, the kings of Cyprus and the kings of Naples.


The kings of Cyprus continued to be crowned kings of Jerusalem, although from 1277 to 1282 the remnants of the kingdom (Acre) were actually under Charles d'Anjou's control, and the kings of Cyprus only gradually restored their authority. But soon after, with the fall of Acre in 1291, there was nothing left of the kingdom of Jerusalem. In 1458 Jean III, last male of the line, died without male heirs. His only sister Anne had (d. 1462) married Louis I de Savoie. His only daughter Charlotte (d. 1487) was recognized as queen of Cyprus, Armenia and Jerusalem, and married to her first cousin Louis de Savoie. But she was dethroned in 1460 by a bastard son of her father, namely Jacques II (d. 1473), and fled to Italy. Ultimately, in 1485, she ceded her rights to her husband's nephew Charles I, duke of Savoie, and his successors; at that point the dukes of Savoie (later kings of Sardinia and kings of Italy) added the title of king of Jerusalem, Cyprus and Armenia to their titles and the arms to their achievement. The kings of Italy used the title until 1946.


Jacques II died in 1473, leaving a widow Caterina Cornero (1454-1510), from the Venitian aristocracy. His posthumous son Jacques III soon died. The city of Venice turned Cyprus into a protectorate, and, in 1489, forced Caterina Cornero to return to Venice and cede her rights to the Republic. From then on, the Republic of Venice also added the title and arms of Jerusalem, Cyprus and Armenia to its own, until 1797 when the Republic was abolished and its territories handed over to Austria by the Treaty of Campo-Formio. Cyprus was under Venetian control until 1571 when it was conquered by the Turks. Venice became part of the kingdom of Italy in 1866.


Meanwhile, the kings of Sicily also claimed the title of king of Jerusalem. In 1282, Charles d'Anjou lost Sicily and his descendants reigned in Naples only (albeit under the title of kings of Sicily) while Sicily itself was ruled by branches of the house of Aragon. When the descendants of Charles d'Anjou became extinct in 1434, the two claimants were René d'Anjou and Alfonso, king of Aragon and Sicily, and the latter won, at which point his successors the kings of both Sicilies added the claim of Jerusalem to their own. René's claim was resurrected by his grand-nephew king Charles VIII of France in 1494, who managed to conquer and briefly hold Naples, and who used the title of Jerusalem, as did his successor Louis XII (but no other French king did so). In 1506 the Two Sicilies was finally regained by king Ferdinand of Aragon, and henceforth possessed, along with the claim to Jerusalem, by the kings of Spain, descendants of Fernando's daughter Juana and her husband Philip of Habsburg, until their extinction in male line in 1700.


As a result of the war of Spanish Succession (1701-13), Naples and Sicily were ceded by Spain to the Habsburg emperor Charles VI in 1720, and the pope duly invested the emperor with the titles of king of Sicily and Jerusalem on June 5, 1722 (the kingdom being a papal fief). In the course of the war of Polish Succession (1733-38), the younger son of the king of Spain, Don Carlos, managed to conquer the Two Sicilies, a conquest recognized by the peace of Vienna of 1738, and by the pope in the same year. Carlos became king of Spain in 1759 and left Naples and Sicily to his younger son Ferdinand, whose descendants reigned until 1860. The kings of Spain continued to use the title of Jerusalem until 1931, as did the kings of Two-Sicilies.


On the other hand, René's daughter Yolande married Ferry de Vaudémont, one of whose sons became duke of Lorraine. The modern house of Lorraine took up the claim to Jerusalem in 1700 (although it wasn't the best claimant from a genealogical point of view, as pointed out by W. A. Reitwiesner) when duke Leopold returned to his duchy after 28 years of French occupation, and adopted a closed royal crown and the style of king of Jerusalem. His son François, duke of Lorraine, married the Empress Maria-Theresa, and their descendants as rulers of Austria inherited the claim. The arms of Jerusalem could be seen in the grand arms of State of the Austrian Empire in the 19th century and the title was used until 1918.


Other Crusader States

There is very little evidence on the arms of the Crusader states. The traditional arms of the kingdom of Jerusalem are not known before the 1230s, when the city had already been lost. Numismatic evidence is scant, epigraphic evidence even more so (there are very little heraldic traces of the Crusaders in the Middle East, outside Cyprus; see an interesting exception).


Numismatic evidence

The best work is Gustave Schlumberger's Numismatique de l'Orient Latin (Paris, 1878; reprint Graz 1954). In a coin auction catalogue I recently received, coins from Tripoli feature:


Obverse: horse with cross above, Reverse: a cross between four roundels (bronze, Raymond II 1137-52)

Obv: cross patty, Rev: eight-point star (Bohemond VI, 1251-75, silver gros)

Obv: cross slightly patty, Rev: three-towered castle (Bohemond VII, 1275-87, silver gros)

I believe the 8-pt star was a recurrent motif on Tripoli coins.

Coins of Antioch feature:


Raymond Roupen (1216-19): helmeted head between crescent and 5-pt star, Rev: cross patty with crescent in one quarter. (coins from early 12th c. have a bust of St Peter and inscriptions, or the Mother of God facing nimbate).

Interestingly, coins from Cyprus (1306-1473) constantly feature on the reverse a cross potent between four crosses, never crosslets but sometimes patty or formy. But what is peculiar is that the main cross is "quadrat in the centre", that is, its center is thickened by a square. This is, according to Parker's Glossary, called a cross of S. Chad, because it features in the arms of the see of Lichfield and Coventry, of which S. Chad was the first bishop. The quadrating on the Cyprus coins is much less pronounced than in the drawing in Parker, but this is nevertheless quite intriguing.


Other evidence

monuments (carved arms, epitaphs, etc): two or three epitaphs with arms are known; some graffiti carved on marble columns of the church of the Nativity in Bethleem were made by 14th-15th c. pilgrims. That's all that survived. One notable exception: the tomb of Philippe d'Aubigni in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem.

Monuments in the West: Marguerite, daughter of Louis d'Acre, vicomte de Beaumont, himself son of Jean de Brienne, king of Jerusalem, was married to Bohemond VII, count of Tripoli (d. 1287) and eldest son of Bohemond VI, last prince of Antioch. She died in France in 1328, and her tomb in the abbey of Maubuisson was described as "parsemée de croix de Jérusalem dans des losanges de gueules, et de lions rampants dans des losanges de sable fleurdelisés" in Du Cange's Familles d'Outremer (Paris, 1869, p. 486). The tomb was destroyed in 1793 (reference to Dulaure, Environs de Paris, vol. 2, p. 331, n. 2, which I have not checked).

objects: a handful survive, mainly from Cyprus.

seals: Gustave Schlumberger's Sigillographie de l'Orient Latin (Paris, 1943) is probably quite comprehensive, and there is little heraldry to glean from it. Lots of seals of the kings of Jerusalem, princes of Antioch, counts of Tripoli are known, but they bear no arms. See for example the seals of Baudoin II (1118-31), Amalric (1162-75), Jean de Brienne (1212-37). In Antioch, Raymond of Poitiers (1136-49) is shown riding a horse and bearing a cross on his shield and banner, but that's it. Among lesser barons, the Ibelin family, lords of Arsur and Beyrut apparently had "Or a cross patty gules". The device certainly appears on their shields and banners as shown on their seals. Aside from that, there are arms here and there: Hugues de Giblet (Biblos) has a 8-pointed star, the Porcellet family has a boar passant, the lordship of Loron or Thoron was a lion rampant.

There is more armory from Cyprus and Constantinople; but then, those arms are well known. The Courtenay arms appear on Philippe de Courtenay's seal (d. 1283). Interestingly, the earlier emperors of Constantinople, Baudoin of Flanders (d. 1205), Henri I (d. 1216), Baudoin II (d. 1261) all use the lion of Flanders, although one contemporary cronicler describes Henri riding in battle with a coat-armour gules semy of crosses or. Villehardouin, princes of Achaia, use the family arms of a cross recercelee; later, Louis a cadet of Burgundy who claimed Achaia added a quarter of Villehardouin to his arms of Burgundy ancient (14th c.). Achaia was also claimed by a junior branch of Savoy, who differenced with a bend.

https://www.heraldica.org/topics/national/jerusale.htm


Baldwin of Jerusalem, who had been a prisoner in the hands of the Saracens and knew of their disunity, realized at about this time that Islam must eventually unite against the Christian invasion, and the decided that the Templars who prove ideal allies in the battles which were to come. In 1127, therefore, he sent two Templars with his strong recommendation to the Pope, applying for official recognition of the Order by the Holy See. [And this is the first time that the Templars even were considered to be close to the center of religion, the Christian religion in that day, the Catholic church, the Pope. For they were not commissioned as a Christian order; they were not commissioned by the Pope or by the church, and this is a big myth that the Knights Templar started out to protect the church and to protect the pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem. They were established first, primarily, and foremost as a branch of the ancient order of the Religion of Mystery Babylon. And it's indicative of the strategies that they've used since to endear themselves to whatever the established power, or the beliefs of the majority of the people might be.]


[When they went to see the Pope,] they had an introduction to St. Bernard himself, the Abbot of Clairvaux, who was known to be admirer of theirs, and who was a nephew of one of their envoys. Then the Grand Master himself arrived in Europe, and received the eulogistic opinion of the Abbot: “They go not headlong into battle, but with care and foresight, peacefully, as true children of Israel. But as soon as the fight had begun, they rush without delay upon the foe . . . and know no fear . . . one has often put to flight a thousand; two, ten thousand . . . gentler than lambs and grimmer than lions; theirs is the mildness of monks and the valor of the knight.” [Now folks, this was a strong recommendation, and this testimonial was part of the campaign of the Templars in their efforts at recognition of the Pope. All of you who have thought that they began as a religious order in the first place are so way off base that it's pathetic. And neither were the Jesuits a religious order in the first place, but we'll get that together in another broadcast.] [But] on the 31st [of] January [in the year] 1128, the Master appeared before the Council of Troyes. This formidable body consisted of the Archbishops of Rheims and Sens, ten bishops and a number of abbots—including St. Bernard himself - presided over by the Cardinal of Albano, the Papal legate. They were approved; and Pope Honorius chose for them a white mantle, completely plain. The red cross was added by order of Pope Eugenius III in 1146. [And see, you thought the Templars thought of this. Nope not at all. This was mandated by two Popes: first, the white mantle, completely plain; and then later the red cross was added by Pope Eugenius III in 1146.]


Hugh de Payens now took his delegation through France and England, and collected a number of recruits. Gifts and grants were showered upon the Order; lands, rents and arms were forthcoming from all quarters. Richard I of England was enthusiastic about them. By 1133, King Alfonso of Aragon and Naverre, who had fought the Spanish Moors in twenty-nine 113 battles, had willed his country to them; although when the Moors finally laid him low his nobles prevented the Templars from claiming their rights. [Nevertheless, this was of great honor. In fact, to my knowledge and to our research into history, it never had before been done.]


In 1129 the Master, accompanied by three hundred knights, recruited from the noblest houses of Europe, led a huge train of pilgrims to the Holy Land. It was at this time that the Templars formed part of the Christian contingent which, allied with the Assassins, tried to take Damascus. [And it wasn't the first time nor the last that the Christian Knights Templar, or supposedly Christian Knights Templar (they really weren't Christian at all) were allied with the Assassins.] Were they (as the Orientalist von Hammer alleges)109 connected in some secret way with the Assassins? [Yes, our research shows that it is a historical fact. And it is also a historical fact that the Assassins were prepared to adopt Christianity if they could gain greater power thereby (Christianity, that is, on the surface, just as the Knights Templar had done)]. Hammer points to the similarities of the two organizations. The followers of Hasan Ibn Sabah were in contact with the Templars, and had a similar method of organization. They were in existence before the Templars were formed: “The Ismailians ([or] Assassins) was the original, and [folks] the Order of the Templars, [was] the copy.”


The balance of Western opinion is against this contention; more particularly because, one feels from wide reading of historians, great sympathy is felt for the cruelly treated and a arbitrarily dispossessed Templars. Thus Keightley, who made a close study of the Order those who would claim that the Templars were an Assassin branch [but, when you do research into the (laughs) associations and memberships of Keightley, you'll find that Keightley was himself a Knight Templar. And he said:]


“When, nearly thirty years after their institution, the Pope gave them permission to wear a cross on their mantle, like the rival Hospitaller Order, no color could present itself to well suited to those who daily and hourly exposed themselves to martyrdom as that of blood, in which there was so much of what was symbolical. With respect to internal organization it will, we apprehend, be always found that this is for the most part of the growth of time and the product of circumstances; and it always nearly the same where these last are similar.”110


[And you find this kind of rhetoric, semantics, all throughout the writings of those who wish to cover the true origin and the true meaning of Mystery Babylon.]


The famous question of the three thousand gold pieces paid by the Syrian branch of the Assassins to the Templars is another matter which has [of course] never been settled. One opinion holds that this money was given as a tribute to the Christians; the other, that it was a secret allowance from the larger to the small organization. [Which it really was as the Assassins wished to expand their control and remember their original goal was to take over the entire world by the systematic infiltration and control of each individual country.] Those who think that the Assassins were fanatical Moslems, and therefore would not form any alliance with those who to them were infidels, should be reminded that to the followers of the Old Man of the Mountains only he was right, and the Saracens who were fighting the Holy War for Allah against the Crusaders were as bad as anyone else who did not accept the Assassin doctrine.


[And it is true today: “If you are not one of us, you are nothing.” “The ends justify the means.” “The strength of our Order exists in the fact that we manifest ourselves under many different names and many different occupations, and sometimes even seem to oppose ourselves. But at the highest level, we are of one mind."


And I could go on, and on (laughs), and on, and you all know that I could go on and on and on. For I have studied this for so many years that I eat, drink and sleep it. Oh yes.]


[Well, eventually] grave charges against the Templars during the Crusades included the allegation that they were fighting for themselves alone. More than one historical incident bears this out. The Christians had besieged the town of Ascalon in 1153, and were engaged upon burning down the walls with large piles of inflammable materials. Part of the wall fell after a whole night of this burning. The Christian army was about to enter, when the Master of the Temple (Bernard de Tremelai)

109 Chevalier Joseph von Hammer, The History of the Assassins: Derived from Oriental sources, 1835

110 Thomas Keightley, Secret Societies of the Middle Ages, 1837

claimed the right to take the town himself. This was because the first contingent into a conquered town had the whole spoils. As it happened, the garrison rallied and killed the Templars, closing the breach. There seem good grounds for believing that the power which they had gained caused the Templars to devote their efforts as much to their own Order's welfare as to the cause of the Cross, in spite of their tremendous sacrifices for that cause. Having no loyalty to any territorial chief, they obeyed their Master alone, and hence no softening political pressure could be put upon them. [Well,] this might well have led to an idea that they were an invisible super-state [and that is exactly the fact]; and this does show some similarity with the invisible empire of the Assassins. If none can deny their bravery, their high-handedness and exclusivity, in less than a hundred and fifty years after their founding gave them the reputation of considering themselves almost a law unto themselves.


[No longer reading] And now, dear listeners, we get into the meat, the direct connection between the historical events and the events that are happening today. Don't miss even one episode of this series. Good night, and may God bless each and every one of you.

(Outro music: Stardust)111

The Templars and the Assassins (aired March 2nd, 1993)

https://viefag.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/transcripts-of-william-cooper-s-mystery-babylon-series.pdf


1236

June 29 – Siege of Córdoba: Castilian forces under King Ferdinand III (the Saint) capture Muslim Córdoba from Emir Ibn Hud, as part of the Reconquista of the Iberian Peninsula.[2]

July – At a diet (princely convention) in Piacenza, Emperor Frederick II proclaims his wish to recover all Italy for the Holy Roman Empire.[3]


Pope Gregory IX condemned the links that both the Knights Templer and Knights Hospitaller have with the Assassin fighters in the Middle East. He issues a bull, a formal proclamation issued by the pope, preventing further contact with the Assassins.

May 6 – Roger of Wendover, English Benedictine monk and chronicler, dies at St. Albans Abbey. His chronicle is continued by Matthew of Paris.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1236


Atheism: resisting it with all our forces is a special mission given to the Society by the supreme pontiff, 253 2°; a mission which should permeate all forms of our apostolate, 254; our efforts are to be directed toward nonbelievers, ibid.; toward that end, an experience of God must be fostered in ourselves, 223 §§3-4, 224, 247

1° 2° 3° 6°;

and also in others, by means of the Spiritual Exercises, 271

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


The idea of uniting the Templars with the Hospitallers was first argued publicly in a book published in 1305 by Raimon Llull, a renowned illuminatus from Majorca. Llull’s book, Libre de Fine, (“Free At Last”) appeared in the midst of a raging controversy between the French monarchy and the Roman papacy over who held jurisdiction over the Templars. That is the subject of our next chapter.

Rulers of Evil

by F. Tupper Saussy

https://dn790006.ca.archive.org/0/items/rulers-of-evil-f.-tupper-saussy/Rulers%20of%20Evil%20-%20F.%20Tupper%20Saussy.pdf


CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION AND HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

The alumbrados of Castile were a movement that caused much trouble during the first three decades of the sixteenth century. Their ideas were represented by the “Big Three” beatas who, under noble patronage, for at least a decade previous to the arrest in 1524 of the “mother” of the movement (Isabel de la Cruz) had successfully proselytized and spread their ideas throughout Old and New Castile.1

The alumbrados certainly were a charismatic bunch; they enjoyed success with the elites of Castilian society, comuneros, but above all with women and conversos. As a religious movement led by women the alumbrados were part of a growing trend of individual, charismatic female piety. By the time of Cardinal Cisneros’s death in 1517, however, the era of the alumbrados and their grassroots converso spirituality was nearing its end. While the actual heyday of their movement was short-lived the alumbrados made a huge impact upon the minds Prospering in the environment of Catholic spiritual exploration fostered by the personal theological interests of the Archbishop of Toledo Cardinal Ximenez de Cisneros the alumbrados presented an interiorized approach to Christianity. Equipped with the meditational practice of dejamiento the alumbrados stressed the importance of an individual, pseudo-mystical “abandonment” to God and His will. They also emphasized the insignificance of external rituals and works, calling them ataduras or “shackles” to the material world, ties that only served to hinder one’s abandonment to God.

of the Inquisitors who prosecuted them and upon the Spanish religious imagination, an impact that would last across seas and time."

EL SABOR DE HEREJIA: THE EDICT OF 1525, THE ALUMBRADOS

AND THE INQUISITORS’ USAGE OF LOCURA

By

JAVIER A. MONTOYA

http://etd.fcla.edu/UF/UFE0041385/montoya_j.pdf


Alumbrado, (Spanish: “Enlightened”, ) Italian Illuminato, plural Illuminati, a follower of a mystical movement in Spain during the 16th and 17th centuries. Its adherents claimed that the human soul, having attained a certain degree of perfection, was permitted a vision of the divine and entered into direct communication with the Holy Spirit. From this state the soul could neither advance nor retrogress. Consequently, participation in the liturgy, good works, and observance of the exterior forms of religious life were unnecessary for those who had received the “light.” The Alumbrados came primarily from among the reformed Franciscans and the Jesuits, but their doctrines seem to have influenced all classes of people. The extravagant claims made for their visions and revelations caused them to be relentlessly persecuted. The Inquisition issued edicts against them on three occasions (1568, 1574, and 1623)."

https://www.britannica.com/event/Alumbrado


Etymology

Learned borrowing from Pali Buddha (“the Awakened One, the Enlightened One”), from buddha (“awakened, enlightened”), from Sanskrit बुद्ध (buddha, “awakened, enlightened”), past participle of बोधति (bodhati, “to wake, to awaken”). Distantly related to English bid and bede. Also cognate with Russian будить (buditʹ, “to wake up”)."

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Buddha


Gautama

surname of the Buddha, from Sanskrit Gotamah, properly a patronymic, literally "descendant of the greatest ox," from superlative of gauh "ox, bull, cow."

https://www.etymonline.com/word/buddha


Unam Sanctam

One God, One Faith, One Spiritual Authority

Pope Boniface VIII - 1302

Bull of Pope Boniface VIII promulgated November 18, 1302

Urged by faith, we are obliged to believe and to maintain that the Church is one, holy, catholic, and also apostolic. We believe in her firmly and we confess with simplicity that outside of her there is neither salvation nor the remission of sins, as the Spouse in the Canticles [Sgs 6:8] proclaims: ‘One is my dove, my perfect one. She is the only one, the chosen of her who bore her,‘ and she represents one sole mystical body whose Head is Christ and the head of Christ is God [1 Cor 11:3]. In her then is one Lord, one faith, one baptism [Eph 4:5]. There had been at the time of the deluge only one ark of Noah, prefiguring the one Church, which ark, having been finished to a single cubit, had only one pilot and guide, i.e., Noah, and we read that, outside of this ark, all that subsisted on the earth was destroyed.

We venerate this Church as one, the Lord having said by the mouth of the prophet: ‘Deliver, O God, my soul from the sword and my only one from the hand of the dog.’ [Ps 21:20] He has prayed for his soul, that is for himself, heart and body; and this body, that is to say, the Church, He has called one because of the unity of the Spouse, of the faith, of the sacraments, and of the charity of the Church. This is the tunic of the Lord, the seamless tunic, which was not rent but which was cast by lot [Jn 19:23- 24]. Therefore, of the one and only Church there is one body and one head, not two heads like a monster; that is, Christ and the Vicar of Christ, Peter and the successor of Peter, since the Lord speaking to Peter Himself said: ‘Feed my sheep‘ [Jn 21:17], meaning, my sheep in general, not these, nor those in particular, whence we understand that He entrusted all to him [Peter]. Therefore, if the Greeks or others should say that they are not confided to Peter and to his successors, they must confess not being the sheep of Christ, since Our Lord says in John ‘there is one sheepfold and one shepherd.’ We are informed by the texts of the gospels that in this Church and in its power are two swords; namely, the spiritual and the temporal. For when the Apostles say: ‘Behold, here are two swords‘ [Lk 22:38] that is to say, in the Church, since the Apostles were speaking, the Lord did not reply that there were too many, but sufficient. Certainly the one who denies that the temporal sword is in the power of Peter has not listened well to the word of the Lord commanding: ‘Put up thy sword into thy scabbard‘ [Mt 26:52]. Therefore, both are in the power of the Church, namely, the spiritual sword and the material. But indeed, the latter is to be exercised on behalf of the Church; and truly, the former is to be exercised by the Church. The former is of the priest; the latter is by the hand of kings and soldiers, but at the will and sufferance of the priest.


However, one sword ought to be subordinated to the other and temporal authority, subjected to spiritual power. For since the Apostle said: ‘There is no power except from God and the things that are, are ordained of God‘ [Rom 13:1-2], but they would not be ordained if one sword were not subordinated to the other and if the inferior one, as it were, were not led upwards by the other.


For, according to the Blessed Dionysius, it is a law of the divinity that the lowest things reach the highest place by intermediaries. Then, according to the order of the universe, all things are not led back to order equally and immediately, but the lowest by the intermediary, and the inferior by the superior. Hence we must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power whatever, as spiritual things surpass the temporal. This we see very clearly also by the payment, benediction, and consecration of the tithes, but the acceptance of power itself and by the government even of things. For with truth as our witness, it belongs to spiritual power to establish the terrestrial power and to pass judgement if it has not been good. Thus is accomplished the prophecy of Jeremias concerning the Church and the ecclesiastical power: ‘Behold to-day I have placed you over nations, and over kingdoms‘ and the rest. Therefore, if the terrestrial power err, it will be judged by the spiritual power; but if a minor spiritual power err, it will be judged by a superior spiritual power; but if the highest power of all err, it can be judged only by God, and not by man, according to the testimony of the Apostle: ‘The spiritual man judgeth of all things and he himself is judged by no man‘ [1 Cor 2:15]. This authority, however, (though it has been given to man and is exercised by man), is not human but rather divine, granted to Peter by a divine word and reaffirmed to him (Peter) and his successors by the One Whom Peter confessed, the Lord saying to Peter himself, ‘Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound also in Heaven‘ etc., [Mt 16:19]. Therefore whoever resists this power thus ordained by God, resists the ordinance of God [Rom 13:2], unless he invent like Manicheus two beginnings, which is false and judged by us heretical, since according to the testimony of Moses, it is not in the beginnings but in the beginning that God created heaven and earth [Gen 1:1]. Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

https://www.papalencyclicals.net/bon08/b8unam.htm


Presidential elections are scheduled to be held in the United States on November 7, 2028, to elect the president and vice president of the United States for a term of four years.


In the 2024 elections, the Republican Party gained a majority of seats in the House of Representatives and Senate. Incumbent president Donald Trump won a non-consecutive second term; per the limits set by the 22nd Amendment, he is constitutionally barred from being elected president again.[1]


Background

See also: 2024 United States elections

The Republican Party returned to power in the United States with a government trifecta in January 2025 following the 2024 election. Trump, who was elected president in 2016 but lost a re-election bid in 2020 to Joe Biden, and JD Vance, a then-senator from Ohio defeated vice president Kamala Harris, who began her campaign following Biden's exit from the 2024 election, and Minnesota governor Tim Walz. Trump's victory was credited to a post-pandemic surge in inflation,[a] a migrant crisis at the U.S.–Mexico border,[b] and a global anti-incumbent backlash.[8][9][10] In addition, Republicans secured control of the Senate, flipping four seats and earning a three seat majority, while also retaining a House majority, though the party's majority narrowed to three seats after losing two seats.[11]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2028_United_States_presidential_election


25th Amendment

Presidential Disability and Succession

 

Section 1

In case of the removal of the President from office or of his death or resignation, the Vice President shall become President.


Section 2

Whenever there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress.


Section 3

Whenever the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, and until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary, such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President.


Section 4

Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

     

Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.

https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/amendments/amendment-xxv


Raphael Gamaliel Warnock[1] (/ˈrɑːfiɛl ˈwɔːrnɒk/ RAH-fee-el WOR-nok; born July 23, 1969) is an American politician and Baptist pastor serving as the junior United States senator from Georgia, a seat he has held since 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, Warnock has been the senior pastor of Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church since 2005.[2][3]


Warnock was the senior pastor of Douglas Memorial Community Church from 2001 to 2005.[4] He came to prominence in Georgia politics as a leading activist in the campaign to expand Medicaid in the state under the Affordable Care Act. He was the Democratic nominee in the 2020 United States Senate special election in Georgia, defeating incumbent Republican Kelly Loeffler in a runoff election.[5]


Warnock and Jon Ossoff are the first Democrats elected to the U.S. Senate from Georgia since Zell Miller in 2000.[6][7] Their elections were critical in securing a 50–50 Senate majority for Democrats, with Vice President Kamala Harris serving as the tie-breaking vote.[8] Warnock was a reliable supporter of Joe Biden's legislative efforts during his presidency.[9][10] He was reelected to a full term in 2022, defeating Republican nominee Herschel Walker.


Warnock is the first African American to represent Georgia in the Senate, the first Black Democrat elected to the Senate from a Southern state, and the second black U.S. Senator directly elected from a Southern state, after Tim Scott.[11][12][13]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raphael_Warnock


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


Sako Limited (natively Sako Oy)[1] is a Finnish firearm and ammunition manufacturer located in Riihimäki, Kanta-Häme in southern Finland. It also has owned the Tikka brand of bolt-action rifles since 1983, and is now owned by the Italian firearm holding company Beretta Holding. The name Sako comes from the company's former name Suojeluskuntain Ase- ja Konepaja Oy (lit. 'Civil Guard Gun and Machining Works Ltd').


History

In 1919, two years after Finland declared independence from the Russian Empire, the Suojeluskuntain Yliesikunnan Asepaja (Civil Guard Supreme Staff Gun Works) opened in a former Helsinki brewery to repair private arms and recondition Russian military rifles for Finnish service.[2] The rifle repair shop became financially independent of the civil guard in 1921. The Suojeluskuntain Yliesikunnan Asepaja moved from Helsinki to an ammunition factory in Riihimäki on 1 June 1927, and reorganized as SAKO in the 1930s. Sako started exporting pistol cartridges to Sweden in the 1930s and continued manufacturing submachine gun cartridges through World War II.[3]


Another Finnish firearms manufacturer Tikkakoski, which owned the Tikka brand, was merged into SAKO in 1983.[4] In 1986, the arms manufacturing division of the government-owned Valmet conglomerate (which itself had been derived from the Valtion Kivääritehdas, VKT) was merged with Sako and called Sako-Valmet, with ownership split evenly between Nokia and Valmet. After further organizational shifts in state ownership, the company was sold to the Italian Beretta Holding in 2000.[5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAKO


The United States presidential line of succession is the order in which the vice president of the United States and other officers of the United States federal government assume the powers and duties of the U.S. presidency (or the office itself, in the instance of succession by the vice president) upon an elected president's death, resignation, removal from office, or incapacity.


The order of succession specifies that the office passes to the vice president; if the vice presidency is simultaneously vacant, the powers and duties of the presidency pass to the speaker of the House of Representatives, president pro tempore of the Senate, and then Cabinet secretaries, depending on eligibility.


Presidential succession is referred to multiple times in the U.S. Constitution: Article II, Section 1, Clause 6, the 12th Amendment, 20th Amendment, and 25th Amendment. The vice president is designated as first in the presidential line of succession by the Article II succession clause, which also authorizes Congress to provide for a line of succession beyond the vice president. It has done so on three occasions. The Presidential Succession Act was adopted in 1947, and last revised in 2006. The 25th Amendment, adopted in 1967, also establishes procedures for filling an intra-term vacancy in the office of the vice president.


The Presidential Succession Act refers specifically to officers beyond the vice president acting as president rather than becoming president when filling a vacancy. The Cabinet has 15 members, of which the secretary of state is highest and fourth in line (after the president pro tempore of the Senate); the other Cabinet secretaries follow in the order of when their departments (or the department of which their department is the successor) were created. Those heads of department who are constitutionally not "eligible to the Office of President" are disqualified from assuming the powers and duties of the president through succession and skipped to the next in line. Since 1789, the vice president has succeeded to the presidency intra-term on nine occasions: eight times due to the incumbent's death, and once due to resignation. No one lower in the line of succession has ever been called upon to act as president.


Widely considered a settled issue during the late 20th century, the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 demonstrated the potential for a decapitation strike that would kill or incapacitate multiple individuals in the presidential line of succession in addition to many members of Congress and the federal judiciary. In the years immediately following the attacks, numerous wide-ranging discussions were started, in Congress, among academics and within the public policy community about continuity of government concerns including the existing constitutional and statutory provisions governing presidential succession. These discussions remain ongoing. One effort put forward by the Continuity of Government Commission, a nonpartisan think tank, produced three reports (2003, 2009, and 2011), the second of which focused on the implicit ambiguities and limitations in the succession act, and contained recommendations for amending the laws for succession to the presidency.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_line_of_succession


The conspiracy is racist, considering Blacks, Hispanics, and Aboriginal Peoples to be inferior races of useless eaters. They believe or at least profess that the Anglo/Aryan race is the true Israel (British Israel and Christian Identity for the dupes and an Anglophile Secular Humanism for the leaders) and thus the Master race. They have convinced the so-called useless eaters that they are friends, benefactors, and protectors. In the meantime they plan to enslave these poor People under socialism or eliminate them altogether. The Illuminati has convinced them that Karl Marx is their savior, and the sheople follow this Judas goat eagerly.


There will be no individual Rights only privileges. These will be granted or denied at will by the world supra government. All property is to be owned by the State. There will be a redistribution of wealth. They plan to eliminate class differences and reduce the standard of living to a lower level in the advanced nations, such as the united States, and to a higher standard of living in the so-called third world nations. This leveling of the standard of living will be accomplished through a global economic collapse which is in its beginning stages. The economic collapse will fulfill the goal of Marx and Engles' Communist Manifesto mandating the elimination of the middle class. The graduated income tax was the first implementation of this process and is one of the planks of the Communist Manifesto. NAFTA and GATT are a part of this process encouraging industry to move into third-world nations in order to exploit cheap labor.


All existing religions will disappear. The only religion will be the state religion (humanism or illuminism).


All County and State governments will be eliminated and replaced with regional government. These regional governments (Home Rule) are already in place. Regionalism is gradually taking control throughout America.


There will be no more cash. Trade will be accomplished by a system of computer credits with accounts accessed through debit cards or computer chip implants. The cards or implants will also serve as personal identification, drivers license, and etc. When this is completed the human race will be shackled to a computer in a never ending cycle of debt. No action or movement will ever again be private.

MAJESTYTWELVE by William Cooper Copyright © 1997 William Cooper All Rights Reserved

HOTT - MAJESTYTWELVE (hourofthetime.com)

https://www.hourofthetime.com/majestyt.htm


Tulsi Gabbard (/ˈtʌlsi ˈɡæbərd/; born April 12, 1981) is an American politician and military officer serving since 2025 as the eighth director of national intelligence (DNI). She has held the rank of lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army Reserve since 2021, and previously served as U.S. representative for Hawaii's 2nd congressional district from 2013 to 2021. A former Democrat, she became an independent in 2022 and later joined the Republican Party in 2024. Gabbard was the youngest state legislator in Hawaii from 2002 to 2004.


Gabbard joined the Hawaii Army National Guard in 2003 and was deployed to Iraq from 2004 to 2005, where she served as a specialist with a medical unit, and received the Combat Medical Badge. In 2007, Gabbard completed the officer training program at the Alabama Military Academy. She went to Kuwait in 2008 as an Army Military Police officer. In 2015, while also serving in Congress, Gabbard became a major with the Hawaii Army National Guard. In 2020, she transferred to the U.S. Army Reserve and was promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel in 2021.


In 2012, Gabbard was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives from Hawaii's 2nd congressional district. She became the first Samoan American and Hindu American member of U.S. Congress. During her tenure in Congress, she served on the House Armed Services Committee (HASC) and the House Foreign Affairs Committee. She supported the military campaign to defeat Islamic extremism but opposed the U.S. intervention in the Syrian civil war. In her fourth term, Gabbard also served on the HASC Subcommittee on Intelligence, which oversaw military intelligence and counterterrorism.


Gabbard launched her 2020 presidential campaign running on an anti-interventionist and populist platform, but dropped out and endorsed Joe Biden in March 2020. Previously, she also served as vice-chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) from 2013 to 2016 but resigned to endorse Bernie Sanders for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination. After her departure from Congress in 2021, Gabbard took more conservative positions on issues such as transgender rights, border security, and foreign policy. In 2022, she spoke at the conservative CPAC conference and left the Democratic Party.


In 2024, Gabbard endorsed Donald Trump for the presidential election and joined the Republican Party later that year. After Trump nominated Gabbard for DNI, her past statements on Syria and the Russian invasion of Ukraine drew scrutiny and concern. Many veterans and Republicans defended Gabbard's record, noting her military service and Congressional experience. In February 2025, she was confirmed by the Senate, becoming the highest-ranking Pacific Islander American government official in U.S. history.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsi_Gabbard


Isaiah 14:12-17

1599 Geneva Bible

12 How art thou fallen from heaven, O [a]Lucifer, son of the morning? and cut down to the ground, which didst cast lots upon the nations?


13 Yet thou saidest in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, and exalt my throne above beside the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation in the sides of the [b]North.


14 I will ascend above the height of the clouds, and I will be like the most high.


15 But thou shalt be brought down to the grave, to the side of the pit.


16 They that see thee, shall [c]look upon thee and consider thee, saying, Is this the man that made the earth to tremble, and that did shake the kingdoms?


17 He made the world as a wilderness, and destroyed the cities thereof, and opened not [d]the house of his prisoners.


Read full chapter

Footnotes

Isaiah 14:12 Thou that thoughtest thyself most glorious, and as it were placed in the heaven: for the morning star that goeth before the sun, is called Lucifer, to whom Nebuchadnezzar is compared.

Isaiah 14:13 Meaning, Jerusalem, whereof the Temple was of the North side, Ps. 48:2, whereby he meaneth that tyrants fight against God, when they persecute his Church, and would set themselves in his place.

Isaiah 14:16 In marveling at thee.

Isaiah 14:17 To set them at liberty: noting his cruelty.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah%2014%3A12-17&version=GNV


XLI

THE GODDESS OF FREEMASONRY-THE

WIDOW

PAGAN RELIGIONS OF ANCIENT TIMES HAD NO god without a goddess. If as we have seen Masonry is a modern 'caricature' of the ancient Barbêlônian and Eqyptian rites, then we should expect to find a goddess in Masonry.

Masons describe themselves in their literature as sons of the Widow'. Who is this Widow? And who is the Son?" The following question and answer explanation from Duane Washum, a Past

for the whole history of Manes rests on legends-, was born in The son of the Widow, a man called Manes, according to the legend- Babylonia about the year A.D. 216, and a slave who was redeemed from slavery by a rich Persian widow who freed and adopted him, thus making him the "son of the widow" a name which after him passed to the nich old woman the books of a Saracen named Scythianus (a all his followers and is still used in Masonic Lodges. He inherited from Combining the doctrines these books contained" [Nesta H. Webster, student of an Aristotle's teachings) on the wisdom of the Egyptians.

295

SHALL I BE A MASON?

concerning her, Isis is said to have conjured the invincible God of Eternities, Ra, to tell her his secret and sacred name, which he did. This name is equivalent to the Lost Word of Masonry." Thus Hall links Iss worship to Masonry. He intimates that Isis is the holder of the sacred name of Ra, the "ineffable name" of the god of Masonry (Abaddon, Apollyon, or Jahbulon).

Who as Isis? Isis was the Venus of Cyprus, the Minerva of Athens, the Cybele of the Phrygians, the Ceres of Eleusis, the Proserpine of Sicily, the Diana of Crete, the Bellona of the Romans, etc. And like the worhsippers of Isis, Freemasons in their ceremonies and initiations perform "the most abominable impurities," and those "initiated into them" are "obliged to take an oath of secrecy."

Secret Societies and Subversive Movements, p. 108.] Manicheism is the religion of the followers of Manes.

Edith Starr Miller Paget Queenborough (Baroness), Occult Theocrasy. Volumes 1-2. According to the Greek accounts, the immediate author of the new doctrines was not Manes, but Scythianus, a Saracen merchant, who in his distant journeys became acquainted with the Oriental and Greek philosophies. His heir and disciple was Terebinthus, who named himself Buddha, and boasted that he had been born of a virgin. The widow of Terebinthus appointed, as her heir, her slave Cubricus, acquainted with Christianity, he infused many ideas borrowed from it into his own system, that he might make it more acceptable to the Christians. These innovations in religion drew upon him a persecution in his native land, and he, therefore, retired to countries more to the east, to Hindostan, Turkestan, and Rhatai, the north of China. He returned to Persia; and he was executed by command of the schach, in 277: see, Johann Joseph Ignaz von Döllinger, A history of the church Volume 1 (London: Published By C. Dolman, 61, New Bond Street, And By T. Jones, 63, Paternoster Row. 1840), p. 155.

Nesta H. Webster, Secret Societies and Subversive Movements. (Boswell: Palmdale, Calif., 1824).

Duane Washum may be reached at the following address: In Search of Light Ministries, Box 28702 Las Vegas, Nevada 89126, USA

Lectures on Ancient Philosophy, Companion to The Secret Teachings All Ages (New York Tarcher/Penguin Group, 2005), originally published

1929

Only at the level, or degree of The Royal Arch is where the Masonic "true ineffable name of god-Jahbulon, is conveyed.

Encyclopaedia Perthesis, or, Universal dictionary of Knowledge (With Supp. nd edition (EDINBURGH: John Brown, Anchor Close, 1816), p

364

1. Ibid, p. 363.

296

The Goddess of Freemasonry-The Widow'

Be of Secrecy and Goddess Fides

"Masonry," writes Freemason Robert Freke Gould, "is... the direct scendant, or as a survival of the mysteries... of ISIS AND OSIRIS in Sp.... Hence in the Master Mason degree, the All-seeing Eye is a ost important symbolism, representing the false Egyptian trinity of sins, Isis and Horus.

And Albert Pike confirms: "Masonry still retains among its emblems e of a woman [Isis] weeping over a broken column, holding in her d a branch of acacia, myrtle, or tamarisk... We need not repeat the pid and trivial explanation... given, of THIS REPRESENTATION OF IS, weeping at Byblos, over the column torn from the palace of the that contained the body of Osiris...."

The conclusion of the matter? The goddess of Freemasonry is Isis. ovanously called by the ancient Romans: Minerva, Venus (or Al zza in Islam), Aurora (the goddess who rode on a car drawn by four s), Diana (Artemis), or Diana Lucifera-being the feminine of ader (a statue of her is still housed, to this day, in the Vatican"). In

Robert Freke Gould (Past Senior Grand Deacon of England, Master of tuor Coronati Lodge No. 2076), History of Freemasonry, Its etiquities, Symbols, Constitutions, Customs, Vol. 1 (New York: John C.

forston & Co., Publishers, 1884) p. 13.

Morals and Dogma, op. cit., p. 379.

ol 4, op. cit., p. 74,

3.0. Heck, Iconographic Encyclopaedia of Science, Literature, and Art, Camera di San Paolo (London: The Warburg Institute, Uni. of London, See, Erwin Panofsky, E. H. Gombrich, The Iconography of Correggio's 1961), H.H. Scullard, Festivals and Ceremonies of the Roman Republic London: Thames and Hudson, 1981), pp. 97, 107.

297

SHALL I BE A MASON?

other cultures this same goddess was called Astarte, Ashtoreth, Asherah, Ishtar, Venus, Artemis, Lilith, Minerva, ISIS, Kwan-yin, Demeter, Gaia, Luna, Hectate, Aphrodite, Shing Moo, HOLY MOTHER, Shakti, Hera, Innanna, Kali (Dark Mother), Juno, Sophia, Ceres, Cybele, Persephone, Our Lady, the Blessed Mother, THE QUEEN OF HEAVEN, and Mary-It is for this reason that in ancient Egypt, Isis (Virgo, the Queen of Heaven) was known as the "goddess of a thousand names," and the Initiator into the Sexual Mysteries.

But by whatever name she is termed, she is the same still: Diana Lucifera! A female demon!

The venerated historian Mosheim confirms that 'Mary,' is the same as the Masonic Isis: "they transferred to the Virgin Mary the worship and offerings they had been accustomed to pay to the "Queen of Heaven"-the... Mother of the Babylonian false Messiah, worshipped throughout the ancient heathen world under the various names of Venus, Astarte or Ashtoreth, Juno, Diana, Vesta, Ceres, Cybele, Rhea..." (Mosheim, Ecel. Hist., vol. i, p. 410, quoting Schlegel).

And Alexander Hislop's The Two Babylons adds these facts And Alexander Hislop's The Two Babylons adds these facts:

The Babylonians, in their popular religion, supremely worshipped a Goddess Mother and a Son.... Beltis, therefore, as the title of the female divinity, was equivalent to "Baalti," which, in English, is "My Lady," in Latin, "Mea Domina,"... in Italian... corrupted into the well-known "[Black, or Dark] Madonna.

13 A. Hislop, The Two Babylons, or The Papal Worship Proved to be the Worship of Nimrod and His Wife (London: Houlston & Wright, 1862 edn.), p. 29. You can download the book from our site: www.luxverb.org.uk/arch/e-books_on_romanism vs protestantism.htm

298

Reader, after all of the revelations found in this book, who but a.... or will be a Mason?

Shall I Be A Mason? Life or Death...

by P.D. Stuart


Dead Presidents is a 1995 American crime film co-written, produced and directed by the Hughes Brothers. The film chronicles the life of Anthony Curtis (Larenz Tate), focusing on his teenage years as a high school graduate and his experiences during the Vietnam War as a Recon Marine. As he returns to his hometown in The Bronx, Curtis finds himself struggling to support himself and his family, eventually turning to a life of crime.


Dead Presidents is based partly on the real-life experiences of Haywood T. Kirkland (aka Ari S. Merretazon), whose true story was detailed in the book Bloods: An Oral History of the Vietnam War by Black Veterans by Wallace Terry. Certain characters from the film are based on real acquaintances of Kirkland, who served time in prison after committing robbery in facepaint.[2] The film is also loosely based on several incidents involving the Black Liberation Army, notably the Brink's armored truck robbery.


Plot

In 1968, Anthony Curtis, a soon-to-be high school graduate in The Bronx, chooses to enlist in the United States Marine Corps rather than go to college. He deploys to Vietnam, leaving behind his middle-class family, his girlfriend Juanita, and small-time crook Kirby, who is like a second father. Anthony's close friend, Skip, later joins Curtis' Recon squad after dropping out of Hunter College. His other friend, Jose, is drafted into the United States Army. Once in Vietnam, Curtis and his squad lose several fellow Marines during combat, and commit several atrocities of their own, such as executing enemy prisoners and beheading Viet Cong corpses for war trophies.


When Anthony returns to the Bronx in 1973, he finds returning to "normal" life impossible. Skip is now an Agent Orange victim and heroin addict; Jose, forced to wear a prosthetic hand, is a pyromaniac who works as a postman at the James A. Farley Building, and Cleon, the squad's religious but homicidal staff sergeant, is now a devoted minister in Mount Vernon.


After being laid off from his job at a butcher shop, on the verge of alcoholism, and suffering from heavily induced PTSD nightmares, Anthony finds himself unable to support Juanita (who is having an affair with a pimp) or his infant daughter. After an argument with Juanita, Anthony meets her sister, Delilah, who is now a member of the "Nat Turner Cadre", a militant Black power Marxist group. Anthony, Kirby, Skip, Jose, Delilah and Cleon devise a plan to rob an armored car making a stop at the Noble Street Federal Reserve Bank.


The next day, the group strategically position themselves around the street, armed with weapons and disguised with face paint, ready to ambush the truck. The plan goes awry when Cleon is approached by a New York Police Department (NYPD) officer who unknowingly stumbles upon the robbery, leading to Kirby being shot in the arm and Skip killing the officer. At the same time, Anthony and Jose are spotted by the truck's driver, causing a shootout with the security guards.


Jose plants an explosive device on the escaping truck to blow off the door, but instead it destroys the entire vehicle. Delilah saves Anthony's life by killing one of the guards. A second guard appears and shoots Delilah multiple times, killing her. As the group collects what cash they can from the burning wreckage, they flee and split up to escape the police. Jose gets cornered in an alley by an approaching police car. When he shoots the officer, he is hit by the car and killed as the car crashes into a wall.


Not long after the heist, Kirby hears that Cleon has been giving out $100 bills and purchased a new Cadillac. Anthony drives over to Cleon's church to speak to him, only to find him being led out the front door in handcuffs by two detectives. Cleon gives up the other robbers as part of a plea bargain. NYPD officers storm Skip's apartment to arrest him, but find him dead from a heroin overdose. As Kirby and Anthony prepare to flee to Mexico, police raid the bar. Kirby tries to fight the officers to allow Anthony to flee, but it is to no avail, as multiple officers corner and arrest Anthony.


In court, Anthony's lawyer pleads for a fair sentence, noting that he served his country in the Marines and earned a Silver Star. Anthony also pleas for leniency, expressing remorse for the deaths of those involved, and that he did what he did out of desperation and hardship. However the judge, a Marine and Battle of Guadalcanal veteran, proclaims that Anthony has forgotten his values and shouldn't use the Vietnam War as an excuse for his actions, sentencing him to fifteen years to life. Anthony, furious at his sentence, throws a chair at the judge before being escorted away by bailiffs. The final scene shows Anthony looking out the window of his prison bus.


Cast

Larenz Tate as Anthony Curtis

Keith David as Kirby

Chris Tucker as Skip

N'Bushe Wright as Delilah Benson

Freddy Rodríguez as Jose "Joe"

Rose Jackson as Juanita Benson

Bokeem Woodbine as Cleon

Michael Imperioli as D'Ambrosio

David Barry Gray as Devaughn

Jaimz Woolvett as Lieutenant Dugan

Jenifer Lewis as Mrs. Curtis

James Pickens Jr. as Mr. Curtis

Clifton Powell as "Cutty"

Clifton Gonzalez Gonzalez as Betancourt

Terrence Howard as "Cowboy"

Jean-Claude La Marre as Ramsuer

Sticky Fingaz as Martin

Alvaleta Guess as Mrs. Benson

Elizabeth Rodriguez as Marisol

Tony Sirico as Officer Spinelli

Robert LuPone as Attorney Salvatore Rizzo

Martin Sheen as The Judge (uncredited)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Presidents


The Institute for the Works of Religion (Italian: Istituto per le Opere di Religione; Latin: Institutum pro Operibus Religionis; abbreviated IOR),[4][5] commonly known as the Vatican Bank, is a financial institution[2] that is situated inside Vatican City and run by a Board of Superintendence, which reports to a Commission of Cardinals and the Pope. It is not a private bank, as there are no owners or shareholders; it has been established in the form of a juridical canonical foundation, pursuant to its statutes.[2] Since 9 July 2014, its president is Jean-Baptiste de Franssu. The IOR is regulated by the Vatican's financial supervisory body ASIF (Autorità di Supervisione e Informazione Finanziaria).[6]


The Institute was founded in June 1942 by papal decree of Pope Pius XII. In June 2012, the IOR gave a first presentation of its operations. In July 2013, the Institute launched its own website.[7] On 1 October 2013, it also published its first-ever annual report.[8][9][10]


On 24 June 2013, Pope Francis created a special investigative Pontifical Commission (CRIOR) to study IOR reform.[11] On 7 April 2014, Pope Francis approved respective recommendations on the IOR's future which were jointly developed by the CRIOR and COSEA commissions and the IOR's management. "The IOR will continue to serve with prudence and provide specialized financial services to the Catholic Church worldwide", as the Vatican release stated.[12] On 7 April 2014, Pope Francis approved a proposal on the Institute's future, "reaffirming the importance of the IOR’s mission for the good of the Catholic Church, the Holy See and the Vatican City State".[12] On 30 January 2023, with a Chirograph published on March 7, Pope Francis revised the Statute, reaffirming that the purpose of the Institute is "to provide for the custody and management of movable and immovable assets transferred or entrusted to it by individuals or legal entities, intended for works of religion or charity."[13][14]


On 23 August 2022 Pope Francis signs a Rescript establishing that all financial resources of the Holy See and its associated institutions must be transferred to the Institute for the Works of Religion, which is to be considered the sole and exclusive entity responsible for asset management activities and the custodian of the Holy See's movable assets, as well as those of its departments, offices, and affiliated entities.[15][16]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_the_Works_of_Religion


Elon Musk breaks silence on Twitter, posts a picture with the pope

By Reuters

July 2, 20226:13 AM PDT Updated 2 years ago

July 2 (Reuters) - Elon Musk on Friday night broke his nine-day silence on Twitter, the social media platform he is trying to buy for $44 billion, posting a picture of him meeting Pope Francis on Thursday.

The world's richest person tweeted a picture where he can be seen standing next to the pope, captioning it: "Honored to meet @pontifex yesterday."

Musk's four teenage boys are also pictured, but not his 18-year-old transgender daughter who, on June 20 sought to change her name and sever ties with him. Musk has a total of eight children. read more

The purpose and location of Musk's meeting with the pope were not immediately clear.

Last month, Musk said there were "still a few unresolved matters" on the deal to buy Twitter, including the number of spam users on the system and the coming together of the debt portion of the deal.

https://www.reuters.com/technology/musk-breaks-silence-twitter-posts-picture-with-pope-2022-07-02/


Elon Reeve Musk was born on June 28, 1971, in Pretoria, South Africa's administrative capital.[2][3] He is of British and Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry.[4][5] His mother, Maye (née Haldeman), is a model and dietitian born in Saskatchewan, Canada, and raised in South Africa.[6][7][8][a] His father, Errol Musk, is a South African electromechanical engineer, pilot, sailor, consultant, emerald dealer, and property developer, who partly owned a rental lodge at Timbavati Private Nature Reserve.[14][15][16][17] Elon has a younger brother, Kimbal, a younger sister, Tosca, and four paternal half-siblings.[18][19][8][20] Musk was raised in the Anglican Church, in which he was baptized.[21][22]


The Musk family was wealthy during Elon's youth.[17] Despite both Elon and Errol previously stating that Errol was a part owner of a Zambian emerald mine,[17] in 2023, Errol recounted that the deal he made was to receive "a portion of the emeralds produced at three small mines".[23][24] Errol was elected to the Pretoria City Council as a representative of the anti-apartheid Progressive Party and has said that his children shared their father's dislike of apartheid.[2]


After his parents divorced in 1980, Elon chose to live primarily with his father.[4][14] Elon later regretted his decision and became estranged from his father.[25] Elon has recounted trips to a wilderness school that he described as a "paramilitary Lord of the Flies" where "bullying was a virtue" and children were encouraged to fight over rations.[26] In one incident, after an altercation with a fellow pupil, Elon was thrown down concrete steps and beaten severely, leading to him being hospitalized for his injuries.[27] Elon described his father berating him after he was discharged from the hospital.[27] Errol denied berating Elon and claimed, "The boy had just lost his father to suicide and Elon had called him stupid. Elon had a tendency to call people stupid. How could I possibly blame that child?"[28]


Elon was an enthusiastic reader of books, and had attributed his success in part to having read The Lord of the Rings, the Foundation series, and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.[16][29] At age ten, he developed an interest in computing and video games, teaching himself how to program from the VIC-20 user manual.[30] At age twelve, Elon sold his BASIC-based game Blastar to PC and Office Technology magazine for approximately $500.[31][32]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk


The Second Boer War (Afrikaans: Tweede Vryheidsoorlog, lit. 'Second Freedom War', 11 October 1899 – 31 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, Transvaal War,[8] Anglo–Boer War, or South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer republics (the South African Republic and Orange Free State) over the Empire's influence in Southern Africa.


The Witwatersrand Gold Rush caused a large influx of "foreigners" (Uitlanders) to the South African Republic (SAR), mostly British from the Cape Colony. As they, for fear of a hostile takeover of the SAR, were permitted to vote only after fourteen years of residence, they protested to the British authorities in the Cape. Negotiations failed at the botched Bloemfontein Conference in June 1899. The conflict broke out in October after the British government decided to send 10,000 troops to South Africa.[9] With a delay, this provoked a Boer and British ultimatum and subsequent Boer irregulars and militia attacks on British colonial settlements in Natal Colony. The Boers placed Ladysmith, Kimberley, and Mafeking under siege, and won victories at Colenso, Magersfontein and Stormberg. Increased numbers of British Army soldiers were brought to Southern Africa and mounted unsuccessful attacks against the Boers.


However, British fortunes changed when their commanding officer, General Redvers Buller, was replaced by Lord Roberts and Lord Kitchener, who relieved the besieged cities and invaded the Boer republics in early 1900 at the head of a 180,000-strong expeditionary force. The Boers, aware they were unable to resist such a large force, refrained from fighting pitched battles, allowing the British to occupy both republics and their capitals, Pretoria and Bloemfontein.[10][11][12] Boer politicians, including President of the South African Republic Paul Kruger, either fled or went into hiding; the British Empire officially annexed the two republics in 1900. In Britain, the Conservative ministry led by Lord Salisbury attempted to capitalise on British military successes by calling an early general election, dubbed by contemporary observers a "khaki election". However, Boer fighters took to the hills and launched a guerrilla campaign, becoming known as bittereinders. Led by generals such as Louis Botha, Jan Smuts, Christiaan de Wet, and Koos de la Rey, Boer guerrillas used hit-and-run attacks and ambushes against the British for two years.[13][14]


The guerrilla campaign proved difficult for the British to defeat, due to unfamiliarity with guerrilla tactics and extensive support for the guerrillas among civilians. In response to failures to defeat the guerrillas, British high command ordered scorched earth policies as part of a large scale and multi-pronged counterinsurgency campaign; a network of nets, blockhouses, strongpoints and barbed wire fences was constructed, virtually partitioning the occupied republics. Over 100,000 Boer civilians, mostly women and children, were forcibly relocated into concentration camps, where 26,000 died, mostly by starvation and disease. Black Africans were interned in concentration camps to prevent them from supplying the Boers; 20,000 died.[15] British mounted infantry were deployed to track down guerrillas, leading to small-scale skirmishes. Few combatants on either side were killed in action, with most casualties dying from disease. Kitchener offered generous terms of surrender to remaining Boer leaders to end the conflict. Eager to ensure fellow Boers were released from the camps, most Boer commanders accepted the British terms in the Treaty of Vereeniging, surrendering in May 1902.[16][17] The former republics were transformed into the British colonies of the Transvaal and Orange River, and in 1910 were merged with the Natal and Cape Colonies to form the Union of South Africa, a self-governing dominion within the British Empire.[18]


British expeditionary efforts were aided significantly by colonial forces from the Cape Colony, the Natal, Rhodesia,[19] and many volunteers from the British Empire worldwide, particularly Australia, Canada, India and New Zealand. Black African recruits contributed increasingly to the British war effort. International public opinion was sympathetic to the Boers and hostile to the British. Even within the UK, there existed significant opposition to the war. As a result, the Boer cause attracted thousands of volunteers from neutral countries, including the German Empire, United States, Russia and even some parts of the British Empire such as Australia and Ireland.[20] Some consider the war the beginning of questioning the British Empire's veneer of impenetrable global dominance, due to the war's surprising duration and the unforeseen losses suffered by the British.[21] A trial for British war crimes committed during the war, including the killings of civilians and prisoners, was opened in January 1901.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Boer_War


Orange (French pronunciation: [ɔʁɑ̃ʒ] ⓘ; Provençal: Aurenja (classical norm) or Aurenjo (Mistralian norm)) is a commune in the Vaucluse department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in Southeastern France.[3] It is about 21 km (13 mi) north of Avignon, on the departmental border with Gard, which follows the Rhône and also constitutes the regional border with Occitania. Orange is the second-most populated city in Vaucluse, after Avignon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orange,_Vaucluse


Agent Orange: This nickname gained traction during Trump's presidency, alluding to his controversial policies and the color of his trademark hair. It has a dual meaning, referencing both his hair color and the herbicide of the same name used during the Vietnam War.

https://abatul.com/


History of the Orange Order

The Loyal Orange Institution was formed on 21st September 1795 shortly after the ‘Battle of the Diamond’ outside Loughgall, Co. Armagh. Three well-known local men of the area, James Wilson, Dan Winter, and James Sloan, established the institution. Whilst much is made of these ‘founding fathers’ within Orange circles; from a spiritual perspective we see no evidence that any of them had evangelical credentials. History, in fact, shows that all three men were dedicated Freemasons and two of the three were actually proprietors of licensed premises.


The Bible addresses such people, saying, “Woe unto him that giveth his neighbour drink, that puttest thy bottle to him, and makest him drunken also, that thou mayest look on their nakedness!” (Habakkuk 2:15). The Rev. Allan Dunlop, addressing this passage of Scripture in his book ‘Where Shadows Fall’ (p. 37), says, “The curse of God is upon the drink trade for what profits it brings are wrung from widows tears, children’s terror, women’s virtue and young men’s strength; and of wives and mothers broken hearts.”


It is true to say that Dan Winter came from a Quaker background, although his ungodly lifestyle shows he was anything but a dedicated Quaker. Firstly, Quakers have always practised strict ‘total abstinence’ and have always opposed the devilish influence of alcohol. Winter was the proprietor of a public house. Secondly, Quakers have always been opposed to the heathenish practices and teachings of Freemasonry. Winter was a zealous Freemason. Thirdly, Quakers have always been pacifists, opposing all type of fighting. Winter was the leader of the local ‘Peep O’ Day Boys’ (an illegal Protestant militia group of the day), and he was also a well-known ‘cock fighter’ in the area.


The ‘Battle of the Diamond’ itself lasted only fifteen minutes and was centred on Dan Winter’s public house, which was located at the Diamond crossroads. This battle (or skirmish) resulted in Winter’s premises being burnt to the ground by the attacking Roman Catholics who were ironically known as ‘the Defenders’. This place was the special focus of the attack as it was the gathering house for the local ‘Peep O’ Day Boys’. Prior to the battle, the authorities had made several arrests and various arms seizures relating to this illegal group.


Winter’s supporters, many of whom were Freemasons, gathered around the debris of the public house and pledged themselves to form a new secret society, made up wholly of Protestant men. Now that they no longer had Winter’s premises as a meeting place the men retired to James Sloan’s public house in the local village of Loughgall. Here the Orange Institution was properly organised.


The founders of the Orange Institution were known as ‘unwarranted masons’, ‘clandestine masons’ or ‘hedge’ Masons. These Masons were a rebellious group who would not accept the existing degree format of the ruling Masonic Grand Lodge of the day. Belinda Loftus, in her book ‘Mirrors’ (p.24) confirms that the clandestine or hedge Masons were “unwarranted by the Grand Lodge in Dublin” because Irish Masonry “refused to recognise any degrees but craft.” Up until the early 1800s the Grand Masonic Lodge of Ireland only accepted three degrees, – Entered Apprentice, Fellowcraft and Master Mason, collectively known as the ‘Craft degrees’ or the ‘Blue Lodge’. All other degrees were held to be illegal.


Read a detailed exposure of the Royal Arch Purple by W P Malcomson:


The Unwarranted Masons were the more zealous (or esoteric) Masons who adhered to the many mystical degrees, which today are accepted within the domain of higher degree Freemasonry. These degrees are found under the auspices of the Red Lodge, known as the Chapter and the Chivalry degrees, known as the Preceptory.


The Irish Masonic publication ‘History of Freemasonry in the Province of Antrim’ alludes to these clandestine Masons. It explain how these men would ascend to “the top of some neighbouring hill, and there, towards the close of a summers evening, after the manner of the ancient Druids, perform their rites and ceremonies, the meeting being properly tyled and guarded…They were unwarranted and recognised no authority and no authority recognised them” (p.143&144).


Winter, Sloan and Wilson, accompanied by others, felt the great need to instigate a ceremony of initiation into the new body and not surprisingly Freemasonry was chosen as the model. They used the Masonic template to formulate their degree structure. That is why the Loyal Orders teaching, titles, symbols and rituals so closely resembles that of Freemasonry.


Initially the Orange had one sole degree known simply as the ‘Orange degree’. As the months progressed the founding fathers introduced a further degree somewhere around late 1796. The ‘Orange Marksman’ degree as it was originally designated, became better known as the ‘Purple degree’. It was constructed in Portadown, in the home of prominent Freemason, John Templeton – a location frequently used for Masonic ceremonies. Orange historian (and well known Freemason of his day) Colonel R.H. Wallace outlined in his ‘History of the Orange Order’ (1899) how the founders “were observed going into and out of a house in which a Masonic Lodge held its meetings,” and that, “He [Mr Templeton] invited them into the Masonic room, and there and then satisfactory arrangements were made.” He concluded by saying, “the influence of the place and its associations can be discerned in the results” (p. 50). Another Orange historian R.M. Sibbett in ‘Orangeism in Ireland and Throughout the Empire’ (1938) explained how, “The subject uppermost in their minds was touched upon and discussed, and, at the request of Mr. Templeton, they adjourned to a room which had been used for other ceremonies. Here the warrant was produced, the lodge was reopened, and a higher Order was added.”


A further degree was added as Orangeism consolidated itself. The Royal Arch Purple Chapter book states that, “Probably late in the year 1796 or early 1797 a third degree known as Purple Marksman was added to the ritual. It is likely to have been composed by the same hands, probably in the same room as that of the Orange Marksman or Purpleman” (History of the Royal Arch Purple Order p. 39).


Whilst little is known of the exact content of these three degrees it seems certain that they were highly ritualistic in character, being modelled on the first three degrees of Freemasonry, namely, Entered Apprentice, Fellowcraft and Master Mason. The Royal Arch Purple Chapter book testifies that these three initial Orange degrees were “elaborate degrees” (p. 59).


Orange degree – Entered Apprentice degree

Orange Marksman degree – Fellowcraft degree

Purple Marksman degree – Master Mason degree


These were the three main degrees that were worked within the Order between 1795 and 1798, although many other ritualistic degrees were finding their way into Orangeism throughout the island of Ireland. Most of these degrees can today be found within the Royal Black Institution.


During this early period each individual Orange lodge administered its own control over the working of degrees, as no controlling authority existed to govern the degree system. A Grand Lodge of Ulster, as it were, was formed on 12th of July 1797, although it seemed to exercise little power over the whole island of Ireland.


The prevailing confusion within the Order, coupled with a large influx of new members, due to the deteriorating political situation in the form of the Republican uprising of the ‘United Irelanders’, resulted in the formation of a Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland on 21st April 1798. This brought much needed stability and leadership to the Order at a strategic period in its history.


Grand Lodge immediately addressed the bewildering amount of unnecessary ritualism that had found its way into Orangeism, and here began a process of reform which purged out all the ritualistic baggage which had settled itself within the Order. This resulted in the disposal of the original three (elaborate) degrees of the Orange. These were replaced with two simplified degrees of ‘Orange’ and ‘Plain Purple’. Out with the old degrees went the old leadership of James Wilson, Dan Winter, and James Sloan.


Wasting little time, Grand Lodge released a strong statement on 13th December 1798 which reflected the hierarchy’s strong desire to separate themselves from former error, stating: “That many persons having introduced various Orders into the Orange Society which will very much tend to injure the regularity of the institution. The Grand Lodge disavows any Order but Orange and Purple and there can be none other regular unless issuing and approved by them.”


From this date forward, the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland accepted only two degrees within the Order – ‘Orange’ and ‘Plain Purple’. Between 1798 and 1800 Grand Lodge began a process of implementing this simplification by standardising procedures throughout every lodge in Ireland. That they might eradicate any lingering injurious behaviour by spurious characters, they abolished the old Orange Order in 1800, with its ritualistic connections, obliging every Orangeman to rejoin a now simplified new Orange Institution.


Grand Lodges opposition to Royal Arch Purple and Black degrees


1798-1801

1802-1828

1834-1875

1876-1878

1880-1913

1925

Those ritualistic Orangemen inside the Order who bore allegiance to the former neo-Masonic degrees were far from happy at this radical reform. Some continued to practise these illegal degrees in a clandestine manner, in blatant violation of the rules of the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland.


Facing strong persecution from a now powerful Grand Lodge and realising their beleaguered position, they merged the three old degrees into one large ritualistic degree. The Arch Purple Chapter’s book ‘History of the Royal Arch Purple Order’ explains: “Sometime between 1800 and 1811, possibly in 1802, a new degree was devised by the Brethren who valued and loved the old traditions and who were concerned by the turn of events” (p. 58). This degree was ” developed from the three pre 1798 ‘old degrees’ ” (p. 59). This elaborate degree became known as the ‘Royal Arch Purple degree’.


Orange degree

Orange Marksman degree – Royal Arch Purple degree

Purple Marksman degree


The Arch Purple Chapter’s book also confirms its composition, how that it was designed to “include as much as possible of the travel and ritual of the original three.”


The draft to the Arch Purple Chapter’s book diplomatically traces the roots of the Royal Arch Purple degree, stating that, “In light of the evidence available it would appear that the degree given today evolved from certain practices which had their origin in the Masonic Order, together with some innovations which had been introduced by those brethren conferring the degree in different areas being added to the original theme of the pre 1800 degrees to form a new ritual.” Even this guarded statement was omitted from the published book!


Nevertheless, in their book ‘The Orange Order: An Evangelical Perspective’ Grand Chaplain of the Grand Orange Lodge of Scotland (which owns the Royal Arch Purple as its third degree) Rev. Ian Meredith and Irish Arch Purple man Rev. Brian Kennaway comment on the Arch Purple degree. They state, “It has to be admitted that this is the most ‘Masonic-like’ part of our ceremony.” They later describe it as “a Christianised or ‘Reformed Freemasonry’ ” (pp. 12, 25).


From its inception, the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland looked upon this neo-Masonic Royal Arch Purple degree with understandable abhorrence. It was viewed as being incompatible with, and contrary to, both Protestantism and Orangeism. Those ritualistic Orangemen who practised the degree were persecuted by Grand Lodge, forcing them to practise the degree in great secrecy for fear of expulsion from the Order. Grand Lodge maintained this position throughout the whole of the 1800s and into the early 20th century. The hard line assumed by the Orange Institution in Ireland mirrored the resolute stance of Orangeism throughout Great Britain.


The history of the Royal Black Institution

The history of the Royal Black degrees

Royal Black Institution, the Crusades and the Jesuits

https://www.evangelicaltruth.com/royal-black-institution-crusades-the-jesuits/

https://www.evangelicaltruth.com/history-of-the-orange-order/


Trump International, Scotland

@TrumpScotland

Donald J Trump, 45th President of the United States, announced today the start of a new golf venture in Scotland: the MacLeod course, to be built at Trump International Scotland in Aberdeenshire in honor of his late mother Mary Anne MacLeod.

10:47 AM · May 1, 2023

https://x.com/TrumpScotland/status/1653093764271857666


James Francis Edward Stuart (10 June 1688 – 1 January 1766) [a] was the House of Stuart claimant to the thrones of England, Ireland and Scotland from 1701 until his death in 1766. The only son of James II of England and his second wife, Mary of Modena, he was Prince of Wales and heir until his Catholic father was deposed and exiled in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. His Protestant half-sister Mary II and her husband William III became co-monarchs. As a Catholic, he was subsequently excluded from the succession by the Act of Settlement 1701.


Raised primarily in France and Italy, when his father died in September 1701 James claimed the thrones. As part of the War of the Spanish Succession, in 1708 Louis XIV of France backed a landing in Scotland on his behalf. This failed, as did further attempts in 1715 and 1719. Led by his elder son Charles Edward Stuart, the 1745 Rising was the last serious effort to restore the House of Stuart.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Francis_Edward_Stuart  


This is Me Paperback – Illustrated, May 7, 2014

by Edward M. Dunn Jr. (Author)

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The surname Dunn comes from the Gaelic word donn, which means "brown" The Gaelic form O'Duinn (the descendant of donn) is most commonly anglicized as Dunn, but is also written as Dunne. The Dunn family is of the same Celtic stock as the O'Connors and O'Dempseys-clans who trace their descendants from Rossa Failgeach, eldest son of Cathaoir Mor, king of Ireland in the second century. The Dunn sept stems from Riagan, tenth in lineal descent from Failgeach, the district ruled over by Riagan, located in County Leix, which became the ancestral home of the Dunns. In later times, their chieftains were known as Lords of Iregan. Irish bards praise the martial prowess and commanding stature of the Dunn warriors. They were undoubtedly conspicuous in history for their doughty resistance to the encroachment of Anglo-Norman invaders who held lands in the pale boarding their territory. The Dunns were in the forefront of every battle for Irish nationalism. They suffered heavily in the bitter and prolonged struggle against Cromwell. In the next generation, they espoused the Stuart cause, and the head of the family was killed in the Battle of Aughrim. With the fall of the Stuarts, the lands of the Dunns were confiscated, and their fighting men who survived followed Sarsfield and the "wild geese" to fight in the ranks of the Irish Brigade in France. Many of them served with distinction in the regiments of O'Donnell, Lord Clare, and Walsh up to the days of the French Revolution. The name Dunn is twenty-seventh in the list of commonest surnames in Ireland. It is widespread in the United States also. Representatives of the family have achieved prominence in the literary, political, and religious life of our country.

https://www.amazon.com/This-Me-Edward-Dunn-Jr/dp/1493179608


Jacob Rothschild, Banker Who Broke From His Fabled Family, Dies at 87

The fourth Baron Rothschild, he left the family banking dynasty to start his own company, becoming a powerful financier, patron of the arts and philanthropist.


Mr. Rothschild retired as head of RIT Capital Partners in 2019. That year, his personal wealth was estimated by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index to be more than $1 billion.


Nathaniel Charles Jacob Rothschild was born in Berkshire, England, on April 29, 1936, to Victor Rothschild, the third Baron Rothschild, and his first wife, Barbara Judith (Hutchinson) Rothschild.


Mr. Rothschild studied history at Oxford before joining the family bank. After he resigned to head RIT, he became involved in a series of ventures, including an unsuccessful bid in 1989 with other investors to take over British American Tobacco for $21 billion.


He maintained a wide network of international connections, acting as deputy chairman of Rupert Murdoch’s BSkyB Television, and as an adviser to then-Prince Charles. He was a member of the International Advisory Board of the Blackstone Group, a leading private equity group, and co-founded the J. Rothschild Assurance Group in 1991, a wealth management company now known as St. James’s Place.


Not all his maneuvers were free of controversy. In 2003, British media reports said he had struck a trusteeship deal with Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky, a Russian oil tycoon and Putin foe, to transfer Mr. Khodorkovsky’s stake in the Yukos oil company to Mr. Rothschild in the event of his arrest. Mr. Khodorkovsky was arrested in October 2003 and later exiled. Mr. Rothschild did not confirm the reports.


Alongside his career as a high-powered financier, Mr. Rothschild played an energetic if sometimes secretive role in Israel, overseeing his family’s long-running philanthropic activities there as head of the Yad Hanadiv foundation.


Over the decades, the Rothschilds quietly sponsored major projects, including the construction of Israel’s Parliament, Supreme Court and National Library, none of which bear the family’s name. “We’ve tried not to be in the headlines,” Mr. Rothschild told The Jerusalem Report in 2012, adding, “Our tradition has been that we don’t shout from the rooftops what we are doing.”


He took over Yad Hanadiv after the death in 1988 of Dorothy de Rothschild, the foundation’s chairwoman and an aunt of his. She bequeathed him estates in Buckinghamshire, England.


Image

An aerial view of sprawling stone manor house built in the ornate style of a French chateau. A highly manicured garden the length of the house can be seen in the background.

Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild built Waddesdon Manor in the 1880s. It is now overseen by Britain’s National Trust, but Mr. Rothschild struck a deal in which the building would house the family’s enormous collection of art.Credit...David Goddard/Getty Images

The ownership of one of the properties, Waddesdon Manor, built by Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild in the 1880s in the style of a French chateau, had already been transferred to the nonprofit National Trust in 1957. But Mr. Rothschild struck an unusual deal with the trust to administer the manor as a home for the Rothschilds’ collection of an estimated 15,000 works of art and objects, and for his personal collection of Rothschild wines, mainly from the Bordeaux region of France.


Mr. Rothschild was a principal benefactor of the manor’s restoration and played a part in other ambitious projects, including the regeneration of Somerset House, an 18th-century building overlooking the River Thames in London. Among many arts-related positions in Britain and elsewhere, he chaired the trustees of London’s National Gallery from 1985 to 1991.


Mr. Rothschild married Serena DUNN, a racehorse owner, in 1961; she died in 2019. He had four children, Hannah, Beth, Emily and Nathaniel, and a number of grandchildren. Complete information on his survivors was not immediately available.


For all his standing among the world’s wealthy elite, Mr. Rothschild was openly critical of some of his peers in the international financial system. In 2012, four years after the economic crisis of 2008, he told The Jerusalem Report that he had “a lot of sympathy with people who protested about some of the excesses in the world of finance.”


“After all, here are characters who have made great fortunes, who have been in charge of a system which has been very damaging to many interests in the last five to 10 years,” he said. “They have had enormous benefits, but the banking system as a whole has had a crippling effect in a number of areas throughout the world.”


Victor Mather contributed reporting.


After a long career as a foreign correspondent for The New York Times based in Africa, the Middle East and Europe, Alan Cowell became a freelance contributor in 2015, based in London.


  More about Alan Cowell


See more on: Rothschild Family

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/26/business/jacob-rothschild-dead.html  


The Monument to the Royal Stuarts is a memorial in St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican City State. It commemorates the last three members of the Royal House of Stuart: James Francis Edward Stuart ("the Old Pretender", d. 1766), his elder son Charles Edward Stuart ("the Young Pretender" or "Bonnie Prince Charlie", d. 1788), and his younger son, Henry Benedict Stuart ("the Cardinal Duke of York", d. 1807). The Jacobites recognised these three as kings of England, Scotland and Ireland.


The marble monument is by Antonio Canova (1757–1822), the most celebrated Italian sculptor of his day. It was erected in 1819.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monument_to_the_Royal_Stuarts  


Valley of Traverse City

ANCIENT ACCEPTED SCOTTISH RITE

The History and Legend of Scottish Rite Origins

The Story Unfolds…

Like much of early Masonic history, the origins of the Scottish Rite are uncertain. This is primarily due to the lack of historic documentation prior to the early 1700’s and not to any great veiled mystery. The few records kept were subject to loss, fire, weather and aging. So we can at best only speculate on many of our origins by looking at the few documents, historical references and legends that remain.

What We Know

In 1754, near Paris, Chevalier de Bonneville established the Chapter of Clermont. The Chapter resided in the College of Jesuits of Clermont, hence the name. It is said to have been created to honor the Duc de Clermont, then Grand Master of the English Grand Lodge of France.

The Chapter of Clermont was a “Chapter of the Advanced Degrees” and initially entailed six degrees and was later extended to 25 known degrees. The six initial degrees were 1˚, 2˚ and 3˚ St John’s Masonry, 4˚ Knight of the Eagle, 5˚ Illustrious Knight or Templar, 6˚ Sublime Illustrious Knight.

Interestingly enough historically, prior to the time of the Rite’s creation, James II had been in residence at Clermont in exile from Britain from 1688 to his death in 1701. As noted by German Masonic historian, Lenning… “whilst in exile, James II residing at the Jesuit College of Clermont in France, allowed his closest associates to fabricate certain degrees in order to extend their political views.” Lenning believed this to have been an attempt on the part of James and his associates to regain control of the British throne for the House of Stuart. If Lenning is right, this places the origins of the “Rite of Perfection” in the hands of James II and the Jacobite (Stuart) Freemasons who at the time were in exile from Great Britain throughout France and Italy. Lenning also contends that these degrees were introduced into French Freemasonry under the name of the Clermont System.

James II died in exile in 1701. His son James III is said to have continued his father’s Masonic legacy and later created further higher degrees.

Perhaps James II saw in the Jesuit morality plays of the College of Clermont a vessel for passing on a set of moral lessons. Some of the world’s greatest playwrights had emerged from Clermont. Jesuit tutelage had previously produced great writers such as Lope de Vega, Moliere, Racine, and the Corneille brothers. Ensconced in exile, I believe James II did find the inspiration and the training to help produce what would later become the first six degrees. From out of the darkness… comes light.

To be continued… (Author’s note… An in depth look at the Templar influence in Scottish Rite masonry’s origins can be found by visiting the Rosslyn Templars’ website.)"

https://web.archive.org/.../scottish-rite-history.html


PART VI 1THE PERSONAL LIFE OF THOSE ALREADY ADMITTED AND INCORPORATED INTO THE BODY OF THE SOCIETY

SECTION 1: THE APOSTOLIC CHARACTER OF OUR VOWS IN GENERAL

143 §1. Our consecration by profession of the evangelical counsels, by which we respond to a divine vocation, is at one and the same time the following of Christ poor, virginal, and obedient and a rejection of those idols that the world is always prepared to adore, especially wealth, pleasure, prestige, and power. Hence, our poverty, chastity, and obedience ought visibly and efficaciously to bear witness to this attitude, whereby we proclaim the evangelical possibility of a certain communion among men and women that is a foretaste of the future kingdom of God.[1]

§2. Our religious vows, while binding us, also set us FREE:

FREE, by our vow of poverty, to share the life of the poor and to use whatever resources we may have, not for our own security and comfort, but for service;

FREE, by our vow of chastity, to be men for others, in friendship and communion with all, but especially with those who share our mission of service;

FREE, by our vow of obedience, to respond to the call of Christ as made known to us by him whom the Spirit has placed over the Church, and to follow the lead of all our superiors.[2] [1] See GC 32, d. 4, no. 16; see GC 31, d. 16, no. 4; d. 17, no. 2; d. 18, no. 3. [2] GC 32, d. 2, no. 20. 215

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


I began by attending Fordham University in the Bronx, mostly because I wanted to be close to home. I got along very well with the Jesuits who ran the school, but after two years, I decided that as long as I had to be in college, I might as well test myself against the best. I applied to the Wharton School of Finance at the University of Pennsylvania and I got in. At the time, if you were going to make a career in business, Wharton was the place to go. Harvard Business School may produce a lot of CEOs—guys who manage public companies— but the real entrepreneurs all seemed to go to Wharton: Saul Steinberg, Leonard Lauder, Ron Perelman—the list goes on and on."

Donald Trump The Art of the Deal

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1DLcbnLrl6moQT7nGj1JitG6AiQ6qgK0y/view?usp=sharing

University of Scranton welcomes President Biden

The university has illuminated its Class of 2020 Gateway in red and blue lights.

Author: WNEP Web Staff

Published: 10:52 PM EDT October 19, 2021

Updated: 10:52 PM EDT October 19, 2021

SCRANTON, Pa. — In preparation for President Joe Biden's visit, a university lit up their lights in his honor.


The University of Scranton has illuminated its Class of 2020 Gateway in blue and red with the number 46 prominently displayed to welcome the 46th president."

University of Scranton welcomes President Biden | wnep.com

https://www.wnep.com/article/news/local/lackawanna-county/university-of-scranton-welcomes-president-biden-gateway-lights/523-cdba68b1-822b-4747-94be-4cd7e4de9d67

"His son, Hunter Biden, 38, is a longtime federal lobbyist for the Jesuit university located in his father's hometown, Scranton PA. According to federal disclosures, Hunter Biden has been earning about $80,000 a year since 2006 to lobby for this university. Senator Biden himself has lectured at the Jesuit University of Scranton, and received an honorary degree from the same university, in 1976."

Codeword Barbelon

by P.D. Stuart


On June 24, 1717, six months after the exile of the Stuarts, four lodges in London (names not given) met at Apple-Tree Tavern and united English Freemasonry under the name "United Grand Lodge," which has been nicknamed the Mother Grand Lodge, or Grand Mother Lodge.

The first French Templar Lodge was founded in 1725 by a contingent of exiled Stuart sympathizers. In 1745 Prince Charles Edward Stuart, the Young Pretender, attempted to regain his Scottish throne and was soundly defeated in less than a year. Upon returning to France, the Scottish Templars founded the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry, quickly developing it to 32 degrees by 1755. In 1801 all French lodges accepted the Templar Scottish Rite degrees. That same year the Scottish Rite of Charleston, S.C., created the 33rd and final degree in Templar Freemasonry.

On the continent of Europe, French Freemasonry is known as Scottish Rite, Grand Orient, French Grand Lodge, Continental, or Latin Freemasonry. The Templar York Rite in England was transported to America, where it remains to this day. English Freemasonry continued with the three Craft Degrees until 1860, when it adopted the thirty additional degrees of the Scottish Rite, but for competitive reasons refused to call it "Scottish."'

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://ia803001.us.archive.org/28/items/ScarletAndTheBeastJohnDaniel1995/Scarlet%20and%20the%20Beast,%20John%20Daniel%20(1995).pdf


The De Beers Group is a South African–British corporation that specializes in the diamond industry, including mining, exploration, retail, inscription, grading, trading and industrial diamond manufacturing.[3] The company is active in open-pit, underground, large-scale alluvial and coastal mining. It operates in 35 countries with mining taking place in Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, and Canada. It also has an artisanal mining business, Gemfair, which operates in Sierra Leone.


From its inception in 1888 until the start of the 21st century, De Beers controlled 80% to 85% of rough diamond distribution and was considered a monopoly.[4] By 2000, the company's control of the world diamond supply decreased to 63%.[5]


The company was founded in 1888 by British businessman Cecil Rhodes, who was financed by the South African diamond magnate Alfred Beit and the London-based N M Rothschild & Sons bank.[6][7] In 1926, Ernest Oppenheimer, a German immigrant to Britain and later South Africa who had earlier founded mining company Anglo American with American financier J. P. Morgan,[8] was elected to the board of De Beers.[9] He built and consolidated the company's global monopoly over the diamond industry until his death in 1957. During this time, he was involved in several controversies, including price fixing and trust behaviour, and was accused of not releasing industrial diamonds for the US war effort during World War II.[10][11]


In 2011, Anglo American took control of De Beers after buying the Oppenheimers' family stake of 40% for US$5.1 billion (£3.2 billion) and increasing its stake to 85%, ending the 80-year Oppenheimer control of the company.[12] The company is currently owned 85% by Anglo American and 15% by the Government of Botswana.


In May 2024, Anglo American announced its intention to spin off or sell De Beers.[13]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Beers


The first member of the family who was known to use the name "Rothschild" was Isaak Elchanan Rothschild, born in 1577. The name is derived from the German zum rothen Schild (with the old spelling "th"), meaning "at the red shield", in reference to the house where the family lived for many generations (in those days, houses were designated not by numbers, but by signs displaying different symbols or colours). A red shield can still be seen at the centre of the Rothschild coat of arms. The family's ascent to international prominence began in 1744, with the birth of Mayer Amschel Rothschild in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. He was the son of Amschel Moses Rothschild (born circa 1710),[13] a money changer who had traded with the Prince of Hesse. Born in the "Judengasse", the ghetto of Frankfurt, Mayer developed a finance house and spread his empire by installing each of his five sons in the five main European financial centres to conduct business. The Rothschild coat of arms contains a clenched fist with five arrows symbolising the five dynasties established by the five sons of Mayer Rothschild, in a reference to Psalm 127: "Like arrows in the hands of a warrior, so are the children of one's youth." The family motto appears below the shield: Concordia, Integritas, Industria (Unity, Integrity, Industry).[14]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rothschild_family


When his grandson, Naftali Hirz left the "House at the Red Shield" in 1664 and moved to the Hinterpfann (a tenement in the back of a house at the northern end of the Judengasse), he took the name Rothschild with him."

The Family ‹ Rothschild Name & Arms :: The Rothschild Archive

https://www.rothschildarchive.org/family/the_rothschild_name_and_arms/any_questions


From Middle High German hirz, from Old High German hiruz, from Proto-West Germanic *herut, from Proto-Germanic *herutaz. Compare Dutch hert, English hart."

Hirsch - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Hirsch#:~:text=German-,Etymology,Compare%20Dutch%20hert%2C%20English%20hart.


The word “Hirz” has its origins in Arabic and is often used to refer to a fortified or protected place. In its broader sense, it represents a location or space that is enclosed and fortified, offering a sense of safety and protection to those inside."

What is Islamic Hirz and Amulet? - MyRings Boutique

https://www.myrings.co/blog/what-is-islamic-hirz-and-amulet/#:~:text=The%20word%20%E2%80%9CHirz%E2%80%9D%20has%20its,and%20protection%20to%20those%20inside.


Herzl is a beautiful boy's name of Yiddish origin. Borrowed from the name Hirsh, Herzl means “deer,” making it a special way to dote on your little one's delicate nature."

Herzl - Baby Name Meaning, Origin and Popularity (thebump.com)

https://www.thebump.com/b/herzl-baby-name


The ancestral home of the Herzl family is in the German province of Bavaria. Herzl is a German nickname surname. Such names came from eke-names, or added names, that described their initial bearer through reference to a physical characteristic or other attribute. It is a name for a kindhearted or stalwart individual, and is derived from the German word herz, which means heart."

Herzl Name Meaning, Family History, Family Crest & Coats of Arms (houseofnames.com)

https://www.houseofnames.com/herzl-family-crest


Old English heorte "heart (hollow muscular organ that circulates blood); breast, soul, spirit, will, desire; courage; mind, intellect," from Proto-Germanic *hertan- (source also of Old Saxon herta, Old Frisian herte, Old Norse hjarta, Dutch hart, Old High German herza, German Herz, Gothic hairto), from PIE root *kerd- "heart.""

heart | Etymology, origin and meaning of heart by etymonline

https://www.etymonline.com/word/heart


[666] 6. 1On the side of the superior general, what will aid toward this union of hearts are the qualities of his person [G], to be treated in Part IX [723-25], with which he will perform his office, 2which is to be for all the members a head from which the influence required for the end sought by the Society ought to descend to them all. 3It is thus from the general as head that all authority of the provincials should flow, from the provincials that of the local superiors, and from the local superiors that of the individual members. 4And from this same head, or at least by his commission and approval, should likewise come the appointing of missions. And the same should apply to communicating the graces of the Society. 5For the more the subjects are dependent upon their superiors, the better will the love, obedience, and union among them be preserved.

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

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9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? 10 I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings." Jeremiah 17:9-10


6. The delegates commit to working with the schools to enhance the way parents and families are invited into our education and formation." The Rio Papers International Congress for Jesuit Education Delegates Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, October 2017

The Rio Papers (googleusercontent.com)

https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:ce18dDJhSfoJ:https://jesuitinstitute.org/Resources/Rio%2520Papers.pdf&cd=51&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us


Administration/administrators of temporal goods: 1. Of the Society in general: those who are administrators [326, 327, 419-21, 740-745, 759, 815]; the powers they have [743-745]; in what spirit and with what care and dedication the temporal goods of the Society are to be administered [305], 216 §§1, 2-4; social justice is to be safeguarded and fostered in the investment of money, 217; nothing is to be changed in or derogated from norms and instructions without permission, 216 §3; an account of one s administration is to be rendered [326, 741, 759], 167; especially so at the end of the t e rm s o f o f f i c e o f l o c a l superiors and treasurers, 222; negligent or wasteful superiors are to be corrected, 216 §4 2. Of one s own goods: is to be yielded from the beginning of novitiate and after first vows, 57 3. Of the goods of others: not to be undertaken without permission of the general, 166; administration of deposits of money from externs, whether in cash or in negotiable paper, should not be undertaken, 219. See also Buildings; Contracts in general, and in particular: Alienation of goods; Debts; Deposits; Gifts; Investment of money; Legacy; Rentals; Revenues

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


The Union Générale.

Meanwhile the Nationalist and Reactionary parties in France desired to counterbalance the "Semitic" influence of the Rothschilds by establishing a banking concern which should be essentially Catholic. Accordingly in 1876 the Union Générale was founded with a capital of 4,000,000 francs, increased to 25,000, 000 fraces in 1878 under the direction of a certain Bontoux. After various vicissitudes, graphically described by Zola in his novel "L'Argent," the Union failed, and brought many of the Catholic nobility of France to ruin, leaving the Rothschilds still more absolutely the undisputed leaders of French finance, but leaving also a legacy of hatred which had much influence on the growth of the anti-Semitic movement in France. Something analogous occurred in England when the century-long competition of the Barings and the Rothschilds culminated in the failure of the former in 1893; but in this case the Rothschilds came to the rescue of their rivals and prevented a universal financial catastrophe. It is a somewhat curious sequel to the attempt to set up a Catholic competitor to the Roths-childs that at the present time the latter are the guardians of the papal treasure.


Of recent years the Rothschilds have consistently refused to have anything to do with loans to Russia, owing to the anti-Jewish legislation of that empire, though on one occasion the members of the Paris house joined in a loan to demonstrate their patriotism as Frenchmen.


As Philanthropists and Art Patrons.

The remarkable success of the Rothschilds, which has now lasted exactly a century, has been due in the first place to the financial genius of Nathan Mayer Rothschild, and secondly in large measure to the settlement of the five brothers in the European capitals, which enabled them to issue loans simultaneously. In the early and later stages the London house was the base of operations; but during the reign of Louis Philippe the Paris house appears to have directed undertakings. The business principles on which the Rothschilds acted were the unified policy of the five, later four, and finally three firms; their determination never to deal with unsuccessful persons; their use of the surest information and the most reliable instruments; and prompt action after obtaining such information. They did not aim at excessive profits, nor did they put "all their eggs in one basket"; they drew back in time if an enterprise was not promising, selling quickly, if necessary even at a loss, on the principle that the first loss is the best; and they were almost the first to make use of journalistic methods to arouse the interest of the public in their loans. They have, however, consistently kept the secret of their own operations. The original five brothers were shrewd business men, but all were equally uncultured (Karl Mayer writes of a "kondract" he had made). Their descendants, however, have been among the great patrons of art throughout western Europe, the collections of Barons Amschel, James, and Ferdinand being especially noteworthy. They have created quite a school of Jewish dealers in art, whose chief customers they have been (Duveen, C. Davis, Spitzer, and Wertheimer).


The services of the Rothschilds in the cause of philanthropy have been equally marked. Special hospitals have been founded by them for all creeds at Jerusalem, Vienna, Paris, and London; the Jews' Free School of the last-named city is supported almost entirely by Lord Rothschild at an estimated annual cost of £15,000. In London and Paris they have established workmen's dwellings on a large scale and on an economic and commercial basis; and their private charities are very large. The founder of the house, Mayer Amschel Rothschild, held the curious theory that if a beggar thanked him, the charitable transaction was concluded, whereas if he received no thanks, Heaven owed him some recompense for his charity. Consequently, it was his custom to thrust a coin into the hand of a beggar, and to hurry away before the latter could express his gratitude.


In addition, some of the members of the family have evinced an interest in Jewish literature. Baron James in Paris was the founder of the Société des Etudes Juives; Baron Wilhelm of Frankfort was a zealous collector of Hebrew incunabula, which are now in the Frankfort town library; and almost all great Jewish literary undertakings have been subventioned by one or other branch of the firm.


Hitherto the pedigree of the Rothschild family has been traced only as far as Amschel, the father of Mayer Amschel Rothschild; but, owing to the recent publication of the tombstone inscriptions of Frankfort-on-the-Main by Horovitz ("Inschriften von Frankfort"), it is now possible to trace it back with a high degree of probability four generations further, as far as Moses Rothschild, who was born about the middle of the sixteenth century. There is little doubt that all the Rothschilds form one family, as is shown by the similarity of first names; this would account for the somewhat unusual name of Kalman (brother of Mayer Amschel), and would give some hint as to the use of "Jacob" as the name of Mayer Amschel's youngest son, since the younger son of the uncle after whom he was named was also called Jacob. It is also seen that the rabbinic part of the family left Frankfort early in the seventeenth century, and is not related in a direct line with the more worldly portion.


The number of marriages between cousins in the later history of the family is remarkable, especially in the second and third generations after the five brothers had gone to five different capitals. Altogether of fifty-eight marriages contracted by the descendants of Mayer Amschel Rothschild to date (1905), no less than twenty-nine, or exactly one-half, have been between first cousins. It is noteworthy that these marriages as a rule have been fertile, which is what is anticipated by biological science; but several of the unions have resulted in daughters only, which is also anthropologically significant.


In the first names adopted there has been a restriction in choice in the early generations, causing a considerable amount of confusion between the many Charlottes, Louises, Karls, and Nathans. As a rule, the son has adopted the father's name as a second name, which has enabled a distinction to be made,and the same plan has with less suitability been followed in the case of the daughters. The family tree is found on pages 491-493.


Bibliography:

Das Haus Rothschild, Seine Geschichte und Geschäfte, Prague, 1857;

Reeves, The Rothschilds, London, 1887;

Scherb, Gesch. das Hauses Rothschild, Berlin, 1892;

A. Ehrenberg, in Deutsche Rundschau, 1903-4;

Dict. National Biography;

Wurzbach, Biographisches Lexikon, s. v.;

A. Kohut, Jüdische Berühmtheiten;

Horovitz, Inschriften von Frankfort;

Lewysohn, Sechzig Epiiaphien zu Worms.

https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/12909

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid024yZdYGrKib969zbfc9EUpSkcHhrdaaRvXEGUxmNtJNp7oh8X7fpYmoiiTcvQv39Fl


Sheriff Jim Cooper

Wednesday, December 3, 2025 at 6:45 AM

Hustlin'  · Rick Ross

After a long day yesterday, I stopped by the Main Jail last night to say hi to the Deputies on A-Nights, who are all chomping at the bit to get out to patrol. Seeing that kind of drive and focus from our Deputies makes me proud and I know our department will be in great hands for years to come.

https://www.facebook.com/SheriffJimCooper/posts/pfbid02yaZnxCt5afCui3EL1JTr74Lb3fLqTFTLWWqppCA5eXCn8fNXwsjcrfKaqfoaN3XMl


"Papa Was a Rollin' Stone" is a song originally performed by Motown recording act the Undisputed Truth in 1972, though it became much better known after a Grammy Award-winning cover by the Temptations was issued later the same year. This latter version of the song became a number-one hit on the Billboard Hot 100.


"Papa Was a Rollin' Stone" was written by Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong in 1971. Whitfield produced the original Undisputed Truth version, which was released as a single in May 1972. This version of the song peaked at number 63 on the Pop Charts and number 24 on the R&B Charts. The song was included on the Undisputed Truth's album Law of the Land (1973).


Later in 1972, Whitfield cut a different version of the song, turning it into a 12-minute track for the Temptations. This version was included on their 1972 album All Directions. The edited 7-inch single release of this Temptations track was issued in September 1972, and this version was a number-one hit on the Billboard Hot 100 and won three Grammy Awards in 1973. While the original Undisputed Truth version of the song has been largely forgotten, the Temptations' version of the song has been regarded as an enduring and influential soul classic. The full-length album version was ranked number 169 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, one of the group's three songs on the list. In retrospect, the Temptations' Otis Williams considers the song to be the last real classic the group recorded (it would be the Temptations' last number one hit and would win them their second and final Grammy Award in a competitive category).


Overview

Beginning with an extended instrumental introduction (3:53 in length), each of the three verses in the Temptations's version is separated by extended musical passages, in which Whitfield brings various instrumental textures in and out of the mix. A solo plucked bass guitar part, backed by hi-hat cymbals drumming, establishes the musical theme, a simple three-note figure; the bass is gradually joined by other instruments, including a blues guitar, wah-wah guitar, electric piano, handclaps, strings and solo trumpet; all are tied together by the ever-present bass guitar line and repeating hi-hat rhythm.


The full-length version is listed as 11:45 on the sleeve of the All Directions album. However, on the original vinyl version of the album (despite the sleeve showing 11:45), the song's fade-out is extended, including several sequential drum fills before fully fading out, pushing the song's length to approximately 12:04.[5] When All Directions was issued on CD, its length was in fact shortened to 11:45. The original full LP version is featured on the Temptations' Psychedelic Soul compilation.[6]


Vocal duties are performed in a true ensemble style: Temptations singers Dennis Edwards, Melvin Franklin, Richard Street (who was a frequent fill-in for Paul Williams and his eventual replacement) and Damon Harris (who had replaced Eddie Kendricks as the group's falsetto singer the previous year) alternate vocal lines, taking the role of siblings questioning their mother about their now-dead father; their increasingly pointed questions, and the mother's repeated response ("Papa was a rollin' stone/wherever he laid his hat was his home/and when he died, all he left us was alone") paint a somber picture for the children who have never seen their father and have "never heard nothing but bad things about him."


Friction arose during the recording of "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone" for a number of reasons. The Temptations did not like the fact that Whitfield's instrumentation had been getting more emphasis than their vocals on their songs at the time, and that they had to press Whitfield to get him to produce ballads for the group. Whitfield forced Edwards to re-record his parts dozens of times until he finally got the angered, bitter grumble he desired out of the usually fiery-toned Edwards.[7] Whitfield's treatment of the group eventually led to his dismissal as their producer.[7] Legend has it that Edwards was angered by the song's first verse: "It was the third of September/That day I'll always remember/'cause that was the day/that my daddy died", as his father was said to have died on the third of September. Edwards's father actually died on the third of October.[7]


The solo trumpet part in the introduction was played by Funk Brothers member Maurice Davis; guitar parts were played by fellow member Melvin "Wah-Wah Watson" Ragin[8] and a young Paul Warren.[9] The Temptations' version of "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone" followed in the extended-length "cinematic soul" tradition of the work of Isaac Hayes and others, and future songs like Donna Summer's 14-minute "Love to Love You Baby" and the instrumentals of MFSB expanded upon the concept in the mid-1970s.


Release

A seven-minute edited version of "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone" was released as a single in September 1972. For this mix, congas were added to bolster the song's sparse percussion; this version appeared on the 1973 Anthology triple LP. The Temptations' box set Emperors of Soul has the edited version in stereo, but without the congas. The B-side was the instrumental backing by the Funk Brothers without the Temptations' vocals (though Damon Harris' final chorus is included after a single "Unngh!" at the end of the second verse), this version appears on the Funk Brothers' 2003 compilation 20th Century Masters: The Millennium Collection.


Reception

"Papa Was a Rollin' Stone" rose to number one on the U.S. pop charts and number five on the U.S. R&B charts, becoming the Temptations' final pop number-one hit. The song, the anchor of the 1972 Temptations album All Directions, won three 1973 Grammy Awards: its A-side won for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Group; its B-side won for Best R&B Instrumental (awarded to Whitfield and arranger/conductor Paul Riser); and Whitfield and Barrett Strong won for Best R&B Song as the song's composers. In 1999, the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.[10]


Music critic Kelefa Sanneh described the song as "nearly seven glorious minutes long (the album version was twelve) sustained by little more than a perfect bassline and a few artfully placed hand claps."[11]


Stereogum called it "a monolith. A towering monument out of tense hi-hats and pulsating bass and shivering strings and hard-strutting chicken-scratch guitars and panicked trumpet-blasts. And the merciless four-four stomp-clap beat predicted not just disco but house music, as well."[12]


Covers and remixes

Bill "Wolf" Wolfer created an electronic cover of the song for his 1983 debut album Wolf.[13][14] The single peaked at number 55 on the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1983, as well as number 47 on the R&B singles chart.[15] Michael Jackson provided backing vocals.[16]

The group Was (Not Was) covered the song on their 1990 album Are You Okay?. Their version reached number 12 in the UK.[17]

George Michael performed "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone" live at the Wembley Arena in March 1991 and released it in a remixed version together with the Adamski song "Killer" on the 1993 EP Five Live. It was released as a single and charted at number 69 on the US Billboard Hot 100.[citation needed]

On May 17, 2024, British-American musician Slash released a cover of the song as part of his second solo studio album Orgy of the Damned (2024); the track featured American singer Demi Lovato.[18]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papa_Was_a_Rollin%27_Stone

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid02g9wFuxCnHbzejbD3C6mpYSWrUzAiaf398VHQsdTHC2gN8gbAWicej3ncDcxe4vwEl


Marcia Rachel Clark (née Kleks, formerly Horowitz; born August 31, 1953[1]) is an American prosecutor, author, television correspondent, and television producer.[2] She was the lead prosecutor in the O. J. Simpson murder case.[3][4]


Early life and education

Clark was born Marcia Rachel Kleks on August 31, 1953,[1] the daughter of Rozlyn (née Masur) and Abraham Kleks. Her father was born in Mandatory Palestine and raised there and in Israel, and worked as a chemist for the FDA.[5] Because of her father's job, the family moved several times, including living in California, New York, Michigan, and Maryland.[5]


Kleks graduated from Susan E. Wagner High School, a public school in the Manor Heights section of Staten Island, New York City.[6] She studied at the University of California, Los Angeles, graduating in 1976 with a degree in political science, and then earned a Juris Doctor degree at Southwestern University School of Law.[citation needed]


Career

Attorney

Clark was admitted to the State Bar of California in 1979, where she continued to practice law.[7] She worked in private practice and as a public defender for the city of Los Angeles before she became a prosecutor in 1981.[5][8] She worked as a deputy district attorney for Los Angeles County, California and was mentored by prosecutor Harvey Giss.[9]


Clark is well known as the lead prosecutor in the 1995 trial of O. J. Simpson for the murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman.[10] Prior to the Simpson trial, Clark's highest-profile trial occurred in 1991 when she prosecuted Robert John Bardo for the murder of television star Rebecca Schaeffer.[11][12][13] Clark said that the media attention that she received during the trial was "the hell of the trial," calling herself "famous in a way that was kind of terrifying."[14] Clark was advised by a jury consultant to "talk softer, dress softer, wear pastels" in order to improve her image.[14] She subsequently changed her hairstyle into a perm, and the Los Angeles Times described her as resembling "Sigourney Weaver, only more professional."[15] The New York Times commented that "the transformation was not entirely seamless."


Commentator and author

Clark resigned from the district attorney's office after she lost the Simpson case. She and Teresa Carpenter wrote a book about the Simpson case, Without a Doubt, in a deal reported to be worth $4.2 million.[8][16]


Since the Simpson trial, Clark has made numerous appearances on television, including as a special correspondent for Entertainment Tonight. She provided coverage of high-profile trials and reported from the red carpet at awards shows such as the Emmy Awards. She was a guest attorney on the short-lived television series Power of Attorney and was also featured on Headline News analyzing the Casey Anthony trial. In July 2013, Clark provided commentary for CNN during the Florida trial of George Zimmerman.[citation needed]


Clark wrote a pilot script for a television series called Borderland, centering on "a very dark version of the DA's office." The series was purchased by FX but was never produced.[8] Clark has contributed true-crime articles to The Daily Beast.[17]


Clark has written several novels.[18] Her "Rachel Knight" series centers on a prosecutor in the Los Angeles district attorney's office, and includes Guilt By Association (2011),[19] Guilt By Degrees (2012),[20] Killer Ambition (2013)[21] and The Competition (2014).[22] Guilt by Association was adapted as a television pilot for TNT in 2014.[18][23][24]


Clark's "Samantha Brinkman" series features a female defense attorney. It includes Blood Defense (2016), Moral Defense (2016) and Snap Judgment (2017), and was planned as a television adaptation series for NBC that Clark would cowrite.[18][24] Clark did not expect to become an author, saying, "As a lawyer, I came to understand early that storytelling plays a very important part when you address a jury. So I guess my instincts have always kind of been there when it comes to weaving a narrative."[25] She read Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys mystery fiction as a child and said "I have been addicted to crime since I was born. I was making up crime stories when I was a 4 or 5-year-old kid."[26]


Media appearances

In August 2013, Clark appeared as attorney Sidney Barnes in the Pretty Little Liars episode on Freeform (formally ABC) titled "Now You See Me, Now You Don't".[27]


In 2015, Clark was parodied on the sitcom Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt through the character Marcia, implied to represent Marcia Clark in a relationship with Chris Darden. The character portrayed by Tina Fey,[28][29] whose performance earned her a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for the role.[30]


Clark appears in the 2016 documentary miniseries O.J.: Made in America.[31][32] That same year, she was portrayed by Sarah Paulson in the 2016 television series The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story, which focuses on the Simpson trial. Paulson's performance as Clark earned wide acclaim, and she earned a Primetime Emmy Award and a Golden Globe Award for the role.[33][34] Clark attended the Emmy Awards with Paulson on September 18, 2016.[33] Katey Rich wrote in Vanity Fair that the series positions Clark as a "feminist hero."[35]


In 2019, Clark appeared in the 18th season finale of Gordon Ramsay's reality series Hell's Kitchen as a VIP guest diner for winner and Season 6 veteran Ariel Contreras-Fox.


In 2024, Clark appeared on the third episode of comedian John Mulaney’s live comedy special Everybody’s in LA. While the episode was themed to and titled "Helicopters," much of the discussion focused around the 1994 O.J. Simpson trial due to the presence of Clark and reporter Zoey Tur, who famously captured helicopter footage of the slow-speed Bronco chase. Clark and Tur had never met before their appearance on the show.


Personal life

When Clark was 17 years old, she was raped on a trip to Israel. She has said that it was an experience with which she did not deal until later in life and that it greatly influenced her decision to become a prosecutor.[8]


In 1976, Clark married Gabriel Horowitz, an Israeli professional backgammon player[36] whom she had met as a student at UCLA.[5] They obtained a "Mexican divorce"[5] in 1980[8][37] and had no children. Horowitz was briefly in the news after he sold topless photos of Clark to the National Enquirer during the Simpson trial.[5]


In 1980, Clark married her second husband, Gordon Clark, a computer programmer and systems administrator who was employed at the Church of Scientology.[8][38] They were divorced in 1995 and had two sons.[8] Gordon argued at a custody hearing during the Simpson trial that he should receive full custody of their children given the long hours that Marcia had spent working for the trial.[5]


Clark no longer considers herself religious, although she was raised Jewish and her first wedding was a Conservative Jewish ceremony.[8] She was a member of the Church of Scientology until 1980.[8]


Clark resides in Calabasas, California.[8]


Bibliography

Non-fiction

Without a Doubt with Teresa Carpenter (1997). Viking Press. ISBN 978-0-670-87089-9

Trial by Ambush: Murder, Injustice, and the Truth about the Case of Barbara Graham (2024). Thomas & Mercer. ISBN 978-1-662-51596-5

Rachel Knight series

Guilt By Association (2011). Mulholland Books. ISBN 978-0-316-12951-0

Guilt By Degrees (2012). Mulholland Books. ISBN 978-0-316-12953-4

Killer Ambition (2013). Mulholland Books. ISBN 978-0-316-22094-1

The Competition (2014). Mulholland Books. ISBN 978-0-316-22097-2

If I'm Dead: A Rachel Knight Story (2012). Mulholland Books. Digital.

Trouble in Paradise: A Rachel Knight Story (2013). Mulholland Books. Digital.

Samantha Brinkman series

Blood Defense (2016). Thomas & Mercer. ISBN 978-1-503-93619-5

Moral Defense (2016). Thomas & Mercer. ISBN 978-1-503-93977-6

Snap Judgment (2017). Thomas & Mercer. ISBN 978-1-542-04599-5

Final Judgment (2020). Thomas & Mercer. ISBN 978-1-542-09117-6

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcia_Clark


Early Female Transgender Identity after Prenatal Exposure to Diethylstilbestrol: Report from a French National Diethylstilbestrol (DES) Cohort

by Laura Gaspari 1,2,3,†,Marie-Odile Soyer-Gobillard 4,5,†ORCID,Scott Kerlin 6,Françoise Paris 1,2,3 andCharles Sultan 1,*

1

Unité d’Endocrinologie-Gynécologie Pédiatrique, CHU Montpellier, University Montpellier, 34090 Montpellier, France

2

INSERM 1203, Développement Embryonnaire Fertilité Environnement, University of Montpellier, 34295 Montpellier, France

3

CHU Montpellier, University Montpellier, Centre de Référence Maladies Rares du Développement Génital, Constitutif Sud, Hôpital Lapeyronie, 34295 Montpellier, France

4

Laboratoire Arago, Observatoire Océanologique, Sorbonne University, CNRS, 75016 Paris, France

5

Association HHORAGES-France, 66100 Perpignan, France

6

DES International Information and Research Network, Livermore, CA 94551, USA

*

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.

These authors contributed equally to this work.

J. Xenobiot. 2024, 14(1), 166-175; https://doi.org/10.3390/jox14010010

Submission received: 28 November 2023 / Revised: 8 January 2024 / Accepted: 10 January 2024 / Published: 12 January 2024

(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Role of Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals in the Human Health)

Downloadkeyboard_arrow_down Browse Figure Review Reports Versions Notes

2. Patients and Methods

This study was based on a French national retrospective cohort of DES-treated women (HHORAGES-France Association) (n = 1200) and their families. Detailed standard questionnaires were obtained from all DES mothers when they joined the HHORAGES-France Association and all DES children were already adults at this time. The answers to this online questionnaire were used to select women who met the following inclusion criteria: (1) at least two pregnancies with two viable male babies (same father) among whom the first child was not exposed in utero to DES (pre-DES), followed by one or more children with fetal exposure to DES (DES); (2) confirmed data on the total DES dose (health record or physician’s observation). The cumulative dose D administered to the French pregnant mothers was 4050 mg < D < 7300 mg. This is considered a medium-low-dose cohort, in accordance with the observations by Tournaire et al. [31] and compared with the higher doses administered in the United States (7550 mg < D < 12,742 mg). The answers to the questionnaires were also used to identify women with a DES son who presented female gender variance. We then contacted all DES sons with female gender variance and we carried out an individual interview with them.

The local university hospital ethics committee approved this study (ID IRB No. 202301531), and all patients gave their informed consent through the HHORAGES-France Association (CNIL: J B/EM/DC042793, N° 1006460).

All DES sons who identified as transgender women underwent karyotyping at their local hospital at the moment of transition.

https://www.mdpi.com/2039-4713/14/1/10


Thomas Trace Beatie (born 1974[1]) is an American public speaker, author, and advocate of transgender rights and sexuality issues, with a focus on transgender fertility and reproductive rights.[2]


Beatie came out as a trans man in early 1997. Beatie had gender-affirming surgery in March 2002 and became known as "the pregnant man" after he became pregnant through artificial insemination in 2007.[3] Beatie chose to be pregnant, with donated sperm,[4][5] because his wife Nancy was sterile.


The couple filed for divorce in 2012. The Beatie case is the first of its kind on record, where a documented legal male gave birth within a marriage to a woman, and for the first time, a court challenged a marriage where the husband gave birth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Beatie


Tracing boards are painted or printed illustrations depicting the various emblems and symbols of Freemasonry. They can be used as teaching aids during the lectures that follow each of the Masonic Degrees, when an experienced member explains the various concepts of Freemasonry to new members. They can also be used by experienced members as reminders of the concepts they learned as they went through the ceremonies of the different masonic degrees.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracing_board


Exoteric Masonry, which is only the husks of the Mystic Order formed by the Sons of Cain has in modern times attracted the masculine element with its positively polarized physical vehicles, and educated them in industry and statecraft, thus controlling the material development of the world. The sons of Seth, constituting themselves the Priestcraft have worked their spell over the positive vital bodies of the feminine element to dominate the spiritual development. And whereas, the sons of Cain working through Freemasonry and kindred movements, have openly fought for the temporal power, the Priestcraft has fought as strenuously and perhaps more effectively, by stealth, to retain their monopoly upon the spiritual development of the feminine element. To the casual onlooker it would seem as if there were no decided antagonism between these two movements at the present time, but though Freemasonry of today is but a shell of its true ancient mystic self, and though Catholicism has been terribly tarnished by the touch of time, in that one thing there is no difference, the war is as keen as ever, the efforts of the Church are not concentrated upon the masses however as much as upon those who are seeking to live the higher life, so that they may gain admission to the Mystery Temple and learn how to make the Philosophers’ Stone. As mankind advances in evolution, the vital body becomes more permanently positively polarized giving to both sexes a greater desire for spirituality, and though we change from the masculine to feminine in alternate embodiment, positive polarity of the vital body is becoming more pronounced regardless of sex, and this accounts for the growing tendency towards Altruism which is even being brought out by the suffering entailed by the great war we are now fighting, for all agree that they are seeking to obtain a lasting peace where the swords may be made into plowshares, and the spears into pruning hooks. In the past humanity has been claiming universal brotherhood as a great ideal, but we must come closer than that to be in full accord with the Christ. He said to his Disciples “ye are my friends.” Among brothers and sisters hate and enmity may exist, but friendship is the expression of love and cannot exist apart from that. This is therefore the magic word which will eventually level all distinctions, bring peace upon earth and goodwill among men. This is the great Ideal proclaimed by the Rosicrucian Fellowship, an Ideal which points the shortest way to the New Heaven and the New Earth, where the sons of Cain and the sons of Seth will eventually be united.

FREEMASONRY AND CATHOLICISM

by MAX HEINDEL

https://dn720206.ca.archive.org/0/items/freemasonryandca017137mbp/freemasonryandca017137mbp.pdf


Marcus is a masculine given name of Ancient Roman pre-Christian origin derived either from Etruscan Marce of unknown meaning or referring to the god Mars. Mars was identified as the Roman god of War.


The name is popular in Europe, particularly in Sweden, Norway,[1] Italy and Germany, and increasingly, in the Netherlands. It is also popular in English language countries, although less common than the shortened variation 'Mark', associated with the Gospel writer Mark the Evangelist. There are other variants. Marcus ranks in the top 100 most popular boy names in Australia, Canada, England, Scotland, Sweden, and Wales since the 1990s, as well as the top 200 most popular boy names in the US since the 1960s.[2]


Marcus developed as a patronymic or toponymic surname in Italy, southern France, and Spain around 1000 A.D., attributable to religious monasteries and sanctuaries named Sanctus Marcus (or its many variants). The surname was used as an identifier for the area of origin. The first historical record of the surname was in the year 1390 in Biberach an der Riß, Germany.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_(name)


John Hyrcanus (/hɜːrˈkeɪnəs/; Hebrew: יוחנן הרקנוס, romanized: Yoḥānān Hurqanos; Koine Greek: Ἰωάννης Ὑρκανός, romanized: Iōánnēs Hurkanós) was a Hasmonean (Maccabean) leader and Jewish High Priest of Israel of the 2nd century BCE (born 164 BCE, reigned from 134 BCE until he died in 104 BCE). In rabbinic literature he is often referred to as Yoḥanan Cohen Gadol (יוחנן כהן גדול‎), "John the High Priest".[a]


Name

Josephus explains in The Jewish War that John was also known as "Hyrcanus" but does not explain the reason behind this name. The only other primary sources—the Books of the Maccabees—never used this name for John. The single occurrence of the name Hyrcanus in 2 Maccabees 3:11 refers to a man to whom some of the money in the Temple belonged during the c. 178 BCE visit of Heliodorus.[1]


The reason for the name is disputed amongst biblical scholars, with a variety of reasons proposed:


Familial origin in the region of Hyrcania on the Caspian Sea[2]

A Greek regnal name, which would have represented closer ties with the Hellenistic culture against which the Maccabees had revolted under Seleucid rule. However, the region of Hyrcania had been conquered by Mithridates I of Parthia in 141–139 BCE

Given the name by the Seleucids after he fought in the region alongside Antiochus VII Sidetes against Phraates II of Parthia in 130–129 BCE, a campaign which resulted in the release of Antiochus' brother Demetrius II Nicator from captivity in Hyrcania

Life and work

He was the son of Simon Thassi and hence the nephew of Judas Maccabeus, Jonathan Apphus and their siblings, whose story is told in the deuterocanonical books of 1 Maccabees and 2 Maccabees, in the Talmud, and in Josephus. John was not present at a banquet at which his father and his two brothers were murdered by John's brother-in-law, Ptolemy son of Abubus. He attained his father's former offices of High Priest and ethnarch, but not king.[3] Josephus said that John Hyrcanus had five sons but he named only four in his histories: Judah Aristobulus I, Antigonus I, Alexander Jannai, and Absalom. It is the fifth brother who is said to have unsuccessfully sought the throne at the death of Aristobulus I according to Antiquities of the Jews 13.12.1.


Siege of Jerusalem

During the first year of John Hyrcanus's reign, he faced a serious challenge to Judean independence from the Seleucid Empire. Antiochus VII Sidetes marched into Judea, pillaged the countryside, and laid what became a year-long siege of Jerusalem. The prolonged siege caused Hyrcanus to remove any Judean from the city who could not assist with the defence effort (Antiquities 13.240). These refugees were not allowed to pass through Antiochus’ lines, becoming trapped in the middle of a chaotic siege. Facing a humanitarian crisis, Hyrcanus re-admitted his estranged Jerusalemites when the festival of Sukkot arrived. Then, as food shortages in Jerusalem became severe, Hyrcanus negotiated a truce with Antiochus.[4]


The terms of the truce required payment of 3,000 talents of silver to Antiochus, the dismantling of the walls of Jerusalem, Judean participation in the Seleucid war against the Parthians, and renewed Judean recognition of Seleucid control (Antiquities 13.245). These terms were a harsh blow to Hyrcanus, who had to loot the tomb of David to pay the 3,000 talents (The Wars of the Jews I 2:5).


Under Seleucid control (133–128 BCE)

Following the Seleucid siege, Judea faced tough economic times which were magnified by taxes to the Seleucids enforced by Antiochus. Furthermore, Hyrcanus was forced to accompany Antiochus on his eastern campaign in 130 BCE. Hyrcanus probably functioned as the military commander of a Jewish company in the campaign.[5] It is reported that Antiochus, out of consideration for the religion of his Jewish allies, at one point ordered a two days' halt of the entire army to allow them to avoid breaking the Sabbath and the festival of Shavuot.[6]


This enforced absence probably caused a loss of support for the inexperienced Hyrcanus among the Judean population.[7] Judeans in the countryside were especially disillusioned with Hyrcanus after Antiochus’ army plundered their land. John Hyrcanus's expulsion of the non-military population of Jerusalem during the siege had probably caused resentment, and his looting of the Tomb of David violated his obligations as High Priest, which would have offended the religious leadership.[8]


Therefore, at an early point in his 31-year reign, Hyrcanus had lost support from Judeans in various cultural sectors. The Jerusalemites, the rural Judeans, and the religious leadership probably doubted the future of Judea under Hyrcanus. However in 128 BCE Antiochus VII was killed in battle against Parthia. What followed was an era of conquest led by Hyrcanus that marked the high point of Judea as the most significant power in the Levant.[9]


Conquests


Hasmonean Kingdom under John Hyrcanus

  situation in 134 BCE

  area conquered

John Hyrcanus took advantage of unrest in the Seleucid Empire to reassert Judean independence and acquire new territories. In 130 BCE Demetrius II, the former Seleucid king, returned from exile in Hyrcania to resume the government of his empire. However the transition of power made it difficult for Demetrius to reassert control over Judea.,[10] and the Seleucid Empire also lost control of other principalities. The Ituraeans of Lebanon, the Ammonites of the Transjordan, and the Arabian Nabateans were among these.[11] Hyrcanus determined to take advantage of the dissipation of the Seleucid Empire to enlarge the Judean State.


Hyrcanus raised a new mercenary army that differed from the Judean forces that had been defeated by Antiochus VII (Ant.13.249). The Judean population was probably still recovering from the attack of Antiochus, and therefore could not provide enough able men for a new army.[10] The new army was funded with more treasure that Hyrcanus removed from the Tomb of David.[12]


Beginning in 113 BCE, Hyrcanus began an extensive military campaign against Samaria. Hyrcanus placed his sons Antigonus and Aristobulus in charge of the siege of Samaria. The Samaritans called for help and eventually received 6,000 troops from Antiochus IX Cyzicenus. Although the siege lasted for a long, difficult year, Hyrcanus did not give up. Ultimately Samaria was overrun and devastated. Cyzicenus' mercenary army was defeated and the city of Scythopolis seems to have been occupied by Hyrcanus as well.[13] The inhabitants of Samaria were enslaved. Upon conquering former Seleucid regions Hyrcanus implemented a policy of compelling the non-Jewish populations to adopt Jewish customs.[14][15]


John Hyrcanus's first conquest was an invasion of the Transjordan in 110 BCE.[16] John Hyrcanus's mercenary army laid siege to the city of Medeba and took it after a six-month siege. After these victories, Hyrcanus went north towards Shechem and Mount Gerizim. The city of Shechem was reduced to a village and the Samaritan Temple on Mount Gerizim was destroyed.[14] This military action against Shechem has been dated archaeologically around 111–110 BCE.[17] Destroying the Samaritan Temple on Mount Gerizim helped ameliorate John Hyrcanus's standing among religious elite and common Jews who detested any temple to God outside of Jerusalem.


Hyrcanus also initiated a military campaign against the Idumeans (Edomites). During this campaign Hyrcanus conquered Adora, Maresha and other Idumean towns (Ant.13.257). Hyrcanus then instituted forced conversions of the Idumeans to Judaism.[18] This was an unprecedented measure for a Judean ruler; it was the first instance of forced conversion perpetrated by Jews in recorded history.[19] However, some scholars dispute the narrative of forced conversion and believe that the Edomites peacefully assimilated in Judean society.[20]


Economy, foreign relations, and religion


Judea, Hasmoneans. John Hyrcanus I (Yehohanan). 135–104 BCE. Æ Prutah (13mm, 2.02 gm, 12h). "Yehohanan the High Priest and the Council of the Jews" (in Hebrew) in five lines within wreath / Double cornucopia adorned with ribbons; pomegranate between horns; small A to lower left. Meshorer Group B, 11; Hendin 457.

After the siege of Jerusalem, Hyrcanus faced a serious economic crisis in Judea, although the economic difficulties probably subsided after the death of Antiochus VII, since Hyrcanus no longer had to pay taxes or tributes to a weaker Seleucid Empire.[21] The economic situation eventually improved enough for Hyrcanus to issue his own coinage (see below). On top of that, Hyrcanus initiated vital building projects in Judea. Hyrcanus re-built the walls destroyed by Antiochus. He also built a fortress north of the Temple called the Baris and possibly also the fortress Hyrcania.[22]


Moreover, out of desperation, Hyrcanus sought for good relations with the surrounding Gentile powers, especially the growing Roman Republic. Two decrees were passed in the Roman Senate that established a treaty of friendship with Judea.[23] Although it is difficult to specifically date these resolutions, they represent efforts made between Hyrcanus and Rome to maintain stable relations. Also, an embassy sent by Hyrcanus received Roman confirmation of Hasmonean independence.[24] Hyrcanus was an excellent case of a ruler backed by Roman support.


In addition to Rome, Hyrcanus was able to maintain steady relations with Ptolemaic Egypt. This was probably made possible due to various Jews living in Egypt who had connections with the Ptolemaic Court (Ant. 13.284–287). Finally, the cities of Athens and Pergamon even showed honor to Hyrcanus in an effort to appease Rome.[25]


Furthermore, the minting of coins by Hyrcanus demonstrates John Hyrcanus's willingness to delegate power. Sixty-three coins found near Bethlehem bear the inscription, "Yohanan the High Priest." The reserve side of the coins contains the phrase, "The Assembly of the Jews." This seems to suggest that during his reign, Hyrcanus was not an absolute ruler. Instead, Hyrcanus had to submit at times to an assembly of Jews that had a certain amount of minority power.[26] The coins lack any depictions of animals or humans. This suggests that Hyrcanus strictly followed the Jewish prohibition against graven images. The coins also seem to suggest that Hyrcanus considered himself to be primarily the High Priest of Judea, and his rule of Judea was shared with the Assembly.[27]


In Judea, religious issues were a core aspect of domestic policy. Josephus only reports one specific conflict between Hyrcanus and the Pharisees, who asked him to relinquish the position of High Priest (Ant. 13.288–296).[28] After this falling-out, Hyrcanus sided with the rivals of the Pharisees, the Sadducees. However, elsewhere Josephus reports that the Pharisees did not grow to power until the reign of Queen Salome Alexandra (JW.1.110) The coins minted under Hyrcanus suggest that Hyrcanus did not have complete secular authority. Furthermore, this account may represent a piece of Pharisaic apologetics due to Josephus's Pharisaic background.[29] Regardless, there were probably tensions because of the religious and secular leadership roles held by Hyrcanus.


Ultimately, one of the final acts of John Hyrcanus's life was an act that solved any kind of dispute over his role as High Priest and ethnarch. In the will of Hyrcanus, he provisioned for the division of the high priesthood from secular authority. John Hyrcanus's widow was given control of civil authority after his death, and his son Judas Aristobulus was given the role of High Priest. This action represented John Hyrcanus's willingness to compromise over the issue of secular and religious authority.[30] (However, Aristobulus was not satisfied with this arrangement, so he cast his mother into prison and let her starve.)


The Tomb of Hyrcanus was, according to Josephus, located near the Towers' Pool (also known as Hezekiah's Pool) northwest of the present Jaffa Gate.[31] During the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE, Titus selected the area opposite the tomb to begin his assault on the city's third wall.[31]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Hyrcanus


The Masonic King of England

Edward VIII was crowned both king and Grand Master of English Freemasonry on January20, 1936. Edward, however, married a divorced commoner from the United States and was forced to abdicate eleven months later on December 10th. His younger brother ascended the throne the next day and downgraded Edward's title to the Duke of Windsor. In July1940 the Duke assumed the governorship of the Bahamas.127 Edward VIII not only supported Hitler, he did so loudly. From the time of Hitler's rise to power, the Windsors were fascinated by the Fuehrer and his New Order in Europe. Speaking in Masonic 480 terms, the King expressed the views of the Brotherhood concerning Hitler: "What-ever happens, he said, "whatever the outcome, a New Order is going to come into the world.... It will be buttressed with police power.. ..When peace comes this time, there is going to be a New Order of Social Justice. It cannot be another Versailles." 128 During his short reign, King Edward VIII made every effort to promote Nazism. As a result some of the most prominent aristocrats in England joined the Nazi Party.129

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://ia803001.us.archive.org/28/items/ScarletAndTheBeastJohnDaniel1995/Scarlet%20and%20the%20Beast,%20John%20Daniel%20(1995).pdf


Edward VIII (Edward Albert Christian George Andrew Patrick David; 23 June 1894 – 28 May 1972), later known as the Duke of Windsor, was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Empire, and Emperor of India, from 20 January 1936 until his abdication in December of the same year.[a]


Edward was born during the reign of his great-grandmother Queen Victoria as the eldest child of the Duke and Duchess of York, later King George V and Queen Mary. He was created Prince of Wales on his 16th birthday, seven weeks after his father succeeded as king. As a young man, Edward served in the British Army during the First World War and undertook several overseas tours on behalf of his father. The Prince of Wales gained popularity due to his charm and charisma, and his fashion sense became a hallmark of the era. After the war, his conduct began to give cause for concern; he engaged in a series of sexual affairs that worried both his father and the British prime minister, Stanley Baldwin.


Upon his father's death in 1936, Edward became the second monarch of the House of Windsor. The new king showed impatience with court protocol, and caused consternation among politicians by his apparent disregard for established constitutional conventions. Only months into his reign, a constitutional crisis was caused by his proposal to marry Wallis Simpson, an American who had divorced her first husband and was seeking a divorce from her second. The prime ministers of the United Kingdom and the Dominions opposed the marriage, arguing a divorced woman with two living ex-husbands was politically and socially unacceptable as a prospective queen consort. Additionally, such a marriage would have conflicted with Edward's status as titular head of the Church of England, which, at the time, disapproved of remarriage after divorce if a former spouse was still alive. Edward knew the Baldwin government would resign if the marriage went ahead, which could have forced a general election and would have ruined his status as a politically neutral constitutional monarch. When it became apparent he could not marry Simpson and remain on the throne, he abdicated. He was succeeded by his younger brother, George VI. With a reign of 326 days, Edward was one of the shortest-reigning British monarchs to date.


After his abdication, Edward was created Duke of Windsor. He married Simpson in France on 3 June 1937, after her second divorce became final. Later that year, the couple toured Nazi Germany, which fed rumours that he was a Nazi sympathiser. During the Second World War, Edward was at first stationed with the British Military Mission to France. After the fall of France, he was appointed Governor of the Bahamas. After the war, Edward spent the rest of his life in France. He and Wallis remained married until his death in 1972; they had no children.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_VIII


Nicole Brown Simpson (née Brown; May 19, 1959 – June 12, 1994) was the second wife of American professional football player, actor, and media personality O. J. Simpson. She was murdered outside her Brentwood home, along with her friend Ron Goldman, in 1994.


Brown was born in Frankfurt, West Germany, and moved to the U.S. early in her life. Brown and Simpson met in 1977 and married in 1985, five years after Simpson had retired from professional American football. Their marriage lasted for eight years, and they had a daughter and a son together. Reports suggest that Simpson emotionally, verbally, and physically abused Brown throughout their relationship, which continued after their divorce. They made an attempt at reconciliation, but later broke up again, seemingly permanently, in May 1994.


In June 1994, Brown and Goldman were stabbed to death, and Simpson was tried for the murders. Following a highly publicized criminal trial, Simpson was acquitted of all charges, though he was later found liable for the wrongful deaths in a civil lawsuit in 1997. No other suspects have ever been identified, and the killings remain unsolved, although Brown's family has expressed the belief that Simpson committed the murders and was the sole perpetrator.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicole_Brown_Simpson


Shanksville is a borough in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, United States. It has a population of 197 as of the 2020 U.S. census.[2] It is part of the Somerset, Pennsylvania Micropolitan Statistical Area and is located 78 miles (126 km) southeast of Pittsburgh and 226 miles (364 km) west of Philadelphia.


Shanksville garnered global attention during the September 11 attacks when United Airlines Flight 93, bound from Newark, New Jersey, for San Francisco, crashed in adjacent Stonycreek Township after its passengers rebelled against the flight's al-Qaeda terrorist hijackers. It was the only one of the four hijacked planes that failed to reach the terrorists' intended target.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanksville,_Pennsylvania


A shiv, also chiv, schiv, shivvie or shank,[1][2] is a handcrafted bladed weapon resembling a knife that is commonly associated with prison inmates.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiv_(weapon)


There are multiple matches for Shiva, including a Hindu god and a Jewish mourning period.

Shiva (Hindu god)

Shiva is a major god in Hinduism, known as the god of destruction.

His name means "auspicious one".

He is also known as Mahadeva, which means "the great god".

Shiva is part of the Hindu trinity, the Trimurti, along with Brahma and Vishnu.

He is worshipped at many shrines in India and around the world.

Shiva is said to live in the Himalayas with his wife, Parvati.

Shiva (Jewish mourning period)

Shiva is a seven-day period of mourning that begins after the burial of a loved one.

The word "shiva" comes from the Hebrew word sheva, which means "seven".

During shiva, mourners traditionally stay home or at the home of the deceased.

They also wear torn clothing or a black ribbon pinned to their clothes.

Shiva is a time to remember, accept death, and return to life.

Generative AI is experimental.


AI Overview

Shiva Shakti | Jai Maa Vaishno Devi

In Hinduism, Devi (the Mother Goddess) is the Shakti (energy) and creative power of Shiva, and her various forms, including Parvati, Sati, and Durga, are often depicted as his consort and the embodiment of the divine feminine.

Here's a more detailed look at the relationship between Devi and Shiva:

Devi as Shiva's Shakti:

In the Shaivite tradition, Shiva is the Supreme Lord, while Devi is regarded as his energy and creative power, the Shakti, and an equal complementary partner.

Parvati as a Form of Devi:

Parvati is a well-known form of Devi and is considered Shiva's eternal wife.

Sati and her Significance:

Sati was the first wife of Shiva, and her story, including her self-immolation, is significant in shaping the traditions of Shaivism and Shaktism.

Durga as a Fierce Aspect of Devi:

Durga is a prominent female deity in Hindu mythology, often depicted as a warrior goddess, and is considered an avatar of Devi.

The Cosmic Union:

The union of Shiva and Devi, or Shiva and his various forms of Devi, represents the intertwining of feminine and masculine energies, the dance of creation and destruction.

Symbolism:

Parvati and Shiva are often symbolized by a yoni and a linga, respectively, representing origin, source, and regenerative power.

Devi's Many Roles:

Devi is portrayed as the ideal wife, mother, and householder, and her statues and iconography grace ancient and medieval era Hindu temples.

Ardhanarishvara:

In Indian art, the vision of the ideal couple is derived from Shiva and Parvati as being half of the other, represented as Ardhanarishvara.

Generative AI is experimental


Kamala Devi Harris (English: /ˈkɑːmələ ˈdeɪvi/ ⓘ,[1] born October 20, 1964) is an American politician and attorney who has been the 49th and current vice president of the United States since 2021, serving under President Joe Biden. Harris is the Democratic presidential nominee in the 2024 United States presidential election. She is the first female vice president of the United States, making her the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history. She is also the first African American and first Asian American vice president. From 2017 to 2021, she represented California in the United States Senate. Before that, she was Attorney General of California from 2011 to 2017.


Born in Oakland, California, Harris graduated from Howard University and the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She began her law career in the office of the district attorney of Alameda County. She was recruited to the San Francisco District Attorney's Office and later to the office of the city attorney of San Francisco. She was elected district attorney of San Francisco in 2003 and attorney general of California in 2010, and reelected as attorney general in 2014. As the San Francisco district attorney and the attorney general of California, Harris was the first woman, the first African American, and the first Asian American to hold each office.


Harris was the junior U.S. senator from California from 2017 to 2021. She won the 2016 Senate election, becoming the second Black woman and first South Asian American U.S. senator. As a senator, Harris advocated for stricter gun control laws, the DREAM Act, federal legalization of cannabis, and reforms to healthcare and taxation. She gained a national profile for her pointed questioning of Trump administration officials during Senate hearings, including Trump's second Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh.


Harris sought the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination in 2019, but withdrew from the race before the primaries. Biden selected her as his running mate, and their ticket defeated the incumbent president and vice president, Donald Trump and Mike Pence, in the 2020 election. Presiding over an evenly split Senate upon entering office, Harris played a crucial role as president of the Senate. She cast more tie-breaking votes than any other vice president, which helped pass bills such as the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 stimulus package and the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. After Biden withdrew from the 2024 presidential election, Harris launched her campaign with Biden's endorsement and soon became the presumptive nominee. On August 6, 2024, she chose Tim Walz, the governor of Minnesota, as her running mate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamala_Harris


Presidential elections are scheduled to be held in the United States on November 7, 2028, to elect the president and vice president of the United States for a term of four years.


In the 2024 elections, the Republican Party gained a majority of seats in the House of Representatives and Senate. Incumbent president Donald Trump won a non-consecutive second term; per the limits set by the 22nd Amendment, he is constitutionally barred from being elected president again.[1]


Background

See also: 2024 United States elections

The Republican Party returned to power in the United States with a government trifecta in January 2025 following the 2024 election. Trump, who was elected president in 2016 but lost a re-election bid in 2020 to Joe Biden, and JD Vance, a then-senator from Ohio defeated vice president Kamala Harris, who began her campaign following Biden's exit from the 2024 election, and Minnesota governor Tim Walz. Trump's victory was credited to a post-pandemic surge in inflation,[a] a migrant crisis at the U.S.–Mexico border,[b] and a global anti-incumbent backlash.[8][9][10] In addition, Republicans secured control of the Senate, flipping four seats and earning a three seat majority, while also retaining a House majority, though the party's majority narrowed to three seats after losing two seats.[11]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2028_United_States_presidential_election


Raphael Gamaliel Warnock[1] (/ˈrɑːfiɛl ˈwɔːrnɒk/ RAH-fee-el WOR-nok; born July 23, 1969) is an American politician and Baptist pastor serving as the junior United States senator from Georgia, a seat he has held since 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, Warnock has been the senior pastor of Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church since 2005.[2][3]


Warnock was the senior pastor of Douglas Memorial Community Church from 2001 to 2005.[4] He came to prominence in Georgia politics as a leading activist in the campaign to expand Medicaid in the state under the Affordable Care Act. He was the Democratic nominee in the 2020 United States Senate special election in Georgia, defeating incumbent Republican Kelly Loeffler in a runoff election.[5]


Warnock and Jon Ossoff are the first Democrats elected to the U.S. Senate from Georgia since Zell Miller in 2000.[6][7] Their elections were critical in securing a 50–50 Senate majority for Democrats, with Vice President Kamala Harris serving as the tie-breaking vote.[8] Warnock was a reliable supporter of Joe Biden's legislative efforts during his presidency.[9][10] He was reelected to a full term in 2022, defeating Republican nominee Herschel Walker.


Warnock is the first African American to represent Georgia in the Senate, the first Black Democrat elected to the Senate from a Southern state, and the second black U.S. Senator directly elected from a Southern state, after Tim Scott.[11][12][13]


Early life and education

Warnock was born in Savannah, Georgia, on July 23, 1969.[14] He grew up in public housing as the eleventh of twelve children born to Verlene and Jonathan Warnock, both Pentecostal pastors.[15][16] His father served in the U.S. Army during World War II, where he learned automobile mechanics and welding, and subsequently opened a small car restoration business where he restored junked cars for resale.[17] His mother picked cotton and tobacco in the summers in Waycross, Georgia, as a teenager and became a pastor.[18]


Warnock graduated from Sol C. Johnson High School in 1987,[19] and having wanted to follow in the footsteps of Martin Luther King Jr., attended Morehouse College, from which he graduated cum laude in 1991 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology.[20][21] He credits his participation in the Upward Bound program for making him college-ready, as he was able to enroll in early college courses through Savannah State University.[19][21] He then earned Master of Divinity, Master of Philosophy, and Doctor of Philosophy degrees from Union Theological Seminary, a school affiliated with Columbia University.[22][23][17]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raphael_Warnock


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.


Biography

Early life

Sako was born in the city of Zakho, Iraq, on 4 July 1948.[2] He comes from an ethnic Assyrian family of the Chaldean Catholic Church that has roots in a religious community that has had a presence in the city of his birth since the 5th century AD.[3]


He completed his early studies in Mosul and then attended the Dominican-run Saint Jean’s Seminary there. He was ordained a priest on 1 June 1974 and filled his first pastoral assignment at the Cathedral of Mosul until 1979. He then earned a doctorate in Eastern patrology at the Pontifical Oriental Institute. When denied a license to teach because he was only qualified for religious instruction, he earned a second doctorate in history from the Sorbonne in Paris.[4] With this he secured his teaching license and was able to provide religious instruction. From 1997 to 2002 he was rector of the Patriarchal Seminary in Baghdad. He then returned to Mosul and guided the parish of Perpetual Help for a year.[5][6]


Sako speaks Neo-Aramaic, German, French, English, Italian, Kurdish and Arabic.[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


Former Sacramento deputy kills 11-year-old son, is fatally shot after I-5 chase, officials say

Marvin Morales, 40, was previously found to have lied about a 2023 fentanyl overdose on the job.

KCRA logo

Updated: 9:43 PM PST Dec 2, 2025 Editorial Standards ⓘ

Jonathan Ayestas

Senior Digital Producer

Daniel Macht

Digital Media Manager

LODI, Calif. —

A former Sacramento County deputy suspected of fatally stabbing his 11-year-old son was fatally shot after multiple law enforcement officers fired their weapons, following a chase on Interstate 5, officials said Tuesday.


Elk Grove police and the Sacramento County Sheriff's Office confirmed with KCRA 3 that the father is 40-year-old Marvin Morales, a former deputy who was found to have lied about a 2023 fentanyl overdose following an investigation.

https://www.kcra.com/article/sacramento-deputy-shooting-interstate-5-thornton-road/69609754


In ancient Roman religion and mythology, Mars (Latin: Mārs, pronounced [maːrs])[4] is the god of war and also an agricultural guardian, a combination characteristic of early Rome.[5] He is the son of Jupiter and Juno, and was pre-eminent among the Roman army's military gods. Most of his festivals were held in March, the month named for him (Latin Martius), and in October, the months which traditionally began and ended the season for both military campaigning and farming.[6]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_(mythology)


Mar Raphael I Bidawid (Syriac: ܪܘܦܐܝܠ ܩܕܡܝܐ ܒܝܬ ܕܘܝܕ, Arabic مار روفائيل الاول بيداويد) (April 17, 1922 – July 7, 2003) was the Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church from 1989–2003. He was also a Syriac scholar.


Life

He was born on April 17, 1922, in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul into an ethnic Assyrian family, and took his school and seminar training in Mosul. He was ordained a priest on October 22, 1944 in Rome and in 1946 he obtained the academic degrees of doctor of philosophy and theology. Between 1948 and 1956, he worked as a professor of philosophy and theology in Mosul. On October 6, 1957, at the age of 35, he was ordained Bishop of Amadiya, by Patriarch Yousef VII Ghanima,[1] becoming the youngest Catholic bishop in the world.[2] As bishop of Amadiya he experienced the mass exodus of Christians from Iraq. Mar Raphael Bidawid was then appointed bishop of Beirut, Lebanon in 1966 and served in this capacity for 23 years.


On March 21, 1989 Raphael I Bidawid was elected Patriarch of Babylon, head of the Chaldean Catholic Church. His election was confirmed by Pope John Paul II in June of 1989. During his patriarchate, in agreement with the Chaldean Synod, he established The Pontifical Babel College for Philosophy and Theology in 1991. The Babel College is situated in Baghdad, Dora, El-Mekaniek, next to St. Peter Chaldean Seminary. The Babel College became an instrumental educational institution for the Chaldean Catholic Church.[3][4] Patriarch Bidawid could speak 13 languages. He died in Beirut, Lebanon, on July 7, 2003, at the age of 81.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raphael_I_Bidawid


Pope John Paul II[b] (born Karol Józef Wojtyła;[c] 18 May 1920 – 2 April 2005) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City from 16 October 1978 until his death in 2005. He was the first non-Italian pope since Adrian VI in the 16th century, as well as the third-longest-serving pope in history, after Pius IX and St. Peter.[d]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_John_Paul_II


The Carolingian dynasty (/ˌkærəˈlɪndʒiən/ KARR-ə-LIN-jee-ən;[1] known variously as the Carlovingians, Carolingus, Carolings, Karolinger or Karlings) was a Frankish noble family named after Charles Martel and his grandson Charlemagne, descendants of the Arnulfing and Pippinid clans of the 7th century AD.[2] The dynasty consolidated its power in the 8th century, eventually making the offices of mayor of the palace and dux et princeps Francorum hereditary, and becoming the de facto rulers of the Franks as the real powers behind the Merovingian throne. In 751 the Merovingian dynasty which had ruled the Franks was overthrown with the consent of the Papacy and the aristocracy, and Pepin the Short, son of Martel, was crowned King of the Franks. The Carolingian dynasty reached its peak in 800 with the crowning of Charlemagne as the first Emperor of the Romans in the West in over three centuries. Nearly every monarch of France from Charlemagne's son Louis the Pious till the penultimate monarch of France Louis Philippe have been his descendants. His death in 814 began an extended period of fragmentation of the Carolingian Empire and decline that would eventually lead to the evolution of the Kingdom of France and the Holy Roman Empire.


Name

The Carolingian dynasty takes its name from Carolus, the Latinised name of multiple Frankish kings including Charlemagne and Charles Martel.[3] The name originates from a common Germanic word, rendered in Old High German as Karl or Kerl,[4] meaning 'man', 'husband', or 'freeman'.[5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carolingian_dynasty


Theologian: John Paul II wanted to show respect by kissing the Koran

Bonn - John Paul II kissed the Koran as a gesture of respect. The picture went around the world. In an interview with katholisch.de, Islamic scholar Felix Körner talks about the sign of the Polish head of the Church and looks at the following pontificates.


Published  on 14.05.2024 at 00:01  – by Mario Trifunovic

The picture of 14 May 1999 of Pope John Paul II kissing the Koran went around the world and sparked discussions within the Church. At that time, the Polish Pope received a Muslim delegation of Shiites and Sunnis as well as the Chairman of the Iranian Ministry of Religion in the Vatican. Among them was the then Archbishop of Baghdad, Raphael I. Bidawid. The Polish church leader received a copy of the Koran as a gift from the Muslim visitors. As a sign of respect, John Paul II kissed the book, which is sacred to Muslims. In an interview with katholisch.de, the Islam expert and Jesuit Felix Körner talks about the gesture 25 years ago and takes a look at the pontificates of Benedict XVI and Francis.


Question: Mr Körner, it is now 25 years since John Paul II kissed the Koran. Why was this event so controversial?


Körner: Behind it was the big theological question: what is the Koran for us? For in Christ are hidden all the treasures of knowledge. That's what it says in Colossians. But for the Koran, Jesus is just one of many prophets. So if the Pope kisses the Koran, does that mean that the Catholic Church no longer sees Jesus as the all-important Saviour? Of course not! The dispute about the kiss only arises if you want to misunderstand John Paul II.


Question: What was the significance of this gesture? Does it still have an effect on the dialogue between Christians and Muslims?


Körner: What did the Pope want to say with it in 1999? Firstly, that he was happy about the gift; and secondly, that he respects the faith of others. In other words, a gesture that was completely in line with the Second Vatican Council. And it went even further: Benedict XVI prayed in the Blue Mosque in Istanbul. No press spokesperson said afterwards that it was a silent meditation. Benedict prayed in the mosque and Francis said to the Muslim guests: "Pray for me. In an atmosphere like this, we can also say clearly today where we disagree, what we expect from each other - and how we can work together.


Question: Have there been similar actions, whether by John Paul II or his predecessors?


Körner: Yes, there certainly were. As Apostolic Envoy to Turkey, John XXIII already made the Muslims feel that he liked them. Then Paul VI - he introduced the word dialogue into the vocabulary of the Church, also for Islamic-Christian relations. John Paul II later brought real experts on Islam into the dialogue council. Networks were established, texts written - the 1984 document "Dialogue and Mission" was already outstanding. And John Paul II himself then in his encyclical "Redemptoris missio" that the Holy Spirit also touches cultures and religions. In doing so, he opened doors.


Bild: ©KNA/Stefano dal Pozzolo/Romano Siciliani

The Jesuit Felix Körner is Professor of Theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. He is considered one of the Catholic Church's best experts on Islam.


Question: What was the headwind like in this regard?


Körner: Sometimes the headwind seemed to slam the doors of dialogue shut again. But now there are the texts, the relationships and above all the institutions - and ever more courageous signs. In the Holy Year 2000, we saw the Pope praying in the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus. At the time, his press spokesman said he had to deny it afterwards, saying it was just a moment of quiet meditation.


Question: Fundamentalist Christians criticised John Paul II for his gesture. Some said at the time that he was confirming the Islamic faith. What can be said in response?


Körner: There are fundamentalists on all sides, because they want to establish a firm identity for themselves. The Christian faith is much more exciting. You can always discover something new there! If you look into the world with the gospel, you can see how the kingdom of God is already growing, how the spirit of Christ is already at work. When I say that I see the good in you, your faithfulness, your seriousness, I am not saying that I am adopting your view. Sometimes we agree to disagree. But there are things that we find exemplary in each other, and in the end we learn from each other.


Question: Benedict XVI was criticised for his Regensburg speech, while Francis was criticised for the Abu Dhabi document on brotherhood between people, which he signed in 2019 together with Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, the Sheikh of Azar University and therefore one of the most respected representatives of Sunni Islam. What is the current mood on both sides?


Körner: I am interested in the arguments of the critics. Those who are worried are often right, because there is cause for concern. But the crucial question is not how bad it is, but what we do now. After Regensburg, we have started a new, serious series of Christian-Islamic encounters. This has become theologically serious. There are now even Islamic theology programmes at German universities. I have respectful and curious encounters with students and colleagues on an almost daily basis. You can also bear witness to your own faith.


Joint declaration by Pope Francis and Grand Imam Ahmad Mohammad Al-Tayyeb

Bild: ©picture alliance/AP Photo/Andrew Medichini

Pope Francis and Grand Imam Ahmad Mohammad Al-Tayyeb sign a joint declaration on "Human Fraternity" on 4 February 2019.


Question: The so-called Abu Dhabi Document provided a new impetus in the Church's dialogue with Islam. How did this come about?


Körner: The document is also based on the Second Vatican Council. There it said: We condemn all discrimination based on skin colour or religion. In 2019, it now said: Differences are willed by God. In the case of religious differences, this means that if the other person believes differently, then the encounter can also be purifying and enriching for me - and that is God's will.


Question: Francis has been sharply criticised for this God-ordained pluralism. Why?


Körner: Well, almost everything a pope does gets a shitstorm, including a Catholic one. Good theology helps here too. The question behind such voices is usually whether the Gospel is still really being emphasised. And we can use it to make that clear. In any case, these gestures are a testimony to the Gospel.


„Wir haben nach Regensburg eine neue, ernsthafte Reihe christlich-islamischer Begegnungen begonnen. Das ist theologisch seriös geworden.“


—  Zitat: Jesuit und Islamkenner Felix Körner zum interreligiösen Dialog

Question: In what way do these gestures serve to clarify?


Körner: Pope Francis aptly said in the programmatic letter "Evangelii gaudium" at the beginning of his pontificate: evangelising means making the kingdom of God present in the world. When people come closer to God and to one another, then what the Good News of Jesus promises happens: then God's kingdom grows among us. A sign of this can also be a courageous word of fraternity, or a respectful kiss on a book that is sacred to Muslims and which they present to a pope.


Question: In your opinion, what else should Francis do to advance the dialogue?


Körner: Francis knows that Christian-Islamic dialogue is not about agreement on matters of faith. Rather, he is talking about the courage to be different and to deal with each other as people of different religions. He is now moving from friendship to institutions, from the atmospheric to the legal. Because living in dialogue also requires political freedom.


by Mario Trifunovic

https://english.katholisch.de/artikel/53269-theologian-john-paul-ii-wanted-to-show-respect-by-kissing-the-koran


Pope Martin V (Latin: Martinus V; Italian: Martino V; January/February 1369 – 20 February 1431), born Oddone Colonna, was the head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 11 November 1417 to his death in February 1431.[1] His election effectively ended the Western Schism of 1378–1417.[not verified in body] As of 2025, he remains the last pope to have taken the pontifical name "Martin".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Martin_V


Pope Nicholas V (Latin: Nicolaus V; Italian: Niccolò V; 15 November 1397 – 24 March 1455),[1] born Tommaso Parentucelli, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 6 March 1447 until his death in March 1455.[2] Pope Eugene IV made him a cardinal in 1446 after successful trips to Italy and Germany, and when Eugene died the next year, Parentucelli was elected in his place. He took his name Nicholas in memory of his obligations to Niccolò Albergati. He remains the most recent pope to take the pontifical name "Nicholas".


The pontificate of Nicholas saw the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks and the end of the Hundred Years' War. He responded by calling a crusade against the Ottomans, which never materialized. By the Concordat of Vienna he secured the recognition of papal rights over bishoprics and benefices. He also brought about the submission of the last of the antipopes, Felix V, and the dissolution of the Synod of Basel. A key figure in the Roman Renaissance, Nicholas sought to make Rome the home of literature and art. He strengthened fortifications, restored aqueducts, and rebuilt many churches. He ordered design plans for what would eventually be the Basilica of St. Peter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Nicholas_V


Pope Alexander VI (Italian: Alessandro VI, Valencian: Alexandre VI, Spanish: Alejandro VI; born Roderic Llançol i de Borja;[Note 2] epithet: Valentinus ("The Valencian");[6] c. 1431 – 18 August 1503) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 11 August 1492 until his death in 1503.


Born into the prominent Borja family in Xàtiva in the Kingdom of Valencia under the Crown of Aragon, he was known as Roderic de Borja, and he is commonly referred to by the Italianized form as Rodrigo Borgia. He studied law at the University of Bologna. He was ordained deacon and made a cardinal in 1456 after the election of his uncle as Pope Callixtus III, and a year later he became vice-chancellor of the Catholic Church. He proceeded to serve in the Roman Curia under the next four popes, acquiring significant influence and wealth in the process. In 1492, Rodrigo was elected pope, taking the name Alexander VI.


Alexander's papal bulls of 1493 confirmed or reconfirmed the rights of the Spanish crown in the New World following the finds of Christopher Columbus in 1492. During the second Italian war, Alexander VI supported his son Cesare Borgia as a condottiero for the French king. The scope of his foreign policy was to gain the most advantageous terms for his family.[7][8]


Alexander is one of the most controversial of the Renaissance popes, partly because he acknowledged fathering several children by his mistresses. As a result, his Italianized Valencian surname, Borgia, became a byword for libertinism and nepotism, which are traditionally considered as characterizing his pontificate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Alexander_VI


Pope Leo X (r. 1513–1521) decided to complete the construction of the new St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. As the sale of certificates of indulgences had been a well-established method of papal fund raising, he announced new indulgences in the papal bull Sacrosanctis in 1515. On the advice of the banker Jakob Fugger (d. 1525), he appointed the pluralist prelate Albert of Brandenburg (d. 1545) to supervise the sale campaign in Germany.[note 22] The Dominican friar Johann Tetzel (d. 1519), a leading figure in the campaign, applied unusually aggressive marketing methods. A slogan attributed to him famously claimed that "As soon as the coin into the box rings, a soul from purgatory to heaven springs".[110][111] Frederick the Wise, Prince-elector of Saxony (r. 1486–1525) forbade the campaign because the Sacrosanctis suspended the sale of previous indulgences, depriving him of revenues that he had spent on his collection of relics.[note 23][94]


The campaign's vulgarity shocked many serious-minded believers,[94] among them Martin Luther, a theology professor at the University of Wittenberg in Saxony.[111][113] Born into a middle-class family, Luther entered an Augustinian monastery after a heavy thunderstorm dreadfully reminded him the risk of sudden death and eternal damnation, but his anxiety about his sinfulness did not abate.[114] His studies on the works of the Late Roman theologian Augustine of Hippo (d. 430) convinced him that those whom God chose as his elect received a gift of faith independently of their acts.[115] He first denounced the idea of justification through human efforts in his Disputatio contra scholasticam theologiam ('Disputation against Scholastic Theology') in September 1517.[116]


On 31 October 1517, Luther addressed a letter to Albert of Brandenburg, stating that the clerics preaching the St. Peter's indulgences were deceiving the faithful, and attached his Ninety-five Theses to it. He questioned the efficacy of indulgences for the dead, although also stated "If ... indulgences were preached according to the spirit and intention of the pope, all ... doubts would be readily resolved".[117] Archbishop Albert ordered the theologians at the University of Mainz to examine the document. Tetzel, and the theologians Konrad Wimpina (d. 1531) and Johann Eck (d. 1543) were the first to associate some of Luther's propositions with Hussitism. The case was soon forwarded to the Roman Curia for judgement.[118] Pope Leo remained uninterested, and mentioned the case as "a quarrel among friars".[111][119]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reformation


416 Finally, those means that are proposed by our holy father Saint Ignatius in Part X of the Constitutions for the preservation and development not only of the body or exterior of the Society but also of its spirit, and for the attainment of the objective it seeks, which is to aid souls to reach their ultimate and supernatural end, [10] are to be observed eagerly and diligently by all, with a truly personal sense of responsibility for its increase and development, for the praise and service of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and the help of souls.[11]

L. D. S.

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996


Francis Borgia SJ (Valencian: Francesc de Borja; Spanish: Francisco de Borja; 28 October 1510 – 30 September 1572) was a Spanish Jesuit priest. The great-grandson of both Pope Alexander VI and King Ferdinand II of Aragon, he was Duke of Gandía and a grandee of Spain. After the death of his wife, Borgia renounced his titles and became a priest in the Society of Jesus, later serving as its third superior general. He was canonized on 20 June 1670 by Pope Clement X.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Borgia


Borja (Borgia)

Spanish: habitational name from a place in Zaragoza province named from Arabic burj ‘tower’. See also Borgia .

https://www.ancestry.com/name-origin?surname=borja


One World Trade Center, also known as One WTC and erroneously as the Freedom Tower,[note 1] is the main building of the rebuilt World Trade Center complex in Lower Manhattan, New York City. Designed by David Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, One World Trade Center is the tallest building in the United States, the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere, and the seventh-tallest in the world. The supertall structure has the same name as the North Tower of the original World Trade Center, which was destroyed in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The new skyscraper stands on the northwest corner of the 16-acre (6.5 ha) World Trade Center site, on the site of the original 6 World Trade Center. It is bounded by West Street to the west, Vesey Street to the north, Fulton Street to the south, and Washington Street to the east.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_World_Trade_Center


AFA-27 [recorded 03/15/87] | The CIA, the Military & Drugs Part IV


Developing a line of inquiry presented in the preceding broadcast, this program focuses on narco-terrorism in Latin America. Particular emphasis is on intelligence-related elements that figured in the Iran-Contra scandal, anti-Castro Cubans in particular. Much of the discussion centers on activities that took place when George Bush was in charge of the CIA.


After reviewing the Latin American narcotics network of Corsican gangster and Third Reich collaborator Auguste Ricord, the broadcast focuses on the role of Ricord associate Klaus Barbie in the 1980 “Cocaine Coup” in Bolivia. The Gestapo chief of Lyons (France) during the war, Barbie found post-war employment with American intelligence, first with the Army’s Counter Intelligence Corps, and later with the CIA.


With the aid of elements of the Central Intelligence Agency and the Unification Church of Sun Myung Moon, Barbie and a group of fascist terrorists associated with the narcotics trade overthrew the Bolivian government and established a dictatorship under General Garcia-Meza. Under this regime, the business of cocaine kingpin Roberto Suarez thrived, aided by Barbie and his “bridegrooms of death.” Doubling as para-fascist terrorists and enforcers for the government, Barbie and his cutthroats aided the bloody suppression of trade unions and the political left in the coup’s aftermath.


Barbie’s cocaine mercenaries included some interesting individuals. German-born Joachim Fiebelkorn (a neo-Nazi and informant for the Drug Enforcement Agency) was joined with Italian fascists, such as Pierluigi Pagliai (a member of the infamous P‑2 lodge discussed in AFAs 18,19) and the notorious fascist Stefano Delle Chiaie, a principal architect of the “strategy of tension.”


The strategy of tension (a major focal point of AFA-19) was an out-cropping of what Danish journalist Henrik Kruger termed “the International Fascista.” (Kruger is the author of The Great Heroin Coup: Drugs, Intelligence and International Fascism, published in softcover by the South End Press of Boston, copyright 1980. Mr. Emory views the work as the best individual volume ever written on the subject of the intelligence community and the narcotics trade.) A consortium of fascists in Europe and Latin America, International Fascista included numerous Latin death squad elements, elements of U.S. intelligence and the Paladin mercenary group (funded by Libyan dictator Khadafy, as well as the weapons empire of SS officer and sometime CIA operative Otto Skorzeny.) A principal figure in the postwar ODESSA organization, Skorzeny is discussed at considerable length in AFA-22.


One of the major cogs of the International Fascista was CORU, arguably the most militant and deadly of the anti-Castro Cuban organizations. CORU was involved in a string of bombings, assassinations and terrorist attacks in the mid 1970’s, including the 1976 assassination of Orlando Letelier in Washington D.C. CORU’s reign of terror took place when George Bush was director of the CIA, and an element of the agency appears to have been involved with it.


Program Highlights Include: “Operation Condor” (an international assassination consortium of Latin American dictatorships); a number of assassinations and attempted assassinations conducted under “Condor;” Argentine fascist and P‑2 lodge member Jose Lopez Rega; Italian fascist and Skorzeny associate Prince Justo Valerio Borghese; former Goebbels Propaganda Ministry official Gerhard Hartmut Von Schubert (the operating manager of the Paladin group); Paladin’s overlap with Spanish intelligence and the CIA; Operation Condor’s attempts at disguising its acts as left-wing terror; the position of the World Anti-Communist League in the milieu set forth in this broadcast


For more related content, please visit:


http://ourhiddenhistory.org/

https://archive.org/details/@altviewstv-fanclub

https://rumble.com/v4e2vto-dave-emory-anti-fascist-archives-27-the-cia-the-military-and-drugs-part-4-o.html


Pope Paul V (Latin: Paulus V; Italian: Paolo V) (17 September 1550 – 28 January 1621), born Camillo Borghese, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 16 May 1605 to his death, in January 1621. In 1611, he honored Galileo Galilei as a member of the papal Accademia dei Lincei and supported his discoveries.[2] In 1616, Pope Paul V instructed Cardinal Robert Bellarmine to inform Galileo that the Copernican theory could not be taught as fact, but Bellarmine's certificate allowed Galileo to continue his studies in search for evidence and use the geocentric model as a theoretical device. That same year Paul V assured Galileo that he was safe from persecution so long as he, the Pope, should live. Bellarmine's certificate was used by Galileo for his defense at the trial of 1633.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Paul_V


Borghese

Recorded in many forms including Bourges, Bourgaize, Bourgeois, (France), Burgess, Burges and Burgis (England and Scotland), Borghese, Borgesio and Burgisi (Italy), and others, this interesting surname is of pre 8th century Old French origins. It derives from the word "burgeis", meaning inhabitant and FREEMAN of a fortified town, one which could apply municipal rates, taxes, and duties. A burgeis generally had tenure of land or buildings from a landlord by "burgage", which involved the payment of a fixed money rent. In Scotland, the position of burgess required not only the making of payments, but to be availble to take part in guarding the town. The surname is one of the earliest recorded anywhere in the world. These recordings are from England because this country was the first to adopt both hereditary surnames and to make the necessary registers in which to record them. France was several centuries later, and Italy, not until the 19th century in most areas. Early recordings showing the influence of the Norman-French in England after the Invasion of 1066 include: Ralph le Burgeis, in the Pipe Rolls of the county of Sussex in 1195, and Philip Bourges in the cartulary of Oseney Abbey, Oxford in 1197. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Geoffrey Burgeis, which was dated 1115, in the "Winton Rolls" of Hampshire. This was during the reign of King Henry 1st, known as "The Lion of Justice", 1100 - 1135. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. Over the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop", often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling.

https://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Borghese


Facade of St Peter's

Designed by Carlo Maderno (1608-1614) The inscription (1m letters) states:

"Paul V Borghese, Roman, Pontiff, in 1612, the seventh of his pontificate, [built] in honour of the Prince of Apostles

On February 10, 1608 the first stone of the Facade was laid and on July 21, 1612 most of the work was completed. It took another two years for the ornamentation, and the basilica was finally consecrated by Urban VIII on November 18, 1926.


From the central balcony, called the Loggia of the Blessings, the new pope is announced with "Habemus Papum", and gives the Urbi et Orbi blessing (to the city and to the world) upon his election and at Christmas and Easter. The relief under the balcony, by Buonvicino, represents Christ giving the keys to St. Peter. The facade is 114.69 metres (376.3 ft) wide and 45.55 metres (149.4 ft) high and is built of travertine.


Above the basic structure is an attic, with eight square windows decorated with small pilasters, surmounted by a balustrade and 13 statues in travertine. The statues on the balustrade represent Christ the Redeemer (19 feet high), St. John the Baptist and 11 Apostles. St. Mathias is included because he is associated with the other "Eleven" in bearing witness to Christ's Resurrection. St Peter is not included because his statue is below in the Square.


When Carlo Maderno started to build the facade, he was bound to the already existing Michelangelo's wings. He just put the attic all around the building, as planned by Michelangelo. That creation looks mighty and dynamic along the west side of the Basilica but is disharmonious in the facade. For this reason, at the far sides of the facade, Maderno planned two bell towers which lightened and soared the building. In 1621, at the death of Paul V, the ground subsided and the building of the two bell towers had to be stopped.


In 1646, Bernini tried to erect the bell towers again, but had to demolish the left-hand side bell tower because of cracks in the facade. Only the bases of the bell towers remain, two archways at the sides of the facade that seem to form part of it while they should have been separated. This was remedied in 1790 by the installation of two clocks designed by Giuseppe Valadier.


The eight gigantic columns of the facade are almost 10ft wide and 90 feet high.


The restoration of the facade and the 13 statues, begun in April 1985, was concluded on November 30, 1986. The original copper cross (1613) in the arms of the statue of the Redeemer, which was replaced by a new one during the work, was given to the Knights of Columbus in recognition of their support for the restoration.


Sources:

Dom Basil Watkins, OSB (ed.), The Book of Saints, 2002

A. Sperandino, Works On The Facade of St Peter's Basilica, 1989

https://www.stpetersbasilica.info/Exterior/Facade/Facade.htm


THE CONFLICT: PRIORY OF SION VERSUS KNIGHTS TEMPLAR

Secret societies by virtue of their very secrecy have often kept historians at bay, and the historians, reluctant to confess their ignorance, prefer to diminish the consequence of their subject. Freemasonry.. is of vital importance to any social, psychological, cultural or political history of eighteenth-century Europe, and even to the founding of the United States; but most history books don't even mention it. It is almost as if an implicit policy obtained: If something cannot be exhaustively documented, it must be irrelevant and thereby not worth discussing I at all. Investigators of the Holy Grail' Freemasonry, French and English, as we know it today, finds its loots in two organizations of the Middle Ages - the Priory of Sion and the Order of the Knights Templar. What follows is the fascinating, if sometimes complicated and obscure history, of how these two modern, anti-Christian secular secret societies - English and French Freemasonry - developed from two groups that themselves had roots in the occult. We will see how the Priory of Sion desired to rule the world from the throne of David in Jerusalem through its counterfeit Jewish Merovingian bloodline, and how its own creation, the Knights Templar, moved beyond its role as police and protector of Sion to financial masters of medieval Europe. We will trace the alliance of Sion and the Templars, their dispute over the discovery of Solomon's treasures, and the terrible intrigues which followed that led to the undoing of the Templars in their struggle over wealth, power, and politics. We will reveal the beliefs of these two groups: that Jesus fathered children by Mary Magdalene; that a spiritual god of good (Satan) battles a material god of evil; that Lucifer, not Jesus, deserves worship; that a "Spear of Destiny" (later sought and possessed by Hitler) allows the holder to rule the world. We will also present data about the whereabouts of King Solomon's wealth, the plan to one day return it to Jerusalem, and reveal that the ultimate goal of these two groups is world government, and that their descendants, English and French Freemasonry, desire the same. The Historical Trail: The Priory of Sion and the Holy Grail In 1982 and 1986 three secular revisionist authors, Michael Baigent~ Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln published Holy Blood, Holy Grail followed by The Messianic Legacy. These two books dramatically reveal a secret order structured in the manner of Freemasonry, and founded in Europe twelve centuries before the Grand Lodge was officially formed in 1717. This order protects both the Holy Grail and the Merovingian bloodline, which bloodline carried Mystery Babylon into the Catholic Church in 496 A.D. 56 The Holy Grail, of course, is the so-called cup from which Jesus drank at the Last Supper. The Merovingians, owners of the Holy Grail, teach that Jesus fathered children by Mary Magdalene. The Merovingians claim to be the offspring of that "holy" union, and as such, assert they are Jews of the Davidic line.

In Revelation 17:3-5 the apostle John describes a vision, which Rev. J. R. Church in Guardians of the Grail believes is fulfilled in the Grail legend. The Whore of Babylon is holding in her hand a golden cup full of blasphemy. Church believes the cup is the blasphemous Holy Grail Another element of the Grail legend is the spear supposed to have pierced the side of Jesus, also known as the Spear of Longinus or the Spear of Destiny. Whoever possesses this spear, so the legend goes, will rule the world. The Merovingians, whose descendants are the Habsburg pretenders to the Austrian throne today, are in possession of the spear. It is on display in the Habsburg museum in Vienna, Austria~ No one, however, knows the location of the Holy Grail. At least no one is telling. Although heretical, this secret society should not be discounted, for it is alive and well today. In fact, in 1956, an Order calling itself the Prieure de Sion, or Priory of Sion, registered itself publicly for the first time with the French government. (Sion is French for Zion.) It is from this Order that the legend of the Holy Grail originated five centuries after Christ's death. Rev. Church remarks of this organization: This mysterious group is presently made up of over 9,000 men, including Protestants, Roman Catholics, Jews, and Moslems. The members of this secret sect should be considered unfaithful to their respective beliefs, for in reality they are neither Christian nor Catholic, they are neither Jew nor Moslem. Their doctrine sidesteps the basic tenets of those beliefs and replaces them with the teachings of their greatest prophet - whom they believe to be Buddha.2 From this secret order J. R. Church believes will come the Anti-Christ, for he writes, "Their ultimate goal is world government!'

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zCd0nFuvnM4OYWuVW5QUBCpsTfBv5bYx/view?usp=sharing


Why is the firstborn so important in the Bible?

translate

firstborn in the Bible

Answer


In biblical times, the firstborn was given certain unique rights, responsibilities, and privileges. A married couple’s firstborn male child was given priority and preeminence in the family, and the best of the inheritance. The nation of Israel is identified as God’s “firstborn” in the Bible (Exodus 4:22; Jeremiah 31:9); in other words, Israel held a special place of privilege and blessing among the nations.


People in ancient cultures attached great value to the eldest son, assigning him distinct benefits and obligations. The firstborn male was important because he was believed to represent the prime of human strength and vitality (Genesis 49:3; Psalm 78:51) as the “opener of the womb” (Exodus 13:2, 12, 15; Numbers 18:15; Luke 2:23). As a result, the firstborn son became the primary heir of the family. The firstborn’s birthright involved a double portion of the household estate and the leadership of the family if his father became incapacitated or was absent for some reason (Deuteronomy 21:17). After his father’s death, the eldest son usually cared for his mother until her death and provided for his unmarried sisters.


In the Old Testament, firstborn humans—and animals—were considered sacred to God (Genesis 4:4; Exodus 13:1–2; Leviticus 27:26; Numbers 3:11–13; Deuteronomy 15:19–23). After God rescued Israel from slavery in Egypt, He commanded the people to consecrate every firstborn male human and firstborn animal to Him (Exodus 22:29–30). The dedication was in memory of God’s great deliverance and a sign to their children that God had brought them out of Egypt (Exodus 13:11–16).


At the beginning of Israel’s years in the wilderness, God took all the males in the tribe of Levi into service in place of the firstborn males from the other tribes, entrusting the Levites with the work of His tabernacle (Numbers 3). The number of Levite males did not equal the full number of firstborns among the other tribes, so, to make up the difference, some of the firstborn from other tribes were redeemed with a financial offering to the priests (Numbers 3:46–48). After the Israelites settled in Canaan, the firstborn sons of all Israelites were to be redeemed as a sign they they belonged to God (Exodus 34:19; Numbers 18:14–16). Among the clean animals, the firstborn male was to be sacrificed to God eight days after birth (Exodus 13:11–16; 22:39–30). The firstborn males of unclean animals were either redeemed through a financial payment to the temple, replaced on the altar of sacrifice by a clean animal, or killed (Exodus 34:20; Numbers 18:14–16). These symbolic acts represented the Passover. In the final plague against Egypt, God “passed over” the firstborn males of Israel, who were in their homes with the blood of a lamb as a sign on their doors as God had commanded. The firstborn Egyptian males, including the livestock, were struck down (Exodus 11—12:30).


The firstborn could sell his rights, as Esau did to Jacob (Genesis 25:29–34). In doing this, “Esau despised his birthright” (Genesis 25:34). The author of Hebrews warned his readers, “See that no one is sexually immoral, or is godless like Esau, who for a single meal sold his inheritance rights as the oldest son. Afterward, as you know, when he wanted to inherit this blessing, he was rejected. Even though he sought the blessing with tears, he could not change what he had done” (Hebrews 12:16–17). In taking his position as firstborn lightly, Esau sinned against God and his family.


The rights of the firstborn could also be lost, as was the case for Reuben, Jacob’s firstborn son (Genesis 49:3–4). Reuben slept with Bilhah, his father’s concubine (Genesis 35:22), an act that demonstrated the utmost disrespect for his father and his family. Jacob denied Reuben the blessing of the firstborn because of that sin (Genesis 49:4). In fact, Jacob withheld the blessing of the firstborn from the next two oldest sons, too, due to their violence against the Shechemites (Genesis 49:5–7; cf. Genesis 34).


The importance of the firstborn reaches its apex in Scripture in the person of Jesus Christ. All prior implications of the firstborn’s role in the Bible serve to illuminate Christ’s preeminence over all creation and in the family of God.


The New Testament describes Christ as the “firstborn” several times. In an earthly sense, Jesus is Mary’s firstborn son (Luke 2:7), and He was dedicated according to the law (Luke 2:22–24). Spiritually, Jesus is the “firstborn among many brothers and sisters” in the body of Christ (Romans 8:29). In Colossians 1:15, the apostle Paul writes, “The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.” This use of the title firstborn for Christ echoes the wording of Psalm 89:27–29, where God says of King David, “And I will appoint him to be my firstborn, the most exalted of the kings of the earth. I will maintain my love to him forever, and my covenant with him will never fail. I will establish his line forever, his throne as long as the heavens endure.”


In the book of Hebrews, Christ is “heir of all things” (Hebrews 1:2) and God’s “firstborn into the world” (Hebrews 1:6). Just as the firstborn son is head over his earthly family after his father, Jesus Christ is head of the body of Christ—the church—after God the Father (Ephesians 1:20–23; Colossians 1:18, Hebrews 2:10–12). Just as the firstborn son receives the greatest inheritance from his father, Jesus Christ receives the world as His inheritance. God says to His Son, “Only ask, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance, the whole earth as your possession” (Psalm 2:8).


As a point of clarification, the term firstborn in relation to Jesus does not suggest that He is a created being. The Son of God has existed for all eternity along with the Father and the Holy Spirit. Jesus is fully God (John 1:1–3). He took on human flesh so that He could become our Savior to serve as the Mediator between humankind and God (1 Timothy 2:5). When Scripture refers to Christ as the “firstborn,” the message is that Christ’s supremacy, sovereignty, and priority extend over all things and all other beings.


In paying for our sin, Jesus Christ suffered death, but He also became “the firstborn from the dead” (Revelation 1:5); that is, He conquered death and is the first person to ever be “born” to eternal life after dying. By God’s grace, through faith in Jesus, we, too, can receive eternal life (Ephesians 2:1–10; John 3:16–18). Through His death and resurrection, Jesus is the “firstfruits” who guarantees the future resurrection and eternal life of many other sons and daughters of God (1 Corinthians 15:20–23). As He Himself said, “Because I live, you also will live” (John 14:19).

https://www.gotquestions.org/firstborn-in-the-Bible.html


Sarina L Barela is 34 years old. Sarina's phone numbers include (775) 443-8186 , Sarina's possible relatives include Sammy Paul Barela , Sylena Barela , Sylena M Dean , Sylvia A Terrazas , Allen Drew Black .


Sarina L Barela currently lives at 992 Round House Ln Apt B, Carson City, NV


Sarina L Barela previously lived at 2029 Lonnie Ln, Dayton, NV | 400 S Saliman Rd Apt 103, Carson City, NV |

https://www.cyberbackgroundchecks.com/detail/sarina-l-barela/pidnppgbmpzylbagqpazqmb

https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=7909736109094672&set=a.112009122200782


Alberto A Banda Age: 34

Current Address

3502 S Mason Ave APT 7D

Tacoma, WA 98409 8541

Pierce County

Last reported in January of 1


Current Address Property Summary

Bedrooms

0

Year Built

1986

Last Sale Amount

$18,475,000

Ownership Type

Corporate

Subdivision

Bathrooms

0

Estimated Value

$0

Last Sale Date

5/3/2024

Land Use

Apt House 5+ Units

Lot SQ FT

310,582

Square Feet

17,116

Estimated Equity

$0

Occupancy Type

Non-Owner Occupied

Property Class

Residential

School District

Tacoma Public Schools

Phone Numbers

(775) 443-5640

Wireless

Cellco Partnership dba Verizon Wireless - CA

Last reported in August of 2016


(775) 884-0435

LandLine/Services

Nevada Bell Telephone Company

Last reported in January of 2013


Full Background Report

Full Name


Other observed names

Alberto Banda | Alberto Alcala Banda

Address History

714 Sean Dr

Carson City, NV 89701 6010

Carson City County

Last reported in January of 1


Po Box 4311

Carson City, NV 89702 4311

Carson City County

Last reported in January of 1


716 Hot Springs Rd APT 2

Carson City, NV 89706 0959

Carson City County

Last reported in January of 1


3230 Imperial Way APT 31

Carson City, NV 89706 0827

Carson City County

Last reported in January of 1


1087 Woodside Dr APT 123

Carson City, NV 89701 2064

Carson City County

Last reported in January of 1


Possible Relatives

Jose Luis Banda | Patricia V Alcala | Arnulfo B Iniguez | Denise America Banda | Fortino A Banda Landavazo | Jose O Banda | Lynda M Banda | Miguel A Maciel | Alberto Serrano | Alejandra Alcala

Possible Associates

Sarina L Barela | Sammy Paul Barela

Possible Businesses

None found

Alberto A Banda is 34 years old. Alberto's phone numbers include (775) 443-5640 , (775) 884-0435 , Alberto's possible relatives include Jose Luis Banda , Patricia V Alcala , Arnulfo B Iniguez , Denise America Banda , Fortino A Banda Landavazo .


Alberto A Banda currently lives at 3502 S Mason Ave Apt 7D, Tacoma, WA


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The Kingdom of Jerusalem, also known as the Crusader Kingdom, was one of the Crusader states established in the Levant immediately after the First Crusade. It lasted for almost two hundred years, from the accession of Godfrey of Bouillon in 1099 until the fall of Acre in 1291. Its history is divided into two periods with a brief interruption in its existence, beginning with its collapse after the siege of Jerusalem in 1187 and its restoration after the Third Crusade in 1192.


The original Kingdom of Jerusalem lasted from 1099 to 1187 before being almost entirely overrun by the Ayyubid Sultanate under Saladin. Following the Third Crusade, it was re-established in Acre in 1192. The re-established state is commonly known as the "Second Kingdom of Jerusalem" or, alternatively, as the "Kingdom of Acre" after its new capital city. Acre remained the capital for the rest of its existence, even during the two decades that followed the Crusaders' establishment of partial control over Jerusalem during the Sixth Crusade, through the diplomacy of Emperor Frederick II.


The vast majority of the Crusaders who settled the Kingdom of Jerusalem were from the Kingdom of France, as were the knights and soldiers who made up the bulk of the steady flow of reinforcements throughout its two-hundred-year existence; its rulers and elite were therefore predominantly French.[5] French Crusaders also brought their language to the Levant, thus establishing Old French as the lingua franca of the Crusader states, in which Latin served as the official language. While the majority of the population in the countryside comprised Christians and Muslims from local Levantine ethnicities, many Europeans (primarily French and Italian) also arrived to settle in villages across the region.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Jerusalem


"Mexican Radio" is a song by American rock band Wall of Voodoo. The track was initially released on their second studio album Call of the West (1982).


The video for the single was regularly featured on MTV in the United States, contributing to the song's popularity.[3][4][5] In April 1983 the song peaked at No. 58 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart[6] and number 55 on the US Cash Box Top 100.[7] It also reached No. 18 in Canada, No. 21 in New Zealand, No. 33 in Australia and No. 64 in the UK.[8][9][10][11]


Composition

The song's lyrics describe listening to the broadcasts of high-wattage unregulated Mexican radio stations, known as border blasters, whose AM broadcasts are strong enough to be picked up by radio receivers in the US.[3] The song was inspired by car trips taken by Wall of Voodoo frontman Stan Ridgway and guitarist Marc Moreland on their way to rehearsals, when they would listen to Mexican broadcasts, preferring their programming to mainstream Los Angeles radio.[3] During one of the band's sessions, Moreland played them a demo tape that he had recorded of himself repeatedly singing the line "I'm on a Mexican radio" over a guitar riff and that sound clip became the starting point of the single.[3]


Writing and recording

The lyrics for "Mexican Radio" were written by Ridgway and Moreland; the music was written by Moreland.[5]


Producer Richard Mazda and recording engineer Jess Sutcliffe, both from England, were invited to Los Angeles to record with Wall of Voodoo by Miles Copeland, founder of I.R.S. Records.[3] The songs "Mexican Radio" and "Suburban Lawns", from Wall of Voodoo's album Call of the West, were recorded with Mazda and Sutcliffe over the course of a weekend at Hit City West studios in Los Angeles.[3]


In order to emulate the sounds of AM radio, many of the song's instruments, including the synthesizers, were played through amplifiers, rather than being recorded directly through the microphones to the mixing console.[3] They recorded some of Moreland's guitar through an amplifier placed in the restroom at the back of the studio and Ridgway sang some of the vocals through a handmade bullhorn.[3] The song also includes soundbites recorded by Ridgway during a trip to Mexico, including the broadcast of a dog race that was playing over a radio in a bar that he visited.[3]


The song was recorded using a Soundcraft mixing console and one 24-track recorder along with Shure and AKG microphones.[3] The synthesizer parts were played on a Minimoog and an Oberheim Eight Voice, the majority of which were recorded through Fender Twin Reverb and Vox AC30 amplifiers.[3] It is the Oberheim Eight Voice that was used to create the sounds right at the opening of the song.[3] The instrumental track for "Mexican Radio" was created using two different drum machines: a Roland TR-808 and a Kalamazoo Rhythm Ace, an older device once owned by voice actor Daws Butler.[3]


Music video

The video for "Mexican Radio" was featured regularly on MTV in the weeks following its release.[3][12] It was the first music video created by filmmaker and former the Bruthers frontman Frank Delia, who had been a long-time friend of Wall of Voodoo band members.[13] The video impressed the Ramones, who hired Delia to direct videos for them as a result.[13]


The video includes bizarre imagery, including a shot of Ridgway's face surfacing from a bowl of beans.[3][14][15] Some of the footage was shot in Tijuana, Mexico at the bullfights.[13] Actor Carel Struycken makes a brief appearance playing the video's director.[16]


The video cost $15,000 to make and was originally shot on film.[13][17]


Critical reception

In 1983 Jim Sullivan of The Boston Globe called "Mexican Radio" a "mildly warped tune...with irresistibly catchy melody lines," and Moira McCormick of Billboard magazine called it an "intriguingly quirky single" in 1985.[5][18] Smash Hits thought that the instrumentation resembled music from the Doors despite the synth-heavy arrangement.[19] In 2012 Rolling Stone said "it's a pretty unconventional pop song, but it's extremely catchy.[14] NPR referred to "Mexican Radio" as "such a wonderfully weird song" and "one of the most compelling, memorable sing-alongs ever" in 2020.[20]


The song gained cult status and was often played on radio stations featuring punk and new wave music.[3][18] Being the only single by Wall of Voodoo to reach the top 100 in the US, "Mexican Radio" is considered a one-hit wonder.[3][12][20]


Ridgway, who left Wall of Voodoo in 1983 to embark on a solo career, told Mix magazine in 2005: "The 'one-hit wonder' status of 'Mexican Radio' is not something to be ashamed of. Obviously, it's not all the band was about, and it's possible the light from it blinded some people from hearing other things the band did, but it exposed a lot of people to our music who probably wouldn't have heard it — and maybe because of it, after Wall of Voodoo I was lucky enough to continue to write songs and make music. If there wasn't a 'Mexican Radio,' you probably wouldn't be talking to me now."[3][15]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Radio


Hermetic Marriage


THE HOUR OF THE TIME

Tape No. 453:  "The Hermetic Marriage"

Tuesday, October 4, 1994


The Hermetic Marriage, or the marriage of the sun and the moon, the

origin of the hermetic philosophy, will astound you.  You're going to

learn a few things about yourselves, about religion, and about Walt

Disney tonight.


Good old Walt.  You've been leading your children to his lessons in The

Mysteries and the philosophic indoctrination into the philosophy of fire

for many years.  And you didn't even know it.


Thoth--Hermes--the ibis-headed, was the Egyptian god of wisdom,

learning, literature, and science--"gnosis", if you will.


The "G" in the center of the compass and square of the Masonic emblem

does not stand for "God" or "geometry".  It means "gnosis"--knowledge.

Those who know.


Thoth--Hermes--is accredited with being the first to reveal the art of

writing to the present human race.  According to the records available,

he lived in Egypt as a contemporary of Moses.  Some authorities even

claim that Moses and Hermes were one and the same person.


The Greek name "Hermes" is taken from an ancient root, "herm", which

means the active, or positive, radiant principle of nature; sometimes

translated as "vitality" or "generative force"; and known to ancient

freemasonry--or the sons of light, the free "macon"--as "the cosmic

fire", Hiram, and later as Hiram Abif.


Hermes Trismegistus, often called "Mercurius Termaximus" dominated the

philosophical and literary thought of the ancient world.  His very name,

ladies and gentlemen, became a synonym of wisdom.  In fact, he was

revered as the personification of philosophy and erudition.  He was

regarded as the first cabalist, the first physician, the first

alchemist, and the first historian. The actual life of this demagogue

and king of the ancient double empire of the Nile is obscured by that

twilight which hides the origin of all peoples.  And those who think

they know, you can be assured, do not.


By reason of his great wisdom and magical powers, Thoth was listed among

the gods until today many believe that he never existed at all outside

of mythology.  But if action and reaction are equal, then something more

substantial than a mere legend must be the foundation for the towering

super-structure of the hermetic arts.


During the early periods of human growth, when the intelligence of man

was scarcely above that of the animal--according to the theory of

evolution--all education was controlled by the priest craft, just as I

have outlined to you on many episodes of "The Hour of the Time".


The ancient priests were called "the shepherds of men"--the analogy is

that men are sheep or cattle--for the shepherds guarded the flocks of

primitive human beings as the shepherd does his sheep.


Are you beginning to have a flicker of understanding?


Both science and philosophy were outgrowths of religion.  In fact, all

our present day wisdom came originally into the world from between the

pillars of the sanctuaries, the temples, what today you call cathedrals

or churches.  And it came from the priesthood, from the priests.


Hermes was to ancient philosophy what Jesus is to Christianity:  its

light, its inspiration, and of course, its impetus.


The Egyptian initiates of the Temple of Isis claimed, therefore, that

Hermes was actually the writer of all books on philosophical and

religious subjects, that the supposed human authors were merely

amanuenses who wrote down upon parchment or velum the thoughts which

this god impressed upon their consciousness.  Sort of like channeling.

In scriptural terms, they were the pens; and he, the ever-ready writer.


During his lifetime--if indeed he lived--Hermes Trismegistus is supposed

to have actually written 42 books.  Some, however, are probably the work

of the ancient Egyptian priests, for in their glory, these

serpent-crowned hierophants represented the wisest group of philosophers

that ever lived upon this planet.


Clemens Alexandrinus states that these hermetic books were divided into

six parts, each dealing with a separate subject under such headings as

astronomy (and its inseparable companion--astrology), medicine,

geography, the hymns to the gods, and, of course, other titles.


During the ages that have past, Hermes has come to be acknowledged as

the godfather of science, particularly its chemical and medical

branches.  And even after the Christian Era, numerous works dealing with

religious and philosophical subjects were dedicated to him and to him

alone.  And the general term "hermetic art" has been applied to

practically all the abstruse sciences of the ancient, medieval, and

modern worlds.


"The Divine Pymander", more commonly known as "The Shepherd of Men", and

"The Smerigdine<?> Tablet" found in the Valley of Hebron, are the most

famous of the hermetic fragments.


You may reference this in a book by Manley P. Hall entitled "The Lost

Keys of Freemasonry".


And these two works are probably authentic and contain many keys to the

universal science of life as held by The Mysteries--not necessarily me

or anyone else--of which Hermes was a master.


Nearly all hermetic thought was an elaboration of the principle of

analogy contained in the great hermetic axiom--and you have heard me

propound upon this before--and I quote verbatim:


"That which is above is like unto that which is below.  And that which

is below is like unto that which is above."


Now at the present time, nearly all the so-called hermetic writings are

said to be lost.  Only a few isolated remnants remain of what once must

have been a magnificent collection of philosophical, medical, and

religious wisdom.


During the Middle Ages, one particular branch of hermetic

thought--alchemy--gradually came into prominence, and for several

hundred years dominated all other branches, and was held under that

ancient name:  "The Rosy Cross"--for those of you not familiar with the

subjects covered on this broadcast.


Alchemy was the androgynous parent of chemistry.


Notice I said androgynous.  This parent of chemistry, which was

separated from its sire by the speculations of Roger Bacon and Baal.

While chemistry as a science dealt only with minerals, medicines, and

essences, alchemy, ladies and gentlemen, struggled with the more

profound elements of macrocosmic and microcosmic relationships, and had

absolutely nothing--nothing--to do with what you have traditionally been

taught.


Alchemy undoubtedly originated in Egypt; for there, for there--the old

legends go--the secrets of transmuting base metals into gold, and of

prolonging the life of the physical body indefinitely, were thoroughly

understood by the priest craft.  But this explanation was of the

exoteric, and not the esoteric, meaning which literally dealt with the

soul and not the body, not the base metal.  For it had nothing to do

with metal.


It was about elevating oneself above the animal, above the baseness of

the human condition, to the purity of the consciousness of the soul, and

thus, a direct communication with God.


Ancient records tell us that the Chaldean sages knew how to rebuild

their bodies, many of them living to be over a thousand years old--and

then this again is a metaphor.


Many of the processes by which this was accomplished were concealed

under the sacred Egyptian rituals such as "The Book of Coming Forth By

Day", which E. A. Wallis Budge has called "The Book of the Dead".  The

correct title is "The Book of Coming Forth By Day", not "The Book of the

Dead".


In the Middle Ages, when religion, divorcing philosophy, was wed to

blind faith, there was a renaissance of the alchemical and hermetic

arts.  They were revived by that type of mind which demands reason,

logic, and philosophy, as well as hymns and prayers.


Alchemy won numerous converts in Germany, France, and England.  The

long-ignored works of the Arabian magicians--or the Magi--enjoyed wide

popularity, and from them was extracted the greater part of modern

astrology.  The ancient philosophies of the Jewish patriarchs were also

revived and cabalism became a universal topic of consideration.


Paracelsus, the great Swiss physician (sometimes called "the second

Hermes"), undoubtedly rediscovered the ancient Egyptian formulae of the

Philosopher's Stone and the Elixir of Life, and around him rallied a

coterie of medieval philosophers who today stand out strongly against

the dun-colored background of medieval culture.  They are, in fact, some

of the most interesting men of that period of history.


In back of this revival of interest in ancient Egyptian philosophy, we

may find the master minds and guiding hands of three great philosophical

movements who now control the world:


  1.  One is known as the Order of the Illuminati, represented by

Muhammad, prophet of Islam; Roger Bacon, father of chemistry; and

Paracelsus, father of modern medicine.  Remember, The Mysteries--or the

Religion of Illuminism--came from the Middle East, and thus, properly

belongs exactly where it is placed, represented by Muhammad, the prophet

of Islam.  For it is from the Islamic faith that the Knights Templars

brought The Mysteries from the Middle East into Europe.  It is an

interesting fact that the present buildings and school of Rudolf

Steiner, the German mystic, are located in the grounds of the old estate

of Hohenheim where Paracelsus lived;


  2.  The Order of Freemasons, represented by the great Robert Flood,

master of symbolism and alchemy, and Elias Ashmole, the unique

philosopher; and


  3.  The Rosicrucians, a sacred organization founded by the mysterious

Father C.R.C. after his return from Arabia.  You see, in the

mythological city of Demcar, he had been educated in alchemy and

astrology by Arabian adepts, according to the story.  After him came Sir

Francis Bacon, the remodeler of British law.  And then Count Cagliostro,

the sublime adventurer.  And last and greatest of all, the great Compte

de St. Germaine, probably the world's greatest political reformer, and

alchemist by fire, and one of the greatest frauds that has ever lived.


These superlative minds leavened the loaf of materiality.  And,

according to those who study The Mysteries, kept alight the flame of

Hermes during the medieval centuries of religious intolerance and

bigotry.


Concealed beneath chemistry--the science of relating chemicals and

elements--these minds discovered the ancient Egyptian arcana, long

hidden by the crafty priests of Ra and Amon, and further concealed by

that great Mystery School known as The Vatican.  Alchemy, thereupon,

became the chemistry of the soul.  For under the material symbol of

chemistry was concealed The Mystery of the Coming Forth By Day.


Now, these ancient wisemen taught that the world was a great laboratory;

that living essences were the chemicals; that the span of life was a

period of time given to the mind in which to experiment with the great

agencies of nature; and that to the thoughtful came wisdom from their

labors, while for the thoughtless life held only foolishness and sorrow.


In this great laboratory, man learned how to combine the living

chemicals of thought, action, and desire, and by learning the ways of

nature, became the master of nature.


According to those who believe, he became a god by actually becoming a

man.  You see, in the words of the great Paracelsus, and I quote:


"The beginning of wisdom is the beginning of supernatural power."


Of all the hermetic mysteries, none is more perplexing than the

so-called "hermetic marriage".  A post-Christian interpretation of an

ancient Egyptian ritual, supposedly written 200 years earlier, was

published to the modern world in the first part of the seventeenth

century under the name of "The Chemical Nuptials of Christian

Rosencruits".  Little, if anything, has been discovered concerning the

origin either of this book or the "Fama Fraternitatis" which appeared

about the same time.


The exalted order of Rosicrucian philosophers, which today is known as

The Rosy Cross, has been very reticent concerning its members and their

works.  And even today it is difficult to prove, from a strictly

material viewpoint, that the order ever existed--unless of course, you

listen to "The Hour of the Time", for we have proved it repeatedly,

cited book, paragraph, chapter and verse.


Concealed under that quaint wording of the alchemical marriage can be

plainly traced a series of mysterious formulae concerning the

transmutation of base metals into gold.  And I have already explained

the esoteric meaning of that.


The alchemists taught that man contained within himself all the elements

of nature, both human and divine, and that by special culture, the base

elements of his nature could be transmuted into the spiritual gold

called "the soul".


In discussing this, Paracelsus makes plain that these philosophers did

not wish to leave the impression that something could be made from

nothing; rather they emphasized the fact that each individual thing

contains all other things, and that the alchemical process of making

gold was merely to culture the germ of gold which is contained in every

base substance--to bring it to the top, so to speak--above the baseness

of human nature.


Modern science substantiates the alchemical point of view by stating

that it expects to extract gold from mercury by taking out, or

isolating, the electron of gold which is one of the constituents of

every mercurial atom.


Taking the chemistry of human relationships as a basis therefor, we have

prepared the following thesis concerning the true preparation of a

Philosopher's Stone and the Elixir of Life, according to the

fundamentals laid down by Hermes and the ancient Egyptian priest craft.

It is known as the Hermetic Anatomy.


A theory of natural creation has been generally accepted by the faiths

of the world, with the possible exception of Christianity.  You see, to

the ancients, everything in nature was alive.  Therefore, they accepted

the human body as symbolic of the universe.


The Hebrews called this prototype "adam-qadmon" or, in translation, the

"grand man", in whose mold all things were made.  Every system of

cosmogony, except the Christian, makes the universe a living thing.


Instead of a God separated from his creation, the Brahmins, Jews,

Persians, and Chinese have conceived their god as being completely

involved in his creation.  They have accepted more literally than the

Christians the idea that man dwells in God, that in God he actually

lives, moves and has his being.  They call this god, "Macroprosopis"--or

translated, "the spirit of the grand man", or more commonly known to all

of you as "the soul".  From his body was made the macrocosm consisting

of suns, moons, planets, meteors, ethers, gases, and the sundry parts of

creation.


In the Scandinavian edas, the universe was formed from the body of Emir,

the Frost King.


In India, the universe was constructed from the person of Brahma, whose

members became the various bodies of the visible cosmos.


The hermetists, therefore, said, quote:


"Man, know thyself.  For thou, like God, art all wisdom, and all power,

and the shadow bearing witness unto the eternal."


Unquote.  An anonymous alchemist, writing in the Middle Ages stated, and

I quote again:


"God has given man three ways whereby he may learn the infinite will:

(1) nature, for in the stars that twinkle in the sky, the planets in

their thundering march, and the earth with its multitude of laws, are

concealed the laws of God;  (2)  holy writ, the inspired word of saints

and sages unnumbered; and (3) anatomy, the structure of our own bodies,

wherein is concealed the structure of the universe, for all things are

made by one mold."


End quote.


The electron revolving around its nebular center obeys the same law that

moves planets around the sun.  In this we see the truth of the great

hermetic axiom:


"As above, so below.  As with the lesser, so with the greater."


This was believed by all of these ancient philosophers.


The hermetists spent much time studying the intricate construction of

man and, like the Brahmans of Indian, they divided him into three major

parts.


In India, this trinity of basic parts is called "Adeh", "Buddhi" and

"Manis", meaning literally, "spirit", "soul" and "body".  Their Trimurti

corresponds to the Trinity of Christian theology.  Each of these three

major parts of a god, a man, or a universe, was personified as an

individual.


The "adeh" or spirit, was called "the divine cause" or "the father".


"Manis," or matter, was called "the divine effect", being known in India

as "Shiva" and in Christendom as the Holy Spirit.


Between these two stood "Buddhi", the mediator, the god-man, the Mercury

of the Latins, the messenger of the gods.  By some, this intermediary is

considered synonymous with soul.  By others it is called "mind" because

mind is the uniting link between life and the sense of energy and death

and the sense of inertia.  And to the pagans and hermetists, all things

in nature, the ethers, the air, minerals, even the earth itself, were

endowed with intelligence, consciousness and feeling.


All was linked and gave rise to what you know today and what is known as

the New Age Movement as the Ghia Principle.


The Adeh-Buddhi-Manis constitution of man, as represented by the

alchemists under the symbolism of the Philosopher's Stone and its three

important constituents:  salt, sulfur and mercury.


According to alchemy, salt is the substance of all things.  It is the

body, the form, the dense crystallized particles from which all physical

things are manufactured.


Sulfur is symbolic of fire, the divine agent.  Fire is defined by the

hermetist as the life of all things and is the Adeh of the Brahman

Trimurti.


Mercury, the universal solvent, becomes synonymous with Buddhi, the

mind, the thing which absorbs all experience into itself, the link

between God and nature.


And now maybe you are beginning to understand how all of these esoteric

thoughts, the religion of The Mysteries, can be hidden behind symbology.


Those of you who would read a book concerning the alchemists of the

medieval times would have actually believed that they were attempting to

create gold from lead.  And you would have gained the exoteric

interpretation concealing--or re-veiling--the true esoteric meaning of

the verse.


And we're not through.


Before this hour is out, you are going to be absolutely and totally

amazed, for I have just begun.


All the great world saviors have come, it seems, as personifications of

Buddhi, as I have just explained its meaning.  Or the universal

mediator.


Like the Indian Vishnu, they have sought to bring God and man closer

together, whether as Christ, Prometheus, Zoroaster, Krishna, or Buddha,

they have come to bear witness to the Father and, being made in the

semblance of man but imbued with the spirit of God, they have become

personifications of the universal solvent represented as mercury.


To the hermetists, man has always been considered androgynous.  And they

created the god, Hermaphrodites, to represent the duality of all living

things.


This word is coined from "Hermes", fire or vitality, and Aphrodite, the

goddess of water.  The great hermetic and alchemical adage was, quote:


"Make the fire to burn in the water and the water to feed the fire.  In

this lies great wisdom."


End quote.


It was the purpose of the pouring of the molten sea.


It is the goal of The Mysteries to reconcile fire and water:  the

conflict between God and Lucifer.


Are you beginning to understand?  There are deep meanings held in these

metaphors.


To the public was given one meaning.  To the priesthood was given the

truth.


The ancient Rosicrucians taught that the eternal feminine was not

extracted from the nature of man, as Moses would have us think; but was

rather made subservient to the opposite side of its own nature.  They

believed, you see, that every creature was essentially male and female.

But for reasons which we will discuss later, only one phase of that

nature manifested at a time.


By fire, these philosophers taught that there was but one life force in

the human body, and that man used it in the furtherance of all his

labors; that he digested his food with essentially the same energy with

which he thought, and reproduced his species with the same forces which

he used in physical exercise.  This force personified was said to be the

builder of the universal temple. It became the Hiram Abif of Masonry,

the builder of the eternal temple.


In Egypt, this force is symbolized by a serpent and it is worthy of note

that in ancient Hebrew, the words "serpent" and "savior" are

synonymous.  And that should be a great revelation to many of you out

there.


Now, remember, I'm not asking that you believe any of this.  I am merely

revealing the esoteric meaning behind the stories that you have heard

and read about in your education, in college, in your private life, in

the movies, all your life.  And yes, even in your churches.


In ancient Hebrew, "serpent" and "savior" are synonymous.


In the stanzas of Diezen<?>, an ancient Tibetan fragment, it is stated

that at one time a shower of serpents fell upon the earth.  Now, this is

understood esoterically to represent the coming of the great world

teachers who have long been called "serpents" or "the gift to man of

intellect" by Lucifer through his agent, Satan.


You see.  For the basis of all of these esoteric Mystery religions is

the Luciferian philosophy.


The savior of the Aztecs and Incas was called "gatzalcotl" and this name

means "feathered serpent".  From the serpent kings of Egypt to the

feathered serpents of Tibet, the serpent is symbolic of the vital

energies of the human body and is, in fact, a metaphor for the

intellect, knowledge, gnosis.


Moses raised the brazen serpent in the wilderness and all who gazed upon

it lived.  Those who gained knowledge, who learned, survived.  Those who

did not, perished.


Christ, whom they called "the serpent reborn" says, quote:


"...I, if I be lifted up..., will draw all men unto me." [John 12:32]


Unquote.  The simile, folks, is obvious, yet few ever understand it.  To

the ancients, the magic wand was the spinal canal.  Through this canal

runs a sacred liquid which they called in those days "fire oil".


Remember, these are the philosophers of fire.


In Greek, "christos", the "savior", or "redeemer of things".  And

"christos" are those who believed in this were called "christians" long

before the birth of Christ.


In Greek, "christos", the "savior" or "redeemer of things".


This same thought has been preserved for freemasonry under the heading,

quote, "the marrow of the bone", unquote.


The hermetic philosophers recognized this essence in man as a

distillation of universal life derived from the atmosphere, the

sunlight, the rays of the stars, and food.


This universal vitality upon which all living things draw is probably

the origin of the myths of the gods who died for mankind.  It is

undoubtedly the origin of the legend of the Last Supper, for man

eternally maintains himself upon the body and the blood of this spirit

of universal energy--according to those who follow The Mysteries.


If this energy, which passes through the conduit of the spine, is

drained off by various parts of the body, it stands to reason that waste

will ultimately result in want.


They knew--or thought they knew--that it was very undesirable to do

heavy thinking directly after eating.  Just as today they tell you,

"Don't go swimming right after eating," for at such times the vital

energies are digesting food and cannot safely be diverted to other

channels.  The admonition that you cannot go swimming directly after

eating is a leftover legacy of this belief.


By analogy, one-pointedness is the basis of success, for when the bodily

energies are divided against each other, they cannot perform their

proper functions.  The ancients, you see, taught that the normal

individual had two distinct avenues of expression:  the first mental and

spiritual; the second, emotional and physical.


The mental faculties were radiant, powerful, dominating, and strong--but

often cruel and cynical.  The mind was called the positive pole of the

soul, while the heart was called the negative pole.  And we have been

taught that the spirit expresses itself through the mind; the soul and

the body through the heart.


The ancient alchemists called the mind "the sun", and the heart "the

moon", for to them strength, reason, and logic were masculine, paternal,

solar powers; while love, beauty, intuition, and kindliness were

feminine, maternal, lunar qualities, reflecting the pure light of their

master.  Just as the moon reflects the light of the sun, love, beauty,

intuition, and kindliness reflect the dominance of the strength, reason,

and logic.


Now, this will probably make clear why gold and silver had to be blended

in the great alchemical enterprises, for the gold and silver of the

alchemists were not dead metals, but living qualities in human life.


The marriage of the sun and moon was, therefore, the marriage of the

mind and heart, or the two halves of every nature.  It was the union of

strength with beauty; courage with inspiration; and in its greater

sense, the union of science with theology, or God with nature.


The urgency of this alliance is evident in the world today where cold,

intellectualism, and commercialism need the finer sentiments of

friendliness and altruism to offset their heartlessness.


On the other hand, fanaticism, blind faith, and ungoverned emotionalism

require the strong hand of logic and reason to steer them away from the

rocks of insanity and death.


Perfect equilibrium in human nature is very, very seldom found.  In

fact, it is nature's greatest rarity.  A person with that perfectly

balanced viewpoint, however, is the living Philosopher's Stone, for he

has the strength matched with kindliness, and justice tempered with

mercy.


Hermetic Anatomy teaches that there are two small bodies in the brain

which are identified with the living "yin" and "yang" of China--or the

positive and the negative, the male and the female.  In the same way,

every person has a masculine nature and a feminine nature; and never do

we find these two entirely disassociated.


It may be that East Indian philosophy gives us our best light on this

rather perplexing subject--pun absolutely intended--for both the Hindus

and the alchemists agree that the spirit, like God, is androgynous,

being both father and mother.  And--bear with me--it states in Genesis,

quote:


"...God created man in his own image,...; male and female created he

them." [Genesis 1:27]


End quote.  So, while the creation is singular within the creation,

there is two.  Listen to it again and listen very carefully.


"...God created man in his own image,...; male and female created he

them." [Genesis 1:27]


We would infer from this that God is both male and female.  And indeed,

if male and female both came from God, then this must be true, as God is

all things.  All things emanated from God and from nowhere else.


And as the spirit of man is of God, it must partake of the androgynous

nature of its parent.  And in harmony with the eastern sages, sex exists

no more in spirit than it does in the embryo before the third month of

prenatal life.


Sex, you see, is a polarization of the body, a manifestation of spirit.

The fetus, at one point in its development, can go either way, can be

male or female.  And all fetuses, up to that point, are exactly the same

in their anatomy.  But the germ of life itself is capable of projecting

both the positive and the negative rays.


So, we now become involved in a still more perplexing problem, namely:

what governs the sex which the animal being is to manifest during life?


Well, many people will tell you many different things.  The ancient

philosophers would turn to the eastern sages and they would say,

"Evolution is the continuity of form appearing in cycles and gradually

unfolding from a simple cell to a complex organism."


If a form evolves, it is not absurd to suppose that the cause of that

form is also evolving.


The oriental philosophy solves one of the western world's greatest

problems by the law of reincarnation--something which has never been

proven to be a reality by anyone, and can be traced to its origin at a

point in Indian history where the poor threatened rebellion over the

wealthy rulers, and all of a sudden, this theory of reincarnation and

Karma cropped up to keep the poor, lower classes, in their place.


I haven't got time to go into that.


This doctrine--which was removed from the Christian faith in A.D. 550 at

the Council of Constantinople--taught that the spirit, or life, is

immortal; that it descends into gross matter not once, but many times,

in order that it may ultimately gain that perfection which no living

creature has ever yet gained in one appearance in the world.


They say.


Again, you must understand, none of this has ever been proven to be

true.  No one, on the other hand, can prove it to be false either.


This doctrine also taught that the consciousness, thus descending into

form, does not always appear in one sex, but alternates, first appearing

in a masculine body and then in a feminine, in this way developing both

sides of the nature symmetrically.


Now, if you accept this doctrine, it will go far toward solving a number

of problems concerning heredity and the so-called injustice and

inequality in the world.  Even without it, hermeticism can still stand.

With its aid, however, the alchemical philosophies become far more

clarified.


And, of course, you have the option of rejecting it outright.


The ancient wisdom teaches that the circle of the creative forces in the

human body is broken at the present time.  One end of this broken ring

is in the brain where it furnishes the power or vitality which is the

basis of brain function.  The other end of this circle is located in the

generative system where it furnishes the means of reproducing the

species.


At a time remote in history, man was a complete creative unit in

himself--they say--being capable of procreating his species like certain

of the lower orders of animals of today.  And if you believe in the

theory of evolution, then this could be true.  However, there is no

proof of it whatsoever anywhere.  There's no proof that the theory of

evolution is correct, as a matter of fact.


At that time, however, when these philosophies bore fruit, and at the

time when man existed--they say--in this state, he had no mind.

According to mythology, the raising of the brazen serpent, therefore,

gave him a mind--remember the gift of intellect by Satan in the Garden

of Eden--but broke the creative circuit.


In the masculine sex, the positive pole of the life force is in the

brain.  The negative pole is used for generative purposes.


In the feminine sex, the negative pole is in the brain, the positive

pole is used for generative purposes.


And again, this is the belief of those who follow the hermetic

philosophy.


As a direct outgrowth of this condition--temporarily maintained in order

that man may think and develop his higher nature and at the same time

offer opportunity for other lives to come into manifestation--the

institution of marriage was established.


I bet you thought I'd never get there, didn't you.


Marriage, folks, is therefore the hermetic symbol of the ultimate

reunion of the two halves of each individual's nature, when, after

repeated appearances and associations, equilibrium between these

masculine and feminine qualities is established.


You see, the wedding ring was accordingly symbolic of the golden ring of

the spirit fire which connected the spiritual and material natures of

every individual.  And these beliefs, and these marriages, and this ring

existed long before Christianity was ever the remotest thought in any

human mind upon this earth.


Ultimately, the present methods of reproduction will be abolished--they

say--and both halves of the spirit fire will again be turned into the

brain.  One of them now finds its polarity in the pituitary body, and

the other in the pineal gland.  These two tiny ductless bodies, while an

enigma to modern science, were recognized by the ancients as organs of

great significance.


The ancient wisdom teaches that the pineal gland was the original organ

of vision, namely the third eye, called in the Sanskrit, "dangma" or

"the eye of Shiva".  It is the all-seeing eye of the Freemasons, and the

meaning of the word "Buddha".  And uniting its spark with the pituitary

body, this gland fuses the broken circle, and thus consummates the

hermetic marriage whereby, through an immaculate conception in the

brain, the great light, the shining one, Lucifer, is born as a luminous

spark in the third ventricle which is the master mason's chamber in the

ancient and accepted rite.


Today, students of the ancient wisdom are seeking to prepare themselves

for this peculiar work.  The hermetic marriage is, therefore, an

individual matter involving the attainment of individual completeness,

requiring of the aspirant a sincere effort to be balanced, sane, and

consistent in everything he does.


In the alchemical retorts and vials, we recognize the bodies' glands and

organs of man; and in the chemicals, the essences and forces coursing

through the body.  With these, the individual consciousness must labor

until it is capable of combining them according to the perfect formula.


And now, Walt Disney.


What child does not grow up in a fairyland, extending from the first

glimmer of understanding to the time when the grim realities of maturity

tear down the dream world and replace it with hopelessness and despair?


Hearts are broken all the way through this tragic pageantry of

existence:  the loss of innocence.  But the first heartbreak is when the

fairy stories and their wonderful little people are given up, and those

beautiful beings with which we have peopled the world of our fancies

give way to heartless human creatures and real existence.


Man thoughtlessly destroys not only the dreams of others, but makes his

own world a nightmare peopled with hobgoblins of selfishness and

egotism.


The fairies of childhood are always benevolent, kindly, helpful, serving

the poor in distress, righting wrongs, and doing many beautiful things;

while the realities of later life are generally malevolent and

productive of all the miseries that the fairies of childhood sought to

heal with silver-tipped wands and rainbow dreams.


And there is a double meaning.  As in the teachings of The Mysteries and

the fairy tales, there is an exoteric and an esoteric.


Walt Disney, a 33rd degree Freemason of the Scottish Rite, a very famous

Anglophile, a priest of The Mystery Religion of Babylon, has been

teaching this esoteric meaning to your children throughout their life.


In the great game of life, why can we not still preserve some of the

beauty and romance of fairyland?


This is what you see.  The world of pixies, gnomes, and fairy godmothers

in a Walt Disney movie is just as real in childhood as the grinding,

commercial system is during later life.


You see, economics would suffer no injury, nor would standards collapse

if dreams were perpetuated and man instructed how to build solid

foundations under his castles of air; for human beings are ever children

at heart.  For you, too, the parents, watch these movies and enjoy them.


Man grows old, but he never grows up.  Like Peter Pan, he is childlike

from the cradle to the grave.  Life, for the average person, has an

insufficiency of beauty or sweetness with which to combat the sordid

grind of modern things and therefore, these esoteric teachings can be

presented to a receptive mind.  And here and there, one lives a whole

life in a fairyland of poetry, art or music, and may be called a

dreamer.


But in the case of Disney, it is a message, an inculcation--a

brainwashing, if you will.


For will any child ever forget Cinderella and her wonderful glass

slipper; how she met and won the beautiful prince while her envious

sisters and cruel step-mother gnashed their teeth in rage?  The story is

part of childhood.


But with the coming of years, poor little Cinderella is forgotten.  The

rag dolls are thrown in the corner.  The toy blocks are covered with

dust.  For the dream world of childhood is faded from the mind.  And

little pattering feet, once running hither and thither, have given place

to slow uncertain steps.


Yet the romance finds another setting.  Prince Charming becomes a soda

fountain clerk or a floor walker in a downtown store, while Princess

Beautiful sells ribbons in some little country shop.


The lives of people are really fairy stories in which they play out the

comedies and tragedies of their lives, seeking for something today to

take the place of the shattered dreams of yesterday.  And so, they

relish and absorb these movies, for they have a counterpart in nature.


The world about us is filled with ugly step-mothers and half-sisters who

cannot wear glass slippers.


Do you remember Beauty and the Beast, how, in spite of the sorcery that

had turned the handsome prince into a hideous monster, the coming of

Beauty into his life restored him again to human form and happiness?


Through the lack of beauty in his own heart, many an individual has

become a horrible, hideous beast who, while still in human shape, has

all the attributes of a ferocious animal.


How often the sense of beauty is the thing that redeems.  Beauty of soul

and beauty of life bring back happiness to the beast.  The whole world

is a romance of beauty and the beast.


We see it on the battle field of Flanders where flowers are springing up

in the shadows of the trenches.


In nature we ever see beauty redeeming the beast.  Out in the forest:

the dark, dead trees, gaunt and bare.  But nature, with her magic wand,

covers the tree with creeping vines, decking its gaunt limbs with

mantles of flowers.


Have you read the story of Sleeping Beauty?  If not, go straight to the

library and visit the children's room.  Sit down in one of those little

chairs about ten inches from the floor.  Get out the book with its

colored pictures and much-thumbed pages and go with the Prince to the

great forest of nettles and thorns which surrounds the palace of

Princess Beautiful.


The Princess is under a spell which causes her to sleep until she is

awakened by the handsome prince, who passes through all the obstacles in

life in order to claim her as his own.


The soul.


The mating.


The bringing together of the masculine and the feminine, after passing

through the degrees, the trials, the tribulations of initiation in The

Mysteries.


And I could go on and on and on and on and on, ladies and gentlemen.

But unfortunately, we're out of time.


Good night.  God bless you all.   ...And think of the magical lamp of

Aladdin:  the lamp of illumination.

https://web.archive.org/web/20210226094721/http://www.hourofthetime.com/hermetic.html 


[251] 5. 1While eating they should be careful to observe temperance, decorum,

and propriety both interior and exterior in everything. 2A blessing

should precede the meal, and it should be followed by a thanksgiving

which all should recite with proper devotion and reverence. 3While the

Part III 111

meal is being eaten, food should be given also to the soul, through the

reading of a book[4] which is devotional rather than difficult so that all can

understand it and draw profit from it, or through having someone preach

during that time according to what the superiors may order, or through

doing something similar for the glory of God our Lord [E].

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Early Female Transgender Identity after Prenatal Exposure to Diethylstilbestrol: Report from a French National Diethylstilbestrol (DES) Cohort

by Laura Gaspari 1,2,3,†,Marie-Odile Soyer-Gobillard 4,5,†ORCID,Scott Kerlin 6,Françoise Paris 1,2,3 andCharles Sultan 1,*

1

Unité d’Endocrinologie-Gynécologie Pédiatrique, CHU Montpellier, University Montpellier, 34090 Montpellier, France

2

INSERM 1203, Développement Embryonnaire Fertilité Environnement, University of Montpellier, 34295 Montpellier, France

3

CHU Montpellier, University Montpellier, Centre de Référence Maladies Rares du Développement Génital, Constitutif Sud, Hôpital Lapeyronie, 34295 Montpellier, France

4

Laboratoire Arago, Observatoire Océanologique, Sorbonne University, CNRS, 75016 Paris, France

5

Association HHORAGES-France, 66100 Perpignan, France

6

DES International Information and Research Network, Livermore, CA 94551, USA

*

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.

These authors contributed equally to this work.

J. Xenobiot. 2024, 14(1), 166-175; https://doi.org/10.3390/jox14010010

Submission received: 28 November 2023 / Revised: 8 January 2024 / Accepted: 10 January 2024 / Published: 12 January 2024

(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Role of Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals in the Human Health)

Downloadkeyboard_arrow_down Browse Figure Review Reports Versions Notes


Abstract

Diagnostic of transsexualism and gender incongruence are terms to describe individuals whose self-identity does not match their sex assignment at birth. A transgender woman is an individual assigned male at birth (AMAB) on the basis of the external or internal genitalia who identifies and lives as a woman. In recent decades, a significant increase in the number of transgender people has been reported. Although, its etiology is unknown, biological, anatomical, genetic, environmental and cultural factors have been suggested to contribute to gender variation. In XY animals, it has been shown that environmental endocrine disruptors, through their anti-androgenic activity, induce a female identity. In this work, we described four XY individuals who were exposed in utero to the xenoestrogen diethylstilbesterol (DES) and were part of the French HHORAGES cohort. They all reported a female transgender identity starting from childhood and adolescence. This high prevalence of male to female transgenderism (1.58%) in our cohort of 253 DES sons suggests that exposure to chemicals with xenoestrogen activity during fetal life may affect the male sex identity and behavior.

Keywords: sexual identity; diethylstilbestrol (DES); prenatal exposure

1. Introduction

Gender identity defines each individual’s deeply held personal sense of their own gender as male or female or something else [1]. Moreover, gender diversity and variance are umbrella terms used to describe the wide range of gender identifications outside the conventional gender categories [2]. Gender dysphoria [3] relates to the distress and unease experienced by individuals who are discontent with their assigned gender and identify with a gender other than the one associated with their birth sex [4]. A transgender man or woman is a person born phenotypically female or male, assigned female or male at birth on the basis of their external or internal genitalia, who identifies and lives as a male or a female. Actually, for many experts [5] this definition should be enlarged to Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming (TGNC) individuals, people with disorders of sex development (DSDs) and people assigned male (AMAB) or female at birth (AFAB) [6].

All studies on secular trends have reported a dramatic increase in the number of transgender people in recent decades [7]. A temporal change in the age of presentation is another notable phenomenon [8]. Quoting Hassler et al. [8] in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, Text Revision (DSM-5), signs of transgender in children include: “A repeated desire to be the other sex or an assertion that they are the other sex; a belief that their assigned sex will change on its own (e.g., thinking they will grow a penis or that their penis will come off when they get older); wanting to change their name to a name typically associated with another gender, or a gender-neutral name; a preference for presenting as another gender (e.g., a child assigned male at birth who prefers long hair and wearing dresses, or a child assigned female at birth who prefers short hair and wearing gender-neutral clothing); resistance or distress when made to present as a gender they do not identify with (such as a ‘girl’ throwing a tantrum over having to wear a dress or a ‘boy’ crying after having to get a haircut); assuming the role of another gender in fantasy games or make-believe; an intense desire to participate in the games and activities typical of the other gender (such as an assigned-male child playing with Barbie and an assigned-female child playing contact sports); a preference for playmates of another gender”.

Hassler et al. also wrote [8]: “In adolescence, signs of transgender includes: feelings of panic or severe discomfort concerning puberty and body changes (e.g., refusing to acknowledge or admit that changes are occurring, refusing to look at their body, or becoming distressed or uncomfortable with body development, menstruation, or ejaculation); discomfort or distress with certain forms of gender presentation, such as disliking long hair or certain types of clothing; increased bullying at school due to differences in acting out one’s perceived gender or lack of self-confidence; isolation from peers due to lack of connection or fear of bullying; depression and/or anxiety as a result of confusion over gender identity or not fitting in with peers; be aware that some adolescents may try to repress their true gender due to outside pressure, such as from family and peers, even if they previously expressed their true gender as a child”.

The literature on the prevalence of transgender people is heterogeneous, depending on the geographic area, inclusion criteria and age at presentation [9]. Specialized centers that manage transgender people estimate a prevalence between 17 and 33/100,000 individuals [10]. Actually, people who identify as transgender represent a sizable proportion of the general population, from 0.1% to 2% [11,12].

Although the biological basis of transgenderism/incongruence is unknown, biological, anatomical, genetic and environmental factors have been suggested to contribute to gender identity [13,14]. The role of sex hormones and genetics in sexual development was described by studies published between 1948 and 2019, and the implication of endogenous steroids in brain sexual differentiation has been widely studied [14,15,16,17,18]. According to the accepted dogma, high levels of fetal testosterone organize the brain towards a male phenotype [19]. Any exogenous chemical that can reduce testosterone action during fetal life can affect the differentiation of genitalia and sex behavior.

Diethylstilbestrol (DES) is a molecule that has strengthened the concepts of endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) and the fetal basis of adult diseases [20]. It is well known that in utero exposure to DES, a compound with estrogenic and anti-androgenic activity, induces a wide range of reproductive tract/function abnormalities in the so-called ‘DES daughters’, e.g., alterations to Müllerian duct development, fertility problems, ectopic pregnancies, miscarriages, premature births and cancers, especially clear cell adenocarcinoma (CCA) of the vagina and cervix in girls and young women [21]. In ‘DES sons’, epididymal cysts, hypospadias, cryptorchidism, hypoplastic testes and micropenises have been observed [22,23,24,25,26]. In addition, although less studied, in utero exposure to synthetic sex hormones, particularly DES, can cause psychological disorders, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorders, eating disorders and suicidal behavior [27]. Interestingly, some studies in patients exposed in utero to DES with psychotic disorders identified methylome changes that affect the expression of ZFP57 and ADAMTS9, two genes implicated in neurodevelopment regulation [28], with potential multigenerational and transgenerational effects [29,30].

In this work, we first describe four transgender women identified among the 253 sons exposed in utero to DES included in the HHORAGES-France cohort (a French National patient association). This high prevalence of male-to-female transgender individuals among DES sons (1.58%) strongly suggests that exposure of male fetuses to this xenoestrogen during fetal life may affect future male sex identity and behavior.

2. Patients and Methods

This study was based on a French national retrospective cohort of DES-treated women (HHORAGES-France Association) (n = 1200) and their families. Detailed standard questionnaires were obtained from all DES mothers when they joined the HHORAGES-France Association and all DES children were already adults at this time. The answers to this online questionnaire were used to select women who met the following inclusion criteria: (1) at least two pregnancies with two viable male babies (same father) among whom the first child was not exposed in utero to DES (pre-DES), followed by one or more children with fetal exposure to DES (DES); (2) confirmed data on the total DES dose (health record or physician’s observation). The cumulative dose D administered to the French pregnant mothers was 4050 mg < D < 7300 mg. This is considered a medium-low-dose cohort, in accordance with the observations by Tournaire et al. [31] and compared with the higher doses administered in the United States (7550 mg < D < 12,742 mg). The answers to the questionnaires were also used to identify women with a DES son who presented female gender variance. We then contacted all DES sons with female gender variance and we carried out an individual interview with them.

The local university hospital ethics committee approved this study (ID IRB No. 202301531), and all patients gave their informed consent through the HHORAGES-France Association (CNIL: J B/EM/DC042793, N° 1006460).

All DES sons who identified as transgender women underwent karyotyping at their local hospital at the moment of transition.

https://www.mdpi.com/2039-4713/14/1/10


Thomas Trace Beatie (born 1974[1]) is an American public speaker, author, and advocate of transgender rights and sexuality issues, with a focus on transgender fertility and reproductive rights.[2]


Beatie came out as a trans man in early 1997. Beatie had gender-affirming surgery in March 2002 and became known as "the pregnant man" after he became pregnant through artificial insemination in 2007.[3] Beatie chose to be pregnant, with donated sperm,[4][5] because his wife Nancy was sterile.


The couple filed for divorce in 2012. The Beatie case is the first of its kind on record, where a documented legal male gave birth within a marriage to a woman, and for the first time, a court challenged a marriage where the husband gave birth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Beatie


Tracing boards are painted or printed illustrations depicting the various emblems and symbols of Freemasonry. They can be used as teaching aids during the lectures that follow each of the Masonic Degrees, when an experienced member explains the various concepts of Freemasonry to new members. They can also be used by experienced members as reminders of the concepts they learned as they went through the ceremonies of the different masonic degrees.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracing_board


Exoteric Masonry, which is only the husks of the Mystic Order formed by the Sons of Cain has in modern times attracted the masculine element with its positively polarized physical vehicles, and educated them in industry and statecraft, thus controlling the material development of the world. The sons of Seth, constituting themselves the Priestcraft have worked their spell over the positive vital bodies of the feminine element to dominate the spiritual development. And whereas, the sons of Cain working through Freemasonry and kindred movements, have openly fought for the temporal power, the Priestcraft has fought as strenuously and perhaps more effectively, by stealth, to retain their monopoly upon the spiritual development of the feminine element. To the casual onlooker it would seem as if there were no decided antagonism between these two movements at the present time, but though Freemasonry of today is but a shell of its true ancient mystic self, and though Catholicism has been terribly tarnished by the touch of time, in that one thing there is no difference, the war is as keen as ever, the efforts of the Church are not concentrated upon the masses however as much as upon those who are seeking to live the higher life, so that they may gain admission to the Mystery Temple and learn how to make the Philosophers’ Stone. As mankind advances in evolution, the vital body becomes more permanently positively polarized giving to both sexes a greater desire for spirituality, and though we change from the masculine to feminine in alternate embodiment, positive polarity of the vital body is becoming more pronounced regardless of sex, and this accounts for the growing tendency towards Altruism which is even being brought out by the suffering entailed by the great war we are now fighting, for all agree that they are seeking to obtain a lasting peace where the swords may be made into plowshares, and the spears into pruning hooks. In the past humanity has been claiming universal brotherhood as a great ideal, but we must come closer than that to be in full accord with the Christ. He said to his Disciples “ye are my friends.” Among brothers and sisters hate and enmity may exist, but friendship is the expression of love and cannot exist apart from that. This is therefore the magic word which will eventually level all distinctions, bring peace upon earth and goodwill among men. This is the great Ideal proclaimed by the Rosicrucian Fellowship, an Ideal which points the shortest way to the New Heaven and the New Earth, where the sons of Cain and the sons of Seth will eventually be united.

FREEMASONRY AND CATHOLICISM

by MAX HEINDEL

https://dn720206.ca.archive.org/0/items/freemasonryandca017137mbp/freemasonryandca017137mbp.pdf


“Rosa Jesuitica, oder Jesuitische Rottgesellen, das ist, Eine Frag ob die Zween Orden, der ganandten Ritter von der Neerscharen Jesu, und der Rosen-Creuzer ein einiger Ordensen: per J. P. D. a S. Jesuitarum Protectorum. Prague, 1620.” (4to). This is a truly curious tract upon the “relations of the Jesuits and the Rosicrucians."

Rosa jesuitica, oder, Jesuitische Rottgesellen (1620) - Google Drive

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1dT28PyPUPfqDfC0iVg7nGFsle8vYBXLf/view


Fulcanelli’s main strategy, the key to unraveling the mystery, lies in an understanding of what he calls the “phonetic law” of the “spoken cabala,” or the “language of the birds.” This punning, multilingual wordplay can be used to reveal unusual and, according to Fulcanelli, meaningful associations between ideas. “What unsuspected marvels we should find, if we knew how to dissect words, to strip them of their bark and liberate the spirit, the divine light which is within,” Fulcanelli writes. He claims that in our day this is the natural language of the outsiders, the outlaws and heretics at the fringes of society. (See appendix A, “Fulcanelli on the Green Language,” for the complete text of this chapter.) 6 This spoken cabala was also the “green language” of the Freemasons (“All the Initiates expressed themselves in cant,” Fulcanelli reminds us) who built the art gothique of the cathedrals. “Gothic art is in fact the art got or art cot —χοτ—the art of light or of the spirit,” Fulcanelli informs us. Ultimately the “art got,” or the “art of light,” is derived from the language of the birds, which seems to be a sort of Ur-language taught by both Jesus and the ancients."

The Mysteries of the Great Cross

by Jay Weidner

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vrxcBcn4h7RRM2SA3X1SS1DsooSxfitI/view?usp=sharing


How to Speak Ignatian: Common words and phrases of the Society of Jesus

Adapted from “How to Speak Loyola,” a glossary developed by the Office of Mission &

Identity, Loyola University, Chicago.

Microsoft Word - How to Speak Ignatian.doc (jesuithighschool.org)

https://www.jesuithighschool.org/sites/main/files/file-attachments/how_to_speak_ignatian_0.pdf


IF WE LOOK AGAIN TO THE BOOK OF DANIEL, this time to chapter 8, verse 25, the prophet foretold that Anti-Christ would cause "craft" to prosper: "And through his policy also he shall cause 'craft" to prosper in his hand: and he shall magnify himself..." What is "kraft"? Strong's Concordance defines the word craft (#4820) as meaning "fraud, deceit, and treachery." Thus, Anti-Christ "through" craft, deceit and treachery (viz., deception) would advance  its position, influence and agenda.

But how do we know that this entity (referred to by Daniel) is indeed the dreaded Anti-Christ? We know this entity is Anti-Christ because it opposes and magnifies itself against Jesus Christ: "he shall magnify in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes" (latter part of Dan. 8: 25).

Earlier in verse 23 of Daniel 8 it says "he" shall also understand dark sentences." Strong's Concordance tells us that the word for dark is the same word for sentences (#2420). Both words mean "a puzzle," or "trick" saying. The expression "dark  sentences" comes from the root word meaning "to put forth (#2330)." Thus, Antichrist would put forth, or utter dark sentences-language not readily understood by the unintiated, which language will have a double meaning designed to trick or mislead the hearer. The "puzzle, or trick" in these "dark sentence" will be the issuing of double meaning in the same statements. In other words, reader, Anti-Christ would have a double rule-"one for its private and particular use, and another to flaunt with before the world."

The agents, or spokesmen of Anti-Christ will speak with mental reservation and amphibologies. That is to say, with double sensed or ambigous words, or to use the words of Constantine Labarum "justification of the means by the end, and many other maxims,

+I say agents of Anti-Christ, because no sensible individual could really believe that Anti-Christ is a single man, for Paul says Anti-Christ (its early manifestation) was already in existence in his day and would continue till the end of time.+

subversive of honesty and morality." In short, Anti-Christ would be a system of unscrupulous duplicity, of impostors, of wolves in sheep's clothing!

Have we any example in the long anals of history of such a duplicitous system using "craft" "deceit" "fraud" and "treachery" as it crept into power over the world? William Tyndale, the great English Reformer, in his Practice of Prelates, speaks of the rise of this phenomenon by the following graphic parable:-


"To see how the holy father came up, mark the ensample of the ivy. First it springeth up out of the earth, and then awhile CREEPETH ALONG BY THE GROUND, till it finds a great tree, and creepeth up a little and a little, fair, and softly. At the begininning, while it is yet thin and small, the burden is not perceived; it seemeth glorious to garnish the tree in the winter. BUT IT HOLDETH FAST WITHAL, AND CEASETH NOT TO CLIMB UP TILL IT BE AT THE TOP, AND EVEN ABOVE ALL. And then it sendeth its branches along by the branches of the tree, and overgroweth all, and waxeth great, heavy, and thich : and sucketh the moisture so sore out of the tree and his branches that choaketh and stifleth them. And then THE FOUL, STINKING IVY waxeth MIGHTY in the stump of the tree, and becometh a seat and a nest for all unclean birds, and for blind owls, which hawk in the dark, and dare not come to the light. EVEN SO THE BISHOP OF ROME, NOW CALLED THE POPE, AT THE BEGINNING CROPE ALONG UPON THE EARTH...."

How accurate is William Tyndale's description of the rise of the pope and the popedome as predicted by prophet Daniel: "in the latter time... a king.. understanding dark sentences, shall stan up... and shall he cause craft to prosper" "and shall prosper, practice, and shall destroy..." (Dan. 8:23,24,25).

Yeah, with what clearness and boldness, and considerable amount of historical learning, does Tyndale trace the way by which the supremacy of the pope arose. It has been said of this passage by one learned author that there is "probably nowhere in the English language any passage superior in force and graphic skill o the well-known description of the rise of the Pope." And we may add here that like the stinking ivy-which plant is almost impossible to entirely kill-it is also very difficult to rid our world of popery: this requires a lot of hard work, courage and persistence, and still the dead stump may yet shoot up again.

Said historian Henry Grattan Guinness, "In the fourth century, with the the fall of paganism, began a worldly, imperial Christianity, wholly unlike primitive apostolic Christianity, a sort of Christianized  heathenism: and in the fifth and sixth centuries sprang up the Papacy, in those career the apostasy culminated later on. The mighty Caesars had fallen; Augustus, Domitian, Hadrian, Diocletian were gone; even the Constantines and Julians had passed away. The seat of sovereignty had been removed from Rome to Constantinople. Goths and Vandals' had overthrown the western empire; the once mighty political structure lay delivered into broken fragments. The imperial government was slain by the Gothic sword. The Czesars were no more, and Rome was an actual desolation Then slowly on the ruins of old imperial Rome an actual desolation. Then slowly on the ruins of an old imperial Rome rose another power and another monarchy-a monarchy of loftier aspirations and more resistless might, claiming dominion, not only within the omits of the fallen empire, but throughout the entire world. Higher and higher [like the stinking ivy] rose the Papacy, till in the dark ages all Christendom was subject to its sway...."

The 'craft' of Rome, both in medieval times and today, is the art of fabrication and daring falsehoods: "Like the successive strata of the earth covering one another, SO LAYER AFTER LAYER OF FORGERIES AND FABRICATIONS HAS BEEN PILED UP IN THE CHURCH |OF ROME|," bolstered by a Jesuitical "literaryand academic flexibility and elastic versatality of pen hitherto confined to journalism."

"Anti-Christ Would Use "Craft" And Deceit To Prosper"

Codeword Barbelon book Two

by P.D. Stuart


The term Black Madonna or Black Virgin tends to refer to statues or paintings in Western Christendom of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Infant Jesus, where both figures are depicted with dark skin.[1] Examples of the Black Madonna can be found both in Catholic and Orthodox countries.


The paintings are usually icons, which are Byzantine in origin or style, some of which were produced in 13th or 14th-century Italy. Other examples from the Middle East, Caucasus or Africa, mainly Egypt and Ethiopia, are even older.[citation needed] Statues are often made of wood but are occasionally made of stone, painted, and up to 75 cm (30 in) tall. They fall into two main groups: free-standing upright figures or seated figures on a throne. About 400–500 Black Madonnas have been recorded in Europe, with the number related to how they are classified. There are at least 180 Vierges Noires in Southern France alone. There are hundreds of copies made since the medieval era. Some are displayed in museums, but most are in churches or shrines and are venerated by believers. Some are associated with miracles and attract substantial numbers of pilgrims.


Black Madonnas come in different forms. Speculations behind the basis of the dark hue of each individual icon or statue vary greatly and some have been controversial. Explanations range from the Madonnas being made from dark wood, Madonnas that have turned darker over time, due to factors such as aging or candle smoke, to a study by Jungian scholar Ean Begg into the potential pagan origins of the cult of the black Madonna and child or the intent to reflect the darker-skinned populations indigenous to certain parts of the world.[2] Another suggestion is that dark-skinned representations of pre-Christian deities were re-envisioned as the Madonna and child.[3]


Studies and research

Research into the Black Madonna phenomenon is limited. Begg links the refrain from the Song of Solomon, “I am black, and I am beautiful” to the Queen of Sheba.[2] Recently, however, interest in this subject has gathered more momentum.


Important early studies of dark-skinned holy images in France were by Camille Flammarion (1888),[4] Marie Durand-Lefebvre (1937), Emile Saillens (1945), and Jacques Huynen (1972).


The first notable study in English of the origin and meaning of the Black Madonnas appears to have been presented by Leonard Moss at a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science on December 28, 1952. Moss divided the images into three categories: (1) dark brown or black Madonnas with physiognomy and skin pigmentation matching that of the indigenous population; (2) various art forms that have turned black as a result of certain physical factors such as deterioration of lead-based pigments, accumulated smoke from the use of votive candles, and accumulation of grime over the ages, and (3) miracle-worker Madonnas, the focus of the study, Black Madonnas found in areas of a Roman legion and, therefore, not a reflection of the current population's skin colour.[3]


In the cathedral at Chartres, there were two Black Madonnas: Notre Dame de Pilar, a 1508 dark walnut copy of a 13th-century silver Madonna, standing atop a high pillar, surrounded by candles; and Notre Dame de Sous-Terre, a replica of an original destroyed during the French Revolution. Restoration work on the cathedral resulted in the painting in 2014 of Notre Dame de Pilar, to reflect an earlier 19th-century painted style. The statue is no longer a "Black Madonna" and the restoration was severely criticized for wiping away the past.[5][6]


Some scholars have chosen to explore the significance of the dark-skinned complexion to pilgrims and worshippers rather than focusing on whether this depiction was intentional. By virtue of their unusual presence, the Black Madonnas have sometimes acted to make their shrines revered pilgrimage sites. Monique Scheer attributes the importance of the dark-skinned depiction to its connection with authenticity. The reason for this connection is the perceived age of the figures.[7]


List of Black Madonnas

Africa

Algeria, Algiers: "Our Lady of Africa"[8]

Côte d’Ivoire, Yamoussoukro: Madonna and child inside Basilica of Our Lady of Peace.

Senegal, Popenguine: "Notre-Dame de la Délivrance"[9]

South Africa, Soweto: "The Black Madonna"[10]

Asia

Japan


Black Madonna at Tsuraoka Catholic Church, Yamagata, Japan

Tsuruoka City, Yamagata Prefecture: the Tenshudō Catholic Church features a Black Madonna statue from France dating to the Meiji Era.[11][12]

The Philippines


Our Lady of the Rule of Opón, Lapu-lapu City, Cebu


Our Lady of Guidance, Ermita, Manila

Antipolo, Rizal: Nuestra Señora de la Paz y Buen Viaje de Antipolo (Our Lady of Peace and Good Voyage of Antipolo)[13]

Ermita, City of Manila: Nuestra Señora de Guía (Our Lady of Guidance)

Santa Ana, City of Manila: Nuestra Señora de los Desamparados (Our Lady of the Abandoned)

Parañaque: Nuestra Señora del Buen Suceso (Our Lady of the Good Event)

Lapu-Lapu City: Nuestra Señora de Regla (Our Lady of the Rule)[14]

Naga, Camarines Sur: Nuestra Señora de Peñafrancia (Our Lady of Peñafrancia)

Piat, Cagayan: Nuestra Señora de la Visitación de Piat (Our Lady of Piat)[15]

Joroan, Tiwi, Albay: Nuestra Señora de la Salvación (Our Lady of Salvation)

India

Dhori Mata

Korvi Mata, Dediapada, Gujarat

Turkey

Trabzon: Sümela Monastery[16]

Europe

Austria

Lavanttal, Carinthia, Austria: St. Andrä im Lavanttal „Schwarze Madonna von Loreto" Basilica Maria Loreto

Belgium

Brugge, "Our Lady of Regla"[17]

Brussels: "De Zwerte Lieve Vrouwe", St. Catherine Church

Halle (Flemish Brabant) : Sint-Martinusbasiliek

Liège: La Vierge Noire d'Outremeuse,

Lier: Onze Lieve Vrouw ter Gratiën

Scherpenheuvel-Zichem: Our Lady of Scherpenheuvel

Tournai: Our Lady of Flanders in Tournai Cathedral

Verviers: "Black Virgin of the Recollects", Notre-Dame des Récollets Church,

Walcourt: (Notre-Dame de Walcourt)


Marija Bistrica

Croatia

Marija Bistrica: Our Lady of Bistrica, Queen of Croatia

Czech Republic

Brno: Assumption of Virgin Mary Minor Basilica, St Thomas's Abbey, Brno[18]

Cesky Krumlov Monastery Museum [19]

Prague: The Madonna of Breznice; The Black Madonna in The Church of Our Lady Under the Chain (Kostel Panny Marie pod řetězem)[20] The Black Madonna on the House of the Black Madonna.

TROJA CHATEAU chapel- original "Montserrat Madonna" from Old Town Byzantine building (pg.100 of Martin Krummholz ISBN 978-80-7010-131-5)


France


Madonna of Saint-Jouan-des-Guérets (35)


Vierge noire de Graville (Le Havre)


The statue of the Black Virgin at Rocamadour

Aix-en-Provence, (Bouches-du-Rhône): Notre-Dame des Graces, Cathédrale Saint-Sauveur d'Aix[21]

Arconsat: (Notre-Dame des Champs)

Aurillac (Cantal): Notre-Dame des Neiges[22]

Beaune: Our Lady of Beaune

Besançon: Our Lady de Gray

Besse-et-Saint-Anastaise, (Puy-de-Dôme): Saint-André Church, Notre-Dame de Vassivière

Bourg-en-Bresse (Ain): 13th century

Chartres, (Eure-et-Loir): crypt of the Cathedral of Chartres, Notre-Dame-de-Sous-Terre[23]

Clermont-Ferrand, (Puy-de-Dôme)[24]

Cusset: the Black Virgin of Cusset

Dijon, (Côte-d'Or): Church of Notre-Dame of Dijon

Douvres-la-Délivrande, Basilique Notre-Dame de la Délivrande, "Notre-Dame de la Délivrande"[25]

Dunkerque, (Nord) : Chapelle des Dunes

Guingamp, (Côtes-d'Armor): Basilica of Notre Dame de Bon Secours.

La Chapelle-Geneste, (Haute-Loire: Notre Dame de La Chapelle Geneste[26]

Laon (Aisne): Notre-Dame Cathedral, statue of 1848

Le Havre,(Seine-Maritime): statue near the Graville Abbey (Abbaye de Graville)

Le Puy-en-Velay: In 1254 when passing through on his return from the Holy Land Saint Louis IX of France gave the cathedral an ebony image of the Blessed Virgin clothed in gold brocade (Notre-Dame du Puy). It was destroyed during the Revolution, but replaced at the Restoration with a copy that continues to be venerated.[27]

Liesse-Notre-Dame (Aisne): Notre-Dame de Liesse, statue destroyed in 1793, copy of 1857

Limeuil (Dordogne): Sainte Catherine d'Alexandrie á Limeuil. This XVII century statue was broken and thrown in the Dordogne during the French Wars of Religion (1562 - 1598) but recovered and returned to the church.

Marseille, (Bouches-du-Rhône): Notre-Dame-de-Confession,[28] Abbey of St. Victor; Notre-Dame d'Huveaune, Saint-Giniez Church

Mauriac, Cantal: Notre Dame des Miracles[29]

Mende (Lozère) : Cathedral (Basilique-cathédrale Notre-Dame-et-Saint-Privat de Mende)

Menton, (Alpes-Maritimes): St. Michel Church

Meymac (Corrèze): Meymac Abbey[30]

Molompize: Notre-Dame de Vauclair

Mont-Saint-Michel: Notre-Dame du Mont-Tombe

Myans (Savoie): Sanctuaire Notre-Dame de Myans

Paris, (Neuilly-sur-Seine): Notre-Dame de Bonne Délivrance, in the motherhouse of the Sisters of St. Thomas of Villanova[31]

Quimper (Finistère): Eglise de Guéodet, nommée encore Notre-Dame-de-la-Cité

Riom, (Puy-de-Dôme): Notre-Dame du Marthuret[32]

Rocamadour, (Lot): Our Lady of Rocamadour[33]

Saint-Germain-Laval: Chapelle Notre-Dame-de-Baffy

Sainte Marie (Réunion) : Black Virgin of the Rains River [fr]

Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer (Camargue) Avignon: Annual Roma pilgrimage and festival[34] celebrating Sara, the patron saint of the Roma[35]

Soissons (Aisne): statue of the 12th century

Tarascon, (Bouches-du-Rhône): Notre-Dame du Château[36]

Thuret, (Puy-de-Dôme)[37]


Black Madonna of Toulouse

Toulouse: The basilica Notre-Dame de la Daurade in Toulouse, France had housed the shrine of a Black Madonna. The original icon was stolen in the fifteenth century, and its first replacement was burned by Revolutionaries in 1799 on the Place du Capitole. The icon presented today is an 1807 copy of the fifteenth century Madonna. Blackened by the hosts of candles, the second Madonna was known from the sixteenth century as Our Lady La Noire[38]

Tournemire, Château d'Anjony, Our Lady of Anjony

Vaison-la-Romaine (Vaucluse): statue on a hill

Vichy (Allier): Saint-Blaise Church

Germany


Shrine of Our Lady of Altötting, Altötting: Gnadenkapelle

Altötting (Bavaria): Gnadenkapelle (Chapel of the Miraculous Image)

Beilstein (Rhineland-Palatinate): Karmeliterkirche St. Joseph

Bielefeld (North Rhine-Westphalia)

Düsseldorf-Benrath (North Rhine-Westphalia): Pfarrkirche St. Cäcilia

Hirschberg an der Bergstraße (Baden-Württemberg): Wallfahrtskirche St. Johannes Baptist

Schloss Hohenstein, Upper Franconia (Bavaria)

Köln (Nord Rhein Westfalen): St. Maria in der Kupfergasse

Ludwigshafen-Oggersheim (Rhineland-Palatinate): Schloss- und Wallfahrtskirche Mariä Himmelfahrt (Ludwigshafen)

Mainau (Baden-Württemberg): Schlosskirche St. Marien

Munich (Bavaria): Theatine Church; St. Boniface's Abbey

Rastatt (Baden-Württemberg): Einsiedelner Kapelle

Regensburg (Bavaria): Regensburg Cathedral

Remagen (Rhineland-Palatinate): Kapelle Schwarze Madonna

Spabrücken (Rhineland-Palatinate)

Stetten ob Lontal, Niederstotzingen (Baden-Württemberg)

Windhausen in Boppard-Herschwiesen (Rhineland-Palatinate)

Wipperfürth (North Rhine-Westphalia): St. Johannes, Kreuzberg

Wuppertal-Beyenburg (North Rhine-Westphalia)

Greece

Hidden church of the Black Madonna, Vamos, Crete

Hungary


Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, Cathedral Basilica of Eger, Hungary

Cathedral Basilica of Eger: Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception

Ireland

Dublin (Leinster): Our Lady of Dublin in Whitefriar Street Carmelite Church

Italy


Tindari Madonna Bruna: restoration work in the 1990s found a medieval statue with later additions. Nigra sum sed formosa, meaning "I am black but beautiful" (from the Song of Songs, 1:5), is inscribed round a newer base.


Street performer in Black Madonna costume in Venice

Biella (Piedmont): Black Virgin of Oropa, sanctuary of Oropa

Canneto Valley near Settefrati (Lazio): Madonna di Canneto

Casale Monferrato (Piedmont): Our Lady of Crea. In the hillside Sanctuary at Crea (Santuario di Crea), a cedar-wood figure, said to be one of three Black Virgins brought to Italy from the Holy Land c. 345 by St. Eusebius.

Castelmonte, Prepotto (Friuli-Venezia Giulia)

Gubbio, Italy: The Niger-Regin square, discovered carved in the cave of Sibilla Eugubina on Mount Ingino, is considered to be a word square form of the "Black Queen". Seemingly of neo-Templar origin, it is dated between 1600–1800 CE, was discovered in 2003, and destroyed by vandalism in 2012.[39][40][41]

Loreto (Marche): Basilica della Santa Casa

Montevergine (Campania): Mamma Schiavona (lit. "Slave Mamma") located at Sanctuary of Montevergine[42][43]

Naples (Campania): Santuario-Basilica SS Carmine Maggiore

Pescasseroli (Abruzzo): Madonna di Monte Tranquillo

Positano (Campania): Located in the church of Santa Maria Assunta, the story of how it got there—sailors shouting "Posa, posa!" ("Put it down, put it down!")—gave the town its name.

San Severo (Apulia): "La Madonna del Soccorso" (The Madonna of Succor), St. Severinus Abbot and Saint Severus Bishop Faeto. Statue in gold garments, object of a major three-day festival that attracts over 350,000 people to this small town.

Seminara (Calabria): Maria Santissima dei poveri

Tindari (Sicily): Our Lady of Tindari

Torre Annunziata (Campania): Madonna della Neve

Venice (Veneto): Madonna della Salute, Santa Maria della Salute

Viggiano (Basilicata): Santuario Madonna del Sacro Monte[44]

Kosovo

Vitina-Letnica [fr]: Church of the Black Madonna, where Mother Teresa is believed to have heard her calling.[45]

Lithuania


Our Lady of the Pine Woods Lithuania

Aušros vartai: Our Lady of the Gate of Dawn

Our Lady of Šiluva: Our Lady of the Pine Woods

Luxembourg

Esch-sur-Sûre

Luxembourg City: Grund

Luxembourg City: St. John's Church[46]

Macedonia

Kališta, Monastery: Madonna icon in the Nativity of Our Most Holy Mother of God church

Ohrid, Church: Madonna with the child

Malta

Ħamrun: Our Lady of Atoċja, a medieval painting brought to Malta by a merchant in the year 1630, depicting a statue found in Atocha, a parish in Madrid, Spain, and widely known as Il-Madonna tas-Samra. (This can mean 'tanned Madonna', 'brown Madonna', or 'Madonna of Samaria'.)

Poland


Icon of the Black Madonna of Częstochowa, covered in a decorative silver shield, at the Jasna Góra Monastery in Poland

Częstochowa: Our Lady of Czestochowa

In the United States, the National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa, in Doylestown, Pennsylvania houses a reproduction of the Black Madonna of Częstochowa. A second shrine to Our Lady of Częstochowa is located near Eureka, Missouri.

In Israel there are two reproductions of the Black Madonna of Częstochowa: One in St. Peter's Church in Tel Aviv, and another in the Abbey of the Dormition in Jerusalem.[47][48][49][50][51][52]

Głogówek: Our Lady of Loretto

Portugal

Nazaré (Oeste Subregion): Sanctuary of Our Lady of Nazaré; see: the legend of Nazaré

Romania

Ghighiu [ro]: Maica Domnului Siriaca – Manastirea Ghighiu [ro]

Cacica: Madona Neagra – Biserica Cacica

Bucuresti: Madona Neagra – Biserica Dichiu


Serbian Orthodox Three-handed Black Madonna, Serbian Orthodox Hilandar. Serbia

Russia

Kostroma (Kostroma Oblast): Theotokos of St. Theodore also known as Our Lady of St. Theodore (Федоровская Богоматерь), in Theophany Monastery

Our Lady of Wladimir, from the 12th century

Black Virgin of Taganrog, Taganrog Old Cemetery

Serbia

Apatin: Blessed Virgin Mary Catholic Church

Slovenia

Koprivna, Črna na Koroškem: St. Anne's Church, Koprivna – the altar of Black Madonna

Spain


Image of the Virgin of Candelaria, in the Basilica of Candelaria (Tenerife)

Andújar (Province of Jaén): Nuestra Señora de la Cabeza (Our Lady of Cabeza), named after the mountain, Cerro de la Cabeza or Cerro de Cabezo.

Chipiona (Province of Cádiz): la Virgen de Regla or Nuestra Señora de Regla (Our Lady of Regla or the Virgin of Regla), considered by some as the custodian of the Rule of Saint Augustine

Coria (Province of Cáceres): Virgen de Argeme (Our Lady of Argeme)

El Puerto de Santa María (Province of Cádiz): Virgen de los Milagros (The Virgin of the Miracles)

Guadalupe (Province of Cáceres): Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe (Our Lady of Guadalupe, Extremadura)

Jerez de la Frontera (Province of Cádiz): Nuestra Señora de la Merced (Our Lady Of Mercy)

Madrid (Community of Madrid): Nuestra Señora de Atocha (Our Lady of Atocha)

Lluc, Majorca (Balearic Islands): Mare de Déu de Lluc (Our Lady of Lluc), Lluc Monastery

Monistrol de Montserrat (Catalonia): Mare de Déu de Montserrat (Virgin of Montserrat) or "La Moreneta" in the Benedictine abbey of Santa Maria de Montserrat

Ponferrada (Province of León): Virgen de la Encina (Our Lady of the Holm Oak)

Salamanca (Province of Salamanca): Virgen de la Peña de Francia (The Virgin of France's Rock, named after the local mountain called Peña de Francia)

Santiago de Compostela (Galicia): A replica of "La Moreneta"

Rianxo (Galicia): Virgen de Guadalupe

Tenerife (Canary Islands): Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria (Virgin of Candelaria), or "La Morenita"

Toledo (Province of Toledo): Virgen Morena (Dark Virgin), statue of La Esclavitud de Nuestra Señora del Sagrario in the Cathedral of Toledo (Catedral Primada de Santa María) (The Enslavement of Our Lady of the Tabernacle)

Torreciudad (Huesca): Our Lady of Torreciudad

Sweden

Lund Cathedral Attached to a marble pillar in the crypt: Black madonna with child

Skee Kyrka, Skee, Bohuslän former Norwegian province. Black madonna with beheaded child [1]

Switzerland

Einsiedeln (Canton of Schwyz): Our Lady of the Hermits

In the United States, a reproduction of Our Lady of the Hermits was gifted to the St. Meinrad Archabbey located in St. Meinrad, Indiana

Sonogno, Valle Verzasca (Canton of Ticino): Santa Maria Loretana

Uetikon upon Lake (Canton of Zürich): Catholic Church Saint Francis of Assisi

Metzerlen-Mariastein (Canton of Solothurn): Mariastein Abbey

Ascona (Canton of Ticino): Black Chapel

Lugano (Canton of Ticino): Chiesa di Santa Maria di Loreto


One of three of Turkey's surviving icons of the Theotokos on the island of Heybeliada at the Theological School of Halki

Ukraine

Tsarytsya Karpat (Hoshiv Monastery): The Queen of the Carpathian Land

United Kingdom

St. Mary Willesden (Our Lady of Willesden): The original Shrine of Our Lady of Willesden.

Our Lady of Częstochowa (Church of Our Lady of Czestochowa, Nottingham)

North America

Costa Rica

Cartago, Cartago Province: Basílica de Nuestra Señora de los Ángeles (Our Lady of the Angels Basilica)

Cuba

Regla, Havana Province: Nuestra Señora de Regla (Spanish for Our Lady of Regla)

Mexico

Tepeyac, Mexico City: Our Lady of Guadalupe

Trinidad and Tobago

Siparia: La Divina Pastora[53]

Gran Couva: Our Lady of Montserrat[54]

United States

Pacific, Missouri: Black Madonna Shrine and Grottos

Doylestown, Pennsylvania: National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa

Jersey City, New Jersey: Our Lady of Czestochowa

New York City, New York: Cathedral of St. John the Divine

New York City, New York: Church of St. Ignatius Loyola

Detroit, Michigan: Shrine of the Black Madonna Church

Chicago, Illinois: Monastery of the Holy Cross

Westport, Connecticut: [2] Church of the Assumption

Cheektowaga, New York: [3] Our Lady of Czestochowa Roman Catholic Church

North Tonawanda, New York: [4] Our Lady of Czestochowa Church

Canada

Windsor, Ontario -Black Madonna chapel located at Italian banquet hall Ciociaro club.

South America

Brazil


Nossa Senhora Aparecida

Aparecida, São Paulo: Our Lady of Aparecida or Our Lady Appeared (Nossa Senhora Aparecida or Nossa Senhora da Conceição Aparecida) in the Basilica of the National Shrine of Our Lady of Aparecida

Chile

Andacollo, Elqui Province: La Virgen Morena (Spanish for The Brunette Virgin)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Madonna

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid028CqSz4TiB4tUSppduSJJPmjbeb8EwmELLW8Kt6dz9wsodHwKiXQt82yQNs8PF33Yl


Larceny is a crime involving the unlawful taking or theft of the personal property of another person or business. It was an offence under the common law of England and became an offence in jurisdictions which incorporated the common law of England into their own law (also statutory law), where in many cases it remains in force.


The crime of larceny has been abolished in England, Wales, Ireland, and Northern Ireland, broken up into the specific crimes of burglary, robbery, fraud, theft, and related crimes. However, larceny remains an offence in parts of the United States, Jersey,[1] and in New South Wales,[2] Australia, involving the taking (caption) and carrying away (asportation) of personal property without the owner's consent and without intending to return it.


Etymology

The word "larceny" is a late Middle English word, from the French word larcin, "theft". Its probable Latin root is latrocinium, a derivative of latro, "robber" (originally mercenary).


By nation

Australia

New South Wales

In the state of New South Wales, the common law offence of larceny is punishable with up to 5 years' imprisonment.[3] Whilst section 117 of the New South Wales Crimes Act 1900 specifies the punishment for larceny, it is silent on the elements of the offence, leaving them to be articulated by the common law.[3] The leading authority on larceny in NSW is the High Court of Australia case of Ilich v R (1987).[4] This case stipulates the mens rea and actus reus elements required to be proven by the prosecution for a successful conviction.


Ireland

The common law offence of larceny was abolished[5] on 1 August 2002.[6] However, proceedings for larceny committed before its abolition are not affected by this.[7]


United Kingdom

England and Wales

The common law offence of larceny was codified by the Larceny Act 1916. It was abolished[8] on 1 January 1969,[9] for all purposes not relating to offences committed before that date.[10] It has been replaced by the broader offence of theft under section 1(1) of the Theft Act 1968. This offence did incorporate some of the terminology and substance of larceny. Despite the offence's being abolished in England, it has been retained in the Crown Dependency of Jersey.[11]


Northern Ireland

The common law offence of larceny was abolished[12] on 1 August 1969,[13] for all purposes not relating to offences committed before that date.[14] It has been replaced by the broader offence of theft under section 1(1) of the Theft Act (Northern Ireland) 1969.


United States of America


Chart indicating the distribution of forms of larceny in the United States, according to the 2004 Uniform Crime Report.

Larceny laws in the United States of America have their roots in common law, pursuant to which larceny involves the trespassory taking (caption) and carrying away (asportation, removal) of the tangible personal property of another with the intent to permanently deprive the owner of its possession. Larceny is now codified as a statutory crime in all U.S. jurisdictions.[15]


Under many states' larceny statutes, including California, larceny can include the taking of "money, labor, or real or personal property."[16]


Elements

Possession versus custody

Larceny is a crime against possession. Furthermore, it has two elements which must be met: the actual taking of the property, even if momentarily (actus reus), and the culpable intent (mens rea) to deprive another of their property. Larceny involves the trespassory taking of property from possession of another, with the intent to permanently deprive the owner of that property.[17]: 945  To understand larceny, one must understand the distinction between custody and possession.[18]


A person has possession of property when he has actual physical control over the property (actual possession) or he has the right to exercise considerable control over the disposition or use of the property (constructive possession).

A person has custody if he has actual physical control of the property, but the person who has constructive possession has substantially restricted the custodian's right to use the property.[18]

Examples of custody would be a store customer examining the goods of a merchant, or an employee who has been given the property of his employer to be used in his employment. This is to be contrasted to, for example, a person who has obtained actual possession of the property by fraud.


Ancient Roman law (first 50 years of written University law, possibly borrowing from Greek law there is no copy of) was more lax about "simple possession"; it was assumed "borrowing" if there was no one to ask: unless or until other factors arose (such as refusal to return promptly when asked).


Take

The taking or caption element requires that the offender take actual physical control of the property, if but for a moment.[19] Under the common law, it was not sufficient if the offender simply deprived the victim of possession; the offender must have gained control over the property. Thus merely knocking an article from a person's hand was not larceny, as long as the defendant did not thereafter take it. The control must be complete. In a famous case, the defendant removed an overcoat from a department store mannequin and began to walk away with it. The overcoat was secured to the mannequin by a chain, a fact the defendant first discovered when the chain drew taut. These actions were held not to be larceny because the defendant never had complete control over the disposition and use of the coat.[20]


The taking may be only momentary. In another famous case,[21] the defendant snatched an earring from the victim which immediately became entangled in the victim's hair. The court held that the defendant's control over the property, although momentary, was sufficient to constitute a taking. The taking may be either direct or indirect; that is, accomplished by the criminal himself or an innocent agent.


The equivalent term "deprive" is also sometimes used:


To "deprive" another of property means (a) to withhold it or cause it to be withheld from him permanently or for so extended a period or under such circumstances that the major portion of its economic value or benefit is lost to him, or (b) to dispose of the property in such manner or under such circumstances as to render it unlikely that an owner will recover such property.


— N.Y. Penal L. § 155.00 (3).[22]

Carry away

Traditionally, a thief must not only gain dominion over the property, but also must move it from its original position. The slightest movement, a hair's breadth, is sufficient.[23] However, the entirety of the property must be moved. As Professor Wayne LaFave noted, at its most literal this requirement renders the rotating of a doughnut a larceny, but not the rotating of a pie,[24] as all of the doughnut is moved through rotation while the pie's exact center remains in the same place when rotated. The movement must also be an actual asportation, rather than movement in preparation. For example,[25] in one case the victim had left his wheelbarrow in his yard. As was his custom he turned the wheelbarrow upside down to avoid water collecting in the tub. The defendant intending to steal the wheelbarrow turned it over but was apprehended by the owner before he could push the wheelbarrow away. The court held that the defendant's acts did not satisfy the asportation element of larceny because the movement of the wheelbarrow had merely been preparatory to the carrying away.


Contrary to popular belief, it is not necessary that the property be removed from the owner's premises or be taken off his property for an asportation to be complete. The slightest movement from its original position with the intent to steal is enough. The problem is proof. If a person picks up a package of steaks intending to steal them then changes her or his mind and puts the steak back in the meat counter, the crime of larceny has been committed but the state will have a difficult time proving it. However, if the thief conceals the steaks by sticking them inside clothing, his or her intent is rather clear. Of course, there could still be an innocent if bizarre explanation.[26]


That said, the asportation requirement is not universally required. In People v. Alamo, for example, the New York Court of Appeals eliminated the asportation requirement. In that case the defendant entered a stranger's car and turned on the car's lights and engine.[27] The Court read asportation as merely a corroborative element of possession and control, and thus not necessary to establish possession and control of a car because transportation is the purpose of a car. Turning it on suffices to establish that the thief has taken possession and control.[28]


Additionally, the Model Penal Code eliminates the asportation requirement and instead requires that the defendant "exercise unlawful control".[29] The drafters noted that historically the asportation requirement distinguished larceny (a felony) and attempted larceny (a misdemeanor).[30] They reasoned, therefore, that asportation was an irrelevant requirement because in modern criminal law, like the Model Penal Code,[31] the sentencing consequences between an attempted and completed crime are negligible.


Personal property


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From its creation[32] the subject matter of larceny has been tangible personal property,[33] with a physical existence: items that can be seen, held, and felt (or in technical terms, property that has a "corporeal existence").[34]


This limitation means that acts of common law larceny cannot be committed against land[35] or items attached to or forming part of land, such as buildings, trees or shrubbery, crops growing in the field, or minerals.[18] Acts of common law larceny cannot be committed against intangible things, such as love or affection, identity (identity theft is a type of fraud), or intellectual property, such as information and ideas. For example, if a person stole the Coca-Cola formula, the crime would be larceny, but the grade of the offense would be determined by the value of the paper on which the formula was recorded, not the value of the recipe. (Theft of trade secrets would be a different offense.)[36]


Services and labor, as well as intangible personal property (incorporeal rights)[18] such as contract rights and choses in action;[37] wills, codicils, or other testamentary documents; wild animals;[18] and items having no economic value[38] cannot be the subjects of acts of common-law larceny.


Most states have enacted statutes to expand the coverage of larceny to include most if not all of the items mentioned above.[citation needed] For example, North Carolina has statutes that make it a crime to steal choses in action, growing crops and so on.[39]


The restriction of the scope of larceny to personal property may have practical consequences. For example, a person may "steal" a central air conditioning unit by cutting the connections to the house, removing the unit from its concrete pad and hauling the disconnected unit away in a truck. In most jurisdictions, a central air conditioning unit changes from personal property to real property (a fixture) once it is attached to a building. Modernly, severance of a fixture from the realty would convert the fixture from real property back to personal property. However, the common law stated that if the severance and carrying away of a fixture were one continuous act, no larceny would occur. The defendant's actions in this example would thus merely constitute damage to real property, and would further not result in possession of stolen property since no larceny had taken place. However, if the person disconnected the air conditioner, left the premises to find someone to help him move the unit, returned and loaded the unit on his truck and left, the crime would be larceny.[citation needed]


Of another

The property taken must be "of another". Thus wild animals cannot be stolen, although possession of a wild animal can itself be unlawful. Nor can co-owners be guilty of larceny. Larceny is a crime against possession. Therefore, it is possible for the person who has title to the property to steal the property from a person who had lawful possession. For example, states provide that a person who repairs a car had a lien on the car to secure payment for the work. The lien is a possessory lien meaning the repair person has the lien as long as he maintains possession of the car. If the title owner were to take the car from the lienholder this action could be prosecuted as larceny in some jurisdictions.


Without consent

The taking must be trespassory; that is, it must be without the consent of the owner. This means that the taking must have been accomplished by stealth, force, threat of force, or deceit. If the offender obtained possession lawfully then a subsequent misappropriation is not larceny.


Intent to steal (animus furandi)

See also: Furtum

The offender must have taken the property with the intent to steal it. Traditionally intent to steal is defined as the intent to deprive the owner of the possession of the property permanently. "Permanently" means indefinitely, that is, with no plan to return the property to the rightful owner. However, intent to steal includes other states of mind such as the intent to recklessly deprive the owner of the property permanently.


A person who takes property of another under the mistaken belief that the property belongs to him does not have the requisite intent to steal; nor does a person "intend to steal" property when he takes property intending to make temporary use of it and then return the property to the owner within a reasonable time.[40] However, it is not a defense that the defendant did not know that the property belonged to the true owner, only that he knew that it did not belong to him.


Must have value

Larceny protects the possession of goods – objects that have economic value. A good has economic value if it has a price; that is, the property can be sold in a market. Thus, if the property taken has no economic value, it is not subject to larceny statutes. Under contemporary larceny laws, it is normally sufficient to support a larceny charge if the item has any value to the owner, even if its market value would be negligible.[41]


Under New York State law, written instruments, utility services, and items of unascertainable value have special rules,[42] and for grand larceny in the fourth degree, a motor vehicle must have value of $100 or greater.[43] Otherwise, value is defined generally as:


the market value of the property at the time and place of the crime, or if such cannot be satisfactorily ascertained, the cost of replacement of the property within a reasonable time after the crime.


— N.Y. Penal L. § 155.20 (1).[44]

Grand larceny

"Grand larceny" redirects here. For the 1987 film, see Grand Larceny. For the 1922 lost film, see Grand Larceny (1922 film).

Grand larceny is typically defined as larceny of a more significant amount of property. In the US, it is often defined as an amount valued at least $400. In New York, grand larceny refers to amounts of at least $1,000. Grand larceny is often classified as a felony with the concomitant possibility of a harsher sentence. In Virginia the threshold is only $5 if taken from a person, or $500 if not taken from the person.[45] The same penalty applies for stealing checks as for cash or other valuables.[46] Some states (such as North Carolina) use the term "felonious larceny" instead of grand larceny.


The classification of larceny as grand or petit larceny originated in an English statute passed in 1275 (grand is a French word meaning "large" while petit is a French word meaning "small"). Both were felonies, but the punishment for grand larceny was death while the punishment for petit larceny was forfeiture of property to the Crown and whipping. The classification was based on the value of the property taken. The offence was grand larceny if the value of the property taken was greater than twelve pence, approximately the value of a sheep in the thirteenth century.[47]


Most jurisdictions have discarded the grand/petit terminology and use value to classify larcenies as felonies or misdemeanors. "Value" means the fair market value of the property at the time and place taken. Most jurisdictions also make certain larcenies felonies regardless of the value of the property taken. For example, North Carolina General Statutes Section 14 - 72 (b)(1) makes the crime of larceny a felony "without regard to value" if the larceny is (1) from the person (2) committed pursuant to certain types of breaking or enterings (3) of any explosive or incendiary device or (4) of any firearm.[48] The modern spelling is petit larceny for the misdemeanor level.[citation needed] Some states may also charge certain types of larceny as "robbery", "burglary", "theft", "shoplifting", "conversion", and other terms.


Problem areas

Subject matter

As noted above one cannot steal items "affixed to the earth" because such things are not personal property. However, one of the remarkable qualities of property is its shiftiness: its ability to change its character often and quickly, from real to personal and from personal to real. The principal methods of achieving this transformation are attachment and severance. If personal property is attached to land, it becomes real property. And if real property is severed from the land (rendered unattached) it becomes personal property. Examples abound. A person buys a furnace. The furnace company dispatches a technician to deliver and install the heating system. Before installation the heating system is personal property. It has corporeal presence and it can be moved around as witnessed by the fact that the technician picked it up at the warehouse, loaded it into his truck, drove it to the house, unloaded it, placed it in the basement and hooked it up to the house. The "hooking up" is the act that transformed what was personal property to real property. Once it is installed it has become "attached to the land" (the house) and is now considered real property. The attachment to the house has to be more than casual for personal property to become real property. For example, a table lamp that is plugged into a wall socket is not real property. A window air conditioning unit is not real property.


Comparison with embezzlement

Embezzlement differs from larceny in two ways. First, in embezzlement, an actual conversion must occur; second, the original taking must not be trespassory.[49] To say that the taking was not trespassory is to say that the person(s) performing the embezzlement had the right to possess, use, and/or access the assets in question, and that such person(s) subsequently secreted and converted the assets for an unintended and/or unsanctioned use. Conversion requires that the secretion interferes with the property, rather than just relocate it. As in larceny, the measure is not the gain to the embezzler, but the loss to the asset stakeholders. An example of conversion is when a person logs checks in a check register or transaction log as being used for one specific purpose and then explicitly uses the funds from the checking account for another and completely different purpose. It is important to make clear that embezzlement is not always a form of theft or an act of stealing, since those definitions specifically deal with taking something that does not belong to the perpetrator(s). Instead, embezzlement is, more generically, an act of deceitfully secreting assets by one or more persons that have been entrusted with such assets. The person(s) entrusted with such assets may or may not have an ownership stake in such assets.


In the case where it is a form of theft, distinguishing between embezzlement and larceny can be tricky.[50] Making the distinction is particularly difficult when dealing with misappropriations of property by employees. To prove embezzlement, the state must show that the employee had possession of the goods "by virtue of her employment"; that is, that the employee had the authority to exercise substantial control over the goods. Typically, in determining whether the employee had sufficient control the courts will look at factors such as the job title, job description and the particular employment practices. For example, the manager of a shoe department at a store would likely have sufficient control over the shoes that if she converted the goods to her own use she would be guilty of embezzlement. On the other hand, if the same employee were to steal cosmetics from the cosmetic counter, so long as they did not convert the product, the crime would not be embezzlement but larceny. For a case that exemplifies the difficulty of distinguishing larceny and embezzlement see State v. Weaver, 359 N.C. 246; 607 S.E.2d 599 (2005).


By trick

See also: Fraud

Using confidence tricks (deception) to get possession of property is larceny.


Larceny by trick is descriptive of the method used to obtain possession. The concept arose from Pear's Case decided in 1779.[51] The issue was whether a person who had fraudulently obtained possession of personal property (a horse) could be convicted of larceny. The chief impediment to conviction was the doctrine of possessorial immunity which said that a person who had acquired possession lawfully, that is with the consent of the owner, could not be prosecuted for larceny. Clearly the owner of the horse had given the defendant possession of the animal – he had agreed that the defendant could borrow the horse to ride to Surrey.[52] The case would seem to have been cut and dried – the doctrine of possessorial immunity applied and the defendant was therefore not guilty of larceny. The court held that consent induced by fraud was not consent in the eyes of the law. The fraudulent act that induced the owner to transfer possession "vitiated" the consent. This concept of consent broadened the scope of larceny. Before, consent meant the voluntary relinquishment of possession and thus property was wrongfully taken only if the defendant acquired possession by stealth, force or threat of force.


By employees

An employee is generally presumed to have custody rather than possession of property of his employer used during his employment. Thus the misappropriation would be larceny. However, officers, managers and employees who have significant authority over the disposition or use of the employer's property have possession rather than custody and the misappropriation of the property would likely be embezzlement rather than larceny. Determining whether an employee has custody or possession can be difficult. A careful examination of the employee's duties and responsibilities, his authority over the property and the actual business practices is required.[53]


If a third party transfers possession of property to an employee for delivery to his employer, the employee has possession of the property and his conversion of the property would be embezzlement rather than larceny. For example, if a customer of a bank delivers money to a teller to deposit in the customer's account, the teller had possession of the property and his misappropriation would be embezzlement rather than larceny. However, once the teller transfers possession of the money to his employer, by placing the money in the till for example, the subsequent taking would be larceny rather than embezzlement. This rule does not apply if the teller intending to steal the property places the money in the till merely as a temporary repository or to hide his peculation.


Aggregation issues

Thievery may well involve many items of personal property stolen from multiple victims. Questions arise as to whether such situations are to be treated as one large theft or multiple small ones. The answer depends on the circumstances. If a thief steals multiple items from one victim during a single episode the courts doubtlessly would treat the act as one crime. The same result would obtain if the thief stole items from the same victim over a period of time on the grounds that the stealing was pursuant to a common scheme or plan. The effect would be that the state could aggregate the value of the various items taken in determining whether the crime was a felony or misdemeanor. Such a result would not always work to the criminal's detriment. Aggregation is also generally permitted when the thief steals property from multiple victims at the same time. For example, a thief steals "rims" from several cars parked in the same lot. On the other hand, aggregation is not permitted when a thief steals items from various victims at different times and places.[54]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larceny


Windows Vista is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. It was released to manufacturing on November 8, 2006, and became generally available on January 30, 2007, on the Windows Marketplace, the first release of Windows to be made available through a digital distribution platform.[7] Vista succeeded Windows XP (2001); at the time, the five-year gap between the two was the longest time span between successive Windows releases.


Microsoft began developing Vista under the codename "Longhorn" in 2001, shortly before the release of XP. It was intended as a small upgrade to bridge the gap between XP and the next major Windows version, codenamed Blackcomb. As development progressed, it assimilated many of Blackcomb's features and was repositioned as a major Windows release. Vista introduced the updated graphical user interface and visual style Aero, Windows Search, redesigned networking, audio, print, and display sub-systems, and new multimedia tools such as Windows DVD Maker among other changes. Vista aimed to increase the level of communication between machines on a home network, using peer-to-peer technology to simplify sharing files and media between computers and devices. Vista included version 3.0 of the .NET Framework, allowing software developers to write applications without traditional Windows APIs. It removed support for Itanium and devices without ACPI.


While its new features and security improvements garnered praise, Vista was the target of significant criticism, such as its high system requirements, more restrictive licensing terms, lack of compatibility, longer boot time, and excessive authorization prompts from User Account Control. It saw lower adoption and satisfaction rates than XP, and it is generally considered a market failure.[8][9] However, Vista usage did exceed Microsoft's pre-launch two-year-out expectations of achieving 200 million users, with an estimated 330 million internet users in January 2009. On October 22, 2010, Microsoft ceased sales of retail copies of Windows Vista, and the original equipment manufacturer's sales for Windows Vista ceased the following year.[10]


Vista was succeeded by Windows 7 (2009), which retained and refined many of the features that Vista introduced. Microsoft ended mainstream support for Vista on April 10, 2012, and extended support on April 11, 2017.[11] In retrospect, Vista is often described as one of the worst versions of Windows,[12] but also an important one that laid the foundation for future releases.[13][14]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Vista


The Marriott World Trade Center was a 22-story, 825-room hotel at 3 World Trade Center within the World Trade Center complex in Manhattan, New York City. It opened in April 1981 as the Vista International Hotel and was the first major hotel to open in Lower Manhattan south of Canal Street since 1836. It was also unofficially known as World Trade Center 3 (WTC 3 or 3 WTC), and the World Trade Center Hotel, officially the Vista Hotel, and the Marriott Hotel throughout its history.


The hotel was damaged in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. It was destroyed by structural damage caused by the collapse of the World Trade Center as a result of the September 11 attacks. The hotel was not replaced as part of the new World Trade Center complex, although its address was reused for a tower at 175 Greenwich Street.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriott_World_Trade_Center


An anonymous Internet commentator reflects:A friend of mine got hold of the beta test CD of Win95, and set up a packet sniffer between his serial port and the modem. When you try out the free demo time on The Microsoft Network, it transmits your entire directory structure in background.This means that they have a list of every directory (and, potentially every file) on your machine. It would not be difficult to have something like a File Request from your system to theirs, without you knowing about it. This way they could get a hold of any juicy routines you've written yourself and claim them as their own if you don't have them copyrighted." Liability For Distributed Artificial Intelligences"

Berkeley Technology Law Journal (btlj.org)

https://www.btlj.org/data/articles2015/vol11/Searchable/11-1/03%20Karnow.pdf?fbclid=IwAR3N1_M0djLd_bQgTM_xQto8kfgVZRyQkphkkmMOmvXec71yVJuGf9UvVnU


The Vatican has founded the Pope John Paul II Center for Prayer and Study for Peace at 1711 Ocean Avenue, Springlake, New Jersey, in a mansion overlooking the ocean. The mansion was given to the New York Archdiocese by the estate of Elmer Bobst, who died in 1978. He was a multimillionaire and chairman of Warner Lambert Company. Richard Nixon was a frequent visitor. Directors of the Center were Kurt Waldheim, former Secretary General of the United Nations and ex-nazi war criminal; Cyrus Vance, former Secretary of State under Carter and member of both the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission; Clare Booth Luce, a dame of the Knights of Malta; and J. Peter Grace of W.R. Grace Company, who is head of the Knights of Malta in the United States. The Center was set up by the Vatican as a part of the Pope's new peace plan, which will bring the world together (see my paper "The Secret Government"). The Center has two roles:

(1) Educate Catholics and their children to accept the New World Order.

(2) Provide residence for the world-peace-solution computer and an ongoing study for peaceful solutions to any future problems which may endanger world peace. The computer is hooked to the world capitals via satellite. All nations have agreed to relinquish sovereignty to the Pope and submit future problems to the computer for solution. Of course, this will not go into effect until the New World Order is publicly announced. I believe that the New World Order was born in secrecy on January 19,1989. Now you know.

Acquaint yourself anew with the teachings of Jesus. Compare his teachings with the tenets of the Illuminati and then compare it with the following. The Vatican has stated at various times that "the Pope is for total disarmament; the Pope is for elimination of the sovereignty of the nation states; the Pope is also stating that property rights are not to be considered true property rights. The Pope believes that only the Vatican knows what is right for man." In the early 1940s, the I.G. Farben Chemical Company employed a Polish salesman who sold cyanide to the Nazis for use in Auschwitz. The same salesman also worked as a chemist in the manufacture of the poison gas. This same cyanide gas along with Zyklon B and malathion was used to exterminate millions of Jews and other groups. Their bodies were then burned to ashes in the ovens. After the war the salesman, fearing for his life, joined the Catholic Church and was ordained a priest in 1946. One of his closest friends was Dr. Wolf Szmuness, the mastermind behind the November/78 to October/79 and March/80 to October/81 experimental hepatitis B vaccine trials conducted by the Center for Disease Control in New York, San Francisco and four other American cities that loosed the plague of AIDS upon the American people. The salesman was ordained Poland's youngest bishop in 1958. After a 30-day reign his predecessor was assassinated and our ex-cyanide gas salesman assumed the papacy as Pope John Paul II. 1990 is the right time with the right leaders: ex-chief of the Soviet secret police Mikhail Gorbachev, ex-chief of the CIA George Bush, ex-Nazi cyanide gas salesman Pope John Paul II, all bound by an unholy alliance to ring in the New World Order."

Behold A Pale Horse

by William Cooper

hourofthetime .com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/William_Cooper-Behold_a_Pale_Horse1991A.pdf


On 9/11 Trump bragged he now had tallest building in Manhattan

‘Forty Wall Street actually was the second-tallest building in downtown Manhattan,’ Mr Trump said erroneously on 9/11. ‘Now it’s the tallest.’

Nathan Place

New York

Saturday 10 September 2022 10:03 EDT

Twenty-one years after 9/11, we can still hear Donald Trump’s reaction to the terrorist attacks – and it was a strange one.


That’s because on 11 September, 2001, the future US president called into the TV station WWOR to talk about the day’s tragic events. Then, oddly, he turned his attention to the height of one of his properties, which he falsely claimed was now the tallest building in lower Manhattan.


“Well, it was an amazing phone call,” Mr Trump told WWOR. “I mean, 40 Wall Street actually was the second-tallest building in downtown Manhattan. And it was actually – before the World Trade Center – was the tallest. And then when they built the World Trade Center, it became known as the second-tallest, and now it’s the tallest.”


As multiple fact checks later pointed out, this was not true. The Wall Street building had not been the tallest building in lower Manhattan in the 1970s, when the Twin Towers were constructed, nor was it the tallest in the area after 2001.


By the time of Mr Trump’s interview, both buildings of the World Trade Center had collapsed after planes hijacked by Al Qaeda terrorists had smashed into them. Two other planes had also crashed into the Pentagon in Washington, DC, and into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, killing everyone onboard. In total, nearly 3,000 people died in the attacks.


But Mr Trump’s attention was elsewhere. Later in the interview, he complained about the closing of the New York Stock Exchange.


“I was so disappointed when they closed the stock exchange, but of course, at some point, you have no choice,” the real estate mogul said. “You want to just say, ‘The hell with it, you’re going forward, nothing’s gonna change.’ But the fact is, something has changed very dramatically.”


The interview had begun with a more predictable focus, as Mr Trump explained how he witnessed part of the attacks.


“I have a window that looks directly at the World Trade Center and I saw this huge explosion,” he said, apparently referring to his view from Trump Tower. “I was with a group of people. I really couldn’t even believe it.


“And even, I think, worse than that, for years I’ve looked right directly at the building. I’d see the Empire State Building in the foreground and the World Trade Center in the background. And now I’m looking at absolutely nothing. It’s just gone. And it’s just hard to believe.”

https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/9-11-trump-tallest-building-manhattan-b2164420.html


Entertainment

Predicting 9/11 was an ‘insane coincidence,’ says ‘The Simpsons’ showrunner

By Hannah Frishberg

Published Nov. 18, 2021

Updated Nov. 18, 2021, 3:55 p.m. ET

One of the original writers for “The Simpsons” has revealed why he believes the show has such an uncanny ability to accurately guess the future.


Indeed, in its over 30 years on air, the animated Nostradamus has been credited with predicting everything from Roy Horn being mauled by a tiger to fish having three eyes, Apple’s keyboards having a glitch, the big “Game of Thrones” surprise ending, European beef being contaminated with horse meat and, perhaps most famously, the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.


The showrunner of “The Simpsons,” Al Jean, who has been writing for the show since it premiered in 1989, believes the trick to its correct prognostications is both luck and the sheer quantity of episodes produced.


“One of our writers, the guy whose episode predicted Donald Trump as president, said it best: ‘If you write 700 episodes, and you don’t predict anything, then you’re pretty bad. If you throw enough darts, you’re going to get some bullseyes,” Jean recently told NME. Still, he notes that he finds the show’s unintentional 9/11 prediction particularly strange.


“The 9/11 one is so bizarre,” said Jean of the episode. “In the World Trade Center episode, [‘The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson’], there was a brochure reading $9 a day with an 11 styled up like the towers. That was in ’96, which was crazy, like this insane coincidence.”


It’s not just Providence that makes “The Simpsons” writers so good at randomly seeing beyond the present, though — it’s also intelligence.


See Also

"The Simpsons" showrunner Al Jean has revealed how he would like the iconic Fox sitcom to end.

‘The Simpsons’ showrunner dishes on how the iconic sitcom will end

“[Mostly] it’s just educated guesses,” Jean continued. “Stanley Kubrick made the movie ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ in 1968, and there’s Zoom and iPads in it — but that’s because he had futurologists helping him construct what the world might look like in 30 years time.”


As for the show’s own future, Jean says that another “Simpsons” movie may be down the line, although animators already have more than enough on their plates creating the TV show.


“We’re cursed by high ratings,” Jean said. “We’re still on the air as a TV show, and that takes up a lot of time. I worked on the [first] movie simultaneous to the show, and it nearly killed the animators. But we have an idea, it’s just that we’re waiting to see what the environment is.”


Filed under september 11  the simpsons  11/18/21

https://nypost.com/2021/11/18/predicting-9-11-an-insane-coincidence-simpsons-showrunner/


Trump, Vance meet with Pope Leo's Florida brother, 'a major MAGA fan', at White House

Kim Luciani

USA TODAY NETWORK - Florida

May 22, 2025, 12:58 p.m. ET

Key Points AI-assisted summary

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's brother, Louis Prevost, at the White House.

Trump publicly praised Prevost, a Florida resident, for being a "major MAGA fan."

Louis Prevost acknowledged his political views and stated his intention to "tone it down" to avoid causing issues for the pope.

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's Florida brother Louis Prevost at the White House on May 20, after praising Prevost to reporters at the Capitol earlier in the day, calling him a "major MAGA fan."


Trump told reporters he likes the pope and both of his brothers, but spotlighted the eldest brother, Navy veteran and Port Charlotte resident Louis Prevost.

"I like the new pope and I like the pope's brother. You know, one of the pope's brothers – actually both of them – but one in particular is a major MAGA fan. Did you know that? He lives in Florida," Trump said.

"And I look forward to getting him to the White House. I want to shake his hand, I want to give him a big hug."

Later that day, the White House visit happened. Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah met with Trump and Vice President JD Vance in the Oval Office.

"Great meeting between President Trump, Vice President Vance, and @Pontifex’s brother, Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah," Special Assistant to the President and Communications Advisor Margo Martin posted on X, along with a photo of the meeting.


Louis Prevost excited and happy about brother Pope Leo XVI's papacy

The Prevost brothers — Louis, John and Robert (Pope Leo XIV) — grew up in Chicago in a traditional Catholic family.

Louis Prevost said his youngest brother Robert wanted to "play priest" when he was 6 and set his sights on the priesthood as a freshman in high school. Their parents, neighbors and even strangers told Robert, "You're going to be pope someday," he said.

Robert Prevost's election as Pope Leo XIV left Louis Prevost excited, happy, mind blown and a little worried about how the papacy would impact their relationship.

“I just freaked out and said ‘It’s Rob, OMG.’ I was up, dressed, out, just going nuts,” he told WBBH.

“We can only hope that we can maintain that closeness, and we don't do anything to embarrass him,” he said.

Louis Prevost attended Pope Leo's inaugural mass at the Vatican on May 18. The brothers shared a hug after the service.


Pope Leo's Florida brother Louis Prevost is a MAGA, Trump supporter

Trump told reporters Louis Prevost is a "major MAGA fan."


In an interview with Piers Morgan, Louis Prevost said, "I don’t want to create waves that don’t need to be there because I’m a MAGA type and I have my beliefs,” he said. “I don’t need to create heat for him. He’s going to have enough to handle as it is without the press going ‘the pope’s brother says this.’ He doesn’t need that.”


Asked about his reposts of controversial social media memes, including one calling Nancy Pelosi a drunk (expletive), and how they might affect the pope, Louis Prevost said he will "tone it down."


"He knows I am who I am," he said of the pope. "He's well aware of my position. He knows I'm probably not going to change and I don't think I will, other than to, just like you say, tone it down."

Contributing: Melissa Pérez-Carrillo, Herald-Tribune, Ashley Ferrer, USA TODAY Network-Florida

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.


Biography

Early life

Sako was born in the city of Zakho, Iraq, on 4 July 1948.[2] He comes from an ethnic Assyrian family of the Chaldean Catholic Church that has roots in a religious community that has had a presence in the city of his birth since the 5th century AD.[3]


He completed his early studies in Mosul and then attended the Dominican-run Saint Jean’s Seminary there. He was ordained a priest on 1 June 1974 and filled his first pastoral assignment at the Cathedral of Mosul until 1979. He then earned a doctorate in Eastern patrology at the Pontifical Oriental Institute. When denied a license to teach because he was only qualified for religious instruction, he earned a second doctorate in history from the Sorbonne in Paris.[4] With this he secured his teaching license and was able to provide religious instruction. From 1997 to 2002 he was rector of the Patriarchal Seminary in Baghdad. He then returned to Mosul and guided the parish of Perpetual Help for a year.[5][6]


Sako speaks Neo-Aramaic, German, French, English, Italian, Kurdish and Arabic.[2]


Archeparch

A synod of the bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church meeting in Baghdad elected Sako Archeparch of Kirkuk on 24 October 2002. Pope John Paul II gave his assent on 27 September 2003.[7] He received his episcopal consecration on 14 November 2003 from his predecessor in Kirkuk, André Sana.[8]


In August 2009, and at the beginning of Ramadan, Sako organized an appeal for national peace, reconciliation and end to violence on the part of more than fifty religious leaders in Kirkuk. He called it "a gesture of closeness to our Muslim brothers. We are all brothers, sons of the same God we must respect and cooperate for the good of the people and our country." The participants included representatives of Ali Sistani and Muqtada al Sadr.[9]


Patriarch

The Synod of Bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church, convoked in Rome on 28 January 2013, elected Sako to succeed Emmanuel III Delly as Patriarch of Babylon. He chose Louis Raphael I as his regnal name. Pope Benedict XVI gave his assent to the election on 1 February[2] and granted him ecclesiastica communio (ecclesiastical communion) as required by the canon law for Eastern-rite Catholic churches in recognition of their unity with the wider Catholic church.[10]


That same year, Iraq's President Jalal Talabani issued a decree recognizing Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Church.[11]


In July 2014 Sako led a wave of condemnation for the Sunni Islamists who demanded Christians either convert, submit to their radical rule and pay a religious levy or face death by the sword.[12] In September 2014 Sako said “The U.S. is indirectly responsible for what is going on in Iraq as it said it would ensure democracy and the well-being of the people, but 10 years have passed and on the contrary we have gone backward." He was responding to a question following remarks attributed to him in the local daily Ad-Diyar in which he accused the U.S. of supporting ISIS. Sako had also criticized Muslim countries for lack of support: "Our Muslim neighbours did not help us." He urged Muslim preachers to issue a religious ruling against the killing of all innocent people and said that "Issuing a fatwa preventing Muslims from killing fellow Muslims is not enough."[13]


In 2014, Sako ordered ten priests who had fled Iraq to return there by 22 October; he suspended them when they failed to comply. The priests, all living in the United States, some for as long as twenty years, appealed to Pope Francis for relief from the order.[14] In January 2015, Pope Francis granted them permission to remain in the United States.[15] Sako later renewed his order despite the pope's decision.[16]


In 2015, Sako proposed a "merger" or reunion of his own Chaldean Catholic Church with the Ancient Church of the East and the Assyrian Church of the East to create one united "Church of the East" with a single patriarch in union with the pope. His proposal would have required both his own resignation and that of Mar Addai II, followed by a joint synod of the bishops of all three churches to elect a new patriarch for the reunited Church of the East. (The patriarchate of the Assyrian Church of the East was vacant at the time, following the death of Mar Dinkha IV.)[17] He wrote that "Unity does not mean uniformity, nor the melting of our own church identity into one style, but it maintains unity in diversity and we remain one apostolic universal church, the Oriental Church, that maintains its independence of administration, laws and liturgies, traditions and support."[18] The Assyrian Church of the East respectfully declined this proposal citing "ecclesiological divergences still remaining" and proceeded with its election of a new patriarch.[19]


On 14 November 2015, the Synod of Bishops announced that Pope Francis had named Sako as one of his three appointments to that body's council.[20]


Cardinal

Pope Francis made Sako a cardinal in a consistory on 28 June 2018.[21] Later that year, Pope Francis named him one of the four cardinals to preside over sessions of the Synod of Bishops on Youth in October.[22]


On 6 October 2018 Sako was named a member of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches,[23] on 22 February 2019 a member of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue,[24] and on 29 September 2021 a member of the Congregation for Catholic Education.[25] On 4 January 2022, Pope Francis made him a member of the Council for the Economy.[26]


Sako was a cardinal elector in the 2025 papal conclave that elected Pope Leo XIV.[27] Patriarch Sako was also the first Chaldean Catholic Patriarch ever to participate in a papal conclave.[28][a] Sako opted not to wear the shash, the traditional headgear of East Syriac Christian bishops, and wore only his scarlet zucchetto.[32]


Government recognition dispute

On 15 July 2023, Iraq's President Abdul Latif Rashid announced the revocation of the government's 2013 decree recognizing Sako as Patriarch. In response that same day Sako announced he was leaving Baghdad to take up residence in Iraqi Kurdistan. He called the revocation "unprecedented in the history of Iraq".[11] Rashid said his action "does not affect the religious or legal status of patriarch Sako" and said it was based on the fact that Sako's office is not recognized by the Iraqi Constitution; Sako viewed as an extension of the government's ongoing "deliberate and humiliating campaign" against him and its wider failure to protect Iraqi Christians.[33] Rashid had recently rejected requests for comparable decrees from the Patriarchs of the Assyrian Church and the Old Assyrian Church. Others cited complex political manoeuvering.[34]


On 15 July 2023, Sako announced his intention to "retire from the Patriarchal See in Baghdad and move to a church, a mission, in one of the monasteries of Iraqi Kurdistan". His announcement followed a decision by the President of Iraq, Abdul Latif Rashid, to revoke a decree established in 2013 by the former Iraq's President, Jalal Talabani, recognising Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Church. The revocation "is unprecedented in Iraq's history," Sako said, highlighting "the government's silence" about the incident and the suffering of the Christian community.[35] For months, Sako had been embroiled in a war of words with a Shia lawmaker and militia leader, Rayan al-Kildani. Both accused each other of exploiting their influence to illegally seize Christian-owned properties. Al-Kildani is the leader of the Babylon Movement, whose militia fought ISIS within the state-linked Popular Mobilisation Forces, a network of largely pro-Iran paramilitaries. Since then, al-Kildani forged strong alliances with powerful Tehran-allied Shiite militias. Sako criticized the Babylon Movement as falsely Christian, noting most of its members and supporters are Shia Muslims using the label for political gain.[36][37] Furthermore, the Babylon Movement, led by al-Kildani, is accused of pillaging homes, unlawful confiscation of land, coercion, extortion, abuse of women, persecution of religious minorities, and torture of detainees. As a result, in 2019, the US imposed sanctions on al-Kildani and another Shiite militia leader, calling them "perpetrators of serious human rights abuse and corruption", and penalizing entities that interact with them.[38]


Cardinal Sako has accused Archbishop Bashar Warda of collaborating and conspiring with Rayan al-Kildani in an effort to subvert his authority and push for his resignation as head of the Chaldean Church. Warda is criticized for supporting al-Kildani despite his horrendous actions, and for not supporting Sako's efforts to counter the Babylon Movement's seizure of Christian assets. This has led to accusations that Warda prioritizes benefits from al-Kildani's support over protecting church interests. Sako has referred to Warda as the "Godfather" of the Babylon Movement.[39][40][41]


On 7 August 2023, Sako told an interviewer that "Withdrawing the decree is very bad. For 15 centuries, there were decrees recognising the Patriarch as head of the Church and administrator of the properties of the Church. Revoking it is a humiliation for the Church. Those behind this move want to put their hands on the properties of the Church and administer them separately from the ecclesiastical authorities. We cannot accept that."[42]


In April 2024, after nine months of exile, Sako returned to Baghdad with the assistance of Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia' Al Sudani.[43][44]


On 28 August 2024, Sako demanded a public apology from five bishops based on perceived disunity in the Chaldean Catholic Church, including absence from a mandatory July episcopal synod, setting a deadline of September 5. The five bishops, led by Bashar Warda, the Archbishop of Erbil, also withdrew from an August spiritual retreat and pulled their students from the Chaldean Seminary. The bishops refused to apologize, citing dissatisfaction with Sako's leadership style and unilateral decision-making. As a result, he would suspend them and ask Pope Francis to impose canonical penalties, including excommunication.[45][46] The actions of Bashar Warda and the other bishops have been described by the Chaldean Patriarchate as a "dangerous precedent" that goes against their episcopal vows to support the patriarch. The 17 bishops who attended the July 2024 synod issued a communiqué, calling for "appropriate legal measures" against the "clear violations" committed by the boycotting group of Warda.[47]


The rivalry between Louis Sako and Bashar Warda is driven by a fierce personal conflict, with Sako perceiving Warda as ruthlessly ambitious to seize the patriarchate. This perception has led Sako to backtrack on his initial plans to retire at 75, driven by a determination to thwart Warda's power grab. Warda's actions are seen as a betrayal of Sako's leadership.[48]


Honours

Defensor Fidei Prize, 2008

Pax Christi International Peace Award, 2010

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


What does Revelation 18:6 mean?

Romans 6:23 mentions the "wages of sin," meaning the expected outcome one "earns" from evil and immorality. God will give Babylon exactly what it deserves when He destroys it and all it stands for. This set of references to "Babylon" focuses on an ungodly political and economic entity. Similarly judged nations in the Bible had treated others viciously: swindled, stolen, plundered, and even murdered to accumulate wealth and fame, impoverishing multitudes to live in luxury (Exodus 1:8–14; Isaiah 1:9–17). Now God pays her back. He repays her double for her deeds. She must drink the full cup of God's wrath. John hears these words spoken by a voice from heaven.


Jeremiah predicted judgment on Babylon. He wrote in Jeremiah 51:25–26: "Behold, I am against you, O destroying mountain, declares the LORD, which destroys the whole earth; I will stretch out my hand against you, and roll you down from the crags, and make you a burnt mountain. No stone shall be taken from you for a corner and no stone for a foundation, but you shall be a perpetual waste, declares the LORD."

https://www.bibleref.com/Revelation/18/Revelation-18-6.html


Jake Leslie Davis (born 27 October 1992),[1] known professionally as Topiary, is a British hacktivist. He has worked with Anonymous, LulzSec, and other similar groups.[2] He was an associate of the Internet group Anonymous,[3] which has publicly claimed various online attacks, including hacking HBGary,[4] Westboro Baptist Church, and Gawker.[5] They have also claimed responsibility for the defacing of government websites in countries such as Zimbabwe,[6] Syria,[7] Tunisia,[8] Ireland,[9] and Egypt.[10]


After serving his time and staying off the Internet for two years, Jake Davis is now a security researcher, disclosing bugs to corporations as a part of their bounty programs.


Anonymous

Davis was a member of hacker collective Anonymous,[3] where he was involved in the attack on HBGary in response to Aaron Barr, then CEO of the organization, claiming to have unmasked various members of Anonymous.[4] The stolen HBGary emails were published and the small team who had been responsible splintered from Anonymous calling itself LulzSec.


LulzSec

On 24 February 2011, Topiary gained attention after he appeared on The David Pakman Show. He informed the host that Anonymous had replaced a Westboro Baptist Church webpage with a message from Anonymous during an on-air confrontation with Shirley Phelps-Roper.[11] A recording of this event was placed on YouTube,[12] where it reached over one million views in five days.


Topiary was a member of LulzSec, and ran their Twitter account.[13][14] The Guardian made a claim in a report that Topiary's name was Daniel.[15]


On 14 July 2011, The Guardian published an exclusive interview with Topiary,[16] in which he spoke extensively about his motivations. Describing himself as "an internet denizen with a passion for change" he said he feared being tracked by the authorities: "I can only hope that they haven't pinned any of us, especially my friends from LulzSec." Later, a full transcript of the lengthy interview surfaced on the website of freelance Guardian journalist Ryan Gallagher.[17]


Arrest

An 18-year-old man suspected of being Topiary was arrested in the Shetland islands of Scotland on 27 July 2011.[18] On 31 July 2011, the man was charged with five offences including unauthorised computer access and conspiracy to carry out a distributed denial of service attack on the Serious Organised Crime Agency's website.[19] Scotland Yard later identified the man arrested as Jake Davis, a resident of the island of Yell.[20] He was charged with unauthorised access of a computer under the Computer Misuse Act 1990, encouraging or assisting criminal activity under the Serious Crime Act 2007, conspiracy to launch a denial-of-service attack against the Serious Organised Crime Unit contrary to the Criminal Law Act 1977, and criminal conspiracy also under the Criminal Law Act 1977.[21]


Police confiscated a Dell laptop and a 100-gigabyte hard drive that had 16 different virtual machines. The hard drive also contained details relating to an attack on Sony and hundreds of thousands of email addresses and passwords.[22] A London court released Davis on bail under the conditions that he live under curfew with his mother and have no access to the Internet. His lawyer Gideon Cammerman stated that, while his client did help publicise LulzSec and Anonymous attacks, he lacked the technical skills to have been anything but a sympathiser.[22]


After his arrest, Anonymous launched a 'Free Topiary' campaign,[23] which included adding a "Free Topiary" banner to their Twitter avatars, similar to the Free Bradley banner.


Guilty plea

Davis pleaded guilty on 25 June 2012 to DDoS attacks on several websites, but pleaded not guilty to two counts of encouraging others to commit computer offenses and fraud. Davis was due to be tried along with Ryan Cleary (Ryan), Ryan Ackroyd (Kayla), Mustafa Al-Bassam (tflow), beginning 8 April 2013. The court was informed it would take 3,000 hours to view the material against Ackroyd alone. They were released on bail, except for Cleary.[24][25]


Davis was not tried for a number of other crimes perpetrated by LulzSec.


Court appearance

On 8 April 2013, Davis again appeared in court with fellow hackers, Ryan Ackroyd, Ryan Cleary and Mustafa Al-Bassam. All four pleaded guilty to computer crimes and were sentenced on 14 May 2013. Davis faced a maximum of 10 years in prison but got 24 months in a young offenders institute. He served 38 days because he had been electronically tagged for 21 months and this counted against his sentence.[26]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topiary_(hacktivist)


topiary(adj.)

1590s, in gardening "clipping or cutting into ornamental shapes" (in topiary work), from Latin topiarius "of or pertaining to ornamental gardening" (as a noun, "ornamental gardening, landscape gardening," also "an ornamental gardener"), from topia "ornamental gardening," from Greek topia, plural of topion, originally "a field," diminutive of topos "place" (see topos).


The noun in English is by 1906, "art of training and clipping trees in artificial shape, topiary work," from the adjective. Related: Topiarian.

https://www.etymonline.com/word/topiary


The Hanging Gardens of Babylon were one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World listed by Hellenic culture. They were described as a remarkable feat of engineering with an ascending series of tiered gardens containing a wide variety of trees, shrubs, and vines, resembling a large green mountain constructed of mud bricks. It was said to have been built in the ancient city of Babylon, near present-day Hillah, Babil province, in Iraq. The Hanging Gardens' name is derived from the Greek word κρεμαστός (kremastós, lit. 'overhanging'), which has a broader meaning than the modern English word "hanging" and refers to trees being planted on a raised structure such as a terrace.[1][2][3]


According to one legend, the Hanging Gardens were built alongside a grand palace known as The Marvel of Mankind, by the Neo-Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar II (who ruled between 605 and 562 BC), for his Median wife, Queen Amytis, because she missed the green hills and valleys of her homeland. This was attested to by the Babylonian priest Berossus, writing in about 290 BC, a description that was later quoted by Josephus. The construction of the Hanging Gardens has also been attributed to the legendary queen Semiramis[4] and they have been called the Hanging Gardens of Semiramis as an alternative name.[5]


The Hanging Gardens are the only one of the Seven Wonders whose location has not been definitively established.[6] No extant Babylonian texts mention the gardens and no definitive archaeological evidence has been found in Babylon.[7][8] Three theories have been suggested to account for this: first, that the gardens were purely mythical, and the descriptions found in ancient Greek and Roman writings (including those of Strabo, Diodorus Siculus and Quintus Curtius Rufus) represented a romantic ideal of an eastern garden;[9] second, that they existed in Babylon but were destroyed sometime around the first century AD;[10][4] and third, that the legend refers to a well-documented garden that the Assyrian King Sennacherib (704–681 BC) built in his capital city of Nineveh on the River Tigris, near the modern city of Mosul.[11][1]


Descriptions in classical literature

There are five principal writers whose descriptions of Babylon exist in some form today. These writers concern themselves with the size of the Hanging Gardens, their overall design and means of irrigation, and why they were built.


Josephus (c. 37–100 AD) quotes a description of the gardens by Berossus, a Babylonian priest of Marduk,[6] whose writing c. 290 BC is the earliest known mention of the gardens.[5] Berossus described the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II and is the only source to credit that king with the construction of the Hanging Gardens.[12][13]


In this palace he erected very high walls, supported by stone pillars; and by planting what was called a pensile paradise, and replenishing it with all sorts of trees, he rendered the prospect an exact resemblance of a mountainous country. This he did to gratify his queen, because she had been brought up in Media, and was fond of a mountainous situation.[14]


Hanging gardens of Semiramis, by H. Waldeck

Diodorus Siculus (active c. 60–30 BC) seems to have consulted the 4th century BC texts of both Cleitarchus (a historian of Alexander the Great) and Ctesias of Cnidus. Diodorus ascribes the construction to a "Syrian king". He states that the garden was in the shape of a square, with each side approximately four plethra long. The garden was tiered, with the uppermost gallery being 50 cubits high. The walls, 22 feet thick, were made of brick. The bases of the tiered sections were sufficiently deep to provide root growth for the largest trees, and the gardens were irrigated from the nearby Euphrates.[15]


Quintus Curtius Rufus (fl. 1st century AD) probably drew on the same sources as Diodorus.[16] He states that the gardens were located on top of a citadel, which was 20 stadia in circumference. He attributes the building of the gardens to a "Syrian king", again for the reason that his queen missed her homeland.


The account of Strabo (c. 64 BC – 21 AD) possibly based his description on the lost account of Onesicritus from the 4th century BC.[17] He states that the gardens were watered by means of an Archimedes' screw leading to the gardens from the Euphrates river.


The last of the classical sources thought to be independent of the others is A Handbook to the Seven Wonders of the World by the paradoxographer Philo of Byzantium, writing in the 4th to 5th century AD (not to be confused with the earlier engineer of the same name).[18] The method of raising water by screw matches that described by Strabo.[19] Philo praises the engineering and ingenuity of building vast areas of deep soil, which had a tremendous mass, so far above the natural grade of the surrounding land, as well as the irrigation techniques.


Historical existence

It is unclear whether the Hanging Gardens were an actual construction or a poetic creation, owing to the lack of documentation in contemporaneous Babylonian sources. There is also no mention of Nebuchadnezzar's wife Amytis (or any other wives), although a political marriage to a Median or Persian would not have been unusual.[20] Many records exist of Nebuchadnezzar's works, yet his long and complete inscriptions do not mention any garden.[21] However, the gardens were said to still exist at the time that later writers described them, and some of these accounts are regarded as deriving from people who had visited Babylon.[2] Herodotus, who describes Babylon in his Histories, does not mention the Hanging Gardens,[22] although it could be that the gardens were not yet well known to the Greeks at the time of his visit.[2]


To date, no archaeological evidence has been found at Babylon for the Hanging Gardens.[6] It is possible that evidence exists beneath the Euphrates, which cannot be excavated safely at present. The river flowed east of its current position during the time of Nebuchadnezzar II, and little is known about the western portion of Babylon.[23] Rollinger has suggested that Berossus attributed the Gardens to Nebuchadnezzar for political reasons, and that he had adopted the legend from elsewhere.[24]


Identification with Sennacherib's gardens at Nineveh


This copy of a bas relief from the North Palace of Ashurbanipal (669–631 BC) at Nineveh shows a luxurious garden watered by an aqueduct.

See also: Nineveh § Sennacherib's Nineveh

Oxford scholar Stephanie Dalley has proposed that the Hanging Gardens of Babylon were actually the well-documented gardens constructed by the Assyrian king Sennacherib (reigned 704 – 681 BC) for his palace at Nineveh; Dalley posits that during the intervening centuries the two sites became confused, and the extensive gardens at Sennacherib's palace were attributed to Nebuchadnezzar II's Babylon.[1] Archaeological excavations have found traces of a vast system of aqueducts attributed to Sennacherib by an inscription on its remains, which Dalley proposes were part of an 80-kilometre (50 mi) series of canals, dams, and aqueducts used to carry water to Nineveh with water-raising screws used to raise it to the upper levels of the gardens.[25]


Dalley bases her arguments on recent developments in the analysis of contemporary Akkadian inscriptions. Her main points are:[26]


The name Babylon, meaning "Gate of the Gods",[27] was the name given to several Mesopotamian cities.[28] Sennacherib renamed the city gates of Nineveh after gods,[29] which suggests that he wished his city to be considered "a Babylon".

Only Josephus names Nebuchadnezzar as the king who built the gardens; although Nebuchadnezzar left many inscriptions, none mentions any garden or engineering works.[30] Diodorus Siculus and Quintus Curtius Rufus specify a "Syrian" king. By contrast, Sennacherib left written descriptions,[31] and there is archaeological evidence of his water engineering.[32] His grandson Assurbanipal pictured the mature garden on a sculptured wall panel in his palace.[33]

Sennacherib called his new palace and garden "a wonder for all peoples". He describes the making and operation of screws to raise water in his garden.[34]

The descriptions of the classical authors fit closely to these contemporary records. Before the Battle of Gaugamela in 331 BC Alexander the Great camped for four days near the aqueduct at Jerwan.[35] The historians who travelled with him would have had ample time to investigate the enormous works around them, recording them in Greek. These first-hand accounts have not survived into modern times, but were quoted by later Greek writers.

King Sennacherib's garden was well-known not just for its beauty – a year-round oasis of lush green in a dusty summer landscape – but also for the marvelous feats of water engineering that maintained the garden.[36] There was a tradition of Assyrian royal garden building. King Ashurnasirpal II (883–859 BC) had created a canal, which cut through the mountains. Fruit tree orchards were planted. Also mentioned were pines, cypresses and junipers; almond trees, date trees, ebony, rosewood, olive, oak, tamarisk, walnut, terebinth, ash, fir, pomegranate, pear, quince, fig, and grapes. A sculptured wall panel of Assurbanipal shows the garden in its maturity. One original panel[37] and the drawing of another[38] are held by the British Museum, although neither is on public display. Several features mentioned by the classical authors are discernible on these contemporary images.


Assyrian wall relief showing gardens in Nineveh

Of Sennacherib's palace, he mentions the massive limestone blocks that reinforce the flood defences. Parts of the palace were excavated by Austin Henry Layard in the mid-19th century. His citadel plan shows contours which would be consistent with Sennacherib's garden, but its position has not been confirmed. The area has been used as a military base in recent times, making it difficult to investigate further.


The irrigation of such a garden demanded an upgraded water supply to the city of Nineveh. The canals stretched over 50 kilometres (31 mi) into the mountains. Sennacherib was proud of the technologies he had employed and describes them in some detail on his inscriptions. At the headwater of Bavian (Khinnis)[39] his inscription mentions automatic sluice gates. An enormous aqueduct crossing the valley at Jerwan was constructed of over two million dressed stones. It used stone arches and waterproof cement.[40] On it is written:


Sennacherib king of the world king of Assyria. Over a great distance I had a watercourse directed to the environs of Nineveh, joining together the waters.... Over steep-sided valleys I spanned an aqueduct of white limestone blocks, I made those waters flow over it.


Sennacherib claimed that he had built a "Wonder for all Peoples", and said he was the first to deploy a new casting technique in place of the "lost-wax" process for his monumental (30 tonne) bronze castings.[clarification needed] He was able to bring the water into his garden at a high level because it was sourced from further up in the mountains, and he then raised the water even higher by deploying his new water screws. This meant he could build a garden that towered above the landscape with large trees on the top of the terraces – a stunning artistic effect that surpassed those of his predecessors.


Plants


Date palms are a common tree species in Babylon.

The gardens, as depicted in artworks, featured blossoming flowers, ripe fruit, burbling waterfalls and terraces exuberant with rich foliage. Based on Babylonian literature, tradition, and the environmental characteristics of the area, some of the following plants may have been found in the gardens:[41][unreliable source?]


Olive (Olea europaea)

Quince (Cydonia oblonga)

Common pear (Pyrus communis)

Fig (Ficus carica)

Almond (Prunus dulcis)

Common grape vine (Vitis vinifera)

Date palm (Phoenix dactylifera)

Athel tamarisk (Tamarix aphylla)

Mt. Atlas mastic tree (Pistacia atlantica)

Imported plant varieties that may have been present in the gardens include the cedar, cypress, ebony, pomegranate, plum, rosewood, terebinth, juniper, oak, ash tree, fir, myrrh, walnut, and willow.[42] Some of these plants were suspended over the terraces and draped over its walls with arches underneath.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon


Mallotus philippensis is a plant in the spurge family. It is known as the kamala tree or red kamala or kumkum tree, due to the fruit covering, which produces a red dye. However, it must be distinguished from kamala meaning "lotus" in many Indian languages, an unrelated plant, flower, and sometimes metonymic spiritual or artistic concept. Mallotus philippensis has many other local names. This kamala often appears in rainforest margins. Or in disturbed areas free from fire, in moderate to high rainfall areas.


It occurs in South Asia, Southeast Asia, as well as Afghanistan and Australia. The southernmost limit of natural distribution is Mount Keira, south of Sydney. The species name refers to the type specimen being collected in the Philippines, where it is known as banato.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallotus_philippensis


Kamala Devi Harris (English: /ˈkɑːmələ ˈdeɪvi/ ⓘ,[1] born October 20, 1964) is an American politician and attorney who has been the 49th and current vice president of the United States since 2021, serving under President Joe Biden. Harris is the Democratic presidential nominee in the 2024 United States presidential election. She is the first female vice president of the United States, making her the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history. She is also the first African American and first Asian American vice president. From 2017 to 2021, she represented California in the United States Senate. Before that, she was Attorney General of California from 2011 to 2017.


Born in Oakland, California, Harris graduated from Howard University and the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She began her law career in the office of the district attorney of Alameda County. She was recruited to the San Francisco District Attorney's Office and later to the office of the city attorney of San Francisco. She was elected district attorney of San Francisco in 2003 and attorney general of California in 2010, and reelected as attorney general in 2014. As the San Francisco district attorney and the attorney general of California, Harris was the first woman, the first African American, and the first Asian American to hold each office.


Harris was the junior U.S. senator from California from 2017 to 2021. She won the 2016 Senate election, becoming the second Black woman and first South Asian American U.S. senator. As a senator, Harris advocated for stricter gun control laws, the DREAM Act, federal legalization of cannabis, and reforms to healthcare and taxation. She gained a national profile for her pointed questioning of Trump administration officials during Senate hearings, including Trump's second Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh.


Harris sought the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination in 2019, but withdrew from the race before the primaries. Biden selected her as his running mate, and their ticket defeated the incumbent president and vice president, Donald Trump and Mike Pence, in the 2020 election. Presiding over an evenly split Senate upon entering office, Harris played a crucial role as president of the Senate. She cast more tie-breaking votes than any other vice president, which helped pass bills such as the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 stimulus package and the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. After Biden withdrew from the 2024 presidential election, Harris launched her campaign with Biden's endorsement and soon became the presumptive nominee. On August 6, 2024, she chose Tim Walz, the governor of Minnesota, as her running mate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamala_Harris


Presidential elections are scheduled to be held in the United States on November 7, 2028, to elect the president and vice president of the United States for a term of four years.


In the 2024 elections, the Republican Party gained a majority of seats in the House of Representatives and Senate. Incumbent president Donald Trump won a non-consecutive second term; per the limits set by the 22nd Amendment, he is constitutionally barred from being elected president again.[1]


Background

See also: 2024 United States elections

The Republican Party returned to power in the United States with a government trifecta in January 2025 following the 2024 election. Trump, who was elected president in 2016 but lost a re-election bid in 2020 to Joe Biden, and JD Vance, a then-senator from Ohio defeated vice president Kamala Harris, who began her campaign following Biden's exit from the 2024 election, and Minnesota governor Tim Walz. Trump's victory was credited to a post-pandemic surge in inflation,[a] a migrant crisis at the U.S.–Mexico border,[b] and a global anti-incumbent backlash.[8][9][10] In addition, Republicans secured control of the Senate, flipping four seats and earning a three seat majority, while also retaining a House majority, though the party's majority narrowed to three seats after losing two seats.[11]


Electoral system

Main article: United States Electoral College

See also: United States presidential primary and Primary elections in the United States

The president and vice president of the United States are elected through the Electoral College, determined by the number of senators and representatives with an additional three representatives for Washington, D.C. A majority of 270 votes is needed to win the election. Forty-eight states use a winner-take-all system, in which states award all of their electors to the winner of the popular vote. In Maine and Nebraska, two votes are allocated to the winner of the popular vote, while each of the individual congressional districts have one vote. Electoral votes are certified by state electors in December and by Congress on January 6.[12] Presidential candidates are selected in a presidential primary, conducted through primary elections run by state governments or caucuses run by state parties which bind convention delegates to candidates.[13] A brokered convention occurs when a candidate does not receive a majority of votes on the first round of voting,[14] or when a candidate withdraws.[15]


Election Day in the United States has been held on the first Tuesday that falls after the first Monday in November.[16] Previously, states could determine their own Election Day prior to the first Wednesday in December. The 2028 presidential election will occur on November 7, 2028.[17]


Eligibility

The United States Constitution limits occupancy of the presidency to individuals who are at least thirty-five, who have been a resident in the United States for at least fourteen years, and who are a natural-born citizen.[18] Section three of the Fourteenth Amendment prevents current and former federal, state, and military officials from holding office—including the presidency—if they have "engaged in insurrection or rebellion" against the United States;[19] in March 2024, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled in Trump v. Anderson that former president Donald Trump could seek office after challenges to his ballot eligibility were raised by several state attorneys general.[20] A convicted felon may serve as president.[21] Elon Musk, who emerged as a political influencer in the 2024 presidential election, is ineligible to serve as president as he was born in South Africa and is a naturalized citizen.[22]


Trump is ineligible to be elected to a third term, as the Twenty-Second Amendment forbids any person from being elected president more than twice.[23] Nonetheless, he has repeatedly suggested running for a third term, an idea supported by several of his allies, including Steve Bannon.[24] In January 2025, Tennessee representative Andy Ogles proposed a resolution to amend the Twenty-Second Amendment, allowing for presidents who have served two non-consecutive terms to seek a third term. The verbiage of the amendment would prevent living presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama, all currently ineligible under the 22nd Amendment, from running for a third term.[25] At CPAC 2025, conservative groups, such as the Third Term Project, supported the Ogles resolution and promoted the idea of Trump running for an as-yet unconstitutional third term.[26][27] In response, New York Democratic representative Dan Goldman planned to introduce a resolution affirming the Twenty-Second Amendment.[28]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2028_United_States_presidential_election


Raphael Gamaliel Warnock[1] (/ˈrɑːfiɛl ˈwɔːrnɒk/ RAH-fee-el WOR-nok; born July 23, 1969) is an American politician and Baptist pastor serving as the junior United States senator from Georgia, a seat he has held since 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, Warnock has been the senior pastor of Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church since 2005.[2][3]


Warnock was the senior pastor of Douglas Memorial Community Church from 2001 to 2005.[4] He came to prominence in Georgia politics as a leading activist in the campaign to expand Medicaid in the state under the Affordable Care Act. He was the Democratic nominee in the 2020 United States Senate special election in Georgia, defeating incumbent Republican Kelly Loeffler in a runoff election.[5]


Warnock and Jon Ossoff are the first Democrats elected to the U.S. Senate from Georgia since Zell Miller in 2000.[6][7] Their elections were critical in securing a 50–50 Senate majority for Democrats, with Vice President Kamala Harris serving as the tie-breaking vote.[8] Warnock was a reliable supporter of Joe Biden's legislative efforts during his presidency.[9][10] He was reelected to a full term in 2022, defeating Republican nominee Herschel Walker.


Warnock is the first African American to represent Georgia in the Senate, the first Black Democrat elected to the Senate from a Southern state, and the second black U.S. Senator directly elected from a Southern state, after Tim Scott.[11][12][13]


Early life and education

Warnock was born in Savannah, Georgia, on July 23, 1969.[14] He grew up in public housing as the eleventh of twelve children born to Verlene and Jonathan Warnock, both Pentecostal pastors.[15][16] His father served in the U.S. Army during World War II, where he learned automobile mechanics and welding, and subsequently opened a small car restoration business where he restored junked cars for resale.[17] His mother picked cotton and tobacco in the summers in Waycross, Georgia, as a teenager and became a pastor.[18]


Warnock graduated from Sol C. Johnson High School in 1987,[19] and having wanted to follow in the footsteps of Martin Luther King Jr., attended Morehouse College, from which he graduated cum laude in 1991 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology.[20][21] He credits his participation in the Upward Bound program for making him college-ready, as he was able to enroll in early college courses through Savannah State University.[19][21] He then earned Master of Divinity, Master of Philosophy, and Doctor of Philosophy degrees from Union Theological Seminary, a school affiliated with Columbia University.[22][23][17]


Religious work


Warnock with John Lewis at a "Souls to the Polls" event. Warnock later officiated Lewis's funeral at Ebenezer Baptist Church.[24]

Warnock began his ministry as an intern and licentiate at the Sixth Avenue Baptist church in Birmingham, Alabama,[25] under the civil rights movement leader John Thomas Porter.[25][26] In the 1990s, he served as youth pastor and then assistant pastor at Abyssinian Baptist Church in New York.[27][28] While Warnock was pastor at Abyssinian, the church declined to hire workfare recipients as part of organized opposition to then-mayor Rudy Giuliani's workfare program.[29] The church also hosted Fidel Castro on October 22, 1995, while Warnock was youth pastor. There is no evidence Warnock was involved in that decision. During the 2020–21 United States Senate special election in Georgia, his campaign refused to say whether Warnock attended the event.[30]


In January 2001, Warnock was elected senior pastor of Douglas Memorial Community Church in Baltimore, Maryland.[31][32] He and an assistant minister were arrested and charged with obstructing a 2002 police investigation into suspected child abuse at a summer camp run by the church. The police report called Warnock "extremely uncooperative and disruptive". Warnock had demanded that the counselors have lawyers present when being interviewed by police.[33] The charges were later dropped with the deputy state's attorney's acknowledgment that it had been a "miscommunication", adding that Warnock had aided the investigation and that prosecution would be a waste of resources.[34][35] Warnock said he was merely asserting that lawyers should be present during the interviews[36] and that he had intervened to ensure that an adult was present while a juvenile suspect was being questioned.[37] Warnock stepped down as the church's senior pastor in 2005.[4]


On Father's Day 2005, Warnock was named senior pastor of the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, Martin Luther King Jr.'s former congregation;[38] he is the fifth and the youngest person to serve as Ebenezer's senior pastor since its founding.[19][39][40] He has continued in the post while serving in the Senate.[41][42]


As pastor, Warnock advocated for clemency for Troy Davis, who was executed in 2011.[43] In 2013, he delivered the benediction at the public prayer service at the second inauguration of Barack Obama.[44] After Fidel Castro died in 2016, Warnock told his church to pray for the Cuban people, calling Castro's legacy "complex, kind of like America's legacy is complex".[30] In March 2019, Warnock hosted an interfaith meeting on climate change at his church, featuring Al Gore and William Barber II.[45] He presided at Representative John Lewis's funeral at Ebenezer Church in July 2020.[46][24]


On Easter Sunday 2021, Warnock's Twitter account tweeted, "The meaning of Easter is more transcendent than the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Whether you are a Christian or not, through a commitment to helping others we are able to save ourselves." Some conservative Christians and political commentators criticized the tweet, including Benjamin Watson, Allie Beth Stuckey, and Jenna Ellis, who called it "heretical". The tweet was deleted that afternoon, with a spokesperson for Warnock saying, "the tweet was posted by staff and was not approved" but declining to say whether it reflected Warnock's beliefs.[47][48]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raphael_Warnock


Lawes Divine, Morall and Martiall

SUMMARY

Lawes Divine, Morall and Martiall, the rules and regulations issued in Jamestown beginning in 1610 and 1611, are the earliest extant English-language body of laws in the western hemisphere. It was not a legal code in the modern sense. No legislation created it, and no court enforced it. The laws were orders that the governor, appointed by the Virginia Company of London that settled and managed the colony between 1607 and 1624, issued to regulate the conduct of its members, employees, and servants. The laws recognized none of the principles of the English common law and did not provide for jury trials, even though the royal charters of the company specified that residents of the colony were entitled to all the rights of Englishmen.


In This Entry

Map

Timeline

Further Reading

Contributor: Brent Tarter

The three men who issued and first administered the laws were all career army officers, and because the largest part of the code was the law martial for the governing of the soldiers, the code has been misunderstood as imposing martial law on everyone in the colony. It has also been wrongly called Dale’s Laws, as if Deputy Governor Sir Thomas Dale, who administered the code for much of the time that it was in effect, was its sole or principal author.


The Virginia Company received a new charter in 1609 that authorized it to send a military governor to the struggling colony. Sir Thomas Gates sailed for Virginia in 1609, but his ship, the Sea Venture, was wrecked on Bermuda in a hurricane. When he arrived in Virginia in May 1610, he found the remnant of the garrison at Jamestown that had survived the deadly winter known as the Starving Time. On May 24, 1610, Gates issued the first of the orders that William Strachey compiled and published in England in 1612 in a book entitled For the Colony in Virginea Britannia. Lawes Divine, Morall and Martiall, &c.


Gates and the surviving colonists decided within weeks to pack up and sail for Newfoundland to catch a ride back to England aboard the fishing fleet. On the way down the James River, they met a relief expedition under the command of Thomas West, baron De La Warr, who had been appointed governor of the colony by the Virginia Company. The survivors returned to Jamestown. On June 12, 1610, De La Warr confirmed and began adding to the regulations that Gates had first announced. It is not possible from Strachey’s compilation to know in most instances who issued which orders or whether the governors issued them in the same sequence in which Strachey published them. Some orders, such as those mentioning a new well that was dug later, clearly postdate the first Gates and De La Warr orders. The whole body of laws that Strachey compiled before returning to England in 1612 fills eighteen pages in his book. In the title he called them “Divine” and “Morall” laws and in another part “Divine” and “Politique” laws.


In May 1611, Sir Thomas Dale arrived in Virginia with supplies, livestock, and many new settlers. He commanded a large and well-equipped military force and on June 22, 1611, issued a detailed law martial for the governing of the soldiers. It fills sixty-nine pages of Strachey’s book and was a fairly standard military code prescribing the duties and responsibilities of all the officers and men and imposing severe corporal punishments or death for infractions of discipline. Dale ordered that the guard publicly read a seven-page prayer twice each day. He administered the colony most of the time until the spring of 1616 during the long absences of Gates and De La Warr, but it is unlikely that he subjected the civilian residents of Virginia to the law martial. The orders imposed on civilians, to which Dale very likely added others, were strict enough to give the laws an evil reputation, and Dale’s administration of them was harsh enough to earn him much criticism then and thereafter.


The laws specified the responsibilities of ministers and required every person to attend church twice every Sunday. The laws established procedures for the disposal of the property of colonists who died, regulated trade with Indians, prohibited unnecessary killing of livestock, required houses and bedding to be kept clean, and forbade washing soiled clothing and cooking utensils or doing “the necessities of nature” within a quarter mile of the new well. The laws also regulated the collection of debts and trading with men aboard ships, and they required tradesmen, cooks, laundry women, and others to work at their tasks and the men to muster for defense when summoned.


The laws ordered severe corporal punishment for many offenses, such as having a bodkin driven through the tongue for cursing or speaking disrespectfully of the clergy or company officials. The code imposed whippings and other physical punishment for gambling, failing to attend church, fornication, adultery, unnecessarily killing livestock, or stealing agricultural implements or other people’s crops.


The list of crimes to be punished with death was long: blasphemy, uttering treasonous words or words critical of the company, murder, sodomy, robbery, swearing false oaths, bearing false witness, trading with Indians without permission, stealing from Indians, cheating the company or the cape merchant (who operated the company’s storehouse), trading with sailors without permission, and sending goods out of the colony without permission. It prescribed death for a third offence for several of the crimes to be punished in the first or second instance by whipping, standing in the stocks or at the pillory, or having the tongue bored through or cut out.


The laws required that every minister “read all these lawes and ordinances, publickly in the assembly of the congregation.”


It is very likely that Dale (as well as Gates and De La Warr during their occasional short residences in Virginia) issued more orders after Strachey left Virginia early in 1612, but those orders, or laws, have not survived. Strict enforcement of the code, for which Dale was noteworthy, helped the company restore order and discipline in Virginia. The company’s military governors administered the code until April 18, 1619, when Sir George Yeardley arrived in Jamestown and began governing under the new Great Charter of 1618. From July 30 to August 4, 1619, he presided over the first meeting of the General Assembly of Virginia that adopted the first laws of the new civilian government.

https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/lawes-divine-morall-and-martiall/


In the Prestonian lectures, eleven was a mystical number, and was the final series of steps in the winding stairs of the Fellow Craft, which were said to consist of 3, 5, 7, 9, and 11. The eleven was referred to the eleven apostles after the defection of Judas, and to the eleven sons of Jacob after Joseph went into Egypt. But when the lectures were revived by Henning, the eleven was struck out. In Templar Freemasonry, however, eleven is still significant as being the constitutional number required to open a Commandery; and here it is evidently allusive of the eleven true disciples.

https://www.freemasonry.bcy.ca/symbolism/numbers.html


Former sheriff’s deputy fatally shot by officers after child is slain in Elk Grove home

Bay City News Service

PUBLISHED: December 3, 2025 at 6:41 AM PST | UPDATED: December 3, 2025 at 8:51 AM PST

Categories:California News, Crime and Public Safety, Latest Headlines, News

The Elk Grove Police Department responded to a stabbing Dec. 2, 2025, in the 7600 block of Ferrell Way in Elk Grove, Calif.. (Elk Grove Police Department via Bay City News)

A man fleeing a Sacramento-area home where a child had been killed was fatally shot Tuesday by law enforcement officers.


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The man was identified as Marvin Morales, 40 — the child’s father and a former Sacramento County sheriff’s deputy.


According to police in Elk Grove, a woman called them just after 8 a.m. Tuesday, Dec. 2, to say she was worried about the safety of her two children, who were at home with their father.


When officers arrived at the home, they found that an 11-year-old boy had been stabbed. A 6-year-old was unharmed. Morales was not at the house.


A car believed to be Morales’ was spotted by a law enforcement officer on southbound Interstate 5 around 9:25 a.m., and the California Highway Patrol and other agencies joined the pursuit. South of Highway 12, as the car approached Stockton, it hit spike strips laid down by the CHP, and it crashed.


After the crash, officers from multiple agencies shot at Morales, and he was fatally struck. Among those shooting were two Sacramento County sheriff’s deputies and at least one CHP officer, the agencies said.


No further details of the shooting were released, including whether Morales was armed. No law enforcement officers were injured during the confrontation.


The 11-year-old boy, meanwhile, was pronounced dead at a hospital.


Morales resigned from the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office in 2024 after an internal affairs report determined he ingested fentanyl taken from a suspect.


Video of Morales unconscious on the bathroom floor at the sheriff’s office in 2023 went viral at the time. Deputies can be seen administering him the opioid overdose reversal drug naloxone.


This report was updated with additional information about the agencies involved.


Copyright © 2025 Bay City News, Inc. All rights reserved. Republication, rebroadcast or redistribution without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. Bay City News is a 24/7 news service covering the greater Bay Area.

https://www.mercurynews.com/2025/12/03/chp-shooting-after-child-stabbed/amp/


The Hamburg cell (German: Hamburger Zelle) was, according to U.S. and German intelligence agencies, a group of radical Islamists based in Hamburg, Germany, that included students from different Arab countries who eventually came to be key operatives in the September 11 attacks. Important members included Mohamed Atta, who led the four hijacking teams in 2001 and piloted American Airlines Flight 11; Ramzi bin al-Shibh, who conspired with the other three members but was unable to enter the United States; Marwan al-Shehhi, who piloted United Airlines Flight 175; and Ziad Jarrah, who piloted United Airlines Flight 93 and failed to hit a target in Washington, D.C.. Other members included Said Bahaji, Zakariya Essabar, Mounir el-Motassadeq, and Abdelghani Mzoudi.


Background

On November 1, 1998, future-hijackers Mohamed Atta, Marwan al-Shehhi, and Ramzi bin al-Shibh moved into a spacious apartment (two bedrooms, one living room, one kitchen) together on Marienstraße. Here they formed the secretive Hamburg cell, which also included other minor participants in the 9/11 plot. They met together three or four times a week to discuss their anti-American and anti-Israeli views and to decide how best to fight for their cause.


As late as 1999, the four core members of the group had intended to wage jihad in Chechnya, where Islamic jihadists were rebelling against Russia. The 9/11 Commission Report notes in Chapter 5 that "according to bin al-Shibh [who is now in U.S. custody], a chance meeting on a train in Germany caused the group to travel to Afghanistan instead. An individual named Khalid al Masri (or Khalid al-Masri) approached bin al-Shibh and Shehhi (because they were Arabs with beards, bin al-Shibh thinks) and struck up a conversation about jihad in Chechnya. When they later called Masri and expressed interest in going to Chechnya, he told them to contact Abu Musab in Duisburg, Germany. Abu Musab turned out to be Mohamedou Ould Slahi, who was well known to U.S. and German intelligence.


Bin al-Shibh, Shehhi and Jarrah visited Slahi in Duisburg, where he convinced them that it would be best to train in Afghanistan first, because further experience would be useful, and anyway it was difficult at that time to get into Chechnya. Slahi instructed them to travel to Karachi, Pakistan, then to the Taliban office in Quetta, Pakistan, where they were to contact a man named Umar al-Masri. Atta and Jarrah left Hamburg during the last week of November 1999. Shehhi left by himself around the same time; bin al-Shibh followed two weeks later. Slahi denies any involvement with Al-Qaeda by 1999, having previously fought with the group against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. He attests that he hosted the trio as an act of hospitality to fellow muslims.


"Umar al-Masri" turned out to be a nonexistent person. The name was a code word that instructed members of the Taliban office to escort the men to Kandahar, Afghanistan, where they were convinced to join the al-Qaeda network and wage jihad against America. They met with Osama bin Laden himself and swore their loyalty to him. Mohamed Atta was chosen by Bin Laden as the leader of the group that would attack America; Atta would contact Bin Laden several more times before the attacks. The men then returned to Germany to enroll in flight training school, and later moved on to flight training schools in the United States at the recommendation of one of their instructors based in Germany.


The members of the Hamburg Cell were a boon to the 9/11 plot, which Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had proposed to Bin Laden in 1996. The Hamburg students were fluent in English, educated, accustomed to the Western lifestyle, radically Islamic, and capable of learning to pilot aircraft. "Bin Laden and Mohammed Atef wasted no time in assigning the Hamburg group to the most ambitious operation yet planned by al-Qaeda," the 9/11 Commission Report says.


Many al-Qaeda members lived in the Hamburg apartment at various times. In all, 29 men listed the apartment as their home address while Mohamed Atta's name was on the lease. Reportedly, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed visited the apartment repeatedly.


German intelligence monitored the apartment, but did not find any evidence against the residents. Both the United States' Central Intelligence Agency and German Intelligence have received criticism for failing to share information on these and other al-Qaida members.


Hamburg Cell film

The film Hamburg Cell is a docudrama on the planning and execution of the attacks. A co-production between Channel 4 in the UK and CBC in Canada, it was shown in the UK during September 2004, amid criticism that this was too close to the anniversary of the attack. Using computer-generated imagery, the film's producers were able to show the twin towers of the World Trade Center, before the attack, in the background. Ziad Jarrah is featured calling his girlfriend, Aysel Sengün, from a public telephone at the airport, repeating the words 'I love you' over and over.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg_cell


The Deutsche Bank Building (formerly Bankers Trust Plaza) was a 39-story office building located at 130 Liberty Street in Manhattan, New York City, adjacent to the World Trade Center site. The building opened in 1974 and closed following the September 11 attacks in 2001, due to contamination that spread from the collapse of the South Tower. The structure was designed by Shreve, Lamb & Harmon, which also designed the Empire State Building.


The building was purchased by Deutsche Bank when it acquired Bankers Trust in 1998. It was part of the skyline of Lower Manhattan, and was demolished between 2007 and 2011. 5 World Trade Center will eventually replace the building, expanding the ground space on which the World Trade Center stands, as this land was not part of the original World Trade Center.


September 11th

The collapse of the South Tower during the September 11 attacks tore a 24-story gash into the facade of the building, knocked out a load-bearing column,[3] and destroyed 158,000 square feet of floor space.[4] Additionally, an elevated plaza[5] that was located at the base of the building was destroyed by the collapse.[6]


One person is known to have died within the building during the attacks.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsche_Bank_Building


Poppy Fields in the Tora Bora Region of Afghanistan

405027 04: An Afghan farmer cuts into a poppy bulb to extract the sap, which will be used to make opium, in a field May 6, 2002 in the village of Markhanai in the Tora Bora region of Afghanistan. Afghanistan once supplied 70 percent of the world's opium. The country's former Taliban rulers banned poppies in 2000, but farmers quickly planted the lucrative crop again after a U.S. bombing campaign helped push the Islamic militia from power late last year. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-afghan-farmer-cuts-into-a-poppy-bulb-to-extract-the-sap-news-photo/1540301


The Battle of Tora Bora was a military engagement that took place in the cave complex of Tora Bora, eastern Afghanistan, from November 30 – December 17, 2001, during the final stages of the United States invasion of Afghanistan. It was launched by the United States and its allies with the objective to capture or kill Osama bin Laden, the founder and leader of the militant organization al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda and bin Laden were suspected of being responsible for the September 11 attacks three months prior. Tora Bora (Pashto: تورا بورا; Black Cave) is located in the Spīn Ghar mountain range near the Khyber Pass. The U.S. stated that al-Qaeda had its headquarters there and that it was bin Laden's location at the time.


Background

In Operation Cyclone during the early 1980s, CIA officers had assisted the mujahideen fighters in extending and shoring up the caves to use for resistance during the Soviet–Afghan War.[8] The U.S. then supported their effort. Several years later, the Taliban formed and took control of most of the country, enforcing Islamic fundamentalist rule. Several cave areas were used in much earlier periods, as the difficult terrain formed a natural defensive position and had been used by tribal warriors fighting foreign invaders.


In the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the United States launched Operation Enduring Freedom to dismantle the Taliban regime that had sheltered Osama bin Laden. To achieve this goal, the U.S. military joined forces with the Northern Alliance, a group of rebels who had long been waging a guerrilla war against the Taliban. Through a combination of air strikes and ground operations, the U.S. and its allies quickly gained the upper hand, seizing control of key Taliban strongholds and toppling the regime's grip on power. By November 13, 2001, the Northern Alliance had captured the capital city of Kabul.


The CIA was closely tracking Osama bin Laden's movements, hoping to locate and catch him. On November 10, 2001, he had been spotted near Jalalabad traveling in a convoy of 200 pick-up trucks heading in the direction of his training camp in Tora Bora mountain.[12] The U.S. had expected bin Laden to make a last stand at Tora Bora, hoping to repeat his success against the Soviets in the Battle of Jaji in 1987. Vice President Dick Cheney revealed in a November 29, 2001 television interview that bin Laden was believed to be in the general area of Tora Bora, surrounded by a sizable force of loyal fighters.[4] The CIA lead in the Panjshir, Gary Berntsen, sent a detachment to team up with Afghan tribal militias around Jalalabad who opposed the Taliban.[12] The Americans climbed the mountains guided by the locals who knew the terrain. After a few days of climbing, they arrived at the training camp in Tora Bora where hundreds of Al-Qaeda fighters could be spotted.[13]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Tora_Bora


Katharina von Bora (German: [kataˈʁiːnaː fɔn ˈboːʁaː]; 29 January 1499? – 20 December 1552), after her wedding Katharina Luther, also referred to as "die Lutherin" ('the Lutheress'),[1] was the wife of the German reformer Martin Luther and a seminal figure of the Protestant Reformation. Although little is known about her, she is often considered to have been important to the Reformation, her marriage setting a precedent for Protestant family life and clerical marriage.[2]


Ancestry

Katharina von Bora was the daughter to a family of Saxon lesser nobility.[3][4][5] According to common belief, she was born on 29 January 1499 in Lippendorf, but there is no evidence of this in contemporary documents. Due to there being multiple branches in her family and the uncertainty of her birth name, there are diverging theories about her place of birth.[6] One of them proposes that she was born in Hirschfeld and that her parents were Hans von Bora zu Hirschfeld and his wife, born Anna von Haugwitz.[7][8] It is also possible that Katharina was the daughter of Jan von Bora auf Lippendorf and his wife Margarete, both of whom were only mentioned in 1505.[9]


Early life


A portrait of Martin Luther in 1526 by Lucas Cranach the Elder

Her father sent then five-year-old von Bora to a Benedictine convent in Brehna in 1504 to be educated, according to a letter Laurentius Zoch sent to Martin Luther in 1531.[10] At the age of nine, she was moved to Nimbschen Abbey, Cistercian community named Marienthron ('Mary's Throne') near Grimma, where her maternal aunt was a nun.[11] Von Bora's presence is in the financial accounts of 1509/10.[12]


Plaque on the ruins of Nimbschen Abbey, commemorating von Bora's time there and her escape.

After years of being a nun, von Bora became interested in the growing reform movement and grew dissatisfied with cloistered life. Conspiring with several other sisters, she contacted Luther and begged for his assistance.[13] On 4 April 1523, Holy Saturday, Luther sent Leonhard Köppe, a merchant and councillor of Torgau who regularly delivered herring to the convent. The nuns escaped by hiding in his covered wagon among the fish barrels, and fled to Wittenberg.[14]


Luther asked the family of the nuns to admit them into their houses, but they declined, possibly because this would have made them accomplices to a crime under canon law.[15]


Within two years, Luther was able to arrange marriages or find employment for all of the escaped nuns except von Bora. She was first housed with the family of Philipp Reichenbach, the municipal clerk of Wittenberg, then with Lucas Cranach the Elder and his wife, Barbara. Von Bora had a number of suitors, including Hieronymus Baumgartner from Nuremberg, and a pastor, Kaspar Glatz from Orlamünde, but none of the proposals resulted in marriage. She told Luther's friend and fellow reformer, Nicolaus von Amsdorf, that she would be willing to marry only Luther or von Amsdorf.[16]


Marriage to Luther


Three depictions of Katharina von Bora

Martin Luther, as well as many of his friends, was at first unsure of whether he should marry. Philip Melanchthon thought that this would hurt the Reformation by causing scandal. Luther eventually decided that his marriage would 'please his father, rile the pope, cause the angels to laugh, and the devils to weep'.[16] 26-year-old Von Bora and 41-year-old Luther married on 13 June 1525, before witnesses including Justus Jonas, Johannes Bugenhagen, and Barbara and Lucas Cranach.[17] A small wedding breakfast was held the next morning, and a more formal, public ceremony on 27 June, presided over by Bugenhagen.[18]


The couple took up residence in the former dormitory and educational institution of Augustinian friars studying in Wittenberg (known as the 'Black Monastery'), a wedding gift from John, Elector of Saxony, brother of Luther's protector Frederick III, Elector of Saxony.[19] Katharina immediately took on the task of managing the monastery's vast holdings. She bred and sold cattle and ran a brewery to provide for their family, the numerous students who boarded with them, and her husband's visitors. In times of epidemics, she operated a hospital with nurses, working alongside them. Luther called her the 'boss of Zulsdorf', after the farm they owned, and the 'morning star of Wittenberg' for her habit of rising at 4 a.m.[2]


Based on Luther's descriptions, his wife, whom he nicknamed 'Herr Käthe', exerted much control over his life. She might have even influenced his decisions to a degree; Luther said that his wife 'convince[d] [him] of whatever' she pleased', and explicitly afforded her 'complete control' over the household, as long as 'his rights' were 'preserved', since '[f]emale government has never done any good'.[20] She thus assisted her husband with running their estate and directed renovations when necessary.[21] Anecdotal evidence suggests that Katharina Luther played a wife's role as taught by her husband's movement: she depended on him financially (although she also increased their estate's profits), and respected him as a 'higher vessel', always calling him 'Herr Doktor'. He reciprocated by occasionally consulting her on church matters.[22]


Katharina bore six children: Hans (1526–1575), Elisabeth (1527–1528), Magdalena (1529–1542), Martin (1531–1565), Paul (1533–1593), and Margarete (1534–1570). She also suffered a miscarriage on 1 November 1539. The Luthers raised four orphaned children, including Katharina's nephew, Fabian.[23]


Significance of the marriage

The marriage of von Bora to Luther is very important in the history of Protestantism, specifically in regard to the development of its views on marriage and gender roles. While Luther was not the first cleric to marry because of Reformation ideas, he was one of the most prominent. As he argued publicly for clerical marriage and produced much anti-Catholic propaganda, his marriage became a natural target for his enemies.[24]


After Luther's death


von Bora in 1546


von Bora's gravestone engraving at Saint Mary's Church in Torgau, Germany

When Martin Luther died in 1546, Katharina was left in difficult financial straits without Luther's salary as professor and pastor, even though she owned land, properties, and the Black Cloister. She had been counselled by Martin Luther to move out of the old abbey and sell it after his death, and move into much more modest quarters with the children who remained at home, but she refused.[25] Luther had named her his sole heir in his last will. His will could not be executed, however, because it did not conform with Saxon law.[26]


Almost immediately after, Katharina had to leave the Black Cloister, now called Lutherhaus, by herself, at the outbreak of the Schmalkaldic War, fleeing to Magdeburg. After she returned, the approaching war forced another flight in 1547, this time to Braunschweig. In July 1547, at the close of the war, she was able to return to Wittenberg.[citation needed]


After the war, the buildings and lands of the monastery had been torn apart and laid waste. Cattle and other farm animals had been stolen or killed. If she had sold the land and the buildings, she could have had a good financial situation. Financially, they could not remain there. Katharina was able to support herself thanks to the generosity of John Frederick I, Elector of Saxony, and the princes of Anhalt.[27]


She remained in Wittenberg in poverty until 1552, when an outbreak of the Black Plague and a harvest failure forced her to leave the city once again. She fled to Torgau, where she was thrown from her cart into a watery ditch near the city gates. For three months, she went in and out of consciousness, before dying in Torgau on 20 December 1552, at the age of 53. She was buried at Torgau's Saint Mary's Church, far from her husband's grave in Wittenberg. She is reported to have said on her deathbed, 'I will stick to Christ as a burr to cloth.'[28]


By the time of Katharina's death, the surviving Luther children were adults. After Katharina's death, the Black Cloister was sold back to the university in 1564 by his heirs.[citation needed]


Margareta Luther, born in Wittenberg on 27 December 1534, married into a noble, wealthy Prussian family, to Georg von Kunheim (Wehlau, 1 July 1523 – Mühlhausen [now Gvardeyskoye, Kaliningrad Oblast], 18 October 1611, the son of Georg von Kunheim [1480–1543] and wife Margarethe, Truchsessin von Wetzhausen [1490–1527]) but died in Mühlhausen in 1570 at the age of thirty-six.[29]


Commemoration

Katharina von Bora is commemorated on 20 December in the Calendar of Saints of some Lutheran churches in the United States.[30] In 2022, she was officially added to the Episcopal Church liturgical calendar with a feast day on 20 December.[31]


In addition to a statue in Wittenberg and several biographies, an opera of her life now keeps her memory alive.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katharina_von_Bora


 Augustinians and Cistercians | Church and Society in the Medieval West

One newly founded order broke with the rule of Benedict, finding its inspiration in a letter of Augustine is that prescribed simply that monks share all their property, pray together at regular intervals, dress alike, and obey a superior. Some of the “Augustinians,” as they called themselves, interpreted these general rules severely, living in silence, performing manual labor, eating and drinking sparingly, and singing psalms; others ate meat, conversed among themselves, and did not insist on manual labor.


Often beginning as small informal foundations, the Augustinians attracted modest donations from relatively modest donors. Unlike Cluny, with its vast collections of buildings crowned by a great and splendid church, the Augustinian foundations were simple and humble. The Augustinians preached, baptized, heard confessions, and helped the poor unobtrusively. They multiplied rapidly, and in the thirteenth century there were thousands of Augustinian houses in England and on the Continent.


Founded only a little later, the Cistercians abandoned the world instead of living in it. Their original house, Citeaux (Cistercium) in Burgundy, lay in a dismal wasteland far from the distractions of the world. There they pioneered land reclamation and launched a period of agricultural expansion. By the twelfth century the Cistercians were looked to for their knowledge of how to make previously uncultivated lands, often swamps, productive. They considered themselves the only true Benedictines, vet the self-denial, poverty, and wholly spiritual life that the Cistercians adopted was often seen by their contemporaries as arrogant, worldly, and even greedy.


Perhaps the best-known Cistercian leader was Bernard of Clairvaux (c. 1091-1153), who in 1115 led a band of Cistercians to a new and remote site from which he influenced worldly affairs to a remarkable degree, preaching for a Second Crusade and attacking the scholastic method of teaching. As he wrote, “There are many who seek knowledge for the sake of knowledge: that is curiosity. There are others who desire to know in order that they themselves be known: that is vanity. Others seek knowledge in order to sell it: that is dishonorable. But there are also some who seek knowledge in order to edify others. That is love.” He launched significant reforms in teaching, the observance of church rules, and attitudes toward worship.


In the end, the Cistercians, too, changed. Display conquered austerity, and aristocratic traditions quenched humility. By the thirteenth century, great Cistercian monasteries were wealthy centers of production. The expensive arts of architecture and sculpture were lavished on their buildings. These Cistercian monasteries had become great corporations, thoroughly tied into the increasingly complex web of medieval economic life.

https://bigsiteofhistory.com/augustinians-and-cistercians-church-and-society-in-the-medieval-west


 The Cistercian Order

Main article: Cistercians

In 1075 Robert de Molesme, a Benedictine monk from Cluny Abbey, had obtained the permission of Pope Gregory VII to found a monastery at Molesme in Burgundy. At Molesme, Robert tried to restore monastery practice to the simple and severe character of the original Rule of Saint Benedict, called "Strict Observance". Being only partly successful in this at Molesme, Robert in 1098 led a band of 21 monks from their abbey at Molesme to establish a new monastery. The monks acquired a plot of marsh land just south of Dijon called Cîteaux (Latin: "Cistercium") and set about building a new monastery there which became Cîteaux Abbey, the mother Abbey of the newly founded Cistercian Order.[10]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cluniac_Reforms


Finally, the Constitutions train us all for perfection, instructing us in the weapons to be used in combatting our three fierce and raging adversaries. They teach us how to counter the lust of the flesh with chastity, the lust of the eyes with poverty, and the pride of life with obedience. I shall say nothing of our observance of chastity (in which we should imitate the purity of the angels so far as our frailty allows), or of our OBSERVANCE of poverty (which is so STRICT that neither churches nor professed houses may acquire any rents, lands, or even perpetual endowments). As for obedience, however, by which we consecrate the chief and noblest part of ourselves to God, our Constitutions require of us that it be so prompt, eager, perfect, and integral that we do not swerve even a hairsbreadth from our superiors commands. In matters falling under obedience, not only must our action be guided by the superior s command and our will by his will, but even something much more difficult our understanding by his understanding.

To sum up: men crucified to the world, and to whom the world itself is crucified[7] such would our Constitutions have us to be; new men, I say, who have put off their affections to put on Christ;[8] dead to themselves to live to justice; who, with St. Paul in labors, in watchings, in fastings, in chastity, in knowledge, in long suffering, in sweetness, in the Holy Spirit, in charity unfeigned, in the word of truth, show themselves ministers of God[9] and by the armor of Justice on the right hand and, on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report, by good success finally and ill success, press forward with great strides to their heavenly country. This is the sum and aim of our institute.

And so I beseech you, brothers in the Lord, that we may walk in a manner worthy of our vocation,[10] and, in order to know that vocation, may read and reread these Constitutions that have been bestowed upon us by the gift of God. Let us study them day and night. Let us vie with each other in learning them, pondering them, and keeping them. If we do so, our name will be matched by our lives and our profession made manifest in deed.

Farewell in Christ.

Rome, the house of the Society of Jesus, 1559 [7]

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Muhammed Fethullah Gülen (27 April 1941 – 20 October 2024) was a Turkish Muslim scholar, preacher, and leader of the Gülen movement[7][8] who as of 2016 had millions of followers.[9] Gülen was an influential neo-Ottomanist,[10] Anatolian panethnicist,[clarification needed][11][12] Islamic poet, writer,[13] social critic, and activist–dissident developing a Nursian theological perspective[14] that embraces democratic modernity.[12] Gülen was a local state imam from 1959 to 1981[15][16] and he was a citizen of Turkey until his denaturalization by the Turkish government in 2017.[17] Over the years, Gülen became a centrist political figure in Turkey prior to his being there as a fugitive. From 21 March 1999 until his death on 20 October 2024, Gülen lived in self-exile in the United States near Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania.[18][19][20] Gülen's body was buried in a plot of land near the Chestnut Retreat Center in Pennsylvania due to the political situation in Turkey.[21]


Gülen said his social criticisms are focused upon individuals' faith and morality and a lesser extent toward political ends,[22] and self described as rejecting an Islamist political philosophy, advocating instead for full participation within professions, society, and political life by religious and secular individuals who profess high moral or ethical principles and who wholly support secular rule, within Muslim-majority countries and elsewhere.[23] Gülen was described in the English-language media as an imam "who promoted a tolerant Islam which emphasises altruism, hard work, and education" and as "one of the world's most important Muslim figures".[24][25]


In 2003, a number of Gülen movement participants allied with Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's right wing Justice and Development Party (AKP), providing the AKP political and sorely-needed administrative support.[26][27][28] This political alliance worked together to weaken left-of-center Kemalist factions, but fractured in 2011. Turkish prosecutors accused Gülen of attempts to overthrow the government by allegedly directing politically motivated corruption investigations by Gülen-linked investigators then in the judiciary,[29][30] who illegally wiretapped the executive office of the Turkish president,[8] and Gülen's alleged instigations of the 2016 coup attempt.[31][32] Gülen denied the accusations.[33][34]


A Turkish criminal court issued an arrest warrant for Gülen in 2016,[35][36] and Turkey demanded his extradition from the United States.[37][38][39] U.S. government officials did not believe he was associated with any terrorist activity, and requested evidence to be provided by the Turkish government to substantiate the allegations in the warrant requesting extradition, frequently rejecting Turkish calls for his extradition.[40][41][42]


Gülen was wanted as a terrorist leader in Turkey[43] and Pakistan,[44] as well as by the OIC[45][46] and GCC.[47]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fethullah_G%C3%BClen


The Gehlen Organization or Gehlen Org (often referred to as The Org) was an intelligence agency established in June 1946 by U.S. occupation authorities in the United States zone of post-war occupied Germany, and consisted of former members of the 12th Department of the German Army General Staff (Foreign Armies East, or FHO). It was headed by Reinhard Gehlen who had previously been a Wehrmacht Major General and head of the Nazi German military intelligence in the Eastern Front during World War II.


The agency was a precursor to the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND or Federal Intelligence Service) which was formed in 1956.


Establishment


Reinhard Gehlen in 1943

After World War II, Reinhard Gehlen acted under the tutelage of US Army G-2 (intelligence), but he wished to establish an association with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). In 1947, in alliance with the CIA, the military orientation of the organization turned increasingly toward political, economic and technical espionage against the Eastern bloc and the moniker "Pullach" became synonymous with secret service intrigues.[1]


According to one report, the Org was for many years "the only eyes and ears of the CIA on the ground in the Soviet Bloc nations" during the Cold War. The CIA kept close tabs on the Gehlen group: the Org supplied the manpower while the CIA supplied the material needs for clandestine operations, including funding, cars and airplanes.[citation needed]


Every German POW returning from Soviet captivity to West Germany between 1947 and 1955 was interviewed by Org agents. Those returnees who were forced to work in Soviet industries and construction, and who were willing to participate, represented an incomparable source of information: a post-war, up-to-date picture of the Soviet Union as it evolved.[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gehlen_Organization


Operation Mockingbird is an alleged large-scale program of the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) that began in the early years of the Cold War and attempted to manipulate domestic American news media organizations for propaganda purposes. According to author Deborah Davis, Operation Mockingbird recruited leading American journalists into a propaganda network and influenced the operations of front groups. CIA support of front groups was exposed when an April 1967 Ramparts article reported that the National Student Association received funding from the CIA.[1] In 1975, Church Committee Congressional investigations revealed Agency connections with journalists and civic groups.


In 1973, a document referred to as the "Family Jewels"[2] was published by the CIA containing a reference to "Project Mockingbird", which was the name of an operation in 1963 which wiretapped two journalists who had published articles based on classified material.[3] The document does not contain references to "Operation Mockingbird".[4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird


Kodashim (Hebrew: קׇדָשִׁים‎, romanized: Qoḏāšim, lit. 'holy things') is the fifth of the six orders, or major divisions, of the Mishnah, Tosefta and the Talmud, and deals largely with the services within the Temple in Jerusalem, its maintenance and design, the korbanot, or sacrificial offerings that were offered there, and other subjects related to these topics, as well as, notably, the topic of kosher slaughter.


Topics

This Seder (order, or division) of the Mishnah is known as Kodashim (“sacred things” or “sanctities”), because it deals with subjects connected with Temple service and ritual slaughter of animals (shehitah). The term kodashim, in the Biblical context, applies to the sacrifices, the Temple and its furnishings, as well as the priests who carried out the duties and ceremonies of its service; and it is with these holy things, places and people that Kodashim is mainly concerned. The title Kodashim is apparently an abbreviation of Shehitat Kodashim ("the slaughter of sacred animals") since the main, although not the only subject of this order is sacrifices.[1][2][3]


The topics of this Seder are primarily the sacrifices of animals, birds, and meal offerings, the laws of bringing a sacrifice, such as the sin offering and the guilt offering, and the laws of misappropriation of sacred property. In addition, the order contains a description of the Second Temple (tractate Middot), and a description and rules about the daily sacrifice service in the Temple (tractate Tamid). The order also includes tractate Hullin, which concerns the slaughter of animals for non-sacrificial use, as well as other dietary laws applying to meat and animal products. Although Hullin is about the slaughter of animals for non-sacrificial, and therefore unsanctified purposes, because the rules about the proper slaughter of animals and birds, and their ritual fitness for use were considered to be an integral part of the concept of holiness in Judaism, they were also included in the order regarding “holy things”.[2][3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodashim


And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird.

Revelation 18:2


Zevachim (“Sacrifices”), with FOURTEEN chapters, and originally called Shehitat Kodashim ("slaughtering of the holy animals") deals with the sacrificial system of the Temple period, namely the laws for animal and bird offerings, and the conditions which make them acceptable or not, as specified in the Torah, primarily in the book of Leviticus (Lev 1:2 and on).[1][2][4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodashim


14We ought to act on the principle that everyone who lives under obedience should let himself be carried and directed by Divine Providence through the agency of the superior 15as if he were a lifeless body, which allows itself to be carried to any place and treated in any way; or an old man s staff, which serves at any place and for any purpose in which the one holding it in his hand wishes to employ it. 16For in this way the obedient man ought joyfully to employ himself in any task in which the superior desires to employ him in aid of the whole body of the religious order; 17and he ought to hold it certain that by so doing he conforms himself with the divine will more than by anything else he could do while following his own will and different judgment.[3]"

page 221

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


14 And deceived them that dwell on the earth by the signs which were permitted to him to do in the sight of the beast, saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make the [t]image of the [u]beast, which had the wound of a sword, and did live.

Revelation 13:14


Himmler used the Jesuits as the model for the SS, since he found they had the core elements of absolute obedience and the cult of the organisation.[59][60] Hitler is said to have called Himmler "my Ignatius of Loyola".[59] As an order, the SS needed a coherent doctrine that would set it apart.[61] Himmler attempted to construct such an ideology, and deduced a "pseudo-Germanic tradition" from history.[61] Himmler dismissed the image of Christ as a Jew and rejected Christianity's basic doctrine and its institutions.[62] Starting in 1934, the SS hosted "solstice ceremonies" (Sonnenwendfeiern) to increase team spirit within their ranks.[63] In a 1936 memorandum, Himmler set forth a list of approved holidays based on pagan and political precedents meant to wean SS members from their reliance on Christian festivities.[64] In an attempt to replace Christianity and suffuse the SS with a new doctrine, SS-men were able to choose special Lebenslauffeste, substituting common Christian ceremonies such as baptisms, weddings and burials. Since the ceremonies were held in small private circles, it is unknown how many SS-members opted for these kind of celebrations.[65]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideology_of_the_SS


The large Latin inscription on the façade reads: Clemens XII Pont Max Anno V Christo Salvatori In Hon SS Ioan Bapt et Evang. This abbreviated inscription translates as: "The Supreme Pontiff Clement XII, in the fifth year [of his Pontificate, dedicated this building] to Christ the Savior, in honor of Saints John the Baptist and [John] the Evangelist".[5] The inscription indicates, with its full title (see below), that the archbasilica was originally dedicated to Christ the Savior and, centuries later, rededicated in honor of Saint John the Baptist and Saint John the Evangelist. Christ the Savior remains its primary dedication, and its titular feast day is 6 August, the Transfiguration of Christ. As the cathedral of the pope as bishop of Rome, it ranks superior to all other churches of the Catholic Church, including Saint Peter's Basilica.


Name

The archbasilica's Latin name is Archibasilica Sanctissimi Salvatoris ac Sancti Ioannis Baptistae et Ioannis Evangelistae ad Lateranum,[6] which in English is the Archbasilica of the Most Holy Savior and Saints John the Baptist and John the Evangelist at the Lateran, and in Italian Arcibasilica [Papale] del Santissimo Salvatore e Santi Giovanni Battista ed Evangelista in Laterano.[4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archbasilica_of_Saint_John_Lateran#Lateran_Palace


From modest beginnings the SS (Schutzstaffel; Protection Squadrons), became a virtual state within a state in Nazi Germany, staffed by men who perceived themselves as the “racial elite” of Nazi future.


In the Nazi state, the SS assumed leading responsibility for security, identification of ethnicity, settlement and population policy, and intelligence collection and analysis. The SS controlled the German police forces and the concentration camp system. The SS conceived and implemented plans designed to restructure the ethnic composition of eastern Europe and the occupied Soviet Union.


From 1939, the SS assumed responsibility for “solving” the so-called Jewish Question; after 1941, its leadership planned, coordinated and directed the so-called Final Solution of the Jewish Question. This “solution” was the annihilation of the European Jews, which we now refer to as the Holocaust

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/ss


2 §1. The character and charism of the Society of Jesus arise from the Spiritual Exercises which our holy father Ignatius and his companions went through. Led by this experience, they formed an apostolic group rooted in charity, in which, after they had taken the vows of chastity and poverty and had been raised to the priesthood, they offered themselves as a HOLOCAUST to God,[2] so that serving as soldiers of God beneath the banner of the cross and serving the Lord alone and the Church his spouse under the Roman Pontiff, the vicar of Christ on earth,[3] they would be sent into the entire world[4] for the defense and propagation of the faith and for the progress of souls in Christian life and doctrine. [5]

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Hajj Amin al-Husayni meets Hitler

In this German propaganda newsreel, the former Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husayni, an Arab nationalist and prominent Muslim religious leader, meets Hitler for the first time. During the meeting, held in in the Reich chancellery, Hitler declined to grant al-Husayni’s request for a public statement—or a secret but formal treaty—in which Germany would: 1) pledge not to occupy Arab land, 2) recognize Arab striving for independence, and 3) support the “removal” of the proposed Jewish homeland in Palestine. The Führer confirmed that the “struggle against a Jewish homeland in Palestine” would be part of the struggle against the Jews. Hitler stated that: he would “continue the struggle until the complete destruction of Jewish-Communist European empire”; and when the German army was in proximity to the Arab world, Germany would issue “an assurance to the Arab world” that “the hour of liberation was at hand.” It would then be al-Husayni’s “responsibility to unleash the Arab action that he has secretly prepared.” The Führer stated that Germany would not intervene in internal Arab matters and that the only German “goal at that time would be the annihilation of Jewry living in Arab space under the protection of British power.”

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/film/hajj-amin-al-husayni-meets-hitler


The ratlines (German: Rattenlinien) were systems of escape routes for German Nazis and other fascists fleeing Europe from 1945 onwards in the aftermath of World War II. These escape routes mainly led toward havens in the Americas, particularly in Argentina, though also in Paraguay, Colombia,[1] Brazil, Uruguay, Mexico, Peru, Guatemala, Ecuador, and Bolivia, as well as the United States, Canada, Australia, Spain, and Switzerland.


There were two primary routes: the first went from Germany to Spain, then Argentina; the second from Germany to Rome, then Genoa, then South America. The two routes developed independently but eventually came together.[2] The ratlines were supported by rogue elements in the Vatican, particularly an Austrian bishop and four Croatian clergy of the Catholic Church who sympathized with the Ustaše.[3][4][5] Starting in 1947, U.S. Intelligence utilized existing ratlines to move certain Nazi strategists and scientists.[6]


While consensus among Western scholars is that Nazi leader Adolf Hitler died by suicide in 1945, in the late 1940s and 1950s the U.S. investigated claims that he survived and fled to South America..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratlines_(World_War_II)


20. It is better and safer to make alliance and amity with [Moslem] Turks, [Communist] Infidels, or [Talmudic and anti-Torah, Zionist] Jews, than with [Reformation Bible-believing] Heretic Protestants [and Baptists], because they may draw us into the errors of their novelties. {1}

Absolutist Papal Maxims of the Jesuits


AI Overview

Timothy McVeigh, the perpetrator of the Oklahoma City bombing, was raised in the Catholic faith and baptized in the Catholic Church. However, he stopped practicing later in life and described himself as agnostic. He was also quoted as saying his only religion was science.

Despite his later agnosticism, according to CNN and The Oklahoman, he did request and receive last rites from a priest before his execution. Father Ron Ashmore of St. Margaret Mary Church in Terre Haute stated that McVeigh knew the significance of the sacrament, interpreting it as an act of asking God's forgiveness. However, he remained publicly unrepentant at the time of his execution, choosing to issue a defiant statement rather than express remorse.

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Explore the SOSA Neighborhood in Oklahoma City

South of St Anthony, referred to as SOSA by those who live there, offers a modern take on neighborhoods in Oklahoma City.

Welcome to SOSA - South of St Anthony

South of St Anthony, referred to as SOSA by those who live there, offers a modern take on neighborhoods in Oklahoma City. With an urban and hip environment and many eclectic restaurants and shops to visit, this community is fun and inviting. There are many modern-style homes that have been built in recent years, increasing their size and bringing more members into the fold.

 

What to Love

Many new builds allowing for growth

An inviting and fun atmosphere

Many eclectic shops and eateries

Extremely close to the midtown area of Oklahoma City


Local Lifestyle

The nearby St. Anthony Hospital helped give this neighborhood its namesake. This inner-city community is home to many urban influencers, developers, and prominent architects, which is why you will find many interesting and creative modern architecture in the homes and buildings here. Make your way through the Cottage District and see the beauty that surrounds you.

 

Dining, Entertainment & Shopping

Many eclectic eateries fill the community, including places like McNellie's OKC. This Irish pub offers more than 350 beer choices and sometimes hosts tasting events.

 

Brown's Bakery nearby has a seating area so you can enjoy a donut, bread slice, cake, cookie, or another treat. Insomnia Cookies is known for its delightful desserts and is open late. Neighborhood JAM is a hip spot for breakfast and lunch.

 

Visit Elemental Coffee when you want a brew that's roasted in-house. Craft coffee, tea, and pastries fill the menu. The Collective Kitchens and Cocktails allows you to dine on a rooftop terrace. With a trendy food court and bar, you have an assortment of menu options.

 

Fassler Hall is a highly-rated German restaurant, while Barrios serves fine Mexican dishes. Many make their way to the Midtown Plaza Court for shopping. You get more options, however, if you make your North to Penn Square Mall past Uptown. Various department stores, service centers, and a food court make up the vicinity.

 

Things to Do

Red Andrews Park provides a place to play and relax for residents of the area. Provided benches give you a space to sit as you watch your kids enjoy their time on the play structure. The Johnie L. Williams Municipal Gymnasium is located here. It's a great spot for basketball. Many prefer to make their way Northeast of SOSA to Oklahoma City's Midtown Mutts Dog Park. The fenced-in area gives your pup a safe place to play. You get a great view of Midtown from here.

 

Right outside of SOSA, you'll find the Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum. This can't-miss locale features a memorial sculpture garden for the 1995 bombing that hit the Murrah Building. The outside space is complete with a scenic water backdrop. While the grounds are gorgeous to look at, the interior of the space offers various collections and archives, as well as video explanations to learn about what happened.

 

Schools

The Millwood School District operates in the area.


John W Rex Charter Elementary School, Pre-K-4th Grade

Oklahoma School of Science and Mathematics, Grades 11-12

https://westrealestatecompany.com/neighborhoods/sosa-south-of-st-anthony


Arturo Marcelino Sosa Abascal SJ (born 12 November 1948) is a Venezuelan Catholic priest who has served as the 31st superior general of the Society of Jesus since 2016. He was elected by the Society's 36th General Congregation to succeed Adolfo Nicolás. He is the first person born in Latin America to lead the Jesuits.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arturo_Sosa


AI Overview

As of September 2025, there has been no 37th General Congregation of the Society of Jesus. The most recent assembly was the 36th General Congregation (GC 36), which met in Rome in October 2016.

What is a General Congregation?

A General Congregation (GC) is the highest governing body of the Society of Jesus, a Catholic religious order. A GC can be called for two main reasons:

To elect a new Superior General: This happens when the previous Superior General resigns or dies. In 2016, GC 36 was called after Father Adolfo Nicolás announced his resignation.

To address important matters: A GC can be called by the Superior General to discuss and act on significant issues concerning the order, the Church, and the world.

Key outcomes of the 36th General Congregation (GC 36)

The last General Congregation made two major decisions for the Society of Jesus:

Election of a new Superior General: The delegates elected Father Arturo Sosa Abascal of Venezuela as the 31st Superior General.

Declaration on reconciliation and justice: The assembly released a decree titled "Companions in a Mission of Reconciliation and Justice," which recommitted the order to the service of faith and the promotion of justice, continuing a priority first established at the 32nd General Congregation.

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1987 Slammy Awards

The Slammy Awards returned a year later, now honoring the events and individuals involved within the professional wrestling aspect of the World Wrestling Federation. The second edition of the ceremony (referred to in commercials and on-air as the 37th annual Slammy Awards) took place on December 16, 1987, from Caesars Atlantic City in Atlantic City, New Jersey. It aired in syndication on December 19, 1987.[11][14][13] The ceremony was hosted by Jesse Ventura and Gene Okerlund.[15] Musical numbers were performed by Vince McMahon (singing the song "Stand Back")[16] and Jimmy Hart (singing "Girls in Cars"), with the entire WWF roster performing "If You Only Knew" as the show's closing number.[16][15]


Winners are listed first, highlighted in boldface.[11][14][13]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slammy_Award


Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, Named Next Provincial of the Jesuits of Canada

March 15, 2024 — The Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) announced the appointment of Fr. Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, as the next provincial of the Jesuits of Canada. This appointment is the culmination of a thoughtful, prayerful process of consultation and discernment, marking a significant milestone for the Canadian Province.


Fr. Jeffrey Burwell, SJ

Fr. Burwell will succeed Fr. Erik Oland, SJ, assuming his new responsibilities on July 31, 2024, with an inaugural Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Toronto. A special celebration will also take place at the Jesuit infirmary in Richelieu, Quebec, on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15, 2024.


Fr. Burwell, 48, is an educational specialist whose doctoral research took him to the Holy Land, where he focused on Catholic schools in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. A lecturer in Catholic studies, first St. Paul’s College at the University of Manitoba and now Campion College at the University of Regina, he balances university work with pastoral service as a chaplain to police (RCMP) and to prisoners. He dedicates his university holidays to ministering in the Dene and Cree Indigenous communities of Saskatchewan and Manitoba.


Holding positions as a local superior since 2017 and a province consultor since 2021, Fr. Burwell brings a profound understanding of the Jesuit mission and a significant appreciation for Canada and Haiti’s diverse cultures.


This leadership change comes at a time when the Society of Jesus seeks to deepen its engagement with contemporary challenges, oriented by their Universal Apostolic Preferences: showing the way to God through the Spiritual Exercises and discernment; walking with the excluded; journeying with youth; and caring for our common home.


A Jesuit provincial leads a specific geographic region. This role is deeply spiritual, with responsibilities that extend beyond administrative tasks to include guiding the province’s mission and providing spiritual and pastoral care for its members. Provincials generally serve a six-year term.


There are five provinces within the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States. The Canadian Province of the Society of Jesus encompasses a wide range of works, including colleges/universities, secondary and pre-secondary schools, parishes, retreat houses, formation in spirituality, Indigenous ministries, social justice center and ecological endeavors.


The Jesuits of Canada, together with their partners, look forward to supporting Fr. Burwell in his new role as they continue to serve the mission of the Church and society in Canada and beyond.

https://www.jesuits.org/stories/jeffrey-s-burwell-sj-named-next-provincial-of-the-jesuits-of-canada/


Templar Military Lodges

The Templars also stealthily entered America through military lodges. Of particular significance are those chartered by the Irish Grand Lodge, which offered the higher degrees of Jacobite Masonry. Later these lodges incorporated the French Templar Scottish Rite degrees, further dividing colonial America between two rival forms of Freemasonry. While British politics in the colonies was dominated by English Masons in the Northeast, her military was under the influence of French Templar Field Lodges throughout the colonies - not a stable union for governing "13" rebellious colonies.25


European Templars Settle America

Another identifying characteristic of the Beast's revived Roman empire, according to our analysis of Daniel 7:7-8 in chapter 26, is that it must be populated by immigrants from the territory governed by the old Roman empire. Of course colonial America was populated by peoples from a Europe shaped by ancient Rome and later by the Holy Roman Empire. Templar influence in America began after Prince Charles Edward, the Young Stuart Pretender, failed to regain his British throne. As you recall, in 1746 he was soundly defeated, forever dashing the hopes of Scottish Templars recapturing England. As a result, many Irish and Scottish Templar Jacobites who had fought with Charles Stuart fled to America. Those who returned to France with the Prince founded the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry. Between 1745 and 1753, the British and European Templar population in the New World had increased dramatically. In 1754 Benjamin Franklin attempted to relieve population pressure by proposing a plan for the union of all 13 colonies. The British government rejected Franklin's proposal, fearing a united America would be difficult to control. Subsequently, the exploding population was forced to move west into French territory, which precipitated the French and Indian War in America, a phase of the Seven Years War on the continent of Europe. During this war the French military brought to the New World the Templar Scottish Rite, first setting up base at Boston, then Charleston, S.C.26 Michael Baigent, in The Temple and The Lodge, explains: 565 Prior to the Seven Years War, most of the Freemasonry in North America was orthodox pro- Hanoverian, warranted by Grand Lodge [London]. During the Seven Years War, however, "higher degree" [Templar] Freemasonry, by means of regimental field lodges, was transplanted on a large scale to the American colonies and quickly took root. Boston - the soil from which the American Revolution was to spring - exemplifies the process of transplantation and the friction that sometimes arose from it.27

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://ia803001.us.archive.org/28/items/ScarletAndTheBeastJohnDaniel1995/Scarlet%20and%20the%20Beast,%20John%20Daniel%20(1995).pdf


At Survivor Series, Holly was a part of the Underdogs team along with Marty Jannetty, Hakushi, and Barry Horowitz. They were defeated by the Body Donnas team of Skip, Doctor of Desire Tom Prichard, Rad Radford, and the 1–2–3 Kid.[6]


Despite lasting nearly 40 minutes in the Royal Rumble, Holly made very few television appearances in the WWF throughout 1996 and 1997.[1] In 1997 he scored two victories over Owen Hart on May 19 episode of Raw by pinfall and Brian Pillman on August 4 episode of Raw by count-out. Afterwards, Holly was inactive during the rest of 1997 and temporarily went back to welding.


The Midnight Express (1998)

Main article: The Midnight Express

In February 1998, Holly returned after six month hiatus with a newly blonde hair and Bart Gunn joined forces with Jim Cornette as part of Jeff Jarrett's National Wrestling Alliance stable.[2] Holly, renamed "Bombastic Bob", and Gunn, renamed "Bodacious Bart" were known collectively as The Midnight Express.[1] The Midnight Express defeated The Headbangers for the NWA World Tag Team Championship on March 30, 1998[6] and held the titles until August 14 of that year, when they were defeated by The Border Patrol. They challenged the New Age Outlaws for the WWF Tag Team Championship at the King of the Ring pay-per-view, but were unsuccessful.[14]


In mid-1998, Holly competed in the WWF Brawl for All, a 16-man shootfighting tournament. He was eliminated in the first round by the eventual winner, Bart Gunn, who defeated him on points; Holly has the distinction of being the only one of Gunn's opponents he was unable to knock out.[3] They disbanded in July and Holly went on his own working in lower card matches on Shotgun Saturday Night.


J.O.B. Squad (1998–1999)

Main article: J.O.B. Squad

In November 1998, Al Snow, Holly, and Scorpio united and formed the J.O.B. Squad (later members of the stable also included Gillberg and The Blue Meanie). During that same month on an edition of Raw, they helped Mankind defeat Ken Shamrock and The Big Boss Man in a triple threat match, as Mankind (though not a member of the stable) became a close associate. At 1998's Survivor Series pay-per-view, Holly and Scorpio defeated The Legion of Doom (Animal and Droz) in a warmup match. Two months later at the Royal Rumble pay-per-view, Holly and Scorpio notably defeated Too Much in one of the warmup matches.


In February 1999, the members gradually drifted apart: Scorpio was released by the WWF, Gillberg was later phased out of storylines, and The Blue Meanie allied with Goldust; thus, after dwindling down to only two members, Snow wrestled against himself on an edition of Raw before Holly came down to the ring to prevent Snow from hurting himself. The two fought and it led to the formal breakup of the J.O.B. Squad. Later that month at St. Valentine's Day Massacre: In Your House, Holly defeated Snow for the WWF Hardcore Championship to permanently end the J.O.B. Squad.[15] A week later on Raw, for his title defense match against former partner Bart Gunn, Holly formally changed his name to Hardcore Holly.[7]


Hardcore Champion and the Holly Cousins (1999–2001)

Main article: Holly Cousins

Holly dropped the championship to Billy Gunn on the March 15, 1999 edition of Raw, but regained the title two weeks later at WrestleMania XV, in a triple threat hardcore match also involving Al Snow. He lost the title to Al Snow at Backlash, and soon began referring to himself as "The Big Shot", feuding with Big Show and Kane.[16] On the August 16, 1999 edition of Raw, Holly introduced his on-screen "cousin" Crash Holly.[17]


They unsuccessfully challenged for the WWF Tag Team Championship at SummerSlam. Although simultaneously arguing over who was the better Holly, they won the WWF Tag Team Championship on the October 18, 1999 edition of Raw,[18] by defeating the Rock 'n' Sock Connection, after Triple H interfered.[19][20] They lost the titles two weeks later to Mankind and Al Snow on the November 4 edition of SmackDown![21][22] The Holly Cousins and Too Cool defeated Edge, Christian and The Hardy Boyz in a traditional four-on-four elimination match at Survivor Series, where Holly was the lone survivor.[23]


On the November 18, 1999 edition of SmackDown!, Holly challenged The Big Show for the WWF Championship, but was defeated. In early 2000, Hardcore Holly pursued the Intercontinental Championship, losing a match against Chyna due to interference from Chris Jericho. He then lost a Triple Threat Match against Chyna and Jericho for the championship at the Royal Rumble, which was won by Jericho.[24] He lost two more subsequent matches to Jericho for the title, ending their feud.


After Crash Holly won the Hardcore Championship on the February 24, 2000 episode of SmackDown!, the cousins began feuding over the title. Holly won the Hardcore Championship in a "hardcore" 13-man battle royal at WrestleMania 2000. He lost the title back to Crash the following night on Raw. He then sporadically challenged for both the Intercontinental and Hardcore championships the following months. Holly then missed several months of ring time due to a legitimately broken arm, suffered in a match with Kurt Angle on the June 29, 2000 edition of SmackDown!.[1] After his return, later in 2000, another on-screen cousin, Molly Holly was introduced.[2][25] Holly returned on the November 13, 2000 edition of Raw, where Holly, Crash Holly and The Undertaker defeated Edge, Christian, and Kurt Angle in a six-man tag match. At Survivor Series, Holly faced William Regal for the WWF European Championship but lost by disqualification. Holly got a rematch at the title at Armageddon but was defeated by Regal. At the Royal Rumble, Holly competed in the 30-man Royal Rumble match but was eliminated by The Undertaker. In February, Holly won the Hardcore title three more times, but each time re-lost the title moments later under the "24/7 Hardcore rule". Holly competed in the King of the Ring tournament but lost to Kurt Angle in the first round. Then Holly continued teaming with Crash until December 2001.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardcore_Holly


Blondi (1941 – 29 April 1945)[a][2] was Adolf Hitler's German Shepherd, a gift as a puppy[3][4] from Martin Bormann in 1941. Hitler kept Blondi even after his move into the Führerbunker located underneath the garden of the Reich Chancellery on 16 January 1945.[5]


Hitler was very fond of Blondi, keeping her by his side and allowing her to sleep in his bed while in the bunker. According to Hitler's secretary Traudl Junge, this affection was not shared by Eva Braun, Hitler's companion, who preferred her two Scottish Terrier dogs named Negus and Stasi.


Blondi played a role in Nazi propaganda by portraying Hitler as an animal lover. Dogs like Blondi were coveted as "germanische Urhunde", being close to the wolf, and became very fashionable during the Nazi era.[6] On 29 April 1945, one day before his death, Hitler expressed doubts about the cyanide capsules he had received through Heinrich Himmler's SS. To verify the capsules' potency, Hitler ordered SS physician Werner Haase to test one on Blondi, who died as a result.[7]


Blondi's puppies

In March[8][9] or in early April[10][11] (likely 4 April)[12] 1945, she had a litter of five puppies with Gerdy Troost's German Shepherd, Harras. Adolf Hitler named one of the puppies "Wulf", his favorite nickname and the meaning of his own first name, Adolf ("noble wolf"),[13] and he began to train her.[14] One of Blondi's puppies was reserved for Eva Braun's sister Gretl. Eva sent Gretl a letter containing a photo of Blondi and three of her puppies, Gretl's being indicated with an arrow.[15]


Other dogs

During his military service in World War I, Hitler rescued a stray white Fox Terrier named Fuchsl. Hitler had great affection for the dog, and when he was not on duty at the front, he would spend much of his free time playing with the dog in the barracks and teaching it tricks. Hitler was profoundly distraught when his unit had to move and the dog was lost in August 1917.[16][17][18]


Hitler (the leftmost soldier) and Fuchsl (towards the right) in World War I

He had been given a German Shepherd before named "Prinz" in 1921, during his years of poverty, but he had been forced to lodge the dog elsewhere. However, the dog managed to escape and return to him. Hitler, who adored the loyalty and obedience of the dog, thereafter developed a great liking for the breed.[19]


He also owned a German Shepherd called "Muckl".[20] Before Blondi, Hitler had two German Shepherd dogs, a mother [born 1926] and daughter [born ca. 1930] – both named Blonda. In some photos taken during the 1930s the younger Blonda is incorrectly labeled as Blondi (in most cases photograph inscriptions were written later).[12]


In May 1942, Hitler bought another young German Shepherd "from a minor official in the post office in Ingolstadt" to keep Blondi company.[21] He called her Bella.[22] According to Traudl Junge, Eva Braun was very fond of her two Scottish Terrier dogs named Negus and Stasi. She usually kept them away from Blondi.[23]


Hitler was jealous about his dogs and got irritated when they showed affection to other people.[24][25] The physician Ferdinand Sauerbruch claimed that in 1942 Hitler threatened to kill the dog Blondi because Sauerbruch played with it.[26][27] Although in general he didn't like cats, Hitler developed a similar jealous attitude regarding a cat that strayed into his command post in Wolffschanze.[28]


Hitler was very strict with his dogs, and got very angry when they disobeyed him.[29] He often used to beat them on such occasions.[30] Maria Reiter, a girl Hitler had dated in the late 1920s, told of an occasion where their dogs got into a fight, and then "Hitler suddenly intervened, like a maniac he hit his dog with his riding whip [...] and shook him violently by the collar."[31][32] When she asked him how he could be so brutal to his dog he said "it was necessary".[32]


Death of Blondi and other dogs

During the course of 29 April 1945, Hitler learned of the death of his ally Benito Mussolini at the hands of Italian partisans on 28 April. This, along with the fact that the Soviet Red Army was closing in on his location, strengthened Hitler in his resolve not to allow himself or his wife to be captured. That afternoon, Hitler expressed doubts about the cyanide capsules he had received through Heinrich Himmler's SS. By this point, Hitler regarded Himmler as a traitor.[33] To verify the capsules' contents, Hitler had SS physician Werner Haase summoned to the Führerbunker that afternoon to test one on his dog Blondi. A cyanide capsule was crushed in the mouth of the dog, which died as a result.[7] Hitler was expressionless as he viewed the dog's corpse,[34] but he became completely inconsolable.[35]


According to a report commissioned by Joseph Stalin and based on eyewitness accounts, Hitler's dog-handler, Feldwebel Fritz Tornow, took Blondi's pups and shot them in the garden of the bunker complex on 30 April 1945, after Hitler and Eva Braun had committed suicide that same day. He also killed Eva Braun's two dogs, Gerda Christian's dogs, and his own dachshund. Tornow was later captured by the Allies.[36] Erna Flegel, who met Hitler and worked at the emergency casualty-station in the Reich Chancellery, stated in 2005 that Blondi's death had affected the people in the bunker more than Eva Braun's suicide.[37] After the battle in Berlin ended on 2 May 1945, the remains of Hitler, Braun, and two dogs (thought to be Blondi and her offspring Wulf) were discovered in a shell crater by a unit of SMERSH, the Soviet counter-intelligence agency.[38][39] The dog thought to be Blondi was exhumed and photographed by the Soviets.[40]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blondi


The ratlines (German: Rattenlinien) were systems of escape routes for German Nazis and other fascists fleeing Europe from 1945 onwards in the aftermath of World War II. These escape routes mainly led toward havens in the Americas, particularly in Argentina, though also in Paraguay, Colombia,[1] Brazil, Uruguay, Mexico, Peru, Guatemala, Ecuador, and Bolivia, as well as the United States, Canada, Australia, Spain, and Switzerland.


Two primary routes developed independently but their operators eventually collaborated.[2] The first went from Germany to Spain, then Argentina; the second led to Rome, then Genoa, and finally South America. The ratlines were supported by some clergy of the Catholic Church, such as Austrian bishop Alois Hudal and Croatian priest Krunoslav Draganović. Starting in 1947, U.S. Intelligence used existing ratlines to move certain Nazi strategists and scientists.[3]


While consensus among Western scholars is that Nazi leader Adolf Hitler died by suicide in 1945, in the late 1940s and 1950s the U.S. investigated claims that he survived and fled to South America.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratlines_(World_War_II)


"Rapture" is a song by American rock band Blondie from their fifth studio album Autoamerican (1980). Written by band members Debbie Harry and Chris Stein, and produced by Mike Chapman, the song was released as the second and final single from Autoamerican on January 12, 1981, by Chrysalis Records. Musically, "Rapture" is a combination of new wave, disco and hip hop with a rap section forming an extended coda.[7]


"Rapture" was another commercial success for the band, shipping one million copies in the United States, where it was certified Gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and spent two weeks at number one on the Billboard Hot 100, their fourth and last single to reach the top. It was the first number-one single in the United States to feature rap vocals. The single also peaked at number three in Canada, and number five in Australia and the United Kingdom.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapture_(Blondie_song)


The Operation Paperclip was a secret United States intelligence program in which more than 1,600 German scientists, engineers, and technicians were taken from former Nazi Germany to the US for government employment after the end of World War II in Europe, between 1945 and 1959; several were confirmed to be former members of the Nazi Party, including the SS or the SA.


The effort began in earnest in 1945, as the Allies advanced into Germany and discovered a wealth of scientific talent and advanced research that had contributed to Germany's wartime technological advancements. The US Joint Chiefs of Staff officially established Operation Overcast (operations "Overcast" and "Paperclip" were related, and the terms are often used interchangeably) on July 20, 1945, with the dual aims of leveraging German expertise for the ongoing war effort against Japan and to bolster US postwar military research. The operation, conducted by the Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency (JIOA), was largely actioned by special agents of the US Army's Counterintelligence Corps (CIC). Many selected scientists were involved in the Nazi rocket program, aviation, or chemical/biological warfare. The Soviet Union in the following year conducted a similar program, called Operation Osoaviakhim, that emphasized many of the same fields of research.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip


The discovery of nuclear fission by Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann in 1938, and its theoretical explanation by Lise Meitner and Otto Frisch, made an atomic bomb theoretically possible. There were fears that a German atomic bomb project would develop one first, especially among scientists who were refugees from Nazi Germany and other fascist countries.[2] In August 1939, Hungarian-born physicists Leo Szilard and Eugene Wigner drafted the Einstein–Szilard letter, which warned of the potential development of "extremely powerful bombs of a new type". It urged the United States to acquire stockpiles of uranium ore and accelerate the research of Enrico Fermi and others into nuclear chain reactions.[3] They had it signed by Albert Einstein and delivered to President Franklin D. Roosevelt.


Roosevelt called on Lyman Briggs of the National Bureau of Standards to head an Advisory Committee on Uranium; Briggs met with Szilard, Wigner and Edward Teller in October 1939.[3] The committee reported back to Roosevelt in November that uranium "would provide a possible source of bombs with a destructiveness vastly greater than anything now known."[4]


Enrico Fermi, John R. Dunning, and Dana P. Mitchell in front of the cyclotron in the basement of Pupin Hall at Columbia University, 1940

In February 1940, the U.S. Navy awarded Columbia University $6,000,[5] most of which Fermi and Szilard spent on graphite. A team of Columbia professors including Fermi, Szilard, Eugene T. Booth and John Dunning created the first nuclear fission reaction in the Americas, verifying the work of Hahn and Strassmann. The same team subsequently built a series of prototype nuclear reactors (or "piles" as Fermi called them) in Pupin Hall at Columbia but were not yet able to achieve a chain reaction.[6] The Advisory Committee on Uranium became the National Defense Research Committee (NDRC) on Uranium when that organization was formed on 27 June 1940.[7]


On 28 June 1941, Roosevelt signed Executive Order 8807, which created the Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD),[8] under director Vannevar Bush. The office was empowered to engage in research and large engineering projects.[9] The NDRC Committee on Uranium became the S-1 Section of the OSRD; the word "uranium" was dropped for security reasons.[10] In July 1941, Briggs proposed spending $167,000 on researching uranium, particularly the uranium-235 isotope, and plutonium,[9] which had been isolated for the first time at the University of California in February 1941.[11][a]


In Britain, Frisch and Rudolf Peierls at the University of Birmingham had made a breakthrough investigating the critical mass of uranium-235 in June 1939.[13] Their calculations indicated that it was within an order of magnitude of 10 kilograms (22 lb), small enough to be carried by contemporary bombers.[14] Their March 1940 Frisch–Peierls memorandum initiated the British atomic bomb project and its MAUD Committee,[15] which unanimously recommended pursuing the development of an atomic bomb.[14] In July 1940, Britain had offered to give the United States access to its research,[16] and the Tizard Mission's John Cockcroft briefed American scientists on British developments. He discovered that the American project was smaller than the British, and not as advanced.[17]


As part of the scientific exchange, the MAUD Committee's findings were conveyed to the United States. One of its members, the Australian physicist Mark Oliphant, flew to the US in late August 1941 and discovered that data provided by the MAUD Committee had not reached key American physicists. Oliphant set out to find out why the committee's findings were apparently being ignored. He met with the Uranium Committee and visited Berkeley, California, where he spoke persuasively to Ernest O. Lawrence. Lawrence was sufficiently impressed to commence his own research into uranium. He in turn spoke to James B. Conant, Arthur H. Compton and George B. Pegram. Oliphant's mission was therefore a success; key American physicists were now aware of the potential power of an atomic bomb.[18][19]


On 9 October 1941, President Roosevelt approved the atomic program after he convened a meeting with Vannevar Bush and Vice President Henry A. Wallace. He created a Top Policy Group consisting of himself—although he never attended a meeting—Wallace, Bush, Conant, Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson, and the Chief of Staff of the Army, General George C. Marshall. Roosevelt chose the Army to run the project rather than the Navy, because the Army had more experience with managing large-scale construction. He agreed to coordinate the effort with the British and on 11 October sent a message to Prime Minister Winston Churchill, suggesting that they correspond on atomic matters.[20]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project


Hulk Hogan performing the Atomic Leg Drop (running leg drop) on Mr. McMahon

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leg_drop


Hulk Hogan

@HulkHogan

Weighing in at 275 from Venice Beach,last time I weighed 275 I was in 9th grade,I don’t remember this big back then brother HollyWoodHH4Life

12:56 PM · Mar 8, 2020

https://x.com/HulkHogan/status/1236742614554214401


VENICE AND GENOA COMBINE

For Venice, so far so good: Florence, Naples, and Milan had been ruined. But ironically, the same dumb Valois and Hapsburg giants which had taken out three dangerous rivals were now to turn like Frankenstein’s monsters on the wily new Romans. Venetian manipulations were about to boomerang in the form of an alliance of all of Europe against Venice. This was the famous crisis of the War of the League of Cambrai, which was assembled in 1508-1509. The opposing coalition was made up of the pope (by then the Genoese Giuliano della Rovere, as Julius II), the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, France, Spain, Savoy, Mantua, and Ferrara. The announced purpose of this alliance was to expunge Venice from the face of the earth. It nearly worked. At Agnadello, near the Adda River, the Venetian mercenary army was crushed by an army composed predominantly of Frenchmen. The Venetians were driven all the way down the Po Valley to Padua, and they soon lost that as well. Machiavelli exulted that on the day of Agnadello, the Venetians lost everything that they had conquered in more than 800 years. Machiavelli was himself engaged in operations against Venice, bringing a grant of Florentine cash to the aid of the Franco- Imperial forces holding Verona. With nothing left but the lagoons, the Venetian position was desperate. The doge sent a message to the pope asking for mercy, and announcing that Venice would vacate territory taken in the past from the Papal States. Inside Venice, Agnadello brought on an orgy of hysterical self-flagellation among the terrified patricians. The banker Girolamo Priuli wrote in his diary that Agnadello had been a punishment for the sins of the Venetian nobility, among which he numbered arrogance, violation of promises, lechery in nunneries, sodomy, effeminate dress, and luxurious and lascivious entertainments. Antonio Contarini, newly appointed patriarch of Venice, gave a speech to the Senate in which he characterized the Serenissima as a thoroughly amoral city. The defeat was a punishment for the city’s sins, he said. Nunneries were catering to the sexual needs of the rich and powerful. Homosexuality was so widespread that female prostitutes had complained to him that they had earned so little during their youth that they had to keep working far into their old age. But more significantly, the shock of Agnadello set into motion a strategic review in the Venetian intelligence community which led to very far-reaching conclusions, some of which were not obvious before several decades had gone by. The first Venetian ploy was to attempt to dismember the Cambrai coalition. They started with Pope Julius II. This pontiff was, as already noted, Genoese. Genoa and Venice had engaged in a series of highly destructive wars up till about the end of the fourteenth century, but after that, Genoa gravitated toward the status of junior partner and close associate of the Venetians. The Venetians had bested the Genoese by virtue of superior connections in the East, but otherwise their was a broad area of agreement. The symbol of Genoa was St. George the dragon-slayer, in reality no saint at all but a thinly disguised version of Perseus saving Andromeda by slaying the sea monster, a legend that is centered on the coast of Lebanon. The “George” is said to come from the Gorgon Medusa, whose head Perseus was carrying. Perseus is in turn nothing but a westernized variant of Marduk, the Syrian Apollo, a deity associated with the most evil forces of ancient Assyria and Babylon. The Venetians had their own Marduk cult, although subordinated to St. Mark, on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore, home of a Dominican monastery and today of the Cini Foundation, one of the highest level think tanks in the world. The modern British preference of Gorgons is too well known to need comment. What probably accounted more directly for Julius II’s decision to reverse his alliances was a deal mediated with the Venetians by Agostino Chigi, the Siena Black Guelph banker from whose financial empire the infamous Siena Group of today derives. He proposed that the Venetians stop buying alum, needed in textile and glass manufacture, from the Turks, but contract for a large shipment at higher prices from the alum mines at Tolfa in the Papal States – mines for which he, Chigi, was acting as agent. To sweeten the pot, Chigi offered the Venetians tens of thousands of ducats in much-needed loans.


The Venetians, fearing a rapid French offensive, accepted. Their own state finances were in total shambles. Only the Chigi loan allowed them to hire enough Swiss mercenaries to hold out against the French and the Imperial Landsknechte. To provide a plausible cover for his move, Julius II suddenly discovered that the real issue was not Venice after all, but the need to expel the barbarians (primarily the French) from Italy. Julius stipulated an alliance with Venice. He then set up the slogan of Fuori Barbari! (Kick the Barbarians out!) which is still recorded by credulous writers of Italian school books as the beginning of the struggle to unify Italy. Even the Venetian mercenaries, mostly Swiss, began using the battle cry of “Italy and Freedom!” Thus the post-Agnadello crisis was overcome. Some years later the Venetians tried the same tactic in reverse, this time with more lasting success. By 1525 the prevalent barbarians in Italy were the forces of Emperor Charles V, who had defeated the French at Pavia, capturing King Francis I. The French lost their hold on Naples and Milan. At this point Doge Andrea Gritti, whose portrait by Tiziano speaks volumes about his personality, decided to agitate once again the banner of Italian freedom. This took the form of the Holy League of Cognac “for the restoration of Italian liberty,” uniting France, Venice, Milan, Florence, and the Papal States under Pope Clement VIII Medici. After having set up this alliance, designed to play the French against Charles V once again to destroy Medici-controlled Rome, the last intact Renaissance center, the Venetians retired into defensive positions to await the outcome. Venetian capacities to manipulate Charles V were formidable indeed. The emperor’s bankers and intelligencers were the Fuggers of Augsburg, a banking house and a city that must be regarded as Venetian satellites, within a context of very heavy Venetian control of the cities of the Danube valley. Virtually every young male member of the Fugger family, and of their colleagues the Welsers as well, was sent to Venice for a period of apprenticeship at the Fondaco dei Tedeschi. This was the case with Jacob Fugger the Rich. Venice was the pivot for Fugger metals trading, especially toward the East. Thus, the Venetians stayed in their phony war posture against Charles V, while the imperial army of Lutheran Lanzi under Georg Frundsberg devastated Italy. The sack of Rome in 1527 was the direct outcome of this combined Venetian diplomacy and manipulation. To make Charles V’s triumph complete, the Genoese Admiral Andrea Doria, commanding the French fleet, defected to the imperial side. A Doria coup in Genoa then established a permanent de facto alliance with Venice. In 1530, Charles V was crowned as Holy Roman Emperor and King of Italy in a ceremony at Bologna. Garrisons of imperial troops were shortly stationed in every major city. Thanks to the tenacious policy of the Venetians, the main centers of the Renaissance had been subverted or destroyed. Venice was the only major Italian state which had retained real sovereignty. With the end of the Renaissance, Venice could feel free to start a delphic Renaissance among the throngs of intellectuals seeking asylum in the lagoons.


THE CREATION OF THE JESUITS

The “long autumn of the Italian Renaissance in Venice” during the rest of the sixteenth century was only one deployment among several. Another was the promotion of the Protestant Reformation. The more immediate controllers of Martin Luther have yet to be identified, but this is something of a secondary matter. Luther’s agitation in Wittenberg was merely one more example of protests against the papacy and the Curia that had been chronic and endemic for decades. What gave Luther and the rest of the Protestant reformers real clout was a publicity and diffusion of their ideas that owed much to the Venetian publishing establishment. The Venetian presses quickly turned out 40,000 copies of the writings of Luther, Calvin, Melancthon, and the heresiarch Juan Valdes, especially popular in Italy. Pope Leo X publicly denounced the University of Padua as the hotbed of inspiration of the German disease of Lutheranism. Clearly, Venetian interest was well-served by a schismatic movement that would embroil Germany, France, and the rest of Europe in a series of easily profiled conflicts. In addition, a conflict between reformers and counter- reformers, all owing allegiance to Aristotle, would severely undercut the influence of Erasmus and others like him. Venetian influence on both Reformation and Counter- Reformation can be seen most clearly in the remarkable career of Gasparo Contarini, who did not let the fact that he was a Protestant in theology, well before Luther, prevent him from founding the Society of Jesus. Contarini was the scion of one of Venice’s most prestigious LONGHI families. The Contarinis had produced seven doges, and Gasparo had his sights set on being the eighth, before he was tapped to serve Venice as a member of the College of Cardinals. He served the Serene Republic as ambassador to the court of Charles V, and as ambassador to the Vatican, where he took a role in setting up the Medici Pope Clement VII for the 1527 sack of Rome. Toward the end of his life, Contarini was sent as papal legate to the Imperial Diet at Regenburg, where he represented the Roman point of view in debates with schismatics like Melancthon. There, he had a hand in destroying any compromise between the Lutherans and the Emperor Charles, which would have helped to end the bloodshed and dissension of the Reformation years. What does this sublime Venetian patrician have to do with the founding of the Jesuit order by that itinerant and deranged mystic, Ignatius of Loyola? Ignatius was the creature of Venice, and of Contarini in particular. In 1521, Ignatius was wounded while fighting the French in one of the wars of Charles V. During his convalescence, he underwent his much-touted mystical crisis, after which he took up the life of a hobo. Making his way around Europe seeking funding for a pilgrimage to the holy land, Ignatius found his way to Venice, where he camped out in St. Mark’s Square and lived by begging. One evening the Venetian oligarch Marcantonio Trevisan was sleeping in his golden palace, and had a vision. An angel came to him asking, “Why are you sleeping so soundly in your warm bed, while in the square there is a holy man, a poor pilgrim who needs your help?” Trevisan rushed downstairs to find Ignatius, who became his house guest, fleas and all. After that, Ignatius was given an audience with the doge, Andrea Gritti, who offered him passage to Cyprus on a Venetian warship as first leg of his pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Ignatius continued his travels, but soon returned to Venice to develop relationships with other members of the oligarchy. These included Gasparo Contarini’s nephew Pietro, who became a recipient of Ignatius’ patented brainwashing treatment, the Exercitationes Spirituales. Then Ignatius made his way to Rome. Here he became the protégé of Gasparo Contarini, who had been appointed to the College of Cardinals by Pope Paul III Farnese. The cardinal took the Exercitationes Spirituales, and appointed Ignatius his personal confessor and spiritual advisor. By 1540, Contarini had personally interceded with the pope against Ignatius’ enemies within the church hierarchy to ensure the founding of the Society of Jesus as a new Church order. In June 1539, Contarini personally traveled to the pope’s summer residence at Tivoli, and prevailed on the pontiff to let him read aloud the statutes of the new order composed by Ignatius. The pope must have been favorably impressed by something. His approving comment Hic est digitus Dei, (”Here is the finger of God”), has become a feature of the turgid Jesuit homiletics.

The Venetian Conspiracy

« Against Oligarchy

Webster G. Tarpley

https://ia600902.us.archive.org/1/items/pdfy--vMPBwiHw_IDIeob/Against%20Oligarchy%20by%20Webster%20Griffin%20Tarpley.pdf


The Mega Powers was a tag team in the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) from 1987 to 1989, consisting of Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage, and managed by Savage's wife, Miss Elizabeth. Lust and jealousy surrounding her led to the team's demise and subsequent feud, culminating in a match at WrestleMania V. They briefly reformed in World Championship Wrestling (WCW) in 1994 as The Monster Maniacs before returning to their original name. They then interacted regularly thereafter as both teammates and rivals, particularly as members of the New World Order (nWo), until their departures from WCW in 2000.


Part of a series on

Professional wrestling


History

World Wrestling Federation (1987–1993)

Formation (1987)

Prior to the fall of 1987, Hogan and Savage were bitter enemies. In fact, from late 1985 through mid-summer 1987, the two often wrestled for the WWF World Heavyweight Championship. Hogan was able to defeat Savage on many of these occasions, although Savage gained some important countout and disqualification victories over Hogan as well. While Hogan was the most popular star in the WWF during most of this time, Savage—who was the WWF Intercontinental Heavyweight Champion for many of their matches in 1986 and early 1987—had gained a strong following even during his heel days, and by July 1987, was starting to get more cheers than boos. A slow face turn for Savage was beginning, and gained credibility when an angle was started involving The Honky Tonk Man (a heel who had since won the Intercontinental Championship) began making disparaging comments about Savage. To aid in Savage's face turn, the WWF began booking him against various heels, including King Kong Bundy and Killer Khan, with those matches taking place prior to his first match against Honky.


The Mega Powers officially formed their alliance, then, on the October 3, 1987 Saturday Night's Main Event XII (taped September 23, 1987), when Savage sought to win the Intercontinental Championship from Honky Tonk Man. When Savage hit his diving elbow drop finisher on Honky for the pin, The Hart Foundation came in and attacked Savage, getting Honky disqualified.[1]


When Honky shoved Miss Elizabeth to the mat, who was trying to stop them, she ran away to the backstage area; meanwhile, Honky completed his attempt to break his guitar over Savage's head. Shortly afterward, Miss Elizabeth returned with Savage's former rival Hulk Hogan, who came and saved Savage from the assault.[1] Afterwards, Savage extended his hand in friendship to Hogan, who accepted and the three paraded around the ring with their hands adjoined.[1] Their alliance solidified Savage's change into a fan favorite, which had been brewing for weeks as fan support grew for him. Later that night, during a backstage interview with Gene Okerlund, Savage and Hogan shook hands again and Savage referred to themselves for the first time as the Mega Powers. Hogan stated that "the combination of 'Hulkamania' and 'Macho Madness' may become the most powerful force in WWF history".


Over the next four months, Hogan and Savage would team up several times. The first being at a house show in Vancouver, BC, on November 10, 1987. It was a six-man tag team match with Hogan and Savage teaming with Jim Duggan to defeat the team of King Kong Bundy, Rick Rude and Harley Race. Their second tag team match was held in Huntsville, Alabama on January 5, 1988. It was a dark match at a television taping where Hogan and Savage defeated the team of Honky Tonk Man and the Hart Foundation in a handicap match. Another six-man tag team match was held in Montreal on February 8, 1988, with Hogan and Savage teaming up with Ricky Steamboat to defeat the Honky Tonk Man and the Hart Foundation.


On the March 12, 1988 episode of Saturday Night's Main Event XV, Savage wrestled Ted DiBiase in a singles match. DiBiase was accompanied by Virgil and André The Giant. Halfway through the match the referee ejected Virgil from ringside for outside interference. The match ended when Andre took advantage of the referee being incapacitated and rammed Savage into the ringpost. When the referee came to he counted Savage out of the ring. Following the match, Virgil returned to the ring and joined DiBiase and Andre in a 3-on-1 beating of Savage. Miss Elizabeth ran away from ringside and when she returned she was with Hulk Hogan, who ran into the ring carrying a steel chair. Hogan saved Savage from any further attacks by chasing the trio out of the ring. Afterwards, Hogan helped Savage back to his feet.


WrestleMania IV (1988)

Main article: WrestleMania IV

A tournament was made to decide a new WWF World Heavyweight Champion after Hogan "lost" the title to André the Giant at The Main Event I on February 5, 1988. André immediately surrendered the belt to Ted DiBiase. It was revealed that DiBiase had hired referee Dave Hebner's twin brother, Earl, to pretend to be Dave and give Hogan a bogus three count when Hulk's shoulder was clearly off the mat before the count of three. Between the referee cheating Hogan, André forfeiting the title and DiBiase's illegal attempt to buy the title, this caused WWF President Jack Tunney to declare the championship vacant.


Hogan and André were both given byes in the first round of the tournament, but fought to a double-disqualification in the quarterfinals. This had the side effect of giving Ted DiBiase a bye in the semifinals. Ultimately, Savage and DiBiase met in the final match of the tournament. DiBiase did all that he could to take out Savage (including the constant interference of André, who was acting as DiBiase's second for this match), but he couldn't keep him down. Savage eventually went to Miss Elizabeth, whispering something to her. She ran backstage, as the fans were trying to figure out what was going on.


A few minutes later, Miss Elizabeth re-emerged with Hogan. André and DiBiase seemed shocked by the turn of events. Hogan got revenge on DiBiase by hitting him in the back with a steel chair while André had distracted the referee by preventing Savage from getting to the ropes while locked in DiBiase's Million Dollar Dream.[1] Savage was able to hit his diving elbow drop finisher and got the three count. After the match, they celebrated as a group.


A few months later, with Hogan on leave of absence from the WWF and Savage feuding with DiBiase over the title, DiBiase and André attacked Savage during an interview segment prompting Savage to challenge the two to a tag team match against him and a partner of his choosing, which was accepted. Savage then revealed that his partner would be the returning Hogan and that they would meet André and DiBiase at SummerSlam.


SummerSlam (1988)

Main article: SummerSlam (1988)

Their official televised debut match as a tag team was at SummerSlam '88. They went against André the Giant and Ted DiBiase in a match billed as "The Mega Powers versus the Mega Bucks". Jesse Ventura, a longtime supporter of Savage's but a longtime adversary of Hogan's, served as referee for this match. The match didn't go as planned for the Mega Bucks. Miss Elizabeth exposed her assets in skimpy panties after stripping off her skirt to the heels, resulting in the Mega Powers coming back to win the match. Ventura counted but hesitated at two, so Savage forced the three-count.


Feud with The Twin Towers and split (1988–1989)

At the 1988 Survivor Series, Hogan and Savage captained a team that faced a five-member squad headed by Big Boss Man and Akeem (who by now were being billed as The Twin Towers). Hogan and Savage eventually won the match (last eliminating King Haku, Big Boss Man and Akeem had been counted out and disqualified, respectively); during the post-match posing, Hogan again began acting friendly toward Miss Elizabeth, visibly annoying Savage. In a post-match interview, pro-heel commentator Jesse Ventura interviewed Savage, playing up Savage's growing anger regarding Hogan's behavior toward Miss Elizabeth. However, Miss Elizabeth was not the only reason Hogan and Savage had issues with each other during their stint as a team.


The two had an uneasy relationship, particularly when it became obvious Hogan would act friendly and/or protective toward Miss Elizabeth. On Saturday Night's Main Event XVII and XX, Hogan was insistent on Miss Elizabeth appearing at ringside for his matches versus King Haku, Akeem, and Bad News Brown. In the latter instance, Miss Elizabeth's was endangered by Akeem and his allies, Slick and King Haku when Big Boss Man grabbed Miss Elizabeth and placed her in handcuffs; before Big Boss Man could use his nightstick to strike Miss Elizabeth, Savage ran out and made the save. While Savage showed concern for Miss Elizabeth, he disregarded Hogan, who was still reeling from being attacked by The Big Boss Man and Akeem.


At the 1989 Royal Rumble, Hogan accidentally eliminated Savage in the Royal Rumble match when he went to put out Bad News Brown (with whom Savage was having a concurrent feud). The two appeared to make amends at the behest of their manager, but Savage was clearly upset after the event (which was ultimately won by Big John Studd).


Things came to a full boil on February 3, 1989, on NBC's prime-time special, The Main Event II when the two wrestled The Twin Towers. During the match, Akeem threw Savage out of the ring. Savage was thrown onto Miss Elizabeth, knocking her unconscious. Hogan saw what happened and carried Miss Elizabeth from the ring to the medical area. When Miss Elizabeth was revived, she implored a distraught Hogan to return to the ring to help Savage, who had been left to fight the two gargantuans on his own for several minutes. Hogan eventually called for the tag, but Savage, who was furious with being abandoned during the match, slapped Hogan in the face. After some choice words to a confused Hogan, he took his world championship belt, and stormed back to the locker room. Hogan defeated The Twin Towers by himself. After the match, Hogan went to check on Miss Elizabeth. Savage was back there too, who was caught in mid-tirade yelling to Miss Elizabeth that as world champion he was tired of taking a backseat to both Hogan and Miss Elizabeth in the Mega Powers pecking order. Upon Hogan's arrival, Savage turned his frustration to him, accused Hogan of trying to steal Miss Elizabeth from him, and manipulate the belt away from him. Hogan implored Miss Elizabeth to try and talk some sense into him before Savage attacked him by hitting him in the face with the title belt, sealing the end to their partnership and beginning their feud.


WrestleMania V: The Mega Powers explode (1989)

Main article: WrestleMania V

Hogan's first response to Savage's actions was to challenge him at WrestleMania for the WWF World Heavyweight Championship, which Savage eventually accepted. Most of the leadup to the match involved two things: the first being Savage showing (heavily edited and out of context) footage to prove that Hogan "lusted after" Miss Elizabeth, after which Hogan would respond by showing the footage in its proper context and with explanation; and the question of whose corner would Miss Elizabeth be in. Miss Elizabeth ultimately announced she would be in a neutral corner.[1][3]


On April 2, 1989, Hogan and Savage decided to settle the score at WrestleMania V for the WWF World Heavyweight Championship. Although Miss Elizabeth was stationed in her "neutral corner" for the match, she was eventually ejected from ringside after too many complications were caused by her attempting to assist both men at different points in the match. After an even match between both, Hogan eventually prevailed after kicking out of a Savage's diving elbow drop before "hulking up" and executing the leg drop to become WWF World Heavyweight Champion for the second time.[1][3]


The two would continue their feud in the months following WrestleMania. Savage replaced Miss Elizabeth as his manager with Sensational Sherri after Wrestlemania V and aligned himself with Hogan's co-star from the movie No Holds Barred, Tiny Lister (who appeared in character as Zeus, his role in the film).[3] This extension of the angle would culminate at SummerSlam when Hogan and Brutus Beefcake (with a return appearance by Miss Elizabeth) would defeat Savage and Zeus in the main event, and a December 1989 cage match between the two teams during a pay-per-view event entitled No Holds Barred: The Match, The Movie.[3]


Savage and Hogan would meet one last time for a WrestleMania V rematch on the February 23, 1990 edition The Main Event III with Heavyweight Boxing Champion James "Buster" Douglas as the guest referee.[4] Hogan would come out victorious yet again with Savage knocked out by Douglas post-match.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mega_Powers


Trump, Vance meet with Pope Leo's Florida brother, 'a major MAGA fan', at White House

Kim Luciani

USA TODAY NETWORK - Florida

May 22, 2025, 12:58 p.m. ET

Key Points AI-assisted summary

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's brother, Louis Prevost, at the White House.

Trump publicly praised Prevost, a Florida resident, for being a "major MAGA fan."

Louis Prevost acknowledged his political views and stated his intention to "tone it down" to avoid causing issues for the pope.

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's Florida brother Louis Prevost at the White House on May 20, after praising Prevost to reporters at the Capitol earlier in the day, calling him a "major MAGA fan."

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


Monty KIP Sopp[1] (born November 1, 1963),[2] better known by his ring name Billy Gunn, is an American professional wrestler. He is signed to the WWE under a Legends contract and All Elite Wrestling (AEW), where he also performs under the ring name Daddy Ass and is the on-screen manager for Anthony Bowens. He was a member of The Acclaimed as a manager and the team's six-man tag team partner.


He was previously known for his tenures in World Wrestling Federation/Entertainment (WWF/E) from 1993 to 2004 and from 2012 to 2015, while also serving as a coach on WWE's Tough Enough and was a trainer in NXT. He also wrestled for Total Nonstop Action Wrestling from 2005 to 2009.


Primarily a tag team wrestler, Gunn is an overall 11-time tag team champion in WWE with three different partners (with Bart Gunn as The Smoking Gunns; with Road Dogg as The New Age Outlaws; and with Chuck Palumbo as Billy and Chuck). He is also a former one-time WWF Intercontinental Champion and a two-time WWF Hardcore Champion, giving him 14 total championships in WWE. He also won the 1999 King of the Ring tournament, and was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2019 as a member of D-Generation X. At AEW, Gunn is a former one-time and longest reigning AEW World Trios Champions with The Acclaimed (Max Caster and Anthony Bowens)


Professional wrestling career

Early career (1989–1993)

Gunn trained as a bull rider while attending Oviedo High School in Oviedo, Florida.[8] After a stint as a professional bull rider in Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association, Sopp left the profession in his early 20s in order to pursue a career as a professional wrestler.[1] Trained by Jerry Gray, Sopp wrestled on the independent circuit for eight years (including a brief stint as enhancement talent for World Championship Wrestling (WCW) before signing a contract with the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) in 1993.


World Wrestling Federation/Entertainment (1993–2004)

The Smoking Gunns (1993–1996)

Main article: Smoking Gunns


Gunn in 1996

After weeks of vignettes, Sopp, under the name Billy Gunn, made his WWF debut on the May 17, 1993, episode of Raw, teaming with his on-screen brother, Bart Gunn to defeat Tony Vadja and Glenn Ruth.[9] The duo, now known as The Smoking Gunns, made their pay-per-view debut at King of the Ring, teaming with The Steiner Brothers to defeat Money Inc. and The Headshrinkers in an eight-man tag team match.[10] At SummerSlam, the duo teamed with Tatanka to pick up a win against Bam Bam Bigelow and the Headshrinkers.[11] On January 22, 1994, Gunn entered his first Royal Rumble match at the namesake event, but was eliminated by Diesel.[12] In early 1995, the Gunns won their first Tag Team Championship by defeating the makeshift team of Bob Holly and 1-2-3 Kid.[13] They held the title until WrestleMania XI, where they were defeated by the team of Owen Hart and Yokozuna.[14] They won the titles again in September 1995.[15]


On February 15, 1996, the Gunns vacated the title because Billy was in need of neck surgery.[16] After Billy returned from hiatus, The Smoking Gunns won the Tag Team Title for the third time by defeating The Godwinns in May.[17] After the match, The Godwinns' manager Sunny turned on her team in favor of the Gunns.[17] On September 22 at In Your House: Mind Games, the Gunns lost the Tag Team Title to Owen Hart and The British Bulldog. After the match, Sunny abandoned The Gunns, saying that she would only manage title holders. Billy, frustrated with losing both the championship and Sunny, walked out on Bart, breaking up The Smoking Gunns. The two would feud in late 1996.


Rockabilly, The New Age Outlaws and D-Generation X (1997–1998)

Main articles: New Age Outlaws and D-Generation X

After The Smoking Gunns disbanded, Gunn took some time off to nurse an injury. At WrestleMania 13, he defeated Flash Funk[18] catching the attention of The Honky Tonk Man, who made Gunn his protégé.[19] During this time, he adopted a new gimmick, Rockabilly,[19] He would use this gimmick throughout much of 1997 and eventually had a short-lived feud with "The Real Double J" Jesse James. On the October 4, 1997, episode of Shotgun Saturday Night, James realized both of their careers were going nowhere and suggested that they become a tag team. Gunn agreed and smashed a guitar over the Honky Tonk Man's head to solidify their new alliance.


James and Rockabilly were quickly rebranded as "Road Dogg" Jesse James and "Badd Ass" Billy Gunn, respectively, and their tag team was dubbed the New Age Outlaws. They quickly rose to the top of the tag team ranks and won the Tag Team Championship from the Legion of Doom on November 24.[20] They also defeated the LOD in a rematch at In Your House: D-Generation X.[21]


"Road Dogg" Jesse James and "Badd Ass" Billy Gunn (right) in 1999

The Outlaws slowly began to align themselves with D-Generation X. At the Royal Rumble, the New Age Outlaws interfered in a casket match to help Shawn Michaels defeat The Undertaker. At No Way Out Of Texas, the Outlaws teamed up with Triple H and Savio Vega (who replaced the injured Shawn Michaels) to face Chainsaw Charlie, Cactus Jack, Owen Hart, and Steve Austin. They were, however, defeated.[21] On February 2, The Outlaws locked Cactus and Chainsaw in a dumpster and pushed it off the stage. This led to a dumpster match at WrestleMania XIV where Cactus and Chainsaw defeated the Outlaws for the Tag Titles.[21] The next night on Raw, the New Age Outlaws won the Tag Team Championship for a second time by defeating Chainsaw and Cactus in a steel cage match, but only after interference from Triple H, Chyna, and X-Pac.[22] After the match, the Outlaws officially became members of D-Generation X (DX).[23]


After joining DX, the Outlaws successfully defended their Tag Team Title against the Legion of Doom 2000 at Unforgiven.[21] DX began to feud with Owen Hart and his new stablemates, The Nation. At Over The Edge, the Outlaws and Triple H were defeated by Nation members Owen, Kama Mustafa, and D'Lo Brown in a Six Man Tag Match.[21]


During this time, the Outlaws began a feud with Kane and Mankind. At SummerSlam, Mankind faced the Outlaws in a Handicap match after Kane no-showed the title defense.[24] The Outlaws defeated Mankind to win the titles for the third time.[25] In December, the Outlaws lost the title to The Big Boss Man and Ken Shamrock from The Corporation.[15]


Mr. Ass and reformation of the Outlaws and DX (1999–2000)


Gunn posing in 1999

The Outlaws then began to focus more on singles competition. Road Dogg won the Hardcore Championship in December 1998,[26] and Gunn set his sights on the Intercontinental Championship. At the 1999 Royal Rumble, Gunn unsuccessfully challenged Ken Shamrock for the Intercontinental Title.[27] The next month at St. Valentine's Day Massacre, Gunn was the special guest referee for the Intercontinental Championship match between Val Venis and champion Ken Shamrock, where Gunn made a fast count and declared Venis the new champion before attacking both men.[27]


In March, Gunn won the Hardcore Championship from Hardcore Holly.[26] At WrestleMania XV, Gunn lost the title to Holly in a Triple Threat match which also included Al Snow.[28] The New Age Outlaws then reunited to defeat Jeff Jarrett and Owen Hart at Backlash.[28] After Backlash, Gunn left D-Generation X and aligned himself with Triple H and Chyna. Gunn defeated his former partner, Road Dogg, in a match at Over the Edge.[28] Gunn then won the King of the Ring tournament by defeating Ken Shamrock, Kane, and his former ally, X-Pac.[28] After King of the Ring, Gunn, Triple H, and Chyna went on to feud with X-Pac and Road Dogg over the rights to the D-Generation X name. This feud culminated at Fully Loaded when X-Pac and Road Dogg defeated Gunn and Chyna.[28]


Gunn then began a brief feud with The Rock. At SummerSlam, The Rock defeated Gunn in a Kiss My Ass Match.[29] Following this, Gunn then briefly feuded with Jeff Jarrett for the Intercontinental Title before reuniting with Road Dogg to reform The New Age Outlaws. The Outlaws won their fourth tag team championship by defeating The Rock 'n' Sock Connection in September 1999.[30] The Outlaws later reunited with X-Pac and Triple H to reform D-Generation X. During this time, The Outlaws won their fifth Tag Team Championship after defeating Mankind and Al Snow.[31] At the 2000 Royal Rumble, The New Age Outlaws retained their title against The Acolytes after interference from X-Pac.[32] The Outlaws then had a feud with The Dudley Boyz, who won the Tag Team Championship from The Outlaws at No Way Out.[32] After suffering a torn rotator cuff in the match with The Dudley Boyz, Gunn was kicked out of D-Generation X for "losing his cool" to explain his impending absence to recover from his injury.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Gunn


On May 21, 1998, 15-year-old freshman student KIPLAND Kinkel opened fire with a semi-automatic rifle in the cafeteria of Thurston High School in Springfield, Oregon, United States, killing 2 of his classmates and wounding 25 others.[1] He had killed his parents at the family home the previous day, following his suspension pending an expulsion hearing after he admitted to school officials that he was keeping a stolen handgun in his locker. Fellow students subdued him, leading to his arrest. He later characterized his actions as an attempt to get others to kill him, since he wanted to take his own life after killing his parents but could not bring himself to.[citation needed]


During the year before the shooting, Kinkel displayed increasingly aberrant behavior and a heightened fascination with weapons and death, leading his parents to take him to a psychologist, who diagnosed Kinkel with major depressive disorder. Kinkel's parents had not disclosed any histories of mental illness in their families, and Kinkel himself had not told anyone about having heard voices urging him to violence since he was 12, out of fear of being ostracized or institutionalized. After the shooting, Kinkel pled guilty to murder and attempted murder and was sentenced to 111 years in prison without the possibility of parole; a sentence upheld on appeal. He was additionally diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and began taking antipsychotic medication. He is currently incarcerated at Oregon State Correctional Institution in Salem.


The shooting made national news, as the latest in a series of school shootings over the previous year. Kinkel's was seen as more egregious than the earlier ones before since he had gone into a crowded internal space and indiscriminately opened fire with a semi-automatic rifle. President Bill Clinton spoke at the high school a month later about the issue. A memorial outside the school memorializes the two students killed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1998_Thurston_High_School_shooting 


The word asas in Arabic means "principle". The Asāsiyyūn (plural, from literary Arabic) were, as defined in Arabic, the principle people. The term "assassin" likely has roots in hashshāshīn ("hashish smokers or users"), a mispronunciation of the original Asāsiyyūn, but not a mispronunciation of Assasiyeen (pronounced "Asāsiyyeen", the plural of "Asasi"). Originally referring to the methods of political control exercised by the Assasiyuun, one can see how it became "assassin" in several languages to describe similar activities anywhere.


The Assassins were finally linked by the 19th-century orientalist Silvestre de Sacy to the Arabic word hashish using their variant names assassin and assissini in the 19th century. Citing the example of one of the first written applications of the Arabic term hashish to the Ismailis by 13th-century historian Abu Shama, de Sacy demonstrated its connection to the name given to the Ismailis throughout Western scholarship.[87] Following de Sacy's account, various popularizers of the "Hashishi myth" – including self-proclaimed Sufi scholar Idries Shah (who, in fact, never belonged to any Sufi tariqa nor even graduated from any university) – continue to pejoratively describe the Assassins (and, by extension, Ismailis in general) as 'druggers' who used hashish "in stupefying candidates for the ephemeral visit to paradise".[88] However, the first known usage of the term hashishi has been traced back to 1122 when the Fatimid caliph al-Amir bi-Ahkami'l-Lah, himself later assassinated, employed it in derogatory reference to the Syrian.[87] Used figuratively, the term hashishi connoted meanings such as outcasts or rabble.[87] Without actually accusing the group of using the hashish drug, the caliph used the term in a pejorative manner. This label was quickly adopted by anti-Isma'ili historians and applied to the Isma'ilis of Syria and Persia. The spread of the term was further facilitated through military encounters, whose chroniclers adopted the term and disseminated it across Europe. The Crusaders and other European travelers accepted and spread myths such as the 'paradise legend', the 'leap of faith' legend, and the 'hashish legend', sewn together in the writings of Marco Polo.[89]


During the medieval period, Western scholarship on the Isma'ilis contributed to the popular view of the community as a radical sect of assassins, believed to be trained for the precise murder of their adversaries. By the 14th century, European scholarship on the topic had not advanced much beyond the work and tales from the Crusaders.[87] The origins of the word forgotten, across Europe the term assassin had taken the meaning of "professional murderer".[87] In 1603, the first Western publication on the topic of the Assassins was authored by a court official for King Henry IV of France and was mainly based on the narratives of Marco Polo from his visits to the Near East. While he assembled the accounts of many Western travellers, the author failed to explain the etymology of the term Assassin.[90]


According to the Lebanese writer Amin Maalouf, based on texts from Alamut, Hassan-i Sabbah tended to call his disciples Asāsīyūn (أساسيون, meaning "people who are faithful to the foundation [of the faith]"), and derivation from the term hashish is a misunderstanding by foreign travelers.[91]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_Assassins


Pope Adrian IV (Latin: Adrianus IV; born Nicholas Breakspear (or Brekespear);[1] c. 1100[note 1] – 1 September 1159, also Hadrian IV)[3] was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 4 December 1154 to his death in 1159. He is the only Englishman to have been pope.


Adrian was born in Hertfordshire, England, but little is known of his early life. Although he does not appear to have received a great degree of schooling, while still a youth he travelled to the south of France where he was schooled in Arles, studying law. He then travelled to Avignon, where he joined the Abbey of Saint-Ruf. There he became a canon regular and was eventually appointed abbot. He travelled to Rome several times, where he appears to have caught the attention of Pope Eugene III, and was sent on a mission to Catalonia where the Reconquista was attempting to reclaim land from the Muslim Al-Andalus. Around this time his abbey complained to Eugene that Breakspear was too heavy a disciplinarian, and in order to make use of him as a papal legate as well as to pacify his monks, he was appointed Bishop of Albano some time around 1149.


As bishop, Breakspear was soon sent on another diplomatic mission, this time to Scandinavia. In the middle of a civil war, Breakspear reorganised the Church in Norway and then moved on to Sweden. Here, he was very much acclaimed by the people, and when he left, chroniclers called him a saint. Breakspear returned to Rome in 1154; Eugene's successor Pope Anastasius IV had died only a few weeks previously.


For reasons now unknown, but possibly at his predecessor's request, Breakspear was elected next pope by the cardinals. He was unable to complete his coronation service, however, because of the parlous state of politics in Rome, which at the time was a den of 'heresy' and republicanism. Adrian decisively restored the papal authority there, but his other major policy issue—relations with the newly crowned Holy Roman emperor, Frederick I—started off badly and got progressively worse. Each party, as a result of a particular aggravating incident, found something to condemn the other for. As a result, Adrian entered into an alliance with the Byzantine emperor, Manuel I Komnenos who was keen to re-assert his authority in the south of Italy, but was unable to do so due to the Norman kings' occupation of the region, now under William I of Sicily.


Adrian's alliance with the Byzantine emperor came to nothing, as William decisively defeated Manuel and forced Adrian to come to terms at the Treaty of Benevento. This alienated Emperor Frederick even more, as he saw it as a repudiation of their existing treaty. Relations soured further when Frederick laid claim to a large swathe of territory in northern Italy. Adrian's relations with his country of birth, however, seem to have remained generally good. Certainly, he showered St Albans Abbey with privileges, and he appears to have forwarded King Henry II's policies where he could. Most famously, in 1158 Adrian is supposed to have granted Henry the papal bull Laudabiliter, which is thought to have authorised Henry to invade Ireland. Henry did not do so, however, for another 14 years, and scholars are uncertain whether the bull ever existed.


Following Adrian's death at Anagni, there was uncertainty as to who to succeed him, with both pro- and anti-imperial cardinals voting for different candidates. Although Pope Alexander III officially took over, the subsequent election of an antipope led to a 22-year-long schism. Scholars have debated Adrian's pontificate widely. Much of a positive nature—his building programme and reorganisation of papal finances, for example—has been identified, particularly in the context of such a short reign. He was also up against powerful forces out of his control, which, while he never overcame them, he managed effectively.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Adrian_IV


AI Overview

The surname Breakspear comes from the Middle English words breken meaning "to break" and spere meaning "spear". It may have been used to describe someone who was successful in a battle or tournament.

Examples of the name in use:

Stephen Bruselaunce: In 1308 in Ramsey Abbey Court Rolls (Suffolk)

Martin Briselaunce: In 1312 in London Letter Books D

Richard Brekeswerd: In 1195 in Pipe Rolls (Lincs)

Similar surnames:

Creaser, Brashear, Greaser, Treaster, Reasner, Breaker, and Reaser.

Related information:

You can learn more about the Breakspear family history at Ancestry.com.

You can learn more about the Breakspear name meaning and family history at FamilySearch.

You can learn more about the Breakspear surname origin, meaning, and family tree at Findmypast.

Generative AI is experimental.


Domesday Book (/ˈduːmzdeɪ/ DOOMZ-day; the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book") is a manuscript record of the Great Survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 at the behest of King William the Conqueror.[1] The manuscript was originally known by the Latin name Liber de Wintonia, meaning "Book of Winchester", where it was originally kept in the royal treasury.[2] The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle states that in 1085 the king sent his agents to survey every shire in England, to list his holdings and dues owed to him.[3]


Written in Medieval Latin, it was highly abbreviated[a] and included some vernacular native terms without Latin equivalents. The survey's main purpose was to record the annual value of every piece of landed property to its lord, and the resources in land, labour force, and livestock from which the value derived.


The name "Domesday Book" came into use in the 12th century.[4] Richard FitzNeal wrote in the Dialogus de Scaccario (c. 1179) that the book was so called because its decisions were unalterable, like those of the Last Judgment, and its sentence could not be quashed.[5]


The manuscript is held at the National Archives at Kew, London. Domesday was first printed in full in 1783, and in 2011 the Open Domesday site made the manuscript available online.[6]


The book is an invaluable primary source for modern historians and historical economists. No survey approaching the scope and extent of Domesday Book was attempted again in Britain until the 1873 Return of Owners of Land (sometimes termed the "Modern Domesday")[7] which presented the first complete, post-Domesday picture of the distribution of landed property in the United Kingdom.[8]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domesday_Book


King Charles Honoured With a New Title and Special Chair in Vatican

The Royal Family Channel

Oct 24, 2025  #kingcharles #popeleoxiv #royalfamily

King Charles received a new title on Thursday as his historic visit to the Vatican continued. 


Earlier in the day, he joined Pope Leo XIV in prayer before travelling to the Pontifical Basilica of St Paul Outside the Walls, where he was formally honoured with the title of “Royal Confrater” which symbolises spiritual fellowship  In return, the King made Pope Leo the Papal Confrater of St George's Chapel in Windsor.


During the ceremony, Charles sat in a special chair adorned with his coat of arms and the Latin phrase “Ut Unum Sint” (“That they may be one”). 


The chair was presented to him and will remain in the basilica for future use by the King and his heirs, officials confirmed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lc-tMqLwsyc


Pope Leo XIV[a] (born Robert Francis Prevost,[b][c] September 14, 1955) is the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State. He is the first pope to have been born in the United States, the first from North America, the first to hold either U.S. or Peruvian citizenships (or both), the first born after World War II, the first from the Order of Saint Augustine, and the second (after his immediate predecessor Pope Francis) from the Americas.


Prevost was born in Chicago and raised in the nearby suburb of Dolton, Illinois. He became a friar in the Order of Saint Augustine in 1977 and was ordained as a priest in 1982. He earned a Doctor of Canon Law (JCD) degree in 1987 from the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas in Rome. His service includes extensive missionary work in Peru in the 1980s and 1990s—he worked there as a parish pastor, diocesan official, seminary teacher, and administrator. Elected prior general of the Order of Saint Augustine, he was based in Rome from 2001 to 2013, and traveled extensively as part of this work, including to the order's many provinces and missions around the world. He then returned to Peru as Bishop of Chiclayo from 2015 to 2023. In 2023, Pope Francis appointed him prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops in Rome, and president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America.


Upon his return to Rome in 2023, Prevost was made a cardinal by Pope Francis. As Cardinal Prevost, he emphasized synodality, missionary dialogue, and engagement with social and technological challenges. He has also addressed issues such as climate change, global migration, church governance, and human rights, and expressed alignment with the reforms of the Second Vatican Council and the direction set for the Church by Francis.


Prevost's election in the 2025 conclave was unexpected by observers; he was a dark horse candidate, with Vatican insiders believing the prospect of a pope from the United States to be unrealistic given its status as a superpower.[8][9] In honor of Pope Leo XIII, who developed modern Catholic social teaching amid the tumult of the Second Industrial Revolution, Prevost chose the papal name Leo XIV — both to echo Leo XIII's concern for workers and fairness, and as a response to the challenges of a new industrial revolution and artificial intelligence.[10]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Leo_XIV


Trump, Vance meet with Pope Leo's Florida brother, 'a major MAGA fan', at White House

Kim Luciani

USA TODAY NETWORK - Florida

May 22, 2025, 12:58 p.m. ET

Key Points AI-assisted summary

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's brother, Louis Prevost, at the White House.

Trump publicly praised Prevost, a Florida resident, for being a "major MAGA fan."

Louis Prevost acknowledged his political views and stated his intention to "tone it down" to avoid causing issues for the pope.

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's Florida brother Louis Prevost at the White House on May 20, after praising Prevost to reporters at the Capitol earlier in the day, calling him a "major MAGA fan."


Trump told reporters he likes the pope and both of his brothers, but spotlighted the eldest brother, Navy veteran and Port Charlotte resident Louis Prevost.

"I like the new pope and I like the pope's brother. You know, one of the pope's brothers – actually both of them – but one in particular is a major MAGA fan. Did you know that? He lives in Florida," Trump said.

"And I look forward to getting him to the White House. I want to shake his hand, I want to give him a big hug."

Later that day, the White House visit happened. Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah met with Trump and Vice President JD Vance in the Oval Office.

"Great meeting between President Trump, Vice President Vance, and @Pontifex’s brother, Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah," Special Assistant to the President and Communications Advisor Margo Martin posted on X, along with a photo of the meeting.


Louis Prevost excited and happy about brother Pope Leo XVI's papacy

The Prevost brothers — Louis, John and Robert (Pope Leo XIV) — grew up in Chicago in a traditional Catholic family.

Louis Prevost said his youngest brother Robert wanted to "play priest" when he was 6 and set his sights on the priesthood as a freshman in high school. Their parents, neighbors and even strangers told Robert, "You're going to be pope someday," he said.

Robert Prevost's election as Pope Leo XIV left Louis Prevost excited, happy, mind blown and a little worried about how the papacy would impact their relationship.

“I just freaked out and said ‘It’s Rob, OMG.’ I was up, dressed, out, just going nuts,” he told WBBH.

“We can only hope that we can maintain that closeness, and we don't do anything to embarrass him,” he said.

Louis Prevost attended Pope Leo's inaugural mass at the Vatican on May 18. The brothers shared a hug after the service.


Pope Leo's Florida brother Louis Prevost is a MAGA, Trump supporter

Trump told reporters Louis Prevost is a "major MAGA fan."


In an interview with Piers Morgan, Louis Prevost said, "I don’t want to create waves that don’t need to be there because I’m a MAGA type and I have my beliefs,” he said. “I don’t need to create heat for him. He’s going to have enough to handle as it is without the press going ‘the pope’s brother says this.’ He doesn’t need that.”


Asked about his reposts of controversial social media memes, including one calling Nancy Pelosi a drunk (expletive), and how they might affect the pope, Louis Prevost said he will "tone it down."


"He knows I am who I am," he said of the pope. "He's well aware of my position. He knows I'm probably not going to change and I don't think I will, other than to, just like you say, tone it down."

Contributing: Melissa Pérez-Carrillo, Herald-Tribune, Ashley Ferrer, USA TODAY Network-Florida

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/


The Robertians (sometimes called the Robertines in modern scholarship) are the proposed Frankish family which was ancestral to the Capetian dynasty, and thus to the royal families of France and of many other countries (currently Spain and Luxembourg). The Capetians appear first in the records as powerful nobles serving under the Carolingian dynasty of Charlemagne in West Francia, which later became France. As their power increased, they came into conflict with the older royal family and attained the crown several times before the eventual start of the continuous rule of the descendants of Hugh Capet (ruled 987–996).


Hugh's paternal ancestral family, the Robertians, appear in documents that trace the family back to his great-grandfather Robert the Strong (d. 866). His origins remain unclear, but medieval records hint at an origin in East Francia, in present-day Germany, an area then still also ruled by the Carolingians. In particular, Regino of Prüm (died 915) states that Robert the Strong's son Odo was said to be a relative (nepos) of a Count Meingaud, count of an area near Worms, who died in 892, and there are indications that Maingaud's family used the names Robert and Odo.


Modern proposals about their ancestry further back are based on the idea that there was one family which frequently named its sons Robert, including Robert III of Worms (800–834), Robert the Strong (d. 866), and Robert I of France (866–923). For example, one proposed ancestor is Robert of Hesbaye (c. 800), about whom there are almost no records.


The Robertian family figured prominently amongst the Carolingian nobility and married into this royal family. Eventually, the Robertians themselves produced Frankish kings such as the brothers Odo (reigned 888–898) and Robert I (r. 922–923), then Hugh Capet (r. 987–996), who ruled from his seat in Paris as the first Capetian king of France.


Although Philip II Augustus (r. 1180–1223) was officially the last monarch of France with the title "King of the Franks" (rex Francorum) and the first to style himself "King of France" (roi de France), in (systematic application of) historiography, Hugh Capet holds this distinction. He founded the Capetians, the royal dynasty that ruled France until the revolution of the Second French Republic in 1848—save during the interregnum of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars. Members of the family still reign in Europe today : both King Felipe VI of Spain and Grand Duke Henri of Luxembourg descend from this family through the Bourbon cadet branch of the dynasty.


Origin

The oldest known Robertians probably originated in the county of Hesbaye, around Tongeren in modern-day Belgium. The first certain ancestor is Robert the Strong count of Paris,[1] probably the son of Robert III of Worms, grandson of Robert of Hesbaye, and nephew of Ermengarde of Hesbaye, who was the daughter of Ingram, and wife of Louis the Pious. Other related family includes Cancor, founder of the Lorsch Abbey, his sister Landrada and her son Saint Chrodogang, archbishop of Metz.


History

Robert the Strong

The sons of Robert the Strong were Odo and Robert, who were both king of Western Francia and ruled during the Carolingian era. His daughter Richildis married a count of Troyes. The family became Counts of Paris under Odo and "Dukes of the Franks" under Robert, possessing large parts of the ancient Neustria. Although quarrels continued between Robert's son Hugh the Great and Louis IV of France, they were mended upon the ascension of Lothair I of France (954–986). Lothair greatly expanded the Robertian dominions when he granted Hugh Aquitaine as well as much of Burgundy,[2] both rich and influential territories, arguably two of the richest in France.


The Carolingian dynasty ceased to rule France upon the death of Louis V (d. 987). After the death of Louis, the son of Hugh the Great, Hugh Capet was chosen as king of the Franks, nominally the last ruler of West Francia. Given the resurgence of the Holy Roman Empire title and dignities in the West Francian kingdom, Europe was later believed to have entered a new age, so Hugh came to be known in historiography as the first king of France, as western civilization was perceived to have entered the High Middle Ages period. Hugh was crowned at Noyon on July 3, 987 with the full support of Holy Roman Emperor Otto III. With Hugh's coronation, a new era began for France, and his descendants came to be named, after him, the Capetians. They ruled France as the Capetians, Valois, and Bourbons until the French Revolution. They returned after 1815 and ruled until Louis Philippe was deposed in 1848.


However, they have continued to rule Spain, with two republican interruptions, through the Bourbon Dynasty right down to the current king Felipe VI.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robertians


When were the Jesuits restored?

August 7, 1814

Pressured by the royal courts of Portugal, France and Spain, Pope Clement XIV suppressed the Society, causing Jesuits throughout the world to renounce their vows and go into exile. Pope Pius VII, a Benedictine, restored the Society on August 7, 1814."

https://www.xavier.edu/jesuitresource/online-resources/video-resources/jesuit-values-videos/suppression-of-the-society-of-jesus


The Capetian dynasty (/kəˈpiːʃən/; French: Capétiens), also known as the House of France, is a dynasty of Frankish origin, and a branch of the Robertians. It is among the largest and oldest royal houses in Europe and the world, and consists of Hugh Capet, the founder of the dynasty, and his male-line descendants, who ruled in France without interruption from 987 to 1792, and again from 1814 to 1848. The senior line ruled in France as the House of Capet from the election of Hugh Capet in 987 until the death of Charles IV in 1328. That line was succeeded by cadet branches, the Houses of Valois and then Bourbon, which ruled without interruption until the French Revolution abolished the monarchy in 1792. The Bourbons were restored in 1814 in the aftermath of Napoleon's defeat, but had to vacate the throne again in 1830 in favor of the last Capetian monarch of France, Louis Philippe I, who belonged to the House of Orléans. Cadet branches of the Capetian House of Bourbon house are still ruling over Spain and Luxembourg."


Name origins and usage

The name of the dynasty derives from its founder, Hugh, who was known as "Hugh Capet".[4] The meaning of "Capet" (a nickname rather than a surname of the modern sort) is unknown. While folk etymology identifies it with "cape", other suggestions indicate it might be connected to the Latin word caput ("head"), and explain it as meaning "chief" or "head".[citation needed]


Historians in the 19th century (see House of France) came to apply the name "Capetian" to both the ruling house of France and to the wider-spread male-line descendants of Hugh Capet. It was not a contemporary practice. The name "Capet" has also been used as a surname for French royalty, particularly but not exclusively those of the House of Capet. One notable use was during the French Revolution, when the dethroned King Louis XVI (a member of the House of Bourbon and a direct male-line descendant of Hugh Capet) and Queen Marie Antoinette (a member of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine) were referred to as "Louis and Antoinette Capet" (the queen being addressed as "the Widow Capet" after the execution of her husband).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capetian_dynasty


St. John Lateran Basilica in Rome is considered the mother church of all the Catholic churches in the Western world; inscribed on the church facade for all to see are the Latin words “omnium urbis et orbis ecclesiarum mater et CAPUT,” meaning, “The mother and HEAD of all the churches of the city and of the world.”

https://www.simplycatholic.com/st-john-lateran-basilica/


Head:

1. See Illness, mental

2. The superior general, head of the Society [666]

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.


Biography

Early life

Sako was born in the city of Zakho, Iraq, on 4 July 1948.[2] He comes from an ethnic Assyrian family of the Chaldean Catholic Church that has roots in a religious community that has had a presence in the city of his birth since the 5th century AD.[3]


He completed his early studies in Mosul and then attended the Dominican-run Saint Jean’s Seminary there. He was ordained a priest on 1 June 1974 and filled his first pastoral assignment at the Cathedral of Mosul until 1979. He then earned a doctorate in Eastern patrology at the Pontifical Oriental Institute. When denied a license to teach because he was only qualified for religious instruction, he earned a second doctorate in history from the Sorbonne in Paris.[4] With this he secured his teaching license and was able to provide religious instruction. From 1997 to 2002 he was rector of the Patriarchal Seminary in Baghdad. He then returned to Mosul and guided the parish of Perpetual Help for a year.[5][6]


Sako speaks Neo-Aramaic, German, French, English, Italian, Kurdish and Arabic.[2]


Archeparch

A synod of the bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church meeting in Baghdad elected Sako Archeparch of Kirkuk on 24 October 2002. Pope John Paul II gave his assent on 27 September 2003.[7] He received his episcopal consecration on 14 November 2003 from his predecessor in Kirkuk, André Sana.[8]


In August 2009, and at the beginning of Ramadan, Sako organized an appeal for national peace, reconciliation and end to violence on the part of more than fifty religious leaders in Kirkuk. He called it "a gesture of closeness to our Muslim brothers. We are all brothers, sons of the same God we must respect and cooperate for the good of the people and our country." The participants included representatives of Ali Sistani and Muqtada al Sadr.[9]


Patriarch

The Synod of Bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church, convoked in Rome on 28 January 2013, elected Sako to succeed Emmanuel III Delly as Patriarch of Babylon. He chose Louis Raphael I as his regnal name. Pope Benedict XVI gave his assent to the election on 1 February[2] and granted him ecclesiastica communio (ecclesiastical communion) as required by the canon law for Eastern-rite Catholic churches in recognition of their unity with the wider Catholic church.[10]


That same year, Iraq's President Jalal Talabani issued a decree recognizing Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Church.[11]


In July 2014 Sako led a wave of condemnation for the Sunni Islamists who demanded Christians either convert, submit to their radical rule and pay a religious levy or face death by the sword.[12] In September 2014 Sako said “The U.S. is indirectly responsible for what is going on in Iraq as it said it would ensure democracy and the well-being of the people, but 10 years have passed and on the contrary we have gone backward." He was responding to a question following remarks attributed to him in the local daily Ad-Diyar in which he accused the U.S. of supporting ISIS. Sako had also criticized Muslim countries for lack of support: "Our Muslim neighbours did not help us." He urged Muslim preachers to issue a religious ruling against the killing of all innocent people and said that "Issuing a fatwa preventing Muslims from killing fellow Muslims is not enough."[13]


In 2014, Sako ordered ten priests who had fled Iraq to return there by 22 October; he suspended them when they failed to comply. The priests, all living in the United States, some for as long as twenty years, appealed to Pope Francis for relief from the order.[14] In January 2015, Pope Francis granted them permission to remain in the United States.[15] Sako later renewed his order despite the pope's decision.[16]


In 2015, Sako proposed a "merger" or reunion of his own Chaldean Catholic Church with the Ancient Church of the East and the Assyrian Church of the East to create one united "Church of the East" with a single patriarch in union with the pope. His proposal would have required both his own resignation and that of Mar Addai II, followed by a joint synod of the bishops of all three churches to elect a new patriarch for the reunited Church of the East. (The patriarchate of the Assyrian Church of the East was vacant at the time, following the death of Mar Dinkha IV.)[17] He wrote that "Unity does not mean uniformity, nor the melting of our own church identity into one style, but it maintains unity in diversity and we remain one apostolic universal church, the Oriental Church, that maintains its independence of administration, laws and liturgies, traditions and support."[18] The Assyrian Church of the East respectfully declined this proposal citing "ecclesiological divergences still remaining" and proceeded with its election of a new patriarch.[19]


On 14 November 2015, the Synod of Bishops announced that Pope Francis had named Sako as one of his three appointments to that body's council.[20]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, Named Next Provincial of the Jesuits of Canada

March 15, 2024 — The Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) announced the appointment of Fr. Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, as the next provincial of the Jesuits of Canada. This appointment is the culmination of a thoughtful, prayerful process of consultation and discernment, marking a significant milestone for the Canadian Province.


Fr. Jeffrey Burwell, SJ

Fr. Burwell will succeed Fr. Erik Oland, SJ, assuming his new responsibilities on July 31, 2024, with an inaugural Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Toronto. A special celebration will also take place at the Jesuit infirmary in Richelieu, Quebec, on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15, 2024.


Fr. Burwell, 48, is an educational specialist whose doctoral research took him to the Holy Land, where he focused on Catholic schools in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. A lecturer in Catholic studies, first St. Paul’s College at the University of Manitoba and now Campion College at the University of Regina, he balances university work with pastoral service as a chaplain to police (RCMP) and to prisoners. He dedicates his university holidays to ministering in the Dene and Cree Indigenous communities of Saskatchewan and Manitoba.


Holding positions as a local superior since 2017 and a province consultor since 2021, Fr. Burwell brings a profound understanding of the Jesuit mission and a significant appreciation for Canada and Haiti’s diverse cultures.


This leadership change comes at a time when the Society of Jesus seeks to deepen its engagement with contemporary challenges, oriented by their Universal Apostolic Preferences: showing the way to God through the Spiritual Exercises and discernment; walking with the excluded; journeying with youth; and caring for our common home.


A Jesuit provincial leads a specific geographic region. This role is deeply spiritual, with responsibilities that extend beyond administrative tasks to include guiding the province’s mission and providing spiritual and pastoral care for its members. Provincials generally serve a six-year term.


There are five provinces within the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States. The Canadian Province of the Society of Jesus encompasses a wide range of works, including colleges/universities, secondary and pre-secondary schools, parishes, retreat houses, formation in spirituality, Indigenous ministries, social justice center and ecological endeavors.


The Jesuits of Canada, together with their partners, look forward to supporting Fr. Burwell in his new role as they continue to serve the mission of the Church and society in Canada and beyond.

https://www.jesuits.org/stories/jeffrey-s-burwell-sj-named-next-provincial-of-the-jesuits-of-canada/


After his initiation, which is said to have been conducted personally by Pike, his attitude and activities suddenly changed. While he outwardly remained anti-clerical and anti-Vatican, he no longer advocated the violent overthrow of the Vatican by force. Pike did with Lemmi what Karl Rothschild had had to do little more than a decade earlier with other Satanists when they stirred up so much anti-Vatican hatred that the governments of France and Italy were on the verge of destroying it. Karl Rothschild, an initiate of the Full Secret, stepped in to act as “Peacemaker” between the Vatican and her enemies. History relates how his intervention ‘saved’ the Vatican and made Karl Rothschild the ‘friend’ and ‘trusted adviser’ of the Pope. He reorganized the affairs of the Treasury and State Departments. But history has proved that Karl Rothschild was no true friend of the Vatican. Two World Wars, instigated by his family of moneylenders, and their international affiliates who direct the W.R.M.., have seen Christians of all denominations divided into opposing camps, been made to fight and kill each other off by the tens of millions. This has been done to bring Pike’s plan for the final social cataclysm nearer to fruition. Communism grew stronger as Christianity was weakened, until today, as Pike’s plan required, Communism has darkened the entire earth. While it would be inaccurate to deny that there have been ‘bad’ Popes, as there have been ‘bad’ Kings, it is only proper to point out that the ‘bad’ Popes and Kings were no worse than some of the other leaders of Christianity, when they became presidents of republics. Luciferianism demands that ALL temporal and spiritual authority be destroyed because of their alleged badness. Because the struggle in which we are involved, is against the spiritual forces of darkness, it stands to reason that there must be good and bad people in all walks of life; in all levels of government and in all religions. It is typical of all who serve the Devil’s cause that they always use destructive criticism aimed at those in authority, to undermine the confidence and loyalty of the individual in the remaining governmental and religious institutions. This policy helps those who direct the W.R.M. to at first weaken, and then destroy ALL remaining governments and religions. Let us never forget that there is nothing wrong with Christianity. Many things done in the name of Christianity were done by men who, knowingly or unknowingly, furthered the secret plans of the Luciferian conspiracy. What we need to do is clean upon and strengthen Christianity as God would wish. The above remarks are published to explain how it is that Satanists have always attacked the Popes and the Vatican, and advocated their destruction, while the High Priests of the Luciferian Creed have, to-date, always stepped in and prevented their doing so. The intervention of those who control the Synagogue of Satan AT THE TOP was not out of love or respect for the Pope of the Vatican. They intervened because, being initiated into the FULL SECRET, they knew that when their conspiracy reaches its final stage; after all temporal powers have been reduced in strength until they no longer remain World Powers; when a tired and weary people have been reduced to such a physical and mental condition that they became convinced that ONLY a One World Government can put an end to revolutions and wars, and give them peace, they must use the clash between Communism and Christianity to destroy ALL remaining religious institutions also. Gen. Albert Pike revealed how this was to be done in the letter he wrote Mazzini August 15,1871. That part which deals with this particular phase of the conspiracy reads as follows, “We shall unleash the Nihilists and Atheists, and we shall provoke a formidable social cataclysm which in all its horror will show clearly to the nations (people of different nationalities), the effects of absolute atheism, origin of savagery and of the most bloody turmoil. Then everywhere, the citizens obliged to defend themselves against the world minority or revolutionaries, will exterminate those destroyers of civilization, and the multitude, disillusioned with Christianity, whose deistic spirits will be from that moment without compass (direction), anxious for an ideal, but without knowing where to render its adoration, will receive the TRUE LIGHT, through the universal manifestation of the pure doctrine of Lucifer, brought finally out in the public view, a manifestation which will result from the general reactionary movement which will follow the destruction of Christianity and Atheism, both conquered and exterminated at the same time.” We ask the reader to study every word of this diabolically inspired document. According to Pike’s military blueprint, drawn up between 1859 and 1871, three global wars and three major revolutions were to place the High Priests of the Luciferian Creed in position to usurp world powers. Two World Wars have been fought according to schedule. The Russian and Chinese revolutions have achieved success. Communism has been built up in strength and Christendom weakened. World War Three is now in the making. If it is allowed to break out, all remaining nations will be further weakened, and Islam and political Zionism will be destroyed as world powers. The reader must not forget that the Arab world is made up of millions of people, many of whom are Christians; many are of the Jewish faith; many are Mohammedans, but all subscribe to belief in the same God Christians worship as the Creator of the Universe. The Koran of the Mohammedan faith is practically identical with the Bible, excepting only that the Mohammedan religion, while accepting Jesus Christ as the GREATEST of God’s prophets before Mohammed, does not permit its members to believe in the Divinity of Christ. The point we wish to make is this: Those who direct the Luciferian conspiracy AT THE TOP realize only too well that before they can provoke the final social cataclysm, they must first of all bring about the destruction of Islam as a world power, because if Islam were not destroyed, it would undoubtedly line up with Christianity in the event of an all out war with Communism. If that were allowed to happen, the balance of power would be held by Christianity, allied to Mohammedanism, and it would be very unlikely that both sides would conquer and exterminate each other. It is of the greatest of importance that these facts, which explain the political intrigue and chicanery now going on in the near, middle, and far East, be brought to the attention ofALL political and religious leaders so they may take action to prevent the last phases of the Luciferian conspiracy from being put into effect, and bring to fruition the prediction made in Chapter 20 of Revelations, i.e., that Satan shall be bound for a thousand years. The events of the past half century would indicate that we are rapidly approaching that period of the world’s history when, if it were not for the intervention of God, “No flesh would survive” (Matt. 24:22, Mark 13: 20). It is important that the general public know the diabolical fate being prepared for the whole of the human race. I cannot agree with some of the clergy of several denominations, with whom I have discussed this matter at considerable length, who say, “It is better that the public be left in ignorance of their pending fate. To tell them the truth will only alarm them and cause them to panic.” Even some Bishops, who are supposed to be the shepherds of their flocks, hold such views. This is beyond my comprehension. They are like physicians who advocate drugging a person they suppose to be dying at the first indication of pain. If the general public is told the whole TRUTH, knowledge of the TRUTH will certainly make the vast majority of people busy themselves about saving their immortal souls. Knowledge of the TRUTH regarding the diabolically inspired conspiracy will wake them up; it will put an end to lethargy and indifference. As Christ told us the TRUTH will set us free (spiritually) from the bonds with which we are being ever tighter bound, by the spiritual forces of darkness every day. What does it matter if Devil’s incarnate kill our bodies provided we prevent them deceiving us into losing our immortal souls? (Matt. 10:28; Luke 12:4). The TRUTH is that if World War Three is fought, the United States will be the only remaining world power after it is ended. Either ALL people will have to acknowledge that power, or they will clamour for, and demand a world government. And they will get it if the Luciferian conspiracy is allowed to be developed to its intended conclusion. Then, through the auspices of the United Nations, or some similar organization, a puppet King will be made World Sovereign, and he will secretly be under the influence and direction of the agentur of the Synagogue of Satan, who will have been appointed, not elected, to be his “Specialists,” “Experts,” and “Advisors.” The High Priests of the Luciferian Creed know they cannot usurp world power before the United States is ruined as the last remaining world power, so those who direct the W.R.M. ATTHE VERYTOP are arranging matters so the United States will, as Lenin stated, “Fall into our hands like an overripe fruit.” This is how events taking place today indicate the subjugation of the U.S.A. is planned. Pike’s plan requires that the final social cataclysm between the masses controlled by atheistic-communism and those who profess Christianity, be fought on a national as well as an international scale. That is the reason, and the only reason, that Communism is being tolerated, while being kept under restraint, in the remaining socalled Free Nations of the World. I have served in the higher levels of government, and in the naval forces, in positions that enabled me to realize that Communism in Canada and in the United States is tolerated, and is being controlled and contained, so its evil destructive force can be used on the national level, as well as the international level, when the final social cataclysm is provoked by those who direct the W RM. AT THE TOP I have tried to bring this great TRUTH to the attention of cabinet ministers since 1944, when I served on the staff of Naval Headquarters in Ottawa. The late Right Hon. Angus McDonald was then Naval Secretary. Admiral J.C. Jones was Chief-of-Naval Staff. I convinced both these chief executives regarding the TRUTH of what was going on BEHIND THE SCENES of government in Canada and the United States. I was ordered to submit these facts in the form of briefs, so they could be presented to the Canadian cabinet. I know these matters were presented to said cabinet, but Mackenzie King brushed them aside. Col. Ralston, Minister for the Army, and Major ‘Chubby’ Power, Minister for the Air Force, were so disgusted with Mackenzie King because of the manner in which he wielded autocratic power, that they both resigned from his government, even though it was war time. The Naval Minister told me personally, “Carr, the cabinet is full of the people you wish to expose. I intend to stick with the ship (Navy) until we win the war. Then I am going to resign from federal politics. What is going on is more than I can take ....” When I requested to be de-mobilized in Mayy, 1945 (after Germany collapsed), in order that I might start writing Pawns in the Game and Red Fog over America, Admiral Jones shook my hand as we said good-bye, and said, “I wish you luck with your new books. Publication of the TRUTH, as you have explained it to the Minister and myself, could do more to prevent World War Three than any defensive plan based on armaments.” Both of these men died suddenly shortly afterwards. In 1955 it required six times as many members of the RC.M.P and the F.B.I. to ‘contain’ Communism in Canada and the United States, as it did in 1945. In 1956 the Canadian Minister of Justice asked parliament to increase his budget by millions of dollars on the grounds that six RC.M.P officers were now required to keep check on Communists, where only one was required 10 years before. This was a superlative illustration of the double talk used by men who are involved in the W.R.M.. The Minister said: “To keep check on Communists.” What he should have said was: “To keep Communism in check until the time is ripe to use it.” I personally knew Inspector John Leopold who for many years headed the anti-subversive department of the RC.M.P We discussed these matters on many occasions. The RC.M.P and the F B.I. could arrest every Communist in Canada and the United States within twenty-four hours of the order being given by the heads of the respective departments of Justice, provided the Communists were not tipped off previously. It isn’t much of an exaggeration to say that John Leopold had one of his agents sleep with the Communist leaders every night. But the order to destroy the most destructive weapon the leaders of the Luciferian conspiracy possess, by legal means, was not given, and John Leopold retired from the RC.M.P a broken man, worn out bodily, mentally, and, I am sorry to say, spiritually, because of sheer frustration. The power of the United States can be destroyed only from within. The internal unrest now being fomented between citizens of different races, colors, and creeds is not so much the result of aggressive action taken by different groups as it is the result of rulings which have been passed by the Supreme Court. Their purpose was the creation of issues and troubles where previously no real issue or problem existed. I say with all gravity, fully realizing the seriousness of what I say, that if the day is allowed to come when those controlled by atheistic Communism are thrown at the throats of those who profess Christianity, on an international scale, over some real or cooked-up’ issue, then Communists in every one of the remaining socalled free nations will be released from the check-reins with which they are now being contained, and, as Pike boasted to Mazzini, the people will experience the worst social cataclysm the world has ever known. What I say is based on documentary evidence supported by historical facts, events which have taken place since the plans were laid. Everything Weishaupt planned between 1770 and 1776 to further the Luciferian conspiracy has developed EXACTLY as he intended. Everything Pike planned between 1859 and 1871 has occurred EXACTLY as he intended. We are now on the verge of World War Three, and about to enter the first stage of the conspiracy. But what is of even greater importance -the Holy Scriptures confirm what I say. All a person needs to do, to convince himself of this TRUTH, is to read Matt. 24:1-35 and Mark 13:1-30, and Luke 21: 25- 33. What abominations could the human mind conceive worse than those we know from experience happen when human beings fight civil wars? What could be worse than to use the atomic weapons and nerve gas? It seems that human beings are turned into devils incarnate when engaged in war, particularly civil war, because they practice every abomination upon each other that Dante in his Inferno describes as being practiced in Hell."

Satan Prince of This World

by William Guy Carr

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Hw94yTrcRzvZjNQOo8T5_w-jqL8v5IMu/view?usp=sharing

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid02agMSibSAb25P32GX7iLCVB7DE3LZiGiVi7o4PFMwriU73tfQn8RF3NmVNn69VzVel


Martin Fitzgerald Lawrence[1] (born April 16, 1965) is an American actor and comedian. Lawrence began his career doing comedy shows, including in The Improv. After his first acting role in the sitcom What's Happening Now!! (1987–1988), Lawrence co-created and played the titular character of the Fox television sitcom Martin (1992-1997), which helped catapult him into larger film roles. His first major lead role on the big screen was playing Detective Sergeant Marcus Burnett in the buddy cop action comedy Bad Boys (1995), a role he reprised in three sequels.[2]


Lawrence went on to star in the commercially successful films A Thin Line Between Love and Hate (1996), which marked his directorial debut, Nothing to Lose (1997), Blue Streak (1999), Big Momma's House (2000), Big Momma's House 2 (2006), Wild Hogs (2007), College Road Trip (2008), Death at a Funeral (2010), and Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son (2013), among others. His voice acting work includes the animated films Open Season (2006) and Sneaks (2025), and the animated television series Kid 'n Play (1990).


Early life

The fourth of six children, Martin Fitzgerald Lawrence was born on April 16, 1965, in Frankfurt, West Germany. His father, John Lawrence, was serving in the U.S. military at the time of his birth.[1] Lawrence's first and middle names were after civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and U.S. President John F. Kennedy, respectively.[1] When Lawrence was seven, his father left the military, and the family moved from West Germany back to the United States, settling in the Washington D.C. area in the town of Landover, Maryland. Lawrence's mother had moved herself and her six children into the troubled King Square housing projects where he would attend Dodge Park Elementary.[1] Following his parents' divorce when he was eight years old, Lawrence rarely saw his father, who was a police officer, serving as the Police Chief for the Franklin D. Roosevelt VA Medical Center in Montrose, New York.[3] His mother, Chlora (née Bailey), worked several jobs, including as a sales representative and cashier at various department stores, to support her family.[4][5] Small for his size growing up in the projects, Lawrence often engaged in street fights with other kids. He stated that it was his mother and older brothers who kept him out of jail where most of his childhood friends ended up. During his teen years, Lawrence excelled at boxing.[1] While living in Fort Washington, Maryland, Lawrence attended Eleanor Roosevelt High School[1] and Friendly High School, and became a Mid-Atlantic Golden Gloves boxing contender.[6]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Lawrence


The Lorraine Motel, where King was assassinated, is now the site of the National Civil Rights Museum.

I've Been to the Mountaintop

Duration: 30 seconds.0:30

Final 30 seconds of "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech by Martin Luther King Jr.

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On March 29, 1968, King went to Memphis, Tennessee, in support of the black sanitation workers, who were represented by American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Local 1733. The workers had been on strike since March 12 for higher wages and better treatment. In one incident, black street repairmen received pay for two hours when they were sent home because of bad weather, but white employees were paid for the full day.[251][252][253]


On April 3, King addressed a rally and delivered his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" address at Mason Temple. King's flight to Memphis had been delayed by a bomb threat against his plane.[254] In reference to the bomb threat, King said:


And then I got to Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers? Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. So I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.[255]


King was booked in Room 306 at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis. Ralph Abernathy, who was present at the assassination, testified to the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations that King and his entourage stayed at Room 306 so often that it was known as the "King-Abernathy suite".[256] According to Jesse Jackson, who was present, King's last words were spoken to musician Ben Branch, who was scheduled to perform that night at an event King was attending: "Ben, make sure you play 'Take My Hand, Precious Lord' in the meeting tonight. Play it real pretty."[257]


King was fatally shot by James Earl Ray at 6:01 p.m., Thursday, April 4, 1968, as he stood on the motel's second-floor balcony. The bullet entered through his right cheek, smashing his jaw, then traveled down his spinal cord before lodging in his shoulder.[258][259] Abernathy heard the shot from inside the motel room and ran to the balcony to find King on the floor.[260]


After emergency surgery, King died at St. Joseph's Hospital at 7:05 p.m.[261] According to biographer Taylor Branch, King's autopsy revealed that though only 39 years old, he "had the heart of a 60 year old", which Branch attributed to stress.[262] King was initially interred in South View Cemetery in South Atlanta, but in 1977, his remains were transferred to a tomb on the site of the Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park.[263]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King_Jr.


AI Overview

The names Lawrence and Lori both derive from the Latin word laurus, meaning "laurel" or "sweet bay tree". The laurel wreath was a symbol of victory, honor, and achievement in ancient Greece and Rome. 

Lawrence Name Meaning

Origin: Lawrence is a masculine name with Latin origins, derived from the Roman name Laurentius, which meant "man from Laurentum," an ancient Italian city.

Meaning: It is primarily understood to mean "from Laurentum" or "crowned with laurel".

Connotations: The name carries historical associations with triumph, accomplishment, and distinction, largely due to the ancient practice of bestowing laurel wreaths upon victors, poets, and military heroes. 

Lori Name Meaning

Origin: Lori is predominantly a feminine name in the United States and the United Kingdom. It originated as a diminutive (short form) of names like Laura, Lorraine, or Laurel.

Meaning: Its meaning is directly tied to its root, laurus, signifying "laurel".

Connotations: Similar to Lawrence, Lori embodies qualities associated with the laurel, such as honor, victory, and a connection to nature. 

In essence, both names share a common, historically rich root symbolizing success and distinction.

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The Kingdom of Jerusalem was created in 1098, when the members of the First Crusade captured Jerusalem and elected Godfrey of Boulogne, or Godefroi de Bouillon, duke of Lower-Lorraine, as king of Jerusalem. The city was itself finally taken back by the Muslims in 1291, although the title continued to be claimed for centuries.


The Corpus Inscriptionum Crucesignatorum is online, listing inscriptions from the Crusader times that have been found in the Middle East.


The Arms

The Arms of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem are well-known: Argent a cross potent between four crosses or. It is the most well-known violation of the rule of tinctures.


Insignia or the Order of the Holy Sepulchre

Insignia of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre (from Diderot's Encyclopédie. They are A cross potent between four crosslets gules.

Whether these arms were ever used by the kings of Jerusalem is another matter. According to an article by Hervé Pinoteau in the Cahiers d'Héraldique, vol. 4, the earliest representation of the cross potents between crosslets is on the seal of a nephew and ward of John of Brienne, king from 1210 (the seal is from 1227). The arms of Jerusalem also appear on a reliquary called "la cassette de Saint-Louis" which he dates to 1236. (See also an article by Elliot Nesterman on early evidence of the Cross of Jerusalem).

Claimants to the Throne

The arms of Jerusalem pop up in a number of places. The reason for this is the rather tortuous history of the throne and title. The short version is this: three lines stemmed from Queen Isabeau (d. 1206), the eldest of which ruled in absentia until 1268, at which time the two other lines entered in dispute over the succession. From this dispute stems the claims of (1) the kings of Cyprus and (2) the kings of Sicily. The claim to Cyprus (1) became object of dispute in 1474 as the result of an usurpation: the claims of the usurper (1a) passed to Venice, while those of the displaced ruler (1b) passed to Savoy. As for the claims of the kings of Sicily (2), it became part of the dispute in 1434 between the duke of Anjou and the king of Aragon. The claims of the former (2a) passed briefly to the kings of France (1494-1515) and were later resurrected by the dukes of Lorraine in 1700 (whose descendants became emperors of Austria), while the the claims of the latter (2b) passed along with Sicily itself to the kings of Spain (1506-1700), then becoming the object of yet another dispute until returning to a younger son of the king of Spain in 1738; henceforth the title was used both by the kings of Spain and those of the Two Sicilies.


The kingdom of Jerusalem was founded as a consequence of the 1st crusade of 1099. Godefroi de Bouillon died in 1100 and was succeeded by his brother Baudoin I (+ 1118) and a great-nephew Baudoin II (+ 1131), who left an eldest daughter Mélissende. She passed the throne to her husband Foulques d'Anjou (+ 1147), and to her sons Baudoin III (+ 1163) and Amaury or Amalric (+ 1173). Amaury had a son and successor Baudoin IV (d. 1185), and two daughters, Sybille and Isabeau (1169-1206).


Sybille married in 1176 William of Montferrat (+ 1177), by whom she had a posthumous son Baudoin. She was then married in 1180 to Guy de Lusignan (d. 1194), count of Jaffa and Ascalon who was also appointed regent of the kingdom by the invalid Baudoin IV. But Baudoin IV then changed his mind, took away the regency, and abdicated in 1182 in favor of Sybille's son Baudoin V. This child died in 1186, soon after his uncle, and Sybille became queen of Jerusalem, and was crowned with her husband Guy de Lusignan. However, a rival in the person of Conrad of Montferrat, brother of Sybille's first husband, rose up. In the end an agreement was reached: Guy would retain the title for his life, Conrad would marry Sybille's sister Isabeau and succeed as well as his posterity. By that time, the city itself had actually been lost. Sybille had died in 1190, Conrad was murdered in 1192, leaving only a daughter Marie (1191-1212), and Guy renounced his claim in 1192 and bought the island of Cyprus from Richard Lionheart who had just conquered it from the Byzantine empire.


This left only Isabeau as the heir, and she became queen in 1192. All subsequent claims to the throne of Jerusalem stem from her. She married the same year Henri de Champagne (1166-97), who became king with her and died in 1197, leaving two daughters Alix and Philippa. Queen Isabeau next married Amaury de Lusignan (1145-1205), elder brother of Guy and his successor as king of Cyprus, by whom she had Sybille (married to Leo II of Armenia) and Mélissande. Isabeau died in 1205 and was succeeded by her eldest daughter Marie (1191-1212), married to Jean de Brienne (d. 1237) in 1209. Their only daughter Isabeau (1211-28) was married to the Emperor Frederic II who forced his parents-in-law to turn over the throne to him in 1225. Frederic was succeeded as Emperor and king of Jerusalem by his only child of that marriage, Conrad (1228-54), himself succeeded by his only child Conradin of Hohenstaufen 1252-68), who lost his throne of Naples and his life to Charles of Anjou. With him the issue of queen Isabeau's first daughter died out.


The Hohenstaufens were ruling in absentia, and their rule was not liked. The local barons managed to induce various people to claim the regency. Alix de Brienne, second daughter of queen Isabeau, had married Hughes de Lusignan (d. 1218), son of Amaury by a previous wife, and king of Cyprus. Alix died in 1246 and her son Henri (1218-53) succeeded her as regent of Jerusalem. At his death, his son grandson Hugues II (1252-67) was a minor and the widow Plaisance (d. 1261) was regent of both Cyprus and Jerusalem. At her death, a new regent was required; the late king Henri had two sisters Marie (d. 1252) married to Gauthier de Brienne, and Isabelle (d. 1264), married to Henri de Poitiers. The elder one's son, Hugues de Brienne, was passed over in favor of the younger one's son Hugues d'Antioche as regent of Cyprus, while Isabelle herself was accepted as regent for Jerusalem. On her death in 1267, Hugues de Brienne's attempt to claim his rights was rebuffed and the throne of Cyprus, along with the regency of Jerusalem, passed to Hugues d'Antioche, whose descendants assumed the name of Lusignan and reigned over Cyprus.


At the death of Conradin, the issue of Queen Isabeau's eldest daughter became extinct. Hugues III of Cyprus, descended from her second daughter and already regent, now claimed the throne. But another claim emerged through the third daughter of Queen Isabeau, Mélissende, who married Bohémond IV of Antioch (uncle of Hugues III) and whose only daughter Marie of Antioch claimed the throne as being closer in kinship to Isabeau. She was unsuccessful and Hugues III was crowned king of Jerusalem in 1269. She went to Rome to plead her case with the Pope, and was eventually induced to cede her rights in 1277 to Charles of Anjou, whom the pope had established as king of Naples and Sicily (the same who had defeated Conradin in 1268). Henceforth there were two lines of claimants, the kings of Cyprus and the kings of Naples.


The kings of Cyprus continued to be crowned kings of Jerusalem, although from 1277 to 1282 the remnants of the kingdom (Acre) were actually under Charles d'Anjou's control, and the kings of Cyprus only gradually restored their authority. But soon after, with the fall of Acre in 1291, there was nothing left of the kingdom of Jerusalem. In 1458 Jean III, last male of the line, died without male heirs. His only sister Anne had (d. 1462) married Louis I de Savoie. His only daughter Charlotte (d. 1487) was recognized as queen of Cyprus, Armenia and Jerusalem, and married to her first cousin Louis de Savoie. But she was dethroned in 1460 by a bastard son of her father, namely Jacques II (d. 1473), and fled to Italy. Ultimately, in 1485, she ceded her rights to her husband's nephew Charles I, duke of Savoie, and his successors; at that point the dukes of Savoie (later kings of Sardinia and kings of Italy) added the title of king of Jerusalem, Cyprus and Armenia to their titles and the arms to their achievement. The kings of Italy used the title until 1946.


Jacques II died in 1473, leaving a widow Caterina Cornero (1454-1510), from the Venitian aristocracy. His posthumous son Jacques III soon died. The city of Venice turned Cyprus into a protectorate, and, in 1489, forced Caterina Cornero to return to Venice and cede her rights to the Republic. From then on, the Republic of Venice also added the title and arms of Jerusalem, Cyprus and Armenia to its own, until 1797 when the Republic was abolished and its territories handed over to Austria by the Treaty of Campo-Formio. Cyprus was under Venetian control until 1571 when it was conquered by the Turks. Venice became part of the kingdom of Italy in 1866.


Meanwhile, the kings of Sicily also claimed the title of king of Jerusalem. In 1282, Charles d'Anjou lost Sicily and his descendants reigned in Naples only (albeit under the title of kings of Sicily) while Sicily itself was ruled by branches of the house of Aragon. When the descendants of Charles d'Anjou became extinct in 1434, the two claimants were René d'Anjou and Alfonso, king of Aragon and Sicily, and the latter won, at which point his successors the kings of both Sicilies added the claim of Jerusalem to their own. René's claim was resurrected by his grand-nephew king Charles VIII of France in 1494, who managed to conquer and briefly hold Naples, and who used the title of Jerusalem, as did his successor Louis XII (but no other French king did so). In 1506 the Two Sicilies was finally regained by king Ferdinand of Aragon, and henceforth possessed, along with the claim to Jerusalem, by the kings of Spain, descendants of Fernando's daughter Juana and her husband Philip of Habsburg, until their extinction in male line in 1700.


As a result of the war of Spanish Succession (1701-13), Naples and Sicily were ceded by Spain to the Habsburg emperor Charles VI in 1720, and the pope duly invested the emperor with the titles of king of Sicily and Jerusalem on June 5, 1722 (the kingdom being a papal fief). In the course of the war of Polish Succession (1733-38), the younger son of the king of Spain, Don Carlos, managed to conquer the Two Sicilies, a conquest recognized by the peace of Vienna of 1738, and by the pope in the same year. Carlos became king of Spain in 1759 and left Naples and Sicily to his younger son Ferdinand, whose descendants reigned until 1860. The kings of Spain continued to use the title of Jerusalem until 1931, as did the kings of Two-Sicilies.


On the other hand, René's daughter Yolande married Ferry de Vaudémont, one of whose sons became duke of Lorraine. The modern house of Lorraine took up the claim to Jerusalem in 1700 (although it wasn't the best claimant from a genealogical point of view, as pointed out by W. A. Reitwiesner) when duke Leopold returned to his duchy after 28 years of French occupation, and adopted a closed royal crown and the style of king of Jerusalem. His son François, duke of Lorraine, married the Empress Maria-Theresa, and their descendants as rulers of Austria inherited the claim. The arms of Jerusalem could be seen in the grand arms of State of the Austrian Empire in the 19th century and the title was used until 1918.


Other Crusader States

There is very little evidence on the arms of the Crusader states. The traditional arms of the kingdom of Jerusalem are not known before the 1230s, when the city had already been lost. Numismatic evidence is scant, epigraphic evidence even more so (there are very little heraldic traces of the Crusaders in the Middle East, outside Cyprus; see an interesting exception).


Numismatic evidence

The best work is Gustave Schlumberger's Numismatique de l'Orient Latin (Paris, 1878; reprint Graz 1954). In a coin auction catalogue I recently received, coins from Tripoli feature:


Obverse: horse with cross above, Reverse: a cross between four roundels (bronze, Raymond II 1137-52)

Obv: cross patty, Rev: eight-point star (Bohemond VI, 1251-75, silver gros)

Obv: cross slightly patty, Rev: three-towered castle (Bohemond VII, 1275-87, silver gros)

I believe the 8-pt star was a recurrent motif on Tripoli coins.

Coins of Antioch feature:


Raymond Roupen (1216-19): helmeted head between crescent and 5-pt star, Rev: cross patty with crescent in one quarter. (coins from early 12th c. have a bust of St Peter and inscriptions, or the Mother of God facing nimbate).

Interestingly, coins from Cyprus (1306-1473) constantly feature on the reverse a cross potent between four crosses, never crosslets but sometimes patty or formy. But what is peculiar is that the main cross is "quadrat in the centre", that is, its center is thickened by a square. This is, according to Parker's Glossary, called a cross of S. Chad, because it features in the arms of the see of Lichfield and Coventry, of which S. Chad was the first bishop. The quadrating on the Cyprus coins is much less pronounced than in the drawing in Parker, but this is nevertheless quite intriguing.


Other evidence

monuments (carved arms, epitaphs, etc): two or three epitaphs with arms are known; some graffiti carved on marble columns of the church of the Nativity in Bethleem were made by 14th-15th c. pilgrims. That's all that survived. One notable exception: the tomb of Philippe d'Aubigni in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem.

Monuments in the West: Marguerite, daughter of Louis d'Acre, vicomte de Beaumont, himself son of Jean de Brienne, king of Jerusalem, was married to Bohemond VII, count of Tripoli (d. 1287) and eldest son of Bohemond VI, last prince of Antioch. She died in France in 1328, and her tomb in the abbey of Maubuisson was described as "parsemée de croix de Jérusalem dans des losanges de gueules, et de lions rampants dans des losanges de sable fleurdelisés" in Du Cange's Familles d'Outremer (Paris, 1869, p. 486). The tomb was destroyed in 1793 (reference to Dulaure, Environs de Paris, vol. 2, p. 331, n. 2, which I have not checked).

objects: a handful survive, mainly from Cyprus.

seals: Gustave Schlumberger's Sigillographie de l'Orient Latin (Paris, 1943) is probably quite comprehensive, and there is little heraldry to glean from it. Lots of seals of the kings of Jerusalem, princes of Antioch, counts of Tripoli are known, but they bear no arms. See for example the seals of Baudoin II (1118-31), Amalric (1162-75), Jean de Brienne (1212-37). In Antioch, Raymond of Poitiers (1136-49) is shown riding a horse and bearing a cross on his shield and banner, but that's it. Among lesser barons, the Ibelin family, lords of Arsur and Beyrut apparently had "Or a cross patty gules". The device certainly appears on their shields and banners as shown on their seals. Aside from that, there are arms here and there: Hugues de Giblet (Biblos) has a 8-pointed star, the Porcellet family has a boar passant, the lordship of Loron or Thoron was a lion rampant.

There is more armory from Cyprus and Constantinople; but then, those arms are well known. The Courtenay arms appear on Philippe de Courtenay's seal (d. 1283). Interestingly, the earlier emperors of Constantinople, Baudoin of Flanders (d. 1205), Henri I (d. 1216), Baudoin II (d. 1261) all use the lion of Flanders, although one contemporary cronicler describes Henri riding in battle with a coat-armour gules semy of crosses or. Villehardouin, princes of Achaia, use the family arms of a cross recercelee; later, Louis a cadet of Burgundy who claimed Achaia added a quarter of Villehardouin to his arms of Burgundy ancient (14th c.). Achaia was also claimed by a junior branch of Savoy, who differenced with a bend.

https://www.heraldica.org/topics/national/jerusale.htm


The President William Jefferson Clinton Birthplace Home National Historic Site is located in HOPE, Arkansas.[2] Built in 1917 by Dr. H. S. Garrett, in this house the 42nd president of the United States, Bill Clinton, spent the first four years of his life, having been born on August 19, 1946, at Julia Chester Hospital in HOPE, Arkansas.[3][4] The house was owned by Clinton's maternal grandparents, Edith Grisham and James Eldridge Cassidy, and they cared for him when his mother, Virginia, was away working as an anesthetist in New Orleans.[5]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_William_Jefferson_Clinton_Birthplace_Home_National_Historic_Site


Tragedy and HOPE: A History of the World in Our Time is a work of history written by former Georgetown University professor and historian Carroll Quigley. The book covers the period of roughly 1880 to 1963 and is multidisciplinary in nature though perhaps focusing on the economic problems brought about by the First World War and the impact these had on subsequent events. While global in scope, the book focuses on Western civilization."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_and_Hope


In his first year (1965) in the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown, Bill Clinton took Quigley's course, receiving a 'B' as his final grade in both semesters (an excellent grade in a course where nearly half the students received D or lower).[1]: 94, 96 In 1991, Clinton named Quigley as an important influence on his aspirations and political philosophy, when Clinton launched his presidential campaign in a speech at Georgetown.[1]: 96 He said he learned from Quigley that “The future can be better than the past, and that each of us has a personal, moral responsibility to make it so.” Bill Clinton told his audiences, “that is what the new choice is all about....We are not here to save the Democratic party. We are here to save the United States of America.” It was Clinton's most effective speech, and he repeated variations time and time again as the blueprint for his campaign message in winning the Democratic nomination and the general election for President of the United States in 1992.[21][22]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carroll_Quigley


Theorists also cite the inclusion of Bill Clinton at the meetings in 1991 before he was president and Tony Blair’s presence in 1993 before he became the British prime minister as examples of the group’s power. Past attendees have included former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (who will also be attending this year), former Chase Manhattan chief executive David Rockefeller, and British Prime Minister David Cameron."

Bilderberg Group: What To Know About the Secretive Meetings

https://time.com/4362872/bilderberg-group-meetings-2016-conspiracy-theories/


Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner October 20, 2016 Donald Trump Hillary Clinton Henry Kissinger Gayle King Cardinal Dolan Katie Couric Chuck Schumer Mayor Bill de Blasio"

https://www.facebook.com/MariaBartiromo/posts/alfred-e-smith-memorial-foundation-dinner-october-20-2016-donald-trump-hillary-c/1353937201283479/


HOPE: all hope is to be placed in God, and with what degree of perfection [67]; eternal life alone is to be hoped for as a reward [82]; the extent to which this hope should be of assistance [288]; how hope should be shown by the dying | 595]; hope in the preservation and growth of the Society [812]. See also Faithfulness" The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms pg. 464

https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Bill Clinton ‘Encouraged’ Trump to Run

SLICK WILLY

Updated Apr. 14, 2017 10:12AM EDT /

Published Aug. 05, 2015 3:33PM EDT

https://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2015/08/05/bill-clinton-encouraged-trump


I began by attending Fordham University in the Bronx, mostly because I wanted to be close to home. I got along very well with the Jesuits who ran the school, but after two years, I decided that as long as I had to be in college, I might as well test myself against the best. I applied to the Wharton School of Finance at the University of Pennsylvania and I got in. At the time, if you were going to make a career in business, Wharton was the place to go. Harvard Business School may produce a lot of CEOs—guys who manage public companies— but the real entrepreneurs all seemed to go to Wharton: Saul Steinberg, Leonard Lauder, Ron Perelman—the list goes on and on."

Donald Trump The Art of the Deal

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1DLcbnLrl6moQT7nGj1JitG6AiQ6qgK0y/view?usp=sharing

University of Scranton welcomes President Biden

The university has illuminated its Class of 2020 Gateway in red and blue lights.

Author: WNEP Web Staff

Published: 10:52 PM EDT October 19, 2021

Updated: 10:52 PM EDT October 19, 2021

SCRANTON, Pa. — In preparation for President Joe Biden's visit, a university lit up their lights in his honor.


The University of Scranton has illuminated its Class of 2020 Gateway in blue and red with the number 46 prominently displayed to welcome the 46th president."

University of Scranton welcomes President Biden | wnep.com

https://www.wnep.com/article/news/local/lackawanna-county/university-of-scranton-welcomes-president-biden-gateway-lights/523-cdba68b1-822b-4747-94be-4cd7e4de9d67

"His son, Hunter Biden, 38, is a longtime federal lobbyist for the Jesuit university located in his father's hometown, Scranton PA. According to federal disclosures, Hunter Biden has been earning about $80,000 a year since 2006 to lobby for this university. Senator Biden himself has lectured at the Jesuit University of Scranton, and received an honorary degree from the same university, in 1976."

Codeword Barbelon

by P.D. Stuart


Trump and Harris neck-and-neck as she prepares to announce VP pick after meeting candidates Sunday: Live

Harris met with top running mate contenders Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly and Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro at her Washington DC residence

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/kamala-harris-vp-pick-trump-polls-news-b2591106.html


San Francisco's 555 California St., co-owned by Trump, on lender watchlist

The beautiful, very great, big league skyscraper, still allegedly 30% owned by Donald Trump, is on a lender watchlist, according to Bloomberg

By Alex Shultz,

Politics editor, SFGATE

Updated Feb 23, 2023 3:40 p.m.

https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/san-francisco-building-trump-stake-on-watchlist-17801816.php


Early life and education

Harris's childhood home at 1227 Bancroft Way in Berkeley, August 2020

Kamala Devi Harris[a] was born in Oakland, California,[3] on October 20, 1964.[4] Her mother, Shyamala Gopalan (1938–2009), was a biologist who arrived in the United States from India in 1958 to enroll in graduate school in endocrinology at the University of California, Berkeley. A research career of over 40 years followed, during which her work on the progesterone receptor gene led to advances in breast cancer research.[5] Kamala's father, Donald J. Harris (1938–),[6] is an Afro-Jamaican who immigrated to the United States in 1961 and also enrolled in UC Berkeley, specializing in development economics. The first Black scholar to be granted tenure at Stanford University's economics department, he has emeritus status there.[7] Kamala's parents met in 1962 and married in 1963.[8]


The Harris family lived in Berkeley until they moved in 1966, around Kamala's second birthday. The Harrises lived for a few years in college towns in the MIDWEST where her parents held teaching or research positions:[9] Urbana, Illinois (where her sister Maya was born in 1966); Evanston, Illinois; and Madison, Wisconsin.[b][10][9][11] By 1970, the marriage had faltered, and Shyamala moved back to Berkeley with her two daughters;[12][13][9] the couple divorced when Kamala was seven.[8] In 1972, Donald Harris accepted a position at Stanford University; Kamala and Maya spent weekends at their father's house in Palo Alto and lived at their mother's house in Berkeley during the week.[14] Shyamala was friends with African-American intellectuals and activists in Oakland and Berkeley.[11] In 1976, she accepted a research position at the McGill University School of Medicine, and moved with her daughters to Montreal, Quebec.[15][16] Kamala graduated from Westmount High School on Montreal Island in 1981.[17]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamala_Harris


Donald Jasper Harris, OM (born August 23, 1938) is a Jamaican-American economist and professor emeritus at Stanford University, known for applying post-Keynesian ideas to development economics.[1]


He is the father of US Vice President and current Democrat presidential nominee Kamala Harris and lawyer Maya Harris.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_J._Harris


Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump


Danney Lee Williams Jr. (born December 7, 1985) is a man from Little Rock, Arkansas who claims to be the biological son of Bill Clinton, the former President of the United States.[1] Blood tests ruled out Clinton as the father.[1][2]


Background

Williams was born in 1985 to Danney Williams Sr. and Bobbie Ann Williams.


The story came to notice in the late 1990s when reporting by Newsmax led by celebrity tabloid magazine Star to commission a paternity test prove whether Williams is actually Clinton's biological son.[3] Time magazine cited Star on July 18, 1999 to say that there was no match.[4]


The story was revived in 2016 before the 2016 presidential election and pushed by a number of media outlets including Newsmax, the Drudge Report,[3] as well as WorldNetDaily,[1] and the New York Daily News.[1]


Due to some uncertainties with the original test by Star, Snopes concluded that the claim was unproven.[3] The Washington Post stated that, while the test could not prove Clinton was the father, it did conclusively rule him out as the father.[1]


On October 19, 2016, Williams' lawyers announced their intentions to file a paternity suit to prove that Clinton's DNA matched Williams'.[5] Williams wrote to Monica Lewinsky asking for her dress in order to obtain a sample of Clinton's DNA. However, Lewinsky never replied to Williams.[6] A partial analysis of Clinton's blood, and thus his DNA, was already part of the public record because of the Lewinsky affair investigation.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danney_Williams


Early Female Transgender Identity after Prenatal Exposure to Diethylstilbestrol: Report from a French National Diethylstilbestrol (DES) Cohort

by Laura Gaspari 1,2,3,†,Marie-Odile Soyer-Gobillard 4,5,†ORCID,Scott Kerlin 6,Françoise Paris 1,2,3 andCharles Sultan 1,*

All DES sons who identified as transgender women underwent karyotyping at their local hospital at the moment of transition.

https://www.mdpi.com/2039-4713/14/1/10


Kamala Devi Harris[a] was born in Oakland, California,[3] on October 20, 1964.[4] Her mother, Shyamala Gopalan (1938–2009), was a Tamil Brahmin biologist[5] who arrived in the United States from India in 1958 to enroll in graduate school in endocrinology at the University of California, Berkeley. A research career of over 40 years followed, during which her work on the progesterone receptor gene led to advances in breast cancer research.[6] Kamala's father, Donald J. Harris (born 1938),[7] is an Afro-Jamaican who immigrated to the United States in 1961 and also enrolled in UC Berkeley, specializing in development economics. The first Black scholar to be granted tenure at Stanford University's economics department, he has emeritus status there.[8] Kamala's parents met in 1962 and married in 1963.[9]


The Harris family lived in Berkeley until they moved in 1966, around Kamala's second birthday. The Harrises lived for a few years in college towns in the Midwest where her parents held teaching or research positions:[10] Urbana, Illinois (where her sister Maya was born in 1966); Evanston, Illinois; and Madison, Wisconsin.[b][11][10][12] By 1970, the marriage had faltered, and Shyamala moved back to Berkeley with her two daughters;[13][14][10] the couple divorced when Kamala was seven.[9]


During the early 1970s, Harris often went with her mother to Chennai, India, where they stayed with her maternal grandfather. She learned to wear traditional Indian dress and speak a few phrases of the Tamil language.[15]


In 1972, Donald Harris accepted a position at Stanford University; Kamala and Maya spent weekends at his house in Palo Alto and lived at their mother's house in Berkeley during the week.[16] Shyamala was friends with African-American intellectuals and activists in Oakland and Berkeley.[12] In 1976, she accepted a research position at the McGill University School of Medicine, and moved with her daughters to Montreal, Quebec.[17][18] Kamala graduated from Westmount High School on Montreal Island in 1981.[19]


Kamala Harris attended Vanier College in Montreal in 1981–1982;[20] she then attended Howard University, a historically black university in Washington, D.C.[21][22] At Howard, she became a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha, one of the "Divine Nine" historically black sororities.[23] She graduated in 1986 with a degree in political science and economics.[24][25] Harris then attended the University of California, Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco,[26] where she served as president of its chapter of the Black Law Students Association.[27] She graduated with a Juris Doctor in 1989.[28]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamala_Harris


The Battle of Hastings (1066) as depicted on a stained glass window over the main entrance of 100 McAllister Street.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_California_College_of_the_Law,_San_Francisco


The Battle of Hastings[a] was fought on 14 October 1066 between the Norman-French army of William, Duke of Normandy, and an English army under the Anglo-Saxon King Harold Godwinson, beginning the Norman Conquest of England. It took place approximately 7 mi (11 km) northwest of Hastings, close to the present-day town of Battle, East Sussex, and was a decisive Norman victory.


The background to the battle was the death of the childless King Edward the Confessor in January 1066, which set up a succession struggle between several claimants to his throne. Harold was crowned king shortly after Edward's death but faced invasions by William, his own brother Tostig, and the Norwegian king Harald Hardrada (Harold III of Norway). Hardrada and Tostig defeated a hastily gathered army of Englishmen at the Battle of Fulford on 20 September 1066. They were in turn defeated by Harold at the Battle of Stamford Bridge on 25 September. The deaths of Tostig and Hardrada at Stamford Bridge left William as Harold's only serious opponent. While Harold and his forces were recovering, William landed his invasion forces in the south of England at Pevensey on 28 September and established a beachhead for his conquest of the kingdom. Harold was forced to march south swiftly, gathering forces as he went.


The numbers present at the battle are unknown as even modern estimates vary considerably. The composition of the forces is clearer: the English army was composed almost entirely of infantry and had few archers, whereas only about half of the invading force was infantry, the rest split equally between cavalry and archers. Harold appears to have tried to surprise William, but scouts found his army and reported its arrival to William, who marched from Hastings to the battlefield to confront Harold. The battle lasted from about 9 am to dusk. Early efforts of the invaders to break the English battle lines had little effect. Therefore, the Normans adopted the tactic of pretending to flee in panic and then turning on their pursuers. Harold's death, probably near the end of the battle, led to the retreat and defeat of most of his army. After further marching and some skirmishes, William was crowned as king on Christmas Day 1066.


There continued to be rebellions and resistance to William's rule, but Hastings effectively marked the culmination of William's conquest of England. Casualty figures are difficult to assess, but some historians estimate that 2,000 invaders died along with about twice that number of Englishmen. William founded a monastery at the site of the battle, the high altar of the abbey church supposedly placed at the spot where Harold died.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Hastings


Spitfire is the third album by American rock band Jefferson Starship. Released in 1976, a year after the chart-topping Red Octopus, it quickly scaled the charts, peaking for six consecutive weeks at No. 3 in Billboard and attaining an RIAA platinum certification. Stereo and quadraphonic mixes of the album were released.


Background

By early 1976, Jefferson Starship had become one of America's biggest rock bands thanks to the multiplatinum success of 1975's Red Octopus and its smash hit "Miracles". They were playing arenas and stadiums as well as headlining big festivals, and money was pouring in.[1] All seemed well within the group, although the beginnings of dissent began to appear when singer Grace Slick broke up her seven-year relationship with guitarist Paul Kantner, choosing to hook up instead with the group's lighting director Skip Johnson (Johnson was quickly fired from that position, although he would be re-hired in 1978).[1] There were also lingering problems with Marty Balin, who had refused to sign a long-term contract with RCA/Grunt and was working on an album-by-album basis, which gave him much leverage now that he was writing the hit singles.[2] Although he was enjoying his return to prominence within the group, the pressure was now on Balin to come up with another hit that would equal or surpass "Miracles".


In the meantime, there were also increasing charges that the group had betrayed their earlier underground credentials as Jefferson Airplane and "sold out" to corporate rock interests. Slick complained that Grunt kept sending her out to silly publicity stunts like cake-judging contests, later reasoning "I was smiling and going along with it because we had to keep the publicity machine oiled while we were waiting for Marty to decide whether or not he was going to go on the road".[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spitfire_(Jefferson_Starship_album)


Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, Named Next Provincial of the Jesuits of Canada

March 15, 2024 — The Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) announced the appointment of Fr. Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, as the next provincial of the Jesuits of Canada. This appointment is the culmination of a thoughtful, prayerful process of consultation and discernment, marking a significant milestone for the Canadian Province.


Fr. Jeffrey Burwell, SJ

Fr. Burwell will succeed Fr. Erik Oland, SJ, assuming his new responsibilities on July 31, 2024, with an inaugural Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Toronto. A special celebration will also take place at the Jesuit infirmary in Richelieu, Quebec, on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15, 2024.


Fr. Burwell, 48, is an educational specialist whose doctoral research took him to the Holy Land, where he focused on Catholic schools in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. A lecturer in Catholic studies, first St. Paul’s College at the University of Manitoba and now Campion College at the University of Regina, he balances university work with pastoral service as a chaplain to police (RCMP) and to prisoners. He dedicates his university holidays to ministering in the Dene and Cree Indigenous communities of Saskatchewan and Manitoba.


Holding positions as a local superior since 2017 and a province consultor since 2021, Fr. Burwell brings a profound understanding of the Jesuit mission and a significant appreciation for Canada and Haiti’s diverse cultures.

https://www.jesuits.org/stories/jeffrey-s-burwell-sj-named-next-provincial-of-the-jesuits-of-canada/


Arturo Marcelino Sosa Abascal SJ (born 12 November 1948) is a Venezuelan Catholic priest who has served as the 31st superior general of the Society of Jesus since 2016. He was elected by the Society's 36th General Congregation to succeed Adolfo Nicolás. He is the first person born in Latin America to lead the Jesuits.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arturo_Sosa


Etymology of Arturo

What does the name Arturo mean?

The surname Arturo is an Italian patronymic surname; that is, it was a name created from the first name of the father. Arturo is derived from the Breton given names Artuir and Arthur. This personal name is of very ancient origin and is derived from the Celtic word art, which means bear. The name Arthur is also related to the Greek Arcturus, which means bear or guardian and is the name of the bright star in the constellation Bootes.


Arturo Spelling Variations

Italian surnames come in far more variations than the names of most other nationalities. Regional traditions and dialects are a decisive factor in this characteristic. For example, northern names tend to end in "o", while southern in "i". Also important, but not unique to Italy, was the fact that before dictionaries and the printing press most scribes simply spelled words according to their sounds. The predictable result was an enormous number of spelling variations. The recorded spellings of Arturo include and others.

https://www.houseofnames.com/arturo-family-crest


Arcturus is a red giant star in the northern constellation of Boötes, and the brightest star in the constellation. It has the Bayer designation α Boötis, which is Latinized to Alpha Boötis and abbreviated Alf Boo or α Boo. With an apparent visual magnitude of −0.05,[2] it is the fourth-brightest star in the night sky and the brightest in the northern celestial hemisphere. Arcturus forms one corner of the Spring Triangle asterism.


Located relatively close at 36.7 light-years from the Sun, Arcturus is a red giant of spectral type K1.5III—an aging star around 7.1 billion years old that has used up its core hydrogen and evolved off the main sequence. It is about the same mass as the Sun, but has expanded to 25 times its size (around 35 million kilometers) and is around 170 times as luminous.


Nomenclature

The traditional name Arcturus is Latinised from the ancient Greek Ἀρκτοῦρος (Arktouros) and means "Guardian of the Bear",[9] ultimately from ἄρκτος (arktos), "bear"[10] and οὖρος (ouros), "watcher, guardian".[11] As ἄρκτος also came to mean "north", the name can also translate to "Guardian of the North".[12]


The designation of Arcturus as α Boötis (Latinised to Alpha Boötis) was made by Johann Bayer in 1603. In 2016, the International Astronomical Union organized a Working Group on Star Names (WGSN) to catalog and standardize proper names for stars. The WGSN's first bulletin of July 2016 included a table of the first two batches of names approved by the WGSN, which included Arcturus for α Boötis.[13][14]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arcturus


The Beast (Koine Greek: Θηρίον, Thērion) may refer to one of three beasts described in the Book of Revelation.


Revelation 12-13 describes these three beasts as follows:


The dragon (later revealed in the text to be Satan)[1]

The beast of the sea (commonly interpreted as the Antichrist)[2][3]

The beast of the earth (later revealed in the text to be the False prophet)[4]

However, many people have different beliefs about the meaning of these beasts.


In Revelation 13:1–10, the beast of the sea rises "out of the sea" and is given authority and power by the dragon. It persecutes God's people in the 2nd part of Revelation 13. To buy and sell, everyone is required to have its name or number on their forehead or right hand (Rev 13:16-17). It speaks blasphemous words against God, will rule the world for 42 months (Revelation 13:5-7), and is described as resembling a leopard, a lion, and a bear—which are three of the animals in Daniel 7. It suffers a fatal head wound which is miraculously healed, bewildering the world's population and causing many to worship it.


In Revelation 13:11–18, the beast of the earth, later known as the false prophet, comes "out of the earth," exercises all the authority of the Sea Beast, forces everyone on earth to worship the Sea Beast, and convinces the people, through signs and wonders, to make an image of the Sea Beast.


In their fight against God, the Sea Beast and the False Prophet ally with the Dragon to persecute the "saints" and those who do not "worship the image of the beast [of the sea]" and influence earthly kings through three unclean spirits to gather for the battle of Armageddon.[5] These two beasts are ultimately defeated by Christ and thrown into the lake of fire mentioned in Revelation 19:18–20, while Satan, the dragon, is imprisoned in the bottomless pit for 1,000 years. After being released from the bottomless pit after the millennial reign, Satan deceives the nations one last time, ultimately ending in Satan being defeated and thrown in the lake of fire.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Beast_(Revelation) 


The Hamburg cell (German: Hamburger Zelle) was, according to U.S. and German intelligence agencies, a group of radical Islamists based in Hamburg, Germany, that included students from different Arab countries who eventually came to be key operatives in the September 11 attacks. Important members included Mohamed Atta, who led the four hijacking teams in 2001 and piloted American Airlines Flight 11; Ramzi bin al-Shibh, who conspired with the other three members but was unable to enter the United States; Marwan al-Shehhi, who piloted United Airlines Flight 175; and Ziad Jarrah, who piloted United Airlines Flight 93 and failed to hit a target in Washington, D.C.. Other members included Said Bahaji, Zakariya Essabar, Mounir el-Motassadeq, and Abdelghani Mzoudi.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg_cell


The Deutsche Bank Building (formerly Bankers Trust Plaza) was a 39-story office building located at 130 Liberty Street in Manhattan, New York City, adjacent to the World Trade Center site. The building opened in 1974 and closed following the September 11 attacks in 2001, due to contamination that spread from the collapse of the South Tower. The structure was designed by Shreve, Lamb & Harmon, which also designed the Empire State Building.


The building was purchased by Deutsche Bank when it acquired Bankers Trust in 1998. It was part of the skyline of Lower Manhattan, and was demolished between 2007 and 2011. 5 World Trade Center will eventually replace the building, expanding the ground space on which the World Trade Center stands, as this land was not part of the original World Trade Center.


September 11th

The collapse of the South Tower during the September 11 attacks tore a 24-story gash into the facade of the building, knocked out a load-bearing column,[3] and destroyed 158,000 square feet of floor space.[4] Additionally, an elevated plaza[5] that was located at the base of the building was destroyed by the collapse.[6]


One person is known to have died within the building during the attacks.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsche_Bank_Building


Katharina von Bora (German: [kataˈʁiːnaː fɔn ˈboːʁaː]; 29 January 1499? – 20 December 1552), after her wedding Katharina Luther, also referred to as "die Lutherin" ('the Lutheress'),[1] was the wife of the German reformer Martin Luther and a seminal figure of the Protestant Reformation. Although little is known about her, she is often considered to have been important to the Reformation, her marriage setting a precedent for Protestant family life and clerical marriage.[2]


Ancestry

Katharina von Bora was the daughter to a family of Saxon lesser nobility.[3][4][5] According to common belief, she was born on 29 January 1499 in Lippendorf, but there is no evidence of this in contemporary documents. Due to there being multiple branches in her family and the uncertainty of her birth name, there are diverging theories about her place of birth.[6] One of them proposes that she was born in Hirschfeld and that her parents were Hans von Bora zu Hirschfeld and his wife, born Anna von Haugwitz.[7][8] It is also possible that Katharina was the daughter of Jan von Bora auf Lippendorf and his wife Margarete, both of whom were only mentioned in 1505.[9]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katharina_von_Bora


The Cistercian Order

Main article: Cistercians

In 1075 Robert de Molesme, a Benedictine monk from Cluny Abbey, had obtained the permission of Pope Gregory VII to found a monastery at Molesme in Burgundy. At Molesme, Robert tried to restore monastery practice to the simple and severe character of the original Rule of Saint Benedict, called "Strict Observance". Being only partly successful in this at Molesme, Robert in 1098 led a band of 21 monks from their abbey at Molesme to establish a new monastery. The monks acquired a plot of marsh land just south of Dijon called Cîteaux (Latin: "Cistercium") and set about building a new monastery there which became Cîteaux Abbey, the mother Abbey of the newly founded Cistercian Order.[10]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cluniac_Reforms


Finally, the Constitutions train us all for perfection, instructing us in the weapons to be used in combatting our three fierce and raging adversaries. They teach us how to counter the lust of the flesh with chastity, the lust of the eyes with poverty, and the pride of life with obedience. I shall say nothing of our observance of chastity (in which we should imitate the purity of the angels so far as our frailty allows), or of our OBSERVANCE of poverty (which is so STRICT that neither churches nor professed houses may acquire any rents, lands, or even perpetual endowments). As for obedience, however, by which we consecrate the chief and noblest part of ourselves to God, our Constitutions require of us that it be so prompt, eager, perfect, and integral that we do not swerve even a hairsbreadth from our superiors commands. In matters falling under obedience, not only must our action be guided by the superior s command and our will by his will, but even something much more difficult our understanding by his understanding.

To sum up: men crucified to the world, and to whom the world itself is crucified[7] such would our Constitutions have us to be; new men, I say, who have put off their affections to put on Christ;[8] dead to themselves to live to justice; who, with St. Paul in labors, in watchings, in fastings, in chastity, in knowledge, in long suffering, in sweetness, in the Holy Spirit, in charity unfeigned, in the word of truth, show themselves ministers of God[9] and by the armor of Justice on the right hand and, on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report, by good success finally and ill success, press forward with great strides to their heavenly country. This is the sum and aim of our institute.

And so I beseech you, brothers in the Lord, that we may walk in a manner worthy of our vocation,[10] and, in order to know that vocation, may read and reread these Constitutions that have been bestowed upon us by the gift of God. Let us study them day and night. Let us vie with each other in learning them, pondering them, and keeping them. If we do so, our name will be matched by our lives and our profession made manifest in deed.

Farewell in Christ.

Rome, the house of the Society of Jesus, 1559 [7]

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Marduk (/ˈmɑːrdʊk/;[2] cuneiform: 𒀭𒀫𒌓 dAMAR.UTU; Sumerian: amar utu.k "calf of the sun; solar calf"; Hebrew: מְרֹדַךְ, Modern: Merōdaḵ, Tiberian: Mərōḏaḵ) is a god from ancient Mesopotamia and patron deity of Babylon who eventually rose to prominence in the 1st millennium BC. In Babylon, Marduk was worshipped in the temple Esagila. His symbol is the spade and he is associated with the Mušḫuššu.[3]


By the 1st millennium BC, Marduk had become astrologically associated with the planet Jupiter. He was a prominent figure in Babylonian cosmology, especially in the Enūma Eliš creation myth.


Name

The name of Marduk was solely spelled as dAMAR.UTU in the Old Babylonian Period, although other spellings such as MES and dŠA.ZU were also in use since the Kassite Period. In the 1st millennium BC, the ideograms dŠU and KU were regularly used.[4] The logogram for Adad is also occasionally used to spell Marduk.[5]


Texts from the Old Babylonian period support the pronunciation Marutu or Marutuk, with the shortened spelling Martuk or Marduk attested starting from the Kassite period. His name in Hebrew, Merodak, supports the longer version,[6] and First Millennium Assyrian and Babylonian texts employ the long spelling when the circumstances call for the precise form of the name.[7] The personal name Martuku is not to be confused with the god Marduk.[8] Marduk was commonly called Bēl (lord) in the First Millennium BC.[9]


The etymology for the name Marduk is generally understood to be derived from damar-utu-(a)k, meaning "bull-calf of Utu".[7] Sommerfield suggests this is used to explain the name Marduk in the Enuma Elish as "He is the 'son of the sun[a]' of the gods, radiant is he."[11] While the name may suggest a relationship with Shamash, Marduk has no genealogy with the sun god.[12] However, Babylon was closely associated with the city of Sippar in this period, which may have been the reason for the name.[13]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marduk


Gautama

surname of the Buddha, from Sanskrit Gotamah, properly a patronymic, literally "descendant of the greatest ox," from superlative of gauh "ox, bull, cow."

https://www.etymonline.com/word/buddha


Unam Sanctam

One God, One Faith, One Spiritual Authority

Pope Boniface VIII - 1302

Bull of Pope Boniface VIII promulgated November 18, 1302

Urged by faith, we are obliged to believe and to maintain that the Church is one, holy, catholic, and also apostolic. We believe in her firmly and we confess with simplicity that outside of her there is neither salvation nor the remission of sins, as the Spouse in the Canticles [Sgs 6:8] proclaims: ‘One is my dove, my perfect one. She is the only one, the chosen of her who bore her,‘ and she represents one sole mystical body whose Head is Christ and the head of Christ is God [1 Cor 11:3]. In her then is one Lord, one faith, one baptism [Eph 4:5]. There had been at the time of the deluge only one ark of Noah, prefiguring the one Church, which ark, having been finished to a single cubit, had only one pilot and guide, i.e., Noah, and we read that, outside of this ark, all that subsisted on the earth was destroyed.

We venerate this Church as one, the Lord having said by the mouth of the prophet: ‘Deliver, O God, my soul from the sword and my only one from the hand of the dog.’ [Ps 21:20] He has prayed for his soul, that is for himself, heart and body; and this body, that is to say, the Church, He has called one because of the unity of the Spouse, of the faith, of the sacraments, and of the charity of the Church. This is the tunic of the Lord, the seamless tunic, which was not rent but which was cast by lot [Jn 19:23- 24]. Therefore, of the one and only Church there is one body and one head, not two heads like a monster; that is, Christ and the Vicar of Christ, Peter and the successor of Peter, since the Lord speaking to Peter Himself said: ‘Feed my sheep‘ [Jn 21:17], meaning, my sheep in general, not these, nor those in particular, whence we understand that He entrusted all to him [Peter]. Therefore, if the Greeks or others should say that they are not confided to Peter and to his successors, they must confess not being the sheep of Christ, since Our Lord says in John ‘there is one sheepfold and one shepherd.’ We are informed by the texts of the gospels that in this Church and in its power are two swords; namely, the spiritual and the temporal. For when the Apostles say: ‘Behold, here are two swords‘ [Lk 22:38] that is to say, in the Church, since the Apostles were speaking, the Lord did not reply that there were too many, but sufficient. Certainly the one who denies that the temporal sword is in the power of Peter has not listened well to the word of the Lord commanding: ‘Put up thy sword into thy scabbard‘ [Mt 26:52]. Therefore, both are in the power of the Church, namely, the spiritual sword and the material. But indeed, the latter is to be exercised on behalf of the Church; and truly, the former is to be exercised by the Church. The former is of the priest; the latter is by the hand of kings and soldiers, but at the will and sufferance of the priest.


However, one sword ought to be subordinated to the other and temporal authority, subjected to spiritual power. For since the Apostle said: ‘There is no power except from God and the things that are, are ordained of God‘ [Rom 13:1-2], but they would not be ordained if one sword were not subordinated to the other and if the inferior one, as it were, were not led upwards by the other.


For, according to the Blessed Dionysius, it is a law of the divinity that the lowest things reach the highest place by intermediaries. Then, according to the order of the universe, all things are not led back to order equally and immediately, but the lowest by the intermediary, and the inferior by the superior. Hence we must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power whatever, as spiritual things surpass the temporal. This we see very clearly also by the payment, benediction, and consecration of the tithes, but the acceptance of power itself and by the government even of things. For with truth as our witness, it belongs to spiritual power to establish the terrestrial power and to pass judgement if it has not been good. Thus is accomplished the prophecy of Jeremias concerning the Church and the ecclesiastical power: ‘Behold to-day I have placed you over nations, and over kingdoms‘ and the rest. Therefore, if the terrestrial power err, it will be judged by the spiritual power; but if a minor spiritual power err, it will be judged by a superior spiritual power; but if the highest power of all err, it can be judged only by God, and not by man, according to the testimony of the Apostle: ‘The spiritual man judgeth of all things and he himself is judged by no man‘ [1 Cor 2:15]. This authority, however, (though it has been given to man and is exercised by man), is not human but rather divine, granted to Peter by a divine word and reaffirmed to him (Peter) and his successors by the One Whom Peter confessed, the Lord saying to Peter himself, ‘Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound also in Heaven‘ etc., [Mt 16:19]. Therefore whoever resists this power thus ordained by God, resists the ordinance of God [Rom 13:2], unless he invent like Manicheus two beginnings, which is false and judged by us heretical, since according to the testimony of Moses, it is not in the beginnings but in the beginning that God created heaven and earth [Gen 1:1]. Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

https://www.papalencyclicals.net/bon08/b8unam.htm


Before the discoveries of the authors of Holy Blood, Holy Grail, Dagobert's assassination was

regarded as the end of the Merovingian dynasty. At least this is what the Catholic Church wanted

the world to believe. In its place in 754 A.D. Rome established the Carolingian dynasty with

Pepin II. The name "Carolingian" derives from Charles Martel, grandfather of Charlemagne, the

61

first designated "Holy Roman Emperor." This title, by virtue of the pact with Clovis three

centuries before, should have been reserved exclusively for the Merovingians.

The authors of Holy Blood discovered, however, that Dagobert's son (Sigisbert IV) by his second

wife had survived. His sister had rescued him and smuggled him southward to the domain of his

mother, the Visigoth princess Giselle de Razes. Arriving in the Lanquedoc (southern France) in

681 A.D., he shortly thereafter inherited his uncle's titles - Duke of Razes and Count of Rhedae.

Sigisbert also adopted the surname "Plant-Ard" (subsequently Plantard), which means "ardently

flowering shoot" of the Merovingian vine. Under this name, and under the titles acquired from

his uncle, he perpetuated his lineage. By 886 A.D. one branch of that lineage culminated in a

certain Bernard Plantavelu (which name is a derivative of Plant-Ard or Plantard), whose son

became the first Duke of Aquitaine.18

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://ia803001.us.archive.org/28/items/ScarletAndTheBeastJohnDaniel1995/Scarlet%20and%20the%20Beast,%20John%20Daniel%20(1995).pdf


The House of Tudor (/ˈtjuː.dər/, TEW-dər)[1] was an English and Welsh dynasty that held the throne of England from 1485 to 1603.[2] They descended ultimately from Ednyfed Fychan and the Tudors of Penmynydd, a Welsh noble family, and Catherine of Valois. The Tudor monarchs were also descended from the House of Lancaster. They ruled the Kingdom of England and the Lordship of Ireland (later the Kingdom of Ireland) for 118 years with five monarchs: Henry VII, Henry VIII,[3] Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I. The Tudors succeeded the House of Plantagenet as rulers of the Kingdom of England, and were succeeded by the Scottish House of Stuart. The first Tudor monarch, Henry VII, descended through his mother from the House of Beaufort, a legitimised branch of the English royal House of Lancaster, a cadet house of the Plantagenets. The Tudor family rose to power and started the Tudor period in the wake of the Wars of the Roses (1455–1487), which left the main House of Lancaster (with which the Tudors were aligned) extinct in the male line.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Tudor


Margaret Tudor (29 November 1489 – 18 October 1541) was Queen of Scotland from 1503 until 1513 by marriage to James IV. She then served as regent of Scotland during her son's minority, and fought to extend her regency. Margaret was the eldest daughter and second child of Henry VII of England and Elizabeth of York, and the elder sister of Henry VIII. By her line, the House of Stuart eventually acceded to the throne of England and Ireland, in addition to Scotland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Tudor


James Francis Edward Stuart (10 June 1688 – 1 January 1766) [a] was the House of Stuart claimant to the thrones of England, Ireland and Scotland from 1701 until his death in 1766. The only son of James II of England and his second wife, Mary of Modena, he was Prince of Wales and heir until his Catholic father was deposed and exiled in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. His Protestant half-sister Mary II and her husband William III became co-monarchs. As a Catholic, he was subsequently excluded from the succession by the Act of Settlement 1701.


Raised primarily in France and Italy, when his father died in September 1701 James claimed the thrones. As part of the War of the Spanish Succession, in 1708 Louis XIV of France backed a landing in Scotland on his behalf. This failed, as did further attempts in 1715 and 1719. Led by his elder son Charles Edward Stuart, the 1745 Rising was the last serious effort to restore the House of Stuart.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Francis_Edward_Stuart  


Trump International, Scotland

@TrumpScotland

Donald J Trump, 45th President of the United States, announced today the start of a new golf venture in Scotland: the MacLeod course, to be built at Trump International Scotland in Aberdeenshire in honor of his late mother Mary Anne MacLeod.

10:47 AM · May 1, 2023

https://x.com/TrumpScotland/status/1653093764271857666  


According to doctrinal English opinion, the present heir to the Royal House of Stuart is Prince Franz of Bavaria who is said to inherit the Scottish honours by virtue of the Last Will and Testament of Charles Edward’syounger brother, Cardinal Henry, de jure Duke of York. This Will supposedly nominated Charles Emmanuel IV of Sardinia as the Stuart successor. By wayof marriages in the female line of descent from Charles Emmanuel’s brother, Victor Emmanuel I, the present Franz of Bavaria succeeds his father, the late Prince Albrecht, relying in this on a somewhat tenuous ancestry back to Henrietta, a daughter of Charles I. The fact is, however, that Cardinal Henry Stuart’s Will did not name Charles Emmanuel as his successor. This is acomplete fantasy that has made its way into the historybooks, but was originally a purposely-contrived deceptionon the part of Georgian politicians — a deception perpetuated by the later Victorian ministers.From the time that the Elector of Hanover began his reign as King George I of Britain in 1714, it became politically expedient to suppress or veil a good deal of information about certain families while enhancing the lineage of others. The House of Stuart came underparticular attack in order to justify the incoming German succession. Even today, history books repeat the nonsense contrived contemporarily and afterwards to discredit the Scots dynasty and its associated families.


The fabrications are so well ingrained that they are destined to prevail for as long as historical authors continue to copy from one another.Charles Edward Stuart was married in 1772 to Princess Louise Maximilienne, the daughter of Gustavus, Prince de Stolberg-Guedern. In 1784, however, papal dispensation for divorce was obtained following Louise’s affair with the Italian poet Vittorio, Count Alfieri. Louise had been declared barren by the doctors,and after a few years of marriage she left Charles in 1780 to take up residence with her lover. The divorce is frequently described as the end of married life for Charles Edward — but it was not. The Stuart archives in Rome and Brussels reveal thatin November 1785 Charles was married again, to the Comtesse de Massillan at the Santi Apostoli in Rome. She was Marguerite Marie Thérése O’Dea d’Audibert de Lussan — a cousin by descent from Charles's grand uncle, King Charles II. Until 1769 she had been a ward of her own grand uncle, Louis Jacques d’Audibert, Archbishop of Bordeaux. Marguerite’s paternal grandmother Theresa, Marchesa d’Aubignie, was the daughter of James de Rohano Stuardo, Prince of Boveria, Marquis d’Aubignie. He was the natural son (legitimated 1667) of King Charles Il and Marguerite, Duchesse de Rohan. On her mother’s side, Margueritede Massillan was descended through the Comtes de Lussan. In November 1786 the 37-year-old Countess gavebirth to a son, Edouard Jacques Stuardo (Edward James Stuart), who became known as ‘Count Stuarton’. Although no secret in Europe, news of Charles Edward's legitimate son and heir was immediately suppressed by the Hanoverian government at Westminster. He has consequently since been totally neglected by academic historians in Britain. In that same month, Charles Edward's daughter Charlotte of Albany (born 1753 by Clementina Walkinshaw of Borrowfield) met King George III's brother William, Duke of Gloucester, at thehouse of Prince Santa Croce in Rome. Concerned about the strength of her own position as Charles Edward's ‘legitimated’ offspring, she informed Gloucester of the royal birth and sought his advice. The Duke confided that Charlotte’s status was probably safe enough, but his main concern was a letter that had been sent to her father by King George III in 1784. It suggested that Charles Edward could return to Britain from exile as the Count of Albany (Scotland). Charles had declined the invitation, but the matter was now complicated bythe new-born son who might well choose otherwise on becoming the Second Count in due course. When Charles Edward died, a contrived substitution of Wills enabled knowledge of both the marriage and the birth to be concealed from the British public, a concealment that was perpetuated through the Hanover—Saxe-Coburg era until the truth finally emerged inthe 1970s.  In 1784 Charles had made a Will nominating his brother Cardinal Henry, de jure Duke of York, as hisroyal heir. Charlotte of Albany was to be the sole estate beneficiary. This is well enough documented in the historical biographies — but what those accounts fail tomention is that this was not Charles's final Testament. It was superseded by another before his death. Not only was the fact of this later Will concealed by the Georgian Parliament, but so too was the reason for its existence. In order to stabilize King George III's position, his politicians thought it expedient to end the problem of Stuart popularity in Britain by having the Scottish linedeclared extinct — particularly since the Jacobites had been so instrumental in the American War of Independence (1775-1783). An enormous number of deprived Scots had emigrated to America following the subjugation of the Highlands after Culloden. They had not managed to regain their independence at home, but continued their Cause from across the Atlantic, thereby aiding their fellow Americans to secure their own freedom from Hanoverian constraint. On 30 January 1788 the de jure King Charles II (fondly remembered as Bonnie Prince Charlie) died, aged 67, at the Mutti Palazzo in Rome. Shortly before his death he wrote his Last Will and Testament. This was witnessed on 13 January 1788 by the Dominican Father O'Kelly and the Abbé Consalvi, both of whom were executors. The Will stated that Charles's offspring, Edward James and Charlotte, were to be co-heirs of the estate; his son Edward was to succeed to the Royal Honours on his 16th birthday, and Cardinal Henry was to be temporary Regent in the meantime. Following Charles Edward's demise, his ambitious brother Henry wasted no time in proclaiming himself King Henry I de jure of Scots (IX of England). To support this claim he produced not Charles’s Will of 1788 but his earlier Will of 1784 — which suited Britain’s Government since the Cardinal was not likely to have any children. Both O’Kelly and Consalvi were party to the intrigue in return for rapid promotion within the Church. Soon afterwards, the former became Dominican Procurator, while the Abbé was raised to the Cardinalate. Charlotte of Albany was provided with a home in Frascati, and the Mutti Palazzo was retained for Marguerite de Massillan and Prince Edward. Also involved in the scheme was the Abbé James Placid Waters, Procurator of the Benedictines in Rome. By declaring himself King de jure, Henry sought to nullify the immediate Regency clause in his brother’s Will. But in January 1789 Henry made his own Will in which he redressed his selfish strategy for the future: all his possessions and heritable status were bequeathed to Prince Edward James — that is, ‘to my nephew, Count Stuarton’. Both Cardinal Ercole Consalvi and Cardinal Angelo Cesarini were privy to the Will and were executors, as attested in their memoirs. As it happened, Henry subsequently lost a great deal of his wealth in the French Revolution and during the Napoleonic advance into the Papal States. In 1799 he became a pensioner of the British Crown at the rate of £5,000 per annum (about £250,000 in today’s terms) - but in return he was required to rewrite his Will. At a joint meeting between Prince Edward, Comtesse Marguerite, and the Pope, a suitable rewording was agreed. The new Will was made in 1802, but the inheritance still rested with Prince Edward. The revised document simply substituted the words ‘to my nephew, Count Stuarton’ with ‘in favour of that Prince to whom it descends by virtue of de jure blood relationship’. When Henry Stuart died in July 1807, King George and the British Parliament decided that the second Will was actually less appropriate than the former. They therefore ignored the 1802 document and reverted to Henry’s original Will of 1789 — and the press reported that Henry had made his bequest to his ‘relation Count Stuarton’ (meaning, of course, Edward James). However, no one in England thought to enquire who this relation, Count Stuarton, might be. Having dealt with the first hurdle, the Hanoverian ministers then produced Henry’s amended 1802 Will. By virtue of its malleable nature, the wording (‘in favour of that Prince to whom it descends by virtue of de jure blood relationship’) was strategically implemented in favour of Charles Emmanuel IV, ex-King of Sardinia. He had recently abdicated to join the Jesuit Order, and so the Stuart legacy passed to a potentially childless monk. Charles Emmanuel duly wrote to King George's Parliament denouncing the nomination because heknew the Stuarts to be alive and well. Indeed, having lived with him in Sardinia from 1797, Marguerite andher son Edward were then resident at his house by the Corso in Rome. The correspondence was ignored at Westminster, and the whole issue was put under wraps in Britain. History now records the ‘diverted succession’ as having progressed from Sardinia, through Modena, into Bavaria. The reality is that the legitimate Royal House of Stuart (Stewart) exists today, and haslong been actively interested in European constitutional management. In 1809 a dispute over sovereign loyalties arose between two sons of George III. It became known as the ‘War of the Brothers’. Prince Edward, Duke of Kent (the father of Queen Victoria), was a Freemason, while his brother Prince Augustus Frederick, Duke of Sussex,was a Knight Templar. Edward's problem was that his brother’s Templar colleagues were Stuart supporters. He therefore endeavoured to sway their allegiance tothe reigning House of Hanover. In the event he failed, but compromised by creating a Templar-styled branch within the existing Masonic structure. This fell under the protectorate of Kent, and followed the English York Rite of Freemasonry. The chivalric Templars pursued the Scottish Rite under the protectorate of Prince Edward James Stuart, Second Count of Albany. While the exiled Stuarts were in France and Italy, they were deeply involved with the general growth and dissemination of Freemasonry, and they were the instigators of the exported Scottish Rite, which had higher degrees and held more profound mysteries than other Masonic systems. Prominent in this movement was Charles Edward's cousin and mentor, the Comte de St Germain. The Stuarts’ involvement was firmly based on established rights and privileges, with a desire to initiate brethren into the true antiquity and pedigree ofthe Craft. In England, the inherent secrecy of the club like lodges provided the perfect facility for undercover intrigue against the Whigs and the German succession. Throughout the land, the Jacobite societies and Tory lodges became closely entwined — as a result of which they became prime targets for Whig Intelligence, whose high-ranking Secret Service operatives duly infiltrated the fraternities. In later years English Freemasonry dispensed with political intrigue to become more concerned with allegorical representation and the codes of brotherly love, faith and charity. In Europe, however, many scientifically-based intellectual lodges of the traditional style are still extant. In 1817 a Dr Robert Watson purchased in Rome some of Cardinal Henry’s documents concerning the Stuart dynasty. He paid £23 sterling (equivalent to about £610 today), and prepared to publish the contents. But, beforehe had a chance to do this, the files were seized by the papal police and passed to London so that their contents would not become known. Some time later, the doctor received a payment from Westminster for having been deprived of his property. Not content with this, Watson pursued his right to the papers — only to be found dead, supposedly having committed suicide, in 1838. The papers have never since appeared in the public domain. Along with Cardinal Henry, the Abbé Waters also lost his possessions and became a pensioner of King George. Waters, an executor for Charlotte of Albany, was the custodian of various other Stuart papers — his guardianship of which constituted the route to his future Hanoverian income. In 1805 the Abbé was obliged to pass them over to the British Government. At length, some were deposited at Windsor Castle, where they remain today. As for the rest, their whereabouts are conveniently unknown.


By virtue of these documentary acquisitions, the way was deemed clear for Prince Edward James to be totally excluded from historical records in Britain. But this was not the case in continental Europe, where he is well documented in papers held by the Stuart Trustees, and features in the writings of René, Vicomte Chateaubriand, Abbé James Waters, Princess Caroline Murat, and others. Although the Stuarts have been ignored by the British authorities since the death of Cardinal Henry, the descendants of Prince Edward James, Count Stuarton, Second Count of Albany, have been actively engaged in social, political, military and sovereign affairs for the past two centuries. They have often advised governments on constitutional and diplomatic matters in an effort to promote the ideals of public service and religious toleration, as upheld by their own reigning house, and they have been particularly concerned with matters of trade, welfare and education. In 1888 Prince Edward's grandson, Charles Benedict James Stuart, Fourth Count of Albany, was scheduled to visit Britain. He was due to attend a grand Stuart Exhibition at the New Gallery, London. It was sponsored by the Order of the White Rose, and the main organizers were Bertram, Earl of Ashburnham, and Melville Massue, Marquis de Ruvigny. But the Exhibition was wholly undermined by Hanoverian agents, and Prince Charles Benedict was found dead (presumed murdered) in Italy. There was no display in 1888 after all. A rather different Exhibition was held the following year. Instead of being in honour of the Stuarts, as was planned, it was promoted to celebrate the bicentenary of the Whig Revolution which had deposed James VII (Il) and the Stuarts in 1688! The Exhibition’s new patron was Queen Victoria herself, and the event was used as a cover to obtain even more valuable documents of Stuart heritage. Having been ousted from their patronage, Lord Ashburnham and the Marquis de Ruvigny directed their future interests towards the chivalric societies of Europe — the Order of the Realm of Sion, the Knights Protectors of the Sacred Sepulchre, and the Order of the Sangréal. In spite of Queen Victoria’s efforts to suppress Stuart popularity, there was a significant Jacobite revival in the late 1800s. The Queen’s advisers therefore sought to emphasize her tenuous claim to Stuart descent to the exclusion of the Stuarts’ own Scottish heritage. As a result, Thane Banquo and the Scots line from King Alpin disappeared from the Hanoverians’ readjusted Stuart registers. The Lord Lyon, King of Arms, subsequently wrote, ‘The traditional account of the descent of the family from Banquo, Thane of Lochaber, and through him from the ancient Kings of Scotland, is now generally discredited.’ From that time, the Stuarts’ Breton line was brought wholly to the fore —- but why anyone should have to discredit one line of a descent in order to promote another is beyond ordinary understanding. Everyone has at least two lines of immediate descent, and the Stuarts were no exception. Subsequent members of the Scots Royal Family were prominent in the Belgian Resistance during World War Il. Hubert Pierlot, Prime Minister of Belgium, was a close friend of the Stewarts, who had reverted to the original spelling of their name in 1892. In that year they had moved to the Chateau du Moulin in the Belgian Ardennes, where they lived until 1968. This castle had originally been given to the family in 1692 by King Louis XIV. As recently as 1982, the City of Brussels honoured the Stewarts with a grand reception. Then, on 14 December 1990, the Brussels Registrars signed, sealed and authenticated an updated Charter of the Royal House of Stewart, detailing the complete family descent from the time of Robert the Bruce down to date.


Today, there are several lines descended from Prince Edward James, Second Count of Albany. They include the Counts of Derneley and the Dukes of Coldingham. Foremost, however, in the main line of legitimate descent from Charles Edward Stewart and his son Edward James is the present Seventh Count of Albany: Prince Michael James Alexander Stewart, Duc d’Aquitaine, Comte de Blois, Head of the Sacred Kindred of St Columba, Knight Grand Commander of the Order of the Temple of Jerusalem, Patron Grand Officer of the International Society of Commission Officers for the Commonwealth, and President of the European Council of Princes. Prince Michael’s own compelling book Scotland — The Forgotten Kingdom? (a thoroughly detailed and politically corrected history of the Scots royal descent) is now in the course of preparation. This senior Stewart descent goes all the way back to King Arthur's father, King Aedan of Scots, on the one hand and to Prince Nascien of the Septimanian Midi on the other. The Scots descent traces further back through King Lucius of Siluria to Bran the Blessed and Joseph of Arimathea (St James the Just), while the Midi succession stems from the Merovingians’ male ancestral line through the Fisher Kings to Jesus and Mary Magdalene. Conjoining the lines from their 1st-century points of departure, the descent is in the succession of the Royal House of Judah. This is a truly unique line of sovereign lineage from King David in one of the key descents which comprise the Bloodline of the Holy Grail.

pages 427-436

Chapter 20 "The Sangreal Today"

Bloodline of the Holy Grail

by Laurence Gardner

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zsH4O_ls0IgWEYXLXWCo7I3IUi32FJhq/view?usp=sharing


The Alans (Latin: Alani) were an ancient and medieval Iranic nomadic pastoral people who migrated to what is today North Caucasus;[1][2][3][4][5] some continued on to Europe and later North Africa. They are generally regarded as part of the Sarmatians, and possibly related to the Massagetae.[6] Modern historians have connected the Alans with the Central Asian Yancai of Chinese sources and with the Aorsi of Roman sources.[7] Having migrated westwards and becoming dominant among the Sarmatians on the Pontic–Caspian steppe, the Alans are mentioned by Roman sources in the 1st century CE.[1][2] At that time they had settled the region north of the Black Sea and frequently raided the Parthian Empire and the South Caucasus provinces of the Roman Empire.[8] From 215 to 250 CE the Goths broke their power on the Pontic Steppe,[4] thereby assimilating a sizeable portion of the associated Alans.


Upon the Hunnic defeat of the Goths on the Pontic Steppe around 375 CE, many of the Alans migrated westwards along with various Germanic tribes. They crossed the Rhine in 406 along with the Vandals and Suebi, settling in Orléans and Valence. Around 409 they joined the Vandals and Suebi in crossing the Pyrenees into the Iberian Peninsula, settling in Lusitania and Hispania Carthaginensis.[9] The Iberian Alans, soundly defeated by the Visigoths in 418, subsequently surrendered their authority to the Hasdingi Vandals.[10] In 428 CE, the Vandals and Alans crossed the Strait of Gibraltar into North Africa, where they founded a kingdom which lasted until its conquest by forces of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I in 534.[10]


Eventually in the 9th century those Alans who remained under Hunnic rule established the regionally powerful kingdom of Alania in the Northern Caucasus. It survived until the Mongol invasions of the 13th century. Various scholars regard these Alans as the ancestors of the modern Ossetians.[8][11]


The Alans spoke an Eastern Iranian language which derived from Scytho-Sarmatian; in turn, the language evolved into the modern Ossetian language.[2][12][13] The name Alan represents an Eastern Iranian dialectal form of Old Iranian term Aryan,[1][2][14] and so is cognate with the name of the country Īrān (from the gen. plur. *aryānām).[15]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alans


The Camino de Santiago (Latin: Peregrinatio Compostellana, lit. 'Pilgrimage of Compostela'; Galician: O Camiño de Santiago),[1] or the Way of St. James in English, is a network of pilgrims' ways or pilgrimages leading to the shrine of the apostle James in the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia in northwestern Spain, where tradition holds that the remains of the apostle are buried. Pilgrims follow its routes as a form of spiritual path or retreat for their spiritual growth. It is also popular with hikers, cyclists, and organized tour groups.


Created and established in the beginning of the 9th century following the discovery of the relics of Saint James the Great, the Way of St. James became a major pilgrimage route of medieval Christianity from the 10th century onwards. Following the end of the Granada War in 1492, under the reign of the Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile, Pope Alexander VI officially declared the Camino de Santiago to be one of the "three great pilgrimages of Christendom", along with Jerusalem and the Via Francigena to Rome.


In 1987, the Camino, which encompasses several routes in Spain, France, and Portugal, was declared the first Cultural Route of the Council of Europe. Since 2013, the Camino has attracted more than 200,000 pilgrims each year, with an annual growth rate of more than 10 percent. Pilgrims come mainly on foot and often from nearby cities, requiring several days of walking to reach Santiago. The French Way gathers two-thirds of the walkers, but other minor routes are experiencing a growth in popularity. The French Way and the Northern routes in Spain were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List, followed by the routes in France in 1998, because of their historical significance for Christianity as a major pilgrimage route and their testimony to the exchange of ideas and cultures across the routes.[2][3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camino_de_Santiago


Alan fitz Flaad (c. 1060 – after 1120) was a Breton knight, probably recruited as a mercenary by Henry I of England in his conflicts with his brothers.[1] After Henry became King of England, Alan became an assiduous courtier and obtained large estates in Norfolk, Sussex, Shropshire, and elsewhere in the Midlands, including the feudal barony and castle of Oswestry in Shropshire.[2][3][4] His duties included supervision of the Welsh border.[5] He is now noted as the progenitor of the FitzAlan family, the Earls of Arundel (1267–1580), and the House of Stuart,[6] although his family connections were long a matter of conjecture and controversy.


Career

Arrival in England

Flaad and his son Alan had come to the favourable notice of King Henry I of England who, soon after his accession, brought Flaad and Alan to England. Eyton, consistently following the theory of the Scottish origins of the Stewarts, thought this was because he was part of the entourage of the Queen, Matilda of Scotland,[7] Round pointed out that Henry had been besieged in Mont-Saint-Michel during his struggle with his brothers,[1] an event which probably occurred in 1091. He is known to have recruited Breton troops at that time and, after his surrender, left the scene via the adjoining regions of Brittany, where Dol is situated. This is a likely explanation for the Bretons in the military retinue he brought to England after the death of William Rufus.


Alan's career in England can be traced largely through his presence as a witness to charters granted by the king during his travels in the first decade or more of his reign. Some of his activities were traced by Eyton, and his researches overlap with William Farrer's calendar of Henry I travel. All of the business in which he took part was ecclesiastical, involving grants, sometimes disputed, to churches and monasteries.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_fitz_Flaad


Al-Andalus[a] (Arabic: الأَنْدَلُس) was the Muslim-ruled area of the Iberian Peninsula. The term is used by modern historians for the former Islamic states in modern Spain, Portugal[1] and France. The name describes the different Muslim[2][3] states that controlled these territories at various times between 711 and 1492. At its greatest geographical extent, it occupied most of the peninsula[4][5][6] and part of present-day southern France (Septimania) under Umayyad rule. These boundaries changed constantly through a series of conquests Western historiography has traditionally characterized as the Reconquista,[2][3][7][8][9] eventually shrinking to the south and finally to the Emirate of Granada.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Andalus


1236

June 29 – Siege of Córdoba: Castilian forces under King Ferdinand III (the Saint) capture Muslim Córdoba from Emir Ibn Hud, as part of the Reconquista of the Iberian Peninsula.[2]

July – At a diet (princely convention) in Piacenza, Emperor Frederick II proclaims his wish to recover all Italy for the Holy Roman Empire.[3]


Pope Gregory IX condemned the links that both the Knights Templer and Knights Hospitaller have with the Assassin fighters in the Middle East. He issues a bull, a formal proclamation issued by the pope, preventing further contact with the Assassins.

May 6 – Roger of Wendover, English Benedictine monk and chronicler, dies at St. Albans Abbey. His chronicle is continued by Matthew of Paris.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1236


Atheism: resisting it with all our forces is a special mission given to the Society by the supreme pontiff, 253 2°; a mission which should permeate all forms of our apostolate, 254; our efforts are to be directed toward nonbelievers, ibid.; toward that end, an experience of God must be fostered in ourselves, 223 §§3-4, 224, 247

1° 2° 3° 6°;

and also in others, by means of the Spiritual Exercises, 271

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996


The idea of uniting the Templars with the Hospitallers was first argued publicly in a book published in 1305 by Raimon Llull, a renowned illuminatus from Majorca. Llull’s book, Libre de Fine, (“Free At Last”) appeared in the midst of a raging controversy between the French monarchy and the Roman papacy over who held jurisdiction over the Templars. That is the subject of our next chapter.

Rulers of Evil

by F. Tupper Saussy

https://dn790006.ca.archive.org/0/items/rulers-of-evil-f.-tupper-saussy/Rulers%20of%20Evil%20-%20F.%20Tupper%20Saussy.pdf


CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION AND HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

The alumbrados of Castile were a movement that caused much trouble during the first three decades of the sixteenth century. Their ideas were represented by the “Big Three” beatas who, under noble patronage, for at least a decade previous to the arrest in 1524 of the “mother” of the movement (Isabel de la Cruz) had successfully proselytized and spread their ideas throughout Old and New Castile.1

The alumbrados certainly were a charismatic bunch; they enjoyed success with the elites of Castilian society, comuneros, but above all with women and conversos. As a religious movement led by women the alumbrados were part of a growing trend of individual, charismatic female piety. By the time of Cardinal Cisneros’s death in 1517, however, the era of the alumbrados and their grassroots converso spirituality was nearing its end. While the actual heyday of their movement was short-lived the alumbrados made a huge impact upon the minds Prospering in the environment of Catholic spiritual exploration fostered by the personal theological interests of the Archbishop of Toledo Cardinal Ximenez de Cisneros the alumbrados presented an interiorized approach to Christianity. Equipped with the meditational practice of dejamiento the alumbrados stressed the importance of an individual, pseudo-mystical “abandonment” to God and His will. They also emphasized the insignificance of external rituals and works, calling them ataduras or “shackles” to the material world, ties that only served to hinder one’s abandonment to God.

of the Inquisitors who prosecuted them and upon the Spanish religious imagination, an impact that would last across seas and time."

EL SABOR DE HEREJIA: THE EDICT OF 1525, THE ALUMBRADOS

AND THE INQUISITORS’ USAGE OF LOCURA

By

JAVIER A. MONTOYA

http://etd.fcla.edu/UF/UFE0041385/montoya_j.pdf


El[a] is a Northwest Semitic word meaning 'god' or 'deity', or referring (as a proper name) to any one of multiple major ancient Near Eastern deities. A rarer form, 'ila, represents the predicate form in the Old Akkadian and Amorite languages.[8] The word is derived from the Proto-Semitic *ʔil-.[9]


Originally a Canaanite deity known as 'El, 'Al or 'Il the supreme god of the ancient Canaanite religion[10] and the supreme god of East Semitic speakers in Early Dynastic Period of Mesopotamia.[11] Among the Hittites, El was known as Elkunirša (Hittite: 𒂖𒆪𒉌𒅕𒊭 Elkunīrša).


Although El gained different appearances and meanings in different languages over time, it continues to exist as El-, -il or -el in compound proper noun phrases such as Elizabeth, Ishmael, Israel, Samuel, Daniel, Michael, Gabriel (Arabic: Jibra'il), and Bethel.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_(deity)


The first member of the family who was known to use the name "Rothschild" was Isaak Elchanan Rothschild, born in 1577. The name is derived from the German zum rothen Schild (with the old spelling "th"), meaning "at the red shield", in reference to the house where the family lived for many generations (in those days, houses were designated not by numbers, but by signs displaying different symbols or colours). A red shield can still be seen at the centre of the Rothschild coat of arms. The family's ascent to international prominence began in 1744, with the birth of Mayer Amschel Rothschild in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. He was the son of Amschel Moses Rothschild (born circa 1710),[13] a money changer who had traded with the Prince of Hesse. Born in the "Judengasse", the ghetto of Frankfurt, Mayer developed a finance house and spread his empire by installing each of his five sons in the five main European financial centres to conduct business. The Rothschild coat of arms contains a clenched fist with five arrows symbolising the five dynasties established by the five sons of Mayer Rothschild, in a reference to Psalm 127: "Like arrows in the hands of a warrior, so are the children of one's youth." The family motto appears below the shield: Concordia, Integritas, Industria (Unity, Integrity, Industry).[14]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rothschild_family


When his grandson, Naftali Hirz left the "House at the Red Shield" in 1664 and moved to the Hinterpfann (a tenement in the back of a house at the northern end of the Judengasse), he took the name Rothschild with him."


The Family ‹ Rothschild Name & Arms :: The Rothschild Archive

https://www.rothschildarchive.org/family/the_rothschild_name_and_arms/any_questions


From Middle High German hirz, from Old High German hiruz, from Proto-West Germanic *herut, from Proto-Germanic *herutaz. Compare Dutch hert, English hart."


Hirsch - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Hirsch#:~:text=German-,Etymology,Compare%20Dutch%20hert%2C%20English%20hart.


The word “Hirz” has its origins in Arabic and is often used to refer to a fortified or protected place. In its broader sense, it represents a location or space that is enclosed and fortified, offering a sense of safety and protection to those inside."


What is Islamic Hirz and Amulet? - MyRings Boutique

https://www.myrings.co/blog/what-is-islamic-hirz-and-amulet/#:~:text=The%20word%20%E2%80%9CHirz%E2%80%9D%20has%20its,and%20protection%20to%20those%20inside.


Herzl is a beautiful boy's name of Yiddish origin. Borrowed from the name Hirsh, Herzl means “deer,” making it a special way to dote on your little one's delicate nature."


Herzl - Baby Name Meaning, Origin and Popularity (thebump.com)

https://www.thebump.com/b/herzl-baby-name


The ancestral home of the Herzl family is in the German province of Bavaria. Herzl is a German nickname surname. Such names came from eke-names, or added names, that described their initial bearer through reference to a physical characteristic or other attribute. It is a name for a kindhearted or stalwart individual, and is derived from the German word herz, which means heart."


Herzl Name Meaning, Family History, Family Crest & Coats of Arms (houseofnames.com)

https://www.houseofnames.com/herzl-family-crest


Old English heorte "heart (hollow muscular organ that circulates blood); breast, soul, spirit, will, desire; courage; mind, intellect," from Proto-Germanic *hertan- (source also of Old Saxon herta, Old Frisian herte, Old Norse hjarta, Dutch hart, Old High German herza, German Herz, Gothic hairto), from PIE root *kerd- "heart.""


heart | Etymology, origin and meaning of heart by etymonline

https://www.etymonline.com/word/heart


[666] 6. 1On the side of the superior general, what will aid toward this union of hearts are the qualities of his person [G], to be treated in Part IX [723-25], with which he will perform his office, 2which is to be for all the members a head from which the influence required for the end sought by the Society ought to descend to them all. 3It is thus from the general as head that all authority of the provincials should flow, from the provincials that of the local superiors, and from the local superiors that of the individual members. 4And from this same head, or at least by his commission and approval, should likewise come the appointing of missions. And the same should apply to communicating the graces of the Society. 5For the more the subjects are dependent upon their superiors, the better will the love, obedience, and union among them be preserved.

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? 10 I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings."

Jeremiah 17:9-10


6. The delegates commit to working with the schools to enhance the way parents and families are invited into our education and formation." The Rio Papers International Congress for Jesuit Education Delegates Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, October 2017

The Rio Papers (googleusercontent.com)

https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:ce18dDJhSfoJ:https://jesuitinstitute.org/Resources/Rio%2520Papers.pdf&cd=51&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us


Administration/administrators of temporal goods: 1. Of the Society in general: those who are administrators [326, 327, 419-21, 740-745, 759, 815]; the powers they have [743-745]; in what spirit and with what care and dedication the temporal goods of the Society are to be administered [305], 216 §§1, 2-4; social justice is to be safeguarded and fostered in the investment of money, 217; nothing is to be changed in or derogated from norms and instructions without permission, 216 §3; an account of one s administration is to be rendered [326, 741, 759], 167; especially so at the end of the t e rm s o f o f f i c e o f l o c a l superiors and treasurers, 222; negligent or wasteful superiors are to be corrected, 216 §4 2. Of one s own goods: is to be yielded from the beginning of novitiate and after first vows, 57 3. Of the goods of others: not to be undertaken without permission of the general, 166; administration of deposits of money from externs, whether in cash or in negotiable paper, should not be undertaken, 219. See also Buildings; Contracts in general, and in particular: Alienation of goods; Debts; Deposits; Gifts; Investment of money; Legacy; Rentals; Revenues

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


The Union Générale.

Meanwhile the Nationalist and Reactionary parties in France desired to counterbalance the "Semitic" influence of the Rothschilds by establishing a banking concern which should be essentially Catholic. Accordingly in 1876 the Union Générale was founded with a capital of 4,000,000 francs, increased to 25,000, 000 fraces in 1878 under the direction of a certain Bontoux. After various vicissitudes, graphically described by Zola in his novel "L'Argent," the Union failed, and brought many of the Catholic nobility of France to ruin, leaving the Rothschilds still more absolutely the undisputed leaders of French finance, but leaving also a legacy of hatred which had much influence on the growth of the anti-Semitic movement in France. Something analogous occurred in England when the century-long competition of the Barings and the Rothschilds culminated in the failure of the former in 1893; but in this case the Rothschilds came to the rescue of their rivals and prevented a universal financial catastrophe. It is a somewhat curious sequel to the attempt to set up a Catholic competitor to the Roths-childs that at the present time the latter are the guardians of the papal treasure.


Of recent years the Rothschilds have consistently refused to have anything to do with loans to Russia, owing to the anti-Jewish legislation of that empire, though on one occasion the members of the Paris house joined in a loan to demonstrate their patriotism as Frenchmen.

ROTHSCHILD - JewishEncyclopedia.com

https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/12909


Britain's Prince Andrew (L) and Sir Evelyn Rothsch

MARTHA'S VINEYARD, UNITED STATES: Britain's Prince Andrew (L) and Sir Evelyn Rothschild of London (R) watch US President Bill Clinton tee-off the first hole at the Farm Neck Golf Club 27 August 1999 in Martha's Vineyard. Andrew and Clinton made a joking wager for return of the island which was acquired by the US from Great Britian. (ELECTRONIC IMAGE) AFP PHOTO/Paul J. RICHARDS (Photo credit should read PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP via Getty Images)

https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/britains-prince-andrew-and-sir-evelyn-rothschild-of-london-news-photo/51617811


Did Jeffrey Epstein spend 2017 Thanksgiving at Mar-a-Lago with Trump? Claim viral amid emails row

By

Shamik Banerjee

Updated on: Nov 14, 2025 08:31 am IST

In the newly released Epstein emails, a note claimed Epstein supposedly spent 2017 Thanksgiving at Mar-a-Lago, despite Trump saying he banned him.


The newly released emails of Jeffrey Epstein, made public by the Democrat-led US House Oversight Committee on Wednesday, have sparked a row over the multiple mentions of President Donald Trump.


A banner of Jeffrey Epstein and President Donald Trump displayed during a protest earlier this year.(REUTERS)

One email from Faith Kates, created a lot of buzz over supposedly mentioning that Jeffrey Epstein spent the 2017 Thanksgiving at Mar-a-Lago, Trump's resort-sum-residence in Palm Beach, Florida. The email was shared by the official X handle of the Democrats, sparking a row.


The purported claim that Epstein was at Mar-a-Lago with Trump, celebrating Thanksgiving in 2017, is of particular interest, as Trump has repeatedly claimed that he banned Epstein from Mar-a-Lago.


Though Trump has not mentioned when the ban was brought into effect. Some reports claim that Epstein's account at Mar-a-Lago was closed in 2007.


What The Email States

In the email exchange between Faith Kates and Jeffrey Epstein, dated November 23, 2017, Kates asks Epstein about what he is doing for Thanksgiving. Epstein replies that he is having Thanksgiving at 'Eva's.' It is not immediately clear who Epstein refers to by "Eva."


Faith Kates then asks him who else is there at the party with him. He replies: "david fizel, hanson. trump." It was not immediately clear who these people were. But Democrats claimed that by "trump," Epstein meant Donald Trump. However, there is no mention of Mar-a-Lago on the emails.


Here's the viral exchange:


What The Epstein Emails Reveal On Trump

The newly released emails from Jeffrey Epstein have revealed details of his connection with high-profile individuals, including political operatives, royalty, and media figures. But, undoubtedly, the most talked-about aspect in them was the mentions of Donald Trump.


Also read: Trump-Epstein row: 10 explosive comments financier made about POTUS – ‘dog that hasn’t barked’ to ‘borderline insane’


In one email from 2011, Epstein told Ghislaine Maxwell that Donald Trump “spent hours at my house” with a trafficking victim and called Trump “that dog that hasn’t barked.”


Another 2019 message to author Michael Wolff stated that Trump “knew about the girls,” though it didn’t clarify the extent of Trump’s knowledge or involvement.


Notably, Trump has repeatedly denied his association with Epstein. He called the recently released emails a "hoax."

https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/us-news/did-jeffrey-epstein-spend-2017-thanksgiving-at-mar-a-lago-with-trump-claim-viral-amid-emails-row-101763087315941.html


What Epstein's emails reveal about the rich and famous who sought his advice

Financial and political intel? Sure. But there was so much more that Bold Face Names sought from the disgraced sex offender and former Trump friend.

Portrait of Josh MeyerJosh Meyer

USA TODAY


Was Bill Clinton on Epstein's island?


Did Trump know about Epstein's activities?


How did Epstein's network influence politics?


Was Bill Clinton on Epstein's island?


Which Senate Democrats voted with Republicans to end the shutdown?


WASHINGTON – The emails came at all hours of the day and night from the world’s rich and powerful. They all wanted advice from disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, especially after his former friend Donald Trump became president.


Political advice, sure. And, of course, to tap into Epstein’s much-touted − albeit murkily obtained − financial acumen.


But there was so much more that the bold face names sought from Epstein – and what he gave them in response − according to a USA TODAY review of the bombshell revelations in the more than 20,000 pages of Epstein emails released Nov. 12 by the House Oversight Committee.


Epstein died in a Manhattan jail while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges in April 2019.


“Who is your colonoscopy man?” friend and writer Michael Wolff asked on May 30, 2017, after Epstein nixed a Manhattan breakfast meeting because he was having the procedure. At the time, Wolff was writing a book about Trump's 2016 campaign and his ascension to the White House.


COLOGNE, GERMANY - FEBRUARY 28: Michael Wolff during the reading of his book 'Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House' ( Feuer und Zorn - Im Weissen Haus von Donald Trump ) at the lit.cologne on February 28, 2018 in Cologne, Germany. (Photo by Ralf Juergens/Getty Images)

Department store scion Jonathan Farkas, the husband of Trump’s ambassador to Malta, asked Epstein on May 8, 2017 what he thought of a woman he was seeing that was not his wife.


“careful she is nottrustworthy at ALLL,” Epstein said in one of his typically cryptic, typo-riddled and shorthand responses.


“a 2 timer?” asked Farkas?


“worse,” Epstein said.  


“Jeffrey please help me here is she a hooker,” Farkas asked.


Epstein’s response: “alcoholic . drugs. unstable . consumate liar. CAREFUL”


As an aside in the conversation, Farkas mentioned that his wife Somers “got an appointment from Trump” on a White House commission “because she bundled,” presumably in reference to collecting Trump presidential campaign contributions.


SOUTHAMPTON, NY - JULY 21: Jonathan Farkas and Somers Farkas attend Hamptons Magazine's 40th Anniversary Bash by Lawrence Scott Events presented by Compass at Southampton Arts Center on July 21, 2018 in Southampton, New York. (Photo by Mark Sagliocco/Getty Images for Hamptons Magazine)

'Annoyed shows caring., no whining showed strentgh'

Epstein bantered regularly with Lawrence Summers, or Larry as he called the former Harvard president and treasury secretary under Bill Clinton. One of their favorite topics was Trump, and his transition from real estate mogul to candidate and then president.


“How plausible is idea that trump is real cocaine user?” Summers asked Epstein on Oct. 2, 2016.


“zero. !” Epstein replied. “do you want to have dinner with rothchild in new york. thurs. , woody?”


The Rothchild, or more likely someone from the Rothschild banking family, was never revealed. The Woody was almost certainly the same Woody mentioned elsewhere in the emails: Woody Johnson, the billionaire businessman, prominent Trump campaign fundraiser and owner of the New York Jets. (Trump appointed Johnson ambassador to Britain in his first term.)


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But Summers also wanted relationship advice from Epstein, whose 2006 arrest amid allegations of trafficking in sex with underage girls was back in the news thanks to a bombshell investigative series in the Miami Herald. So was Epstein’s shockingly lenient 2008 plea deal with a prosecutor named Alex Acosta who was, by the time of their emailing, a member of Trump’s Cabinet as labor secretary.


In a March 16, 2019 email, Summers complained that an unidentified woman with whom he was involved was favoring another man.


“I said what are you up to. She said “I'm busy”. I said awfully coy u are,” Summers wrote Epstein, saying the woman had blown off their weekend plans in favor of  “guy number 3.”


“I said ok I got to go call me when u feel like it. Tone was not of good feeling,” Summers added. “I dint want to be in a gift giving competition while being the friend without benefits.”


Epstein wrote back minutes later with praise for Summers’ response.


“shes smart. making you pay for past errors,” Epstein wrote. “ignore the daddy im going to go out with the motorcycle guy,    .  you reacted well. .  annoyed shows caring.  ,  no whining showed strentgh.”


When Summers emailed the November before that to say he was going radio silence on another woman, Epstein replied: “She’s already begining to sound needy :) nice.”


(The periods at the end of Epstein's quotes at the end of sentences have been added by USA TODAY. Epstein didn’t waste his time ending most of his sentences with periods.)


Senior White House economic adviser Lawrence Summers speaks during an interview with Reuters in Washington June 24, 2010.

'Thank you a million times, Jeffrey'

There was virtually never a stated reason why all of these bigwigs – mostly men but also women – assumed Epstein would be able to provide insight into whatever was on their minds.


Epstein had no college degree; his first job was as a math and physics teacher at the elite Dalton School in Manhattan.


Despite that unconventional start, and with no transparent or easily explainable path to riches, Epstein emerged as a globe-trotting fixer who spent his time shuttling between luxury homes, private jets and his Caribbean island. His financial empire was opaque, seemingly built largely on connections, secrecy and the perception of influence.  


Oftentimes, they went back and forth about the day’s headlines, especially when it came to Trump. On occasion, they hinted at, or outright asked, for money.


“Larry has told me that you and a friend would like to contribute to my project (hallelujah and thank you a million times, Jeffrey) and that I ought to... write up a proposal asking for 500,000,” Summers' wife, Lisa New, wrote in an Oct. 27, 2014 email.


New, an American Literature professor at Harvard, wanted to do “post-production and distribution of a whole historical period of American poetry” from 1914 to 1945, including three TV episodes for her "Poetry in America" PBS series.


New also gave Epstein advice on literature.


On Nov. 25, 2018, she recommended "Lolita" by Vladimir Nabokov, which is about a 30-something married scholar and his sexual obsession with a 12-year-old girl.


Also, she said without a trace of irony given Epstein’s legal troubles, “I would recommend reading My Antonia by (Willa) Cather next time you're on a long plane trip.”


“The prose is gorgeous, and the book has-- come to think of it-- similar themes to Lolita in that it's about a man whose whole life is stamped forever by his impression of a young girl,” she wrote.


Epstein’s private plane, which ferried VIPs and young girls to his private island and other redoubts, was nicknamed by others "The Lolita Express" after his legal troubles burst into public view.


U.S. prosecutor Kathryn Ruemmler arrives at federal court on the first day of jury selection in the Enron trial in Houston January 30, 2006. Former company executives are facing conspiracy and fraud charges connected to the downfall of the energy giant. REUTERS/Lee Celano

'Trump is truly stupid'

Obama administration White House counsel Kathryn Ruemmler, who had famously taken down energy giant Enron as a star Justice Department prosecutor, talked about Trump a lot with Epstein.


"Trump is truly stupid," Ruemmler wrote in a July 21, 2017 email. In another, she said, he was “so gross.”


In one email to Ruemmler, Epstein downplayed Trump’s wealth, saying, "Donald doesn't really own very much, he rents out his name."


In another, Epstein wrote Ruemmler that, "You see, I know how dirty Donald is." That was in response to one of many news articles the two shared with each other, this one about Trump’s "High Crimes and Misdemeanors" as outlined in a New York Times column in August 2018.


More: 'I am the one able to take him down.' What Jeffrey Epstein said about Donald Trump.

Epstein also liked to introduce his various friends and acquaintances to each other as part of his relentless campaign to cultivate relationships with the rich, powerful and merely famous.


It was in that spirit that Epstein introduced Wolff to one of his former defense lawyers, Kenneth Starr, for help with research. Starr had been the independent counsel leading the exhaustive “Whitewater” investigation into Bill and Hillary Clinton in the 1990s.


'I am the one able to take him down.' What Jeffrey Epstein said about Donald Trump.

Epstein email claims Trump 'knew about the girls'; accuser calls for full release of files

Six years after Jeffrey Epstein's death, hundreds of women push for justice

Virginia Giuffre memoir details alleged abuses inside Jeffrey Epstein circle

Prince Andrew royal titles stripped after alleged Jeffrey Epstein link

She’s inmate No. 02879-509 in Florida. But once again, Ghislaine Maxwell is holding court

House GOP releases full Jeffrey Epstein 'birthday book.' What's in it?

How Trump and 'terrific guy' Jeffrey Epstein's party boy friendship ended badly

“With thanks to Jeffrey, I’m delighted to come into your orbit, and look forward to our conversation,” Starr wrote to Wolff, in an email shared with Epstein.


'An opportunity to come forward'

While many of those communicating with Epstein hoped to benefit from their conversations, some – like Wolff – also offered to help the disgraced financier in return.


“There's an opportunity to come forward this week and talk about Trump in such a way that could garner you great sympathy and help finish him,” Wolff emailed Epstein on Oct. 29, 2016, right before Election Day. “Interested?”


There’s no indication in the emails that Epstein responded, or that he acted on Wolff’s request.


Transparency Note:


Michael Wolff was a freelance USA TODAY contributor from 2012 to early 2017. USA TODAY had no knowledge of any relationship between him and Jeffrey Epstein, nor any actions beyond his submissions for publication. We are committed to integrity and transparency, as we uphold our editorial standards and maintain the trust of our readers.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/11/15/jeffrey-epsteins-emails-advice-to-rich-and-famous/87274450007/


"Sweet Lorraine" is a popular song with music by Cliff Burwell and words by Mitchell Parish that was published in 1928 and has become a jazz standard.[1] It is written in F major and has an AABA structure.[2]


A version by Teddy Wilson charted in October 1935, peaking at #17.[3] Nat King Cole recorded "Sweet Lorraine" in 1940 as the King Cole Trio and it became his first hit.[4] Frank Sinatra recorded the song on December 17, 1946 as part of the Metronome All Stars, with a number of other all stars, including Johnny Hodges, Charlie Shavers, and Coleman Hawkins. Nat King Cole was on piano.[5] His version was released as a single on Columbia Records (#37293) but did not chart.[6] The Nat "King" Cole Trio rerecorded the song in 1956 and released it on the Capitol album After Midnight.[7] Sinatra recorded it again on March 14, 1977 for a proposed album of songs about women on Reprise. The album was not completed and the recording was not released until The Reprise Collection in 1990.[8] It was also recorded by Donnie Brooks, released on ERA Records in 1961.[9]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweet_Lorraine


Finally, the Constitutions train us all for perfection, instructing us in the weapons to be used in combatting our three fierce and raging adversaries. They teach us how to counter the lust of the flesh with chastity, the lust of the eyes with poverty, and the pride of life with obedience. I shall say nothing of our observance of chastity (in which we should imitate the purity of the angels so far as our frailty allows), or of our observance of poverty (which is so strict that neither churches nor professed houses may acquire any rents, lands, or even perpetual endowments). As for obedience, however, by which we consecrate the chief and noblest part of ourselves to God, our Constitutions require of us that it be so prompt, eager, perfect, and integral that we do not swerve even a hairsbreadth from our superiors commands. In matters falling under obedience, not only must our action be guided by the superior s command and our will by his will, but even something much more difficult our understanding by his understanding.

To sum up: men crucified to the world, and to whom the world itself is crucified[7] such would our Constitutions have us to be; new men, I say, who have put off their affections to put on Christ;[8] dead to themselves to live to justice; who, with St. Paul in labors, in watchings, in fastings, in chastity, in knowledge, in long suffering, in SWEETNESS, in the Holy Spirit, in charity unfeigned, in the word of truth, show themselves ministers of God[9] and by the armor of Justice on the right hand and, on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report, by good success finally and ill success, press forward with great strides to their heavenly country. This is the sum and aim of our institute.

And so I beseech you, brothers in the Lord, that we may walk in a manner worthy of our vocation,[10] and, in order to know that vocation, may read and reread these Constitutions that have been bestowed upon us by the gift of God. Let us study them day and night. Let us vie with each other in learning them, pondering them, and keeping them. If we do so, our name will be matched by our lives and our profession made manifest in deed.

Farewell in Christ.

Rome, the house of the Society of Jesus, 1559 [7]

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


The Capetian dynasty (/kəˈpiːʃən/; French: Capétiens), also known as the House of France, is a dynasty of Frankish origin, and a branch of the Robertians. It is among the largest and oldest royal houses in Europe and the world, and consists of Hugh Capet, the founder of the dynasty, and his male-line descendants, who ruled in France without interruption from 987 to 1792, and again from 1814 to 1848. The senior line ruled in France as the House of Capet from the election of Hugh Capet in 987 until the death of Charles IV in 1328. That line was succeeded by cadet branches, the Houses of Valois and then Bourbon, which ruled without interruption until the French Revolution abolished the monarchy in 1792. The Bourbons were restored in 1814 in the aftermath of Napoleon's defeat, but had to vacate the throne again in 1830 in favor of the last Capetian monarch of France, Louis Philippe I, who belonged to the House of Orléans. Cadet branches of the Capetian House of Bourbon house are still ruling over Spain and Luxembourg."


Name origins and usage

The name of the dynasty derives from its founder, Hugh, who was known as "Hugh Capet".[4] The meaning of "Capet" (a nickname rather than a surname of the modern sort) is unknown. While folk etymology identifies it with "cape", other suggestions indicate it might be connected to the Latin word caput ("head"), and explain it as meaning "chief" or "head".[citation needed]


Historians in the 19th century (see House of France) came to apply the name "Capetian" to both the ruling house of France and to the wider-spread male-line descendants of Hugh Capet. It was not a contemporary practice. The name "Capet" has also been used as a surname for French royalty, particularly but not exclusively those of the House of Capet. One notable use was during the French Revolution, when the dethroned King Louis XVI (a member of the House of Bourbon and a direct male-line descendant of Hugh Capet) and Queen Marie Antoinette (a member of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine) were referred to as "Louis and Antoinette Capet" (the queen being addressed as "the Widow Capet" after the execution of her husband).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capetian_dynasty


Caput Mundi is a Latin phrase which literally means "Head of the world" whereas Roma Caput Mundi means "Rome capital of the world" and is one of the many nicknames given to the city of Rome throughout its history.[1]


The phrase is related to the enduring power of the city first as the capital of the Republic and the Empire, and later as the centre of the Catholic Church.[2]


Although it is not known for sure when it was first used, Rome was already named in this way by the poet Ovid in 1st century BC.[3]


Along with "Eternal City" and the "City of Seven Hills", Caput Mundi remains as one of the most commonly used names to refer to the city of Rome.[4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caput_Mundi


The Constantinian dynasty is an informal name for the ruling family of the Roman Empire from Constantius Chlorus (died 306) to the death of Julian in 363. It is named after its most famous member, Constantine the Great, who became the sole ruler of the empire in 324. The dynasty is also called Neo-Flavian because every Constantinian emperor bore the name Flavius, similarly to the rulers of the first Flavian dynasty in the 1st century.


Stemmata

In italics the augusti and the augustae.


Constantius I

From relationship between Constantius I and Helena

Constantine I

From marriage between Constantine I and Minervina

Crispus

From marriage between Constantine I and Fausta

Constantina, wife of Hannibalianus and Constantius Gallus

Constantine II

Constantius II

No offspring from marriage between Constantius II and his first wife, daughter of Julius Constantius

No offspring from marriage between Constantius II and Eusebia

From marriage between Constantius II and Faustina

Constantia, wife of Gratian

Constans I

Helena, wife of Julian

From marriage between Constantius Chlorus and Theodora

Flavius Dalmatius

From marriage between Flavius Dalmatius and unknown wife

Flavius Dalmatius

Hannibalianus, husband of Constantina

Julius Constantius

From marriage between Julius Constantius and Galla

son, died in the purges of 337[1]

daughter, first wife of Constantius II

Constantius Gallus

No offspring from marriage between Gallus and Constantina

From marriage between Julius Constantius and Basilina

Julian

No offspring from marriage between Julian and Helena, daughter of Constantine I

Hannibalianus (must have died before the imperial purges that occurred in 337 because he is not listed among its victims);

Anastasia;

Flavia Julia Constantia, wife of Licinius

Licinius II

Eutropia

Nepotianus

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constantinian_dynasty


The Carolingian dynasty ceased to rule France upon the death of Louis V (d. 987). After the death of Louis, the son of Hugh the Great, Hugh Capet was chosen as king of the Franks, nominally the last ruler of West Francia. Given the resurgence of the Holy Roman Empire title and dignities in the West Francian kingdom, Europe was later believed to have entered a new age, so became to be known in historiography as the first king of France, as western civilization was perceived to have entered the High Middle Ages period. Hugh was crowned at Noyon on July 3, 987 with the full support from Holy Roman Emperor Otto III, Holy Roman Emperor. With Hugh’s coronation, a new era began for France, and his descendants came to be named, after him, the Capetians. They ruled France as the Capetians, Valois, and Bourbons until the French Revolution. They returned after 1815 and ruled until Louis Philippe was deposed in 1848.

However they continue to rule Spain, with two republican interruptions, through the Bourbon Dynasty right down to Juan Carlos of Spain.

[edit] Family branches

Ro(d)bert (-764), dux of Hesbaye from 732, married Williswinda of Worms

Ingerman of Hesbaye

Ermengarde of Hesbaye (780-818), wife of Emperor Louis the Pious

Cancor (-782), founder of Lorsch Abbey

Heimrich (-795), count in the Lahngau

Poppo of Grapfeld (-839/41), ancestor of the Frankish House of Babenberg

Landrada, married Sigram

Saint Chrodogang (-766), Archbishop of Metz, Abbot of Lorsch Abbey

Robert II of Hesbaye (770-807)

Robert III of Worms (800-822)

Robert IV the Strong (820-866)

Odo of Paris (860-898), king of West Francia from 888, married Théodrate of Troyes

Raoul

Arnulf

Guy

Richildis, or Regilindis, married William I of Périgueux, son of Count Wulgrin I of Angoulême

Robert (866-923), king of West Francia from 922, second marriage to Béatrice of Vermandois

Emma (894-934), married Rudolph of Burgundy

Adela, married Herbert II, Count of Vermandois

Hugh the Great (898-956), married for the 3rd time to Hedwige of Saxony, daughter of German king Henry the Fowler

Béatrice (939-987), married Frederick of Bar

Hugh Capet (940-996), ancestor of the Capetian dynasty

Otto of Paris (944-965), Duke of Burgundy from 956

Odo-Henry (946-1002), Duke of Burgundy from 965

Emma (-966), married Richard I, Duke of Normandy

Herbert (-994), Bishop of Auxerre


Ermengarde of Hesbaye (or Irmengarde) (c. 778 – 3 October 818) was Queen of the Franks and Holy Roman Empress as the wife of Emperor Louis I. She was Frankish, the daughter of Ingeram, count of Hesbaye, and Hedwig of Bavaria. Her family is known as the Robertians.

In 794/5 Ermengarde married Louis the Pious, king of Aquitania, king of Franks, king of Italy, ruler of the Holy Roman Empire.

She had six children:

Lothair I, born 795 in Altdorf, Bavaria

Pepin I of Aquitaine, born 797

Adelaide, born ca. 799

Rotrude, born 800

Hildegard / Matilda, born ca. 802

Wife of Gerard, Count of Auvergne, possible mother of Ranulf I of Poitiers.

Louis the German, born ca. 805

She died at Angers, France on 3 October 818. A few years after her death, her husband remarried to Judith of Bavaria, who bore him Charles the Bald.

https://rosamondpress.com/2012/06/25/merovingian-grail-lineage-of-the-swan-knight/


The Robertians (sometimes called the Robertines in modern scholarship) are the proposed Frankish family which was ancestral to the Capetian dynasty, and thus to the royal families of France and of many other countries (currently Spain and Luxembourg). The Capetians appear first in the records as powerful nobles serving under the Carolingian dynasty of Charlemagne in West Francia, which later became France. As their power increased, they came into conflict with the older royal family and attained the crown several times before the eventual start of the continuous rule of the descendants of Hugh Capet (ruled 987–996).


Hugh's paternal ancestral family, the Robertians, appear in documents that trace the family back to his great-grandfather Robert the Strong (d. 866). His origins remain unclear, but medieval records hint at an origin in East Francia, in present-day Germany, an area then still also ruled by the Carolingians. In particular, Regino of Prüm (died 915) states that Robert the Strong's son Odo was said to be a relative (nepos) of a Count Meingaud, count of an area near Worms, who died in 892, and there are indications that Maingaud's family used the names Robert and Odo.


Modern proposals about their ancestry further back are based on the idea that there was one family which frequently named its sons Robert, including Robert III of Worms (800–834), Robert the Strong (d. 866), and Robert I of France (866–923). For example, one proposed ancestor is Robert of Hesbaye (c. 800), about whom there are almost no records.


The Robertian family figured prominently amongst the Carolingian nobility and married into this royal family. Eventually, the Robertians themselves produced Frankish kings such as the brothers Odo (reigned 888–898) and Robert I (r. 922–923), then Hugh Capet (r. 987–996), who ruled from his seat in Paris as the first Capetian king of France.


Although Philip II Augustus (r. 1180–1223) was officially the last monarch of France with the title "King of the Franks" (rex Francorum) and the first to style himself "King of France" (roi de France), in (systematic application of) historiography, Hugh Capet holds this distinction. He founded the Capetians, the royal dynasty that ruled France until the revolution of the Second French Republic in 1848—save during the interregnum of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars. Members of the family still reign in Europe today : both King Felipe VI of Spain and Grand Duke Henri of Luxembourg descend from this family through the Bourbon cadet branch of the dynasty.


Origin

The oldest known Robertians probably originated in the county of Hesbaye, around Tongeren in modern-day Belgium. The first certain ancestor is Robert the Strong count of Paris,[1] probably the son of Robert III of Worms, grandson of Robert of Hesbaye, and nephew of Ermengarde of Hesbaye, who was the daughter of Ingram, and wife of Louis the Pious. Other related family includes Cancor, founder of the Lorsch Abbey, his sister Landrada and her son Saint Chrodogang, archbishop of Metz.


History

Robert the Strong

The sons of Robert the Strong were Odo and Robert, who were both king of Western Francia and ruled during the Carolingian era. His daughter Richildis married a count of Troyes. The family became Counts of Paris under Odo and "Dukes of the Franks" under Robert, possessing large parts of the ancient Neustria. Although quarrels continued between Robert's son Hugh the Great and Louis IV of France, they were mended upon the ascension of Lothair I of France (954–986). Lothair greatly expanded the Robertian dominions when he granted Hugh Aquitaine as well as much of Burgundy,[2] both rich and influential territories, arguably two of the richest in France.


The Carolingian dynasty ceased to rule France upon the death of Louis V (d. 987). After the death of Louis, the son of Hugh the Great, Hugh Capet was chosen as king of the Franks, nominally the last ruler of West Francia. Given the resurgence of the Holy Roman Empire title and dignities in the West Francian kingdom, Europe was later believed to have entered a new age, so Hugh came to be known in historiography as the first king of France, as western civilization was perceived to have entered the High Middle Ages period. Hugh was crowned at Noyon on July 3, 987 with the full support of Holy Roman Emperor Otto III. With Hugh's coronation, a new era began for France, and his descendants came to be named, after him, the Capetians. They ruled France as the Capetians, Valois, and Bourbons until the French Revolution. They returned after 1815 and ruled until Louis Philippe was deposed in 1848.


However, they have continued to rule Spain, with two republican interruptions, through the Bourbon Dynasty right down to the current king Felipe VI.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robertians


When were the Jesuits restored?

August 7, 1814

Pressured by the royal courts of Portugal, France and Spain, Pope Clement XIV suppressed the Society, causing Jesuits throughout the world to renounce their vows and go into exile. Pope Pius VII, a Benedictine, restored the Society on August 7, 1814."

https://www.xavier.edu/jesuitresource/online-resources/video-resources/jesuit-values-videos/suppression-of-the-society-of-jesus


The Hohenstaufens were ruling in absentia, and their rule was not liked. The local barons managed to induce various people to claim the regency. Alix de Brienne, second daughter of queen Isabeau, had married Hughes de Lusignan (d. 1218), son of Amaury by a previous wife, and king of Cyprus. Alix died in 1246 and her son Henri (1218-53) succeeded her as regent of Jerusalem. At his death, his son grandson Hugues II (1252-67) was a minor and the widow Plaisance (d. 1261) was regent of both Cyprus and Jerusalem. At her death, a new regent was required; the late king Henri had two sisters Marie (d. 1252) married to Gauthier de Brienne, and Isabelle (d. 1264), married to Henri de Poitiers. The elder one's son, Hugues de Brienne, was passed over in favor of the younger one's son Hugues d'Antioche as regent of Cyprus, while Isabelle herself was accepted as regent for Jerusalem. On her death in 1267, Hugues de Brienne's attempt to claim his rights was rebuffed and the throne of Cyprus, along with the regency of Jerusalem, passed to Hugues d'Antioche, whose descendants assumed the name of Lusignan and reigned over Cyprus.


At the death of Conradin, the issue of Queen Isabeau's eldest daughter became extinct. Hugues III of Cyprus, descended from her second daughter and already regent, now claimed the throne. But another claim emerged through the third daughter of Queen Isabeau, Mélissende, who married Bohémond IV of Antioch (uncle of Hugues III) and whose only daughter Marie of Antioch claimed the throne as being closer in kinship to Isabeau. She was unsuccessful and Hugues III was crowned king of Jerusalem in 1269. She went to Rome to plead her case with the Pope, and was eventually induced to cede her rights in 1277 to Charles of Anjou, whom the pope had established as king of Naples and Sicily (the same who had defeated Conradin in 1268). Henceforth there were two lines of claimants, the kings of Cyprus and the kings of Naples.


The kings of Cyprus continued to be crowned kings of Jerusalem, although from 1277 to 1282 the remnants of the kingdom (Acre) were actually under Charles d'Anjou's control, and the kings of Cyprus only gradually restored their authority. But soon after, with the fall of Acre in 1291, there was nothing left of the kingdom of Jerusalem. In 1458 Jean III, last male of the line, died without male heirs. His only sister Anne had (d. 1462) married Louis I de Savoie. His only daughter Charlotte (d. 1487) was recognized as queen of Cyprus, Armenia and Jerusalem, and married to her first cousin Louis de Savoie. But she was dethroned in 1460 by a bastard son of her father, namely Jacques II (d. 1473), and fled to Italy. Ultimately, in 1485, she ceded her rights to her husband's nephew Charles I, duke of Savoie, and his successors; at that point the dukes of Savoie (later kings of Sardinia and kings of Italy) added the title of king of Jerusalem, Cyprus and Armenia to their titles and the arms to their achievement. The kings of Italy used the title until 1946.

https://www.heraldica.org/topics/national/jerusale.htm


The Order carries through ancient tradition, the Coat of Arms attributed to the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, which is of silver to the Jerusalem Cross of gold and enamelled in the color of blood." "Motto: “Deus lo vult” in capital ROMAN characters on a forked band under the point of the shield."

Insignia, Decorations and Attire – Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem (midatlanticeohs.com)

EQUESTRIAN ORDER OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE OF JERUSALEM

https://www.midatlanticeohs.com/insignia-decorations-and-attire/


The History and Legend of Scottish Rite Origins


The Story Unfolds…

Like much of early Masonic history, the origins of the Scottish Rite are uncertain. This is primarily due to the lack of historic documentation prior to the early 1700’s and not to any great veiled mystery. The few records kept were subject to loss, fire, weather and aging. So we can at best only speculate on many of our origins by looking at the few documents, historical references and legends that remain.


What We Know

In 1754, near Paris, Chevalier de Bonneville established the Chapter of Clermont. The Chapter resided in the College of Jesuits of Clermont, hence the name. It is said to have been created to honor the Duc de Clermont, then Grand Master of the English Grand Lodge of France.


The Chapter of Clermont was a “Chapter of the Advanced Degrees” and initially entailed six degrees and was later extended to 25 known degrees. The six initial degrees were 1˚, 2˚ and 3˚ St John’s Masonry, 4˚ Knight of the Eagle, 5˚ Illustrious Knight or Templar, 6˚ Sublime Illustrious Knight.


Interestingly enough historically, prior to the time of the Rite’s creation, James II had been in residence at Clermont in exile from Britain from 1688 to his death in 1701. As noted by German Masonic historian, Lenning… “whilst in exile, James II residing at the Jesuit College of Clermont in France, allowed his closest associates to fabricate certain degrees in order to extend their political views.” Lenning believed this to have been an attempt on the part of James and his associates to regain control of the British throne for the House of Stuart. If Lenning is right, this places the origins of the “Rite of Perfection” in the hands of James II and the Jacobite (Stuart) Freemasons who at the time were in exile from Great Britain throughout France and Italy. Lenning also contends that these degrees were introduced into French Freemasonry under the name of the Clermont System.


James II died in exile in 1701. His son James III is said to have continued his father’s Masonic legacy and later created further higher degrees.


Perhaps James II saw in the Jesuit morality plays of the College of Clermont a vessel for passing on a set of moral lessons. Some of the world’s greatest playwrights had emerged from Clermont. Jesuit tutelage had previously produced great writers such as Lope de Vega, Moliere, Racine, and the Corneille brothers. Ensconced in exile, I believe James II did find the inspiration and the training to help produce what would later become the first six degrees. From out of the darkness… comes light.


To be continued… (Author’s note… An in depth look at the Templar influence in Scottish Rite masonry’s origins can be found by visiting the Rosslyn Templars’ website.)

https://web.archive.org/web/20190615041607/http://www.traversecityscottishrite.com/scottish-rite-history.html


PART VI 1THE PERSONAL LIFE OF THOSE ALREADY ADMITTED AND INCORPORATED INTO THE BODY OF THE SOCIETY

SECTION 1: THE APOSTOLIC CHARACTER OF OUR VOWS IN GENERAL

143 §1. Our consecration by profession of the evangelical counsels, by which we respond to a divine vocation, is at one and the same time the following of Christ poor, virginal, and obedient and a rejection of those idols that the world is always prepared to adore, especially wealth, pleasure, prestige, and power. Hence, our poverty, chastity, and obedience ought visibly and efficaciously to bear witness to this attitude, whereby we proclaim the evangelical possibility of a certain communion among men and women that is a foretaste of the future kingdom of God.[1]

§2. Our religious vows, while binding us, also set us free:

free, by our vow of poverty, to share the life of the poor and to use whatever resources we may have, not for our own security and comfort, but for service;

free, by our vow of chastity, to be men for others, in friendship and communion with all, but especially with those who share our mission of service;

free, by our vow of obedience, to respond to the call of Christ as made known to us by him whom the Spirit has placed over the Church, and to follow the lead of all our superiors.[2] [1] See GC 32, d. 4, no. 16; see GC 31, d. 16, no. 4; d. 17, no. 2; d. 18, no. 3. [2] GC 32, d. 2, no. 20. 215

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Rito Scozzese

Antioco Ed Accettato

History

The Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite is the final and the only result of a complex reform that involves various Masonic Systems which developed separately one from another during the XVIII century in the range of the so called Scottish Regime. This regime originated from the advent of the Scottish Masters since about 1738 and continued with the Chapters of Clermont (1754), the Emperors of the Orient and the Western world (1758) which put in practice rituality defined as the Rite of Perfection or the Rite of Heredom. The aim of the reform, that unified all in one single Order, was aside from these veins, also minor branches with more recent manifestation among which the Primitive Rite and others.


The Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite is the rituality that characterises a particular Masonic Body which it adopts and makes his. This Masonic Body is called “The Supreme Council of the Sovereign Grand Inspector General of the 33 rd and Last Level of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite”.


The first Supreme Council (SC) called Mother of the World was founded in Charleston, Carolina, USA on the May 31st 1801 and presently has headquarters in Washington DC, USA.


In some ten years the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, under the impetus of the SC of Charleston, practically spread to all the world through further Supreme Councils which were formed in national territorial Jurisdictions, each independent and autonomous, jealous of their very sovereignty.


The Scottish Rite in Italy

The SC of Italy, that today is denominated “the Supreme Council SS.GG.II.GG. of the 3 rd and Last Level of the Free Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite for the Italian Jurisdiction – Grand Orient of Italy – Palazzo Giustiniani” as shown in a manuscript handed down as the Verbal of the Foundation, also called the “Seal of Foundation” which was founded and installed ritually in Milan on March16th 1805 by the Count Alexandre Francois Auguste De Grasse Tilly S.G.C. of the SC of France (1804), duly assisted by the French and Italian Brothers, with Licenses conferred by the SC Mother of the World of Charleston. The SC of Italy was a direct emanation of this Ritual Body.


In the same constitutional act of the SC of Italy, it is formally declared that it “creates and constitutes by its sovereign authority a General Grand Lodge in Italy under the name of G.O. Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite“. The Grand Orient of Italy, thus founded, was ritually installed on June 20th 1805 by the same founders of the SC of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite.


The SC of Italy with headquarters in Milan, had jurisdiction only in the territory of the Italian Kingdom and the Sovereign Grand Commander was the Vice King Eugenio Beauharnais.


Subsequently, on the not yet unified Italian territory, other SS.CC ‘s were formed among which (in Naples) a SC called of the two Sicilies (1809), a SC of Palermo (1860), a SC of Naples (1860). Following the unification of Italy initially a SC was formed with the fusion of the SC Milan with that of Turin (1862), then with the transfer of the capital to Florence another SC of this city (1864) was formed. A further SC was established in 1870 in Rome, permanent Capital of the Kingdom. Following numerous agreements and with much difficulty, the unification between the various SS.CC in a single SC of Italy was achieved with headquarters in Rome.


From a schism which occurring 1908, a second SC was born called “Piazza del Gesù” which since 1912 was recognized by many SS.CC. of the world opposed to that of 2Palazzo Giustiniani”. The fascist period, during which all Masonic activity in Italy was prohibited, actually eliminated the problem of this atypical duplication between the historical continuity and the possession of recognition of the various Jurisdictions.


The separation between the Jurisdictions of the Grand Orient of Italy and the SC was sanctioned in 1922. The conference of Paris of the SS.CC. of the world, held in 1929, authorized this principle for all the SS.CC.


Upon recommencement of Masonic activity in 1943, after the failures of unification attempts, those who possessed the Supreme Level of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, formed two SS.CC. of “Palazzo Giustiniani” and “Piazza del Gesù”.


From 1960 to 1973, the residual incomprehension between the two historical blocks of Italian Masonry were settled. Since then, in spite of other efforts of schism, in particular that of 1977 which failed owing to the loyalty of the Scottish Brothers of Italy and the wisdom of SS.CC. of the rest of the world, the SC of “Palazzo Giustiniani” represents the regularity for 54 Supreme Councils in the world.

https://www.ritoscozzese.it/en/rsaa/history/


Note 370.—"Sublime Prince of the Royal Secret. The 32nd degree of the Ancient and Accepted rite, and for many years, or until the institution of the 33d degree, this was the highest degree, or ne plus ultra of Masonry. The body is styled a Consistory, and should be held in a building of two stories. The officers are, a Thrice Illustrious Commander, First and Second Lieutenants, a Minister of State, a Grand Chancellor, a Grand Treasurer, a Grand Secretary, and a Grand Captain of the Guard. In the East a throne, elevated on seven steps, which is the seat of the Thrice Illustrious Commander, who wears a robe of royal purple, and he and the Lieutenants, wear swords. The collar of this degree is black, lined with scarlet, and in the center, at the point, a double-headed eagle, of silver or gold, on a red Teutonic cross. The apron is of white satin, with a border of gold lace, one inch wide, lined with scarlet; on the flap is a double-headed eagle, on each side of which is the flag of the country in which the body is located, the flag of Prussia and the Beause- -ant of the Kadosh degree; on the apron is the camp of the Crusaders, , which is thus explained; it is composed of an enneagon, within which is ' inscribed a heptagon, within that a pentagon, and in the center an equilateral triangle, within which is a circle. Between the heptagon and pentagon are placed five standards, in the designs of whigjl are five letters, which form a particular word. The first standard is purple, on which is emblazoned the ark of the covenant, with a palm, tree on each side; the ark has the motto Laus Deo. The second is blue, on which is a lion, of gold, couchant, holding in his mouth a golden key, with a collar of the same metal on his neck, and on it is the device, Ad majorem Dei gloriam. The third is white, and displays a heart in flames, with two wings; it is surmounted by a crown of laurels. The fourth is green, and bears a double-headed black eagle, crowned, holding a sword in his right claw, and a bleeding heart in his left. The fifth bears a black ox. on a field of gold. On the sides of the enneagon are nine tents, with flags, representing the divisions of the Masonic army; on the angles are nine pinions, of the same color as the flag of the tent that precedes it. The hall of the Consistory is hung with black, strewed with tears of silver. The jewel is a double-headed white and black eagle, resting on a Teutonic cross, of gold, worn attached to the collar or ribbon. ^The members are called Sublime Princes of the Royal Secret. The moral of the degree teaches opposition to bigotry, superstition, and all the passions and vices which disgrace human nature.

—Macoy's Encyclopaedia and Pictionary of Freemasonry, Article Sublime Prince of the Royal Secret


MISSIONS FROM THE SUPREME PONTIFF

252 §1. To be truly Christian, our service to the Church must be anchored in fidelity to Christ, who makes all things new; to be proper to the Society, it must be done in union with the successors of Peter[32]

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.


Biography

Early life

Sako was born in the city of Zakho, Iraq, on 4 July 1948.[2] He comes from an ethnic Assyrian family of the Chaldean Catholic Church that has roots in a religious community that has had a presence in the city of his birth since the 5th century AD.[3]


He completed his early studies in Mosul and then attended the Dominican-run Saint Jean’s Seminary there. He was ordained a priest on 1 June 1974 and filled his first pastoral assignment at the Cathedral of Mosul until 1979. He then earned a doctorate in Eastern patrology at the Pontifical Oriental Institute. When denied a license to teach because he was only qualified for religious instruction, he earned a second doctorate in history from the Sorbonne in Paris.[4] With this he secured his teaching license and was able to provide religious instruction. From 1997 to 2002 he was rector of the Patriarchal Seminary in Baghdad. He then returned to Mosul and guided the parish of Perpetual Help for a year.[5][6]


Sako speaks Neo-Aramaic, German, French, English, Italian, Kurdish and Arabic.[2]


Archeparch

A synod of the bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church meeting in Baghdad elected Sako Archeparch of Kirkuk on 24 October 2002. Pope John Paul II gave his assent on 27 September 2003.[7] He received his episcopal consecration on 14 November 2003 from his predecessor in Kirkuk, André Sana.[8]


In August 2009, and at the beginning of Ramadan, Sako organized an appeal for national peace, reconciliation and end to violence on the part of more than fifty religious leaders in Kirkuk. He called it "a gesture of closeness to our Muslim brothers. We are all brothers, sons of the same God we must respect and cooperate for the good of the people and our country." The participants included representatives of Ali Sistani and Muqtada al Sadr.[9]


Patriarch

The Synod of Bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church, convoked in Rome on 28 January 2013, elected Sako to succeed Emmanuel III Delly as Patriarch of Babylon. He chose Louis Raphael I as his regnal name. Pope Benedict XVI gave his assent to the election on 1 February[2] and granted him ecclesiastica communio (ecclesiastical communion) as required by the canon law for Eastern-rite Catholic churches in recognition of their unity with the wider Catholic church.[10]


That same year, Iraq's President Jalal Talabani issued a decree recognizing Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Church.[11]


In July 2014 Sako led a wave of condemnation for the Sunni Islamists who demanded Christians either convert, submit to their radical rule and pay a religious levy or face death by the sword.[12] In September 2014 Sako said “The U.S. is indirectly responsible for what is going on in Iraq as it said it would ensure democracy and the well-being of the people, but 10 years have passed and on the contrary we have gone backward." He was responding to a question following remarks attributed to him in the local daily Ad-Diyar in which he accused the U.S. of supporting ISIS. Sako had also criticized Muslim countries for lack of support: "Our Muslim neighbours did not help us." He urged Muslim preachers to issue a religious ruling against the killing of all innocent people and said that "Issuing a fatwa preventing Muslims from killing fellow Muslims is not enough."[13]


In 2014, Sako ordered ten priests who had fled Iraq to return there by 22 October; he suspended them when they failed to comply. The priests, all living in the United States, some for as long as twenty years, appealed to Pope Francis for relief from the order.[14] In January 2015, Pope Francis granted them permission to remain in the United States.[15] Sako later renewed his order despite the pope's decision.[16]


In 2015, Sako proposed a "merger" or reunion of his own Chaldean Catholic Church with the Ancient Church of the East and the Assyrian Church of the East to create one united "Church of the East" with a single patriarch in union with the pope. His proposal would have required both his own resignation and that of Mar Addai II, followed by a joint synod of the bishops of all three churches to elect a new patriarch for the reunited Church of the East. (The patriarchate of the Assyrian Church of the East was vacant at the time, following the death of Mar Dinkha IV.)[17] He wrote that "Unity does not mean uniformity, nor the melting of our own church identity into one style, but it maintains unity in diversity and we remain one apostolic universal church, the Oriental Church, that maintains its independence of administration, laws and liturgies, traditions and support."[18] The Assyrian Church of the East respectfully declined this proposal citing "ecclesiological divergences still remaining" and proceeded with its election of a new patriarch.[19]


On 14 November 2015, the Synod of Bishops announced that Pope Francis had named Sako as one of his three appointments to that body's council.[20]


Cardinal

Pope Francis made Sako a cardinal in a consistory on 28 June 2018.[21] Later that year, Pope Francis named him one of the four cardinals to preside over sessions of the Synod of Bishops on Youth in October.[22]


On 6 October 2018 Sako was named a member of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches,[23] on 22 February 2019 a member of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue,[24] and on 29 September 2021 a member of the Congregation for Catholic Education.[25] On 4 January 2022, Pope Francis made him a member of the Council for the Economy.[26]


Sako was a cardinal elector in the 2025 papal conclave that elected Pope Leo XIV.[27] Patriarch Sako was also the first Chaldean Catholic Patriarch ever to participate in a papal conclave.[28][a] Sako opted not to wear the shash, the traditional headgear of East Syriac Christian bishops, and wore only his scarlet zucchetto.[32]


Government recognition dispute

On 15 July 2023, Iraq's President Abdul Latif Rashid announced the revocation of the government's 2013 decree recognizing Sako as Patriarch. In response that same day Sako announced he was leaving Baghdad to take up residence in Iraqi Kurdistan. He called the revocation "unprecedented in the history of Iraq".[11] Rashid said his action "does not affect the religious or legal status of patriarch Sako" and said it was based on the fact that Sako's office is not recognized by the Iraqi Constitution; Sako viewed as an extension of the government's ongoing "deliberate and humiliating campaign" against him and its wider failure to protect Iraqi Christians.[33] Rashid had recently rejected requests for comparable decrees from the Patriarchs of the Assyrian Church and the Old Assyrian Church. Others cited complex political manoeuvering.[34]


On 15 July 2023, Sako announced his intention to "retire from the Patriarchal See in Baghdad and move to a church, a mission, in one of the monasteries of Iraqi Kurdistan". His announcement followed a decision by the President of Iraq, Abdul Latif Rashid, to revoke a decree established in 2013 by the former Iraq's President, Jalal Talabani, recognising Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Church. The revocation "is unprecedented in Iraq's history," Sako said, highlighting "the government's silence" about the incident and the suffering of the Christian community.[35] For months, Sako had been embroiled in a war of words with a Shia lawmaker and militia leader, Rayan al-Kildani. Both accused each other of exploiting their influence to illegally seize Christian-owned properties. Al-Kildani is the leader of the Babylon Movement, whose militia fought ISIS within the state-linked Popular Mobilisation Forces, a network of largely pro-Iran paramilitaries. Since then, al-Kildani forged strong alliances with powerful Tehran-allied Shiite militias. Sako criticized the Babylon Movement as falsely Christian, noting most of its members and supporters are Shia Muslims using the label for political gain.[36][37] Furthermore, the Babylon Movement, led by al-Kildani, is accused of pillaging homes, unlawful confiscation of land, coercion, extortion, abuse of women, persecution of religious minorities, and torture of detainees. As a result, in 2019, the US imposed sanctions on al-Kildani and another Shiite militia leader, calling them "perpetrators of serious human rights abuse and corruption", and penalizing entities that interact with them.[38]


Cardinal Sako has accused Archbishop Bashar Warda of collaborating and conspiring with Rayan al-Kildani in an effort to subvert his authority and push for his resignation as head of the Chaldean Church. Warda is criticized for supporting al-Kildani despite his horrendous actions, and for not supporting Sako's efforts to counter the Babylon Movement's seizure of Christian assets. This has led to accusations that Warda prioritizes benefits from al-Kildani's support over protecting church interests. Sako has referred to Warda as the "Godfather" of the Babylon Movement.[39][40][41]


On 7 August 2023, Sako told an interviewer that "Withdrawing the decree is very bad. For 15 centuries, there were decrees recognising the Patriarch as head of the Church and administrator of the properties of the Church. Revoking it is a humiliation for the Church. Those behind this move want to put their hands on the properties of the Church and administer them separately from the ecclesiastical authorities. We cannot accept that."[42]


In April 2024, after nine months of exile, Sako returned to Baghdad with the assistance of Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia' Al Sudani.[43][44]


On 28 August 2024, Sako demanded a public apology from five bishops based on perceived disunity in the Chaldean Catholic Church, including absence from a mandatory July episcopal synod, setting a deadline of September 5. The five bishops, led by Bashar Warda, the Archbishop of Erbil, also withdrew from an August spiritual retreat and pulled their students from the Chaldean Seminary. The bishops refused to apologize, citing dissatisfaction with Sako's leadership style and unilateral decision-making. As a result, he would suspend them and ask Pope Francis to impose canonical penalties, including excommunication.[45][46] The actions of Bashar Warda and the other bishops have been described by the Chaldean Patriarchate as a "dangerous precedent" that goes against their episcopal vows to support the patriarch. The 17 bishops who attended the July 2024 synod issued a communiqué, calling for "appropriate legal measures" against the "clear violations" committed by the boycotting group of Warda.[47]


The rivalry between Louis Sako and Bashar Warda is driven by a fierce personal conflict, with Sako perceiving Warda as ruthlessly ambitious to seize the patriarchate. This perception has led Sako to backtrack on his initial plans to retire at 75, driven by a determination to thwart Warda's power grab. Warda's actions are seen as a betrayal of Sako's leadership.[48]


Honours

Defensor Fidei Prize, 2008

Pax Christi International Peace Award, 2010

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid0kp851LgGfawE8dhYjdzoPZeZQfpET7sMdnx9Uxb9iuDa1Z2cdv9Y3vRxkddeLwNpl


CHANNAH COHEN

channah cohenbWorking for the Heshe & Harriet Seif Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus (OU-JLIC), Channah Cohen serves as a Torah educator at Queens College in New York. In this role, she gives shiurim and organizes programs and events while serving as a role model for Orthodox women on campus. An alumna of Tomer Devorah Seminary and a graduate of Stern College for Women, Channah completed a master’s in adult learning & leadership at Teachers College, Columbia University. She lives in Passaic, New Jersey with her husband, Jeff, and their son, Aryeh.


Oh, sure, I knew all about leadership. I knew that the trait theory was passé and would turn up ludicrous hypotheses; for instance, that through studying Napoleon and Caesar one can deduce that great leaders must be left-handed and shorter than 5’4”. I knew that the difference between good leaders and good managers lay in asking “how” versus asking “why.” I even had a master’s in adult learning and leadership to boot. So yeah, I knew all about leadership.


Until I became a leader.


When I started working for OU-JLIC on the Queens College campus in the fall of 2015, things weren’t quite as I expected they would be. I spent the entire first semester on campus in absolute shock. Here’s some of what I learned about leadership—and about myself—along the way.  


Lesson One: The only characteristics that research studies have successfully correlated to effective leadership are not charisma, extroversion or even intelligence; they are humility and perseverance. Humility is the ability to work as a team and to give credit to others. Perseverance is the ability to fail—repeatedly—and to try again.  


I learned this lesson from the leadership of OU-JLIC, an incredible organization both on the national and campus levels. Its leadership isn’t composed of loud, charismatic, bombastic personalities; rather, they are quiet, thought-out, passionate individuals. At our biannual conference, the national staff spends five minutes patting us on the back for our work and countless hours making sure that we are acutely aware of our responsibility to our students, and as well-equipped as possible to handle the various challenges we face. Humility is their most blatant characteristic, but it’s coupled with traits that are often overlooked in the literature on leadership  and that are, in my opinion, integral: the caring and the passion to affect others in a positive way.


channah cohen pull quoteI’ve witnessed these same qualities in the OU-JLIC staff on my campus (and that of every other campus that I’ve interacted with). They don’t expect me to be perfect at teaching or running events. In the hours we spend planning every detail of every event we run, reviewing later what worked and what didn’t, and taking most seriously an event that belly-flopped, the staff has taught me that mistakes are human, but that we care enough to improve for next time. It isn’t about having the “right” opinions on how to do things best, it’s about asking questions to one another, to the students, to those who have done this before us. Humility and perseverance.


Lesson Two: The extraordinary power of a woman in a leadership position. At the risk of being controversial, I don’t usually put many women on the list of great historical leaders that I try to learn from and emulate. I’ve read the biographies of Abraham Lincoln and Benjamin Franklin. I’ve studied the Biblical personalities of Jeremiah and Moses. In graduate school, women flitted in and out of leadership classes, but men had center-stage.


On campus, I’ve seen what a woman in a leadership position can do. Naturally, women have a balancing act between work life and home life that’s more difficult and complex than that of men.


But I’m surprised again and again at how the skills I work on in my home life as a wife and mother—organization, patience and the ability to validate and reflect emotions—play out at work. I’ve been shocked at how often just sitting across from a student and listening to her, holding her moral debate in my hands, has given her the small amount of courage that she needed to make a real change. I distinctly recall numerous conversations that progressed as follows: a student tells me about a relationship she has with a young man she knows is not right for her but she’s too afraid to break up. I listen, I validate and I reflect back the dreams of the young woman. She checks her watch and rushes off to class. Within a few days, she calls to tell me she ended the malignant relationship, and I am surprised every time.


Another example: A student insists that she does not want to get involved in Jewish programming on campus. What’s more, she wants to change her name and befriend only non-Jews who don’t know her. I listen; I try to hear her motivation. I say goodbye after our meeting, sighing heavily, certain that I will never see her again. Surprisingly, I receive several e-mails from her requesting information on upcoming events. I see her at several programs. Speaking with her and accepting her must have enabled her to believe in and accept herself.


Before I started working for OU-JLIC, I thought it was jejune to say that what students really need is “someone to listen.” But after a semester on the job, I understand that what students need most really is someone to listen, to reflect, to validate. And I learned, to my surprise, that being a woman gives me a special capacity to provide a quiet, encouraging and compassionate form of leadership. I think of myself as a “leader in the middle”: I’m not a distant, charismatic, pontificating rabble-rouser who is going to change political structures. But I am a woman leader who can use her innate characteristics to effect real, lasting change on an individual level.


Lesson Three: Making an impact is not the most difficult task.


I have listened to the life stories, the hopes, the dreams and the challenges of my students. And in only one semester on campus, I have been blown away by the heroism of my students. I have spoken to students who are struggling with mental disorders that make daily living a battle. I have spoken with students who have combatted physical disabilities and have fought their way to independence. I have spoken with students who are fighting chronic diseases, or dealing with perpetual rehabilitation, and need to take life one day at a time. And it has taught me that as a society, we have a definite affinity to the glorious halo that surrounds leaders, instead of learning about the quiet inner strength of the people that are all around us. And having been inspired so often by my students, I believe society might be missing out . . . big-time.


This first semester as a Torah educator on campus has been an eye-opening one for me. I did not realize how myopic my view of leadership was until I was introduced to leaders who are both humble and perseverant, actively working to positively impact the Jewish community. I found my place as a woman leader, a leader in the middle between the community and the distant figures we read about in history books. I have learned infinitely more from the discreet, private conversations I have had with real-life student heroes than I did from bombastic, egoistic lecturers on leadership in graduate school. Perhaps if I can continue to learn from my students and others around me, in a few decades I will be the kind of humble, perseverant leader that our community always needs.


This article was featured in the Summer 2016 issue of Jewish Action.

https://jewishaction.com/religion/women/channah-cohen/


What does Elchanan mean?

AI Overview

Elchanan is a Hebrew male name meaning "God is gracious" or "God has been gracious". It is formed from the Hebrew words "El" (God) and "chanan" (gracious) and is associated with biblical figures, most notably one of King David's mighty warriors who killed Goliath's brother, say the bible study tools. 

Origin and meaning: A male name of Hebrew origin, "Elchanan" means "God is gracious". It can also be interpreted as "whom God has graciously bestowed". 

Biblical connection: The name is found in the Hebrew Bible, where it is the name of a warrior in King David's army. He is famous for killing Goliath's brother, an act of divine favor. 

Symbolism: The name embodies themes of gratitude, divine benevolence, and a blessing from God. 

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AI Overview

The term "Chan khon" does not directly translate as a single phrase in Hebrew, but appears to be a Thai phrase referring to the Hebrew language or people.

The Hebrew words related to "chan" and "khon" have distinct meanings: 

Hebrew words related to "Chan"

Chanan (חָנַן, pronounced khaw-nan') is a verb meaning "to be gracious," "to favor," "to have compassion on," "to entreat," or "to be merciful".

Channun (חַנּוּן, pronounced khan-noon') is an adjective derived from chanan, meaning "gracious" or "merciful". It is frequently used in the Bible to describe God's character (e.g., Exodus 34:6, Psalm 86:15).

Chen (חֵן, pronounced khen), a related noun, means "grace" or "favor". It is also a gender-neutral Hebrew name meaning "grace". 

Hebrew words related to "Khon" or "Kohn" 

Kun (כּוּן, pronounced koon) is a verb meaning "to establish" or "to prepare".

Kohen or Kohn (כֹּהֵן) is the Hebrew word for "priest," referring to the descendants of Aaron who served in the Temple. The surname "Kahn" often derives from this word, and gravestones of individuals with this name sometimes feature the symbol of the priestly blessing hands.

Koan is also a term used in Zen Buddhism, which is derived from Chinese Chan Buddhist lore.

Chân Không is the name of a Vietnamese Buddhist nun and peace activist who signed a declaration against modern slavery. 

It appears the user's query is seeking information about Hebrew terms with pronunciations similar to "Chan khon" in a Thai context.

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Priscilla Chan (born February 24, 1985)[2] is an American pediatrician and philanthropist.[3] Chan has been married to Mark Zuckerberg, co-founder and chief executive of Meta Platforms, since May 2012. In December 2015, Chan and Zuckerberg founded the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative with a pledge to transfer 99 per cent of their Meta shares, then valued at $45 billion, to venture capital and philanthropic initiatives.


Early life and education

Chan was born in Braintree, Massachusetts,[4] and grew up in Quincy, Massachusetts. Her parents were ethnically Chinese refugees who fled Vietnam in boats.[5][6] Chan grew up speaking Cantonese and interpreted for her grandparents who raised her and her two younger sisters, Michelle and Elaine, while her parents worked.[7][8] Chan's father owned a restaurant near Boston Symphony Hall and Northeastern University in Boston, which he later sold to run a wholesale fish company in 2006. Chan graduated valedictorian of her class from Quincy High School,[7] where she was involved with the FIRST Robotics Competition team #69 HYPER[9][10] and where she was the captain of the tennis team.[10] Her classmates voted her "Class Genius."[8]


Although her parents were supportive of college education, they were unfamiliar with the process, including the SAT exam.[8] Chan is the first college graduate in her family and has said that "education is an incredibly personal issue" for her, noting that "[i]f you're the first generation to go to college...sometimes you don't realize your potential until others point it out."[7][11] She credits her public school teachers with recognizing hers and for "getting me excited about learning."[11] Chan received a full scholarship to attend Harvard University.[12] Feeling out of place at the school, Chan planned to transfer to another institution; however, her involvement with the Franklin Afterschool Enrichment program, specifically an encounter with a young girl who had broken teeth, inspired Chan to stay and to become a pediatrician.[13][12] Chan once reflected: "I was devastated. I thought, 'What happened? What did I do wrong? I thought at the time, 'I am not enough yet. … I need more skills. I need more power to be able to solve this.' And so, when you're 20 years old and a type-A Harvard student, the answer is medical school."[12]


After graduating in 2007 with a bachelor's degree in biology, she taught 4th and 5th grade science at the private Harker School in San Jose, California, for a year before entering medical school at the University of California, San Francisco, in 2008,[14][15] where she graduated with a Doctor of Medicine degree in 2012 and then completed residency training in pediatrics in 2015.[16][7] Chan was a pediatrician at San Francisco General Hospital until 2017.[7][17]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priscilla_Chan


Early Female Transgender Identity after Prenatal Exposure to Diethylstilbestrol: Report from a French National Diethylstilbestrol (DES) Cohort

by Laura Gaspari 1,2,3,†,Marie-Odile Soyer-Gobillard 4,5,†ORCID,Scott Kerlin 6,Françoise Paris 1,2,3 andCharles Sultan 1,*


Abstract

Diagnostic of transsexualism and gender incongruence are terms to describe individuals whose self-identity does not match their sex assignment at birth. A transgender woman is an individual assigned male at birth (AMAB) on the basis of the external or internal genitalia who identifies and lives as a woman. In recent decades, a significant increase in the number of transgender people has been reported. Although, its etiology is unknown, biological, anatomical, genetic, environmental and cultural factors have been suggested to contribute to gender variation. In XY animals, it has been shown that environmental endocrine disruptors, through their anti-androgenic activity, induce a female identity. In this work, we described four XY individuals who were exposed in utero to the xenoestrogen diethylstilbesterol (DES) and were part of the French HHORAGES cohort. They all reported a female transgender identity starting from childhood and adolescence. This high prevalence of male to female transgenderism (1.58%) in our cohort of 253 DES sons suggests that exposure to chemicals with xenoestrogen activity during fetal life may affect the male sex identity and behavior.

Keywords: sexual identity; diethylstilbestrol (DES); prenatal exposure

1. Introduction

Gender identity defines each individual’s deeply held personal sense of their own gender as male or female or something else [1]. Moreover, gender diversity and variance are umbrella terms used to describe the wide range of gender identifications outside the conventional gender categories [2]. Gender dysphoria [3] relates to the distress and unease experienced by individuals who are discontent with their assigned gender and identify with a gender other than the one associated with their birth sex [4]. A transgender man or woman is a person born phenotypically female or male, assigned female or male at birth on the basis of their external or internal genitalia, who identifies and lives as a male or a female. Actually, for many experts [5] this definition should be enlarged to Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming (TGNC) individuals, people with disorders of sex development (DSDs) and people assigned male (AMAB) or female at birth (AFAB) [6].

All studies on secular trends have reported a dramatic increase in the number of transgender people in recent decades [7]. A temporal change in the age of presentation is another notable phenomenon [8]. Quoting Hassler et al. [8] in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, Text Revision (DSM-5), signs of transgender in children include: “A repeated desire to be the other sex or an assertion that they are the other sex; a belief that their assigned sex will change on its own (e.g., thinking they will grow a penis or that their penis will come off when they get older); wanting to change their name to a name typically associated with another gender, or a gender-neutral name; a preference for presenting as another gender (e.g., a child assigned male at birth who prefers long hair and wearing dresses, or a child assigned female at birth who prefers short hair and wearing gender-neutral clothing); resistance or distress when made to present as a gender they do not identify with (such as a ‘girl’ throwing a tantrum over having to wear a dress or a ‘boy’ crying after having to get a haircut); assuming the role of another gender in fantasy games or make-believe; an intense desire to participate in the games and activities typical of the other gender (such as an assigned-male child playing with Barbie and an assigned-female child playing contact sports); a preference for playmates of another gender”.

Hassler et al. also wrote [8]: “In adolescence, signs of transgender includes: feelings of panic or severe discomfort concerning puberty and body changes (e.g., refusing to acknowledge or admit that changes are occurring, refusing to look at their body, or becoming distressed or uncomfortable with body development, menstruation, or ejaculation); discomfort or distress with certain forms of gender presentation, such as disliking long hair or certain types of clothing; increased bullying at school due to differences in acting out one’s perceived gender or lack of self-confidence; isolation from peers due to lack of connection or fear of bullying; depression and/or anxiety as a result of confusion over gender identity or not fitting in with peers; be aware that some adolescents may try to repress their true gender due to outside pressure, such as from family and peers, even if they previously expressed their true gender as a child”.

The literature on the prevalence of transgender people is heterogeneous, depending on the geographic area, inclusion criteria and age at presentation [9]. Specialized centers that manage transgender people estimate a prevalence between 17 and 33/100,000 individuals [10]. Actually, people who identify as transgender represent a sizable proportion of the general population, from 0.1% to 2% [11,12].

Although the biological basis of transgenderism/incongruence is unknown, biological, anatomical, genetic and environmental factors have been suggested to contribute to gender identity [13,14]. The role of sex hormones and genetics in sexual development was described by studies published between 1948 and 2019, and the implication of endogenous steroids in brain sexual differentiation has been widely studied [14,15,16,17,18]. According to the accepted dogma, high levels of fetal testosterone organize the brain towards a male phenotype [19]. Any exogenous chemical that can reduce testosterone action during fetal life can affect the differentiation of genitalia and sex behavior.

Diethylstilbestrol (DES) is a molecule that has strengthened the concepts of endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) and the fetal basis of adult diseases [20]. It is well known that in utero exposure to DES, a compound with estrogenic and anti-androgenic activity, induces a wide range of reproductive tract/function abnormalities in the so-called ‘DES daughters’, e.g., alterations to Müllerian duct development, fertility problems, ectopic pregnancies, miscarriages, premature births and cancers, especially clear cell adenocarcinoma (CCA) of the vagina and cervix in girls and young women [21]. In ‘DES sons’, epididymal cysts, hypospadias, cryptorchidism, hypoplastic testes and micropenises have been observed [22,23,24,25,26]. In addition, although less studied, in utero exposure to synthetic sex hormones, particularly DES, can cause psychological disorders, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorders, eating disorders and suicidal behavior [27]. Interestingly, some studies in patients exposed in utero to DES with psychotic disorders identified methylome changes that affect the expression of ZFP57 and ADAMTS9, two genes implicated in neurodevelopment regulation [28], with potential multigenerational and transgenerational effects [29,30].

In this work, we first describe four transgender women identified among the 253 sons exposed in utero to DES included in the HHORAGES-France cohort (a French National patient association). This high prevalence of male-to-female transgender individuals among DES sons (1.58%) strongly suggests that exposure of male fetuses to this xenoestrogen during fetal life may affect future male sex identity and behavior.

2. Patients and Methods

This study was based on a French national retrospective cohort of DES-treated women (HHORAGES-France Association) (n = 1200) and their families. Detailed standard questionnaires were obtained from all DES mothers when they joined the HHORAGES-France Association and all DES children were already adults at this time. The answers to this online questionnaire were used to select women who met the following inclusion criteria: (1) at least two pregnancies with two viable male babies (same father) among whom the first child was not exposed in utero to DES (pre-DES), followed by one or more children with fetal exposure to DES (DES); (2) confirmed data on the total DES dose (health record or physician’s observation). The cumulative dose D administered to the French pregnant mothers was 4050 mg < D < 7300 mg. This is considered a medium-low-dose cohort, in accordance with the observations by Tournaire et al. [31] and compared with the higher doses administered in the United States (7550 mg < D < 12,742 mg). The answers to the questionnaires were also used to identify women with a DES son who presented female gender variance. We then contacted all DES sons with female gender variance and we carried out an individual interview with them.

The local university hospital ethics committee approved this study (ID IRB No. 202301531), and all patients gave their informed consent through the HHORAGES-France Association (CNIL: J B/EM/DC042793, N° 1006460).

All DES sons who identified as transgender women underwent karyotyping at their local hospital at the moment of transition.

https://www.mdpi.com/2039-4713/14/1/10


Thomas Trace Beatie (born 1974[1]) is an American public speaker, author, and advocate of transgender rights and sexuality issues, with a focus on transgender fertility and reproductive rights.[2]


Beatie came out as a trans man in early 1997. Beatie had gender-affirming surgery in March 2002 and became known as "the pregnant man" after he became pregnant through artificial insemination in 2007.[3] Beatie chose to be pregnant, with donated sperm,[4][5] because his wife Nancy was sterile.


The couple filed for divorce in 2012. The Beatie case is the first of its kind on record, where a documented legal male gave birth within a marriage to a woman, and for the first time, a court challenged a marriage where the husband gave birth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Beatie


Tracing boards are painted or printed illustrations depicting the various emblems and symbols of Freemasonry. They can be used as teaching aids during the lectures that follow each of the Masonic Degrees, when an experienced member explains the various concepts of Freemasonry to new members. They can also be used by experienced members as reminders of the concepts they learned as they went through the ceremonies of the different masonic degrees.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracing_board


Exoteric Masonry, which is only the husks of the Mystic Order formed by the Sons of Cain has in modern times attracted the masculine element with its positively polarized physical vehicles, and educated them in industry and statecraft, thus controlling the material development of the world. The sons of Seth, constituting themselves the Priestcraft have worked their spell over the positive vital bodies of the feminine element to dominate the spiritual development. And whereas, the sons of Cain working through Freemasonry and kindred movements, have openly fought for the temporal power, the Priestcraft has fought as strenuously and perhaps more effectively, by stealth, to retain their monopoly upon the spiritual development of the feminine element. To the casual onlooker it would seem as if there were no decided antagonism between these two movements at the present time, but though Freemasonry of today is but a shell of its true ancient mystic self, and though Catholicism has been terribly tarnished by the touch of time, in that one thing there is no difference, the war is as keen as ever, the efforts of the Church are not concentrated upon the masses however as much as upon those who are seeking to live the higher life, so that they may gain admission to the Mystery Temple and learn how to make the Philosophers’ Stone. As mankind advances in evolution, the vital body becomes more permanently positively polarized giving to both sexes a greater desire for spirituality, and though we change from the masculine to feminine in alternate embodiment, positive polarity of the vital body is becoming more pronounced regardless of sex, and this accounts for the growing tendency towards Altruism which is even being brought out by the suffering entailed by the great war we are now fighting, for all agree that they are seeking to obtain a lasting peace where the swords may be made into plowshares, and the spears into pruning hooks. In the past humanity has been claiming universal brotherhood as a great ideal, but we must come closer than that to be in full accord with the Christ. He said to his Disciples “ye are my friends.” Among brothers and sisters hate and enmity may exist, but friendship is the expression of love and cannot exist apart from that. This is therefore the magic word which will eventually level all distinctions, bring peace upon earth and goodwill among men. This is the great Ideal proclaimed by the Rosicrucian Fellowship, an Ideal which points the shortest way to the New Heaven and the New Earth, where the sons of Cain and the sons of Seth will eventually be united.

FREEMASONRY AND CATHOLICISM

by MAX HEINDEL

https://dn720206.ca.archive.org/0/items/freemasonryandca017137mbp/freemasonryandca017137mbp.pdf


Who were Priscilla and Aquila?

Answer


The story of these two friends of the apostle Paul is told in Acts 18. Aquila, a Jewish Christian, and his wife, Priscilla, first met Paul in Corinth, became good friends of his, and shared in his work. These two remarkable people belong in the pantheon of Christian heroes, and their ministry is both an encouragement and an example for us.


When we first meet Aquila and Priscilla, we are told that they had come to Corinth from Italy as victims of Roman persecution, not for their Christian faith but because Aquila was a Jew. The Emperor Claudius expelled all Jews from Rome, and no doubt Jews deemed it unsafe to remain in any part of Italy. Aquila and Priscilla found their way to Corinth and settled there, pursuing their trade as tentmakers. When Paul, a tentmaker himself, came to Corinth, he went to see them, no doubt having heard of their faith in Christ. Paul lived and worked with them while founding the Corinthian church.


After a year and a half, Paul left for Ephesus and took Aquila and Priscilla with him. The couple stayed in Ephesus when Paul left and established a church in their home (1 Corinthians 16:19). Then an eloquent preacher named Apollos came through Ephesus. Apollos was mighty in the Scriptures, but he only knew the baptism of John. This means Apollos knew Christ had come and fulfilled John’s prophecies, but he didn’t know the significance of Christ’s death and resurrection, the ministry of the indwelling Holy Spirit, or the mystery of the church containing both Jews and Gentiles. Priscilla and her husband took Apollos aside and explained these things to him (Acts 18:24-26). Both Aquila and Priscilla possessed an in-depth understanding of doctrine learned from Paul, and this husband and wife team was able to pass it on to another Christian and build him up in the faith.


These two remarkable people set an example for us of hospitality, seen in opening their home to Paul and using their house as a meeting place for the church. We are also impressed by their passion for Christ and their hunger for knowledge of Him.


Another hallmark of the lives of Priscilla and Aquila is their desire to build others in the faith. Paul’s last reference to them is in his last letter. Paul was imprisoned in Rome and writing to Timothy one last time. Timothy was pastoring the church at Ephesus, and Aquila and Priscilla are there with him, still faithfully ministering (2 Timothy 4:19). To the end, Aquila and Priscilla were offering hospitality to other Christians, spreading the gospel they had learned from Paul, and rendering faithful service to the Master.

https://www.gotquestions.org/Priscilla-and-Aquila.html


Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy was wearing a pink Chanel suit when her husband, U.S. President John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963.[1][2] She insisted on wearing the suit, stained with his blood, during the swearing-in of Lyndon B. Johnson that afternoon and for the flight back to Washington, D.C. Jacqueline Kennedy was a fashion icon, and the suit is the most referenced and revisited among her clothing items.[3][4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pink_Chanel_suit_of_Jacqueline_Bouvier_Kennedy


Pink Floyd

The new group rebranded as the Pink Floyd Sound in late 1965.[24][25][26][27] Barrett purportedly created the name on the spur of the moment when he discovered that another band, also called the Tea Set, were to perform at one of their gigs.[28] The name Pink Floyd is derived from the given names of two blues musicians whose Piedmont blues records Barrett had in his collection, Pink Anderson and Floyd Council.[29] By 1966, the group's repertoire consisted mainly of rhythm and blues songs, and they had begun to receive paid bookings, including a performance at the Marquee Club in December 1966, where Peter Jenner, a lecturer at the London School of Economics, noticed them. Jenner was impressed by the sonic effects Barrett and Wright created and, with his business partner and friend Andrew King, became their manager.[30] The pair had little experience in the music industry and used King's inheritance to set up Blackhill Enterprises, purchasing about £1,000 (equivalent to £23,500 in 2023[31]) worth of new instruments and equipment for the band.[nb 7] Around this time, Jenner suggested the band drop the "Sound" from their name.[33]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pink_Floyd


Queen Of The Underdogs: 5 Reasons Pink Is an Underappreciated Gay Icon

The androgynous star has been a longtime advocate for LGBTQ rights.

By Patrick Crowley

10/23/2017

https://www.billboard.com/culture/pride/pink-gay-icon-5-reasons-8007038/


Early Female Transgender Identity after Prenatal Exposure to Diethylstilbestrol: Report from a French National Diethylstilbestrol (DES) Cohort

by Laura Gaspari 1,2,3,†,Marie-Odile Soyer-Gobillard 4,5,†ORCID,Scott Kerlin 6,Françoise Paris 1,2,3 andCharles Sultan 1,*

The local university hospital ethics committee approved this study (ID IRB No. 202301531), and all patients gave their informed consent through the HHORAGES-France Association (CNIL: J B/EM/DC042793, N° 1006460).

All DES sons who identified as transgender women underwent karyotyping at their local hospital at the moment of transition.

https://www.mdpi.com/2039-4713/14/1/10


Thomas Trace Beatie (born 1974[1]) is an American public speaker, author, and advocate of transgender rights and sexuality issues, with a focus on transgender fertility and reproductive rights.[2]


Beatie came out as a trans man in early 1997. Beatie had gender-affirming surgery in March 2002 and became known as "the pregnant man" after he became pregnant through artificial insemination in 2007.[3] Beatie chose to be pregnant, with donated sperm,[4][5] because his wife Nancy was sterile.


The couple filed for divorce in 2012. The Beatie case is the first of its kind on record, where a documented legal male gave birth within a marriage to a woman, and for the first time, a court challenged a marriage where the husband gave birth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Beatie


Tracing boards are painted or printed illustrations depicting the various emblems and symbols of Freemasonry. They can be used as teaching aids during the lectures that follow each of the Masonic Degrees, when an experienced member explains the various concepts of Freemasonry to new members. They can also be used by experienced members as reminders of the concepts they learned as they went through the ceremonies of the different masonic degrees.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracing_board


Pinkerton is a private security guard and detective agency established around 1850 in the United States by Scottish-born American cooper Allan Pinkerton and Chicago attorney Edward Rucker as the North-Western Police Agency, which later became Pinkerton & Co. and finally the Pinkerton National Detective Agency. At the height of its power from the 1870s to the 1890s, it was the largest private law enforcement organization in the world.[1] It is currently a subsidiary of Swedish-based Securitas AB.[2]


Pinkerton became famous when he claimed to have foiled the Baltimore Plot to assassinate President-elect Abraham Lincoln in 1861. Lincoln later hired Pinkerton agents to conduct espionage against the Confederacy and act as his personal security during the American Civil War.[3][4]


Following the Civil War, the Pinkertons began conducting operations against organized labor.[5] During the labor strikes of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, businesses hired the Pinkerton Agency to infiltrate unions, supply guards, keep strikers and suspected unionists out of factories, and recruit goon squads to intimidate workers.[6] During the Homestead Strike of 1892, Pinkerton agents were called in to reinforce the strikebreaking measures of industrialist Henry Clay Frick, who was acting on behalf of Andrew Carnegie, the head of Carnegie Steel.[7] Tensions between the workers and strikebreakers erupted into violence, which led to the deaths of three Pinkerton agents and nine steelworkers. [8][9] During the late nineteenth century, the Pinkertons were also hired as guards in coal, iron, and lumber disputes in Illinois, Michigan, New York, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia, and were involved in other strikes such as the Great Railroad Strike of 1877.[10]


During the 20th century, Pinkerton rebranded itself as a personal security and risk management firm. The company has continued to exist in various forms to the present day and is now a division of the Swedish security company Securitas AB, operating as Pinkerton Consulting & Investigations, Inc., doing business as Pinkerton Corporate Risk Management. [11] The former Pinkerton Government Services division, PGS, now operates as Securitas Critical Infrastructure Services, Inc..[12]


Origins

In the 1850s, Allan Pinkerton, a Scottish immigrant, met Chicago attorney Edward Rucker in a local Masonic Hall. The two men formed the North-Western Police Agency, later known as the Pinkerton Agency.[13][14][15] Pinkerton used his skills in espionage to attract clients and begin growing the agency. Historian Frank Morn writes: "By the mid-1850s, a few businessmen saw the need for greater control over their employees; their solution was to sponsor a private detective system. In February 1855, Allan Pinkerton, after consulting with six midwestern railroads, created such an agency in Chicago."[16] The Pinkerton Agency began to hire women and minorities shortly after its founding because they were useful as spies, a practice uncommon at the time.[17]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinkerton_(detective_agency)


Don't forget, folks, Monday, March 15th, 8pm, LaFayette Hotel, 2223 El Cajon Boulevard in San Diego. I'll be there, I'll be giving a three-hour presentation, entitled The Sacrificed King: On the Assassination of John F. Kennedy. In it, I will directly connect to the occult worship of Mystery Babylon, the secret societies, and specifically to the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry, which really is just the outward form of the old Knights Templar. And I also believe, have reason to believe, that the sovereign and military order of the Knights of Malta was involved, which is just another branch of the old Templar order. So make sure that you're there. Forty dollars is the admission fee unless you're a CAJI member, then the admission fee if thirty dollars. I managed to negotiate a 25% discount with the people who are putting this on and who have invited me to speak. If you're not a CAJI member, you can purchase advance tickets at the Controversial Bookstore in San Diego. If you are a CAJI member, you must buy your tickets at the event. That's the only way, uh, that we can get you the discount. If you would like information on this whole conference that lasts the whole weekend, there's a whole lot of Looney Tunes stuff going on there. There are some good speakers. Uh, my workshop is, uh, Monday night, the last one of the whole conference, and it's not a workshop ticket, so it's a separate event altogether. But you can call and find out about the whole thing in case you want to spend the whole weekend. Call (619)492-8588, that's (619)492-8588, and we still donations to pay for this airtime, folks. C'mon, get out your checkbooks and money orders and help us out here. Send your donation to Stan and make your checks and money orders to WWCR, not to me, I don't want your money. It goes to pay for airtime, that's it, period. Send them to Stan, P.O. Box 889, Camp Verde, Arizona, 86322. That's Stan, P.O. Box 889, Camp Verde, Arizona, 86322. Tell him Bill sent you (laughs), and while you're at it, and even if you don't send a donation, write to Stan or call him and tell him you'd like to receive a packet of information. He'd be glad to send it to you. If you'd like to call him, his number is (602)567-6109. That's (602)567-6109. Please call him during normal waking hours. Stan's getting up there and he likes his sleep, and I don't blame him, so please don't call him, uh, late in the evening or late at night. Let him have some, some of his own time. Call him during the day, during waking hours or early evening, please. Thank you very much for those of you who are doing that. Those of you who are not, please start. Well, let's continue where we left off and, uh, this is about the society in the Middle East known as the Assassins, and we've covered quite a bit of their history already:

[Reading from A History of Secret Societies]:

But this secret society, [the] most successful of secret societies showed that its strength ultimately depended upon a powerful leader. [Well,] Kia Mohammed was no such [leader]. [And] little by little it became obvious that his son, Hasan the Hated, was the stronger personality. [Now remember, Kia Mohammed was the Old Man of the Mountain, and the mountain lair was called: The Eagle's Nest.] Now Hasan, through some magnetic power, was able to capture the imagination of the Assassins, soon having it believed that he himself was none other than the Power of All Powers, the Hidden Imam, who had been mentioned by the first Grand Master; an incarnation of all greatness. So important was [Hasan] that he was the fountain of power, and others only held a [very small] measure of authority because he allowed them to have it [and for no other reason].

This final absurdity was lapped up by members who had been conditioned to believe in things which were not, shall we say, exactly self-evident to the ordinary man. The doctrine of the all-powerful Invisible Imam was a part of Ismailism; and Hasan was ready even during his early manhood to assume the role. But, since his father was able to assert himself by having some two hundred and fifty of Hasan' followers murdered, he thought it wiser to hold his hand. In 1163 his chance came. Mohammed died, and Hasan II issued an order to all Ismailis to collect below the castle of Alamut.

Never before had such an assembly of killers, fanatics and dedicated perverters of the truth been seen. Hasan, probably in a state of megalomania, assured them that he had received a message from the Almighty that as from now, all the bond of religion were loosed: everyone might do as he liked. [Later, in the modern age, we would hear that again as: “The whole of the Law shall be: do as thou wilt.”] It was not necessary [he said] to keep up pretences. And, furthermore, he, Hasan, was none other than the Hidden Imam. His word was law; and he was a form of the divinity, not merely relaying instructions from above [but the divinity].

Hour 12: The Templars and the Assassins (aired March 2nd, 1993)

https://viefag.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/transcripts-of-william-cooper-s-mystery-babylon-series.pdf

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid02dFyFj1nJcfQ2LYyPQWZt3RL7MR7oXRRymCVViQuq85K8MRm2D3Vg9a7rQhgzKxxBl


Ghislaine Noelle Marion Maxwell[a] (born 25 December 1961[5]: 436 [6]) is a British former socialite and convicted child sex offender.[7] In 2021 she was found guilty of child sex trafficking and other offences in connection with the deceased financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.[8] The following year, she was sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment in the United States.[9]


Born in France and raised in Oxford, England, she attended Balliol College, Oxford, in the 1980s and became a prominent member of London's social scene. She is a naturalised American citizen and retains both French and British citizenship.[4] Maxwell worked for her father, Robert Maxwell, until his death in 1991; she then moved to New York City, where she continued living as a socialite and had developed a close relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.[10] Alongside Epstein, Maxwell built up a vast social network consisting of various prominent elites.[11] Documents released by the United States Department of Justice reveal that she had maintained friendships with Naomi Campbell, Prince Andrew, Bill Clinton and Kerry Kennedy.[12][13]


Maxwell was arrested by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation and charged by the US federal government in July 2020 with the crimes of enticement of minors and sex trafficking of underage girls, related to her association with Epstein[14][15] as his recruiter.[16][17] She was denied bail as a flight risk, with the judge expressing concerns regarding her "completely opaque" finances, her skill at living in hiding, and the fact that France does not extradite its citizens.[18] She was convicted on five out of six counts, including one of sex trafficking of a minor, in December 2021.[1][2][3]


Early life

Ghislaine Noelle Marion Maxwell was born on 25 December 1961 in Maisons-Laffitte, Île-de-France, France,[19] the ninth and youngest child of Elisabeth (née Meynard), a French-born scholar, and Robert Maxwell (born Ján Ludvík Hyman Binyamin Hoch), a Czechoslovak-born British media proprietor. Her father was from a Jewish family, and her mother was of Huguenot (French Protestant) descent. Maxwell was born two days before a car accident that left her fifteen-year-old brother Michael in a prolonged coma until he died in 1967.[20] Her mother later reflected that the accident had an effect on the entire family, and surmised that Ghislaine had shown signs of anorexia while only a toddler.[20]


Headington Hill Hall, Oxford

Throughout childhood, Maxwell lived with her family in Oxford at Headington Hill Hall, a 53-room mansion, where the offices of Pergamon Press, a publishing company run by her father, were also located.[10][19][21] Her mother said that all her children were raised as Anglicans.[22] Maxwell first attended Oxford High School for Girls in North Oxford and then, at age nine, was enrolled at Edgarley Hall preparatory school in Somerset, followed by Headington School at age 13.[23] She attended Marlborough College to study for A-Levels, before going on to earn a degree in Modern History with Languages from Balliol College, Oxford, in 1985.[5][23][24] While at Balliol she fraternised with Boris Johnson and Anna Pasternak.[24][25][26][27]


Maxwell had a close relationship with her father and was reportedly his favourite.[10][16][28] According to Tatler, Maxwell recalled that her father installed computers at Headington in 1973 and her first job was training to use a Wang 2200 and later programming code.[29] The Times reported that he did not permit her to bring her boyfriends home, or to be seen with them publicly, after she started attending the University of Oxford.[6][30]


Career


The Dancing Hare yacht, formerly known as the Lady Ghislaine

Maxwell was a prominent figure in the London social scene of the 1980s.[31] She founded a women's club named after the original Kit-Cat Club[16][32] and was a director of Oxford United Football Club during her father's ownership.[33][34] She also worked at The European,[35] a publication her father had established. According to Tom Bower, writing for The Sunday Times, in 1986, Robert invited her to the naming in her honour of his new yacht the Lady Ghislaine, at a shipyard in the Netherlands.[36] She spent a large amount of time in the late 1980s aboard the yacht, which was equipped with a jacuzzi, sauna, gym, and disco.[37] The Scotsman said Robert had also "tailor-made a New York company for her".[38] The company, which was engaged in corporate gifts, was not profitable.[30][36][39]


The Sunday Times reported that Maxwell flew to New York City on 5 November 1990 to deliver an envelope on her father's behalf that, unbeknownst to her, was part of "a plot initiated by her father to steal $200m" from Berlitz shareholders.[36] After Robert purchased the New York Daily News in January 1991, he sent Ghislaine to New York City to act as his emissary.[30][40] This furnished her entry to the Manhattan social scene.[24] In May 1991 Maxwell and her father took the Concorde on business to New York, from where he soon departed for Moscow and left her to represent his interests at an event honouring Simon Wiesenthal.[30]


In November 1991 Robert's body was found floating in the sea near the Canary Islands and Lady Ghislaine.[41] Soon afterwards, Ghislaine flew to Tenerife, where the yacht was berthed, to attend to his business paperwork.[30] She attended her father's funeral in Jerusalem alongside Israeli intelligence figures, President Chaim Herzog and Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, who delivered the eulogy.[42][43] Although a verdict of death by accidental drowning was recorded, Maxwell has since said she believes her father was murdered,[44] commenting in 1997: "He did not commit suicide. That was just not consistent with his character. I think he was murdered."[45]


After his death, Robert was found to have fraudulently appropriated the pension assets of Mirror Group Newspapers, a company that he ran and in which he held a large share of ownership, to support its share price.[46] Pension funds over £400m were said to be missing, and 32,000 people were affected.[47] Two of Maxwell's brothers, Ian and Kevin, who were the most involved with their father in daily business dealings, were arrested on 19 June 1992 and charged with fraud related to the Mirror Group pension scandal.[48] The brothers were acquitted three and a half years later in January 1996.[49]


Maxwell moved to the United States in 1991, shortly after her father's death.[28][16] It is reported that, owing to social discomfort she experienced in the wake of the pension fraud perpetrated by her father, she purchased a one-way Concorde ticket to New York in November 1992.[24] Maxwell was provided with an annual income of £80,000 (equivalent to £216,935 in 2023) from a trust fund established in Liechtenstein by her father.[50][51] By 1992 she had moved to an apartment of an Iranian friend overlooking Central Park. At the time, Maxwell worked at a real estate office on Madison Avenue and was reported to be socialising with celebrities.[52] She quickly rose to wider prominence as a New York City socialite.[16][53] In 1996 Maxwell made headlines when she was arrested in West London for drink-driving; the media reported her occupation as "internet operative".[54]


Relationship with Jeffrey Epstein


Maxwell with Jeffrey Epstein on 29 September 1993

Accounts differ on when Maxwell first met the American financier Jeffrey Epstein. According to Epstein's former business partner Steven Hoffenberg, Robert Maxwell introduced his daughter to Epstein in the late 1980s.[55] The Times reported that Maxwell met Epstein in the early 1990s at a New York party following "a difficult break-up with Count Gianfranco Cicogna" (1962–2012) of the CIGA Hotels clan.[56] Maxwell and Epstein were associated with each other by February 1993.[57] In 1995, Maxwell and Epstein were guests of honour on a cruise organised by Lindsay Fox who had invited Rodney Adler and wife Lindi as well as James Packer and then-girlfriend Deni Hines.[58]


Maxwell had a romantic relationship with Epstein for several years in the early 1990s and remained closely associated with him for more than 25 years until his death in 2019.[16][53][59] The nature of their relationship remains unclear, although at trial, prosecutors said that from 1994 to 1997 they were engaged in an intimate relationship.[24] A 22 January 2001 article by Nigel Rosser of the Evening Standard reported that friends of Epstein said Maxwell "remains desperate to marry Epstein", further elaborating: "You could say she was pretty much entirely dependent on him. She loves him. He sometimes treats her well, sometimes off-handedly. You could say she sees something of a father in him."[60] In a 2009 deposition, several of Epstein's household employees testified that Epstein referred to her as his "main girlfriend" who also hired, fired, and supervised his staff, starting around 1992.[61] She has also been referred to as the "Lady of the House" by Epstein's staff and as his "aggressive assistant".[62] In a 2003 Vanity Fair profile on Epstein, the author Vicky Ward said Epstein referred to Maxwell as "my best friend".[63] Ward also observed that Maxwell seemed "to organize much of his life".[63] Politico reported that Maxwell and Epstein had friendships with several prominent individuals in elite circles of politics, academia, business, and law, including the US presidents Donald Trump and Bill Clinton, the lawyer Alan Dershowitz, and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, known at the time as His Royal Highness Prince Andrew.[64] However, it has been acknowledged that Clinton, who Maxwell has stated was actually her friend and not Epstein's, was in fact connected to Epstein through her.[65][66][67]


Maxwell is known for her longstanding friendship[68] with the former Prince Andrew, and for having escorted him to a "hookers and pimps" social function in New York.[69] In a November 2019 interview with the BBC, Andrew said that the two had known each other since Maxwell was an undergraduate at Oxford.[70] She introduced Epstein to Andrew, and the three often socialised together.[71] In 2000 Maxwell and Epstein attended a party thrown by Andrew at the Queen's Sandringham House estate in Norfolk, reportedly for Maxwell's 39th birthday.[72] In his November 2019 interview with the BBC, Andrew confirmed that Maxwell and Epstein had attended an event at his invitation, but he denied that it was anything more than a "straightforward shooting weekend".[73] In 1995 Epstein renamed one of his companies the Ghislaine Corporation; based in Palm Beach, Florida, US, the company was dissolved in 1998.[61] As a trained helicopter pilot, Maxwell also transported Epstein to Little Saint James, his private Caribbean island in the US Virgin Islands.[6][74]


Maxwell in 2007

In 2008 Epstein was convicted of soliciting a minor for prostitution and served 13 months of an 18-month prison sentence. Following Epstein's release, although Maxwell continued to attend prominent social functions, she and Epstein were no longer seen together publicly.[10] Although in 2013 Maxwell was an honoured guest at the Clinton Global Initiative conference,[75] by late 2015 she had largely retreated from attending social functions.[10][76]


In her October 2025 memoir Nobody's Girl, Virginia Giuffre alleged Maxwell and Epstein sought to use her to be a surrogate mother for a baby they were planning to have together.[67]


Civil cases and accusations

Civil suits

Virginia Giuffre v Maxwell (2015)

Details of a civil lawsuit, made public in January 2015, contained a deposition from "Jane Doe 3" that accused Maxwell of recruiting her in 1999, when she was a minor, and grooming her to provide sexual services for Epstein:


In court documents, Epstein's accusers allege that Maxwell acted as a recruiter, an instructor, and in some cases a participant in the abuse he practiced. Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who claims that Maxwell recruited her on behalf of Epstein when Giuffre was a 16-year-old spa attendant at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, where Epstein has a home, said much of her grooming came from Maxwell herself. "The training started immediately", she said in a video interview with the Miami Herald. "It was everything down to how to give a blowjob, how to be quiet, be subservient, give Jeffrey what he wants. A lot of this training came from Ghislaine herself. Being a woman, it kind of surprises you that a woman could let stuff like that happen. Not only let it happen but to groom you into doing it."[16]


A 2018 exposé by Julie K. Brown in the Miami Herald revealed Jane Doe 3 to be Virginia Giuffre, who was previously known as Virginia Roberts. Giuffre met Maxwell at Trump's Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Florida, when Giuffre was a 16-year-old spa attendant.[16] She asserted that Maxwell had introduced her to Epstein, after which she was "groomed by the two [of them] for his pleasure, including lessons in Epstein's preferences during oral sex".[16][77] Maxwell repeatedly denied any involvement in Epstein's crimes.[59] In a statement in 2015 Maxwell rejected allegations that she had acted as a procurer for Epstein and denied that she had "facilitated Prince Andrew's [alleged] acts of sexual abuse". Her spokesperson said "the allegations made against Ghislaine Maxwell are untrue" and she "strongly denies allegations of an unsavoury nature, which have appeared in the British press and elsewhere, and reserves her right to seek redress at the repetition of such old defamatory claims".[71][78]


Giuffre asserted that Maxwell and Epstein had trafficked her and other underage girls, often at sex parties hosted by Epstein at his homes in New York, New Mexico, Palm Beach, and the United States Virgin Islands. Maxwell called her a liar. Giuffre sued Maxwell for defamation in federal court in the Southern District of New York in 2015. While details of the settlement have not been made public, in May 2017 the case was settled in Giuffre's favour,[79] with Maxwell paying Giuffre "millions".[80] Giuffre's family reported that she committed suicide on 25 April 2025, at her farm in Australia.[81] She was 41, and had three children.[81]


Sarah Ransome v Epstein and Maxwell (2017)

In 2017 Sarah Ransome filed a suit, in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, against Epstein and Maxwell, alleging that Maxwell hired her to give massages to Epstein and later threatened to physically harm her or destroy her career prospects if she did not comply with their sexual demands at his mansion in New York and on Little Saint James. The suit was settled in 2018 under undisclosed terms.[10][53][82][83]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghislaine_Maxwell


Dame Sarah Elisabeth Mullally (née Bowser; born 26 March 1962) is an English Anglican prelate and former nurse. She has been the bishop of London since 2018, and is the first woman to hold this office. By virtue of her office she is also a Lord Spiritual, one of the 26 Church of England bishops who sit in the House of Lords of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. On 3 October 2025, it was announced that Mullally would become the 106th archbishop of Canterbury in January 2026; she will be the first woman to hold the office.


Born in Woking, Surrey, Mullally received clinical training in nursing from St Thomas' Hospital. She practised nursing primarily in South London, where she also began her study for ministry in the Church of England. In 1999 she became Chief Nursing Officer and director of patient experience for the English National Health Service. She left these roles in 2004 to pursue full-time ministry. For her service in nursing, Mullally was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2005.


Mullally was ordained a priest in 2002 and began her ministry in the diocese of Southwark. She served in various London churches, and in 2012 became a canon of Salisbury Cathedral. In 2015 she was consecrated as bishop of Crediton, a suffragan bishop in the diocese of Exeter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Mullally


All Saints' Church is an active English-speaking chaplaincy of the Church of England's Diocese in Europe - a part of the Anglican Communion - in Rome, Italy.[2]


The church building is a Gothic revival red-brick construction, situated in the Via del Babuino, about 100 meters from the Spanish Steps. The architect was George Edmund Street (1824–1881). It has a regular weekly schedule of masses and prayer services and is also used for concerts. All Saints follows the high church tradition of Anglicanism, with a sung Eucharist being held weekly.


History

Anglican worship in Rome can trace its history back to the eighteenth century, when young British travellers took Grand Tours. Although some would bring Prayer Books, bibles and occasionally even chaplains, there remained demand for an English-language, Anglican service in Rome. Records exist of Anglican worship in the Palazzo Balestra as early as 1719, however, it was not until the nineteenth century that a permanent Anglican community was established.[3]


In the area near the Spanish Steps known as the "English Ghetto", worship began in 1816. On 29 December that year, the service raised funds that were distributed to the poor, commencing a tradition of charity that continues today. In 1825, an anonymous donation allows for the foundation of the Granary Chapel in the Porta del Popolo, which gained a permanent chaplain in 1828 and fell under the jurisdiction of the Diocese of Gibraltar in 1842. Despite local unrest and changes in location, the chapel continued to expand into the 1870s.[3]


The 1870s marked a schism in the Anglican community at Rome. Those who considered the clergy at the Granary Chapel too ritualistic separated and established a new church, Holy Trinity, which saw various iterations of building and location. However, this church closed in 1937, and the building was demolished in 1948.[4]


The remaining community commenced planning for a new building when the Municipality of Rome announced the need to demolish the Granary Chapel for street widening. Victorian Gothic Revival architect G. E. Street began preparing plans in 1876, with the foundation stone being laid in 1882. Despite delays and a lack of funds (the incumbent Canon Wasse had to cover remaining construction expenses), the church was considered completed by 1887.[5][3]


G. E. Street's design for the Anglican Church at Rome

Throughout the early twentieth century, various internal improvements were made and electricity was installed. In 1937, after an anonymous donation, the steeple which now pierces the Roman skyline was completed. The church closed during the Second World War, reopening on 9 June 1944. During the latter half of that century, the church saw many distinguished visitors, including the Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret, and Archbishops of Canterbury Ramsey and Fisher. In February 2017, Pope Francis visited All Saints’, the first visit of its kind by a sitting pope.[3]


Architecture

The church is the last work of Victorian architect George Edmund Street, and follows his usual ‘High Victorian’ gothic style. Influenced by both Italian architecture and the prevailing gothic style in England at the time, the building features a polychromatic design of red brick, pale Italian marble and pink Arles stone. During excavations before construction of the current church, remains of an imperial domus senatoria were discovered.[6]


The church has a typical design of a central nave flanked by two aisles, gothic pointed arches and flying buttresses, surmounted by a wooden roof.[6] The steeple, famous for appearances on the Roman skyline and in many films, was not completed until 1937, about fifty years after the main church took shape.[3]


Interior


In the central nave, the columns and pillars are polychromed with marbles from across Southern Europe: green Carrara, red Perugia, black Verona and Yellow Siena. There are mosaics roundels of evangelists and other scriptural themes designed by Edward Burne-Jones.[6]


The stained glass was designed by Clayton and Bell of London. In the chancel are scenes of the life of Christ, in the Lady Chapel the arcangels, in the nave, various English and Italian saints. At the counter-façade the window depicts the ascenscin of Christ, and by the rear door, Saints Peter and Paul.[7][8]


The Lady Chapel is in the north aisle and features an English use altar. It is also the location of the aumbry, signified by the sacrament lamp. Also in the chapel is a copy of a Benedetto da Maiano Madonna and child.[7]


The sanctuary contains the high altar, behind which is the marble reredos. The apse was decorated with red damask, which was replaced in 2001. The church uses vestments and altar frontals following the liturgical colours outlined by Percy Dearmer.[7]


The pulpit is in yellow Siena and black Verona marble with white Como highlights, dedicated to the memory of Canon Wasse. The chancel-screen follows a similar colour pattern. There is a baptismal font, also of marble, with iconography of Christ about it.[8][7]


List of Chaplains

Granary Chapel


1828 - Richard Burgess

1837 - James Hutchinson

1850 - Francis Blake Woodward

1866 - John Crowder

1869 - Arthur Thomas Whitmore Shadwell

1873 - Joseph Brett Grant

1874 - Thomas Childe Barker

1875 - Henry Watson Wasse


All Saints' Church


1887 - Henry Watson Wasse

1891 - Frank Nutcombe Oxenham

1910 - John Gardner Brown

1916 - Gilbert Holme Sissons

1920 - Bernard Edgar Holmes

1924 - Lonsdale Ragg

1930 - William Thomas Farmiloe

1934 - Joshua Goodland

1935 - Hugh Aldersey Tudor

1936 - Ariel Law Harkness

1947 - Clifford Stickney Powers

1949 - John Findlow

1956 - Douglas James Noel Wanstall

1971 - David Davies

1974 - Edward Murfet

1977 - David Henry Palmer

1983 - Bevan Wardrobe

1992 - Peter Merchant

1994 - Geoffrey Evans

1999 - Jonathan Thomas Boardman

2019 - Robert James Warren

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Saints%27_Church,_Rome


666 1 Samuel 26:15-16. And David said to Abner, Art not thou a valiant man? and who is like to thee in Israel? wherefore then hast thou not kept thy lord the king? for there came one of the people in to destroy the king thy lord. This thing is not good that thou hast done. As the LORD liveth, ye are worthy to die, because ye have not kept your master, the LORD'S anointed. And now see where the king's spear is, and the cruse of water that was at his bolster. 2 Samuel 18:3. But the people answered, Thou shalt not go forth: for if we flee away, they will not care for us; neither if half of us die, will they care for us: but now thou art worth ten thousand of us: therefore now it is better that thou succour us out of the city. Esther 6:2. And it was found written, that Mordecai had told of Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king's chamberlains, the keepers of the door, who sought to lay hand on the king Ahasuerus

THE

WESTMINSTER

LARGER

CATECHISM

https://www.freepresbyterian.org/uploads/Larger_Catechism.pdf


Can. 666 In the use of means of social communication, necessary discretion is to be observed and those things are to be avoided which are harmful to one’s vocation and dangerous to the chastity of a consecrated person."

TITLE II. RELIGIOUS INSTITUTES (Cann. 607 - 709) CODE OF CANON LAW

https://www.vatican.va/archive/cod-iuris-canonici/eng/documents/cic_lib2-cann607-709_en.html


18 U.S. Code § 666 - Theft or bribery concerning programs receiving Federal funds

U.S. Code

Notes

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(a)Whoever, if the circumstance described in subsection (b) of this section exists—

(1)being an agent of an organization, or of a State, local, or Indian tribal government, or any agency thereof—

(A)embezzles, steals, obtains by fraud, or otherwise without authority knowingly converts to the use of any person other than the rightful owner or intentionally misapplies, property that—

(i)is valued at $5,000 or more, and

(ii)is owned by, or is under the care, custody, or control of such organization, government, or agency; or

(B)corruptly solicits or demands for the benefit of any person, or accepts or agrees to accept, anything of value from any person, intending to be influenced or rewarded in connection with any business, transaction, or series of transactions of such organization, government, or agency involving any thing of value of $5,000 or more; or

(2)corruptly gives, offers, or agrees to give anything of value to any person, with intent to influence or reward an agent of an organization or of a State, local or Indian tribal government, or any agency thereof, in connection with any business, transaction, or series of transactions of such organization, government, or agency involving anything of value of $5,000 or more;

shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both.

(b)The circumstance referred to in subsection (a) of this section is that the organization, government, or agency receives, in any one year period, benefits in excess of $10,000 under a Federal program involving a grant, contract, subsidy, loan, guarantee, insurance, or other form of Federal assistance.

(c)This section does not apply to bona fide salary, wages, fees, or other compensation paid, or expenses paid or reimbursed, in the usual course of business.

(d)As used in this section—

(1)the term “agent” means a person authorized to act on behalf of another person or a government and, in the case of an organization or government, includes a servant or employee, and a partner, director, officer, manager, and representative;

(2)the term “government agency” means a subdivision of the executive, legislative, judicial, or other branch of government, including a department, independent establishment, commission, administration, authority, board, and bureau, and a corporation or other legal entity established, and subject to control, by a government or governments for the execution of a governmental or intergovernmental program;

(3)the term “local” means of or pertaining to a political subdivision within a State;

(4)the term “State” includes a State of the United States, the District of Columbia, and any commonwealth, territory, or possession of the United States; and

(5)the term “in any one-year period” means a continuous period that commences no earlier than twelve months before the commission of the offense or that ends no later than twelve months after the commission of the offense. Such period may include time both before and after the commission of the offense.

(Added Pub. L. 98–473, title II, § 1104(a), Oct. 12, 1984, 98 Stat. 2143; amended Pub. L. 99–646, § 59(a), Nov. 10, 1986, 100 Stat. 3612; Pub. L. 101–647, title XII, §§ 1205(d), 1209, Nov. 29, 1990, 104 Stat. 4831, 4832; Pub. L. 103–322, title XXXIII, § 330003(c), Sept. 13, 1994, 108 Stat. 2140.)

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/666


Revelation 13:16-18

New International Version

16 It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, 17 so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name.


18 This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man.[a] That number is 666.


Read full chapter

Footnotes

Revelation 13:18 Or is humanity’s number

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2013%3A16-18&version=NIV


In Hebrew, the word saraph means "burning", and is used seven times throughout the text of the Hebrew Bible as a noun, usually to denote "serpent",[4] twice in the Book of Numbers, once in the Book of Deuteronomy, and four times in the Book of Isaiah.[5][6][7] The reason why the word for "burning" was also used to denote a serpent is not universally agreed upon; it may be due to a certain snake species' fiery colors, or perhaps the burning sensation left by its venomous bite. Regardless, its plural form, seraphim, occurs in both Numbers and Isaiah, but only in Isaiah is it used to denote an angelic being; likewise, these angels are referred to only as the plural seraphim – Isaiah later uses the singular saraph to describe a "fiery flying serpent", in line with the other uses of the term throughout the Tanakh.


There is emerging consensus that the motifs used to display seraphs in Hyksos-era Canaan had their original sources in Egyptian uraeus iconography.[8] In Egyptian iconography, the uraeus was used as a symbol of sovereignty, royalty, divinity and divine authority, and later iconography often showed uraei with wings. In the early monarchic period of Israel and Judah, Egyptian motifs were evidently borrowed by the Israelites en masse, as a plethora of personal seals belonging to classes ranging from commonfolk to royalty have been discovered, which incorporate several pieces of ancient Egyptian iconography, including the winged sun, ankh, the hedjet and deshret crowns of Upper and Lower Egypt, scarabs, and the uraeus cobra. These uraei often had four wings, as opposed to the Egyptian standard which only gave them two.[9] These images have been connected with the seraphim angels associated with Isaiah's visions, or perhaps more directly to the aforementioned "fiery flying serpent", but this continues to be debated – and an image of serpentine seraphim clashes with Isaiah's own vision, which clearly envisioned seraphim with heads, legs, and arms – although, on the second matter, some scholars have proposed that the covered "feet" of the seraphim should be identified as genitals, as "feet" are often used in the Hebrew Bible as a euphemism for the penis.[10][11]


The vision in Isaiah Chapter 6 of seraphim in an idealized version of Solomon's Temple represents the sole instance in the Hebrew Bible of this word being used to describe celestial beings.[12] "... I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphim: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly." (Isaiah 6:1–3)[13] And one cried to another, "Holy, holy, holy, is YHWH of hosts: the whole earth is full of His glory." (verses 2–3)[14] One seraph carries out an act of ritual purification for the prophet by touching his lips with a live coal from the altar (verses 6–7)[15] "And he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged."


The text describes the "seraphim" as winged celestial beings with a fiery passion for doing God's good work.[16] Notwithstanding the wording of the text itself, at least one Hebrew scholar claims that in the Hebrew Bible the seraphim do not have the status of angels, and that it is only in later sources (like De Coelesti Hierarchia or Summa Theologiae) that they are considered to be a division of the divine messengers.[17]


Seraphim appear in the 2nd-century BC Book of Enoch,[18] where they are mentioned, in conjunction with cherubim, as the heavenly creatures standing nearest to the throne of God. In non-biblical sources they are sometimes called the Akyəst (Ge'ez: አክይስት "serpents", "dragons"; an alternate term for Hell).[19][20][21]


In the Second Book of Enoch, two classes of celestial beings are mentioned alongside the seraphim and cherubim, known as the phoenixes and the chalkydri (Ancient Greek: χαλκύδραι khalkýdrai, compound of χαλκός khalkós "brass, copper" + ὕδρα hýdra "hydra", "water-serpent"—lit. "brazen hydras", "copper serpents"). Both are described as "flying elements of the sun" that reside in either the 4th or 7th heaven, who have twelve wings and burst into song at sunrise.[22][23]


In the Book of Revelation (4:4–8), the beasts are described as being forever in God's presence and praising him: "[A]nd they rest not day and night, saying, 'Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come.'" This account differs slightly from the account of Isaiah, stating in the eighth verse, "And the four beasts had each of them six wings about him; and they were full of eyes within". They appear also in the Gnostic text, On the Origin of the World.[24]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seraph


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And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.

◄ 2 Corinthians 11:14 ►


1 In the year of the death of king Uzziah, [a]I saw also the Lord sitting upon an [b]high throne, and lifted up, and the lower [c]parts thereof filled the Temple.


2 The [d]Seraphims stood upon it, every one had six wings: with twain he covered his [e]face, and with twain he covered his [f]feet, and with twain he did [g]fly.


3 And one cried to another, and said, [h]Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts: the whole [i]world is full of his glory.

Isaiah 6:1-3

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah%206&version=GNV


Learned borrowing from Pali Buddha (“the Awakened One, the Enlightened One”), from buddha (“awakened, enlightened”), from Sanskrit बुद्ध (buddha, “awakened, enlightened”), past participle of बोधति (bodhati, “to wake, to awaken”). Distantly related to English bid and bede. Also cognate with Russian будить (buditʹ, “to wake up”)."

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Buddha


Alumbrado, (Spanish: “Enlightened”, ) Italian Illuminato, plural Illuminati, a follower of a mystical movement in Spain during the 16th and 17th centuries. Its adherents claimed that the human soul, having attained a certain degree of perfection, was permitted a vision of the divine and entered into direct communication with the Holy Spirit. From this state the soul could neither advance nor retrogress. Consequently, participation in the liturgy, good works, and observance of the exterior forms of religious life were unnecessary for those who had received the “light.” The Alumbrados came primarily from among the reformed Franciscans and the Jesuits, but their doctrines seem to have influenced all classes of people. The extravagant claims made for their visions and revelations caused them to be relentlessly persecuted. The Inquisition issued edicts against them on three occasions (1568, 1574, and 1623)."

https://www.britannica.com/event/Alumbrado


Entries linking to gautama

Buddha (n.)

an epithet applied to the historical founder of Buddhism, 1680s, from Pali, literally "awakened, enlightened," past participle of budh "to awake, know, perceive," which is related to Sanskrit bodhati "is awake, observes, understands," from PIE root *bheudh- "be aware, make aware." Title given by his adherents to the man who taught this path, Siddhartha Gautama, also known to them as Sakyamuni "Sage of the Sakyas" (his family clan), who lived in northern India 5c. B.C.E."

https://www.etymonline.com/word/gautama


Gautama

surname of the Buddha, from Sanskrit Gotamah, properly a patronymic, literally "descendant of the greatest ox," from superlative of gauh "ox, bull, cow."


Unam Sanctam

One God, One Faith, One Spiritual Authority

Pope Boniface VIII - 1302

Bull of Pope Boniface VIII promulgated November 18, 1302

Urged by faith, we are obliged to believe and to maintain that the Church is one, holy, catholic, and also apostolic. We believe in her firmly and we confess with simplicity that outside of her there is neither salvation nor the remission of sins, as the Spouse in the Canticles [Sgs 6:8] proclaims: ‘One is my dove, my perfect one. She is the only one, the chosen of her who bore her,‘ and she represents one sole mystical body whose Head is Christ and the head of Christ is God [1 Cor 11:3]. In her then is one Lord, one faith, one baptism [Eph 4:5]. There had been at the time of the deluge only one ark of Noah, prefiguring the one Church, which ark, having been finished to a single cubit, had only one pilot and guide, i.e., Noah, and we read that, outside of this ark, all that subsisted on the earth was destroyed.

We venerate this Church as one, the Lord having said by the mouth of the prophet: ‘Deliver, O God, my soul from the sword and my only one from the hand of the dog.’ [Ps 21:20] He has prayed for his soul, that is for himself, heart and body; and this body, that is to say, the Church, He has called one because of the unity of the Spouse, of the faith, of the sacraments, and of the charity of the Church. This is the tunic of the Lord, the seamless tunic, which was not rent but which was cast by lot [Jn 19:23- 24]. Therefore, of the one and only Church there is one body and one head, not two heads like a monster; that is, Christ and the Vicar of Christ, Peter and the successor of Peter, since the Lord speaking to Peter Himself said: ‘Feed my sheep‘ [Jn 21:17], meaning, my sheep in general, not these, nor those in particular, whence we understand that He entrusted all to him [Peter]. Therefore, if the Greeks or others should say that they are not confided to Peter and to his successors, they must confess not being the sheep of Christ, since Our Lord says in John ‘there is one sheepfold and one shepherd.’ We are informed by the texts of the gospels that in this Church and in its power are two swords; namely, the spiritual and the temporal. For when the Apostles say: ‘Behold, here are two swords‘ [Lk 22:38] that is to say, in the Church, since the Apostles were speaking, the Lord did not reply that there were too many, but sufficient. Certainly the one who denies that the temporal sword is in the power of Peter has not listened well to the word of the Lord commanding: ‘Put up thy sword into thy scabbard‘ [Mt 26:52]. Therefore, both are in the power of the Church, namely, the spiritual sword and the material. But indeed, the latter is to be exercised on behalf of the Church; and truly, the former is to be exercised by the Church. The former is of the priest; the latter is by the hand of kings and soldiers, but at the will and sufferance of the priest.


However, one sword ought to be subordinated to the other and temporal authority, subjected to spiritual power. For since the Apostle said: ‘There is no power except from God and the things that are, are ordained of God‘ [Rom 13:1-2], but they would not be ordained if one sword were not subordinated to the other and if the inferior one, as it were, were not led upwards by the other.


For, according to the Blessed Dionysius, it is a law of the divinity that the lowest things reach the highest place by intermediaries. Then, according to the order of the universe, all things are not led back to order equally and immediately, but the lowest by the intermediary, and the inferior by the superior. Hence we must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power whatever, as spiritual things surpass the temporal. This we see very clearly also by the payment, benediction, and consecration of the tithes, but the acceptance of power itself and by the government even of things. For with truth as our witness, it belongs to spiritual power to establish the terrestrial power and to pass judgement if it has not been good. Thus is accomplished the prophecy of Jeremias concerning the Church and the ecclesiastical power: ‘Behold to-day I have placed you over nations, and over kingdoms‘ and the rest. Therefore, if the terrestrial power err, it will be judged by the spiritual power; but if a minor spiritual power err, it will be judged by a superior spiritual power; but if the highest power of all err, it can be judged only by God, and not by man, according to the testimony of the Apostle: ‘The spiritual man judgeth of all things and he himself is judged by no man‘ [1 Cor 2:15]. This authority, however, (though it has been given to man and is exercised by man), is not human but rather divine, granted to Peter by a divine word and reaffirmed to him (Peter) and his successors by the One Whom Peter confessed, the Lord saying to Peter himself, ‘Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound also in Heaven‘ etc., [Mt 16:19]. Therefore whoever resists this power thus ordained by God, resists the ordinance of God [Rom 13:2], unless he invent like Manicheus two beginnings, which is false and judged by us heretical, since according to the testimony of Moses, it is not in the beginnings but in the beginning that God created heaven and earth [Gen 1:1]. Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

https://www.papalencyclicals.net/bon08/b8unam.htm


Revelation 17

1599 Geneva Bible

17 1 That great whore is described, 2 with whom the Kings of the earth committed fornication. 6 She is drunken with the blood of Saints. 7 The mystery of the woman, and the beast that carried her, expounded. 11 Their destruction. 14 The Lamb’s victory.


1 Then [a]there came one of the seven Angels, which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come: I will show [b]thee the [c]damnation of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters,


2 With whom have committed fornication the kings of the earth, and the inhabitants of the earth are drunken with the wine of her fornication.


3 [d]So he carried me away into the wilderness in the Spirit, and I saw a woman sit upon a [e]scarlet colored beast, full of names of blasphemy, which had seven heads, and ten horns.


4 And [f]the woman was arrayed [g]in purple and scarlet, and gilded with gold, and precious stones, and pearls, [h]and had a cup of gold in her hand full of abomination, and filthiness of her fornication.


5 [i]And in her forehead was a name written, A mystery, [j]that great Babylon that mother of whoredoms, and abominations of the earth.


6 [k]And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of Saints, and with the blood of the Martyrs of JESUS: and when I saw her, [l]I wondered with great marvel.


7 [m]Then the Angel said unto me, Wherefore marvelest thou? I will show thee the mystery of that woman, and of that beast that beareth her, which hath seven heads and ten horns.


8 [n]The beast that thou hast seen, [o]was and is not, and [p]shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and shall go into perdition, and they that dwell on the earth, shall wonder (whose names are not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world) [q]when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.


9 [r]Here is the mind that hath wisdom, The [s]seven heads [t]are seven mountains, whereon the woman sitteth: [u]they are also seven Kings.


10 [v]Five are fallen, [w]and one is, [x]and another is not yet come: and when he cometh, he must continue a short space.


11 [y]And the beast that was, and is not, is even [z]the eighth, and is [aa]one of the seven, and [ab]all go into destruction.


12 [ac]And the ten horns which thou sawest, are [ad]ten kings, which yet have not received a kingdom, but shall receive power, as Kings [ae]at one hour with the beast.


13 [af]These have one mind, and shall give their power and authority unto the beast.


14 These shall fight with the [ag]Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them: for he is Lord of Lords, and King of Kings: and they that are on his side, called, and chosen, and faithful.


15 [ah]And he said unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, [ai]are people, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.


16 And the ten [aj]horns which thou sawest upon the beast, are they that shall hate the whore, and shall make her desolate, and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire.


17 [ak]For God hath put in their hearts to fulfill his will, and to do with one consent for to give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God be fulfilled.


18 And that woman which thou sawest, is that [al]great city which reigned over the kings of the earth.


Footnotes

Revelation 17:1 The state of the Church militant being declared, now followeth the state of the Church overcoming and getting victory, as I showed before in the beginning of chapter 10. The state is set forth in 4 chapters. As in the place beforegoing I noted, that in that history the order of time was not always exactly observed, so the same is to be understood in this history, that it is distinguished according to the persons of which it treateth, and that in the several stories of the persons is severly observed in the time thereof. For first is delivered the story of Babylon destroyed, in this and the next chap. (for this Babylon out of all doubt shall perish before the 2 beasts and the Dragon). Secondly is delivered the destruction of both the two beasts, chap. 19. And lastly of the Dragon, chap. 20, in the story of the spiritual Babylon are distinctly set forth the state thereof in this chap. and the overthrow done from God, chap. 18. In this verse and that which followeth is a transition or passage unto the first argument, consisting of a particular calling of the Prophet (as often heretofore) and a general proposition.

Revelation 17:1 That is the damnable harlot, by a figure of speech called hypallage. For S. John as yet had not seen her. Although another interpretation may be borne, yet I like this better.

Revelation 17:1 The sentence that is pronounced against this harlot.

Revelation 17:3 Henceforth is propounded the type of Babylon, and the state thereof in 4 verses. After a declaration of the type, in the rest of this chap., in the type are described two things, the beast (of whom chap. 13), in verse 3, and the woman that sitteth upon the beast, verses 4, 5, 6. The beast in process of time hath gotten somewhat more than was expressed in the former vision. First in that it is not read before that he was appareled in scarlet, a robe imperial and of triumph. Secondly, in that this is full of names of blasphemy: the other carried the name of blasphemy only in his head. So God did teach that this beast is much increased in impiety and injustice and doth in this last age, triumph in both these more insolently and proudly than ever before.

Revelation 17:3 A scarlet color, that is, with a red and purple garment: and surely it was not without cause that the Romish clergy were so much delighted with this color.

Revelation 17:4 That harlot, the spiritual Babylon, which is Rome. She is described by her attire, profession and deeds.

Revelation 17:4 In attire most glorious, triumphant, most rich, and most gorgeous.

Revelation 17:4 In profession, the nourisher of all, in this verse, and teaching her mysteries unto all, verse 5, setting forth all things most magnificently: but indeed most pernicious besotting miserable men with her cup, and bringing upon them a deadly giddiness.

Revelation 17:5 Deceiving with the title of religion, and public inscription of mystery: which the beast in times past did not bear.

Revelation 17:5 An exposition: in which S. John declareth what manner of woman this is.

Revelation 17:6 In manner of deeds: She is red with blood, and sheddeth it most licentiously, and therefore is colored with the blood of the Saints, as on the contrary part. Christ is set forth imbrued with the blood of his enemies; Isa. 3:1.

Revelation 17:6 A passage unto the second part of this chapter, by occasion given of S. John, as the words of the Angel do show, in the next verse.

Revelation 17:7 The second part or place, as I said, verse 1. The narration of the vision, promised in this verse, and delivered in the verse following. Now there is delivered first a narration of the beast and his story, unto verse 14. After, of the harlot, unto the end of the chap.

Revelation 17:8 The story of the beast hath a triple description of him. The first is a distinction of this beast from all that ever hath been at any time: which distinction is contained in this verse: The second is a delineation or painting out of the beast by things present, by which he might even at that time be known of the godly, and this delineation is according to his heads, verses 2, 10, 11. The third is an historical foretelling of things to come, and to be done by him: and these are ascribed unto his horns, verses 12, 13, 14. This beast is that Empire of Rome, of which I spake, chap. 13:11, according to the mutations and changes whereof which then had already happened, the holy Ghost hath distinguished and set out the same. The Apostle distinguisheth this beast from all others in these words. The beast which thou sawest, was and is not. For so I expound the words of the Apostle for evidence’s sake as I will further declare in the notes following.

Revelation 17:8 The meaning is, that beast which thou sawest before (Rev. 13:1) and which yet thou hast now seen, was, (I say was) even from Julius Caesar in respect of beginning, rising up, station, glory, dominion, manner and stock, from the house of Julius: and yet is not now the same, if thou look unto the house and stock for the dominion of this family was translated unto another, after the death of Nero from the other unto a third, from a third unto a fourth, and so forth was varied and altered by innumerable changes. Finally, the Empire is one, as it were one beast: but exceedingly varied by kindreds, families, and persons. It was therefore (saith S. John) in the kindred or house of Julius: and now it is not in that kindred, but translated unto another.

Revelation 17:8 As if he should say, Also the same that is, shall shortly not be: but shall ascend out of the depth, or out of the sea (as was said, Rev. 13:1) that is, shall be a new stock from amongst the nations without difference, and shall in the same state go unto destruction or ruin, and perish: and so shall successively new Princes or Emperors come and go, arise and fall, the body of the beast remaining still, but tossed with so many and often alterations, as no man can but marvel that this beast was able to stand and hold out, in so many mutations. Verily no Empire that ever was tossed with so many changes, and as it were with so many tempests of the sea, ever continued so long.

Revelation 17:8 That is as many as have not learned the providence of God, according to the faith of the Saints, shall marvel at these grievous and often changes when they shall consider, the selfsame beast, which is the Roman Empire, to have been, not to be, and to be and still molested with perpetual mutation, and yet in the same to stand and continue. This in mine opinion is the most simple exposition of this place, and confirmed by the event of the things themselves. Although by the last change also, by which the Empire, that before was civil became Ecclesiastical, is not obscurely signified by these words: of which two, the first exercised cruelty upon the bodies of the saints: the other also upon their souls: the first by human order and policy, the other under the color of the law of God, and of Religion, raged and imbrued itself with the blood of the godly.

Revelation 17:9 An exhortation preparing unto audience, by the same argument, with that of Christ: He that hath ears to hear, let him hear. Wherefore, for mine own part, I had rather read in this place, Let there be here a mind, etc. So the Angel passeth fully unto the second place of this description.

Revelation 17:9 Very children know what that seven hilled city is, which is so much spoken of, and whereof Virgil thus reporteth, And compasseth seven towers in one wall: that city it is, which when John wrote these things had rule over the kings of the earth: It was and is not, and yet it remaineth this day, but it is declining to destruction.

Revelation 17:9 This is the painting out of the beast by things present (as I said before) whereby S. John endeavored to describe the same, that he might both be known of the godly in that age, and be further observed and marked of posterity afterwards. This delineation hath one type, that is, his heads, but a double description or application of the type: one permanent from the nature of itself, the other changeable, by the working of men. The description permanent, is by the seven hills, in this verse, the other that fleeteth, is from the seven kings, verses 10, 11. And here it is worthy to be observed, that one type hath sometimes two or more applications, as seemeth good unto the holy Ghost to express either one thing by divers types, or divers things by one type. So I noted before, of the seven spirits, Rev. 1:4. Now this woman that sitteth upon seven hills, is the city of Rome, called in times past of the Greeks, … i. of seven tops or crests, and of Varro, septiceps, i. of her seven heads (as here) of seven heads, and of others, septicollis, i. standing upon seven hills.

Revelation 17:9 The beginning of these Kings or Emperors is almost the same with the beginning of the Church of Christ, which I showed before, Rev. 11:1. Namely from the year 35, after the passion of Christ, what time the Temple and Church of the Jews was overthrown. In which year it came to pass by the providence of God that that saying The beast was and is not, was fulfilled before that the destruction of the Jews immediately following came to pass. That was the year from the building of the city of Rome, 109, from which year S. John both numbered the Emperors which hitherto hath been, when he wrote these things, and foretelleth two others next to come: and that with this purpose, that when this particular prediction of foretelling of things to come, should take effect the truth of all other predictions in the Church might be the more confirmed. Which sign God of old mentioned this in the Law, Deut. 18, and Jeremiah confirmeth, Jer. 28:8.

Revelation 17:10 Whose names are these: the first, Servius Sulpicius Galba, who was the seventh Emperor of the people of Rome, the second Marcus Salvius Otho, the third Aulus Vitellius, the fourth, Titus Flavius Vespasianus, the fifth, Titus Vespasianus his son of his own name.

Revelation 17:10 Flavius Domitian son of the first Vespasian. For in the latter end of his days S. John wrote these things, as witnesseth Irenaus, Lib. 5 adversus hareses.

Revelation 17:10 Nerua. The Empire being now translated from the family of Flavius. This man reigned only one year, four months, and nine days, as the history writers do tell.

Revelation 17:11 This is spoken by the figure synecdoche, as much to say as that head of the beast which was and is not, because it is cut off, and Nerua in so short time extinguished. How many heads there were, so many beasts there seemed to be in one. See the like speech in Rev. 13.3

Revelation 17:11 Nerua Traianus, who himself in divers respects is called here the seventh and the eighth.

Revelation 17:11 Though in number and order of succession he be the eighth, yet he is reckoned together with one of these heads, because Nerua and he were one head. For this man obtained authority together with Nerua, and was Consul with him, when Nerua left his life.

Revelation 17:11 Namely, to molest with persecutions the Churches of Christ, as the histories do accord, and I have briefly noted, Rev. 2:10.

Revelation 17:12 The third place of this description as I said, verse 18, is a prophetical prediction of things to come which the beast should do, as in the words following S. John doth not obscurely signify, saying, which have not yet received the kingdom, etc. For there is an Antithesis or opposition between these kings, and those that went before. And first the persons are described, in this verse, then their deeds in the two verses following.

Revelation 17:12 That is, arising with their kingdoms out of the Roman beast: at such time as that political Empire began by the craft of the Popes greatly to fall.

Revelation 17:12 Namely, with the second beast whom we called before a false prophet, which beast, ascending out of the earth got unto himself all the authority and power of the first beast, and exerciseth the same before his face, as was said, Rev. 14:11, 12. For when the political Empire of the West began to bow downwards, there both arose those ten kings, and the second beast took the opportunity offered to usurp unto himself all the power of the former beast. These kings long ago, many have numbered and described to be ten and a great part of the events plainly testifieth the same in this our age.

Revelation 17:13 That is, by consent and agreement, that they may conspire with the beast, and depend upon his beck. Their story is divided into three parts, counsels, acts, and events. The counselors some of them consist in communicating of judgments and affections: and some in communicating of power, which they are said to have given unto this beast in this verse.

Revelation 17:14 With Christ and his Church, as the reason following doth declare, and here are mentioned the facts and the events which followed for Christ’s sake, and for the grace of God the Father towards those that are called, elected, and are his faithful ones in Christ.

Revelation 17:15 This is the other member of the narration as I said verse 7, belonging unto the harlot, showed in the vision, verse 3. In this history of the harlot, these 3 things are distinctly propounded, what is her magnificence in this verse, what is her fall, and by whom it shall happen unto her, in the two verses following: and lastly, who that harlot is, in the last verse. This place which by order of nature should have been the first, is therefore made the last, because it was more fit to be joined with the next Chap.

Revelation 17:15 That is, as unconstant and variable as the waters. Upon this foundation sitteth this harlot as Queen, a vain person upon that which is vain.

Revelation 17:16 The ten Kings as verse 12. The accomplishment of this fact and event, is daily increased in this our age by the singular providence and most mighty government of God. Wherefore the facts are propounded in this verse, and the cause of them in the verses following.

Revelation 17:17 A reason rendered from the chief efficient cause, which is the providence of God, by which alone S. John by inversion of order affirmeth to have come to pass, both that the Kings should execute upon the harlot, that which pleased God, and which he declared in the verse next beforegoing: and also that by one consent and counsel, they should give their kingdom unto the beast, etc., verses 13, 14. For as these being blinded have before depended upon the beck of the beast that lifteth up the harlot, so it is said that afterward it shall come to pass, that they shall turn back, and shall fall away from her when their hearts shall be turned into better state by the grace and mercy of God.

Revelation 17:18 That is, Rome that great City, or only City (as Justinian calleth it) the King and head whereof was then the Emperor, but now the Pope, since that the condition of the beast was changed.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2017&version=GNV


A synod of the bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church meeting in Baghdad elected Sako Archeparch of Kirkuk on 24 October 2002. Pope John Paul II gave his assent on 27 September 2003.[7] He received his episcopal consecration on 14 November 2003 from his predecessor in Kirkuk, André Sana.[8]

In August 2009, and at the beginning of Ramadan, Sako organized an appeal for national peace, reconciliation and end to violence on the part of more than fifty religious leaders in Kirkuk. He called it "a gesture of closeness to our Muslim brothers. We are all brothers, sons of the same God we must respect and cooperate for the good of the people and our country." The participants included representatives of Ali Sistani and Muqtada al Sadr.[9]

Patriarch

The Synod of Bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church, convoked in Rome on 28 January 2013, elected Sako to succeed Emmanuel III Delly as Patriarch of Babylon. He chose Louis Raphael I as his regnal name. Pope Benedict XVI gave his assent to the election on 1 February[2] and granted him ecclesiastica communio (ecclesiastical communion) as required by the canon law for Eastern-rite Catholic churches in recognition of their unity with the wider Catholic church.[10]

That same year, Iraq's President Jalal Talabani issued a decree recognizing Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Church.[11]

In July 2014 Sako led a wave of condemnation for the Sunni Islamists who demanded Christians either convert, submit to their radical rule and pay a religious levy or face death by the sword.[12] In September 2014 Sako said “The U.S. is indirectly responsible for what is going on in Iraq as it said it would ensure democracy and the well-being of the people, but 10 years have passed and on the contrary we have gone backward." He was responding to a question following remarks attributed to him in the local daily Ad-Diyar in which he accused the U.S. of supporting ISIS. Sako had also criticized Muslim countries for lack of support: "Our Muslim neighbours did not help us." He urged Muslim preachers to issue a religious ruling against the killing of all innocent people and said that "Issuing a fatwa preventing Muslims from killing fellow Muslims is not enough."[13]

In 2014, Sako ordered ten priests who had fled Iraq to return there by 22 October; he suspended them when they failed to comply. The priests, all living in the United States, some for as long as twenty years, appealed to Pope Francis for relief from the order.[14] In January 2015, Pope Francis granted them permission to remain in the United States.[15] Sako later renewed his order despite the pope's decision.[16]

In 2015, Sako proposed a "merger" or reunion of his own Chaldean Catholic Church with the Ancient Church of the East and the Assyrian Church of the East to create one united "Church of the East" with a single patriarch in union with the pope. His proposal would have required both his own resignation and that of Mar Addai II, followed by a joint synod of the bishops of all three churches to elect a new patriarch for the reunited Church of the East. (The patriarchate of the Assyrian Church of the East was vacant at the time, following the death of Mar Dinkha IV.)[17] He wrote that "Unity does not mean uniformity, nor the melting of our own church identity into one style, but it maintains unity in diversity and we remain one apostolic universal church, the Oriental Church, that maintains its independence of administration, laws and liturgies, traditions and support."[18] The Assyrian Church of the East respectfully declined this proposal citing "ecclesiological divergences still remaining" and proceeded with its election of a new patriarch.[19]

On 14 November 2015, the Synod of Bishops announced that Pope Francis had named Sako as one of his three appointments to that body's council.[20]

Cardinal

Pope Francis made Sako a cardinal in a consistory on 28 June 2018.[21] Later that year, Pope Francis named him one of the four cardinals to preside over sessions of the Synod of Bishops on Youth in October.[22]

On 6 October 2018 Sako was named a member of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches,[23] on 22 February 2019 a member of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue,[24] and on 29 September 2021 a member of the Congregation for Catholic Education.[25] On 4 January 2022, Pope Francis made him a member of the Council for the Economy.[26]

Sako was a cardinal elector in the 2025 papal conclave that elected Pope Leo XIV.[27] Patriarch Sako was also the first Chaldean Catholic Patriarch ever to participate in a papal conclave.[28][a] Sako opted not to wear the shash, the traditional headgear of East Syriac Christian bishops, and wore only his scarlet zucchetto.[32]

Government recognition dispute

On 15 July 2023, Iraq's President Abdul Latif Rashid announced the revocation of the government's 2013 decree recognizing Sako as Patriarch. In response that same day Sako announced he was leaving Baghdad to take up residence in Iraqi Kurdistan. He called the revocation "unprecedented in the history of Iraq".[11] Rashid said his action "does not affect the religious or legal status of patriarch Sako" and said it was based on the fact that Sako's office is not recognized by the Iraqi Constitution; Sako viewed as an extension of the government's ongoing "deliberate and humiliating campaign" against him and its wider failure to protect Iraqi Christians.[33] Rashid had recently rejected requests for comparable decrees from the Patriarchs of the Assyrian Church and the Old Assyrian Church. Others cited complex political manoeuvering.[34]

On 15 July 2023, Sako announced his intention to "retire from the Patriarchal See in Baghdad and move to a church, a mission, in one of the monasteries of Iraqi Kurdistan". His announcement followed a decision by the President of Iraq, Abdul Latif Rashid, to revoke a decree established in 2013 by the former Iraq's President, Jalal Talabani, recognising Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Church. The revocation "is unprecedented in Iraq's history," Sako said, highlighting "the government's silence" about the incident and the suffering of the Christian community.[35] For months, Sako had been embroiled in a war of words with a Shia lawmaker and militia leader, Rayan al-Kildani. Both accused each other of exploiting their influence to illegally seize Christian-owned properties. Al-Kildani is the leader of the Babylon Movement, whose militia fought ISIS within the state-linked Popular Mobilisation Forces, a network of largely pro-Iran paramilitaries. Since then, al-Kildani forged strong alliances with powerful Tehran-allied Shiite militias. Sako criticized the Babylon Movement as falsely Christian, noting most of its members and supporters are Shia Muslims using the label for political gain.[36][37] Furthermore, the Babylon Movement, led by al-Kildani, is accused of pillaging homes, unlawful confiscation of land, coercion, extortion, abuse of women, persecution of religious minorities, and torture of detainees. As a result, in 2019, the US imposed sanctions on al-Kildani and another Shiite militia leader, calling them "perpetrators of serious human rights abuse and corruption", and penalizing entities that interact with them.[38]

Cardinal Sako has accused Archbishop Bashar Warda of collaborating and conspiring with Rayan al-Kildani in an effort to subvert his authority and push for his resignation as head of the Chaldean Church. Warda is criticized for supporting al-Kildani despite his horrendous actions, and for not supporting Sako's efforts to counter the Babylon Movement's seizure of Christian assets. This has led to accusations that Warda prioritizes benefits from al-Kildani's support over protecting church interests. Sako has referred to Warda as the "Godfather" of the Babylon Movement.[39][40][41]

On 7 August 2023, Sako told an interviewer that "Withdrawing the decree is very bad. For 15 centuries, there were decrees recognising the Patriarch as head of the Church and administrator of the properties of the Church. Revoking it is a humiliation for the Church. Those behind this move want to put their hands on the properties of the Church and administer them separately from the ecclesiastical authorities. We cannot accept that."[42]

In April 2024, after nine months of exile, Sako returned to Baghdad with the assistance of Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia' Al Sudani.[43][44]

On 28 August 2024, Sako demanded a public apology from five bishops based on perceived disunity in the Chaldean Catholic Church, including absence from a mandatory July episcopal synod, setting a deadline of September 5. The five bishops, led by Bashar Warda, the Archbishop of Erbil, also withdrew from an August spiritual retreat and pulled their students from the Chaldean Seminary. The bishops refused to apologize, citing dissatisfaction with Sako's leadership style and unilateral decision-making. As a result, he would suspend them and ask Pope Francis to impose canonical penalties, including excommunication.[45][46] The actions of Bashar Warda and the other bishops have been described by the Chaldean Patriarchate as a "dangerous precedent" that goes against their episcopal vows to support the patriarch. The 17 bishops who attended the July 2024 synod issued a communiqué, calling for "appropriate legal measures" against the "clear violations" committed by the boycotting group of Warda.[47]

The rivalry between Louis Sako and Bashar Warda is driven by a fierce personal conflict, with Sako perceiving Warda as ruthlessly ambitious to seize the patriarchate. This perception has led Sako to backtrack on his initial plans to retire at 75, driven by a determination to thwart Warda's power grab. Warda's actions are seen as a betrayal of Sako's leadership.[48]

Honours

Defensor Fidei Prize, 2008

Pax Christi International Peace Award, 2010

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


Vatican News

Thursday, November 13, 2025 at 9:00 PM

Gospel of the Day (Luke 17,26-37)

Jesus said to his disciples: “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be in the days of the Son of Man;

they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage up to the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all.

Similarly, as it was in the days of Lot: they were eating, drinking, buying, selling, planting, building;

on the day when Lot left Sodom, fire and brimstone rained from the sky to destroy them all.

So it will be on the day the Son of Man is revealed.

On that day, a person who is on the housetop and whose belongings are in the house must not go down to get them, and likewise a person in the field must not return to what was left behind.

Remember the wife of Lot.

Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses it will save it.

I tell you, on that night there will be two people in one bed; one will be taken, the other left.

And there will be two women grinding meal together; one will be taken, the other left."

They said to him in reply, "Where, Lord?" He said to them, "Where the body is, there also the vultures will gather."

https://www.vaticannews.va/.../word-of.../2025/11/14.html

https://www.facebook.com/vaticannews/posts/pfbid0675XwkKYWEoQxdvpQXJL6vQVFkusGgJFHw5sKwrPTJZAFPsYpr7ifJ5Uidewepw5l


What is Masada? What is the history of Masada?

TL;DR:

Masada is not mentioned in the Bible but was a place where the Jewish Zealots hid when the Romans attacked. Masada calls us to trust in God and to stand for what is true.


what does the bible say?

Masada is not explicitly mentioned in the Bible. The events surrounding Masada occurred during the time period between the Old and New Testaments, so it's not directly referenced in biblical texts. However, Masada is a historically significant site, particularly known for the events that took place there during the Jewish-Roman War in the 1st century AD.


Herod the Great built the mountain fortress of Masada in 31 BC above the western shore of the Dead Sea in Israel. He feared revolt and wanted a place to make a stand that was difficult to attack and easy to defend. The fortress, with large places to store food, vast cisterns to store water, and defensive structures, was accessed only by a narrow path up the 1,300-foot mountain.


King Herod, an Edomite appointed by Roman rulers to oversee Judea, built the fortress and made it nearly impregnable, but it was the Jewish Zealots who hid there one hundred years later who made Masada famous.


In AD 70, the Romans attacked Judea and overran Jerusalem. Masada was the last holdout and center of resistance. General Flavius Silva couldn't directly attack the fortress, so in AD 72 he put thousands of slaves to work building a siege ramp. It took months to complete and when the troops broke into the fortress in AD 73, they found 953 people dead of a ceremonial mass suicide. Two women and five children hid in a cistern and survived to tell the story. They quoted Eleazar, their leader, saying, "Since we, long ago, my generous friends, resolved never to be servants to the Romans, not to any other than to God himself, who alone is the true and just Lord of mankind, the time is now come that obliges us to make that resolution true in practice."


from the old testament

Masada is not mentioned in the Old Testament.

from the new testament

Masada is not mentioned in the New Testament.

While Masada itself isn't mentioned in the Bible, some of the events related to the Jewish-Roman War are indirectly referenced in the New Testament, particularly in Jesus' prophecies regarding the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple (Matthew 24:1–2; Mark 13:1–2; Luke 21:20–24). However, Masada is not specifically mentioned in those passages.

implications for today

The story of Masada teaches us the enduring lesson of perseverance and courage in the face of adversity. Despite being outnumbered and facing overwhelming odds, the Jewish Zealots at Masada chose to stand firm in their beliefs and resist Roman rule. While the way we hold onto what is true may vary depending on situation, God calls us to hold onto Him and to build our lives on the Rock on whom we can stand. God is our refuge and strength; in Him we find the courage we need to stand for what is right.

https://www.compellingtruth.org/history-of-Masada.html


UNDER SIEGE

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In his new eye-opening memoir, Eric Trump shares gripping moments from his life as a vital part of America’s most powerful family.


From his earliest memories of growing up as part of the Trump family to pivotal roles in the 2016 and 2024 presidential elections, spearheading strategies to combat lawfare, and leading the Trump Organization, Eric has been deeply invested in all aspects of his family’s legacy. As one of his father’s original apprentices, Eric has always strived to build on that foundation.


As the Executive Vice President of the Trump Organization since 2015, Eric has navigated the dual worlds of politics and business, growing the company, while battling unprecedented opposition from the media, Democrats, and ongoing legal challenges.


From raids on his childhood home, Mar-a-Lago, to near assassination attempts, from Russiagate to cold and corrupt court rooms, the fake news media, censorship, and character smears—this wasn’t just an attack on a president, or even his family. America itself was under siege.


In this book, Eric offers an unfiltered look at the highs and lows of life in the Trump world; how he took the reins of a multibillion-dollar empire at thirty-three years old; enlightening stories from real estate to the boardroom of The Celebrity Apprentice, and the chaos of the campaign trail.


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About The Author

Eric Trump is the Executive Vice President of the Trump Organization, where he leads the global operations of one of the most iconic real estate empires in the world. He oversees an expansive portfolio, including Trump Hotels, Trump Golf, the Trump collection of commercial and residential properties, Trump Estates, and the award-winning Trump Winery. Eric also drives the company’s expansion into emerging industries, including leading-edge cryptocurrency ventures that are reshaping the future of finance.


A fierce defender of America First values, Eric has been a central figure in the Make America Great Again movement and served in pivotal roles during three presidential campaigns, helping shape national strategy and acting as a key spokesperson on major news networks worldwide. Passionate about giving back, he has helped raise more than $50 million for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital to combat pediatric cancer—a cause he has championed since the age of twenty-one.


A proud graduate of Georgetown University with a degree in finance and management, Eric has a deep-rooted passion for building, skiing, the shooting sports, and the outdoors. He lives in Florida with his wife, Lara, and their two children, Luke and Carolina.

https://www.trump.com/lifestyle/books


Erika Lane Kirk (née Frantzve; born November 20, 1988) is an American businesswoman, nonprofit executive, and podcaster. She is CEO and chair of the board of the conservative organization Turning Point USA (TPUSA), which her late husband Charlie Kirk co-founded and led until his assassination in September 2025. She was appointed as his successor following his death.


Kirk previously won Miss Arizona USA in 2012 and participated in Miss USA 2012. She is the founder of Everyday Heroes Like You, a nonprofit supporting under-recognized charities, and BIBLEin365, a faith-based initiative that promotes reading the Bible. She also hosts the Midweek Rise Up podcast. She and Charlie Kirk began dating in 2019, married in 2021, and had two children together.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erika_Kirk


Early Female Transgender Identity after Prenatal Exposure to Diethylstilbestrol: Report from a French National Diethylstilbestrol (DES) Cohort

by Laura Gaspari 1,2,3,†,Marie-Odile Soyer-Gobillard 4,5,†ORCID,Scott Kerlin 6,Françoise Paris 1,2,3 andCharles Sultan 1,*

1

Unité d’Endocrinologie-Gynécologie Pédiatrique, CHU Montpellier, University Montpellier, 34090 Montpellier, France

2

INSERM 1203, Développement Embryonnaire Fertilité Environnement, University of Montpellier, 34295 Montpellier, France

3

CHU Montpellier, University Montpellier, Centre de Référence Maladies Rares du Développement Génital, Constitutif Sud, Hôpital Lapeyronie, 34295 Montpellier, France

4

Laboratoire Arago, Observatoire Océanologique, Sorbonne University, CNRS, 75016 Paris, France

5

Association HHORAGES-France, 66100 Perpignan, France

6

DES International Information and Research Network, Livermore, CA 94551, USA

*

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.

These authors contributed equally to this work.

J. Xenobiot. 2024, 14(1), 166-175; https://doi.org/10.3390/jox14010010

Submission received: 28 November 2023 / Revised: 8 January 2024 / Accepted: 10 January 2024 / Published: 12 January 2024

(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Role of Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals in the Human Health)

Downloadkeyboard_arrow_down Browse Figure Review Reports Versions Notes


Abstract

Diagnostic of transsexualism and gender incongruence are terms to describe individuals whose self-identity does not match their sex assignment at birth. A transgender woman is an individual assigned male at birth (AMAB) on the basis of the external or internal genitalia who identifies and lives as a woman. In recent decades, a significant increase in the number of transgender people has been reported. Although, its etiology is unknown, biological, anatomical, genetic, environmental and cultural factors have been suggested to contribute to gender variation. In XY animals, it has been shown that environmental endocrine disruptors, through their anti-androgenic activity, induce a female identity. In this work, we described four XY individuals who were exposed in utero to the xenoestrogen diethylstilbesterol (DES) and were part of the French HHORAGES cohort. They all reported a female transgender identity starting from childhood and adolescence. This high prevalence of male to female transgenderism (1.58%) in our cohort of 253 DES sons suggests that exposure to chemicals with xenoestrogen activity during fetal life may affect the male sex identity and behavior.

Keywords: sexual identity; diethylstilbestrol (DES); prenatal exposure

1. Introduction

Gender identity defines each individual’s deeply held personal sense of their own gender as male or female or something else [1]. Moreover, gender diversity and variance are umbrella terms used to describe the wide range of gender identifications outside the conventional gender categories [2]. Gender dysphoria [3] relates to the distress and unease experienced by individuals who are discontent with their assigned gender and identify with a gender other than the one associated with their birth sex [4]. A transgender man or woman is a person born phenotypically female or male, assigned female or male at birth on the basis of their external or internal genitalia, who identifies and lives as a male or a female. Actually, for many experts [5] this definition should be enlarged to Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming (TGNC) individuals, people with disorders of sex development (DSDs) and people assigned male (AMAB) or female at birth (AFAB) [6].

All studies on secular trends have reported a dramatic increase in the number of transgender people in recent decades [7]. A temporal change in the age of presentation is another notable phenomenon [8]. Quoting Hassler et al. [8] in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, Text Revision (DSM-5), signs of transgender in children include: “A repeated desire to be the other sex or an assertion that they are the other sex; a belief that their assigned sex will change on its own (e.g., thinking they will grow a penis or that their penis will come off when they get older); wanting to change their name to a name typically associated with another gender, or a gender-neutral name; a preference for presenting as another gender (e.g., a child assigned male at birth who prefers long hair and wearing dresses, or a child assigned female at birth who prefers short hair and wearing gender-neutral clothing); resistance or distress when made to present as a gender they do not identify with (such as a ‘girl’ throwing a tantrum over having to wear a dress or a ‘boy’ crying after having to get a haircut); assuming the role of another gender in fantasy games or make-believe; an intense desire to participate in the games and activities typical of the other gender (such as an assigned-male child playing with Barbie and an assigned-female child playing contact sports); a preference for playmates of another gender”.

Hassler et al. also wrote [8]: “In adolescence, signs of transgender includes: feelings of panic or severe discomfort concerning puberty and body changes (e.g., refusing to acknowledge or admit that changes are occurring, refusing to look at their body, or becoming distressed or uncomfortable with body development, menstruation, or ejaculation); discomfort or distress with certain forms of gender presentation, such as disliking long hair or certain types of clothing; increased bullying at school due to differences in acting out one’s perceived gender or lack of self-confidence; isolation from peers due to lack of connection or fear of bullying; depression and/or anxiety as a result of confusion over gender identity or not fitting in with peers; be aware that some adolescents may try to repress their true gender due to outside pressure, such as from family and peers, even if they previously expressed their true gender as a child”.

The literature on the prevalence of transgender people is heterogeneous, depending on the geographic area, inclusion criteria and age at presentation [9]. Specialized centers that manage transgender people estimate a prevalence between 17 and 33/100,000 individuals [10]. Actually, people who identify as transgender represent a sizable proportion of the general population, from 0.1% to 2% [11,12].

Although the biological basis of transgenderism/incongruence is unknown, biological, anatomical, genetic and environmental factors have been suggested to contribute to gender identity [13,14]. The role of sex hormones and genetics in sexual development was described by studies published between 1948 and 2019, and the implication of endogenous steroids in brain sexual differentiation has been widely studied [14,15,16,17,18]. According to the accepted dogma, high levels of fetal testosterone organize the brain towards a male phenotype [19]. Any exogenous chemical that can reduce testosterone action during fetal life can affect the differentiation of genitalia and sex behavior.

Diethylstilbestrol (DES) is a molecule that has strengthened the concepts of endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) and the fetal basis of adult diseases [20]. It is well known that in utero exposure to DES, a compound with estrogenic and anti-androgenic activity, induces a wide range of reproductive tract/function abnormalities in the so-called ‘DES daughters’, e.g., alterations to Müllerian duct development, fertility problems, ectopic pregnancies, miscarriages, premature births and cancers, especially clear cell adenocarcinoma (CCA) of the vagina and cervix in girls and young women [21]. In ‘DES sons’, epididymal cysts, hypospadias, cryptorchidism, hypoplastic testes and micropenises have been observed [22,23,24,25,26]. In addition, although less studied, in utero exposure to synthetic sex hormones, particularly DES, can cause psychological disorders, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorders, eating disorders and suicidal behavior [27]. Interestingly, some studies in patients exposed in utero to DES with psychotic disorders identified methylome changes that affect the expression of ZFP57 and ADAMTS9, two genes implicated in neurodevelopment regulation [28], with potential multigenerational and transgenerational effects [29,30].

In this work, we first describe four transgender women identified among the 253 sons exposed in utero to DES included in the HHORAGES-France cohort (a French National patient association). This high prevalence of male-to-female transgender individuals among DES sons (1.58%) strongly suggests that exposure of male fetuses to this xenoestrogen during fetal life may affect future male sex identity and behavior.

2. Patients and Methods

This study was based on a French national retrospective cohort of DES-treated women (HHORAGES-France Association) (n = 1200) and their families. Detailed standard questionnaires were obtained from all DES mothers when they joined the HHORAGES-France Association and all DES children were already adults at this time. The answers to this online questionnaire were used to select women who met the following inclusion criteria: (1) at least two pregnancies with two viable male babies (same father) among whom the first child was not exposed in utero to DES (pre-DES), followed by one or more children with fetal exposure to DES (DES); (2) confirmed data on the total DES dose (health record or physician’s observation). The cumulative dose D administered to the French pregnant mothers was 4050 mg < D < 7300 mg. This is considered a medium-low-dose cohort, in accordance with the observations by Tournaire et al. [31] and compared with the higher doses administered in the United States (7550 mg < D < 12,742 mg). The answers to the questionnaires were also used to identify women with a DES son who presented female gender variance. We then contacted all DES sons with female gender variance and we carried out an individual interview with them.

The local university hospital ethics committee approved this study (ID IRB No. 202301531), and all patients gave their informed consent through the HHORAGES-France Association (CNIL: J B/EM/DC042793, N° 1006460).

All DES sons who identified as transgender women underwent karyotyping at their local hospital at the moment of transition.

https://www.mdpi.com/2039-4713/14/1/10


Thomas Trace Beatie (born 1974[1]) is an American public speaker, author, and advocate of transgender rights and sexuality issues, with a focus on transgender fertility and reproductive rights.[2]


Beatie came out as a trans man in early 1997. Beatie had gender-affirming surgery in March 2002 and became known as "the pregnant man" after he became pregnant through artificial insemination in 2007.[3] Beatie chose to be pregnant, with donated sperm,[4][5] because his wife Nancy was sterile.


The couple filed for divorce in 2012. The Beatie case is the first of its kind on record, where a documented legal male gave birth within a marriage to a woman, and for the first time, a court challenged a marriage where the husband gave birth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Beatie


Tracing boards are painted or printed illustrations depicting the various emblems and symbols of Freemasonry. They can be used as teaching aids during the lectures that follow each of the Masonic Degrees, when an experienced member explains the various concepts of Freemasonry to new members. They can also be used by experienced members as reminders of the concepts they learned as they went through the ceremonies of the different masonic degrees.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracing_board


Exoteric Masonry, which is only the husks of the Mystic Order formed by the Sons of Cain has in modern times attracted the masculine element with its positively polarized physical vehicles, and educated them in industry and statecraft, thus controlling the material development of the world. The sons of Seth, constituting themselves the Priestcraft have worked their spell over the positive vital bodies of the feminine element to dominate the spiritual development. And whereas, the sons of Cain working through Freemasonry and kindred movements, have openly fought for the temporal power, the Priestcraft has fought as strenuously and perhaps more effectively, by stealth, to retain their monopoly upon the spiritual development of the feminine element. To the casual onlooker it would seem as if there were no decided antagonism between these two movements at the present time, but though Freemasonry of today is but a shell of its true ancient mystic self, and though Catholicism has been terribly tarnished by the touch of time, in that one thing there is no difference, the war is as keen as ever, the efforts of the Church are not concentrated upon the masses however as much as upon those who are seeking to live the higher life, so that they may gain admission to the Mystery Temple and learn how to make the Philosophers’ Stone. As mankind advances in evolution, the vital body becomes more permanently positively polarized giving to both sexes a greater desire for spirituality, and though we change from the masculine to feminine in alternate embodiment, positive polarity of the vital body is becoming more pronounced regardless of sex, and this accounts for the growing tendency towards Altruism which is even being brought out by the suffering entailed by the great war we are now fighting, for all agree that they are seeking to obtain a lasting peace where the swords may be made into plowshares, and the spears into pruning hooks. In the past humanity has been claiming universal brotherhood as a great ideal, but we must come closer than that to be in full accord with the Christ. He said to his Disciples “ye are my friends.” Among brothers and sisters hate and enmity may exist, but friendship is the expression of love and cannot exist apart from that. This is therefore the magic word which will eventually level all distinctions, bring peace upon earth and goodwill among men. This is the great Ideal proclaimed by the Rosicrucian Fellowship, an Ideal which points the shortest way to the New Heaven and the New Earth, where the sons of Cain and the sons of Seth will eventually be united.

FREEMASONRY AND CATHOLICISM

by MAX HEINDEL

https://dn720206.ca.archive.org/0/items/freemasonryandca017137mbp/freemasonryandca017137mbp.pdf


“Rosa Jesuitica, oder Jesuitische Rottgesellen, das ist, Eine Frag ob die Zween Orden, der ganandten Ritter von der Neerscharen Jesu, und der Rosen-Creuzer ein einiger Ordensen: per J. P. D. a S. Jesuitarum Protectorum. Prague, 1620.” (4to). This is a truly curious tract upon the “relations of the Jesuits and the Rosicrucians."

Rosa jesuitica, oder, Jesuitische Rottgesellen (1620) - Google Drive

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1dT28PyPUPfqDfC0iVg7nGFsle8vYBXLf/view


Fulcanelli’s main strategy, the key to unraveling the mystery, lies in an understanding of what he calls the “phonetic law” of the “spoken cabala,” or the “language of the birds.” This punning, multilingual wordplay can be used to reveal unusual and, according to Fulcanelli, meaningful associations between ideas. “What unsuspected marvels we should find, if we knew how to dissect words, to strip them of their bark and liberate the spirit, the divine light which is within,” Fulcanelli writes. He claims that in our day this is the natural language of the outsiders, the outlaws and heretics at the fringes of society. (See appendix A, “Fulcanelli on the Green Language,” for the complete text of this chapter.) 6 This spoken cabala was also the “green language” of the Freemasons (“All the Initiates expressed themselves in cant,” Fulcanelli reminds us) who built the art gothique of the cathedrals. “Gothic art is in fact the art got or art cot —χοτ—the art of light or of the spirit,” Fulcanelli informs us. Ultimately the “art got,” or the “art of light,” is derived from the language of the birds, which seems to be a sort of Ur-language taught by both Jesus and the ancients."

The Mysteries of the Great Cross

by Jay Weidner

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vrxcBcn4h7RRM2SA3X1SS1DsooSxfitI/view?usp=sharing


How to Speak Ignatian: Common words and phrases of the Society of Jesus

Adapted from “How to Speak Loyola,” a glossary developed by the Office of Mission &

Identity, Loyola University, Chicago.

Microsoft Word - How to Speak Ignatian.doc (jesuithighschool.org)

https://www.jesuithighschool.org/sites/main/files/file-attachments/how_to_speak_ignatian_0.pdf


IF WE LOOK AGAIN TO THE BOOK OF DANIEL, this time to chapter 8, verse 25, the prophet foretold that Anti-Christ would cause "craft" to prosper: "And through his policy also he shall cause 'craft" to prosper in his hand: and he shall magnify himself..." What is "kraft"? Strong's Concordance defines the word craft (#4820) as meaning "fraud, deceit, and treachery." Thus, Anti-Christ "through" craft, deceit and treachery (viz., deception) would advance  its position, influence and agenda.

But how do we know that this entity (referred to by Daniel) is indeed the dreaded Anti-Christ? We know this entity is Anti-Christ because it opposes and magnifies itself against Jesus Christ: "he shall magnify in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes" (latter part of Dan. 8: 25).

Earlier in verse 23 of Daniel 8 it says "he" shall also understand dark sentences." Strong's Concordance tells us that the word for dark is the same word for sentences (#2420). Both words mean "a puzzle," or "trick" saying. The expression "dark  sentences" comes from the root word meaning "to put forth (#2330)." Thus, Antichrist would put forth, or utter dark sentences-language not readily understood by the unintiated, which language will have a double meaning designed to trick or mislead the hearer. The "puzzle, or trick" in these "dark sentence" will be the issuing of double meaning in the same statements. In other words, reader, Anti-Christ would have a double rule-"one for its private and particular use, and another to flaunt with before the world."

The agents, or spokesmen of Anti-Christ will speak with mental reservation and amphibologies. That is to say, with double sensed or ambigous words, or to use the words of Constantine Labarum "justification of the means by the end, and many other maxims,

+I say agents of Anti-Christ, because no sensible individual could really believe that Anti-Christ is a single man, for Paul says Anti-Christ (its early manifestation) was already in existence in his day and would continue till the end of time.+

subversive of honesty and morality." In short, Anti-Christ would be a system of unscrupulous duplicity, of impostors, of wolves in sheep's clothing!

Have we any example in the long anals of history of such a duplicitous system using "craft" "deceit" "fraud" and "treachery" as it crept into power over the world? William Tyndale, the great English Reformer, in his Practice of Prelates, speaks of the rise of this phenomenon by the following graphic parable:-


"To see how the holy father came up, mark the ensample of the ivy. First it springeth up out of the earth, and then awhile CREEPETH ALONG BY THE GROUND, till it finds a great tree, and creepeth up a little and a little, fair, and softly. At the begininning, while it is yet thin and small, the burden is not perceived; it seemeth glorious to garnish the tree in the winter. BUT IT HOLDETH FAST WITHAL, AND CEASETH NOT TO CLIMB UP TILL IT BE AT THE TOP, AND EVEN ABOVE ALL. And then it sendeth its branches along by the branches of the tree, and overgroweth all, and waxeth great, heavy, and thich : and sucketh the moisture so sore out of the tree and his branches that choaketh and stifleth them. And then THE FOUL, STINKING IVY waxeth MIGHTY in the stump of the tree, and becometh a seat and a nest for all unclean birds, and for blind owls, which hawk in the dark, and dare not come to the light. EVEN SO THE BISHOP OF ROME, NOW CALLED THE POPE, AT THE BEGINNING CROPE ALONG UPON THE EARTH...."

How accurate is William Tyndale's description of the rise of the pope and the popedome as predicted by prophet Daniel: "in the latter time... a king.. understanding dark sentences, shall stan up... and shall he cause craft to prosper" "and shall prosper, practice, and shall destroy..." (Dan. 8:23,24,25).

Yeah, with what clearness and boldness, and considerable amount of historical learning, does Tyndale trace the way by which the supremacy of the pope arose. It has been said of this passage by one learned author that there is "probably nowhere in the English language any passage superior in force and graphic skill o the well-known description of the rise of the Pope." And we may add here that like the stinking ivy-which plant is almost impossible to entirely kill-it is also very difficult to rid our world of popery: this requires a lot of hard work, courage and persistence, and still the dead stump may yet shoot up again.

Said historian Henry Grattan Guinness, "In the fourth century, with the the fall of paganism, began a worldly, imperial Christianity, wholly unlike primitive apostolic Christianity, a sort of Christianized  heathenism: and in the fifth and sixth centuries sprang up the Papacy, in those career the apostasy culminated later on. The mighty Caesars had fallen; Augustus, Domitian, Hadrian, Diocletian were gone; even the Constantines and Julians had passed away. The seat of sovereignty had been removed from Rome to Constantinople. Goths and Vandals' had overthrown the western empire; the once mighty political structure lay delivered into broken fragments. The imperial government was slain by the Gothic sword. The Czesars were no more, and Rome was an actual desolation Then slowly on the ruins of old imperial Rome an actual desolation. Then slowly on the ruins of an old imperial Rome rose another power and another monarchy-a monarchy of loftier aspirations and more resistless might, claiming dominion, not only within the omits of the fallen empire, but throughout the entire world. Higher and higher [like the stinking ivy] rose the Papacy, till in the dark ages all Christendom was subject to its sway...."

The 'craft' of Rome, both in medieval times and today, is the art of fabrication and daring falsehoods: "Like the successive strata of the earth covering one another, SO LAYER AFTER LAYER OF FORGERIES AND FABRICATIONS HAS BEEN PILED UP IN THE CHURCH |OF ROME|," bolstered by a Jesuitical "literaryand academic flexibility and elastic versatality of pen hitherto confined to journalism."

"Anti-Christ Would Use "Craft" And Deceit To Prosper"

Codeword Barbelon book Two

by P.D. Stuart


On September 10, 2025, Charlie Kirk, an American right-wing political activist, was assassinated while addressing an audience on the campus of Utah Valley University (UVU) in Orem, Utah, United States. The outdoor event was the first stop of the Fall 2025 season for the American Comeback Tour, a speaking and debate series planned by Turning Point USA, a conservative youth organization that he co-founded.


Kirk was fatally shot in the neck while engaging with an audience member about mass shootings in the United States by a sniper on the roof of a building approximately 142 yards (130 m) away from him. The next day, 22-year-old Tyler James Robinson surrendered himself to the local sheriff. Prosecutors charged Robinson with murder on September 16 and announced they would seek the death penalty, alleging the attack was politically motivated.[2][3][4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Charlie_Kirk


Hugh (c. 1074 – c. 1130) was a French noble who was the first count of Champagne. He was known for donating the valley that was used as the site for the Clairvaux Abbey and going on several pilgrimages to the Holy Land. During his second visit, Hugh de Paynes, a knight in his service, stayed in Jerusalem and established the Knights Templar. Hugh later gave up his wealth and lands to join the Templar Order.


Biography

Hugh was the third son of Count Theobald III of Blois and Countess Adele of Valois,[1] bearing the title count of Bar-sur-Aube. His older brother Count Odo died in 1093,[2] leaving him master of Troyes, where he centred his court, Bar-sur-Aube and Vitry-le-François. In this way the three contiguous countships that formed the core of an emerging Champagne[2] were united in his person, and though he preferred "Count of Troyes", the oldest of his lordships and site of the only bishopric in his domains, many contemporary documents call him the count of Champagne, the title preferred by his descendants.[3]


His first recorded act, a monastic gift in 1094, became the oldest document of the comital archive.[2] The act of his that resonated longest in history was his grant of lands in 1115 to the monk Bernard of the reformed Benedictines at Cîteaux—the Cistercians—in order to found Clairvaux Abbey, a Cistercian monastery at Clairvaux (in the present Ville-sous-la-Ferté), in a wild valley of a tributary of the Aube, where Bernard was appointed abbot and became famous as Bernard of Clairvaux. Hugh's charter makes over to the new foundation Clairvaux and its dependencies, fields, meadows, vineyards, woods and water. A deeply affectionate letter from Bernard to Hugh survives,[4] written in 1125, as Hugh went off for a third time to fight in the Holy Land, joining the Knights Templar, leaving his pregnant wife, and disinheriting his son Odo – according to later sources, Hugh believed himself impotent and never acknowledged his son. Instead, he transferred his titles to his nephew, who became Theobald II of Champagne. Odo's two sons, Odo II of Champlitte and William of Champlitte were important figures in the Fourth Crusade.[5]


Hugh married first Constance,[1] daughter of King Philip I of France and Bertha of Holland. Their only child, a son called Manasses, died young. He married second Isabella,[1] daughter of Stephen I, Count of Burgundy and niece of Pope Callixtus II and they had issue:


Eudes/Odo I, married to Sibylle de La Ferte-sur-L'Aube and had two sons:

Odo II of Champlitte died 1204, one of the leaders of the IV Crusade.

William I 1160s - 1209, prince of Achaea and founder of the Principality.

When Hugh became a Knight Templar himself in 1125,[6] the Order comprised few more than a dozen knights, and the first Grand Master of the Templars was a vassal of his, Hugues de Payens, who had been with him at Jerusalem in 1114.[7] While in the kingdom of Jerusalem, Hugh appeared with the king, Baldwin II, in two documents, but there is no trace of him after 1130.[8]


Hugh was also the generous patron of the abbeys of Montieramey Abbey and of Molesme, making grants from his castle of Isle-Aumont, south of Troyes. In a surviving letter to him from Ivo of Chartres (Letter CCCXLV), the Bishop of Chartres reminds him of his obligations of marriage, perhaps to deter him from making vows of continence.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh,_Count_of_Champagne


Nova music festival massacre

On 7 October 2023, the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Palestinian nationalist organization Hamas, initiated a sudden attack on Israel from the Gaza Strip. As part of the attack, 364 individuals, mostly civilians, were killed and many more wounded at the Supernova Sukkot Gathering, an open-air music festival during the Jewish holiday of Shemini Atzeret near kibbutz Re'im. Hamas also took 40 people hostage, and men and women were reportedly subject to sexual and gender-based violence.[4][5][6][7][8][9][10]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nova_music_festival_massacre


CHAPTER SEVEN – SHABTAI, SHIMON AND SHARON – DESTROYING THE JEWS

ALM 1 - THE DEUTSCH DEVILS

Rabbi Marvin Antelman was right all along. Way back in 1974, he identified the source of all the evil against Jews and humanity but his message and style were too unaccessible to get through to anyone but the most advanced students of antisemitism. What he lacked most was simplicity, a common enough failure of thinkers decades in advance of their contemporaries. What he needed was someone to put out a Cliff's Notes simplified explanation of his thesis...and someone, without intention, just did. The name of the book is, 50 Jewish Messiahs by Jerry Rabow (Gefen Publishing, Jerusalem). It is an informative but shallow overview of just what the title says, but in its shallowness lies vital depth. We begin with Chapter 17, about the "most damaging messiah to the Jewish people," Shabbatai Zvi. First we'll read Rabow and then add commentary opening Rabbi Antelman's work to the wide world. Recall that there are various accepted English spellings for Shabtai Tzvi, and the Sabbataians. The spelling presented depends on the writer:

pp 91 - Shabbatai Zvi was born in Smyrna, Turkey on the ninth of Av, 1626. The ninth day of Av is the day of a triple tragedy for the Jewish nation. According to tradition, the First Temple, the Second Temple and Bar Kokhba's Betar fortress all fell on this day.

pp 93 - He changed the holiday celebrations and violated the dietary prohibitions. All of this followed from his declaration that the usual rules were inapplicable to messianic times.

pp 95 - He declared that the coming of the messianic era meant that the biblical commandments were no longer binding. He proclaimed that God now permitted everything. ** This is Rabbi Antelman's central assertion; that Shabbataism was the polar opposite of Judaism. That Shabbatai Zvi's program was to destroy all the tenets of the Torah and replace them with their opposites. Incredibly, more than half the Jews of the world at the time, believed he would be revealed as their promised messiah: **

pp 101 - Then he finally made the announcement for which the Jewish community had been waiting for 1600 years - he would begin the Redemption on the 15th day of the month of Sivan, June 18, 1666. ** There are many who will recognize the significance of the date. June is the sixth month, 18 divided by three is 6+6+6 and 1666 is clear enough. Either he knew what he was doing or the prophesies of the emergence of an evil false messiah or anti-Christ are right, and Shabbatai Zvi was him. **

pp 110 - Through all of this, Shabbatai continued to issue proclamations of the theological changes wrought by the coming of the messianic age. Shabbatai's new prayer was, "Praised be He who permits the forbidden." Since all things would be permitted in the age of the messiah, Shabbatai declared many of the old restrictions of the Torah no longer applicable. He abolished the laws concerning sexual relationships. He eventually declared that all of the thirty six major biblical sins were now permitted and instructed some of his followers that it was their duty to perform such sins in order to hasten the Redemption.

Shabtai Tzvi, Labor Zionism and the Holocaust

by Barry Chamish

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B66Pc9x2hkIrV2Y3QWxPbkpKYWc/view?usp=sharing&resourcekey=0-5ak831cRNQohyyjZYfFKvw


In physics, string theory is a theoretical framework in which the point-like particles of particle physics are replaced by one-dimensional objects called strings. String theory describes how these strings propagate through space and interact with each other. On distance scales larger than the string scale, a string acts like a particle, with its mass, charge, and other properties determined by the vibrational state of the string. In string theory, one of the many vibrational states of the string corresponds to the graviton, a quantum mechanical particle that carries the gravitational force. Thus, string theory is a theory of quantum gravity.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory


A chain reaction is a sequence of reactions where a reactive product or by-product causes additional reactions to take place. In a chain reaction, positive feedback leads to a self-amplifying chain of events.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chain_reaction


2 Peter 3:10

1599 Geneva Bible

10 [a]But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in the which the heavens shall pass away with a [b]noise, and the elements shall melt with heat, and the earth with the works that are therein shall be burnt up.


Read full chapter

Footnotes

2 Peter 3:10 A very short description of the least distinction of the world, but in such sort as nothing could be spoken more gravely.

2 Peter 3:10 With the violence as it were of a hissing storm.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Peter%203%3A10&version=GNV


NASA's Greeting to Aliens Has Been Floating in Space for 40 Years

February 21, 2017

If extraterrestrial life encounters the Voyager space probes, they would be greeted by a series of Golden Records programmed by NASA in 1977 to explain the story of Earth.

https://www.nbcnews.com/mach/space/nasa-s-greeting-aliens-has-been-floating-space-40-years-n723586


Countdown to the Messiah

Daniel 9:24 gives the Hebrew Nation a 483 year countdown to the year that the Messiah would arrive on the scene (column 2 row 3 of our next table). Luke records that Jesus began to be about 30 years old when he was revealed as the Messiah at the Jordan River baptism.

Three and a half years later the Messiah is crucified, by no coincidence it is forty years before the total Desolation of the Temple and the Nation by the Roman army, the people of the prince that shall come, as foretold by Daniel and Jesus. If any period of time deserves the title, “Time of Jacob’s Trouble” it would be this forty years. And if those days had not been shortened no flesh (Jacob) would have been saved, but for the Elect's sake (those obedient Hebrew's who would spread the gospel) those days of persecution were shortened to prevent the annihilation of even the elect. Many try to apply this verse to the days preceding the return of Messiah but this is not logical because the elect will all be resurrected at that time so those days will not need to be shortened for their sake. Because first century Christians were a sect of the Jews it was necessary for the Elect to survive the desolation of the Hebrew Nation at the end of that century.

The Rapture Will Be Cancelled

by Nicklas Arthur

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hwvsMLXT7Z35KlbSdXw6x5EH0VLHPZsM/view?usp=sharing


1989 (MCMLXXXIX) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1989th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 989th year of the 2nd millennium, the 89th year of the 20th century, and the 10th and last year of the 1980s decade.


1989 was a turning point in political history with the "Revolutions of 1989" which ended communism in Eastern Bloc of Europe, starting in Poland and Hungary, with experiments in power-sharing coming to a head with the opening of the Berlin Wall in November, the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia and the overthrow of the communist dictatorship in Romania in December; the movement ended in December 1991 with the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Revolutions against communist governments in Eastern Europe mainly succeeded, but the year also saw the suppression by the Chinese government of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests in Beijing.


It was the year of the first Brazilian direct presidential election in 29 years, since the end of the military government in 1985 that ruled the country for more than twenty years, and marked the redemocratization process's final point.


F. W. de Klerk was elected as State President of South Africa, and his regime gradually dismantled the apartheid system over the next five years, culminating with the 1994 election that brought jailed African National Congress leader Nelson Mandela to power.


The first commercial Internet service providers surfaced in this year,[1][2] as well as the first written proposal for the World Wide Web and New Zealand, Japan and Australia's first Internet connections. The first babies born after preimplantation genetic diagnosis were conceived in late 1989.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989


Note: Inauguration Day, January 20, 2029, falls on a Saturday.  Federal employees in the Washington, DC, area are entitled to a holiday on the day a President is inaugurated on January 20th for each fourth year after 1965. Only employees scheduled to work on Saturday, January 20th, may be excused from duty and provided with paid holiday time off. In this instance, Inauguration Day is not observed on another day.  There is no in-lieu-of holiday for employees who are not regularly scheduled to work on Inauguration Day (5 U.S.C. 6103(c)).  Employees who are required to perform work on a holiday are entitled to holiday premium pay.

https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/pay-leave/federal-holidays/#url=2029


The other 9/11: George H.W. Bush's 1990 New World Order speech

Out of these troubled times, a new world order can emerge.

By George H.W. Bush|Contributor


12:41 PM on Sep 8, 2017 CDT


Editor's note: The following is an excerpt of George H.W. Bush's speech before a joint session of Congress on Sept. 11, 1990, in which he describes his vision of a new world order amid the Persian Gulf crisis. Read the full speech here.


We stand today at a unique and extraordinary moment. The crisis in the Persian Gulf, as grave as it is, also offers a rare opportunity to move toward an historic period of cooperation. Out of these troubled times, our fifth objective — a new world order — can emerge: a new era — freer from the threat of terror, stronger in the pursuit of justice, and more secure in the quest for peace. An era in which the nations of the world, East and West, North and South, can prosper and live in harmony.


A hundred generations have searched for this elusive path to peace, while a thousand wars raged across the span of human endeavor. Today that new world is struggling to be born, a world quite different from the one we've known. A world where the rule of law supplants the rule of the jungle. A world in which nations recognize the shared responsibility for freedom and justice. A world where the strong respect the rights of the weak. This is the vision that I shared with President Gorbachev in Helsinki. He and other leaders from Europe, the Gulf, and around the world understand that how we manage this crisis today could shape the future for generations to come.


The test we face is great, and so are the stakes. This is the first assault on the new world that we seek, the first test of our mettle. Had we not responded to this first provocation with clarity of purpose, if we do not continue to demonstrate our determination, it would be a signal to actual and potential despots around the world. America and the world must defend common vital interests — and we will. America and the world must support the rule of law — and we will. America and the world must stand up to aggression — and we will. And one thing more: In the pursuit of these goals, America will not be intimidated.


President George Bush and first lady Barbara Bush welcomed Soviet President Mikhail...

President George Bush and first lady Barbara Bush welcomed Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev and his wife, Raisa, for a state dinner at the White House in May 1990. (File Photo/The Associated Press)

Vital issues of principle are at stake. Saddam Hussein is literally trying to wipe a country off the face of the Earth. We do not exaggerate. Nor do we exaggerate when we say Saddam Hussein will fail. Vital economic interests are at risk as well. Iraq itself controls some 10 percent of the world's proven oil reserves. Iraq plus Kuwait controls twice that. An Iraq permitted to swallow Kuwait would have the economic and military power, as well as the arrogance, to intimidate and coerce its neighbors — neighbors who control the lion's share of the world's remaining oil reserves. We cannot permit a resource so vital to be dominated by one so ruthless. And we won't.


Recent events have surely proven that there is no substitute for American leadership. In the face of tyranny, let no one doubt American credibility and reliability. Let no one doubt our staying power. We will stand by our friends. One way or another, the leader of Iraq must learn this fundamental truth. From the outset, acting hand in hand with others, we've sought to fashion the broadest possible international response to Iraq's aggression. The level of world cooperation and condemnation of Iraq is unprecedented. Armed forces from countries spanning four continents are there at the request of King Fahd of Saudi Arabia to deter and, if need be, to defend against attack. Moslems and non-Moslems, Arabs and non-Arabs, soldiers from many nations stand shoulder to shoulder, resolute against Saddam Hussein's ambitions. ...


I cannot predict just how long it will take to convince Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait. Sanctions will take time to have their full intended effect. We will continue to review all options with our allies, but let it be clear: We will not let this aggression stand.


George H.W. Bush was the 41st president of the United States.

https://web.archive.org/web/20230306211151/https://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/commentary/2017/09/08/the-other-9-11-george-h-w-bush-s-1990-new-world-order-speech/


The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations (UN) members in 2015, created 17 world Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The aim of these global goals is "peace and prosperity for people and the planet"[1][2] – while tackling climate change and working to preserve oceans and forests. The SDGs highlight the connections between the environmental, social and economic aspects of sustainable development. Sustainability is at the center of the SDGs, as the term sustainable development implies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_Development_Goals


2030-2031 APPARITION CHARACTERISTICS

Another general rule for predicting oppositions of Mars is from the following: the planet has an approximate 15.8-year periodic opposition cycle, which consists of three or four Aphelic oppositions and three consecutive Perihelic oppositions. Perihelic oppositions are also called "favorable" because the Earth and Mars come closest to each other on those occasions. We sometimes refer to this as the seven Martian synodic periods. This cycle is repeated every 79 years (± 4 to 5 days) and, if one were to live long enough, one would see this cycle nearly replicated in approximately 284 years. The 2031 Mars apparition is considered Transitional (between Aphelic and Perihelic) because the orbital longitude at opposition will be 68.4° from the aphelion longitude of 70° Ls and 111.6° Ls from perihelion (250° Ls).


NOTE: Ls is the planetocentric longitude of the Sun along the ecliptic of Mars’ sky. 0° Ls is defined as that point where the Sun crosses the Martian celestial equator from south to north, that is the planet’s northern hemisphere vernal equinox. The other Ls values that define the beginnings of Martian northern hemisphere seasons are: summer, 90° Ls; autumn, 180° Ls; and winter, 270° Ls. For Mars’ southern hemisphere these values represent the opposite seasons. Distance (A.U.) - Distance from Earth to Mars in astronomical units, where one (1) A.U. equals 92,955,807.267 miles or 149,597,870.691 km.

Opposition occurs 11 months after conjunction when Mars is on the opposite side of the Earth from the Sun. At that time, the two planets will lie nearly in a straight line with respect to the Sun, or five weeks after retrogression begins. Opposition will occur at 1157 UT on May 04, 2031 (138.4° Ls) with an apparent planetary disk diameter of 16.7 arcsec. Mars will remain visible for more than twelve months after opposition and then become lost in the glare of the Sun around May 31, 2032 as it approaches the next conjunction (July 11, 2032). The cycle is complete in 780 Earth days.

Closest approach occurs at 0350 UT on May 12, 2031 (142.1° Ls) with an apparent planetary disk diameter of 16.9 at a distance of 0.5533578 astronomical units (AU) or 51,437,823 miles (82,781,152 km). During closest approach in 2031 the apparent diameter of Mars will be 2.4 arcsec larger than it was at the same period in 2029; however, it will be 17.1 degrees lower in the sky - not quite as good for observing the Red Planet for observers in the northern hemisphere. It should also be noted that closest approach between Earth and Mars is not necessarily coincident with the time of opposition but varies by as much as two weeks.

https://www.alpo-astronomy.org/jbeish/2031_MARS.htm

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid02gyYwP5dRDVpV5zbL4GEkVnzc4cTzxULBVDAbjZTVoHi72bFzWe5QZBwUYX6UKBBMl

Terminator 2: Judgment Day[a] is a 1991 American science-fiction action film directed by James Cameron, who co-wrote the script with William Wisher. Starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, and Robert Patrick, it is the sequel to The Terminator (1984) and is the second installment in the Terminator franchise. In the film, the malevolent artificial intelligence Skynet sends a Terminator—a highly advanced killing machine—back in time to 1995 to kill the future leader of the human resistance, John Connor, when he is a child. The resistance sends back a less advanced, reprogrammed Terminator to protect Connor and ensure the future of humanity.


The Terminator was considered a significant success, enhancing Schwarzenegger's and Cameron's careers, but work on a sequel stalled because of animosity between the pair and Hemdale Film Corporation, which partially owned the film's rights. In 1990, Schwarzenegger and Cameron persuaded Carolco Pictures to purchase the rights from The Terminator producer Gale Anne Hurd and Hemdale, which was financially struggling. A release date was set for the following year, leaving Cameron and Wisher seven weeks to write the script. Principal photography lasted from October 1990 to March 1991, taking place in and around Los Angeles on an estimated $94–102 million budget, making it the most expensive film made at the time. The advanced visual effects by Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), which include the first use of a computer-generated main character in a blockbuster film, resulted in a schedule overrun. Theatrical prints were not delivered to theaters until the night before the picture's release on July 3, 1991.


Terminator 2 was a critical and commercial success, grossing $519–520.9 million at the box office to become the highest-grossing film of 1991 worldwide and the third-highest-grossing film of its time. The film won several accolades, including Saturn, BAFTA, and Academy awards. Terminator 2 merchandise includes video games, comic books, novels, and T2-3D: Battle Across Time, a live-action attraction.


Terminator 2 is considered one of the best science fiction, action, and sequel films ever made. It is also seen as a major influence on visual effects in films, helping usher in the transition from practical effects to reliance on computer-generated imagery. The United States Library of Congress selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry in 2023. Although Cameron intended for Terminator 2 to be the end of the franchise, it was followed by a series of sequels, including Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003), Terminator Salvation (2009), Terminator Genisys (2015), and Terminator: Dark Fate (2019), as well as a 2008 television series.


Plot

In 2029, Earth has been ravaged by the war between the malevolent artificial intelligence Skynet and the human resistance. Skynet sends the T-1000—an advanced, shape-shifting prototype Terminator made of virtually indestructible liquid metal—back in time to kill resistance leader John Connor when he is a child. To protect John, the resistance sends back a reprogrammed T-800 Terminator, a less advanced metal endoskeleton covered in living tissue.


In 1995 Los Angeles, John's mother Sarah is incarcerated in Pescadero State Hospital for her violent efforts to prevent "Judgment Day"—the prophesied events of August 29, 1997, when Skynet will gain sentience and, in response to its creators' attempts to deactivate it, incite a nuclear holocaust. John, living with foster parents, also considers Sarah delusional and resents her efforts to prepare him for his future role. The T-1000 locates John in a shopping mall, but the T-800 intervenes, coming to John's aid and enabling his escape. John calls to warn his foster parents, but the T-800 deduces that the T-1000 has already killed them. Realizing the T-800 is programmed to obey him, John forbids it to kill people and orders it to help him rescue Sarah from the T-1000.


The T-800 and John intercept Sarah as she attempts to escape. Initially horrified that the T-800 resembles the Terminator sent to kill her in 1984[b], she joins them and escapes the pursuing T-1000. Sarah uses the T-800's knowledge of the future to learn that a revolutionary microprocessor, being developed by Cyberdyne engineer Miles Dyson, will be crucial to Skynet's creation. Over the course of their journey, Sarah sees the T-800 serving as a friend and father figure to John, who teaches it catchphrases and hand signs while encouraging it to become more human-like.


Sarah plans to escape to Mexico with John, but a nightmare about Judgment Day prompts her to decide to kill Dyson. She attacks him in his home but cannot bring herself to go through with it and relents. John arrives and reconciles with Sarah while the T-800 explains to Dyson the future consequences of his work. Dyson reveals that his research has been reverse engineered from the CPU and severed arm of the 1984 Terminator. Believing that his work must be destroyed, Dyson helps Sarah, John, and the T-800 break into Cyberdyne, retrieve the CPU and the arm, and set explosives to destroy the lab. The police assault the building and fatally shoot Dyson, but he detonates the explosives as he dies. The T-1000 pursues the surviving trio, cornering them in a steel mill.


Sarah and John split up to escape while the T-1000 mangles the T-800 and briefly deactivates it by destroying its power source. The T-1000 assumes Sarah's appearance and voice to lure out John, but Sarah intervenes and, along with the reactivated T-800, pushes it into a vat of molten steel, where it disintegrates. John also throws the 1984 Terminator's arm and CPU into the vat. The T-800 explains that it must also be destroyed to prevent it from serving as a foundation for Skynet. Despite John's tearful protests, the T-800 persuades him that its destruction is the only way to protect their future. Sarah, having come to respect the T-800, shakes its hand and lowers it into the vat. The T-800 gives John a thumbs-up as it is incinerated.


As Sarah drives down a highway with John, she reflects on her renewed hope for an unknown future, musing that if the T-800 could learn the value of life, so can humanity.


Cast

See also: List of Terminator characters

A photograph of Arnold Schwarzenegger

A photograph of Linda Hamilton

A photograph of Robert Patrick

(Left to right) Arnold Schwarzenegger (pictured in 2003), Linda Hamilton (2009), and Robert Patrick (2014)

Arnold Schwarzenegger as the Terminator: a reprogrammed Model 101 Series 800 "T-800" Terminator that is composed of human tissue over a metal endoskeleton[3]

Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor: a self-trained soldier who is dedicated to preventing the rise of Skynet[4]

Edward Furlong as John Connor: Sarah's son who is destined to lead the human resistance in opposition to Skynet[5]

Robert Patrick as T-1000: an advanced, shape-shifting prototype Terminator composed of liquid metal[6]

Earl Boen as Dr. Peter Silberman: Sarah's doctor at Pescadero State Hospital[7][8][9]

Joe Morton as Miles Bennett Dyson: director of special projects at Cyberdyne Systems Corporation[10][11]

The film's cast also includes Jenette Goldstein and Xander Berkeley as John's foster parents Janelle and Todd Voight,[12] Cástulo Guerra as Sarah's friend Enrique Salceda, S. Epatha Merkerson and DeVaughn Nixon as Dyson's wife Tarissa and son Danny,[13][14] and Danny Cooksey as John's friend Tim.[15] Hamilton's twin sister Leslie Hamilton Gearren appears as the T-1000 impersonating Sarah when Hamilton is also on-screen. Twins Don and Dan Stanton portray a guard at Pescadero State Hospital and the T-1000 imitating him.[4][13][16]


Other cast members includes Ken Gibbel as an abusive orderly;[17] Robert Winley, Ron Young, Charles Robert Brown, and Pete Schrum as men who confront the T-800 in a biker bar; Abdul Salaam El Razzac as Gibbons, a Cyberdyne guard; and Dean Norris as the SWAT team leader.[13][14] Michael Edwards portrays the John Connor of 2029, and Hamilton's infant son Dalton Abbott portrays John in a dream sequence.[5][13][18] Co-writer William Wisher cameos as a man photographing the T-800 in the mall,[19] and Michael Biehn reprises his role as resistance soldier Kyle Reese in scenes that were removed from the theatrical release.[20]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terminator_2:_Judgment_Day


Peter Hans Kolvenbach (30 November 1928 – 26 November 2016) was a Dutch Catholic priest and professor who was the 29th superior general of the Society of Jesus from 1983 to 2008.


Early years

Kolvenbach was born and grew up in Druten, near Nijmegen in the Netherlands.[1] There he attended Canisius College for his secondary studies, where he concentrated on modern languages. He entered the novitiate at Mariendaal on 7 September 1948. After completing philosophy studies at Berchmans Institute in Nijmegen, he was assigned to Lebanon, where he completed his doctorate in Sacred Theology at Université de Saint-Joseph in Beirut. On 29 June 1961, he was ordained a priest in the Armenian Catholic Church, an Eastern-rite church in communion with Rome.[2]


The next years of his life were spent in academia, specifically in linguistics. From 1964 to 1976 he taught general and Oriental linguistics in The Hague, Paris, and then Beirut where he became Professor of General Linguistics and Armenian at Université Saint-Joseph. He served in that capacity until 1981, when he became rector of the Pontifical Oriental Institute.[2]


During his time on the faculty of Saint-Joseph, he also served as superior of the Jesuit Near-East Vice-Province.[3]


History


Father General

On 7 August 1981, Father General Pedro Arrupe suffered a severe stroke in the plane on his way back to Rome. Although he survived for another ten years, he wanted to step down as Superior General. Though Arrupe proposed Vincent O'Keefe of Fordham University as interim successor, Pope John Paul II intervened and named Paolo Dezza his delegate to lead the order for an interim period.[4] Two years later John Paul II allowed the Jesuits to proceed in selecting their new leader. Meeting in September 1983, the 33rd General Congregation of the Society of Jesus accepted the formal resignation of Father Arrupe and on the first ballot elected Father Kolvenbach to be 29th Superior General of the Jesuits.[5]


Kolvenbach took office at a time when the Jesuits' "strongly pro-social justice and church reform orientation was seen by critics as having made the Jesuits something akin to John Paul’s in-house opposition. ...Over time, Kolvenbach was credited with having managed to win back the trust of John Paul II and his Vatican team, without alienating the more liberal members of the order."[6][7]


Meeting a fellow Jesuit personally.

He is credited with successfully defending Jesuit theologian Jacques Dupuis from charges made by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and Fr. Thomas J. Reese, who was removed as editor of America magazine by the insistence of the Vatican, says that he “always felt that Kolvenbach did everything he could to defend me.” He manifested his personal interest in each Jesuit's work, with an interest in meeting each Jesuit individually.[3] He traveled extensively to visit Jesuits in 112 countries, and “his knowledge of them and their ministries is legendary.” He also emphasized the need to make laypersons feel their place of equal partnership in Jesuit ministries, recognizing with Vatican II that “holiness is one - that sanctity is cultivated by all who are moved by the Spirit of God'." He expressed his belief that “the church of the next millennium will be called the 'church of the laity' ...this development is a 'grace of our day and a hope for the future'."[8]


Resignation and retirement


Kolvenbach in Goa, India, in 2006


Grave in Collège Notre Dame de Jamhour

On 2 February 2006, Kolvenbach informed the members of the Society of Jesus that he intended to step down in 2008, the year he would turn 80. As the Superior General is elected for life, Kolvenbach was only the second to resign the office.


The 35th General Congregation of the Society of Jesus convened on 5 January 2008 in Rome. On 14 January it accepted Kolvenbach's resignation and elected Adolfo Nicolás as his successor.[9]


Kolvenbach died in Beirut on 26 November 2016 and is buried outside Beirut on the grounds of Collège Notre Dame de Jamhour.[10] He left just before his death a personal letter to a young medicine doctor, Anthony Kallas-Chemaly, who worked with him on the history of the Jesuits.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Hans_Kolvenbach


Predator is a 1987 American science fiction action horror film directed by John McTiernan and written by brothers Jim and John Thomas.[5] Arnold Schwarzenegger stars as Alan "Dutch" Schaefer, the leader of an elite paramilitary rescue team on a mission to save hostages in a Central American rainforest, who encounters a deadly Predator (Kevin Peter Hall), a skilled and technologically advanced extraterrestrial, who stalks and hunts his team down. The film also features Elpidia Carrillo, Carl Weathers, Richard Chaves, Sonny Landham, Bill Duke, Jesse Ventura and Shane Black.


Predator was written in 1984 with a working title of Hunter. Filming ran from March to June 1986 with creature effects, devised by Stan Winston and a budget of around $15 million. 20th Century Fox released the film on June 12, 1987, in the United States of America, and it grossed $98 million worldwide. Initial reviews were mixed, but the film has since been considered a classic of action and science fiction genres and one of the best films of the 1980s, and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects.


The success of Predator launched a media franchise of films, novels, comic books, video games, and toys. It spawned six additional films: Predator 2 (1990), Predators (2010), The Predator (2018), Prey (2022), Predator: Killer of Killers (2025) and Predator: Badlands (2025).


Crossover with Alien franchise produced Alien vs. Predator film series, Alien vs. Predator (2004) and Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (2007). Schaefer would return in the video games Alien vs. Predator (1994) and Predator: Hunting Grounds (2020), with Schwarzenegger reprising his role in the latter.


Plot

An extraterrestrial spacecraft deploys a shuttle to Earth. Sometime later, Major Alan "Dutch" Schaefer and his elite "rescue team"—veteran mercenaries Sgt. Mac Eliot and Blain Cooper, explosives expert Poncho Ramirez, expert tracker Billy Sole, and jokester Rick Hawkins—are tasked with rescuing a local, (democratic ally) cabinet minister whose helicopter "strayed over the border" and was shot down in an (unnamed, communist) Central American jungle. Dutch's Vietnam War buddy, Al Dillon, now a CIA agent, accompanies the team to oversee the mission.


The rescue team soon finds the wreckage of a US military helicopter and traces of twelve communist "guerrilla" soldiers, as well as three skinned corpses hung high in the trees nearby. Dutch identifies the corpses as Green Berets, and becomes suspicious of Dillon's intentions, especially as the helicopter was outfitted for surveillance, and not dignitary transport.


Dutch's team soon finds a communist "guerrilla" camp, and kills all the soldiers and their Russian military advisors. Realizing the "hostages" were CIA agents, Dillon admits the cabinet minister ruse was to use Dutch—who refuses to use his team for assassinations—to prevent a Soviet-sponsored invasion. Dillon also discloses that the original CIA surveillance team disappeared and the Green Berets had been sent to find them. Dillon takes the lone surviving communist "freedom fighter", Anna, prisoner, and the team travels towards the extraction point.


Unbeknownst to the team, a technologically superior, humanoid alien has stalked them with infrared thermal imaging vision since their arrival, remaining all but invisible via a cloaking device. However, tracker Billy senses the presence of something unusual. Anna flees when the team is distracted, and although Hawkins catches her, he is killed by the cloaked, alien hunter, which Anna later describes as "the jungle itself coming to life". As the team searches for Hawkins' body, the predator kills Blain with a powerful, laser type weapon, fusing and cauterizing his gaping chest wound. Mac catches a glimpse of the predator's "blurry" cloaked form, and enraged over Blain's death, provokes the team into blindly firing a barage of small arms fire in its direction, mildly wounding the predator (in the leg), but decimating the jungle foliage.


The team sets up camp for the night, booby trapping the perimeter. A wild boar triggers a trap, and the predator uses the ensuing confusion to steal Blain's corpse.


The following day, Dutch deduces that the "predator" is stalking them from the treetops, and releases Anna, to help them all survive. She recounts local folktales of a demon monster that kills men and takes trophies from their corpses, typically when the weather is hot. The team booby traps the treetops to force the predator into a net, but it is able to easily escape and Poncho is injured. Mac and Dillon, who both want to make amends, pursue the predator, but they are outmaneuvered and killed by its targeting laser weapon. The predator soon catches the survivors, killing Billy and Poncho. Realizing the predator only attacks those it considers a threat, Dutch makes Anna drop her weapon and flee to the extraction point. Dutch distracts the predator before falling down a mudslide, over a cliff into a waterfall basin and washing up on a muddy shore. The predator pursues Dutch, but is seemingly unable to see him, and leaves to collect the skulls of the others as trophies. Dutch concludes that the mud masked his body heat, making him invisible to the predator.


Seeking to avenge his team, Dutch creates makeshift traps and a bow. As night falls, he covers himself in mud and lets out a war cry to lure the predator to him. Dutch uses his invisibility to wound the predator and disable its cloaking device, but falls into a river which washes off his mud camouflage. Deeming Dutch a worthy opponent, the predator removes its lethal laser weapon and mask—revealing a monstrous 4 mandible visage—to face him in hand-to-hand combat. Easily outmatched by the larger and stronger creature, Dutch attempts to goad it into a booby trap, but the predator suspects and circumvents it. Dutch triggers the trap himself, releasing its counterweight, which pins the predator. Mortally wounded, the predator activates a wrist-mounted self-destruct device. Dutch flees, barely escaping the resulting atomic explosion that razes the area.


As dawn breaks, the extraction helicopter arrives with Anna to collect the exhausted and traumatized Dutch.


Cast

Further information: List of Predator (franchise) characters


The main cast of Predator. Left to right: Jesse Ventura, Shane Black, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bill Duke, Carl Weathers, Sonny Landham, and Richard Chaves.

Arnold Schwarzenegger as Major Alan "Dutch" Schaefer

Elpidia Carrillo as guerilla Anna Gonsalves

Carl Weathers as CIA agent Al Dillon

Richard Chaves as Poncho Ramirez

Sonny Landham as "Indian" tracker Billy Sole

Bill Duke as Sgt. Mac Eliot

Jesse Ventura as Blain Cooper

Shane Black as Rick Hawkins

R. G. Armstrong as 2 star General Homer Phillips[a]

Kevin Peter Hall as alien predator

Peter Cullen (voice of) Predator/Helicopter Pilot

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predator_(film)


Trump, Vance meet with Pope Leo's Florida brother, 'a major MAGA fan', at White House

Kim Luciani

USA TODAY NETWORK - Florida

May 22, 2025, 12:58 p.m. ET

Key Points AI-assisted summary

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's brother, Louis Prevost, at the White House.

Trump publicly praised Prevost, a Florida resident, for being a "major MAGA fan."

Louis Prevost acknowledged his political views and stated his intention to "tone it down" to avoid causing issues for the pope.

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's Florida brother Louis Prevost at the White House on May 20, after praising Prevost to reporters at the Capitol earlier in the day, calling him a "major MAGA fan."


Trump told reporters he likes the pope and both of his brothers, but spotlighted the eldest brother, Navy veteran and Port Charlotte resident Louis Prevost.

"I like the new pope and I like the pope's brother. You know, one of the pope's brothers – actually both of them – but one in particular is a major MAGA fan. Did you know that? He lives in Florida," Trump said.

"And I look forward to getting him to the White House. I want to shake his hand, I want to give him a big hug."

Later that day, the White House visit happened. Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah met with Trump and Vice President JD Vance in the Oval Office.

"Great meeting between President Trump, Vice President Vance, and @Pontifex’s brother, Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah," Special Assistant to the President and Communications Advisor Margo Martin posted on X, along with a photo of the meeting.


Louis Prevost excited and happy about brother Pope Leo XVI's papacy

The Prevost brothers — Louis, John and Robert (Pope Leo XIV) — grew up in Chicago in a traditional Catholic family.

Louis Prevost said his youngest brother Robert wanted to "play priest" when he was 6 and set his sights on the priesthood as a freshman in high school. Their parents, neighbors and even strangers told Robert, "You're going to be pope someday," he said.

Robert Prevost's election as Pope Leo XIV left Louis Prevost excited, happy, mind blown and a little worried about how the papacy would impact their relationship.

“I just freaked out and said ‘It’s Rob, OMG.’ I was up, dressed, out, just going nuts,” he told WBBH.

“We can only hope that we can maintain that closeness, and we don't do anything to embarrass him,” he said.

Louis Prevost attended Pope Leo's inaugural mass at the Vatican on May 18. The brothers shared a hug after the service.


Pope Leo's Florida brother Louis Prevost is a MAGA, Trump supporter

Trump told reporters Louis Prevost is a "major MAGA fan."


In an interview with Piers Morgan, Louis Prevost said, "I don’t want to create waves that don’t need to be there because I’m a MAGA type and I have my beliefs,” he said. “I don’t need to create heat for him. He’s going to have enough to handle as it is without the press going ‘the pope’s brother says this.’ He doesn’t need that.”


Asked about his reposts of controversial social media memes, including one calling Nancy Pelosi a drunk (expletive), and how they might affect the pope, Louis Prevost said he will "tone it down."


"He knows I am who I am," he said of the pope. "He's well aware of my position. He knows I'm probably not going to change and I don't think I will, other than to, just like you say, tone it down."

Contributing: Melissa Pérez-Carrillo, Herald-Tribune, Ashley Ferrer, USA TODAY Network-Florida

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/


All historians acknowledge the ascendancy of the popes began in 308 A.D., when King Clovis of the Salian or Merovingian Franks (later France), won the decisive battle in the Catholic and Arian religious war, thereby settling the dispute in favor of the Catholics. But the popes' temporal reign officially began in the year 538 A.D. when Roman Emperor Justinian subdued the last of the three kingdoms, or "horns," that opposed the rise of the Papacy."

-page 137

Chapter 19 "Exposed (Again): 1260 Years of World Domination

Codeword Barbelon book 2

by P.D. Stuart


Clovis is the modern conventional French (and thence English) form of the Old Frankish name ᚺᛚᛟᛞᛟᚹᛁᚷ (in runic alphabet) or *"Hlōdowik" or "Hlōdowig" (in Latin alphabet), equivalent to the modern forms Louis (French), Lodewijk (Dutch), Lewis (English), and Ludwig (German).


Etymology

The name *Hlōdowik or *Hlōdowig is traditionally considered to be composed of two elements, deriving from both Proto-Germanic *hlūdaz ("loud, famous") and *wiganą ("to battle, to fight") respectively, resulting in the traditional practice of translating Clovis' name as meaning "famous warrior".


However, scholars have pointed out that Gregory of Tours consequently transcribes the names of various Merovingian royal names containing the first element as chlodo-. The use of a close-mid back protruded vowel (o), rather than the expected close back rounded vowel (u) which Gregory does use in various other Germanic names (i.e. Fredegundis, Arnulfus, Gundobadus, etc.) opens up the possibility that the first element instead derives from Proto-Germanic *hlutą ("lot, share, portion"), giving the meaning of the name as "loot bringer" or "plunder (bringing) warrior". This hypothesis is supported by the fact that if the first element is taken to mean "famous", then the name of Chlodomer (one of Clovis' sons) would contain two elements (*hlūdaz and *mērijaz) both meaning "famous", which would be highly uncommon within the typical Germanic name structure.[1][2]


Frankish royalty

Clovis I (c. 466 – 511), the first king of the Franks to unite all the Frankish tribes under one ruler

Clovis II (637 – c. 658), king of Neustria and Burgundy

Clovis III (reigned 675–676), the king of Austrasia

Clovis IV (682–695), the sole king of the Franks from 691 until 695

Clovis (died 580), son of Chilperic I and Audovera, assassinated by his father and stepmother

Louis the Pious, son of Charlemagne, King of Aquitaine from 781 and sole ruler of the Franks 814–840, but counted as "Louis I of France" even though West Francia (the nucleus of the later kingdom of France) was formed only after his death.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clovis_(given_name)


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.


Biography

Early life

Sako was born in the city of Zakho, Iraq, on 4 July 1948.[2] He comes from an ethnic Assyrian family of the Chaldean Catholic Church that has roots in a religious community that has had a presence in the city of his birth since the 5th century AD.[3]


He completed his early studies in Mosul and then attended the Dominican-run Saint Jean’s Seminary there. He was ordained a priest on 1 June 1974 and filled his first pastoral assignment at the Cathedral of Mosul until 1979. He then earned a doctorate in Eastern patrology at the Pontifical Oriental Institute. When denied a license to teach because he was only qualified for religious instruction, he earned a second doctorate in history from the Sorbonne in Paris.[4] With this he secured his teaching license and was able to provide religious instruction. From 1997 to 2002 he was rector of the Patriarchal Seminary in Baghdad. He then returned to Mosul and guided the parish of Perpetual Help for a year.[5][6]


Sako speaks Neo-Aramaic, German, French, English, Italian, Kurdish and Arabic.[2]


Archeparch

A synod of the bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church meeting in Baghdad elected Sako Archeparch of Kirkuk on 24 October 2002. Pope John Paul II gave his assent on 27 September 2003.[7] He received his episcopal consecration on 14 November 2003 from his predecessor in Kirkuk, André Sana.[8]


In August 2009, and at the beginning of Ramadan, Sako organized an appeal for national peace, reconciliation and end to violence on the part of more than fifty religious leaders in Kirkuk. He called it "a gesture of closeness to our Muslim brothers. We are all brothers, sons of the same God we must respect and cooperate for the good of the people and our country." The participants included representatives of Ali Sistani and Muqtada al Sadr.[9]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) is an American populist slogan and political movement led by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who serves as Secretary of Health and Human Services in the second Trump administration. The slogan, echoing the "Make America Great Again" phrase popularized by Donald Trump and his ideology, reflects a focus on public health issues. MAHA gained broader attention following the suspension of Kennedy's independent presidential campaign in August 2024 and his subsequent endorsement of Trump.[1]


According to its proponents, MAHA's primary beliefs are that there is a chronic illness epidemic in the United States, advocating for what they believe are healthier lifestyle choices (including drinking raw milk, taking dietary supplements, and adopting various fad diets), suggesting that autism is caused by environmental effects (especially vaccines) and therefore need to be cured through detoxification, and contending that corruption in the food and pharmaceutical industries is a major source of health problems.[2][3][4][5]


In February 2025, President Trump established the MAHA Commission, chaired by Kennedy, to study psychiatric and anti-obesity medication, childhood diseases, and mental disorders. Its May 2025 MAHA Assessment cited poor diet, environmental chemicals, lack of exercise, stress, and overmedicalization as major child health concerns, while questioning vaccines, water fluoridation, and other public health measures. The assessment was criticized for containing fabricated sources. The Department of Health & Human Services released the "Make Our Children Healthy Again Strategy" in September 2025, proposing food regulation, SNAP restrictions on processed foods, removal of artificial dyes, scrutiny of pesticides, and drawing attention for omitting leading causes of childhood death and promoting conspiracy theories about vaccines, Wi-Fi, and 5G.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Make_America_Healthy_Again


At the time of his father's death at the Battle of Brissarthe in 866, Odo and his brother Robert were still young, and thus king Charles the Bald appointed Hugh the Abbot (d. 886) to govern over counties previously held by Robert the Strong.[9] Since 882, Odo was the Count of Paris,[10] and gained prominence during the reign of Charles the Fat (884–887).[11]. Odo was also the lay abbot of St. Martin of Tours.[12][13]


In 882 or 883 Odo married Théodrate of Troyes.[14] The eleventh-century chronicler Adémar de Chabannes wrote that they had a son, Arnoul (c.882–898)[citation needed], who died shortly after his father. Guy is named as one of the couple's children in an Alan I's charter dated 28 August 903, but genealogist Christian Settipani has argued that the document is false.[15] The genealogical work Europäische Stammtafeln refers to Raoul as a son of Odo by Théodrate, but its primary source is not known.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odo_of_France


AI Overview

Charlemagne and Constantinople | Bridging East and West - mythist

Charlemagne, crowned Holy Roman Emperor in 800 AD, was in direct rivalry with the Eastern Roman Empire in Constantinople due to his assumption of the imperial title, which was still held by the Byzantine emperor. This led to a "problem of two emperors," where both sides claimed the sole right to the title, resulting in diplomatic strain and rivalry that lasted for centuries. The conflict arose when Charlemagne's imperial coronation occurred while Constantinople's ruler, Empress Irene, was a woman, a fact the Pope and Charlemagne used to justify the transfer of imperial power to the West.  

The Coronation of Charlemagne

The Context: In 797, the Eastern Roman Empire in Constantinople experienced a crisis when Emperor Constantine VI was overthrown by his mother, Empress Irene.

The Transfer of Power: Pope Leo III, in an act known as translatio imperii, crowned Charlemagne, king of the Franks, as "Emperor of the Romans" on Christmas Day 800 AD.

Justification: The coronation was partly justified by Irene's rule as a woman, which was not accepted in Western Europe. Charlemagne's position was also a strategic move to assert his authority.

The Rivalry with Constantinople

Two Emperors: Charlemagne's coronation created a situation with two claimants to the Roman imperial title, one in the West (Charlemagne) and one in the East (the Byzantine Emperor in Constantinople).

Denial of Legitimacy: The Byzantine Empire continued to view the Western imperial title as illegitimate, referring to the Western emperor as the "emperor of the Greeks" or "emperor of the Franks".

Diplomatic Tensions: This dispute over the imperial title soured diplomatic relations and remained a significant factor in the relationship between the Holy Roman Empire and the Byzantine Empire for centuries.

Recognition and Outcome

Limited Recognition: While a formal war was not fought over it, the Byzantine emperor eventually recognized Charlemagne as emperor in 812.

A Personal Title: However, this recognition was limited; Charlemagne was acknowledged as an "emperor," but the Byzantine emperor maintained his claim to be the sole legitimate Roman Caesar.

Enduring Rivalry: The rivalry continued even after Charlemagne's death, becoming an important aspect of imperial history until the fall of Constantinople in 1204.

AI responses may include mistakes. Learn more


The Ottoman Empire[l] (/ˈɒtəmən/ ⓘ), also called the Turkish Empire,[24][25] was an empire[m] that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Central Europe, between the early 16th and early 18th centuries.[26][27][28]


The empire emerged from a beylik, or principality, founded in northwestern Anatolia in c. 1299 by the Turkoman tribal leader Osman I. His successors conquered much of Anatolia and expanded into the Balkans by the mid-14th century, transforming their petty kingdom into a transcontinental empire. The Ottomans ended the Byzantine Empire with the conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Mehmed II. With its capital at Constantinople and control over a significant portion of the Mediterranean Basin, the Ottoman Empire was at the centre of interactions between the Middle East and Europe for six centuries. Ruling over so many peoples, the empire granted varying levels of autonomy to its many confessional communities, or millets, to manage their own affairs per Islamic law. During the reigns of Selim I and Suleiman the Magnificent in the 16th century, the Ottoman Empire became a global power.[29]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottoman_Empire


Al-Andalus[a] (Arabic: الأَنْدَلُس) was the Muslim-ruled area of the Iberian Peninsula. The term is used by modern historians for the former Islamic states in modern Spain, Portugal[1] and France. The name describes the different Muslim[2][3] states that controlled these territories at various times between 711 and 1492. At its greatest geographical extent, it occupied most of the peninsula[4][5][6] and part of present-day southern France (Septimania) under Umayyad rule. These boundaries changed constantly through a series of conquests Western historiography has traditionally characterized as the Reconquista,[2][3][7][8][9] eventually shrinking to the south and finally to the Emirate of Granada.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Andalus


1236

June 29 – Siege of Córdoba: Castilian forces under King Ferdinand III (the Saint) capture Muslim Córdoba from Emir Ibn Hud, as part of the Reconquista of the Iberian Peninsula.[2]

July – At a diet (princely convention) in Piacenza, Emperor Frederick II proclaims his wish to recover all Italy for the Holy Roman Empire.[3]


Pope Gregory IX condemned the links that both the Knights Templer and Knights Hospitaller have with the Assassin fighters in the Middle East. He issues a bull, a formal proclamation issued by the pope, preventing further contact with the Assassins.

May 6 – Roger of Wendover, English Benedictine monk and chronicler, dies at St. Albans Abbey. His chronicle is continued by Matthew of Paris.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1236


Atheism: resisting it with all our forces is a special mission given to the Society by the supreme pontiff, 253 2°; a mission which should permeate all forms of our apostolate, 254; our efforts are to be directed toward nonbelievers, ibid.; toward that end, an experience of God must be fostered in ourselves, 223 §§3-4, 224, 247

1° 2° 3° 6°;

and also in others, by means of the Spiritual Exercises, 271

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


The idea of uniting the Templars with the Hospitallers was first argued publicly in a book published in 1305 by Raimon Llull, a renowned illuminatus from Majorca. Llull’s book, Libre de Fine, (“Free At Last”) appeared in the midst of a raging controversy between the French monarchy and the Roman papacy over who held jurisdiction over the Templars. That is the subject of our next chapter.

Rulers of Evil

by F. Tupper Saussy

https://dn790006.ca.archive.org/0/items/rulers-of-evil-f.-tupper-saussy/Rulers%20of%20Evil%20-%20F.%20Tupper%20Saussy.pdf


Ignatius of Loyola: Apostle to the Muslims

Posted on: 26th July 2016  |Author: Damian Howard SJ

Category: The Jesuits

Tags: Feast of St Ignatius, Ignatius, Islam, interreligious, Jesuit history


To educate the youth of Europe? To fight the spread of Protestantism? While many people would guess that one or both of these ambitions drove Ignatius of Loyola to found the Jesuits, he actually had something else in mind: a mission to the Muslim world. For the feast of St Ignatius, Damian Howard SJ considers how ‘Islam haunted Ignatius’s understanding of his calling’ and celebrates the fruitful work of the many Jesuits who have tried to realise Ignatius’s vision in their engagement with Muslims.


Ask the average Catholic why St Ignatius of Loyola founded the Society of Jesus and they will likely say one of two things. First, remembering the Jesuits as bastions of the Counter-Reformation they might assume that Ignatius, militant Catholic that he was, had set out with a dream of a new religious order capable of defeating Protestantism. But whilst it was the case that the Jesuits would be active in efforts to reform the Catholic Church from within and to take on the growing power of Protestant theology and culture as it spread across Europe, this was never Ignatius’s underlying vision. Second, they might suppose that Ignatius had planned from the start a vast network of new schools which would revolutionise education throughout the continent. It’s true that this is indeed what Jesuit schools ended up doing, earning the order’s members the epithet of the ‘schoolmasters of Europe’, but this huge and innovative project came about as the result of a proposal made to Ignatius after he had already become Superior General of the new order; it was never education per se that he saw as its prime mission.


So the following claim may be unexpected: Ignatius’s original apostolic orientation was actually defined in relation to the Muslim world.


This shouldn’t be entirely surprising given the state of Europe at that time in history. Ignatius was born in the Basque country in 1491. Just one year later, the Reconquista reached its conclusion with the Catholic Kings finally ousting the last Muslim rulers from their vestigial Andalusian states, giving Christian princes possession of the whole Iberian Peninsula. The year 1492 was also notable for another major geopolitical event involving Spain: the European discovery of the New World. It was all but impossible to avoid the thought that America was the reward for Spanish triumph against the Moors. Now, the energy which had propelled the Spanish conquest of the Iberian Peninsula would be released outwards; the colonial age of conquest and exploitation was dawning for a new Catholic Spain and it was to be a golden age for Spanish Catholicism. We may rightly harbour ambiguous feelings about this aggressively Christian state but this was a moment when Spanish Catholics must have felt like masters of the world.

https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/ignatius-loyola-apostle-muslims


CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION AND HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

The alumbrados of Castile were a movement that caused much trouble during the first three decades of the sixteenth century. Their ideas were represented by the “Big Three” beatas who, under noble patronage, for at least a decade previous to the arrest in 1524 of the “mother” of the movement (Isabel de la Cruz) had successfully proselytized and spread their ideas throughout Old and New Castile.1

The alumbrados certainly were a charismatic bunch; they enjoyed success with the elites of Castilian society, comuneros, but above all with women and conversos. As a religious movement led by women the alumbrados were part of a growing trend of individual, charismatic female piety. By the time of Cardinal Cisneros’s death in 1517, however, the era of the alumbrados and their grassroots converso spirituality was nearing its end. While the actual heyday of their movement was short-lived the alumbrados made a huge impact upon the minds Prospering in the environment of Catholic spiritual exploration fostered by the personal theological interests of the Archbishop of Toledo Cardinal Ximenez de Cisneros the alumbrados presented an interiorized approach to Christianity. Equipped with the meditational practice of dejamiento the alumbrados stressed the importance of an individual, pseudo-mystical “abandonment” to God and His will. They also emphasized the insignificance of external rituals and works, calling them ataduras or “shackles” to the material world, ties that only served to hinder one’s abandonment to God.

of the Inquisitors who prosecuted them and upon the Spanish religious imagination, an impact that would last across seas and time."

EL SABOR DE HEREJIA: THE EDICT OF 1525, THE ALUMBRADOS

AND THE INQUISITORS’ USAGE OF LOCURA

By

JAVIER A. MONTOYA

http://etd.fcla.edu/UF/UFE0041385/montoya_j.pdf


Alumbrado, (Spanish: “Enlightened”, ) Italian Illuminato, plural Illuminati, a follower of a mystical movement in Spain during the 16th and 17th centuries. Its adherents claimed that the human soul, having attained a certain degree of perfection, was permitted a vision of the divine and entered into direct communication with the Holy Spirit. From this state the soul could neither advance nor retrogress. Consequently, participation in the liturgy, good works, and observance of the exterior forms of religious life were unnecessary for those who had received the “light.” The Alumbrados came primarily from among the reformed Franciscans and the Jesuits, but their doctrines seem to have influenced all classes of people. The extravagant claims made for their visions and revelations caused them to be relentlessly persecuted. The Inquisition issued edicts against them on three occasions (1568, 1574, and 1623)."

https://www.britannica.com/event/Alumbrado


Etymology

Learned borrowing from Pali Buddha (“the Awakened One, the Enlightened One”), from buddha (“awakened, enlightened”), from Sanskrit बुद्ध (buddha, “awakened, enlightened”), past participle of बोधति (bodhati, “to wake, to awaken”). Distantly related to English bid and bede. Also cognate with Russian будить (buditʹ, “to wake up”)."

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Buddha


Gautama

surname of the Buddha, from Sanskrit Gotamah, properly a patronymic, literally "descendant of the greatest ox," from superlative of gauh "ox, bull, cow."

https://www.etymonline.com/word/buddha


Unam Sanctam

One God, One Faith, One Spiritual Authority

Pope Boniface VIII - 1302

Bull of Pope Boniface VIII promulgated November 18, 1302

Urged by faith, we are obliged to believe and to maintain that the Church is one, holy, catholic, and also apostolic. We believe in her firmly and we confess with simplicity that outside of her there is neither salvation nor the remission of sins, as the Spouse in the Canticles [Sgs 6:8] proclaims: ‘One is my dove, my perfect one. She is the only one, the chosen of her who bore her,‘ and she represents one sole mystical body whose Head is Christ and the head of Christ is God [1 Cor 11:3]. In her then is one Lord, one faith, one baptism [Eph 4:5]. There had been at the time of the deluge only one ark of Noah, prefiguring the one Church, which ark, having been finished to a single cubit, had only one pilot and guide, i.e., Noah, and we read that, outside of this ark, all that subsisted on the earth was destroyed.

We venerate this Church as one, the Lord having said by the mouth of the prophet: ‘Deliver, O God, my soul from the sword and my only one from the hand of the dog.’ [Ps 21:20] He has prayed for his soul, that is for himself, heart and body; and this body, that is to say, the Church, He has called one because of the unity of the Spouse, of the faith, of the sacraments, and of the charity of the Church. This is the tunic of the Lord, the seamless tunic, which was not rent but which was cast by lot [Jn 19:23- 24]. Therefore, of the one and only Church there is one body and one head, not two heads like a monster; that is, Christ and the Vicar of Christ, Peter and the successor of Peter, since the Lord speaking to Peter Himself said: ‘Feed my sheep‘ [Jn 21:17], meaning, my sheep in general, not these, nor those in particular, whence we understand that He entrusted all to him [Peter]. Therefore, if the Greeks or others should say that they are not confided to Peter and to his successors, they must confess not being the sheep of Christ, since Our Lord says in John ‘there is one sheepfold and one shepherd.’ We are informed by the texts of the gospels that in this Church and in its power are two swords; namely, the spiritual and the temporal. For when the Apostles say: ‘Behold, here are two swords‘ [Lk 22:38] that is to say, in the Church, since the Apostles were speaking, the Lord did not reply that there were too many, but sufficient. Certainly the one who denies that the temporal sword is in the power of Peter has not listened well to the word of the Lord commanding: ‘Put up thy sword into thy scabbard‘ [Mt 26:52]. Therefore, both are in the power of the Church, namely, the spiritual sword and the material. But indeed, the latter is to be exercised on behalf of the Church; and truly, the former is to be exercised by the Church. The former is of the priest; the latter is by the hand of kings and soldiers, but at the will and sufferance of the priest.


However, one sword ought to be subordinated to the other and temporal authority, subjected to spiritual power. For since the Apostle said: ‘There is no power except from God and the things that are, are ordained of God‘ [Rom 13:1-2], but they would not be ordained if one sword were not subordinated to the other and if the inferior one, as it were, were not led upwards by the other.


For, according to the Blessed Dionysius, it is a law of the divinity that the lowest things reach the highest place by intermediaries. Then, according to the order of the universe, all things are not led back to order equally and immediately, but the lowest by the intermediary, and the inferior by the superior. Hence we must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power whatever, as spiritual things surpass the temporal. This we see very clearly also by the payment, benediction, and consecration of the tithes, but the acceptance of power itself and by the government even of things. For with truth as our witness, it belongs to spiritual power to establish the terrestrial power and to pass judgement if it has not been good. Thus is accomplished the prophecy of Jeremias concerning the Church and the ecclesiastical power: ‘Behold to-day I have placed you over nations, and over kingdoms‘ and the rest. Therefore, if the terrestrial power err, it will be judged by the spiritual power; but if a minor spiritual power err, it will be judged by a superior spiritual power; but if the highest power of all err, it can be judged only by God, and not by man, according to the testimony of the Apostle: ‘The spiritual man judgeth of all things and he himself is judged by no man‘ [1 Cor 2:15]. This authority, however, (though it has been given to man and is exercised by man), is not human but rather divine, granted to Peter by a divine word and reaffirmed to him (Peter) and his successors by the One Whom Peter confessed, the Lord saying to Peter himself, ‘Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound also in Heaven‘ etc., [Mt 16:19]. Therefore whoever resists this power thus ordained by God, resists the ordinance of God [Rom 13:2], unless he invent like Manicheus two beginnings, which is false and judged by us heretical, since according to the testimony of Moses, it is not in the beginnings but in the beginning that God created heaven and earth [Gen 1:1]. Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

https://www.papalencyclicals.net/bon08/b8unam.htm


Gigafactory Texas (also known as Giga Texas, Giga Austin, or Gigafactory 5) is a Tesla, Inc. automotive manufacturing facility in unincorporated Travis County, Texas, just outside of Austin. Construction began in July 2020,[2] limited production of Model Y began before the end of 2021,[3][4] and initial deliveries of vehicles built at the factory took place at an opening party called "Cyber Rodeo" on April 7, 2022.[5]


The factory produces Model Y cars for the Eastern United States and is also the main factory for the Cybertruck and the company's next-generation vehicle.[3][6][7][8] It also serves as the site of Tesla's corporate headquarters.[9] Tesla employs over 20,000 people at the factory and expects to eventually have a staff of 60,000 as production ramps up.[1] It is the country's second biggest factory by size as well as the second-largest building by volume in the world after the Boeing Everett Factory.[10]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gigafactory_Texas


Austin

surname (also Austen) and masc. proper name, from Old French Aousten, an abbreviated form of Latin Augustine. St. Augustine of Canterbury is Austin in Layamon's "Brut" (c. 1200).


Entries linking to Austin

Augustine(adj.)

c. 1400 in reference to members of the religious order named for St. Augustine the Great (354-430), bishop of Hippo. The name is Latin Augustinus, from augustus "venerable, majestic, magnificent, noble" (see august (adj.)) + name-forming element -inus (see -ine (1)). Related: Augustinian.

https://www.etymonline.com/word/Austin


Pope Leo XIV[a] (born Robert Francis Prevost;[b] September 14, 1955) is head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State. He was elected in the 2025 papal conclave as the successor to Pope Francis.


Born in Chicago, Illinois, and raised in a nearby suburb, Prevost became a friar of the Order of Saint Augustine in 1977 and was ordained as a priest in 1982. His service includes extensive missionary work in Peru in the 1980s and 1990s, where he served as a parish pastor, diocesan official, seminary teacher, and administrator. Elected prior general of the Order of Saint Augustine from 2001 to 2013, he returned to Peru as Bishop of Chiclayo from 2015 to 2023. In 2023, Pope Francis appointed him prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops and president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, and made him a cardinal the same year.


As a cardinal, he emphasized synodality, missionary dialogue, and engagement with social and technological challenges. He also engaged with issues such as climate change, global migration, church governance, and human rights, and expressed alignment with the reforms of the Second Vatican Council.


A United States citizen by birth, Leo XIV is the first pope to have been born in North America, the first to hold Peruvian citizenship (having been naturalized in 2015), the second pope from the Americas (after his predecessor Francis), and the first from the Order of Saint Augustine. His papal name was inspired by Pope Leo XIII, who developed modern Catholic social teaching amid the Second Industrial Revolution. Leo XIV believes the ongoing Fourth Industrial Revolution, particularly advances in artificial intelligence and robotics, poses "new challenges for the defense of human dignity, justice, and labor".[4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Leo_XIV


Fourteenth Rule. Although there is much truth in the assertion that no one can save himself without being predestined and without having faith and grace; we must be very cautious in the manner of speaking and communicating with others about all these things.

The Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YC_luOfFWl0Bm0BWkbANKZGC1kkmdHQf/view?usp=sharing


14We ought to act on the principle that everyone who lives under obedience should let himself be carried and directed by Divine Providence through the agency of the superior 15as if he were a lifeless body, which allows itself to be carried to any place and treated in any way; or an old man s staff, which serves at any place and for any purpose in which the one holding it in his hand wishes to employ it. 16For in this way the obedient man ought joyfully to employ himself in any task in which the superior desires to employ him in aid of the whole body of the religious order; 17and he ought to hold it certain that by so doing he conforms himself with the divine will more than by anything else he could do while following his own will and different judgment.[3]"

page 221

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Leo is a given name in several languages. In European languages, it is usually a masculine given name and it comes from the Latin word leo, which in turn comes from the Greek word λέων meaning "lion". It can also be used as a short form of other names that begin with Leo-, such as Leonard, Leonardo, Leonidas or Leopold, and occasionally Llywellyn. In Japanese, Leo or Reo (怜央) is usually a masculine given name.


The name can refer to:


People

Religious figures

Pope Leo (disambiguation), 14 popes

Pope Leo XIV, incumbent pope

List of saints named Leo

Leo of Constantinople (fl. 1134–1143), Patriarch of Constantinople

Leo Rajendram Antony (1927–2012), 4th Bishop of Trincomalee

Leo Baeck (1873–1956), German rabbi, scholar, and theologian

Leo Zhedenov (1883–1959), member of the Russian apostolate

Rulers

Emperor Leo (disambiguation), six Byzantine emperors

King Leo (disambiguation), various kings and monarchs with the ruling name Leo

Leo I, Prince of Armenia (died 1140)

Scientists

Leo Esaki (born 1925), Japanese physicist and Nobel laureate

Leo Kadanoff (1937–2015), American physicist

Leo Stodolsky, physicist

Leó Szilárd (1898–1964), Jewish Hungarian-American physicist

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_(given_name)


Lyon Family History

Lyon Surname Meaning

Scottish English and French: from the personal name Middle English Lyon, Old French Leon (from Latin leo ‘lion’ or the cognate Greek leōn; see Leon). Compare Lyall. Scottish and English (of Norman origin): habitational name from Lyons-la-Forêt in Eure, Normandy. It is unlikely to be from the better-known southern French city of Lyon (see 5 below).


English and French: nickname from Middle English lioun ‘lion’ (Old English Latin leo) Old French leon perhaps applied to a brave, fierce, or proud person or one with a shaggy mane of hair. Compare Lion.


Irish: shortened Anglicized form of Gaelic Ó Laighin (see Lane). French: habitational name from the city of Lyon in south central France (or in some cases from the commune of Lyons-la-Forêt in Eure, Normandy; compare 2 above).


The name of the city of Lyon is recorded in the 1st century BC as Lugdunum and is from the name of a Celtic god Lug (or this as a personal name from a word meaning ‘brightness’) + dunon ‘hill fort’.


Altered form of Dutch De Leeuw.


Source: Dictionary of American Family Names 2nd edition, 2022


Similar surnames: Leon, Lynn, Low, Lion, Moon, Lydon, Elton, Yon, Luton, Lio

https://www.ancestry.com/last-name-meaning/lyon?geo-lang=en-US


1 Peter 5

1599 Geneva Bible

5 1 He warneth the Elders not to usurp authority over the Church, 5 willing the younger sort to be willing to be taught, and to be modest, 8 to be sober and watchful to resist the cruel adversary.


1 The [a]Elders which are among you, [b]I beseech which am also an Elder, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed,


2 [c][d]Feed the [e]flock of God, [f]which dependeth upon you, [g]caring for it not by constraint, but willingly: not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind:


3 Not as though ye were Lords over God’s [h]heritage, but that ye may be examples to the flock.


4 [i]And when that chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive an incorruptible crown of glory.


5 [j]Likewise ye younger submit yourselves unto the Elders, and submit yourselves every man, one to another: deck yourselves inwardly in lowliness of mind: [k]for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble.


6 Humble yourselves therefore [l]under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time.


7 Cast all your care on him: for he careth for you.


8 [m]Be sober, and watch: for your adversary the devil as a roaring lion walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:


9 Whom resist steadfast in the faith, [n]knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your [o]brethren which are in the world.


10 [p]And the God of all grace, which hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a little, make you perfect, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.


11 To him be glory and dominion forever and ever, Amen.


12 [q]By Silvanus a faithful brother unto you, as I suppose, have I written briefly, exhorting and testifying how that this is the true grace of God, wherein ye stand.


13 [r]The Church that is at [s]Babylon elected together with you, saluteth you, and Mark my son.


14 Greet ye one another with the kiss of love. Peace be with you all which are in Christ Jesus, Amen.


Footnotes

1 Peter 5:1 He describeth peculiarly the office of the Elders, that is to say, of them that have the care of the Church.

1 Peter 5:1 He useth a preface touching the circumstance of his own person: to wit, that he as their companion, communeth with them not of matters which he knoweth not, but wherein he is as well experienced as any, and propoundeth unto them no other condition but that which he himself hath sustained before them, and doth still take the same pains, and also hath one selfsame hope together with them.

1 Peter 5:2 The first rule: He that is a shepherd, let him feed the flock.

1 Peter 5:2 He saith not, Offer for the quick and dead, and sing patched shreds in a strange tongue, but (Feed.)

1 Peter 5:2 The second: Let the shepherd consider, that the flock is not his, but God’s.

1 Peter 5:2 The third: Let not the shepherds invade other men’s flocks, but let them feed that which God hath committed unto them.

1 Peter 5:2 Let the shepherds govern the Church with the word and example of godly and unblamable life, not by constraint but willingly, not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind, not as Lords over God’s portion and heritage, but as his ministers.

1 Peter 5:3 Which is the Christian people.

1 Peter 5:4 That the shepherds’ minds be not overcome either with the wickedness of men, or their cruelty, he warneth them to cast their eyes continually upon that chief Shepherd, and the crown which is laid up for them in heaven.

1 Peter 5:5 He commendeth many peculiar Christian virtues, and especially modesty: which admonition all of us stand in need of, but especially the younger sort, by reason of the outwardness and pride of that age.

1 Peter 5:5 Because pride seemeth to many, to be the way unto the glory of this life, the Apostle witnesseth on the contrary side, that ignominy and shame is the reward of pride, and glory the reward of modesty.

1 Peter 5:6 Because those proud and lofty spirits threaten the modest and humble, the Apostle warneth us to set the power of God against the vanity of proud men, and to hang wholly upon his providence.

1 Peter 5:8 The cruelty of Satan, who seeketh by all means to devour us, is overcome by watchfulness and faith.

1 Peter 5:9 The persecutions which Satan stirreth up are neither new nor proper to any one man, but from old and ancient time common to the whole Church, and therefore we must suffer that patiently wherein we have such and so many fellows of our conflicts and combats.

1 Peter 5:9 Amongst your brethren which are dispersed throughout the world.

1 Peter 5:10 He sealeth up as it were with a seal the former exhortation with a solemn prayer, again willing them to ask increase of strength at his hands of whom they had the beginning, and hope to have the accomplishment, to wit, of God the Father in Jesus Christ in whom we are sure of the glory of eternal life.

1 Peter 5:12 Continuance and perseverance in the doctrine of the Apostles, is the only ground and foundation of Christian strength: Now the sum of the Apostles’ doctrine, is salvation freely given of God.

1 Peter 5:13 Familiar salutations.

1 Peter 5:13 In that famous city of Assyria, where Peter the Apostle of the circumcision then was.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Peter%205&version=GNV


Presidential elections are scheduled to be held in the United States on November 7, 2028, to elect the president and vice president of the United States for a term of four years.


In the 2024 elections, the Republican Party gained a majority of seats in the House of Representatives and Senate. Incumbent president Donald Trump won a non-consecutive second term; per the limits set by the 22nd Amendment, he is constitutionally barred from being elected president again.[1]


Background

See also: 2024 United States elections

The Republican Party returned to power in the United States with a government trifecta in January 2025 following the 2024 election. Trump, who was elected president in 2016 but lost a re-election bid in 2020 to Joe Biden, and JD Vance, a then-senator from Ohio defeated vice president Kamala Harris, who began her campaign following Biden's exit from the 2024 election, and Minnesota governor Tim Walz. Trump's victory was credited to a post-pandemic surge in inflation,[a] a migrant crisis at the U.S.–Mexico border,[b] and a global anti-incumbent backlash.[8][9][10] In addition, Republicans secured control of the Senate, flipping four seats and earning a three seat majority, while also retaining a House majority, though the party's majority narrowed to three seats after losing two seats.[11]


Electoral system

The president and vice president of the United States are elected through the Electoral College, determined by the number of senators and representatives with an additional three representatives for Washington, D.C. A majority of 270 votes is needed to win the election. Forty-eight states use a winner-take-all system, in which states award all of their electors to the winner of the popular vote. In Maine and Nebraska, two votes are allocated to the winner of the popular vote, while each of the individual congressional districts have one vote. Electoral votes are certified by state electors in December and by Congress on January 6.[11] Presidential candidates are selected in a presidential primary, conducted through primary elections run by state governments or caucuses run by state parties which bind convention delegates to candidates.[12] A brokered convention occurs when a candidate does not receive a majority of votes on the first round of voting,[13] or when a candidate withdraws.[14]


Election Day in the United States is held on the first Tuesday that falls after the first Monday in November.[15] The 2028 presidential election will occur on November 7, 2028.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2028_United_States_presidential_election


Kamala Devi Harris (English: /ˈkɑːmələ ˈdeɪvi/ ⓘ,[1] born October 20, 1964) is an American politician and attorney who has been the 49th and current vice president of the United States since 2021, serving under President Joe Biden. Harris is the Democratic presidential nominee in the 2024 United States presidential election. She is the first female vice president of the United States, making her the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history. She is also the first African American and first Asian American vice president. From 2017 to 2021, she represented California in the United States Senate. Before that, she was Attorney General of California from 2011 to 2017.


Born in Oakland, California, Harris graduated from Howard University and the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She began her law career in the office of the district attorney of Alameda County. She was recruited to the San Francisco District Attorney's Office and later to the office of the city attorney of San Francisco. She was elected district attorney of San Francisco in 2003 and attorney general of California in 2010, and reelected as attorney general in 2014. As the San Francisco district attorney and the attorney general of California, Harris was the first woman, the first African American, and the first Asian American to hold each office.


Harris was the junior U.S. senator from California from 2017 to 2021. She won the 2016 Senate election, becoming the second Black woman and first South Asian American U.S. senator. As a senator, Harris advocated for stricter gun control laws, the DREAM Act, federal legalization of cannabis, and reforms to healthcare and taxation. She gained a national profile for her pointed questioning of Trump administration officials during Senate hearings, including Trump's second Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh.


Harris sought the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination in 2019, but withdrew from the race before the primaries. Biden selected her as his running mate, and their ticket defeated the incumbent president and vice president, Donald Trump and Mike Pence, in the 2020 election. Presiding over an evenly split Senate upon entering office, Harris played a crucial role as president of the Senate. She cast more tie-breaking votes than any other vice president, which helped pass bills such as the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 stimulus package and the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. After Biden withdrew from the 2024 presidential election, Harris launched her campaign with Biden's endorsement and soon became the presumptive nominee. On August 6, 2024, she chose Tim Walz, the governor of Minnesota, as her running mate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamala_Harris


The University of California College of the Law, San Francisco (abbreviated as UC Law SF or UC Law) is a public law school in San Francisco, California, United States. It was known as the University of California, Hastings College of the Law (abbreviated as UC Hastings) from 1878 to 2023.


Founded in 1878 by Serranus Clinton Hastings, UC Law SF was the first law school of the University of California as well as one of the first law schools established in California. Although part of the University of California, UC Law SF is not directly governed by the Regents of the University of California. UC Law SF is also one of the few prominent university-affiliated law schools in the United States that does not share a campus with the university's undergraduates or other postgraduate programs.


The Battle of Hastings (1066) as depicted on a stained glass window over the main entrance of 100 McAllister Street.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_California_College_of_the_Law,_San_Francisco


The Battle of Hastings[a] was fought on 14 October 1066 between the Norman-French army of William, Duke of Normandy, and an English army under the Anglo-Saxon King Harold Godwinson, beginning the Norman Conquest of England. It took place approximately 7 mi (11 km) northwest of Hastings, close to the present-day town of Battle, East Sussex, and was a decisive Norman victory.


The background to the battle was the death of the childless King Edward the Confessor in January 1066, which set up a succession struggle between several claimants to his throne. Harold was crowned king shortly after Edward's death but faced invasions by William, his own brother Tostig, and the Norwegian king Harald Hardrada (Harold III of Norway). Hardrada and Tostig defeated a hastily gathered army of Englishmen at the Battle of Fulford on 20 September 1066. They were in turn defeated by Harold at the Battle of Stamford Bridge on 25 September. The deaths of Tostig and Hardrada at Stamford Bridge left William as Harold's only serious opponent. While Harold and his forces were recovering, William landed his invasion forces in the south of England at Pevensey on 28 September and established a beachhead for his conquest of the kingdom. Harold was forced to march south swiftly, gathering forces as he went.


The numbers present at the battle are unknown as even modern estimates vary considerably. The composition of the forces is clearer: the English army was composed almost entirely of infantry and had few archers, whereas only about half of the invading force was infantry, the rest split equally between cavalry and archers. Harold appears to have tried to surprise William, but scouts found his army and reported its arrival to William, who marched from Hastings to the battlefield to confront Harold. The battle lasted from about 9 am to dusk. Early efforts of the invaders to break the English battle lines had little effect. Therefore, the Normans adopted the tactic of pretending to flee in panic and then turning on their pursuers. Harold's death, probably near the end of the battle, led to the retreat and defeat of most of his army. After further marching and some skirmishes, William was crowned as king on Christmas Day 1066.


There continued to be rebellions and resistance to William's rule, but Hastings effectively marked the culmination of William's conquest of England. Casualty figures are difficult to assess, but some historians estimate that 2,000 invaders died along with about twice that number of Englishmen. William founded a monastery at the site of the battle, the high altar of the abbey church supposedly placed at the spot where Harold died.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Hastings


Spitfire is the third album by American rock band Jefferson Starship. Released in 1976, a year after the chart-topping Red Octopus, it quickly scaled the charts, peaking for six consecutive weeks at No. 3 in Billboard and attaining an RIAA platinum certification. Stereo and quadraphonic mixes of the album were released.


Background

By early 1976, Jefferson Starship had become one of America's biggest rock bands thanks to the multiplatinum success of 1975's Red Octopus and its smash hit "Miracles". They were playing arenas and stadiums as well as headlining big festivals, and money was pouring in.[1] All seemed well within the group, although the beginnings of dissent began to appear when singer Grace Slick broke up her seven-year relationship with guitarist Paul Kantner, choosing to hook up instead with the group's lighting director Skip Johnson (Johnson was quickly fired from that position, although he would be re-hired in 1978).[1] There were also lingering problems with Marty Balin, who had refused to sign a long-term contract with RCA/Grunt and was working on an album-by-album basis, which gave him much leverage now that he was writing the hit singles.[2] Although he was enjoying his return to prominence within the group, the pressure was now on Balin to come up with another hit that would equal or surpass "Miracles".


In the meantime, there were also increasing charges that the group had betrayed their earlier underground credentials as Jefferson Airplane and "sold out" to corporate rock interests. Slick complained that Grunt kept sending her out to silly publicity stunts like cake-judging contests, later reasoning "I was smiling and going along with it because we had to keep the publicity machine oiled while we were waiting for Marty to decide whether or not he was going to go on the road".[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spitfire_(Jefferson_Starship_album)


Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, Named Next Provincial of the Jesuits of Canada

March 15, 2024 — The Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) announced the appointment of Fr. Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, as the next provincial of the Jesuits of Canada. This appointment is the culmination of a thoughtful, prayerful process of consultation and discernment, marking a significant milestone for the Canadian Province.


Fr. Jeffrey Burwell, SJ

Fr. Burwell will succeed Fr. Erik Oland, SJ, assuming his new responsibilities on July 31, 2024, with an inaugural Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Toronto. A special celebration will also take place at the Jesuit infirmary in Richelieu, Quebec, on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15, 2024.


Fr. Burwell, 48, is an educational specialist whose doctoral research took him to the Holy Land, where he focused on Catholic schools in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. A lecturer in Catholic studies, first St. Paul’s College at the University of Manitoba and now Campion College at the University of Regina, he balances university work with pastoral service as a chaplain to police (RCMP) and to prisoners. He dedicates his university holidays to ministering in the Dene and Cree Indigenous communities of Saskatchewan and Manitoba.


Holding positions as a local superior since 2017 and a province consultor since 2021, Fr. Burwell brings a profound understanding of the Jesuit mission and a significant appreciation for Canada and Haiti’s diverse cultures.


This leadership change comes at a time when the Society of Jesus seeks to deepen its engagement with contemporary challenges, oriented by their Universal Apostolic Preferences: showing the way to God through the Spiritual Exercises and discernment; walking with the excluded; journeying with youth; and caring for our common home.


A Jesuit provincial leads a specific geographic region. This role is deeply spiritual, with responsibilities that extend beyond administrative tasks to include guiding the province’s mission and providing spiritual and pastoral care for its members. Provincials generally serve a six-year term.


There are five provinces within the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States. The Canadian Province of the Society of Jesus encompasses a wide range of works, including colleges/universities, secondary and pre-secondary schools, parishes, retreat houses, formation in spirituality, Indigenous ministries, social justice center and ecological endeavors.


The Jesuits of Canada, together with their partners, look forward to supporting Fr. Burwell in his new role as they continue to serve the mission of the Church and society in Canada and beyond.

https://www.jesuits.org/stories/jeffrey-s-burwell-sj-named-next-provincial-of-the-jesuits-of-canada/


It was while investigating the Little Rock integration incident in 1957 that I first learned of Pike’s rapid advance in Freemasonry, and knowing that Weishaupt, using Thomas Jefferson and Moses Holbrook, had infiltrated Illuminists into the Masonic Lodges of America, I decided I would find out if the fact that Pike’s mansion in Little Rock had thirteen rooms had any significance. “Thirteen’ figures prominently in Satanic, Luciferian and Cabalistic rituals, codes, and writings, etc. My investigations produced documentary evidence to show that, because of Pike’s exceptional mental ability, he came under the notice of professors in Harvard who were members of the Illuminati, who developed in his mind the ‘idea that a One World Government, a One World Religion and a One World financial and economic system was the ONLY solution to the world’s many and varied problems. I next discovered that his departure from Harvard was not due to lack of finances, or because of a misunderstanding with the faculty over tuition fees, but because of his ‘radical’ ideas and teachings. When he returned home determined that he would ‘fight’ his way to the top despite all opposition, he was in a suitable frame of mind to be recruited as a ‘Minerval’ or ‘apprentice’ into the lower degrees of the Illuminati."

Satan Prince of This World

by William Guy Carr

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Hw94yTrcRzvZjNQOo8T5_w-jqL8v5IMu/view


Bill and Hillary Clinton National Airport, also known as Adams Field, is a joint civil-military airport on the east side of Little Rock, Arkansas. It is operated by the Little Rock Municipal Airport Commission.

The largest commercial airport in Arkansas, it served more than 2.1 million passengers in the year spanning from March 2009 through to February 2010.[6] While Clinton National Airport does not have direct international passenger flights, more than 50 flights arrive or depart at Little Rock each day, with nonstop service to 14 cities.[7] The airport is included in the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems for 2019–2023, in which it is categorized as a small-hub primary commercial service facility.[8]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinton_National_Airport


The President William Jefferson Clinton Birthplace Home National Historic Site is located in HOPE, Arkansas.[2] Built in 1917 by Dr. H. S. Garrett, in this house the 42nd president of the United States, Bill Clinton, spent the first four years of his life, having been born on August 19, 1946, at Julia Chester Hospital in HOPE, Arkansas.[3][4] The house was owned by Clinton's maternal grandparents, Edith Grisham and James Eldridge Cassidy, and they cared for him when his mother, Virginia, was away working as an anesthetist in New Orleans.[5]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_William_Jefferson_Clinton_Birthplace_Home_National_Historic_Site


Tragedy and HOPE: A History of the World in Our Time is a work of history written by former Georgetown University professor and historian Carroll Quigley. The book covers the period of roughly 1880 to 1963 and is multidisciplinary in nature though perhaps focusing on the economic problems brought about by the First World War and the impact these had on subsequent events. While global in scope, the book focuses on Western civilization."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_and_Hope


In his first year (1965) in the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown, Bill Clinton took Quigley's course, receiving a 'B' as his final grade in both semesters (an excellent grade in a course where nearly half the students received D or lower).[1]: 94, 96 In 1991, Clinton named Quigley as an important influence on his aspirations and political philosophy, when Clinton launched his presidential campaign in a speech at Georgetown.[1]: 96 He said he learned from Quigley that “The future can be better than the past, and that each of us has a personal, moral responsibility to make it so.” Bill Clinton told his audiences, “that is what the new choice is all about....We are not here to save the Democratic party. We are here to save the United States of America.” It was Clinton's most effective speech, and he repeated variations time and time again as the blueprint for his campaign message in winning the Democratic nomination and the general election for President of the United States in 1992.[21][22]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carroll_Quigley


Theorists also cite the inclusion of Bill Clinton at the meetings in 1991 before he was president and Tony Blair’s presence in 1993 before he became the British prime minister as examples of the group’s power. Past attendees have included former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (who will also be attending this year), former Chase Manhattan chief executive David Rockefeller, and British Prime Minister David Cameron."

Bilderberg Group: What To Know About the Secretive Meetings

https://time.com/4362872/bilderberg-group-meetings-2016-conspiracy-theories/


Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner October 20, 2016 Donald Trump Hillary Clinton Henry Kissinger Gayle King Cardinal Dolan Katie Couric Chuck Schumer Mayor Bill de Blasio"

https://www.facebook.com/MariaBartiromo/posts/alfred-e-smith-memorial-foundation-dinner-october-20-2016-donald-trump-hillary-c/1353937201283479/


HOPE: all hope is to be placed in God, and with what degree of perfection [67]; eternal life alone is to be hoped for as a reward [82]; the extent to which this hope should be of assistance [288]; how hope should be shown by the dying | 595]; hope in the preservation and growth of the Society [812]. See also Faithfulness" The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms pg. 464

https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Bill Clinton ‘Encouraged’ Trump to Run

SLICK WILLY

Updated Apr. 14, 2017 10:12AM EDT /

Published Aug. 05, 2015 3:33PM EDT

https://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2015/08/05/bill-clinton-encouraged-trump


I began by attending Fordham University in the Bronx, mostly because I wanted to be close to home. I got along very well with the Jesuits who ran the school, but after two years, I decided that as long as I had to be in college, I might as well test myself against the best. I applied to the Wharton School of Finance at the University of Pennsylvania and I got in. At the time, if you were going to make a career in business, Wharton was the place to go. Harvard Business School may produce a lot of CEOs—guys who manage public companies— but the real entrepreneurs all seemed to go to Wharton: Saul Steinberg, Leonard Lauder, Ron Perelman—the list goes on and on."

Donald Trump The Art of the Deal

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1DLcbnLrl6moQT7nGj1JitG6AiQ6qgK0y/view?usp=sharing

University of Scranton welcomes President Biden

The university has illuminated its Class of 2020 Gateway in red and blue lights.

Author: WNEP Web Staff

Published: 10:52 PM EDT October 19, 2021

Updated: 10:52 PM EDT October 19, 2021

SCRANTON, Pa. — In preparation for President Joe Biden's visit, a university lit up their lights in his honor.


The University of Scranton has illuminated its Class of 2020 Gateway in blue and red with the number 46 prominently displayed to welcome the 46th president."

University of Scranton welcomes President Biden | wnep.com

https://www.wnep.com/article/news/local/lackawanna-county/university-of-scranton-welcomes-president-biden-gateway-lights/523-cdba68b1-822b-4747-94be-4cd7e4de9d67

"His son, Hunter Biden, 38, is a longtime federal lobbyist for the Jesuit university located in his father's hometown, Scranton PA. According to federal disclosures, Hunter Biden has been earning about $80,000 a year since 2006 to lobby for this university. Senator Biden himself has lectured at the Jesuit University of Scranton, and received an honorary degree from the same university, in 1976."

Codeword Barbelon

by P.D. Stuart


Trump and Harris neck-and-neck as she prepares to announce VP pick after meeting candidates Sunday: Live

Harris met with top running mate contenders Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly and Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro at her Washington DC residence

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/kamala-harris-vp-pick-trump-polls-news-b2591106.html


San Francisco's 555 California St., co-owned by Trump, on lender watchlist

The beautiful, very great, big league skyscraper, still allegedly 30% owned by Donald Trump, is on a lender watchlist, according to Bloomberg

By Alex Shultz,

Politics editor, SFGATE

Updated Feb 23, 2023 3:40 p.m.

https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/san-francisco-building-trump-stake-on-watchlist-17801816.php


Early life and education

Harris's childhood home at 1227 Bancroft Way in Berkeley, August 2020

Kamala Devi Harris[a] was born in Oakland, California,[3] on October 20, 1964.[4] Her mother, Shyamala Gopalan (1938–2009), was a biologist who arrived in the United States from India in 1958 to enroll in graduate school in endocrinology at the University of California, Berkeley. A research career of over 40 years followed, during which her work on the progesterone receptor gene led to advances in breast cancer research.[5] Kamala's father, Donald J. Harris (1938–),[6] is an Afro-Jamaican who immigrated to the United States in 1961 and also enrolled in UC Berkeley, specializing in development economics. The first Black scholar to be granted tenure at Stanford University's economics department, he has emeritus status there.[7] Kamala's parents met in 1962 and married in 1963.[8]


The Harris family lived in Berkeley until they moved in 1966, around Kamala's second birthday. The Harrises lived for a few years in college towns in the MIDWEST where her parents held teaching or research positions:[9] Urbana, Illinois (where her sister Maya was born in 1966); Evanston, Illinois; and Madison, Wisconsin.[b][10][9][11] By 1970, the marriage had faltered, and Shyamala moved back to Berkeley with her two daughters;[12][13][9] the couple divorced when Kamala was seven.[8] In 1972, Donald Harris accepted a position at Stanford University; Kamala and Maya spent weekends at their father's house in Palo Alto and lived at their mother's house in Berkeley during the week.[14] Shyamala was friends with African-American intellectuals and activists in Oakland and Berkeley.[11] In 1976, she accepted a research position at the McGill University School of Medicine, and moved with her daughters to Montreal, Quebec.[15][16] Kamala graduated from Westmount High School on Montreal Island in 1981.[17]


Early career

In 1990, Harris was hired as a deputy district attorney in Alameda County, California, where she was described as "an able prosecutor on the way up".[27] In 1994, Speaker of the California Assembly Willie BROWN, who was then dating Harris, appointed her to the state Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board and later to the California Medical Assistance Commission.[27] In February 1998, San Francisco district attorney Terence Hallinan recruited Harris as an assistant district attorney.[28] There, she became the chief of the Career Criminal Division, supervising five other attorneys, where she prosecuted homicide, burglary, robbery, and sexual assault cases—particularly three-strikes cases. In August 2000, Harris took a job at San Francisco City Hall, working for city attorney Louise Renne.[29] Harris ran the Family and Children's Services Division, representing child abuse and neglect cases. Renne endorsed Harris during her D.A. campaign.[30]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamala_Harris


Donald Jasper Harris, OM (born August 23, 1938) is a Jamaican-American economist and professor emeritus at Stanford University, known for applying post-Keynesian ideas to development economics.[1]


He is the father of US Vice President and current Democrat presidential nominee Kamala Harris and lawyer Maya Harris.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_J._Harris


Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump


Danney Lee Williams Jr. (born December 7, 1985) is a man from Little Rock, Arkansas who claims to be the biological son of Bill Clinton, the former President of the United States.[1] Blood tests ruled out Clinton as the father.[1][2]


Background

Williams was born in 1985 to Danney Williams Sr. and Bobbie Ann Williams.


The story came to notice in the late 1990s when reporting by Newsmax led by celebrity tabloid magazine Star to commission a paternity test prove whether Williams is actually Clinton's biological son.[3] Time magazine cited Star on July 18, 1999 to say that there was no match.[4]


The story was revived in 2016 before the 2016 presidential election and pushed by a number of media outlets including Newsmax, the Drudge Report,[3] as well as WorldNetDaily,[1] and the New York Daily News.[1]


Due to some uncertainties with the original test by Star, Snopes concluded that the claim was unproven.[3] The Washington Post stated that, while the test could not prove Clinton was the father, it did conclusively rule him out as the father.[1]


On October 19, 2016, Williams' lawyers announced their intentions to file a paternity suit to prove that Clinton's DNA matched Williams'.[5] Williams wrote to Monica Lewinsky asking for her dress in order to obtain a sample of Clinton's DNA. However, Lewinsky never replied to Williams.[6] A partial analysis of Clinton's blood, and thus his DNA, was already part of the public record because of the Lewinsky affair investigation.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danney_Williams


Early Female Transgender Identity after Prenatal Exposure to Diethylstilbestrol: Report from a French National Diethylstilbestrol (DES) Cohort

by Laura Gaspari 1,2,3,†,Marie-Odile Soyer-Gobillard 4,5,†ORCID,Scott Kerlin 6,Françoise Paris 1,2,3 andCharles Sultan 1,*

All DES sons who identified as transgender women underwent karyotyping at their local hospital at the moment of transition.

https://www.mdpi.com/2039-4713/14/1/10


Thomas Trace Beatie (born 1974[1]) is an American public speaker, author, and advocate of transgender rights and sexuality issues, with a focus on transgender fertility and reproductive rights.[2]


Beatie came out as a trans man in early 1997. Beatie had gender-affirming surgery in March 2002 and became known as "the pregnant man" after he became pregnant through artificial insemination in 2007.[3] Beatie chose to be pregnant, with donated sperm,[4][5] because his wife Nancy was sterile.


The couple filed for divorce in 2012. The Beatie case is the first of its kind on record, where a documented legal male gave birth within a marriage to a woman, and for the first time, a court challenged a marriage where the husband gave birth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Beatie


Tracing boards are painted or printed illustrations depicting the various emblems and symbols of Freemasonry. They can be used as teaching aids during the lectures that follow each of the Masonic Degrees, when an experienced member explains the various concepts of Freemasonry to new members. They can also be used by experienced members as reminders of the concepts they learned as they went through the ceremonies of the different masonic degrees.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracing_board


Exoteric Masonry, which is only the husks of the Mystic Order formed by the Sons of Cain has in modern times attracted the masculine element with its positively polarized physical vehicles, and educated them in industry and statecraft, thus controlling the material development of the world. The sons of Seth, constituting themselves the Priestcraft have worked their spell over the positive vital bodies of the feminine element to dominate the spiritual development. And whereas, the sons of Cain working through Freemasonry and kindred movements, have openly fought for the temporal power, the Priestcraft has fought as strenuously and perhaps more effectively, by stealth, to retain their monopoly upon the spiritual development of the feminine element. To the casual onlooker it would seem as if there were no decided antagonism between these two movements at the present time, but though Freemasonry of today is but a shell of its true ancient mystic self, and though Catholicism has been terribly tarnished by the touch of time, in that one thing there is no difference, the war is as keen as ever, the efforts of the Church are not concentrated upon the masses however as much as upon those who are seeking to live the higher life, so that they may gain admission to the Mystery Temple and learn how to make the Philosophers’ Stone. As mankind advances in evolution, the vital body becomes more permanently positively polarized giving to both sexes a greater desire for spirituality, and though we change from the masculine to feminine in alternate embodiment, positive polarity of the vital body is becoming more pronounced regardless of sex, and this accounts for the growing tendency towards Altruism which is even being brought out by the suffering entailed by the great war we are now fighting, for all agree that they are seeking to obtain a lasting peace where the swords may be made into plowshares, and the spears into pruning hooks. In the past humanity has been claiming universal brotherhood as a great ideal, but we must come closer than that to be in full accord with the Christ. He said to his Disciples “ye are my friends.” Among brothers and sisters hate and enmity may exist, but friendship is the expression of love and cannot exist apart from that. This is therefore the magic word which will eventually level all distinctions, bring peace upon earth and goodwill among men. This is the great Ideal proclaimed by the Rosicrucian Fellowship, an Ideal which points the shortest way to the New Heaven and the New Earth, where the sons of Cain and the sons of Seth will eventually be united.

FREEMASONRY AND CATHOLICISM

by MAX HEINDEL

https://dn720206.ca.archive.org/0/items/freemasonryandca017137mbp/freemasonryandca017137mbp.pdf


25th Amendment

Presidential Disability and Succession

 

Section 1

In case of the removal of the President from office or of his death or resignation, the Vice President shall become President.


Section 2

Whenever there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress.


Section 3

Whenever the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, and until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary, such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President.


Section 4

Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

     

Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.

https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/amendments/amendment-xxv


Raphael Gamaliel Warnock[1] (/ˈrɑːfiɛl ˈwɔːrnɒk/ RAH-fee-el WOR-nok; born July 23, 1969) is an American politician and Baptist pastor serving as the junior United States senator from Georgia, a seat he has held since 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, Warnock has been the senior pastor of Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church since 2005.[2][3]


Warnock was the senior pastor of Douglas Memorial Community Church from 2001 to 2005.[4] He came to prominence in Georgia politics as a leading activist in the campaign to expand Medicaid in the state under the Affordable Care Act. He was the Democratic nominee in the 2020 United States Senate special election in Georgia, defeating incumbent Republican Kelly Loeffler in a runoff election.[5]


Warnock and Jon Ossoff are the first Democrats elected to the U.S. Senate from Georgia since Zell Miller in 2000.[6][7] Their elections were critical in securing a 50–50 Senate majority for Democrats, with Vice President Kamala Harris serving as the tie-breaking vote.[8] Warnock was a reliable supporter of Joe Biden's legislative efforts during his presidency.[9][10] He was reelected to a full term in 2022, defeating Republican nominee Herschel Walker.


Warnock is the first African American to represent Georgia in the Senate, the first Black Democrat elected to the Senate from a Southern state, and the second black U.S. Senator directly elected from a Southern state, after Tim Scott.[11][12][13]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raphael_Warnock


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


Sako Limited (natively Sako Oy)[1] is a Finnish firearm and ammunition manufacturer located in Riihimäki, Kanta-Häme in southern Finland. It also has owned the Tikka brand of bolt-action rifles since 1983, and is now owned by the Italian firearm holding company Beretta Holding. The name Sako comes from the company's former name Suojeluskuntain Ase- ja Konepaja Oy (lit. 'Civil Guard Gun and Machining Works Ltd').


History

In 1919, two years after Finland declared independence from the Russian Empire, the Suojeluskuntain Yliesikunnan Asepaja (Civil Guard Supreme Staff Gun Works) opened in a former Helsinki brewery to repair private arms and recondition Russian military rifles for Finnish service.[2] The rifle repair shop became financially independent of the civil guard in 1921. The Suojeluskuntain Yliesikunnan Asepaja moved from Helsinki to an ammunition factory in Riihimäki on 1 June 1927, and reorganized as SAKO in the 1930s. Sako started exporting pistol cartridges to Sweden in the 1930s and continued manufacturing submachine gun cartridges through World War II.[3]


Another Finnish firearms manufacturer Tikkakoski, which owned the Tikka brand, was merged into SAKO in 1983.[4] In 1986, the arms manufacturing division of the government-owned Valmet conglomerate (which itself had been derived from the Valtion Kivääritehdas, VKT) was merged with Sako and called Sako-Valmet, with ownership split evenly between Nokia and Valmet. After further organizational shifts in state ownership, the company was sold to the Italian Beretta Holding in 2000.[5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAKO


The United States presidential line of succession is the order in which the vice president of the United States and other officers of the United States federal government assume the powers and duties of the U.S. presidency (or the office itself, in the instance of succession by the vice president) upon an elected president's death, resignation, removal from office, or incapacity.


The order of succession specifies that the office passes to the vice president; if the vice presidency is simultaneously vacant, the powers and duties of the presidency pass to the speaker of the House of Representatives, president pro tempore of the Senate, and then Cabinet secretaries, depending on eligibility.


Presidential succession is referred to multiple times in the U.S. Constitution: Article II, Section 1, Clause 6, the 12th Amendment, 20th Amendment, and 25th Amendment. The vice president is designated as first in the presidential line of succession by the Article II succession clause, which also authorizes Congress to provide for a line of succession beyond the vice president. It has done so on three occasions. The Presidential Succession Act was adopted in 1947, and last revised in 2006. The 25th Amendment, adopted in 1967, also establishes procedures for filling an intra-term vacancy in the office of the vice president.


The Presidential Succession Act refers specifically to officers beyond the vice president acting as president rather than becoming president when filling a vacancy. The Cabinet has 15 members, of which the secretary of state is highest and fourth in line (after the president pro tempore of the Senate); the other Cabinet secretaries follow in the order of when their departments (or the department of which their department is the successor) were created. Those heads of department who are constitutionally not "eligible to the Office of President" are disqualified from assuming the powers and duties of the president through succession and skipped to the next in line. Since 1789, the vice president has succeeded to the presidency intra-term on nine occasions: eight times due to the incumbent's death, and once due to resignation. No one lower in the line of succession has ever been called upon to act as president.


Widely considered a settled issue during the late 20th century, the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 demonstrated the potential for a decapitation strike that would kill or incapacitate multiple individuals in the presidential line of succession in addition to many members of Congress and the federal judiciary. In the years immediately following the attacks, numerous wide-ranging discussions were started, in Congress, among academics and within the public policy community about continuity of government concerns including the existing constitutional and statutory provisions governing presidential succession. These discussions remain ongoing. One effort put forward by the Continuity of Government Commission, a nonpartisan think tank, produced three reports (2003, 2009, and 2011), the second of which focused on the implicit ambiguities and limitations in the succession act, and contained recommendations for amending the laws for succession to the presidency.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_line_of_succession


The conspiracy is racist, considering Blacks, Hispanics, and Aboriginal Peoples to be inferior races of useless eaters. They believe or at least profess that the Anglo/Aryan race is the true Israel (British Israel and Christian Identity for the dupes and an Anglophile Secular Humanism for the leaders) and thus the Master race. They have convinced the so-called useless eaters that they are friends, benefactors, and protectors. In the meantime they plan to enslave these poor People under socialism or eliminate them altogether. The Illuminati has convinced them that Karl Marx is their savior, and the sheople follow this Judas goat eagerly.


There will be no individual Rights only privileges. These will be granted or denied at will by the world supra government. All property is to be owned by the State. There will be a redistribution of wealth. They plan to eliminate class differences and reduce the standard of living to a lower level in the advanced nations, such as the united States, and to a higher standard of living in the so-called third world nations. This leveling of the standard of living will be accomplished through a global economic collapse which is in its beginning stages. The economic collapse will fulfill the goal of Marx and Engles' Communist Manifesto mandating the elimination of the middle class. The graduated income tax was the first implementation of this process and is one of the planks of the Communist Manifesto. NAFTA and GATT are a part of this process encouraging industry to move into third-world nations in order to exploit cheap labor.


All existing religions will disappear. The only religion will be the state religion (humanism or illuminism).


All County and State governments will be eliminated and replaced with regional government. These regional governments (Home Rule) are already in place. Regionalism is gradually taking control throughout America.


There will be no more cash. Trade will be accomplished by a system of computer credits with accounts accessed through debit cards or computer chip implants. The cards or implants will also serve as personal identification, drivers license, and etc. When this is completed the human race will be shackled to a computer in a never ending cycle of debt. No action or movement will ever again be private.

MAJESTYTWELVE by William Cooper Copyright © 1997 William Cooper All Rights Reserved

HOTT - MAJESTYTWELVE (hourofthetime.com)

https://www.hourofthetime.com/majestyt.htm


Tulsi Gabbard (/ˈtʌlsi ˈɡæbərd/; born April 12, 1981) is an American politician and military officer serving since 2025 as the eighth director of national intelligence (DNI). She has held the rank of lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army Reserve since 2021, and previously served as U.S. representative for Hawaii's 2nd congressional district from 2013 to 2021. A former Democrat, she became an independent in 2022 and later joined the Republican Party in 2024. Gabbard was the youngest state legislator in Hawaii from 2002 to 2004.


Gabbard joined the Hawaii Army National Guard in 2003 and was deployed to Iraq from 2004 to 2005, where she served as a specialist with a medical unit, and received the Combat Medical Badge. In 2007, Gabbard completed the officer training program at the Alabama Military Academy. She went to Kuwait in 2008 as an Army Military Police officer. In 2015, while also serving in Congress, Gabbard became a major with the Hawaii Army National Guard. In 2020, she transferred to the U.S. Army Reserve and was promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel in 2021.


In 2012, Gabbard was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives from Hawaii's 2nd congressional district. She became the first Samoan American and Hindu American member of U.S. Congress. During her tenure in Congress, she served on the House Armed Services Committee (HASC) and the House Foreign Affairs Committee. She supported the military campaign to defeat Islamic extremism but opposed the U.S. intervention in the Syrian civil war. In her fourth term, Gabbard also served on the HASC Subcommittee on Intelligence, which oversaw military intelligence and counterterrorism.


Gabbard launched her 2020 presidential campaign running on an anti-interventionist and populist platform, but dropped out and endorsed Joe Biden in March 2020. Previously, she also served as vice-chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) from 2013 to 2016 but resigned to endorse Bernie Sanders for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination. After her departure from Congress in 2021, Gabbard took more conservative positions on issues such as transgender rights, border security, and foreign policy. In 2022, she spoke at the conservative CPAC conference and left the Democratic Party.


In 2024, Gabbard endorsed Donald Trump for the presidential election and joined the Republican Party later that year. After Trump nominated Gabbard for DNI, her past statements on Syria and the Russian invasion of Ukraine drew scrutiny and concern. Many veterans and Republicans defended Gabbard's record, noting her military service and Congressional experience. In February 2025, she was confirmed by the Senate, becoming the highest-ranking Pacific Islander American government official in U.S. history.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsi_Gabbard


Isaiah 14:12-17

1599 Geneva Bible

12 How art thou fallen from heaven, O [a]Lucifer, son of the morning? and cut down to the ground, which didst cast lots upon the nations?


13 Yet thou saidest in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, and exalt my throne above beside the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation in the sides of the [b]North.


14 I will ascend above the height of the clouds, and I will be like the most high.


15 But thou shalt be brought down to the grave, to the side of the pit.


16 They that see thee, shall [c]look upon thee and consider thee, saying, Is this the man that made the earth to tremble, and that did shake the kingdoms?


17 He made the world as a wilderness, and destroyed the cities thereof, and opened not [d]the house of his prisoners.


Read full chapter

Footnotes

Isaiah 14:12 Thou that thoughtest thyself most glorious, and as it were placed in the heaven: for the morning star that goeth before the sun, is called Lucifer, to whom Nebuchadnezzar is compared.

Isaiah 14:13 Meaning, Jerusalem, whereof the Temple was of the North side, Ps. 48:2, whereby he meaneth that tyrants fight against God, when they persecute his Church, and would set themselves in his place.

Isaiah 14:16 In marveling at thee.

Isaiah 14:17 To set them at liberty: noting his cruelty.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah%2014%3A12-17&version=GNV


In physics, string theory is a theoretical framework in which the point-like particles of particle physics are replaced by one-dimensional objects called strings. String theory describes how these strings propagate through space and interact with each other. On distance scales larger than the string scale, a string acts like a particle, with its mass, charge, and other properties determined by the vibrational state of the string. In string theory, one of the many vibrational states of the string corresponds to the graviton, a quantum mechanical particle that carries the gravitational force. Thus, string theory is a theory of quantum gravity.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory


On Easter Sunday 2021, Warnock's Twitter account tweeted, "The meaning of Easter is more transcendent than the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Whether you are a Christian or not, through a commitment to helping others we are able to save ourselves." Some conservative Christians and political commentators criticized the tweet, including Benjamin Watson, Allie Beth Stuckey, and Jenna Ellis, who called it "heretical". The tweet was deleted that afternoon, with a spokesperson for Warnock saying, "the tweet was posted by staff and was not approved" but declining to say whether it reflected Warnock's beliefs.[47][48]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raphael_Warnock


The Day the Sun Exploded

World Wonders 

Aug 21, 2025  #Astrophysics #WhatIf #SpaceScience

Imagine waking up tomorrow to find out the Sun has exploded—what would happen next? In this video, we dive deep into the science behind such a catastrophic event and explore the immediate and long-term effects on Earth. From the loss of sunlight and heat to the collapse of ecosystems, discover how life as we know it would be transformed. Using clear explanations and captivating visuals, this video answers the burning question: could we survive the day the Sun exploded? Join us for a curiosity-driven journey into astrophysics and planetary science. Don’t forget to like and share if you find this mind-blowing scenario fascinating! #SunExplodes #Astrophysics #SpaceScience #WhatIf 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChZIvhRxNhk


A chain reaction is a sequence of reactions where a reactive product or by-product causes additional reactions to take place. In a chain reaction, positive feedback leads to a self-amplifying chain of events.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chain_reaction


2 Peter 3:10

1599 Geneva Bible

10 [a]But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in the which the heavens shall pass away with a [b]noise, and the elements shall melt with heat, and the earth with the works that are therein shall be burnt up.


Read full chapter

Footnotes

2 Peter 3:10 A very short description of the least distinction of the world, but in such sort as nothing could be spoken more gravely.

2 Peter 3:10 With the violence as it were of a hissing storm.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Peter%203%3A10&version=GNV


Pope Francis[b] (born Jorge Mario Bergoglio;[c] 17 December 1936 – 21 April 2025) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 13 March 2013 until his death in 2025. He was the first Jesuit pope, the first Latin American, and the first born or raised outside Europe since the 8th-century Syrian pope Gregory III.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Francis


Easter in 2030

Date: April 21, 2030

Day: Sunday


Avril Ramona Lavigne CM (/ˈævrɪl ləˈviːn/ AV-ril lə-VEEN; French: [avʁil ʁamɔna laviɲ]; born September 27, 1984) is a Canadian singer and songwriter. She is a key musician in popularizing pop-punk music, as she paved the way for female-driven, punk-influenced pop music in the early 2000s. Her accolades include ten Juno Awards and eight Grammy Awards nominations.


At age 16, Lavigne signed a two-album recording contract with Arista Records. Her debut album, Let Go (2002), is the best-selling album of the 21st century by a Canadian artist. It yielded the successful singles "Complicated" and "Sk8er Boi", which emphasized a skate punk persona and earned her the title "Pop-Punk Queen", "Pop Punk Princess" and "Teen-Pop Slayer" from music publications.[1] Her second album, Under My Skin (2004), became Lavigne's first to reach the top of the Billboard 200 chart in the United States, going on to sell 10 million copies worldwide.


Lavigne's third album, The Best Damn Thing (2007), reached number one in seven countries worldwide and saw the international success of its lead single "Girlfriend", which became her first single to reach the top of the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States. Her next two albums, Goodbye Lullaby (2011) and Avril Lavigne (2013), saw continued commercial success and were both certified gold in Canada, the United States, and other territories. After releasing her sixth album, Head Above Water (2019), she returned to her pop punk roots with her seventh album, Love Sux (2022).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avril_Lavigne


Regimini militantis Ecclesiae (Latin for To the Government of the Church Militant) was the papal bull promulgated by Pope Paul III on September 27, 1540, which gave a first approval to the Society of Jesus, also known as the Jesuits, but limited the number of its members to sixty.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regimini_militantis_Ecclesiae


"The Day Called 'X' is a dramatized CBS documentary film set in Portland, Oregon, in which the entire city is evacuated in anticipation of a nuclear air raid, after Soviet bombers had been detected by radar stations to the north; it details the activation of the city's civil defense protocols and leads up to the moment before the attack (the ending is left intentionally unknown). The operations were run from the Kelly Butte Bunker, which was the emergency operations center at that time. It was filmed in September 1957[1] and aired December 8 of that year.[2][3] Apart from presenter/narrator Glenn Ford, none of the people shown are actors. They are locals of Portland shown in their real jobs, including Mayor Terry Schrunk.


Its local re-broadcast in 2004[4] and appearance in the on-line Prelinger Archives attracted interest among local history buffs due to its extensive outside shots of the city, and the use of non-actor participants (local officials and broadcasters). Whenever one of these individuals is heard uttering warnings or statements regarding attack, the words "AN ATTACK IS NOT TAKING PLACE" are superimposed over the picture.[2]


On September 27, 1955, Portland actually conducted an exercise evacuation of downtown called "Operation Greenlight",[5][6] and the film is often misattributed to that year. Ford's narration, however, does make direct reference to the 1955 exercise.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_Called_%27X%27


PART X THE PRESERVATION AND INCREASE OF THE SOCIETY

410 §1. As a sign of gratitude and devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, let that feast be solemnly celebrated; and on that day is to be renewed the consecration by which the Society on January 1, 1872, dedicated and consecrated itself totally and perpetually.

§2. The consecration to the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary is to be renewed each year on the feast of the Immaculate Heart.[1]

411 The sense of belonging and responsibility that each individual one of Ours has toward the whole Society should be manifested in a knowledge of our spirituality, our history, our saints, our apostolic labors, and our men, especially of those who are suffering difficulties for the sake of Christ; it is to be manifested as well by maintaining Ignatian mobility and flexibility with a view to helping any region of the Society whatsoever.[2]

412 §1. All our members should have at heart a shared concern for attracting new members to the Society, especially by prayer and the example of their lives as individuals and in community.[3]

§2. Therefore, we must do everything possible actively to present the Society in such a way that those whom God calls will know and appreciate who and what we are and what is our distinctive way of proceeding in the following of Christ.[4]

§3. We must also promote vocations as widely as possible, in order to reflect the culture and experience of those we seek to serve, including minority cultures, immigrants, and indigenous people.[5]

413 The Society should always show itself bound to its benefactors in charity and gratitude. Superiors should ensure that prayers are offered for them and other appropriate signs of our gratitude are shown them.[6]

414 In the perfect observance of all the Constitutions and in the particular fulfillment of our Institute, our formed members should excel, setting a good example and spreading the good odor of Christ, keeping before their eyes the serious obligation they have of giving edification especially to our younger members.[ 7]

415 All by earnest reading and meditation (in particular, at the time of the annual Spiritual Exercises, renewal of vows, monthly recollection, beginning of the year, and so forth) should strive ever to know, esteem, and love better our Constitutions and the special nature of our Institute,[ 8] which are to be faithfully observed, and which for each and all of us are the one, true, and safe way that surely leads to the perfection to which our Lord calls and invites all sons of the Society.[9] §2. Major superiors, especially at the time of the annual visitation, should see that this is faithfully observed.

416 Finally, those means that are proposed by our holy father Saint Ignatius in Part X of the Constitutions for the preservation and development not only of the body or exterior of the Society but also of its spirit, and for the attainment of the objective it seeks, which is to aid souls to reach their ultimate and supernatural end, [10] are to be observed eagerly and diligently by all, with a truly personal sense of responsibility for its increase and development, for the praise and service of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and the help of souls.[11]


L. D. S.

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Dame Sarah Elisabeth Mullally (née Bowser; born 26 March 1962) is an English Anglican prelate and former nurse. She has been the bishop of London since 2018, and is the first woman to hold this office. By virtue of her office she is also a Lord Spiritual, one of the 26 Church of England bishops who sit in the House of Lords of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. On 3 October 2025, it was announced that Mullally would become the 106th archbishop of Canterbury in January 2026; she will be the first woman to hold the office.


Born in Woking, Surrey, Mullally received clinical training in nursing from St Thomas' Hospital. She practised nursing primarily in South London, where she also began her study for ministry in the Church of England. In 1999 she became Chief Nursing Officer and director of patient experience for the English National Health Service. She left these roles in 2004 to pursue full-time ministry. For her service in nursing, Mullally was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2005.


Mullally was ordained a priest in 2002 and began her ministry in the diocese of Southwark. She served in various London churches, and in 2012 became a canon of Salisbury Cathedral. In 2015 she was consecrated as bishop of Crediton, a suffragan bishop in the diocese of Exeter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Mullally


In Hebrew, the word saraph means "burning", and is used seven times throughout the text of the Hebrew Bible as a noun, usually to denote "serpent",[4] twice in the Book of Numbers, once in the Book of Deuteronomy, and four times in the Book of Isaiah.[5][6][7] The reason why the word for "burning" was also used to denote a serpent is not universally agreed upon; it may be due to a certain snake species' fiery colors, or perhaps the burning sensation left by its venomous bite. Regardless, its plural form, seraphim, occurs in both Numbers and Isaiah, but only in Isaiah is it used to denote an angelic being; likewise, these angels are referred to only as the plural seraphim – Isaiah later uses the singular saraph to describe a "fiery flying serpent", in line with the other uses of the term throughout the Tanakh.


There is emerging consensus that the motifs used to display seraphs in Hyksos-era Canaan had their original sources in Egyptian uraeus iconography.[8] In Egyptian iconography, the uraeus was used as a symbol of sovereignty, royalty, divinity and divine authority, and later iconography often showed uraei with wings. In the early monarchic period of Israel and Judah, Egyptian motifs were evidently borrowed by the Israelites en masse, as a plethora of personal seals belonging to classes ranging from commonfolk to royalty have been discovered, which incorporate several pieces of ancient Egyptian iconography, including the winged sun, ankh, the hedjet and deshret crowns of Upper and Lower Egypt, scarabs, and the uraeus cobra. These uraei often had four wings, as opposed to the Egyptian standard which only gave them two.[9] These images have been connected with the seraphim angels associated with Isaiah's visions, or perhaps more directly to the aforementioned "fiery flying serpent", but this continues to be debated – and an image of serpentine seraphim clashes with Isaiah's own vision, which clearly envisioned seraphim with heads, legs, and arms – although, on the second matter, some scholars have proposed that the covered "feet" of the seraphim should be identified as genitals, as "feet" are often used in the Hebrew Bible as a euphemism for the penis.[10][11]


The vision in Isaiah Chapter 6 of seraphim in an idealized version of Solomon's Temple represents the sole instance in the Hebrew Bible of this word being used to describe celestial beings.[12] "... I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphim: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly." (Isaiah 6:1–3)[13] And one cried to another, "Holy, holy, holy, is YHWH of hosts: the whole earth is full of His glory." (verses 2–3)[14] One seraph carries out an act of ritual purification for the prophet by touching his lips with a live coal from the altar (verses 6–7)[15] "And he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged."


The text describes the "seraphim" as winged celestial beings with a fiery passion for doing God's good work.[16] Notwithstanding the wording of the text itself, at least one Hebrew scholar claims that in the Hebrew Bible the seraphim do not have the status of angels, and that it is only in later sources (like De Coelesti Hierarchia or Summa Theologiae) that they are considered to be a division of the divine messengers.[17]


Seraphim appear in the 2nd-century BC Book of Enoch,[18] where they are mentioned, in conjunction with cherubim, as the heavenly creatures standing nearest to the throne of God. In non-biblical sources they are sometimes called the Akyəst (Ge'ez: አክይስት "serpents", "dragons"; an alternate term for Hell).[19][20][21]


In the Second Book of Enoch, two classes of celestial beings are mentioned alongside the seraphim and cherubim, known as the phoenixes and the chalkydri (Ancient Greek: χαλκύδραι khalkýdrai, compound of χαλκός khalkós "brass, copper" + ὕδρα hýdra "hydra", "water-serpent"—lit. "brazen hydras", "copper serpents"). Both are described as "flying elements of the sun" that reside in either the 4th or 7th heaven, who have twelve wings and burst into song at sunrise.[22][23]


In the Book of Revelation (4:4–8), the beasts are described as being forever in God's presence and praising him: "[A]nd they rest not day and night, saying, 'Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come.'" This account differs slightly from the account of Isaiah, stating in the eighth verse, "And the four beasts had each of them six wings about him; and they were full of eyes within". They appear also in the Gnostic text, On the Origin of the World.[24]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seraph


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And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.

◄ 2 Corinthians 11:14 ►


1 In the year of the death of king Uzziah, [a]I saw also the Lord sitting upon an [b]high throne, and lifted up, and the lower [c]parts thereof filled the Temple.


2 The [d]Seraphims stood upon it, every one had six wings: with twain he covered his [e]face, and with twain he covered his [f]feet, and with twain he did [g]fly.


3 And one cried to another, and said, [h]Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts: the whole [i]world is full of his glory.

Isaiah 6:1-3

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah%206&version=GNV


Learned borrowing from Pali Buddha (“the Awakened One, the Enlightened One”), from buddha (“awakened, enlightened”), from Sanskrit बुद्ध (buddha, “awakened, enlightened”), past participle of बोधति (bodhati, “to wake, to awaken”). Distantly related to English bid and bede. Also cognate with Russian будить (buditʹ, “to wake up”)."

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Buddha


Alumbrado, (Spanish: “Enlightened”, ) Italian Illuminato, plural Illuminati, a follower of a mystical movement in Spain during the 16th and 17th centuries. Its adherents claimed that the human soul, having attained a certain degree of perfection, was permitted a vision of the divine and entered into direct communication with the Holy Spirit. From this state the soul could neither advance nor retrogress. Consequently, participation in the liturgy, good works, and observance of the exterior forms of religious life were unnecessary for those who had received the “light.” The Alumbrados came primarily from among the reformed Franciscans and the Jesuits, but their doctrines seem to have influenced all classes of people. The extravagant claims made for their visions and revelations caused them to be relentlessly persecuted. The Inquisition issued edicts against them on three occasions (1568, 1574, and 1623)."

https://www.britannica.com/event/Alumbrado


Entries linking to gautama

Buddha (n.)

an epithet applied to the historical founder of Buddhism, 1680s, from Pali, literally "awakened, enlightened," past participle of budh "to awake, know, perceive," which is related to Sanskrit bodhati "is awake, observes, understands," from PIE root *bheudh- "be aware, make aware." Title given by his adherents to the man who taught this path, Siddhartha Gautama, also known to them as Sakyamuni "Sage of the Sakyas" (his family clan), who lived in northern India 5c. B.C.E."

https://www.etymonline.com/word/gautama


Gautama

surname of the Buddha, from Sanskrit Gotamah, properly a patronymic, literally "descendant of the greatest ox," from superlative of gauh "ox, bull, cow."


Unam Sanctam

One God, One Faith, One Spiritual Authority

Pope Boniface VIII - 1302

Bull of Pope Boniface VIII promulgated November 18, 1302

Urged by faith, we are obliged to believe and to maintain that the Church is one, holy, catholic, and also apostolic. We believe in her firmly and we confess with simplicity that outside of her there is neither salvation nor the remission of sins, as the Spouse in the Canticles [Sgs 6:8] proclaims: ‘One is my dove, my perfect one. She is the only one, the chosen of her who bore her,‘ and she represents one sole mystical body whose Head is Christ and the head of Christ is God [1 Cor 11:3]. In her then is one Lord, one faith, one baptism [Eph 4:5]. There had been at the time of the deluge only one ark of Noah, prefiguring the one Church, which ark, having been finished to a single cubit, had only one pilot and guide, i.e., Noah, and we read that, outside of this ark, all that subsisted on the earth was destroyed.

We venerate this Church as one, the Lord having said by the mouth of the prophet: ‘Deliver, O God, my soul from the sword and my only one from the hand of the dog.’ [Ps 21:20] He has prayed for his soul, that is for himself, heart and body; and this body, that is to say, the Church, He has called one because of the unity of the Spouse, of the faith, of the sacraments, and of the charity of the Church. This is the tunic of the Lord, the seamless tunic, which was not rent but which was cast by lot [Jn 19:23- 24]. Therefore, of the one and only Church there is one body and one head, not two heads like a monster; that is, Christ and the Vicar of Christ, Peter and the successor of Peter, since the Lord speaking to Peter Himself said: ‘Feed my sheep‘ [Jn 21:17], meaning, my sheep in general, not these, nor those in particular, whence we understand that He entrusted all to him [Peter]. Therefore, if the Greeks or others should say that they are not confided to Peter and to his successors, they must confess not being the sheep of Christ, since Our Lord says in John ‘there is one sheepfold and one shepherd.’ We are informed by the texts of the gospels that in this Church and in its power are two swords; namely, the spiritual and the temporal. For when the Apostles say: ‘Behold, here are two swords‘ [Lk 22:38] that is to say, in the Church, since the Apostles were speaking, the Lord did not reply that there were too many, but sufficient. Certainly the one who denies that the temporal sword is in the power of Peter has not listened well to the word of the Lord commanding: ‘Put up thy sword into thy scabbard‘ [Mt 26:52]. Therefore, both are in the power of the Church, namely, the spiritual sword and the material. But indeed, the latter is to be exercised on behalf of the Church; and truly, the former is to be exercised by the Church. The former is of the priest; the latter is by the hand of kings and soldiers, but at the will and sufferance of the priest.


However, one sword ought to be subordinated to the other and temporal authority, subjected to spiritual power. For since the Apostle said: ‘There is no power except from God and the things that are, are ordained of God‘ [Rom 13:1-2], but they would not be ordained if one sword were not subordinated to the other and if the inferior one, as it were, were not led upwards by the other.


For, according to the Blessed Dionysius, it is a law of the divinity that the lowest things reach the highest place by intermediaries. Then, according to the order of the universe, all things are not led back to order equally and immediately, but the lowest by the intermediary, and the inferior by the superior. Hence we must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power whatever, as spiritual things surpass the temporal. This we see very clearly also by the payment, benediction, and consecration of the tithes, but the acceptance of power itself and by the government even of things. For with truth as our witness, it belongs to spiritual power to establish the terrestrial power and to pass judgement if it has not been good. Thus is accomplished the prophecy of Jeremias concerning the Church and the ecclesiastical power: ‘Behold to-day I have placed you over nations, and over kingdoms‘ and the rest. Therefore, if the terrestrial power err, it will be judged by the spiritual power; but if a minor spiritual power err, it will be judged by a superior spiritual power; but if the highest power of all err, it can be judged only by God, and not by man, according to the testimony of the Apostle: ‘The spiritual man judgeth of all things and he himself is judged by no man‘ [1 Cor 2:15]. This authority, however, (though it has been given to man and is exercised by man), is not human but rather divine, granted to Peter by a divine word and reaffirmed to him (Peter) and his successors by the One Whom Peter confessed, the Lord saying to Peter himself, ‘Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound also in Heaven‘ etc., [Mt 16:19]. Therefore whoever resists this power thus ordained by God, resists the ordinance of God [Rom 13:2], unless he invent like Manicheus two beginnings, which is false and judged by us heretical, since according to the testimony of Moses, it is not in the beginnings but in the beginning that God created heaven and earth [Gen 1:1]. Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

https://www.papalencyclicals.net/bon08/b8unam.htm


Revelation 17

1599 Geneva Bible

17 1 That great whore is described, 2 with whom the Kings of the earth committed fornication. 6 She is drunken with the blood of Saints. 7 The mystery of the woman, and the beast that carried her, expounded. 11 Their destruction. 14 The Lamb’s victory.


1 Then [a]there came one of the seven Angels, which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come: I will show [b]thee the [c]damnation of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters,


2 With whom have committed fornication the kings of the earth, and the inhabitants of the earth are drunken with the wine of her fornication.


3 [d]So he carried me away into the wilderness in the Spirit, and I saw a woman sit upon a [e]scarlet colored beast, full of names of blasphemy, which had seven heads, and ten horns.


4 And [f]the woman was arrayed [g]in purple and scarlet, and gilded with gold, and precious stones, and pearls, [h]and had a cup of gold in her hand full of abomination, and filthiness of her fornication.


5 [i]And in her forehead was a name written, A mystery, [j]that great Babylon that mother of whoredoms, and abominations of the earth.


6 [k]And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of Saints, and with the blood of the Martyrs of JESUS: and when I saw her, [l]I wondered with great marvel.


7 [m]Then the Angel said unto me, Wherefore marvelest thou? I will show thee the mystery of that woman, and of that beast that beareth her, which hath seven heads and ten horns.


8 [n]The beast that thou hast seen, [o]was and is not, and [p]shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and shall go into perdition, and they that dwell on the earth, shall wonder (whose names are not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world) [q]when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.


9 [r]Here is the mind that hath wisdom, The [s]seven heads [t]are seven mountains, whereon the woman sitteth: [u]they are also seven Kings.


10 [v]Five are fallen, [w]and one is, [x]and another is not yet come: and when he cometh, he must continue a short space.


11 [y]And the beast that was, and is not, is even [z]the eighth, and is [aa]one of the seven, and [ab]all go into destruction.


12 [ac]And the ten horns which thou sawest, are [ad]ten kings, which yet have not received a kingdom, but shall receive power, as Kings [ae]at one hour with the beast.


13 [af]These have one mind, and shall give their power and authority unto the beast.


14 These shall fight with the [ag]Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them: for he is Lord of Lords, and King of Kings: and they that are on his side, called, and chosen, and faithful.


15 [ah]And he said unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, [ai]are people, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.


16 And the ten [aj]horns which thou sawest upon the beast, are they that shall hate the whore, and shall make her desolate, and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire.


17 [ak]For God hath put in their hearts to fulfill his will, and to do with one consent for to give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God be fulfilled.


18 And that woman which thou sawest, is that [al]great city which reigned over the kings of the earth.


Footnotes

Revelation 17:1 The state of the Church militant being declared, now followeth the state of the Church overcoming and getting victory, as I showed before in the beginning of chapter 10. The state is set forth in 4 chapters. As in the place beforegoing I noted, that in that history the order of time was not always exactly observed, so the same is to be understood in this history, that it is distinguished according to the persons of which it treateth, and that in the several stories of the persons is severly observed in the time thereof. For first is delivered the story of Babylon destroyed, in this and the next chap. (for this Babylon out of all doubt shall perish before the 2 beasts and the Dragon). Secondly is delivered the destruction of both the two beasts, chap. 19. And lastly of the Dragon, chap. 20, in the story of the spiritual Babylon are distinctly set forth the state thereof in this chap. and the overthrow done from God, chap. 18. In this verse and that which followeth is a transition or passage unto the first argument, consisting of a particular calling of the Prophet (as often heretofore) and a general proposition.

Revelation 17:1 That is the damnable harlot, by a figure of speech called hypallage. For S. John as yet had not seen her. Although another interpretation may be borne, yet I like this better.

Revelation 17:1 The sentence that is pronounced against this harlot.

Revelation 17:3 Henceforth is propounded the type of Babylon, and the state thereof in 4 verses. After a declaration of the type, in the rest of this chap., in the type are described two things, the beast (of whom chap. 13), in verse 3, and the woman that sitteth upon the beast, verses 4, 5, 6. The beast in process of time hath gotten somewhat more than was expressed in the former vision. First in that it is not read before that he was appareled in scarlet, a robe imperial and of triumph. Secondly, in that this is full of names of blasphemy: the other carried the name of blasphemy only in his head. So God did teach that this beast is much increased in impiety and injustice and doth in this last age, triumph in both these more insolently and proudly than ever before.

Revelation 17:3 A scarlet color, that is, with a red and purple garment: and surely it was not without cause that the Romish clergy were so much delighted with this color.

Revelation 17:4 That harlot, the spiritual Babylon, which is Rome. She is described by her attire, profession and deeds.

Revelation 17:4 In attire most glorious, triumphant, most rich, and most gorgeous.

Revelation 17:4 In profession, the nourisher of all, in this verse, and teaching her mysteries unto all, verse 5, setting forth all things most magnificently: but indeed most pernicious besotting miserable men with her cup, and bringing upon them a deadly giddiness.

Revelation 17:5 Deceiving with the title of religion, and public inscription of mystery: which the beast in times past did not bear.

Revelation 17:5 An exposition: in which S. John declareth what manner of woman this is.

Revelation 17:6 In manner of deeds: She is red with blood, and sheddeth it most licentiously, and therefore is colored with the blood of the Saints, as on the contrary part. Christ is set forth imbrued with the blood of his enemies; Isa. 3:1.

Revelation 17:6 A passage unto the second part of this chapter, by occasion given of S. John, as the words of the Angel do show, in the next verse.

Revelation 17:7 The second part or place, as I said, verse 1. The narration of the vision, promised in this verse, and delivered in the verse following. Now there is delivered first a narration of the beast and his story, unto verse 14. After, of the harlot, unto the end of the chap.

Revelation 17:8 The story of the beast hath a triple description of him. The first is a distinction of this beast from all that ever hath been at any time: which distinction is contained in this verse: The second is a delineation or painting out of the beast by things present, by which he might even at that time be known of the godly, and this delineation is according to his heads, verses 2, 10, 11. The third is an historical foretelling of things to come, and to be done by him: and these are ascribed unto his horns, verses 12, 13, 14. This beast is that Empire of Rome, of which I spake, chap. 13:11, according to the mutations and changes whereof which then had already happened, the holy Ghost hath distinguished and set out the same. The Apostle distinguisheth this beast from all others in these words. The beast which thou sawest, was and is not. For so I expound the words of the Apostle for evidence’s sake as I will further declare in the notes following.

Revelation 17:8 The meaning is, that beast which thou sawest before (Rev. 13:1) and which yet thou hast now seen, was, (I say was) even from Julius Caesar in respect of beginning, rising up, station, glory, dominion, manner and stock, from the house of Julius: and yet is not now the same, if thou look unto the house and stock for the dominion of this family was translated unto another, after the death of Nero from the other unto a third, from a third unto a fourth, and so forth was varied and altered by innumerable changes. Finally, the Empire is one, as it were one beast: but exceedingly varied by kindreds, families, and persons. It was therefore (saith S. John) in the kindred or house of Julius: and now it is not in that kindred, but translated unto another.

Revelation 17:8 As if he should say, Also the same that is, shall shortly not be: but shall ascend out of the depth, or out of the sea (as was said, Rev. 13:1) that is, shall be a new stock from amongst the nations without difference, and shall in the same state go unto destruction or ruin, and perish: and so shall successively new Princes or Emperors come and go, arise and fall, the body of the beast remaining still, but tossed with so many and often alterations, as no man can but marvel that this beast was able to stand and hold out, in so many mutations. Verily no Empire that ever was tossed with so many changes, and as it were with so many tempests of the sea, ever continued so long.

Revelation 17:8 That is as many as have not learned the providence of God, according to the faith of the Saints, shall marvel at these grievous and often changes when they shall consider, the selfsame beast, which is the Roman Empire, to have been, not to be, and to be and still molested with perpetual mutation, and yet in the same to stand and continue. This in mine opinion is the most simple exposition of this place, and confirmed by the event of the things themselves. Although by the last change also, by which the Empire, that before was civil became Ecclesiastical, is not obscurely signified by these words: of which two, the first exercised cruelty upon the bodies of the saints: the other also upon their souls: the first by human order and policy, the other under the color of the law of God, and of Religion, raged and imbrued itself with the blood of the godly.

Revelation 17:9 An exhortation preparing unto audience, by the same argument, with that of Christ: He that hath ears to hear, let him hear. Wherefore, for mine own part, I had rather read in this place, Let there be here a mind, etc. So the Angel passeth fully unto the second place of this description.

Revelation 17:9 Very children know what that seven hilled city is, which is so much spoken of, and whereof Virgil thus reporteth, And compasseth seven towers in one wall: that city it is, which when John wrote these things had rule over the kings of the earth: It was and is not, and yet it remaineth this day, but it is declining to destruction.

Revelation 17:9 This is the painting out of the beast by things present (as I said before) whereby S. John endeavored to describe the same, that he might both be known of the godly in that age, and be further observed and marked of posterity afterwards. This delineation hath one type, that is, his heads, but a double description or application of the type: one permanent from the nature of itself, the other changeable, by the working of men. The description permanent, is by the seven hills, in this verse, the other that fleeteth, is from the seven kings, verses 10, 11. And here it is worthy to be observed, that one type hath sometimes two or more applications, as seemeth good unto the holy Ghost to express either one thing by divers types, or divers things by one type. So I noted before, of the seven spirits, Rev. 1:4. Now this woman that sitteth upon seven hills, is the city of Rome, called in times past of the Greeks, … i. of seven tops or crests, and of Varro, septiceps, i. of her seven heads (as here) of seven heads, and of others, septicollis, i. standing upon seven hills.

Revelation 17:9 The beginning of these Kings or Emperors is almost the same with the beginning of the Church of Christ, which I showed before, Rev. 11:1. Namely from the year 35, after the passion of Christ, what time the Temple and Church of the Jews was overthrown. In which year it came to pass by the providence of God that that saying The beast was and is not, was fulfilled before that the destruction of the Jews immediately following came to pass. That was the year from the building of the city of Rome, 109, from which year S. John both numbered the Emperors which hitherto hath been, when he wrote these things, and foretelleth two others next to come: and that with this purpose, that when this particular prediction of foretelling of things to come, should take effect the truth of all other predictions in the Church might be the more confirmed. Which sign God of old mentioned this in the Law, Deut. 18, and Jeremiah confirmeth, Jer. 28:8.

Revelation 17:10 Whose names are these: the first, Servius Sulpicius Galba, who was the seventh Emperor of the people of Rome, the second Marcus Salvius Otho, the third Aulus Vitellius, the fourth, Titus Flavius Vespasianus, the fifth, Titus Vespasianus his son of his own name.

Revelation 17:10 Flavius Domitian son of the first Vespasian. For in the latter end of his days S. John wrote these things, as witnesseth Irenaus, Lib. 5 adversus hareses.

Revelation 17:10 Nerua. The Empire being now translated from the family of Flavius. This man reigned only one year, four months, and nine days, as the history writers do tell.

Revelation 17:11 This is spoken by the figure synecdoche, as much to say as that head of the beast which was and is not, because it is cut off, and Nerua in so short time extinguished. How many heads there were, so many beasts there seemed to be in one. See the like speech in Rev. 13.3

Revelation 17:11 Nerua Traianus, who himself in divers respects is called here the seventh and the eighth.

Revelation 17:11 Though in number and order of succession he be the eighth, yet he is reckoned together with one of these heads, because Nerua and he were one head. For this man obtained authority together with Nerua, and was Consul with him, when Nerua left his life.

Revelation 17:11 Namely, to molest with persecutions the Churches of Christ, as the histories do accord, and I have briefly noted, Rev. 2:10.

Revelation 17:12 The third place of this description as I said, verse 18, is a prophetical prediction of things to come which the beast should do, as in the words following S. John doth not obscurely signify, saying, which have not yet received the kingdom, etc. For there is an Antithesis or opposition between these kings, and those that went before. And first the persons are described, in this verse, then their deeds in the two verses following.

Revelation 17:12 That is, arising with their kingdoms out of the Roman beast: at such time as that political Empire began by the craft of the Popes greatly to fall.

Revelation 17:12 Namely, with the second beast whom we called before a false prophet, which beast, ascending out of the earth got unto himself all the authority and power of the first beast, and exerciseth the same before his face, as was said, Rev. 14:11, 12. For when the political Empire of the West began to bow downwards, there both arose those ten kings, and the second beast took the opportunity offered to usurp unto himself all the power of the former beast. These kings long ago, many have numbered and described to be ten and a great part of the events plainly testifieth the same in this our age.

Revelation 17:13 That is, by consent and agreement, that they may conspire with the beast, and depend upon his beck. Their story is divided into three parts, counsels, acts, and events. The counselors some of them consist in communicating of judgments and affections: and some in communicating of power, which they are said to have given unto this beast in this verse.

Revelation 17:14 With Christ and his Church, as the reason following doth declare, and here are mentioned the facts and the events which followed for Christ’s sake, and for the grace of God the Father towards those that are called, elected, and are his faithful ones in Christ.

Revelation 17:15 This is the other member of the narration as I said verse 7, belonging unto the harlot, showed in the vision, verse 3. In this history of the harlot, these 3 things are distinctly propounded, what is her magnificence in this verse, what is her fall, and by whom it shall happen unto her, in the two verses following: and lastly, who that harlot is, in the last verse. This place which by order of nature should have been the first, is therefore made the last, because it was more fit to be joined with the next Chap.

Revelation 17:15 That is, as unconstant and variable as the waters. Upon this foundation sitteth this harlot as Queen, a vain person upon that which is vain.

Revelation 17:16 The ten Kings as verse 12. The accomplishment of this fact and event, is daily increased in this our age by the singular providence and most mighty government of God. Wherefore the facts are propounded in this verse, and the cause of them in the verses following.

Revelation 17:17 A reason rendered from the chief efficient cause, which is the providence of God, by which alone S. John by inversion of order affirmeth to have come to pass, both that the Kings should execute upon the harlot, that which pleased God, and which he declared in the verse next beforegoing: and also that by one consent and counsel, they should give their kingdom unto the beast, etc., verses 13, 14. For as these being blinded have before depended upon the beck of the beast that lifteth up the harlot, so it is said that afterward it shall come to pass, that they shall turn back, and shall fall away from her when their hearts shall be turned into better state by the grace and mercy of God.

Revelation 17:18 That is, Rome that great City, or only City (as Justinian calleth it) the King and head whereof was then the Emperor, but now the Pope, since that the condition of the beast was changed.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2017&version=GNV


Sarah Jeanette Connor is a fictional character and the female protagonist of the Terminator franchise. She is portrayed by Linda Hamilton in the films The Terminator (1984), Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), Terminator Salvation (2009; voice only), and Terminator: Dark Fate (2019), as well as the theme park attraction T2-3D: Battle Across Time (1996). Other actresses to portray the character include Emilia Clarke in the film Terminator Genisys (2015) and Lena Headey in the television series Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (2008–09).


The character develops from a timid damsel in distress victim in the first film to a wanted fugitive committing acts of terrorism, a hardened warrior and mother who sacrificed everything for her son John Connor's future, on the verge of losing touch with her own humanity, and a mentor preparing and protecting a protégée for her destiny.


In an alternate timeline, depicted in Terminator Genisys, she is in her younger years, raised by a Terminator, while in another alternate timeline, depicted in Terminator: Dark Fate, she hunts numerous rogue Terminators (from various alternate timelines) in the years following her son's death.


Terminator film series

The Terminator (1984)

See also: The Terminator

Sarah is a Los Angeles college student and waitress who is pursued by a relentless android assassin, the Cyberdyne Systems Model 101 Terminator (Arnold Schwarzenegger). She learns she is in danger from a televised report of two identically named Los Angeles women who were shot to death earlier that day, including one played by Marianne Muellerleile. She is rescued from the Terminator by time-travelling soldier Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn), who says that in the future, an artificial intelligence called Skynet will be created by military software developers to make strategic decisions.


The program will become self-aware, seize control of most of the world's military hardware (including highly advanced robots), and launch an all-out attack on human beings. John Connor will eventually lead the remnants of the world's military and survivors, The Resistance, to victory, only to discover Skynet has invented a means of time travel and sent an android killer back in time to destroy John's mother before he is born. John is Sarah's future son; he sends back a trusted sergeant, Kyle Reese, to protect his mother. During their brief time together, Kyle tells Sarah that she will be responsible for training John in the skills and tactics he will use to fight Skynet.


Kyle protects Sarah from the Terminator and they flee together. Initially, she is unaware that Reese has been in love with her. While they are avoiding the Terminator, Sarah grows to reciprocate his feelings, and they consummate their relationship, resulting in John's conception. Kyle dies fighting the Terminator in a factory. Sarah crushes the Terminator in a hydraulic press. Kyle's sincerity and courage inspire her to develop the skills and abilities that make her a suitable mentor and teacher to John. After these events, Sarah, pregnant and a fugitive, begins making a voice recording to give to John later in life. While recording the tape, a boy takes a photograph that he sells to her; John will give this to Kyle in the future before sending him back in time.


Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

See also: Terminator 2: Judgment Day

Sarah and her son John (Edward Furlong) have been separated; John is now ten years old and living in a foster home with Todd and Janelle Voight, and Sarah has been institutionalized at a prison hospital of the criminally insane. In the years since the previous film, she has become a muscled, ferocious warrior. After the death of Kyle Reese, Sarah takes his warnings and the responsibility of raising her son to heart. Her fixation on the disaster and her fanatical desire to keep John safe has made her mentally unstable and very violent, which is aggravated by her fear and hatred of the Model 101. She lives off-grid to protect herself and John. Sarah lived as an outlaw and tried to teach her son the skills he would need to lead the resistance. She is captured and sent to a psychiatric prison hospital ward (of the criminally insane) after trying to blow up a computer factory. Several times at the hospital, she has tried to improve her behavior in hope of getting to see her son, but the criminal psychologist Dr. Silberman does not believe her. Her activities and claims of fighting evil robots from the future led to her being deemed incurable.


Sarah only seemed to confirm the judgment of psychiatrists by committing acts of violence against hospital staff. She tries to escape multiple times; during her final escape attempt, Sarah encounters two Terminator models; the T-1000 (Robert Patrick), a liquid metal android sent back to kill her son, and the Model 101 (Schwarzenegger) that was sent back by John's future self (Michael Edwards) to protect them. When the Model 101 (or T-800) comes to the hospital ward with John, she flees in terror and is almost captured by the hospital staff, but she goes with the android who tells her "come with me if you want to live." They escape in a police car after knocking the driver unconscious. Sarah finds it nearly impossible to accept that the Model 101 is benevolent; throughout the film she remains hostile towards it. John develops a bond with it, resembling a father-son relationship. In the director's cut of the film, Sarah has an opportunity to destroy the machine's CPU. She nearly does so but John persuades her that they will need its help.[1]


After another horrific nightmare about Judgment Day, Sarah decides to hunt down Miles Dyson (Joe Morton), a computer researcher who works at Cyberdyne Systems and is destined to build the microprocessor that will become Skynet. However, she cannot bring herself to kill a person, realizing that doing so would make her no better than a Terminator herself. Shortly afterwards, John and the Model 101 arrive; with Dyson's help, they destroy all of his research and steal the remains of the first Terminator from the Cyberdyne lab. After the T-1000 is defeated, the Model 101 lets Sarah lower it into a vat of molten steel to destroy it, despite John's protests. Sarah finally gains respect for the Model 101 and offers her hand in friendship before its final sacrifice. Because of this event, Sarah looks to the future with renewed hope.


Alternate ending

The alternate ending for Terminator 2: Judgment Day, available on the Ultimate Edition DVD and the Skynet Edition Blu-ray, shows Sarah alive and well 30 years after the primary events of the film. She is an elderly grandmother and John is a Senator in a world in which Skynet was never able to start its war on humanity.


Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003)

See also: Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines

Sarah Connor has died from leukemia before the events of the 2003 film. Her son John (Nick Stahl) mentions that they were living in Baja, Mexico when she was diagnosed. Her doctor gave her six months to live but she fought the disease for three years, long enough to see the 1997 "Judgment Day" pass without incident. John hit the road on the day Sarah died, and she was cremated in Mexico where her ashes were spread out to the sea. Never truly believing they had beaten Skynet, her friends stored a cache of weapons in a casket in a niche at a Los Angeles mausoleum for John to find in the event that Judgment Day was not averted and the Terminators returned, in accordance with her will. The T-850 (Schwarzenegger) gathered all the weaponry and had to hide John in the casket from police before reuniting with Kate (Claire Danes).


Terminator Salvation (2009)

See also: Terminator: Salvation

Linda Hamilton reprised her role as Sarah Connor in (voiceovers only) with warning of the future war, in the form of taped recordings for John (Christian Bale) delivered throughout Terminator Salvation.[2]


Terminator Genisys (2015)

See also: Terminator Genisys


Emilia Clarke as Sarah Connor in Terminator Genisys

Sarah is portrayed by Emilia Clarke. Willa Taylor, the daughter of the film's director Alan Taylor, has a brief role as Sarah's nine-year-old self. The story takes place in an alternate reality to the continuity of the first four films due to Skynet's (Matt Smith) actions throughout the timeline.[citation needed] Therefore, Clarke's Sarah is an alternate timeline variant of her counterpart portrayed by Hamilton.


In the film, Skynet sends a T-1000 (Lee Byung-hun) to an earlier point in Sarah's life, in 1973, to kill her. Sarah is nine when her parents are killed by it during camping at Big Bear Lake. Sarah is found and raised by a reprogrammed T-800 (Schwarzenegger) sent by an unknown party to be her guardian after her escape. These events result in an altered timeline that erases the events of the earlier films.[3] Clarke's Sarah integrates elements of both Hamilton's portrayal and Furlong's portrayal of John in Terminator 2: Judgment Day; young Sarah teaches the android, which she calls "Pops", how to be more human and forms an emotional bond with the T-800, regarding it as a surrogate father after her parents' deaths.


After the T-1000's attack in 1973, Sarah learns from Pops of her assailant's motive, her destiny as John Connor's (Jason Clarke) future mother, and the Resistance's war against Skynet, including its first attempt on killing her in the original timeline's 1984. Over the next decade, Pops trains Sarah to handle weapons and prepare for her destiny. However, Sarah despises her destiny and wants the ability to choose how to live her life. Because she was trained in combat since childhood, Sarah is not helpless by the time Kyle Reese (Jai Courtney) arrives to protect her in 1984. In addition, she is headstrong, assertive, and audacious. Unlike her parallel from the original timeline, that being raised by a Terminator, Sarah has extensive knowledge on Skynet, even able to build a makeshift time machine with Pop, having advanced engineering skills decades ahead of her time. She is not dependent upon Kyle, but rather is fighting alongside him. Sarah initially resents her relationship with Kyle being dictated by fate, but she gradually falls in love with him. Sarah plans to time travel and destroy Skynet to prevent Judgment Day.


Discovering the date of Skynet's initial attack has changed from 1997 to 2017, Sarah and Kyle travel 33 years into the future to stop Skynet and their alternate version of John, who had been compromised by Skynet and was changed into a cyborg known as the T-3000. After John's defeat and the prevention of Skynet from spreading to computer servers worldwide, Sarah, Kyle and Pops prepare to face an unknown future, unaware that Skynet is now self-aware in Cyberdyne's underground facility.


Terminator: Dark Fate (2019)

See also: Terminator: Dark Fate

Hamilton reprises the part of Sarah Connor as the lead character in the 2019 film Terminator: Dark Fate, a direct sequel to Terminator 2 (thus ignoring the events of Terminator 3 and Terminator Salvation). In this timeline, the rise of Skynet is averted, but it dispatched various other Terminators into the past prior to its erasure from history, with the result that John was killed by another T-800 in Guatemala in 1998. Grieving and bitter, Sarah succumbs to alcoholism, and spends the intervening decades hunting down other Terminators based on anonymous texts sent by an unknown figure that direct her to the time and place that they will arrive, allowing her to eliminate them before they can pose a threat. Since the attack on Cyberdyne Systems, Sarah is wanted by the entire United States' authorities.


In 2020, the latest such message eventually leads her to the Rev-9 in Mexico City. Sarah disables the Rev-9 and rescues Daniella "Dani" Ramos as well as her protector, Grace, an augmented soldier and Dani's adopted daughter from the future. Sarah learns that the Rev-9 has been sent by another A.I., Legion, to kill Dani, as she is destined to lead the human resistance against the Legion's machines following the AI takeover, which Sarah and John merely postponed by destroying Cyberdyne Systems' technology. GPS coordinates tattooed onto Grace are revealed to match the source of Sarah's texts, with the group's efforts to track this source revealing that it is the T-800 that killed John. Having completed its primary mission and finding out that Skynet's existence had been erased, it learned from humanity, formed a family and developed a form of conscience, which led it to attempt to make amends with Sarah by sending her the texts so that she could destroy the arriving Terminators and stop their technology being used to rebuild Skynet. This Terminator, now known as Carl, joins them to stop the Rev-9, though Sarah still vows to destroy him after they defeat the Rev-9 for killing John. In a final confrontation in a hydroelectric dam, the Rev-9 is destroyed but Carl and Grace are killed in the process. After Dani vows not to let Grace die again, Sarah vows to prepare her for the coming battle against Legion as she once did with John.


Hamilton was 62 when she reprised her role.[4] Her return marked a rare occurrence of an aged female action hero in cinema,[5] an idea that producer James Cameron was interested in exploring.[6]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Connor_(Terminator)

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid02FKnLsNWmsxWb1R4GohD2THxdJyAMj6ZaATGtGNPx9Y9Xd38iQLYbmvzuwyta3Pnal


Prior to our 1776 War of Independence, 32nd degree French Templarism had not yet reached

America. Although a few Templar lodges from Ireland and Scotland were scattered throughout

the northeast, most were military lodges and had not progressed beyond nine degrees.

Predominant were the three-degree English lodges. By the time George Washington was elected

our first President, 32nd degree Templar Scottish Rite Freemasonry had already been established

at Charleston, S.C. - on the 33rd degree parallel. The Scottish Rite assisted our new government

in developing French republican ideals. In 1801, nine American Masons created the 33rd degree

and the Charleston lodge became the Mother Council of the World.

322

High-degree Scottish Rite lodges soon dotted the southern portion of the United States, and the

Rite moved northeast where low degree English Masonry was strongest. Evidence suggests that

to counter this intrusion into English Masonic territory, the British sent John James Joseph

Gourgas (1777-1865) to New York to organize clandestine Scottish Rite Lodges throughout that

region.6

Gourgas was well-suited to this subversive task. The Gourgas family had been French Scottish

Rite Masons living in Switzerland prior to the French Revolution. During the Reign of Terror,

the family emigrated to England, where John James Joseph became a well-known merchant on

the royal exchange. As a matter of course, he joined low-degree English Freemasonry.7

The Gourgas family sailed from England to Boston in 1803, finally settling in Weston,

Massachusetts. J.J.J. Gourgas went to New York around 1806. By 1813 he had organized five

clandestine Scottish Rite lodges, one of which was called the Cerneau Supreme Council of

Sovereign Grand Inspectors General of the Thirty-Third Degree. These subversive lodges had

assisted England in her War of 1812-1814 against the young American nation.

In the early summer of 1813 Emanual de la Motta, a Supreme Council member from Charleston,

was visiting New York and discovered the five clandestine lodges. An investigation ensued, and

none were found to have received sponsorship from Charleston. After conferring with the

Charleston hierarchy, Motta was told to rectify~ the situation as quietly as possible. He

immediately worked out a territorial arrangement with Gourgas. Thus was born the Northern

Jurisdiction of Scottish Rite Freemasonry on August 5, 1813, with confirmation on December

24th by the Mother Supreme Council at Charleston.8

Permanent headquarters for the Northern Jurisdiction of Freemasonry was later established at

Boston, where English Freemasonry first entered America. Boston was given Masonic dominion

over all the states north and east of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. This legitimacy gave

English Freemasonry a permanent foothold in America from which to continue her subversive

activity. The agreement also stipulated noninterference by the South in the Northern Jurisdiction.

Hence, behind northern lodge doors big business deals were settled without southern

participation or knowledge. Gradually the northeastern Masons became the power brokers for all

the nation, dominating industry, finance and politics. Thus, the Northern Jurisdiction of

Freemasonry acquired the nickname, "The Eastern Establishment."

The non-aggression treaty signed between the U.S. and England in 1814 did not stop Great

Britain from attempting to reclaim the Americas. She may have lost the War of 1812, but

through her Scottish Rite lodges of the English obedience in the North, she controlled the

northeast's wealth. Southern wealth was counted in slaves. In order to exercise economic control

over the South, slavery would have to be abolished. London planned to divide America over the

slavery issue. A nation divided would be easy to conquer, if not militarily, then economically and

financially. By 1860 we were in a civil war, ostensibly over slavery. (Complete story detailed in

323

Vol.III of Scarlet and the Beast.)

Against this British intrusion into American politics, finance, and industry, General Albert Pike

initiated the southern rebellion. In 1859 the Southern Jurisdiction of Freemasonry founded the

Knights of the Golden Circle as a front to direct the insurrection. When the South lost to the

North, and Abraham Lincoln reunited the Union, the Knights of the Golden Circle plotted

Lincoln's assassination. John Wilkes Booth, a 33rd degree Mason and member of Mazzini's

Carbonari of Italy, was selected by the Knights to kill Lincoln.9

After Lincoln's assassination, the Knights of the Golden Circle attempted to rekindle the Civil

War. Riots erupted throughout the South. Even 3rd degree Freemason, Vice President Andrew

Johnson, who assumed the Presidency following Lincoln's assassination, believed these riots

were an attempt to incite another civil war.10 Young Jesse James (1847-1882), a 33rd degree

Freemason and member of the Knights of the Golden Circle, was assigned to rob northern banks

to fund this new war. Regarding James's success, Ralph Epperson, in The Unseen Hand, wrote:

"It has been estimated that Jesse and the other members of the Knights had buried over $7 billion

in gold all over the western states."'1

Meanwhile, a crisis was brewing which brought heavy Masonic pressure to bear upon the newly

appointed president, Andrew Johnson. During the Civil War, General Pike had led a band of

Indians who conducted warfare with barbarity by scalping Union soldiers while they were yet

alive.12 After the war and Lincoln's assassination, Pike was tried and found guilty of treason.

Andrew Johnson, himself a 3rd degree Mason, was pressured by high Masons to pardon brother

Pike.

Master Mason Johnson was under no Masonic obligation to pardon his treasonous Masonic

superior. For clarification we recite part of the Master Mason ceremony. When the 3rd degree

initiate is symbolically raised from the dead by the strong grip of the "lion's paw," he is taught

the "Five Points of Fellowship," which are foot to foot, knee to knee, breast to breast, hand to

back, and cheek to cheek. The second point of fellowship, which is breast to breast, teaches "that

you will ever keep within your breast the secrets of a worthy brother Master Mason as inviolable

as your own when communicated to, and received by you as such, murder and treason

excepted."'3

Relentless pressure from Masons was too great, and the President succumbed to their bidding.

Paul Fisher reports thatBenjamin B. French, a 33rd Degree Mason and member of the board of

directors of the Supreme Council of the Scottish Rite, wrote a letter, dated July 1, 1865, to

President Andrew Johnson.. .urging him to pardon Pike. Additional appeals on Pike's behalf

were made to the President by Masons from different parts of the United States.'4

Johnson bowed to Masonic pressure and pardoned the man who was most responsible for the

Civil War, who undoubtedly was in favor of the assassination of President Lincoln, and who may

himself have been directly involved in the plot. Nine months later a list of pardoned rebels,

324

including Pike, was released to the press. Fisher informs us that "[in] March, 1867, the House

Judiciary Committee began an investigation into charges by some Congressmen that Johnson

should be impeached. Later, when the committee finally issued its report, a key charge against

the President was that he pardoned large numbers of public and notorious traitors. ..."'15

Three months later, Freemasonry honored Johnson for pardoning the treasonous Albert Pike.

"On June 20, 1867," reports Fisher, "the President received a delegation of Scottish Rite officials

in his bedroom at the White House where he received the 4th through the 32nd Degrees of the

Scottish Rite as an honorarium."16

The trial for Johnson's impeachment proceeded as scheduled. In May 1868, fourteen months

after the Congressional investigation of Johnson was initiated, the final vote fell one short of the

necessary two thirds for conviction. Freemasonry celebrated by erecting the only monument to a

Confederate general in the nation's capital. Between Third and Fourth Streets stand the U.S.

Department of Labor Building and the city's Municipal Building. On public property between

these two buildings, on D Street, N.W., "is a statue of Albert Pike, the grand philosopher of

Scottish Rite Masonry, who was indicted for treason for his activities during the Civil War. "17

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://ia803001.us.archive.org/28/items/ScarletAndTheBeastJohnDaniel1995/Scarlet%20and%20the%20Beast,%20John%20Daniel%20(1995).pdf


NRA Institute for Legislative Action

Monday, November 17, 2025 at 7:09 AM

Founded on November 17, 1871, the NRA has grown from a small group of marksmen into a nationwide institution dedicated to firearms training, safety, and advocacy.

Together with millions, we celebrate 154 years of heritage and hard work. 🇺🇸

https://www.facebook.com/NationalRifleAssociation/posts/pfbid03jocNQTSajSBMuMKoHGH1ujbXQT8Cd5KGX4rMFkJYeEA4SpGMKHqtWVV3FWJa5m8l


The Act of 1871: The “United States” Is a Corporation – There are Two Constitutions

By POPEYE

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(POPEYE)   Since the Act of 1871 which established the District of Columbia, we have been living under the UNITED STATES CORPORATION which is owned by certain international bankers and aristocracy of Europe and Britain.


In 1871 the Congress changed the name of the original Constitution by changing ONE WORD — and that was very significant as you will read.


Some people do not understand that ONE WORD or TWO WORDS difference in any “legal” document DO make the critical difference. But, Congress has known, and does know, this.


1871, February 21: Congress Passes an Act to Provide a Government for the District of Columbia, also known as the Act of 1871.


With no constitutional authority to do so, Congress creates a separate form of government for the District of Columbia, a ten mile square parcel of land (see, Acts of the Forty-first Congress,” Section 34, Session III, chapters 61 and 62).


The act — passed when the country was weakened and financially depleted in the aftermath of the Civil War — was a strategic move by foreign interests (international bankers) who were intent upon gaining a stranglehold on the coffers and neck of America.


Congress cut a deal with the international bankers (specifically Rothschilds of London) to incur a DEBT to said bankers. Because the bankers were not about to lend money to a floundering nation without serious stipulations, they devised a way to get their foot in the door of the United States.


The Act of 1871 formed a corporation called THE UNITED STATES. The corporation, OWNED by foreign interests, moved in and shoved the original Constitution into a dustbin. With the Act of 1871, the organic Constitution was defaced — in effect vandalized and sabotage — when the title was capitalized and the word “for” was changed to “of” in the title.


THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA is the constitution of the incorporated UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.


It operates in an economic capacity and has been used to fool the People into thinking it governs the Republic. It does is not!


Capitalization is NOT insignificant when one is referring to a legal document. This seemingly “minor” alteration has had a major impact on every subsequent generation of Americans.


What Congress did by passing the Act of 1871 was create an entirely new document, a constitution for the government of the District of Columbia, an INCORPORATED government. This newly altered Constitution was not intended to benefit the Republic. It benefits only the corporation of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA and operates entirely outside the original (organic) Constitution.


Instead of having absolute and unalienable rights guaranteed under the organic Constitution, we the people now have “relative” rights or privileges. One example is the Sovereign’s right to travel, which has now been transformed (under corporate government policy) into a “privilege” that requires citizens to be licensed.


By passing the Act of 1871, Congress committed TREASON against the People who were Sovereign under the grants and decrees of the Declaration of Independence and the organic Constitution.


The Act of 1871 became the FOUNDATION of all the treason since committed by government officials.

https://web.archive.org/web/20170120040056/https://www.federaljack.com/slavery-by-consent-the-united-states-corporation/


The Constitution of the German Empire (German: Verfassung des Deutschen Reiches) was the basic law of the German Empire. It came into effect on 4 May 1871 and lasted formally until 14 August 1919.[1] Some German historians refer to it as Bismarck's imperial constitution (German: Bismarcksche Reichsverfassung, BRV).


The Constitution created a federation (federally organised national state) of 25 German states under the permanent presidency of Prussia, the largest and most powerful of the states. The presidency (Bundespräsidium) was a hereditary office of the King of Prussia, who had the title of German Emperor. The emperor appointed the chancellor, who was the head of government and chairman of the Bundesrat, the council of representatives of the German states. Laws were enacted by the Bundesrat and the Reichstag, the parliament elected by male Germans above the age of 25 years.


The imperial constitution followed an earlier constitution of 1 January 1871, the Constitution of the German Confederation. That constitution incorporated some of the agreements between the North German Confederation and the four German states south of the River Main which were joining the new empire. It renamed the country to Deutsches Reich (conventionally translated to 'German Empire') and gave the Prussian king the title of German Emperor.[2]


The constitutions of 1 January and 4 May 1871 are both essentially an amended version of the North German Constitution, which had been drafted to reflect the ideas of Otto von Bismarck. The political system remained the same. The constitution went out of effect in the November Revolution of 1918 when the legislative and executive powers were taken over by a new revolutionary body. In 1919 a popularly elected national assembly created a republican constitution known as the Weimar Constitution, which has the same title in German as its predecessor (Verfassung des Deutschen Reiches, or 'Constitution of the German Reich').

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_the_German_Empire


Treaty between the United States and Great Britain.—Claims, fisheries, navigation of the St. Lawrence, &c., American lumber on the river St. John, boundary.—Concluded May 8, 1871; ratifications exchanged June 17, 1871; proclaimed July 4, 1871.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.


A PROCLAMATION.


Whereas a treaty, between the United States of America and Her Majesty the Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, concerning the settlement of all causes of difference between the two countries, was concluded and signed at Washington by the high commissioners and plenipotentiaries of the respective governments on the eighth day of May last; which treaty is, word for word, as follows: The United States of America and Her Britannic Majesty, being desirous to provide for an amicable settlement of all causes of difference between the two countries, have for that purpose appointed their respective plenipotentiaries, that is to say: the President of the United States has appointed, on the part of the United States, as commissioner [Page 517]in a joint high, commission and plenipotentiaries, Hamilton Fish, Secretary of State; Robert Camming Schenck, Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Great Britain; Samuel Nelson, an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States; Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar, of Massachusetts; and George Henry Williams, of Oregon; and her Britannic Majesty, on her part, has appointed as her high commissioners and plenipotentiaries, the Right Honorable George Frederick Samuel, Earl de Grey and Earl of Ripon, Viscount Goderich, Baron Grantham, a Baronet, a Peer of the United Kingdom, Lord President of Her Majesty’s Most Honorable Privy Council, Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, &c., &c., the Right Honorable Sir Stafford Henry Northcote, Baronet, one of Her Majesty’s Most Honorable Privy Council, a Member of Parliament, a Companion of the Most Honorable Order of the Bath, &c., &c., Sir Edward Thornton, Knight Commander of the Most Honorable Order of the Bath, Her Majesty’s Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the United States of America; Sir John Alexander Macdonald, Knight Commander of the Most Honorable Order of the Bath, a member of Her Majesty’s Privy Council for Canada, and Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Her Majesty’s Dominion of Canada; and Montague Bernard, Esquire, Chichele Professor of International Law in the University of Oxford.

https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1871/d257


Vatican during the Savoyard era describes the relation of the Vatican to Italy, after 1870, which marked the end of the Papal States, and 1929, when the papacy regained autonomy in the Lateran Treaty, a period dominated by the Roman Question.


Background

In the years that followed the revolutions of 1848, Italian nationalists – both those who wished to unify the country under the Kingdom of Sardinia and its ruling House of Savoy and those who favored a republican solution – saw the Papal States as the chief obstacle to Italian unity. Louis Napoleon, who had now seized control of France as Emperor Napoleon III, tried to play a double game, simultaneously forming an alliance with Sardinia and playing on his famous uncle's nationalist credentials on the one hand and maintaining French troops in Rome to protect the Pope's rights on the other.


After the Austro-Sardinian War of 1859, much of northern Italy was unified under the House of Savoy's government; in the aftermath, Garibaldi led a revolution that overthrew the Bourbon monarchy in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Afraid that Garibaldi would set up a republican government in the south, the Sardinians petitioned Napoleon for permission to send troops through the Papal States to gain control of the Two Sicilies, which was granted on the condition that Rome was left undisturbed. In 1860, with much of the region already in rebellion against Papal rule, Sardinia conquered the eastern two-thirds of the Papal States and cemented its hold on the south. Bologna, Ferrara, Umbria, the Marches, Benevento and Pontecorvo were all formally annexed by November of the same year, and a unified Kingdom of Italy was declared. The Papal States were reduced to Latium, the immediate neighborhood of Rome.


Rome was declared Capital of Italy in March 1861, when the first Italian Parliament met in the kingdom's old capital Turin in Piemonte. However, the Italian government could not take possession of its capital because Napoleon III kept a French garrison in Rome protecting Pope Pius IX. The opportunity to eliminate the last vestige of the Papal States came when the Franco-Prussian War began in July 1870. Emperor Napoleon III had to recall his garrison from Rome for France's own defence and could no longer protect the pope. Following the collapse of the Second French Empire at the battle of Sedan, widespread public demonstrations demanded that the Italian government take Rome. King Victor Emmanuel II sent Count Gustavo Ponza di San Martino to Pius IX with a personal letter offering a face-saving proposal that would have allowed the peaceful entry of the Italian Army into Rome, under the guise of offering protection to the pope.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vatican_during_the_Savoyard_era_(1870%E2%80%931929)


"Savoy Truffle" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their 1968 album The Beatles (also known as "the White Album"). The song was written by George Harrison and inspired by his friend Eric Clapton's fondness for chocolate. The lyrics list the various flavours offered in Mackintosh's Good News chocolates and serve as a warning to Clapton about the detrimental effect that his gorging would have on his teeth. Along with Clapton's guest appearance on the White Album track "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" and Harrison reciprocating on Cream's "Badge", it is one of several songs that mark the start of a long-lasting musical association between the two guitarists.


The Beatles recorded "Savoy Truffle" in October 1968, towards the end of the five-month sessions for the album. An upbeat rock track in the soul genre, the song reflects Harrison's return to the guitar as his main musical instrument after two years of studying the Indian sitar. The recording includes a Chris Thomas-arranged horn section, and introduced the horn-heavy sound that became a feature of Harrison's music as a solo artist. Through the lyrics' reference to "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da", the song is also an example of the Beatles' use of self-quotation in their later work.


On release, "Savoy Truffle" was viewed by many commentators as a sign of Harrison's growing maturity as a songwriter. Among more recent assessments, Ian MacDonald cited it as an example of the lesser material found on The Beatles, while Daryl Easlea of BBC Music describes it as one of the "doodles that delight" and "a fine counterweight" to "While My Guitar Gently Weeps".[3] Ella Fitzgerald, Terry Manning and They Might Be Giants have also recorded the song.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savoy_Truffle


The National Rifle Association of America (NRA) is a gun rights advocacy group based in the United States.[4][5][b] Founded in 1871 to advance rifle marksmanship, the modern NRA has become a prominent gun rights lobbying organization while continuing to teach firearm safety and competency. The organization also publishes several magazines and sponsors competitive marksmanship events.[6] The group claimed nearly 5 million members as of December 2018, though that figure has not been independently confirmed.[7][8][9]


The NRA is among the most influential advocacy groups in U.S. politics.[10][11][12] The NRA Institute for Legislative Action (NRA-ILA) is its lobbying division, which manages its political action committee (PAC), the Political Victory Fund (PVF). Over its history, the organization has influenced legislation, participated in or initiated lawsuits, and endorsed or opposed various candidates at local, state, and federal levels. Some notable lobbying efforts by the NRA-ILA are the Firearm Owners Protection Act, which lessened restrictions of the Gun Control Act of 1968, and the Dickey Amendment, which blocks the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) from using federal funds to advocate for gun control.


Starting in the mid- to late 1970s, the NRA has been increasingly criticized by gun control and gun rights advocacy groups, political commentators, and politicians. This criticism began following changes in the NRA's organizational policies, following what is now referred to as the Revolt at Cincinnati at the 1977 NRA annual convention. The changes, which deposed former NRA executive vice president Maxwell Rich and included new organizational bylaws, have been described as moving the organization away from its previous focuses of "hunting, conservation, and marksmanship" and toward a focus on the defense of the right to bear arms.[13][14][15] The organization has been the focus of intense criticism in the aftermath of high-profile shootings, such as the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting and the Parkland High School shooting, after both of which they suggested adding armed security guards to schools.[16]


History

Early history


William Conant Church, one of the NRA's founders

A few months after the Civil War began in 1861, a national rifle association was proposed by Americans in England. In a letter that was sent to President Abraham Lincoln and published in The New York Times, R.G. Moulton and R.B. Perry recommended forming an organization similar to the National Rifle Association in Britain, which had formed a year and a half earlier. They suggested making a shooting range, perhaps on the base on Staten Island, and were offering Whitworth rifles for prizes for the first shooting competition with those rifles. They suggested a provisional committee to start the Association which would include: President Lincoln, Secretary of War, officers, and other prominent New Yorkers.[17][18][19]


The National Rifle Association of America was chartered in the State of New York on November 17, 1871[20][6] by Army and Navy Journal editor William Conant Church and Captain George Wood Wingate. On November 25, 1871, the group voted to elect its first corporate officers. Union Army Civil War General Ambrose Burnside, who had worked as a Rhode Island gunsmith, was elected president.[21] When Burnside resigned on August 1, 1872,[22] Church succeeded him as president.[23]


Union Army records for the Civil War indicate that its troops fired about 1,000 rifle shots for each Confederate hit, causing General Burnside to lament his recruits: "Out of ten soldiers who are perfect in drill and the manual of arms, only one knows the purpose of the sights on his gun or can hit the broad side of a barn."[24][25][26] The generals attributed this to the use of volley tactics, devised for earlier, less accurate smoothbore muskets.[27][28]


Ambrose Burnside, Union Army general, Governor of Rhode Island, and first president of the NRA

Recognizing a need for better training, Wingate sent emissaries to Canada, the United Kingdom, and Germany to observe militia and armies' marksmanship training programs.[29] With plans provided by Wingate, the New York Legislature funded the construction of a modern range at Creedmoor, Long Island, for long-range shooting competitions. The range officially opened on June 21, 1873.[30] The Central Railroad of Long Island established a railway station nearby, with trains running from Hunter's Point, with connecting boat service to 34th Street and the East River, allowing access from New York City.[31]


After beating England and Scotland to win the Elcho Shield in 1873 at Wimbledon, then a village outside London, the Irish Rifle Team issued a challenge through the New York Herald to riflemen of the United States to raise a team for a long-range match to determine an Irish-American championship.[32] A team was organized through the subsidiary Amateur Club of New York City.[32] Remington Arms and Sharps Rifle Manufacturing Company produced breech-loading weapons for the team.[33] Although muzzle-loading rifles had long been considered more accurate, eight American riflemen won the 1874 Irish-American Match firing breech-loading rifles. Publicity of the event generated by the New York Herald helped to establish breech-loading firearms as suitable for military marksmanship training, and promoted the NRA to national prominence.[26]


In 1875, the NRA issued a challenge for an international rifle match as part of the 1876 Centennial celebrations of the founding of the nation.[34] Australia, Ireland, Scotland and Canada accepted the challenge, and the Centennial Trophy was commissioned from Tiffany & Co. (later known as the "Palma Trophy").[35] The United States won the 1876 match, and the Palma Match went on to be contested every four years as the World Long Range Rifle Championships.[36][37]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Rifle_Association


Unam Sanctam

One God, One Faith, One Spiritual Authority

Pope Boniface VIII - 1302

Bull of Pope Boniface VIII promulgated November 18, 1302

Urged by faith, we are obliged to believe and to maintain that the Church is one, holy, catholic, and also apostolic. We believe in her firmly and we confess with simplicity that outside of her there is neither salvation nor the remission of sins, as the Spouse in the Canticles [Sgs 6:8] proclaims: ‘One is my dove, my perfect one. She is the only one, the chosen of her who bore her,‘ and she represents one sole mystical body whose Head is Christ and the head of Christ is God [1 Cor 11:3]. In her then is one Lord, one faith, one baptism [Eph 4:5]. There had been at the time of the deluge only one ark of Noah, prefiguring the one Church, which ark, having been finished to a single cubit, had only one pilot and guide, i.e., Noah, and we read that, outside of this ark, all that subsisted on the earth was destroyed.

We venerate this Church as one, the Lord having said by the mouth of the prophet: ‘Deliver, O God, my soul from the sword and my only one from the hand of the dog.’ [Ps 21:20] He has prayed for his soul, that is for himself, heart and body; and this body, that is to say, the Church, He has called one because of the unity of the Spouse, of the faith, of the sacraments, and of the charity of the Church. This is the tunic of the Lord, the seamless tunic, which was not rent but which was cast by lot [Jn 19:23- 24]. Therefore, of the one and only Church there is one body and one head, not two heads like a monster; that is, Christ and the Vicar of Christ, Peter and the successor of Peter, since the Lord speaking to Peter Himself said: ‘Feed my sheep‘ [Jn 21:17], meaning, my sheep in general, not these, nor those in particular, whence we understand that He entrusted all to him [Peter]. Therefore, if the Greeks or others should say that they are not confided to Peter and to his successors, they must confess not being the sheep of Christ, since Our Lord says in John ‘there is one sheepfold and one shepherd.’ We are informed by the texts of the gospels that in this Church and in its power are two swords; namely, the spiritual and the temporal. For when the Apostles say: ‘Behold, here are two swords‘ [Lk 22:38] that is to say, in the Church, since the Apostles were speaking, the Lord did not reply that there were too many, but sufficient. Certainly the one who denies that the temporal sword is in the power of Peter has not listened well to the word of the Lord commanding: ‘Put up thy sword into thy scabbard‘ [Mt 26:52]. Therefore, both are in the power of the Church, namely, the spiritual sword and the material. But indeed, the latter is to be exercised on behalf of the Church; and truly, the former is to be exercised by the Church. The former is of the priest; the latter is by the hand of kings and soldiers, but at the will and sufferance of the priest.


However, one sword ought to be subordinated to the other and temporal authority, subjected to spiritual power. For since the Apostle said: ‘There is no power except from God and the things that are, are ordained of God‘ [Rom 13:1-2], but they would not be ordained if one sword were not subordinated to the other and if the inferior one, as it were, were not led upwards by the other.


For, according to the Blessed Dionysius, it is a law of the divinity that the lowest things reach the highest place by intermediaries. Then, according to the order of the universe, all things are not led back to order equally and immediately, but the lowest by the intermediary, and the inferior by the superior. Hence we must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power whatever, as spiritual things surpass the temporal. This we see very clearly also by the payment, benediction, and consecration of the tithes, but the acceptance of power itself and by the government even of things. For with truth as our witness, it belongs to spiritual power to establish the terrestrial power and to pass judgement if it has not been good. Thus is accomplished the prophecy of Jeremias concerning the Church and the ecclesiastical power: ‘Behold to-day I have placed you over nations, and over kingdoms‘ and the rest. Therefore, if the terrestrial power err, it will be judged by the spiritual power; but if a minor spiritual power err, it will be judged by a superior spiritual power; but if the highest power of all err, it can be judged only by God, and not by man, according to the testimony of the Apostle: ‘The spiritual man judgeth of all things and he himself is judged by no man‘ [1 Cor 2:15]. This authority, however, (though it has been given to man and is exercised by man), is not human but rather divine, granted to Peter by a divine word and reaffirmed to him (Peter) and his successors by the One Whom Peter confessed, the Lord saying to Peter himself, ‘Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound also in Heaven‘ etc., [Mt 16:19]. Therefore whoever resists this power thus ordained by God, resists the ordinance of God [Rom 13:2], unless he invent like Manicheus two beginnings, which is false and judged by us heretical, since according to the testimony of Moses, it is not in the beginnings but in the beginning that God created heaven and earth [Gen 1:1]. Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

https://www.papalencyclicals.net/bon08/b8unam.htm


Trump, Vance meet with Pope Leo's Florida brother, 'a major MAGA fan', at White House

Kim Luciani

USA TODAY NETWORK - Florida

May 22, 2025, 12:58 p.m. ET

Key Points AI-assisted summary

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's brother, Louis Prevost, at the White House.

Trump publicly praised Prevost, a Florida resident, for being a "major MAGA fan."

Louis Prevost acknowledged his political views and stated his intention to "tone it down" to avoid causing issues for the pope.

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's Florida brother Louis Prevost at the White House on May 20, after praising Prevost to reporters at the Capitol earlier in the day, calling him a "major MAGA fan."


Trump told reporters he likes the pope and both of his brothers, but spotlighted the eldest brother, Navy veteran and Port Charlotte resident Louis Prevost.

"I like the new pope and I like the pope's brother. You know, one of the pope's brothers – actually both of them – but one in particular is a major MAGA fan. Did you know that? He lives in Florida," Trump said.

"And I look forward to getting him to the White House. I want to shake his hand, I want to give him a big hug."

Later that day, the White House visit happened. Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah met with Trump and Vice President JD Vance in the Oval Office.

"Great meeting between President Trump, Vice President Vance, and @Pontifex’s brother, Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah," Special Assistant to the President and Communications Advisor Margo Martin posted on X, along with a photo of the meeting.


Louis Prevost excited and happy about brother Pope Leo XVI's papacy

The Prevost brothers — Louis, John and Robert (Pope Leo XIV) — grew up in Chicago in a traditional Catholic family.

Louis Prevost said his youngest brother Robert wanted to "play priest" when he was 6 and set his sights on the priesthood as a freshman in high school. Their parents, neighbors and even strangers told Robert, "You're going to be pope someday," he said.

Robert Prevost's election as Pope Leo XIV left Louis Prevost excited, happy, mind blown and a little worried about how the papacy would impact their relationship.

“I just freaked out and said ‘It’s Rob, OMG.’ I was up, dressed, out, just going nuts,” he told WBBH.

“We can only hope that we can maintain that closeness, and we don't do anything to embarrass him,” he said.

Louis Prevost attended Pope Leo's inaugural mass at the Vatican on May 18. The brothers shared a hug after the service.


Pope Leo's Florida brother Louis Prevost is a MAGA, Trump supporter

Trump told reporters Louis Prevost is a "major MAGA fan."


In an interview with Piers Morgan, Louis Prevost said, "I don’t want to create waves that don’t need to be there because I’m a MAGA type and I have my beliefs,” he said. “I don’t need to create heat for him. He’s going to have enough to handle as it is without the press going ‘the pope’s brother says this.’ He doesn’t need that.”


Asked about his reposts of controversial social media memes, including one calling Nancy Pelosi a drunk (expletive), and how they might affect the pope, Louis Prevost said he will "tone it down."


"He knows I am who I am," he said of the pope. "He's well aware of my position. He knows I'm probably not going to change and I don't think I will, other than to, just like you say, tone it down."

Contributing: Melissa Pérez-Carrillo, Herald-Tribune, Ashley Ferrer, USA TODAY Network-Florida

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/


All historians acknowledge the ascendancy of the popes began in 308 A.D., when King Clovis of the Salian or Merovingian Franks (later France), won the decisive battle in the Catholic and Arian religious war, thereby settling the dispute in favor of the Catholics. But the popes' temporal reign officially began in the year 538 A.D. when Roman Emperor Justinian subdued the last of the three kingdoms, or "horns," that opposed the rise of the Papacy."

-page 137

Chapter 19 "Exposed (Again): 1260 Years of World Domination

Codeword Barbelon book 2

by P.D. Stuart


Clovis is the modern conventional French (and thence English) form of the Old Frankish name ᚺᛚᛟᛞᛟᚹᛁᚷ (in runic alphabet) or *"Hlōdowik" or "Hlōdowig" (in Latin alphabet), equivalent to the modern forms Louis (French), Lodewijk (Dutch), Lewis (English), and Ludwig (German).


Etymology

The name *Hlōdowik or *Hlōdowig is traditionally considered to be composed of two elements, deriving from both Proto-Germanic *hlūdaz ("loud, famous") and *wiganą ("to battle, to fight") respectively, resulting in the traditional practice of translating Clovis' name as meaning "famous warrior".


However, scholars have pointed out that Gregory of Tours consequently transcribes the names of various Merovingian royal names containing the first element as chlodo-. The use of a close-mid back protruded vowel (o), rather than the expected close back rounded vowel (u) which Gregory does use in various other Germanic names (i.e. Fredegundis, Arnulfus, Gundobadus, etc.) opens up the possibility that the first element instead derives from Proto-Germanic *hlutą ("lot, share, portion"), giving the meaning of the name as "loot bringer" or "plunder (bringing) warrior". This hypothesis is supported by the fact that if the first element is taken to mean "famous", then the name of Chlodomer (one of Clovis' sons) would contain two elements (*hlūdaz and *mērijaz) both meaning "famous", which would be highly uncommon within the typical Germanic name structure.[1][2]


Frankish royalty

Clovis I (c. 466 – 511), the first king of the Franks to unite all the Frankish tribes under one ruler

Clovis II (637 – c. 658), king of Neustria and Burgundy

Clovis III (reigned 675–676), the king of Austrasia

Clovis IV (682–695), the sole king of the Franks from 691 until 695

Clovis (died 580), son of Chilperic I and Audovera, assassinated by his father and stepmother

Louis the Pious, son of Charlemagne, King of Aquitaine from 781 and sole ruler of the Franks 814–840, but counted as "Louis I of France" even though West Francia (the nucleus of the later kingdom of France) was formed only after his death.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clovis_(given_name)


Louis Farrakhan (/ˈfɑːrəkɑːn/; born Louis Eugene Walcott; May 11, 1933) is an American religious leader who heads the Nation of Islam (NOI), an organization which combines black nationalism and Islamic teachings.[2][3][4] Prior to joining the NOI, Farrakhan was a calypso singer who used the stage name Calypso Gene. Early in his career, he served as the minister of mosques in Boston and Harlem and was appointed to the post of National Representative of the Nation of Islam by then-NOI leader Elijah Muhammad. He adopted the name Louis X before being named Louis Farrakhan.


After Warith Deen Mohammed reorganized the original NOI into the orthodox Sunni Islamic group American Society of Muslims, Farrakhan began to rebuild the NOI as "Final Call". In 1981, he officially adopted the name "Nation of Islam", reviving the group and establishing its headquarters at Mosque Maryam. In October 1995, Farrakhan organized and led the Million Man March in Washington, D.C. Due to health issues, he reduced his responsibilities with the NOI in 2007.[5] However, Farrakhan has continued to deliver sermons[6] and speak at NOI events.[7] In 2015, he led the 20th Anniversary of the Million Man March: Justice or Else.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Farrakhan


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


PART X THE PRESERVATION AND INCREASE OF THE SOCIETY

410 §1. As a sign of gratitude and devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, let that feast be solemnly celebrated; and on that day is to be renewed the consecration by which the Society on January 1, 1872, dedicated and consecrated itself totally and perpetually.

§2. The consecration to the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary is to be renewed each year on the feast of the Immaculate Heart.[1]

411 The sense of belonging and responsibility that each individual one of Ours has toward the whole Society should be manifested in a knowledge of our spirituality, our history, our saints, our apostolic labors, and our men, especially of those who are suffering difficulties for the sake of Christ; it is to be manifested as well by maintaining Ignatian mobility and flexibility with a view to helping any region of the Society whatsoever.[2]

412 §1. All our members should have at heart a shared concern for attracting new members to the Society, especially by prayer and the example of their lives as individuals and in community.[3]

§2. Therefore, we must do everything possible actively to present the Society in such a way that those whom God calls will know and appreciate who and what we are and what is our distinctive way of proceeding in the following of Christ.[4]

§3. We must also promote vocations as widely as possible, in order to reflect the culture and experience of those we seek to serve, including minority cultures, immigrants, and indigenous people.[5]

413 The Society should always show itself bound to its benefactors in charity and gratitude. Superiors should ensure that prayers are offered for them and other appropriate signs of our gratitude are shown them.[6]

414 In the perfect observance of all the Constitutions and in the particular fulfillment of our Institute, our formed members should excel, setting a good example and spreading the good odor of Christ, keeping before their eyes the serious obligation they have of giving edification especially to our younger members.[ 7]

415 All by earnest reading and meditation (in particular, at the time of the annual Spiritual Exercises, renewal of vows, monthly recollection, beginning of the year, and so forth) should strive ever to know, esteem, and love better our Constitutions and the special nature of our Institute,[ 8] which are to be faithfully observed, and which for each and all of us are the one, true, and safe way that surely leads to the perfection to which our Lord calls and invites all sons of the Society.[9] §2. Major superiors, especially at the time of the annual visitation, should see that this is faithfully observed.

416 Finally, those means that are proposed by our holy father Saint Ignatius in Part X of the Constitutions for the preservation and development not only of the body or exterior of the Society but also of its spirit, and for the attainment of the objective it seeks, which is to aid souls to reach their ultimate and supernatural end, [10] are to be observed eagerly and diligently by all, with a truly personal sense of responsibility for its increase and development, for the praise and service of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and the help of souls.[11]


L. D. S.

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


I.9 Etana

Introduction

The Epic of Etana weaves together a fable of a snake and an eagle with the tale of Etana, the childless king of the city of Kiš, and his quest for the plant of birth. In the Epic, the eagle’s breach of an oath earns him the wrath of god Šamaš, who condemns it to a pit. Etana rescues the eagle so the eagle, in gratitude, carries him to the heavens in search of the plant.

The myth of Etana was probably known in the third millennium BCE, but the earliest surviving manuscripts of the Epic, from Babylonia and Susa, come from the first half of the second millennium BCE. Four Assyrian tablets from Aššur, belonging to at least two different manuscripts, can be dated to the second half of the second millennium BCE. In the first millennium BCE, the Epic is only known in the libraries of Assurbanipal in Nineveh, where at least three sets of the text were kept. The various versions differ considerably in length and wording.

According to the Catalogue of Texts and Authors (L 0), the Epic of Etana was composed by Lu-Nanna, the sage. The Epic is not known on school tablets, and its text is apparently not quoted in other compositions. However, king Etana appears frequently in other texts: the Sumerian King List, for example, describes Etana as “the shepherd, who ascended to heaven,” and mentions Balīḫ as his son and his successor. An Old Babylonian wisdom composition (YBC.2394) mentions Etana’s ascension to heaven and childlessness. Later traditions present Etana as the holder of an important office in the Netherworld (Gilgameš SB VII 202), and some divination texts refer to his journey to heaven as late as the second century BCE (MLC.1874 o 33).

The Epic, first recognized in 1894, has been frequently re-edited. Large portions of the work are only fragmentarily known, and many fragments have been tentatively attributed to the Epic without much evidence. The eBL edition has benefitted from a digital edition kindly made available by J. Novotny.


References

Edition: Haul, 2000; Kinnier Wilson, 1985; Novotny, 2001; Saporetti, 1990.


Translation: Dalley, 2000: 189-202; Foster, 2005: 533-554; Hecker, 2001: 34-51; Schmidt, 2013.


Discussion: Alster, 1989; Haul, 2004; Horowitz, 1990; Kinnier Wilson, 2007; Selz, 1998.

https://www.ebl.lmu.de/corpus/L/1/9


An aquila (Classical Latin: [ˈakᶣɪla]; lit. 'eagle') was a prominent symbol used in ancient Rome, especially as the standard of a Roman legion. A legionary known as an aquilifer, the "eagle-bearer", carried this standard. Each legion carried one eagle. It represents the Eagle of Jove (Aëtos), being Jove the "Father of the Roman state".


The eagle had quasi-religious importance to the Roman soldier, far beyond being merely a symbol of his legion. To lose a standard was seen as extremely grave, shameful and dishonorable, and the Roman military went to great lengths both to protect a standard and to recover one if it were to be lost. For example, after the annihilation of three legions in the Teutoburg Forest, the Romans spent decades retaliating for the defeat while also attempting to recover the three lost eagles.


No legionary eagle standards are known to have survived. However, other Roman eagles, either symbolizing imperial rule or used as funerary emblems, have been discovered.[1]


Roman imperial eagle from the 2nd century AD, possibly from Trajan's Forum, in the outer portico of the Basilica of the Holy Apostles in Rome

History

Main article: Insignia § Ancient Rome

The signa militaria were the Roman military ensigns or standards.[2] The most ancient standard employed by the Romans is said to have been a handful (manipulus) of straw fixed to the top of a spear or pole. Hence the company of soldiers belonging to it was called a maniple. The bundle of hay or fern was soon succeeded by the figures of animals, of which Pliny the Elder (H.N. x.16) enumerates five: the eagle, the wolf, the ox with the man's head, the horse, and the boar.[3][4] Pliny attributes to the consul Gaius Marius the setting aside of the four quadrupeds as standards and the retention of the eagle (Aquila) alone after the devastating Roman defeat at the Battle of Arausio against the Cimbri and Teutons in 104 BC. It was made of silver, or bronze, with upwards stretched wings, but was probably of relatively small size, since a standard-bearer (signifer) under Augustus is said in circumstances of danger (the Teutoburgerwald battle) to have wrenched the eagle from its staff and concealed it in the folds of his tunic above his girdle.[5] Pliny's claim is refuted by sources showing late republican and early imperial legions with other animal symbols such as bulls and wolves.[6]


Eagle and weapons from an Augustan-era funerary monument, probably that of Messalla (Prado, Madrid)

Even after the adoption of Christianity as the Roman Empire's religion; the eagle continued to be used as a symbol by the Holy Roman Empire and the early Byzantine Empire although far more rarely and with a different meaning. In particular the double-headed eagle, despite strongly linking back to a Pagan symbol, became very popular among Christians.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquila_(Roman)


Rubedo is a Latin word meaning "redness" that was adopted by alchemists to define the fourth and final major stage in their magnum opus.[1] Both gold and the philosopher's stone were associated with the color red, as rubedo signaled alchemical success, and the end of the great work.[2] Rubedo is also known by the Greek word iosis.


Interpretation

The three alchemical stages preceding rubedo were nigredo (blackness), which represented putrefaction and spiritual death; albedo (whiteness), which represented purification; and citrinitas (yellowness), the solar dawn or awakening.[3] Some sources describe the alchemical process as three-phased with citrinitas serving as mere extension and takes place between albedo and rubedo.[4] The rubedo stage entails the attempt of the alchemist to integrate the psychospiritual outcomes of the process into a coherent sense of self before its re-entry to the world.[5] The stage can take some time or years to complete due to the required synthesis and substantiation of insights and experiences.[5]


The symbols used in alchemical writing and art to represent this red stage can include blood, a phoenix, a rose, a crowned king, or a figure wearing red clothes. Countless sources mention a reddening process; the seventeenth dictum of the 12th century Turba Philosophorum is one example:


O Turba of Philosophers and disciples, now hast thou spoken about making into white, but it yet remains to treat concerning the reddening! Know, all ye seekers after this Art, that unless ye whiten, ye cannot make red, because the two natures are nothing other than red and white. Whiten, therefore, the red, and redden the white![6]


Psychology

In the framework of psychological development (especially with followers of Jungian psychology), these four alchemical steps are viewed as analogous to the process of attaining individuation or the process that allows an individual to attain the integration of opposites, their transcendence, and, finally, emergence out of an undifferentiated unconscious.[7] In an archetypal schema, rubedo represents the Self archetype, and is the culmination of the four stages, the merging of ego and Self.[8] It is also described as a stage that gives birth to a new personality.[9] Represented by the color of blood in alchemy, the stage indicates a process that cannot be reversed since it involves the struggle of the self towards its manifestation.[10]


The Self manifests itself in "wholeness," a point in which a person discovers their true nature. Another interpretation phrased it as "reunification" which entail the reunion of body, soul, and spirit, leading to a diminished inner conflict.[11]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubedo


The plan is real. The extraterrestrial threat is artificial. The threat is presented through the use of secret technology originally developed by the Germans in their secret weapons programs during WW-II, by geniuses like Nikola Tesla, and many others.


Military and government personnel who have access to this material believe it is real. None of them, however, has ever seen any evidence of the existence of any extraterrestrial creature nor any advanced technology other that that of human origin. It is not what they see that convinces them it is extraterrestrial in origin but the manner in which it is presented. It is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to believe that Top Secret government or military documentation could be lies. It is trust in government by men and women who have given their lives in its service that keeps this monumental lie a alive.


All so-called leaks are intentional misinformation projects designed to promote the alien threat scenario while allowing for complete deniability on the part of government. The antics of Vicki (Cooper) Ecker (CIA), Donald Francis Ecker III (Dupe), William Moore, Jaime Shandera, Stanton T. Friedman, Bruce Maccabee (CIA, ONI), Barry Taff PhD.(Pneuropsychiatric Institute of UCLA worked with recently deceased Dr. Louis Jollyn "Jolly" West), Whitley Strieber, Bud Hopkins (CIA), John Lear (CIA), Linda Moulton Howe Order of the Eastern Star and American Federation of Human Rights (American co-masonry), Art Bell (Freemason), Glen Campbell, George Knapp (Freemason), Colonel Philip Corso (CIA, a monumental liar now Deceased), Richard Hoagland and his Face on Mars, the so-called alien autopsy film, NASA and the Apollo Moon Missions, the so-called Mars Meteorite which was fraudulently promoted as containing fossil evidence of life on Mars, the War Of The Worlds, and many other people and events are projects of this type. Some (very few) of these People are unwitting accomplices in the charade and truly believe in the extraterrestrial threat.


Most of those named, and others not named, are active, and with full knowledge, agents of illuminism/socialism. The most well known are active Fellow Travelers, communist agents of the KGB, the Central Intelligence Agency, or one of the many psychological warfare agencies founded by the Rhodes Round Table Group (The Group), the Royal Institute of International Affairs, and the Council On Foreign Relations.

MAJESTYTWELVE by William Cooper Copyright © 1997 William Cooper All Rights Reserved

HOTT - MAJESTYTWELVE (hourofthetime.com)

https://www.hourofthetime.com/majestyt.htm


Federal Usurpation (1908)

Franklin Pierce (1853-19XX)

CHAPTER 2

Usurpation in the Civil War and Reconstruction Period

“When dangers thicken, the only device may be the Roman one of a temporary dictatorship. Something like this happened in the War of Secession, for the powers then conferred upon President Lincoln, or exercised without Congressional censure by him, were almost as much in excess of those enjoyed under the ordinary law as the authority of a Roman dictator exceeded that of a Roman consul.”


James Bryce

“In the plenitude of their powers as absolute rulers the generals” (of the reconstruction period) “were above the constituent assemblies of the inchoate new states as distinctly as they were above the governmental organs of the expiring old states.”


Professor Dunning


“Those pitiless years of reconstruction! worse than the calamities of war were the ‘desolating furies of peace.'”


Bishop Galloway

THERE is, in the mind of the younger generation which has come up since the war, a tradition of an attack on the Union by men who believed in state rights. By reason thereof state rights, in their mind, has a bad name. The usurpation of power by the Government in our day is occurring in times of peace and so secretly and so all-pervasively that men have become accustomed to it, and are not moved as they were by such violent wrestings of liberty from large bodies of people as occurred in many states during Reconstruction days. The period of the Civil War and Reconstruction, better than any other in our history, shows these violent usurpations of power. During the war, necessity took the place of the Constitution, and we see the written guarantees of liberty grow dim in the smoke of battle. During the Reconstruction period, however, with no necessity to justify their action. Congress established a despotism in nearly every one of the Southern States, which, when well known and fully understood by the younger generation of today, will be condemned by them for its cruel injustice.


There is no statute of limitations in the law of cause and effect, and the usurpations of the war and Reconstruction days are the fundamental causes of the existing conditions today. Not only the clear, unquestioned acts of usurpation of that period deserve examination, but the origin of the great centralizing forces coming out of protective tariffs and national banks and a paper currency and other legacies of like kind from the Civil War are worthy of the reader’s attention. It is not a pleasant duty to recite the acts that make the darkest picture in all American history, and nothing short of averting usurpation on the part of our National Government today can justify such a recital.


Early in the Civil War President Lincoln by proclamation authorized General Scott to suspend the writ of habeas corpus at any point on the military line between Philadelphia and Washington. The portion of the country covered by the proclamation was not in insurrection, and the publishing of the proclamation left hundreds of thousands of people in a region where there was no war without any protection from this writ. There was much doubt as to whether the President, under the circumstances, had a right to suspend its operation. Story and other writers upon the Constitution had maintained that Congress alone had the right to suspend the writ and the United States Supreme Court had indicated its opinion to that effect.25 In 1807, when an act was proposed suspending the writ in connection with the Burr conspiracy, there was no intimation in Congress or the country that the power was in the President.26


Without warrant and without any sworn statement, but merely upon an order of the Secretary of State or the Secretary of War, hundreds of men were arrested for the expression of words construed as tending to inflame party spirit or as sympathetic with the Southern cause, and hurried away to Forts Lafayette, Warren, McHenry, Delaware, Mifflin, Old Capitol Prison, penitentiaries and military camps in the different parts of the country. So many arrests were being made that an attempt was made to test the validity of the President’s action. In 1861 one John Merryman was held in detention at Fort McHenry by General George Cadwalader, under one of these orders of Secretary Seward, on a charge of treason. An application was made to Judge Taney, Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, for a writ of habeas corpus requiring the production of the prisoner before the judge on the ground that he was wrongfully detained. Chief Justice Taney signed the writ commanding General Cadwalader to produce Merryman before him and show cause for his detention. When the marshal of the United States Court presented the writ to General Cadwalader at the fort, Cadwalader refused to obey it, and when Taney issued a body attachment against him the general shut the marshal out of the fort. Thereupon the chief justice wrote an opinion as to the law, which was sent to the President, holding that the prisoner was entitled to his liberty and should be discharged and that Congress alone had the right to suspend the writ of habeas corpus. Lincoln ignored this, but later, in a message to Congress, asserted his right to suspend the writ of habeas corpus without limitation or interference.


On September 24, 1862, the President issued a proclamation ordering that all persons discouraging voluntary enlistments, resisting military drafts, guilty of any disloyal practices, or of offering aid and comfort to the rebels, should be subject to martial law and liable to trial by a military commission, and that the writ of habeas corpus should be suspended in respect to all such persons arrested or held by military authority. It is to be observed that this last order of the President applied to all parts of the North where there was no insurrection, yet it caused the arrest of men without warrant, detained them without a hearing, and convicted them of treason and murder by a court-martial without a jury and without observing a single one of the guarantees in the Bill of Rights of the Constitution.


The writ of habeas corpus was secured to English people by the Great Charter which, Mr. Hallam tells us, was sent to all the sheriffs of England, was kept posted in each cathedral and church, and publicly read twice a year, accompanied by solemn sentences of excommunication against all who should infringe it, and provided that “any judgments contrary to these provisions should be invalid and ‘holden for naught.'” This charter, made sacred by these sanctions and handed down for five hundred years by the English people, was deliberately disregarded. Thousands of men, without any evidence whatever of treasonable words on their part, were dragged from their homes to the different fortresses of the government upon a mere telegram from Washington to a United States marshal or even a police officer of a state. The newsboys of the street were arrested for the offense of selling newspapers which some military commander disapproved. Old men of seventy were dragged from their beds at midnight and hurried to prison by squads of soldiers. Many loyal men of the North were shocked by these brutal arrests, and all classes of men rose up in protest against such usurpation of power.27 Even John Sherman wrote to his brother of “a wanton and unnecessary use of power to arrest without trial.”


There lies before me as I write, a book under the title of “The American Bastile,” written by one John A. Marshall, bearing date of August, 1869, in which he describes the circumstances of the arrest of seventy citizens imprisoned in these fortresses from all of the Northern States except New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin. Among them were foreign ministers, United States senators, members of Congress, members of state legislatures, judges, lawyers, ministers, doctors, farmers, editors, merchants, and men from all the other walks of life. The details connected with the arrests of these men, as described by him, are as terrible as those accompanying the state arrests in Russia today, and one draws back from his vivid descriptions with doubt lest perhaps Mr. Marshall’s experiences caused him to exaggerate the conditions.


But we are not dependent upon his statements for the facts. A few years ago the United States Government published the records of these different fortresses showing these arrests and the names of many of the prisoners, the time when they were brought to the place of imprisonment, the records made by the keepers of the fortresses, and the correspondence between the relatives and Secretary Seward.28 These records, by the Government’s own statement, show that hundreds of simple-minded men living in country villages in different parts of the United States had unwittingly spoken a word now and then which political adversaries had construed as evidence of treasonable intent. Information was given to the War Department or to the Department of State, and the matter was laid before some United States marshal or police officer, for all police officers of any state or town or district were authorized to arrest and imprison. These published prison records have a most suspicious appearance. Descriptions are given of many of the men, but not their names. Even their residence in many cases is not disclosed. Nothing is said of the nature of their offenses. There, far away from their homes, they were imprisoned by the government for months, until the influence of their Congressman or of other powerful friends secured their release. The practices of Russia today of casting men into solitary dungeons and keeping them for months without trial, and of finally trying them at night by drumhead court-martials and condemning them without any of the safeguards of English law, is merely a repetition in almost every feature of the action of our National Government toward its citizens in the Civil War.


Such a storm of indignation arose from the people in every part of the North at these arrests that on March 3, 1863, Congress authorized the President during the Rebellion to suspend the privileges of the writ of habeas corpus in any case throughout the United States or any part thereof. This authorization provided for the discharge of any person held in duress, upon the failure of the Federal Jury sitting in the district where the imprisonment occurred to indict at its next session after the arrest. To secure action on the part of the grand juries and give them opportunity to investigate the cases, it was provided that the officials having charge of the prisoners should present lists to the court in each judicial district of the United States. In case of failure to indict them it was provided that they be released. But few indictments were ever obtained, the arrests proving unwarrantable in nearly all of the cases.


In connection with the act of March 3, 1863, an act of indemnity making the prior illegal acts of the President legal, and relieving him from all liability, was passed by Congress. It also provided that for every arrest caused by him in the future he should be free from legal liability. The military commissions with authority to try the people arrested were continued. The same act provided that in case an action was brought in any state court against an officer acting under an order of the President or his secretaries, to recover damages for an arrest or false imprisonment, the officer thus sued should have the right to apply to the United States Circuit Court in the same district in which the action was brought, and said court, by an order or writ, could remove the case to the United States Circuit Court to be tried there as if originally commenced therein. The United States Supreme Court, however, declared this law unconstitutional.29


On September 15, 1863, Mr. Lincoln proclaimed a general suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, limiting it to persons held as prisoners of war, spies, or aiders or abettors of the enemy. The words “aiders or abettors” were defined by him as follows: “He is to be an enemy who seeks to exalt the motives, character, and capacity of armed traitors; to magnify their resources, etc. He who overrates the success of our adversaries or underrates our own, and he who seeks false causes of complaint against our government, or inflames party spirit among ourselves and gives to the enemy that moral support which is more valuable to them than regiments of soldiers or millions of dollars.” United States deputy marshals and police officers continued to determine on their own judgment whether the citizens overrated the successes of the South or underrated the successes of the North. They continued to determine the “false causes of complaint” against the officers of our government, and hundreds more men were hurried to prison.


Finally, after the war had ended, and thousands of people had been arrested who lived far removed from the seat of war, the following case reached the United States Supreme Court, which determined that the Government had no right to arrest men in the North without warrant and to try them before military commissions. On August 13, 1864, Lambdin P. Milligan, a lawyer residing at Huntington, Indiana, delivered a political speech at a large meeting at Fort Wayne, Indiana. The speech criticised the National Government, and particularly Governor Morton of Indiana, who at that time was a candidate for reflection. On October 5, 1864, Milligan was arrested and taken to Indianapolis before Brevet Major General Hovey, military commandant of the district of Indiana. On the 21st of that month he was placed on trial before a military commission, being charged with conspiracy against the Government of the United States, offering aid and comfort to rebels, and of disloyal practices. He was found guilty and sentenced to death. He contended that the military commission had no authority to try him or condemn him, and thereafter petitioned a United States Court judge for a writ of habeas corpus. Upon denial, an appeal was taken to the Circuit Court, which, being divided upon the question of his right to the writ, certified the matter to the United States Supreme Court.


In December, 1866, the highest court of the nation, for the first time, had an opportunity of determining the right of the United States Government to make these arrests and try the persons arrested under military commissions in portions of the United States removed from the seat of war. Justice David Davis wrote the opinion on behalf of the court, holding that the military commission had no jurisdiction to convict Milligan, and said:


“It follows from what has been said on this subject that there are occasions when martial rule can be properly applied. If, in foreign invasion or civil war, the courts are actually closed, and it is impossible to administer criminal justice according to law, then, on the theater of active military operations, where war really prevails, it is necessary to furnish a substitute for the civil authority thus overthrown, to preserve the safety of the army and society; and as no power is left but the military, it is allowed to govern by martial rule until the laws again have their free course. As necessity creates the rule, so it limits its duration; for, if this government is continued after the courts are reinstated, it is a great usurpation of power. Martial rule can never exist where the courts we open, and in the proper and unobstructed exercise of their jurisdiction, it is also confined to the locality of actual war.”30


There was talk among the radical men of impeaching the judges, and John A. Bingham, a member of the House of Representatives, and a bitter partisan, said:


“Let us sweep away at once every appellate jurisdiction in all cases, if the court by virtue of its original jurisdiction usurps the power to decide political cases and defy a free people’s will.” Thaddeus Stevens, referring to the same case, said in the House of Representatives, “That decision, although in terms and purposes not as infamous as the Dred Scott decision, is yet far more dangerous in its operation upon the lives and liberties of the loyal men of this country.”


There is a story, one of the many attributed to Mr. Lincoln, in which he is reported to have said to his Secretary of the Treasury: “The South has violated the Constitution to break up the Union; I am ready to violate it to preserve the Union; and between you and me, Chase, before we get through this Constitution is going to have a tough time.”31 It is certain at least that he wrote to Mr. Hodges on April 8, 1864, “I felt that measures, otherwise unconstitutional, might become lawful by becoming indispensable to the preservation of the Constitution through the preservation of the Union. Right or wrong, I assumed this ground and now avow it.”32 There is no evidence that Lincoln himself ever personally ordered any of these arrests. The lovable character of Mr. Lincoln, his reconstruction of some of the Southern States upon liberal and humane terms, his last words of mercy toward the South, his sweet and gentle life and noble purposes, will endear him forever to the American people, and we review these acts of his administration only for the purpose of showing the danger of such usurpations of power.


In August, 1861, Congress passed an act known as the Confiscation Act. This act directed the President to cause the seizure of all the property of whatever kind belonging to specified classes of persons, namely: officers of the rebel army and navy, officers of the civil administration of the Southern Confederacy and of its so-called Federal State judges, and persons owning property in a loyal state who should give aid and comfort to the Rebellion. The property so seized was to be proceeded against by action in rem in the United States courts, and the proceeds were to be used for the support of the army of the United States. Of this act. Professor Dunning says:33 “This act assumed the power in Congress to deprive several millions of persons of all their property, and this by simple legislative act. By the theory of our Constitution, such power must be granted by the organic law, or be inferable from some clearly granted power. There was no claim of an express grant. By implication, the power was held to be deducible from the clauses authorizing Congress ‘to declare war,’ ‘to make rules concerning captures on land and water,’ ‘to provide for calling forth the militia to … suppress insurrections,’ and finally, ‘to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers.’ On the other hand, the Constitution contains the following prohibitions: ‘No bill of attainder shall be passed’; ‘no person shall be … deprived of . . . property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation ‘; and finally, ‘no attainder of treason shall work . . . forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted.’ The exercise of authority under the grants enumerated involved of necessity the violation of these prohibitions. Respect for both at the same time was inconceivable.”


Everyone acquainted with the Civil War who has carefully watched events since that time must have seen a gradually accelerated movement of the centralization of government commencing at that time. This was brought about by the government’s issue of legal-tender notes, by the creation of our national banking system,


and especially by the protective tariff then instituted and since continued. Hamilton, in his masterly statement on the currency, said that bills of credit and paper emissions were expressly forbidden to the states by our present Constitution, and that the spirit of that prohibition extended to the National Government. Notwithstanding that it was the intent of the framers of the Constitution to prohibit the National Government, as well as the states, from making paper money legal tender, Congress, in 1862, declared such paper lawful money and a legal tender in payment of public and private debts, and authorized the issue of $150,000,000 in notes, our present greenbacks. Never before had a statute of the United States made anything but gold and silver coin a legal tender in payment of debts. The United States Supreme Court, at a later date, in a suit where these notes had been tendered and rejected in payment of a debt existing before the war, held that the act making them legal tender was unconstitutional; but afterwards, when the court was differently constituted, reversed its own decision. Without discussing further at the present time the constitutionality of this issue, all will acknowledge that the exercise of the power has made the government all powerful in banking and commercial affairs. When a government issues the money of the country and has the tempting power to increase the amount for use in aiding private bankers, such power makes the government almost omnipotent.


On February 5, 1791, the first national bank was established. At that time there were only three banks in the United States, and it was contended that it would secure the collection, transportation, and circulation of the national revenue from one part of the country to another. This was thought to be a sufficient justification for its creation. It was proposed in the Constitutional Convention to insert a provision for the creation of such a corporation, but this was opposed by James Madison and many of the other members, and was defeated.34 When the question of the renewal of the bank charter came up in 1810, Henry Clay declared it as his opinion that the Constitution conferred no power upon Congress to charter a bank or to renew its charter. Clay well said, “Is it to be imagined that a power so vast would have been left by the wisdom of the Constitution to doubtful inference? … If, then, you could establish a bank to collect and distribute revenue, it ought to be expressly restricted to the purposes of such collection and distribution.”35


Now the original bank was permitted for the restricted purposes of the collection and distribution of the moneys of the United States Government, which at that time were collected at different points throughout the whole country. Because of the small number of banks, it was regarded as a necessary means of carrying on the fiscal powers of the government. When the national banking system was established during the war there were ample banking facilities throughout the country. The National Government, however, by passing an act imposing a tax of ten per cent upon the circulation of these state banks, actually destroyed them and substituted its vast banking system, now counting upward of fifteen thousand banks scattered in every city and village of the land.36 It is true that the United States Supreme Court, in the case of McCulloch v. Maryland, sustained the constitutionality of the act renewing in 1816 the charter of the bank of the United States. But the charter of this bank was renewed as the fiscal agent of the government at a time when there were comparatively few banks. The national banking system, however, was created, as we have said, to supplant the State banks, and did supplant them by taxing their circulation out of existence. The result of the national banking act was the creation of thousands of banks, not a single bank.


Senator Beveridge, of Indiana, in The Reader of March, 1907, says: “State rights denied the existence of this power, ‘the power of the general government to create a national bank,’ and it seemed that state rights had the best of the argument, contending that the national government has only the enumerated powers, and has no power except such as is expressly delegated to it by the Constitution.” However this may be, the creation of thousands of banks scattered all over the land more than any other one cause has centralized power in the National Government. Once admit the authority to create corporations by the government, and the other authority to interfere with the internal affairs of the states through the power to regulate commerce, and it would seem to follow that Congress may enact a general law for the creation of as many corporations as promoters desire, may control railways and all means of intercommunication and reduce the states to insignificance.


Under the cover of levying customs duties at seaports, Congress, by the war tariffs, took control of the whole manufacturing industry of the country. About every manufacturer in the whole land is now looking to Congress for the creation of prosperity by obstructing foreign commerce through high protective tariffs. Under the power to regulate commerce the government destroys foreign imports or cripples them to such an extent as will benefit the few thousands who manufacture the same kind of goods in our own country. This is done at the expense of tens of millions who buy them at enhanced prices, and it is the exercise of the most despotic power conceivable on the part of government. In this way the United States Government has come into close touch with these manufacturing interests all over the land, and is actually fixing the price of the necessaries of life for eighty millions of people. It exercises the power of determining the price of every shred of clothing which a man wears, of every piece of furniture in his home, of every piece of lumber, every nail, every piece of glass that enters into the construction of his house. Nobody would doubt that a law attempting to fix the prices at which the domestic manufacturer could sell his product would be unconstitutional, yet the Government indirectly, by means of its taxing power, and its regulation of foreign commerce, passes a law which enhances the price of the necessaries of life to everyone. This despotic power in government, more than anything else, has brought about corruption. It has turned the eyes of fifty thousand manufacturers to Washington for governmental privilege. It is simply a usurpation of power on the part of the government exercised for the benefit of the few at the expense of the remainder of its citizens.


President Lincoln stated that, in his opinion, it was impossible for a state to secede from the Union. He reaffirmed his statement in his first message to Congress, and in his Non-Intercourse Proclamation of August 16, 1861, declared, “Not the states but the inhabitants of the states were in insurrection against the United States.” The theory which he maintained throughout the war and down until his death was that the state was indestructible either through its own act or through the act of the United States Government. During his lifetime he established a state government in Louisiana and one or two other of the Southern States, and he maintained until the day of his death that the states were in the Union and had never been out of the Union. In the last speech which he ever made, April n, 1865, four days before his death by assassination, he said: “I am much censured from some supposed agency in setting up and seeking to sustain the new state government of Louisiana. In this, I have done just so much as, and no more than, the public knows.”


Never once in diplomatic correspondence or in proclamations or in any act of Congress during the war, did the Federal Government directly admit the existence of a state of war in the South. The carrying of mails and the performance of all governmental functions in the South continued during the war so far as the Government was able to carry them on. At the close of the war the United States courts commenced to sit in the circuits of the South and the United States Supreme Court commenced to hear appeals from the Southern States. Lincoln’s view of the indissoluble character of the Union was sustained by the United States Supreme Court. Chief Justice Chase, speaking for the Court, said of the ordinances of secession: “They were utterly without operation in law. The obligations of the state, as a member of the Union and as a citizen of the United States, remained perfect and unimpaired. It certainly follows that the state did not cease to be a state, nor her citizens to be citizens of the Union.”37


President Johnson adopted the attitude of Lincoln toward the Southern States and tried to carry out the dead President’s ideas. He established a state government in each of the Southern States. The thirteenth amendment to the Constitution was submitted to many of these states and was approved by them, so that it would seem that their legality was recognized by Congress. The temporary organization of the Southern States under the proclamations of Presidents Lincoln and Johnson were permitted to remain in force until the spring of 1867. The Republican Party in the House of Representatives, led by Thaddeus Stevens, openly admitted that they desired to reconstruct the Southern States so as to destroy the Democratic majorities which had existed there before the war. In the language of Mr. Stevens, they maintained that the Southern States were only “dead carcasses lying within the Union. . . .


They have torn their constitutional states to atoms and built on their foundations fabrics of a totally different character. Dead men cannot raise themselves. Dead states cannot restore their own existence ‘as it was.’ Whose especial duty is it to do it? In whom does the Constitution place the power?”38 And he concluded that that power was in the Congress and that the Southern States might be treated as subject provinces and new states created therein.


Accordingly, Mr. Stevens, as leader of the House, with a rancor of hatred never exceeded, devised a law for the reconstruction of the Southern States as odious for tyranny and cruel injustice as was ever conceived by the perverse intelligence of man. On March 2, 1867, Congress passed, over the President’s veto, a bill entitled “An Act to Provide for the More Efficient Government of the Rebel States.” It was, however, an act for the more thorough military subjection of the Southern States and is known as The Reconstruction Act. This act recited that no legal state government or adequate protection of life and property existed in the states of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, Florida, Texas, and Arkansas, and it provided that these states should be divided into five military districts under the command of officers of the army, assigned thereto by the President. Each of these commanders was to have under his control troops enough to enforce his authority. They were endowed with unlimited power over all the people of each district, the will of the military commander taking the place of the law. He could declare anything a crime which he chose to call so, and condemn and punish whomsoever he pleased. He was empowered to arrest the people of his department without warrant, accusation, or proof of probable cause. He could have them tried before local magistrates or before himself. He was empowered to remove all local magistrates if he desired. If, without his permission, a state court presumed to exercise legal jurisdiction over the trial of a person arrested he could break up the trial and punish the judge and the jurors.


In vetoing the bill, President Johnson said: “Such a power has not been wielded by any monarch in more than five hundred years. In all that time no people who speak the English language have borne such servitude.” The States of Mississippi and Georgia hastened to commence actions in the United States Supreme Court, asking the court to enjoin the President from the enforcement of this unconstitutional law which they declared would absolutely destroy the existence of their states, but the court held that it had no jurisdiction to enjoin the action of the President.39


The supplementary act of reconstruction of July 19, 1867, provided that the commanders of any district might remove any state, municipal, or other official and fill his place subject only to the disapproval of the general of the army; and it was made a duty of the commander “to remove from office all persons who are disloyal to the government of the United States or who use their influence in any manner to hinder, delay, prevent, or obstruct the due and proper administration of this act and the acts to which it is supplementary.” The act provided that no commander should be bound by any opinion of any civil officer of the United States. General Schofield was assigned to the first district, which included Virginia; General Sickles to the second district of North and South Carolina; General Pope to the third district of Georgia, Alabama, and Florida; General Ord to the fourth district of Mississippi and Arkansas, and General Sheridan to the fifth district of Louisiana and Texas.


Now observe how some of these generals ruled their departments. General Sickles prohibited the manufacture of whisky in North Carolina, saying that the grain was needed for food, and he prohibited the hotel keepers from selling intoxicating liquor; he created a trustee of Newbern Academy, enacted stay laws in North and South Carolina, and abolished imprisonment for debt; suspended the sale of property upon execution for liabilities contracted before December 19, 1860, and suspended the foreclosure of mortgages for one year. In his mightiness he decreed that the wages of agricultural labor were liens upon the crops; created homestead exemptions for those having families dependent upon their labor; abolished distress for rent; ordered that the currency of the United States be recognized as legal tender; decreed that absent debtors be exempted from attachment, and forbade bail in suits brought to recover ordinary contract debts. He prohibited discrimination in public conveyances between citizens because of color, and decreed that anyone injured by such discrimination had a right of action for damages. He acted as a reviewing court and set aside a decree of the South Carolina Court of Chancery providing that the portion of a fund raised to remount a Confederate cavalry force in 1865 remaining unused was to be returned to the contributors, and he judicially determined that the money belonged to the United States.


General Pope removed the mayor, the chief of police, and other municipal officers of Mobile, and filled their places with “efficient Union men”; decreed that the printing patronage in his department should be given only to the newspapers that did not oppose reconstruction; allowed Republican candidates for office in his department to act as election officials, charged with the supervision of the voting in which they had an interest, and authorized them to receive the votes of persons who were not registered in the precinct in which they offered their votes.


General Sheridan, at New Orleans, removed Governor Wells, of Louisiana, and appointed another man as governor in his place; decreed that colored men should be accepted as jurors; abolished the Louisiana Levee Board and assigned its duties to commissioners of his own appointing. He also abrogated an act of the Texas Legislature arranging the judicial districts in that state, upon the ground that the act, as he believed, had been passed for the purpose of legislating two Union judges out of office.


General Ord suspended proceedings looking to the sale of an estate on account of a deed of trust for money due for the purchase of negroes; commanded that illicit stills and their products be sold for the benefit of the poor on the ground that “poverty increased where whisky abounds”; suspended until the end of the year 1867 the judgment sale of lands under cultivation, crops, or agricultural implements, in actions arising before January 1, 1866; and caused the arrest and conviction by court-martial of W. H. McCardle, the editor of a Vicksburg newspaper, on the charge that he had published articles in his paper to incite the people to a breach of the peace and to impede reconstruction.40


McCardle procured a writ of habeas corpus from Judge Hill of the United States District Court. Upon the return thereof General Ord set forth that he held the prisoner by authority of the acts of Congress known as the Reconstruction Acts, and the court dismissed the writ. McCardle appealed from the decision to the Circuit and then to the Supreme Court of the United States, which denied a motion to dismiss his appeal and heard the case argued. The case, inasmuch as it involved the constitutionality of the Reconstruction Acts, was argued very fully before the United States Supreme Court between the second and ninth days of March, 1868. Mr. Rhodes says:41 “The constitutionality of the Reconstruction Acts was involved, and as five out of the nine Supreme Court judges believed them unconstitutional (so an apparently well-founded report ran) the Republicans in Congress were much alarmed. The House passed a bill requiring- two thirds of the judges to concur before any law should be deemed invalid, but this was never brought to the Senate from its Judiciary Committee. Later, however, the two Houses agreed on an act passing the same over the President’s veto (March 27, 1868) which, though general in its terms, took away from the Supreme Court its jurisdiction in the McCardle case and the appeal was therefore dismissed.”42


This method of heading off appeals was a common one in Reconstruction days. About every important act passed in that period when it once reached the United States Supreme Court was declared unconstitutional. The Tenure of Office Act was another illustration of such methods, practically taking away from President Johnson his right of removal from office. He removed Stanton, Secretary of the War Department, putting General Thomas in his place. An altercation and arrest followed, and an effort was made by the attorney-general to raise the question of the constitutionality of this act by appeal, but the complaint of Secretary Stanton was withdrawn and the effort to test its constitutionality thus destroyed.


In 1789 the leading members of the House of Representatives discussed at great length the power of the President of the United States to remove a Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs from office without the consent of the Senate, and it was determined, by a vote of thirty-four to twenty, that the President had full power to remove without the concurrence of the Senate.43 The determination then made was followed until the administration of President Johnson, and then the Tenure of Office Act was passed for the purpose of depriving him of the right of removal. Since that time the right has been acknowledged and today is unquestioned.


The Reconstruction Act provided for the election of a constitutional convention, and the formation of a constitutional government in each of the Southern States, excluding the greater part of the white voters of those states from taking part in the formation of their government. Then Congress made their adoption of the fourteenth amendment to the Constitution a condition of its receiving as members the representatives of the states which had framed constitutions.


Congress, in April, 1866, passed what was known as the Civil Rights Act. On March 31, 1870, it passed what was known as the Enforcement Act; again on February 28, 1871, a third act amending the Enforcement Act; and on April 20, 1871, a fourth act amending the Enforcement Act. All of these laws were unconstitutional. The last amendment provided as follows: “If two or more persons in any state or territory conspire or go in disguise upon the highway or upon the premises of another for the purpose of depriving, either directly or indirectly, any persons or class of persons of the equal protection of the laws or of equal privileges and immunities under the laws, or for the purpose of preventing or hindering the constituted authorities of any state or territory from giving or securing to all persons within such state or territory the equal protection of the laws; he or they are guilty of a misdemeanor and, upon conviction, liable to a fine of not less than $500 or greater than $5,000, and imprisonment for not less than six months nor more than six years, or both said fine and imprisonment.”


This law was known as the Ku Klux Law, and it sought to give to the National Government the power to execute the criminal laws in each of the states, especially in each of the Southern States where it was alleged that the Ku Klux were committing depredations upon the property and taking the lives of colored people. For eleven years this continued to be enforced. Finally, a case deciding their constitutionality reached the United States Supreme Court, and that court held that the law was not directed to the act of a state, but only against the acts of individuals gathering for the commission of crime, and that the fourteenth amendment to the Constitution did not apply to such a condition; that the law was directed merely against ordinary crime in the state, of which the state courts had exclusive jurisdiction, and that the law was unconstitutional and void.44


On March 1, 1875, General Grant approved a bill known as the Civil Rights Bill, the first bill mentioned above being unconstitutional. Its object was to secure to negroes equal rights in inns, public conveyances, and places of public amusement, and to prevent them from being deprived of the right of sitting on juries. Eight years later the United States Supreme Court declared the first and second sections of the act null and void, holding that so long as a state did not pass a law depriving the negro of these rights the Supreme Court could not interfere, since the prohibition of the fourteenth amendment was directed against a state which discriminated against a citizen for any reason, and deprived him of the civil rights which other citizens enjoyed; and that, under the fourteenth amendment, Congress had no authority to attempt to regulate the rights of the citizens of the states, thus leaving the whole question of the social rights of a citizen where it had ever belonged   to the state governments.45


The constitutions in many of the states, reorganized by carpetbag politicians, contained many provisions intended to prevent the Southern leaders, who had had connection with the war, from even earning their livelihood. In the Constitution of Missouri there was a provision to the effect that every person who had aided and sympathized with the South was incapable of holding any office of honor or profit or trust in the state. No such person could be an officer, trustee, or manager of any public or private corporation, he could not act as a professor or teacher in any educational institution or in any common school, nor could he hold any real estate or other property in trust for any church, religious society, or congregation. An oath of loyalty was required as a condition precedent to his exercising the calling of a bishop, priest, deacon, clergyman, or lawyer, such oath being that he had never directly or indirectly done any of the acts of disqualification against which the amendment was leveled.


Sixty days after this Constitution took effect no person was to be allowed, without first taking this oath, to practice as attorney at law, or to act as priest, deacon, minister, clergyman, etc., of any religious persuasion. If he continued without taking such oath after the sixty days he was liable, on conviction thereof, to be punished by a fine of not less than $500, or imprisonment of not less than six months in the county jail, or both, at the discretion of the court. The Rev. Mr. Cummings, a priest of the Catholic Church and a citizen of Missouri, was indicted and convicted in the Circuit Court of Pike County for continuing his work as priest without taking such oath. He was sentenced to pay a fine of $500 and to be committed to jail until the fine and the costs were paid. On appeal from this decision to the United States Supreme Court, the question was presented whether this act was not in fact a bill of attainder, and whether it was not obnoxious to that clause of the Constitution of the United States which prohibited a state from passing such bill of attainder or ex post facto law. That court held the law ex post facto in its nature and reversed the decision of the state court.46


The Constitution provides that the times, places, and manner of holding the elections for senators and representatives shall be prescribed in each state by the legislature thereof, but that Congress at any time may alter such regulations, except as to places of choosing the senators. No clause in the Constitution created so much opposition before the conventions of the adopting states. The conventions in North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and New York strongly remonstrated against it, but the people were assured that the National Government would never avail itself of the provision. For many years, however, after the Civil War and until well down in the eighties. Federal supervisors and marshals were empowered by a statute of Congress to supervise elections in every state where members of Congress were to be elected. They supervised the polls in New York and many other states where assemblymen, mayors, state and city judges were being elected. They often examined the ballots for these state officers, claiming that they were authorized to be present at the opening of all the boxes, those for state and local officials as well as those for Congressmen. By the provisions of the statute authorizing this provision the United States District Court could appoint two supervisors for each district, and the United States marshal could create as many deputies as he deemed necessary to aid him in enforcing the law. It is said that 15,000 supervisors and deputy marshals surrounded the polls at the general election of 1876, and many state officers were punished by the Federal courts for alleged violations of both the national statute and state laws at that election.


In the autumn of 1874 an election for members of the Legislature took place in the State of Louisiana. On the face of the returns the Conservatives, or what were known as the white man’s party, had a majority of five in a House of Representatives of one hundred and eleven members. The government of Louisiana had been so bad for many years under the control of the negro party that even the better class of negroes, becoming disgusted, deserted their party and voted for the white candidates. The Returning Board, controlled by Governor Kellogg and Marshal Packard, found that fifty-three Republicans and only fifty-three of what were known as the Conservatives had been elected, and rendered no decision as to the other five seats. A committee appointed by the United States House of Representatives to examine as to the act of the Returning Board, and as to the honesty of the Conservatives, whose members had been rejected because of alleged intimidation and fraud, consisting of Charles Foster, afterwards Secretary of the Treasury, William Walter Phelps, and Clarkson N. Potter, visited New Orleans and made their report to the effect that the action of the Returning Board was illegal, and that in substance the Conservative majority was procured by honest means. When, however, the Legislature came to assemble, General de Trobriand, of the army of the United States, entered the House of Representatives in uniform, his sword at his side and escorted by his staff. Furnished with an order by Governor Kellogg to clear the hall of all not returned as legal members by the Returning Board, he removed the five members by force, leaving the Republicans in control, who finally organized the House and proceeded to do business. The acts of Charles I and of Cromwell, in removing members from the House of Commons by violence, ever since have been landmarks in usurpation. This act of President Grant and of his general ought to stand side by side with these early acts of tyranny.


Property of considerable value was abandoned from time to time by citizens of the Southern States during the Civil War, and was taken possession of and sold by the National Government and the proceeds deposited in the United States Treasury. On December 8, 1863, the President, pursuant to the authority of Congress, made a proclamation offering pardon to citizens of the South who would take a prescribed oath and return to their allegiance to the National Government. As an inducement to bring about this result the President promised restoration of all their rights of property except as to slaves, and offered to return to the owners of abandoned property the proceeds thereof in the United States Treasury. Thousands of Southern men availed themselves of this proclamation, and after the war many claims for the proceeds of such abandoned property were filed in the Court of Claims. The fact that the claimant had taken the oath after the proclamation, had availed himself of the conditions of the proclamation, and had received the pardon of the President was regarded as sufficient to entitle him to prosecute his claim before the court without other proof of his loyalty. On July 12, 1870, Congress passed, as a rider to the Appropriation Bill, a law providing that no prior pardon of the President should be admissible in evidence on the part of any claimant in the Court of Claims in support of his claim for the proceeds of abandoned property, and that proof of his loyalty must be made irrespective of the effect of the proclamation of the President and his availing himself thereof; and that where the claim had been dismissed and the claimant took an appeal therefrom, that the Appellate Court, when it appeared that proof of loyalty depended alone upon such pardon, should affirm the judgment of the Court of Claims. This statute was declared unconstitutional as an infringement of the right of the President to grant such pardon and as destroying its effect.47


During all the period between 1789, when the first Congress under the Constitution convened, and 1863 the United States Supreme Court had declared only two statutes unconstitutional.48 It is true that in two other cases during that period the court had held that duties imposed upon it by the Congress were not judicial in their nature and that therefore they were under no obligations to perform them.49 In addition to the unconstitutional acts described in this chapter passed in the war and Reconstruction days, the United States Supreme Court declared four other acts of that period unconstitutional.50 Between the years 1863 and 1870 eleven statutes were passed by Congress which were declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States. During the same period the examination by the Supreme Court of several Congressional statutes was prevented by acts of Congress repealing the law allowing appeals to that court. So that during seventy-four years of the history of the country between 1789 and 1863 the United States Supreme Court declared two Congressional acts unconstitutional; while during the period from 1863 to 1870, a period of only seven years, eleven statutes were declared unconstitutional and many more would have been declared unconstitutional had the court ever had the opportunity to pass upon them. No facts could more strongly demonstrate that this era of the latter part of the Civil War and the Reconstruction Period was an era of usurpation than the decision of the highest court that so many statutes passed in that period were void as usurping the rights of the several states.


The importance of the facts which we have given are found in their violence. We, perhaps, have no reason for fear in this country that our liberties will be violently wrested from us. The danger is that they will be secretly undermined and gradually destroyed. The usurping acts of the war were white compared with the cold calculating despotism of Reconstruction days. Mr. Rhodes quotes Bishop Galloway, of Mississippi, as saying in 1903:51 “Those pitiless years of reconstruction! Worse than the calamities of war were the ‘desolating furies of peace.’ No proud people ever suffered such indignities or endured such humiliation and degradation.”


After the Battle of the Boyne, for more than a century England kept the Irish Catholics reduced to the condition of helots, attempting to extirpate their religion, excluding them from Parliament, from municipal office, from legislatures, and from the jury box. The prevailing party of reconstruction sought to accomplish the same results, not because they feared the South as England feared Catholicism, but for the selfish and wicked purpose of political supremacy. Senator Howe, speaking in the United States Senate in those days in behalf of the reconstruction policy of his party, said:


“Do senators comprehend what consequences would result necessarily from restoring the functions of those states! It will add fifty eight members to the House of Representatives, more than one fourth of its present membership. It will add twenty two members to the Senate; more than one half of the present membership. The Constitution designed the legislature to be independent of the Executive. But what independence has that legislature in which the executive at his pleasure may pour so many votes!”52


When General Terry, in command of the department which included the State of Georgia, ousted twenty-four Democrats from the Legislature and by his own appointment filled their places by Republicans, at the same time restoring a number of negroes who had been expelled, Carl Schurz declared in the United States Senate that these acts of General Terry’s were usurpations.


Senator Henry Wilson, of Massachusetts, replied: “Law or no law, we want to keep this state government in power.” In the House of Representatives Thaddeus Stevens, with a malignity as bitter as characterized the leaders of the French Revolution, and that unscrupulous demagogue, Benjamin F. Butler, fired their followers with hatred and fanaticism to enact these pitiless and unconstitutional laws.


War is never done. It leaves its baleful seed for generations. We are suffering today from these usurpations. The exercise of such powers accustomed our people to the sight of tyranny, and as a partial result of those deeds our Government is being transformed. Already the Constitution by construction has been stretched to cover a multitude of conditions never anticipated by its makers; and we are face to face with the problem whether ours is a government under a written constitution and the laws made pursuant thereto, or whether it is a government by ambitious and usurping men.

https://lonang.com/library/reference/pierce-federal-usurpation/pfu-02/


"I'll give you my gun when you pry (or take) it from my cold, dead hands" is a slogan popularized by US organizations opposed to gun control. A form of the slogan is attested from the 1970s when it was promoted by the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms. It gained widespread popularity following the May 2000 National Rifle Association convention when actor and then-president of the NRA, Charlton Heston, used the phrase to conclude a speech. [1][2] Though the slogan has often been used by gun owners and their supporters, it has also been frequently satirised and parodied in the media and by supporters of greater gun control in the United States


Origin

A form of the slogan has existed since at least the mid 1970s. It is referred to in a 1975 article by Larry Wilensky for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch newspaper; the article was subsequently reproduced in a 1976 report on gun control from the Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee to Investigate Juvenile Delinquency. Wilensky reports that the bumper stickers were at that time sold reading "I Will Give Up My Gun When They Peel My Cold Dead Fingers From Around It." The stickers were sold by the Citizens Committee for to Right to Keep and Bear Arms, today the advocacy arm of the Second Amendment Foundation.[3]


John Wayne paraphrased the slogan in a July 19, 1976, interview with Boxoffice:


When asked if he was prepared to give up his guns, Wayne replied:  "I have a sign on my car that reads: 'They can have my guns when they can pry them loose from my cold dead fingers.'"[4]


Use by Charlton Heston

The phrase gained newfound popularity following the 129th NRA convention, in Charlotte, North Carolina on May 20, 2000, when actor and then-president of the NRA, Charlton Heston, ended a speech by concluding:


When ordinary hands can possess such an extraordinary instrument, that symbolizes the full measure of human dignity and liberty. That's why those five words issue an irresistible call to us all, and we muster.


Heston then paused to pick up a replica of a flintlock long rifle and continued:[5]


So, as we set out this year to defeat the divisive forces that would take freedom away, I want to say those fighting words for everyone within the sound of my voice to hear and to heed, and especially for you, Mr. Gore: 'From my cold, dead hands!'[6]


— Charlton Heston, May 20, 2000

Use in American politics

The phrase has been used by numerous Second Amendment rights groups including The National Rifle Association, National Association for Gun Rights.[7] The term also lends itself to the Second Amendment for-profit business Cold Dead Hands.


Media appearances

In the 1984 film Red Dawn, Soviet paratroopers invade the middle United States. A bumper sticker with the statement on it is shown, and then the camera pans to an M1911A1 pistol clutched in its dead owner's hand. One of the paratroopers literally takes the gun from his dead hands, shoves it in his own belt, and then leaves.


In the 1997 film Men in Black, a farmer named Edgar threatens a recently landed evil alien with a shotgun. Told to place the projectile weapon on the ground, Edgar says, "You can have my gun when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers." The alien responds, "Your proposal is acceptable", kills Edgar, and begins using his skin as a disguise.


The phrase is used to introduce Heston (and thence his NRA experience) to viewers of Michael Moore's 2002 documentary film Bowling for Columbine.


In 2005, the phrase was parodied by The Onion in their "300th Anniversary" issue dated June 22, 2056. A small item on the page claimed: "Grave robbers pry valuable rifle from Charlton Heston's cold, dead hands".[8] Later in 2008, shortly after Charlton Heston's death, The Onion again parodied the phrase in a photo caption.[9]


The 2012 update Mann vs Machine for the video game Team Fortress 2 contains a parody of the phrase as one of the Soldier character responses: "You can have this when you pry it from my cold, dead hands. And even then, good luck! Because I will have glued it to my cold, dead hands!"[10]


In 2013, Jim Carrey with The Eels created a single and accompanying music video "Cold Dead Hand", ridiculing gun culture in the United States and specifically Charlton Heston, declaring that he could not enter Heaven as even angels could not pry the gun from his hands.[11][12]


Anthony Jeselnik, on his 2013 TV show, The Jeselnik Offensive, said, "They can have my gun when they pry it from my curious six-year-old's cold dead hands."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_my_cold,_dead_hands


Brady: United Against Gun Violence (formerly “Handgun Control, Inc”., the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence) is an American nonprofit organization that advocates for gun control and against gun violence. It is named after former White House press secretary James "Jim" Brady, who was permanently disabled and later died in 2014 as a result of the Ronald Reagan assassination attempt of 1981, and his wife Sarah Brady, who was a chairwoman of the organization from 1989 until her death in 2015.[2][3]


Brady was founded in 1974 as the National Council to Control Handguns (NCCH). From 1980 through 2000, it operated under the name Handgun Control, Inc. (HCI). In 2001, it was renamed the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, and its sister project, the center to Prevent Handgun Violence, was renamed the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. The nonprofits rebranded as Brady in February 2019, on the 25th anniversary of the implementation of the Brady Bill.[4]


History

In 1974, the National Council to Control Handguns (NCCH) was founded by armed-robbery victim Mark Borinsky, a graduate of Johns Hopkins University. In 1975, Republican marketing manager Pete Shields, whose 23-year-old son had been murdered, joined NCCH as chairman. In 1980, the organization became Handgun Control, Inc. (HCI) and partnered with the National Coalition to Ban Handguns (NCBH). The partnership did not last long; the NCBH, renamed in 1990 as the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV), generally advocates for stricter gun laws than does the Brady Campaign.[5]: 111–112 [6]


HCI had few resources until 1980, after the murder of musician John Lennon increased the public's interest in shootings. By 1981, HCI's membership exceeded 100,000. In 1983, the center to Prevent Handgun Violence (CPHV) was founded as an educational outreach organization and sister project. In 1989, CPHV established the Legal Action Project to press its agenda in the courts.[5][6]


In 2001, Handgun Control, Inc. was renamed the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, and the center to Prevent Handgun Violence was renamed the Brady Center to Prevent Handgun Violence, in honor of both Jim and Sarah Brady. The same year, the Million Mom March (MMM) was incorporated into the Brady Campaign.[5][6][7]


Leadership

Current

In September 2017, Kris Brown and Avery W. Gardiner assumed the roles of co-president, replacing Dan Gross.[8] Brown was named the organization's sole president in November 2018.[9] Liz Dunning, whose mother was randomly murdered by a serial killer in 2003, is the vice president for development.[10]


Former

Mark Borinsky founded the National Council to Control Handguns in 1974. He served as chair until 1976. Charlie Orasin was a key player in the founding and growth of Handgun Control (HCI). He worked at HCI from 1975 until 1992.[11]


Nelson "Pete" Shields became the organization's chairman in 1978 and retired in 1989.[12] In July 1976, Shields estimated that it would take seven to ten years for NCCH to reach the goal of "total control of handguns in the United States." He said: "The first problem is to slow down the increasing number of handguns being produced and sold in this country. The second is to get handguns registered. And the final problem is to make the possession of all handguns and all handgun ammunition – except for the military, policemen, licensed security guards, licensed sporting clubs, and licensed gun collectors – totally illegal."[13] In 1987 Shields said that he believed "in the right of law-abiding citizens to possess handguns... for legitimate purposes.".[14]


Richard Aborn served as president from 1992 until 1996 and went on to form the Citizens Crime Commission of New York City.[15][16]


Jim and Sarah Brady were both influential in the movement since at least the mid-1980s. Mrs. Brady became chair in 1989, and the Bradys became the namesakes of the organization in 2000.[3]


Former Maryland congressman Michael D. Barnes was the president of the Brady Campaign from 2000 to May 2006.[15]


Former Fort Wayne, Indiana, mayor Paul Helmke served from July 2006 to July 2011.[17] In November 2008, Brady president Helmke, a former Republican mayor of Fort Wayne, Indiana, endorsed the American Hunters and Shooters Association saying, "I see our issues as complementary to theirs." He said, "The Brady Campaign is not just East Coast liberal Democrats."[18]


Dan Gross was president from February 2012 to September 2017. He is one of the founders of the Center to Prevent Youth Violence (formerly PAX).[19]


Political advocacy


Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence

2009 Brady Campaign State Scorecard[20]

  75–100, Most restrictive

  50–74

  25–49

  11–24

  0-10, Least restrictive

Undetectable Firearms Act

In 1988, HCI supported Congress in passing the Undetectable Firearms Act, which banned the manufacture, possession and transfer of firearms with less than 3.7 oz of metal, after the emergence of "plastic" handguns[6][21] like Glock pistols.


Critics said that so-called "plastic" handguns contain many metal components (such as the slide, barrel and ammunition) and can be detected by conventional screening technologies. Their response was to say the type of polymer used in the firearms is opaque to X-ray scanners, which would've hidden the metal components.[22]


Brady Law

HCI was the chief supporter of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, commonly known as the Brady Law, enacted in 1993 after a seven-year debate. It successfully lobbied for passage of the Federal Assault Weapons Ban, banning the manufacture and importation of so-called military-style assault weapons.[23]


Castle and stand-your-ground laws

In May 2005, Florida passed a stand-your-ground law that authorized persons attacked in any place they were lawfully present to use lethal force in self-defense without a duty to retreat.[24] Brady Campaign workers passed out fliers at Miami International Airport offering tips like "Do not argue unnecessarily with local people." The group also published ads in The Boston Globe, The Chicago Tribune, and The Detroit Free Press saying: "Thinking about a Florida vacation? Please ensure your family is safe."[25] In 2006, when similar laws were enacted or proposed in other states, the Brady Campaign and other critics warned they could result in vigilantism.[26]


Heller and McDonald cases

After the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2010 in McDonald v. Chicago, Brady president Paul Helmke said he was "pleased that the Court reaffirmed its language in District of Columbia v. Heller that the Second Amendment individual right to possess guns in the home for self-defense does not prevent our elected representatives from enacting 'common-sense' gun laws to protect our communities from gun violence."[27]


Lawsuits

On March 19, 2009, a federal judge ordered a temporary injunction blocking the implementation of the rule allowing concealed carry permit holders to carry firearms concealed within National Park Service lands within states where their permits are valid, based upon environmental concerns, in response to efforts by the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, the National Parks Conservation Association, and the Coalition of National Park Service Retirees.[28][29] On May 20, 2009, the injunction was overturned by the passing of an amendment to the Credit CARD Act of 2009, added by Senator Tom Coburn (R, OK) over the objections of the Brady Campaign.[30]


Sandy Hook school shooting aftermath

In the month after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, the Brady Campaign raised about $5 million[31] and renewed public interest in passing legislation to reduce gun violence. The Brady Campaign has continued to promote federal reform legislation, including an expansion of the national background check program. Its leadership met with President Obama and Vice President Biden to craft a package of bills aimed at reducing gun violence.[32]


Aurora, Colorado theater shooting

In 2014, the parent and step-parent of one of the 2012 Aurora, Colorado shooting victims, represented by Brady Center lawyers, filed suit against the companies from whom James Holmes purchased the ammunition, magazines, and body armor he used in the shooting. In 2015, the judge in the case dismissed the suit on the grounds that such a lawsuit is in violation of both Colorado law and the federal Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act because the guns and ammunition obtained from the online companies, including Lucky Gunner and The Sportsman's Guide, worked as claimed. He also ordered the plaintiffs to pay the legal costs of the defendants, which came to $280,000. As the Brady Center lawyers would be expected to know applicable case law in such a lawsuit, it is not clear whether the Brady Center or the plaintiffs themselves are responsible for paying the judgment.[33][34]


Assault weapons

The Brady Campaign contends that self-loading and select-fire weapons are virtually identical since a semi-automatic rifle may be fired rapidly.[35]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brady_Campaign


American JesuitWalter J. Ciszek (1904 – 1984), 1930; 1980

The official history of this American Jesuit who supposedly was arrested in the

USSR by the NKVD in 1941 as a “Vatican spy” and then sent to the Lubyanka to

be interrogated for five years, then to spend the next ten years in Siberian Gulags

as a persecuted, overworked common priest must be completely rejected as a

fabrication from start to finish. On the contrary, Walter Ciszek is the greatest

American inquisitor to date, exceeding the infamous Jesuit Pierre De Smet. A

self-described “street-tough” American of Polish descent, Ciszek was raised in

the icy coal region of Shenandoah, Pennsylvania, the Devil physically preparing

his chosen vessel for a “ministry of extirpation” in “heretic” Orthodox Russia.

He entered the Novitiate in 1928 and, upon completing his formation in 1934,

entered the Black Pope’s Russian College in Rome. From 1934 to 1938 Ciszek

not only imbibed the Pope’s Canon Law that he would later enforce in the USSR,

but he learned the language and customs of the Russian people fitting him to that

use previously determined by Polish Jesuit Superior General Ledochowski’s

subordinate commanders. Ciszek was tough, a Pole by race, adapted to cold

weather and was eager to wage the ancient Jesuit warfare against “heretics” so

accursed by his Council of Trent. In 1937 Ciszek was ordained in the Latin Rite

and Oriental/Byzantine Rite in Rome, performing his first magical “Mass”

(converting the little Jesus cookie and a cup of wine into the literal body and

blood of Rome’s false Christ) with Jesuit Vincent McCormick, President of

Rome’s Gregorian University and later the powerful American Assistant to

Jesuit General Janssens. Also present was that darling of the Order, Dame of

Malta Genevieve Brady, an intimate friend of Eugenio Pacelli, later Pius XII.

With the backing of the American Knights, the White Pope and the Black Pope,

Ciszek was sent to eastern Poland’s Albyrtyn Jesuit Mission in late 1938 to await

Stalin’s 1939 invasion. With that Soviet attack, his unique mission would begin.

A House of Bread: The Jesuits Celebrate 70 Years in Wernersville, Pennsylvania, Kathy M. Scogna,

(Wernersville, Pennsylvania: Kathy M. Scogna, 2000) p. 142.

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1120

Dame of Malta Genevieve Brady, 1934 #415

Receiving Doctor of Laws from Jesuit Georgetown University

Acting Family for Jesuit Walter J. Ciszek’s Ordination and First Mass, 1937

Jesuits McCormick, General Janssens and Zacheus Maher, 1949 #416

Vincent McCormick, at the time he acted as family for Walter Ciszek at Ciszek’s

first Mass, was President of Gregorian University in Rome—the greatest of all

Jesuit universities. In 1949, while Ciszek is supposedly laboring under a 15-year

prison sentence in Stalin’s USSR, McCormick is the most powerful American

Jesuit in the world—the General’s American Assistant in Rome having replaced

Maher. Upon the nod of Superior General Janssens and one phone call from

Assistant McCormick to Josef Stalin’s personal secretary, Jesuit Poskrebyshev,

Ciszek could have been on the first ship back to the Order’s American Empire.

A House of Bread: The Jesuits Celebrate 70 Years in Wernersville, Pennsylvania, Kathy M. Scogna,

(Wernersville, Pennsylvania: Kathy M. Scogna, 2000) p. 24.

Men Astutely Trained, Peter McDonough, (New York: The Free Press, 1992).

Chapter 37

The Jesuits — 1914 – 1945

1121

Jesuit Walter J. Ciszek at the Novitiate, Wernersville, PA, 1963 #417

In accordance with the Order’s plan of converting “godless, communist” Russia

to the spiritual and temporal powers of the Pope intended by the Fatima Hoax

reported just prior to the Order’s October Revolution of 1917, Jesuit Coadjutors

Hitler and Stalin would secretly work together in “extirpating” the anticommunist

Polish Roman Catholic and Russian Orthodox peoples from 1939 to

1945. With Stalin’s invasion of eastern Poland in late 1939, Ciszek and a Russian

Jesuit entered the Black Pope’s USSR in March of 1940 after which the Order’s

NKVD murdered nearly 15,000 Polish officers in Katyn Forest, then blaming the

Germans until 1989. Working as a lumberjack in the Urals, he gained the

confidence of his fellows when, in 1941, the NKVD arrested every dissident in the

barracks—thanks to the betrayal of NKVD agent Walter Ciszek! To prevent

suspicion, the Jesuit was also arrested and given a 15-year prison sentence,

spending five years in the NKGB’s Lubyanka prison to be trained in the Jesuit

black arts of interrogation, torture and murder. From 1946 to 1955 Ciszek was

assigned to the old Jesuit stronghold of Siberia, where he participated in the

governance of the Order’s gulag system of concentration camps, fighting the

Pope’s Cold War on the Soviet side—extirpating millions! From 1955 to 1963 he

continued to work for Jesuit General Janssens’ KGB until exchanged for two

Soviet spies, returning to America in October, 1963, one month prior to Cardinal

Spellman’s CIA/FBI/Secret Service assassination of JFK. In 1964 Ciszek wrote

his cover-up work, With God In Russia, and spent the next twenty years teaching

at Fordham University specializing in Loyola’s Spiritual Exercises. No doubt he

knew the power of New York’s Jesuits controlling Cardinal Spellman whose rule

over the State Department had brought the Jesuit out of Khrushchev’s USSR.

Above, Ciszek views the crypt of his benefactors, Nicholas and Genevieve Brady.

A House of Bread: The Jesuits Celebrate 70 Years in Wernersville, Pennsylvania, Kathy M. Scogna,

(Wernersville, Pennsylvania: Kathy M. Scogna, 2000) p. 29.

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1122

The Black Pope Blesses JesuitWalter J. Ciszek’s Grave, 2000 #418

One of the maxims of the Order is complete uniformity in both life and death.

The graves are positioned in equally spaced rows forming a vaginal outline

around a centerpiece, being illustrative of these “Knights of the Virgin Mary.”

Every headstone records the name and status, and is identical in shape and size

with essential details written in Latin: date of birth; date entered into the Society

of Jesus; and date of death with a three-lettered abbreviation at the bottom—

“RIP.” No distinguishing amenities are permitted—except for Walter J. Ciszek!

Buried here at the former Jesuit Novitiate of St. Isaac Jogues in Wernersville,

Pennsylvania, is a Jesuit of such vast international importance that the Superior

General of the Order, Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, would personally appear to bless

the grave. In commemorating that occasion, a metal latticework remains on both

sides of the headstone, adorned with meaningful trinkets and flowers. What

could be the magnitude of the personal accomplishments of a man who spent 23

years in the USSR as a virtual unknown soldier for the Company? We shall know

the truth of Jesuit Walter J. Ciszek at the Great White Throne Judgment!

A House of Bread: The Jesuits Celebrate 70 Years in Wernersville, Pennsylvania, Kathy M. Scogna,

(Wernersville, Pennsylvania: Kathy M. Scogna, 2000) p. 143.

Vatican Assassins:

“Wounded In The House Of My Friends”

Third Edition

by Eric Jon Phelps

https://ia802505.us.archive.org/28/items/EricJonPhelpsVaticanAssassins3rdEdition/Eric%20Jon%20Phelps%20-%20Vatican%20Assassins%203rd%20Edition.pdf


On January 8, 2011, Giffords was shot in the head[38] outside a Safeway grocery store in Casas Adobes, Arizona, a suburban area northwest of Tucson, during her first "Congress on Your Corner" (a public opportunity for constituents to speak directly with their representatives)[39] gathering of the year.[40] A man ran up to the crowd and began firing a 9mm pistol with a 33-round magazine.[41][42] The gunman hit 19 individuals with gunfire, killing six of them.[43] Among the dead were federal judge John Roll and 9-year-old child Christina-Taylor Green. Green was the granddaughter of major league baseball manager and GM Dallas Green.[44][45][46] A 20th person was injured at the scene, but not by gunfire.[38][43]


The shooter, Jared Lee Loughner,[47] was detained by bystanders until he was taken into police custody.[48][49] Federal officials charged Loughner on the next day with killing federal government employees, attempting to assassinate a member of Congress, and attempting to kill federal employees.[50][51][52] After eventually facing more than 50 federal criminal charges, Loughner pleaded guilty to 19 of them in a plea bargain to avoid a death sentence.[53]


Giffords's intern, Daniel Hernández Jr., provided first-aid assistance to her immediately after she was wounded, and is credited with saving her life.[54] She was quickly evacuated to the University Medical Center of Tucson in critical condition,[55] though she was still conscious and "following commands."[38]


On the same day, doctors performed emergency surgery to extract skull fragments and a small amount of necrotic tissue from her brain.[56] The bullet passed through Giffords's head without crossing the midline of the brain, where the most critical injuries typically result.[38] Part of her skull was removed to avoid further damage to the brain from pressure caused by swelling.[57] Doctors who first treated Giffords said the bullet entered the back of her head and exited through the front of her skull, but physicians later concluded that it had traveled in the opposite direction.[58]


Upon receiving a call from a staffer about Giffords's injury, her husband Mark Kelly and his daughters flew in a friend's aircraft directly from Houston to Tucson.[59][60]


Recovery

Giffords was initially placed in an induced coma to allow her brain to rest. She was able to respond to simple commands when periodically awakened, but was unable to speak as she was on a ventilator.[61] Nancy Pelosi (the House minority leader) shared that Giffords's husband Mark Kelly had acknowledged that there was a "rough road ahead" in her recovery, but that he was encouraged by her responsiveness,[62] including her ability to signal with her hand and move both arms.[63] U.S. Army neurologist Geoffrey Ling of the Uniformed Services University in Bethesda, Maryland, was sent to Tucson to consult on Giffords's condition. Ling stated, "Her prognosis for maintaining the function that she has is very good. It's over 50 percent."[64] On January 11, neurosurgeon G. Michael Lemole Jr. said that Giffords's sedation had been reduced and that she could breathe on her own.[65] On January 12, President Barack Obama visited Giffords at the medical center and publicly stated in an evening memorial ceremony for the victims of the shooting that Giffords had "opened her eyes for the first time" that day.[66] Shortly after the shootings, some questions were raised by the media as to whether Giffords could be removed from office under a state law that allows a public office to be declared vacant if the officeholder is absent for three months, but a spokesperson for the Arizona secretary of state said the statute "doesn't apply to federal offices" and was, therefore, not relevant.[67]


As Giffords's status improved, by mid-January she began simple physical therapy,[68] including sitting up with the assistance of hospital staff and moving her legs upon command.[68][60] On January 15, surgeons performed a tracheotomy, replacing the ventilator tube with a smaller one inserted through Giffords's throat to assist independent breathing.[69][70] Ophthalmologist Lynn Polonski surgically repaired Giffords's damaged eye socket,[71] with additional reconstructive surgery to follow.[72] Giffords's condition improved from "critical" to "serious" on January 17,[73] and to "good" on January 25.[74] She was transferred on January 21 to the Memorial Hermann Medical Center in Houston, Texas, where she subsequently moved to the TIRR Memorial Hermann to undergo a program of physical therapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy.[74][75] Medical experts' initial assessment in January was that Giffords's recovery could take from several months to more than one year.[76] Upon her arrival in Houston, her doctors were optimistic, saying she has "great rehabilitation potential".[77]


On March 12, 2011, Giffords's husband informed her that six people had been killed in the attack on her, but he did not identify who they were until months later.[78] In late April, Giffords's doctors reported that her physical, cognitive, and language production abilities had improved significantly, placing her in the top 5 percent of patients recovering from similar injuries.[79] She was walking under supervision with perfect control of her left arm and leg, and able to write with her left hand. She was able to read and understand, and spoke in short phrases. With longer efforts, she was able to produce more complex sentences.[79]


From early in her recovery, Giffords's husband had expressed confidence that she would be able to travel to the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, to witness the launch of his final Space Shuttle mission, STS-134, which was scheduled for April 2011.[80] On April 25, Giffords's doctors cleared her for travel to Florida for the launch, scheduled for April 29. She went to Florida to watch from a private family area with no public appearance or photography. The launch of STS-134 was delayed due to mechanical problems, and Giffords and Kelly returned to Houston after meeting with President Obama, who had also planned to see the launch with his family at Kennedy Space Center (KSC).[81][82]


After continuing her rehabilitation therapy in Houston,[83][84] Giffords returned to KSC for her husband's launch on May 16, 2011. Kelly wore his wife's wedding ring into space, which she had exchanged for his.[85]


August 1, 2011: Giffords's first appearance in the House of Representatives since her attempted assassination

Giffords underwent cranioplasty surgery on May 18, 2011, to replace the part of her skull that had been removed in January to permit her brain to swell after the gunshot to her head. Surgeons replaced the bone with a piece of molded hard plastic, fixed with tiny screws. They expected that her skull would eventually fuse with the porous plastic. From that point, Giffords no longer needed to wear the helmet that she had been wearing to protect her brain from further injury.[86][87] On June 9, 2011, her aide Pia Carusone announced that while Giffords's comprehension appeared to be "close to normal, if not normal", she was not yet speaking in complete sentences.[88] On June 12, two photos of Giffords taken on May 17 were released, the first since the shooting.[89] On June 15, Giffords was released from the hospital to return home, where she continued speech, music, physical and occupational therapy.[90] Having learned the French horn as a child, she picked it up again as part of her music therapy, an experience she described in a speech endorsing Joe Biden's presidential bid at the 2020 Democratic presidential convention.[91]


On August 1, 2011, she made her return to the House floor to vote in favor of raising the debt limit ceiling. She was met with a standing ovation and accolades from her fellow members of Congress.[92] A Giffords spokesman, Mark Kimble, stated in August 2011 that the congresswoman was walking without a cane and was writing left-handed, as she did not have full use of her right side.[93] On October 6, Giffords traveled to Washington for her husband's retirement ceremony, where she presented him with the Distinguished Flying Cross medal. She returned to her husband's Texas home.[94] On October 25, 2011, she travelled to Asheville, North Carolina, for intensive rehabilitation treatments, ending November 4.[95] During her treatments in North Carolina, she stayed at the North Carolina Governor's Western Residence.[96] In Kelly's memoir, Gabby: A Story of Courage and Hope, released in November 2011, he reported that Giffords would return to Congress. As of 2016, she continued to struggle with language and had lost fifty percent of her vision in both eyes.[78]


During recovery, Giffords made a concerted effort to share her progress with the public through statements, videos, and other means of communication. Giffords’s recovery and subsequent gun violence prevention advocacy was also chronicled in the 2022 documentary Gabby Giffords Won't Back Down, directed by Julie Cohen and Betsy West.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabby_Giffords


Chapter 9

The Jesuits —1641

The Irish Massacre

Assassination of Lieutenant General Henry Ireton

“The good counsellors of great statesmen, that parliaments of both

kingdoms would take from the king’s majesty, are a faction of perjured

Papists, Prelates, Jesuits, Irish cut-throats, Stratfords, and Apostates;

subverters of all laws, divine, human, of God, of church, of state.” {1}

Samuel Rutherford, 1644

English Presbyterian Preacher

Lex Rex: The Law and the Prince

“Ireland is the most priest-ridden, Jesuitically-governed nation on the

face of the earth.” {2} [Emphasis added]

Hector Macpherson, 1914

English Historian

The Jesuits in History

“Every Jesuit is outwardly a monk, inwardly a devil, and altogether a

serpent.” {3}

Ian Paisley, 1968

Irish Presbyterian Preacher

Member, House of Commons

The Jesuits

“Cardinal Manning has recently said that ‘Romanists never persecuted

Protestants.’ It is a popish lie, told to bolster up a popish movement, in

helping to re-establish ‘Rome rule in Ireland,’ and put forth without a blush

in the face of the most reliable history. In 1172 Nicholas Breakspear, an

Englishman, was elected to the See of Rome under the name of Adrian IV.

He gave Ireland to Henry II of England, under the condition that the

Romish faith be forced upon the people, and that the Pope receive one

penny from each house annually. This is the origin of Peter’s Pence. The

annals of Ulster tell of the horrible persecutions and massacres that

followed on. The Pope, the king, and the army were against the truth [just

as Pope Benedict XVI, President George W. Bush and the Order’s CFRChapter

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controlled American Military Joint Chiefs of Staff are against the truth].

From 1500 to 1534, is a bloody page. Space forbids our transcribing it in

full. As a specimen of the cruelties and barbarities that distinguish Rome

whenever and wherever she gets the power, and as a presentation in

tangible form of the dread of the Irish people of any movement which

purposes to surrender them to Papal rule, read this, that Sir William

Temple wrote. He uncovers the practices of Rome, and shows that three

hundred thousand [300,000] Protestants were massacred before Cromwell

came to the rescue of the people [and those lying Jesuits have the audacity

to condemn Oliver Cromwell for his invasion of Ireland, submitting

Drogheda and Wexford, putting an end to popish massacres! Just who

does that man of God, Cromwell’s son-in-law, Lieutenant General Henry

Ireton, think himself to be in restoring order to Ireland, while putting the

Jesuits to flight across the English Channel! How dare any man of God

interfere with the massacres, Inquisitions and Crusades of the Papacy

loosed upon helpless peoples, their persecutors being under secret orders

from the Black Pope!]. He says,

‘North, south, east, and west, Protestant blood flowed in rivers; houses

were reduced to ashes, villages and towns all but destroyed; the very

cattle of the Protestants were inhumanly tortured; the only burial

allowed to the martyrs was the burial of the living [that is, buried alive],

and their persecutors took fiendish delight in hearing their groans and

cries issuing from the earth. Popish children were taught to pluck out

the eyes of Protestant playmates; and some were forced to murder

their own relations, and then butchered themselves over the bleeding

remains, the last sounds that reached their dying ears being the savage

assurances of the priests, that their agonies were but the

commencement of eternal torment.’

Dublin alone escaped, and became a refuge for the distressed; but all the

popish inhabitants were forbidden, under pain of the direct curse, to afford

the slightest succor to the sufferers. Thousands died of cold and hunger;

thousands more emigrated. In Armagh four thousand Protestants were

drowned. In Cavan the road for twelve miles was stained by the blood of

the fugitives. Sixty children were abandoned in the flight by their parents,

fiercely hunted by the bloodhounds of the Papacy, who declared that any

one who helped or even buried their little ones should be burned by their

aides [as did the Jesuit-controlled, Franciscan-led, Croatian Ustashi to the

helpless, non-Roman Catholic, Orthodox Serbian men, women and children

during World War II]. Seventeen adults were buried alive at Fermanagh,

and in Kilkenny seventy-two. In the province of Munster alone, a

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hundred and fifty-four Protestants were massacred, or expelled from

Ireland. And yet Cardinal Manning declares in June 1886, that

Romanism never persecuted Protestants; and we are told by a Protestant

minister in Boston, in 1887, of the beneficent ministry of Romanism [as do

all the present-day, apostate Protestant and Baptist television evangelists].

In 1643 Pope Urban VII granted full and absolute remission of all sins to

those who had taken part in gallantly doing what in them lay to extirpate

and wholly root out the pestiferous leaven of heretical contagion [as did the

Pope following the Black Pope’s St Bartholomew’s Massacre in Paris,

France, 1572; all this murder being in accordance with the Papacy’s

Canon Law, Council of Trent and the Jesuit Extreme Oath]. Under

Elizabeth I, the Irish lords and commons recognized and generally

supported the English Crown [which Queen the Jesuits sought to murder

many times, in many ways; for which reason she expelled the Jesuits and

compelled Roman Catholics to attend Protestant Bible-reading worship].

[Jesuit Temporal Coadjutor] James II [1685-1688] a Roman Catholic,

betrayed England, and turned to the Papist of Ireland for support. Priests

thronged the court and ruled the king [the Jesuits being in abundance,

having united the army of King Louis XIV with the soldiers of James II in

planning the final “extirpation” of English Protestantism]. Ireland was

given up to the Papacy. Towns in which almost every householder was an

English Protestant were, under Rome rule, placed under the government of

Irish Roman Catholics [as in America today]. The civil power was

transferred from the Saxon to the Celtic population. Six thousand

Protestants were turned out of the army, and their places were supplied by

Roman Catholics [as the majority of officers in the American Armed Forces

today are Roman Catholics or Pope-serving Freemasons though they be

Jews and Gentiles of all religions]. The new soldier never passed an

Englishman without cursing him, and calling him foul names.” {4}

[Emphasis added]

J. Scott Carr, 1900

American Historian;

Plymouth Congregational Pastor

The Devil in Robes; Or,

The Sin of Priests

“When a Jesuit dines in a house where the company are not completely

under his domination, or where Protestants are present, I notice that nothing

can exceed his patience and humility. He never misses a chance of

inculcating the extreme poverty of himself and his Order upon those with

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whom he associates on terms of intimacy. He has been known, after being

entertained at dinner at a well-to-do Dublin Catholic’s house, to ask the

hostess for a penny or twopence to pay his tram-fare back to Gardiner

Street. The Jesuit Society has, perhaps, more strings to its bow than any

other community of priests in Ireland. They have, for instance, a man to

cater in a mild way for sincere temperance people [as in the Protestant-led

American Temperance Movement which resulted in the ratification of the

unenforceable Eighteenth Amendment (1919), Prohibition and the creation

of the Black Pope’s Roman Catholic, Sicilian Mafioso-led Organized

Crime Syndicate]. They have abstemious, ascetic-looking men [like Jesuit

Bernard Vaughan] to win their way into the confidence of ladies who go

for the religious cult [like first lady Mrs. William H. Taft], and who may

be presented by those ladies to their friends in power at the Viceregal

Lodge, and the chief secretary’s lodge, or the castle. The have burly,

stentorian Jesuits to orate and fume in remote country districts, when they

are invited by the local parish priest to give a retreat or mission [like the

infamous Jesuit Coadjutor “Father” Charles E. Coughlin]. In a word, the

Jesuit body can be all things to all men and all women [as per the Jesuit

Oath of the Fourth Vow]. They may be—and it is not admitting much—

better educated than the general run of the religious Orders in Ireland; but

they are, perhaps, on that account, all the more objectionable, and all the

greater drag upon the country [having destroyed the Reformation in Ireland

and reduced its population to the most illiterate and impoverished of the

White races]. Whenever there was trouble in Ireland the Jesuit was always

found absent or invisible. . . . What a fall from the humility and selfsacrifice

of Jesus to the body of men who style themselves the Society of

Jesus, for instance, in so many parts of the world to-day! . . .

This would have been a subject worthy of a historic picture; the ‘hard

headed, [capacity for drinking without getting drunk],’ sly Jesuits, in their

black soutanes [cassocks], remonstrating with the big Dominican in his

robes of white and black. Father Burke was a large man, with jet-black

hair, and a very florid face, and the Dominican used to preach in the showy

robe of his Order. The dispute in the sacristy [a special room in the

church] ended in the Jesuits giving way to Father Burke. . . . Imagine, then,

their consternation when Father Burke, standing up in the pulpit and pulling

back his sleeves, bared his wrists, and commenced operations by thumping

the ledge of the pulpit with the clenched fist of his right arm. And he

bellowed forth, in stentorian tones, as he brought his hand down with a

thud, ‘Damn the Jesuits!’ And he struck the pulpit again and cried out,

‘Damn the Jesuits!’ The audience became intensely excited, and one

might have heard a pin fall in the church. It is said that one of the most

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‘hard-headed’ Jesuits had his foot upon the first step of the pulpit stairs,

about to go up and remonstrate with the preacher. And Burke again cried

forth, in the most pointed way, swinging himself right and left in the pulpit,

‘To hell with the Jesuits!’ It now seemed as if Burke was going to

denounce the Order, which, in so may respects was a rival to his own, and

was going to utilize the Jesuits’ own pulpit for the purpose! The poor

Catholic lay congregation listened awestruck, waiting for the development

of these adjurations. For then, of course, nothing that could emanate from

the pulpit would ever sound wrong. And they knew nothing about the

dinner [at which the Dominican was accused by certain Jesuits of being

drunk with wine and thus unfit to enter the pulpit]. Their faith assured them

that the apparent inexplicability of the situation was bound to be

satisfactorily unraveled. But the lurking Jesuits round the corners, looking

through their spy-holes in the passage doors, and who knew all about the

consumption at dinner, can have had no such comforting assurance. Burke

however relieved the tension by proceeding to speak somewhat in this vein:

‘Yes, my dearly beloved brethren, To Hell with the Jesuits! that is the

irreligious cry which is now ringing throughout Europe [Germany

having expelled the Order in 1872]. That is the unchristian cry which is

now ringing throughout atheistical France [having expelled the Jesuits in

1901—the secret plotters behind the Dreyfus Affair and the Triple Entente

so necessary in causing World War I]. Damn those holy men, the Jesuits;

down with the Jesuits; yea, and other more ribald and even more impious

curses than those I have mentioned, on the heads of the worthy Order which

is one of the principal pillars of the Church.’ And then he proceeded to

preach an eloquent panegyric of the Jesuit Order, which succeeded in its

purpose of eliciting the required subscriptions from the congregation.” {5}

[Emphasis added]

Michael J. F. McCarthy, 1902

Irish Roman Catholic Barrister-at-Law

Priests and People In Ireland

While the Jesuits were busy with their Thirty Years’ War attempting to

completely “extirpate” the Bible-reading, “heretic and liberal” Lutheran Germans,

they were also suppressing the Protestant quest for liberty in the Dutch Republic.

Thus they also planned the annihilation of the Protestants in Ireland. We read:

“So greatly had the Irish ecclesiastics increased under Charles I, by titular

archbishops, bishops, and deans, that in the year 1629 it was deemed

necessary to forbid the public exercise of the popish rites and ceremonies.

But notwithstanding this, soon after, the Romish clergy erected a new

popish [Jesuit] university in Dublin. They also proceeded to build

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monasteries and nunneries in various parts of the kingdom, in which the

priests and the chiefs of the Irish held frequent meetings, and from thence

used to pass to and fro to France, Spain, Flanders, Lorraine, and Rome,

where the plot of 1641 was being hatched by the family of the O’Neils

[O’Neills] and their followers. The great design was, that a general

insurrection should take place at the same time throughout the kingdom,

and that all the Protestants, without exception, should be murdered. The

day fixed for this horrid massacre was the 23rd of October, 1641, the feast

of Ignatius Loyola, founder of the Jesuits; and the chief conspirators in the

principal parts of the kingdom made the necessary preparations for the

intended conflict.” {6} [Emphasis added]

Having devised the plan to murder all the Protestants of Ireland on Ignatius Loyola’s

feast day, the Jesuits moved the deceived Irish Catholic people to carry out the plan.

“The Irish were more strongly instigated to execute the infernal business by

the Jesuits, priests, and friars, who when the day for the execution of the

plot was agreed upon, recommended to their hearers diligence in the great

design, which, they said, would greatly tend to the prosperity of the

kingdom and to the advancement of the Catholic cause. They everywhere

declared to the common people that the Protestants were heretics, and ought

not to be suffered to live any longer among them, adding that it was no

more sin to kill an Englishman than to kill a dog, and that the relieving or

protecting them was a crime of the most unpardonable nature.” {7}

[Emphasis added]

When the extirpation began, the Jesuits, true to form, carried out their bloody

Oath once again. Remember, they always use other people or organizations to do

their dirty work when enforcing the Council of Trent. We read again:

“It is impossible to conceive the pleasure these monsters took in exercising

such cruelty; and to increase the misery of those who fell into their hands,

when they butchered them they would say, ‘Your soul to the devil!’ One of

these miscreants would come into a house with his hands imbrued in blood,

and boast that it was English blood, and that his sword had pricked the

white skins of the Protestants [being both a religious and racial extirpation

as it is subtly today in the UK, South Africa, Canada and the US] even to

the hilt. Upwards of thirty Protestants, men, women and children, in the

county of Tipperary, fell into the hands of the papists, who, after stripping

them naked, murdered them with stones, poleaxes, swords, and other

instruments. . . . Others were hung on windmills, and before they were half

dead the barbarians cut them in pieces with their swords. Some, both men,

women and children, they cut and hacked in various [sexual] parts of their

bodies and left them wallowing in their blood to perish where they fell. . . .

Vatican Assassins

The Jesuits — 1641

256

Similar barbarities were practiced on the wretched Protestants in

almost all parts of the kingdom; and when an estimate was afterwards

made of the number who were sacrificed to gratify the diabolical

cruelty of the papists, it amounted to 150,000.” {8} [Emphasis added]

Continuing with a passage from J. T. Headley’s The Life of Oliver Cromwell, we

read with horror from Sir J. Temple’s Irish Rebellion as given by Merle D’Aubigne:

“Ever since the dreadful [Jesuit-instigated] massacre of 1641, a perpetual

war had been carried on between the Protestants and Catholics. This,

Charles [Charles I, whose descendants include the US Bush Dynasty

having made its family fortune through banking via the Black Pope’s Third

Reich according to John Loftus, a former prosecutor in the Justice

Department’s Nazi War Crimes Unit and the author of Unholy Trinity],

while alive, had fostered by throwing the weight of his influence on the side

of the Catholics. [For six years Charles I of England and Louis XIV of

France had the same Jesuit confessor, Pere La Chaise.] . . .

‘The Catholics burnt the houses of Protestants, turned them out naked

in the midst of winter, and drove them like herds of swine before them.

If ashamed of their nudity, and desirous of seeking shelter from the rigor of

a remarkable severe season, these unhappy wretches took refuge in a barn,

and concealed themselves under the straw, the rebels instantly set fire to it,

and burned them alive [as did the Order’s Nazi SS against Orthodox

Russians and Jews during Operation Barbarossa in 1941]. At other times,

they were bound without clothing, to be drowned in rivers; and if, on the

road they did not move quick enough they were urged forward at the point

of the pike. When they reached the river, or the sea, they were precipitated

into it in bands of several hundreds. . . . If these poor wretches rose to the

surface of the water, men were stationed along the brink, to plunge them in

again with the butts of their muskets, or to fire at, and kill them. Husbands

were cut to pieces in the presence of their wives; wives and virgins were

abused in the sight of their nearest relations; and infants of seven or eight

years were hung before the eyes of their parents. Nay, the Irish even went

so far, as to teach their own children to strip and kill the children of the

English, and dash out their brains against the stones [as did the Order’s

Croatian Ustashi to the Orthodox Serbs and Jews during World War II

pursuant to the Jesuit Oath]. Numbers of Protestants were buried alive—as

many as seventy in one trench. An Irish priest, named MacOdeghan,

captured forty or fifty Protestants, and persuaded them to abjure their

religion, on a promise of quarter. After their abjuration he asked them if

they believed that Jesus Christ was bodily present in the host, and that the

pope was the head of the church? And, on their replying in the affirmative,

Chapter 9

The Jesuits — 1641

257

he said, ‘Now, then, you are in a very good faith; and for fear they should

relapse into heresy, cut all their throats.’ ” {9} [Emphasis added]

And why all this needless bloodshed? Because the murder had been boldly

preached by the Jesuits. We read the brazen, unabashed words of Jesuit Conor

O’Mahony, professor of Moral Theology in Evora, Portugal, spoken in 1645:

“My dear Irish,—Go on and perfect the work of your liberty and defence,

which is so happily begun by you; and kill all the heretics, and all that do

assist and defend them. You have in the space of four or five years, that is,

between the years 1641 and 1645, wherein I write this, killed 150,000

heretics, as your enemies acknowledge. Neither do I deny it. And for my

own part, as I verily believe you have killed more of them, so I would to

God you had killed them all—which you must either do, or drive them all

out of Ireland, that our [Catholic] Holy Land may be plagued no longer

with such a . . . barbarous, ignorant and lawless generation of people.” {10}

(Dear truth-seeker, two hundred years later the Satanic Sons of Loyola controlling

the Queen of England would instigate the Second Irish Massacre. Deceptively

called, “The Irish Potato Famine of 1845 to 1850,” a private source writes:

“During this five-year period—with Queen Victoria sitting on the British

throne [The Royal Butcheress of Ireland whose son, Freemasonic King

Edward VII, never caught Walter Richard Sickert, the notorious “Jack

the Ripper”], and closely attended by her Jesuit advisors—freighters laden

with Irish wheat, oats, barley, eggs, beef and pork were DEPARTING Irish

ports en route to other countries, at the rate of about EIGHT FREIGHTERS

PER DAY, while nearly one million of my Irish ancestors were starving to

death. [In the 1930s the Company would cause Stalin’s Massacre of

Orthodox Ukrainians, the so-called “Famine in the Ukraine,” ordering

Masonic Stalin to lock up all the food as millions perished.]

In addition to producing another Vatican harvest—the Irish Protestant body

count—the ensuing, increased Irish emigration provided the Jesuits with a

stepped-up flow of Irish Catholics to the United States, to help build within

that Protestant nation a blindly obedient Papal fifth column, as an

instrument for destroying American constitutional self-government. It

worked.” [In the 1950s the Jesuits would cause the mass-emigration of

North Vietnamese Catholics to South Vietnam by using Ho Chi Minh (who,

like Jesuit-trained Fidel Castro, had been brought to power by the OSS

ruled by Knight of Malta “Wild” Bill Donovan) to spread the rumor that

his Communists were going to kill all the Catholics in North Vietnam. The

US Navy, formerly led by Cardinal Spellman’s Francis Matthews,

provided the vessels for that movement.] {11} [Emphasis added]

Vatican Assassins

The Jesuits — 1641

258

From 1641 to 1649—eight long years—the Jesuits continued their murder in

Ireland. It was for this reason Oliver Cromwell, the Defender of the Protestant faith,

landed in Ireland and demanded the country to surrender. Upon refusing, Cromwell

made an example out of Jesuit-ruled Drogheda by breaching its wall and destroying

every armed man with many interfering women and children. (The same was later

done to Wexford, which had also butchered innocent Protestants.) This never would

have happened had not the Jesuits instigated the mass-murder of the generally

tolerant, minority Protestants beginning with the Irish Massacre of 1641, the Order

having brainwashed the Irish Catholics to hate and kill anti-pope, anti-Jesuit, English

and Irish Protestants—men, women and children! Headley writes:

“Cromwell himself attempts no disguise, and in writing to the government

on account of it, he says, after speaking of carrying the entrenchments:

‘Being thus entered, we refused them quarter, having the day before

summoned the town. I believe we put to the sword the whole number of the

defendants [over 2000]. I do not think thirty of the whole number escaped

with their lives. Those that did are in safe custody for the Barbadoes . . . I

wish that all honest men may give the glory of this to God alone, to whom,

indeed, the praise of this mercy [to the Irish Protestants] belongs.’ . . . His

Chaplain, Hugh Peters, took the same view of it, and went to the chief

church, where he solemnly offered up thanks to God for the slaughter of his

enemies. Parliament also decreed that a day of thanksgiving should be kept

in honor of this great mercy. The fate of Drogheda struck the Irish people

with dread. The day of vengeance had arrived; and the atrocities they had

practiced on the helpless Protestants were now to be visited upon their own

heads. Cromwell—resolved to bring the Irish [Jesuit-instigated] war to a

speedy termination, followed up this victory by those rapid movements

which distinguished his last campaign in England. ” {12} [Emphasis added]

With the collapse of the Jesuit Order’s eight-year “extirpation” of the

Protestant “accursed heretics,” these converted Irishmen preferring the truths of the

Word of God over the lies of that popish Antichrist in the Vatican, Cromwell placed

his Puritan, Bible-believing, Calvinist son-in-law, Lieutenant General Henry

Ireton, as lord deputy of the nation. Drogheda and Wexford had fallen to Cromwell.

Waterford and Limerick would fall to Ireton. Of the fall of Limerick, Ireland’s last

refuge of the Jesuits, we read from McMains’, The Death of Oliver Cromwell:

“The task in 1650-51 was the taking of Limerick, which proved difficult.

The town lay in two parts, the so-called Irish town occupying the south

bank of the Shannon surrounded by a mile-long wall, poor and mean, . . .

‘but a street of decayed houses.’ The so-called English town occupied the

end of a large island in a river. A drawbridge over Shannon channel

connected the party. . . .

Chapter 9

The Jesuits — 1641

259

In the fall of 1650 a siege failed against the ‘last refuge’ of the Irish. This

failure along the Shannon prompted the commander [Ireton] to ‘be earnest

with the Lord, to know his minde what he would have his poore servants in

the Army to doe.’ In the summer of 1651 he again invested the city. . . .

Attacks failed during that summer because the Irish, led by Hugh O’Neill

[the same O’Neill family having been used by the Jesuits to ignite the Irish

massacre in 1641], skillfully deterred Ireton’s stronger force for four

months. . . . Ireton called for Limerick’s surrender and offered O’Neill great

preferment for yielding the city. O’Neill answered that he had defended the

city for a year and was pledged to do so for another [enabling the Jesuits to

continue to kill all of the Protestants]. . . . Needing troops elsewhere to

fight marauding bands of Irish ‘Tories,’ Ireton in August tightened the

siege, and the city finally surrendered on 27 October. . . .

With the city’s fall twelve hundred soldiers surrendered, and Ireton thought

perhaps, a dozen persons should be tried for their part in the siege,

including Bishop of Emly Terence O’Brien. The principal charge against

them was that they helped disguise ‘those bloody Rogues, the Friars,

Priests, and Jesuits,’ who thereby escaped the city [as the Nuremberg Trials

and the Order’s historians, such as CFR William L. Shirer, enabled the

Jesuits to escape the notice and thus the wrath of Europe and Russia for

their infamous crimes committed through Masons Hitler and Stalin]. . . .

He eventually [and sadly] exempted O’Neill from death [as Hitler and

Stalin were exempted from righteous death sentences by Masons FDR and

Churchill] but hanged seven persons for their ‘obstinate holding out.’

O’Brien’s real crimes were outrages committed during the 1641 uprising

during which Protestants were massacred. His head was ‘fixed on a lofty

stake and placed at the top of the King’s Fort.’ ” {13} [Emphasis added]

Ah, but the Jesuits never forget nor forsake the vengeance due their enemies.

In redirecting an immediate sneak attack upon Ireland’s lord deputy, the Order

contacted their unsuspected Temporal Coadjutors, maybe a doctor or a cook, within

the household of our hero—the trusted son-in-law of the Protector. In 1651, at the

young age of forty, the Bible-believing and benevolent Lieutenant General Henry

Ireton (like General Oliver Cromwell; like Elizabeth Claypole—Cromwell’s

beloved daughter; like General George Washington; like Lieutenant General

Stonewall Jackson—at the young age of thirty-nine; like Lieutenant General

George S. Patton, Jr.), would die of a kind of “pneumonia” and/or a “fever of some

sort,” becoming another victim of the Order’s infamous and unrelenting “poison cup.”

“Ireton’s death [November 26, 1651] in Sir Geoffrey Galway’s townhouse

was widely reported by seventeenth-century standards, but the cause

remained uncertain. . . . [Jesuit] Dennis Murphy, S.J., implied plague by

Vatican Assassins

The Jesuits — 1641

260

claiming that after Limerick’s surrender, ‘Ireton was infected and died.’ . . .

Ireton ‘expired of a fever.’ . . . Dr. Philip Carteret [a Jesuit disguised as a

Baptist] . . . a shadowy person to the events in Limerick . . . was . . . an

attending physician [giving “the heretic,” Ireton, “the poison cup,” whom

the Order considered, “the scourge of Limerick”].” {14} [Emphasis added]

Why is it that today, the Irish Protestants of Northern Ireland do not want to

lose the protection of the British Army and be given over to the Jesuits’ Sein Fein and

the Irish Republican Army (IRA)? Is it not shocking to know that both Sein Fein and

the IRA—aided by certain American Knights of Columbus—work with the Russian

Civilian Intelligence (KGB) as revealed by KGB agent Vasili Mitrokhin in The

Sword and the Shield? Could it be the Jesuits also control the KGB, now the SVR?

Of the Jesuit penetration and control of all intelligence as well as the Order’s

ultimate doom, Doctor George Brown, Bishop of Christ Church in Dublin, Ireland

sagaciously preached a sermon in 1551, a portion of which declares:

“But there is a new fraternity of late sprung up who call themselves Jesuits,

which will deceive many, who are much after the Scribes and Pharisees’

manner. Amongst the Jews they shall strive to abolish the truth, and shall

come very near to do it. For these sorts will turn themselves into several

forms [spiritual shape-shifters]; with the Heathen a Heathenist, with the

Atheists an Atheist, with the Jews a Jew [we wonder how many Talmudic

Rabbis and Masonic Labor Zionists—such as the late New York Zionist

known as “the Jewish Pope,” Rabbi Stephen S. Wise—are secret Jesuits

controlling the Zionist government in Israel through the Labor Party for

the purpose of securing Jerusalem for the Papal Caesar in Rome], with the

Reformers a Reformade [like 33º Freemason Billy Graham, so accurately

described in Cathy Burns’ Billy Graham and His Friends (2001)],

purposely to know your intentions, your minds, your hearts, and your

inclinations, and thereby bring you at last to be like the fool that ‘said in his

heart there was no God.’ These shall spread over the whole world, ‘shall

be admitted into the counsels of princes, and they never the wiser,’

charming of them, yea, making your princes reveal their hearts, and the

secrets therein, and yet they not perceive it; which will happen from falling

from the law of God, by neglect of fulfilling the law of God, and by

winking at their sins. Yet in the end . . . they shall become odious to all

nations: so that at the end they shall be worse than Jews, having no restingplace

upon earth; and then shall a Jew have more favour than a Jesuit.” {15}

[Emphasis added]

Knowing that the Society of Jesus will never change, could it be that the

Jesuits have planned to destroy the Protestants and Baptists of the American Empire?

If so, how? Will the Empire experience a series of nuclear detonations in the future?

Chapter 9

The Jesuits — 1641

261

The First Irish Massacre, 1642 #6-2

The Irish Massacre, also called “Ireland’s St. Bartholomew’s Massacre,” was

incited by the Jesuits with the blessing of Charles I and his De Medici French

Queen, Henrietta, on October 23, 1641, the feast day of Ignatius Loyola. It lasted

for eight long, savage years until Oliver Cromwell landed in Drogheda in 1649 to

put an end to it. The intended purpose of this conspiracy was to put every

Protestant in Ireland to death. This scene depicts forty thousand Bible-reading

Protestants being sacrificed by the savage and bloodthirsty Roman Papists

having been brainwashed by the Sons of Loyola into believing that Protestants

were “heretics” and had no right to live. Deceptively called “Christians” by their

priests, whose allegiance was to the Papal Caesar in Rome, they merely enforced

the curses pronounced by the Black Pope’s Council of Trent, it being a militant

reaffirmation of Pope Innocent III’s Fourth Lateran Council of 1215.

Smokescreens, Jack Chick, (Chino, California: Chick Publications, 1983) p. 16.

Vatican Assassins:

“Wounded In The House Of My Friends”

Third Edition

by Eric Jon Phelps

https://ia802505.us.archive.org/28/items/EricJonPhelpsVaticanAssassins3rdEdition/Eric%20Jon%20Phelps%20-%20Vatican%20Assassins%203rd%20Edition.pdf


Marduk (/ˈmɑːrdʊk/;[2] cuneiform: 𒀭𒀫𒌓 dAMAR.UTU; Sumerian: amar utu.k "calf of the sun; solar calf"; Hebrew: מְרֹדַךְ, Modern: Merōdaḵ, Tiberian: Mərōḏaḵ) is a god from ancient Mesopotamia and patron deity of Babylon who eventually rose to prominence in the 1st millennium BC. In Babylon, Marduk was worshipped in the temple Esagila. His symbol is the spade and he is associated with the Mušḫuššu.[3]


By the 1st millennium BC, Marduk had become astrologically associated with the planet Jupiter. He was a prominent figure in Babylonian cosmology, especially in the Enūma Eliš creation myth.


Name

The name of Marduk was solely spelled as dAMAR.UTU in the Old Babylonian Period, although other spellings such as MES and dŠA.ZU were also in use since the Kassite Period. In the 1st millennium BC, the ideograms dŠU and KU were regularly used.[4] The logogram for Adad is also occasionally used to spell Marduk.[5]


Texts from the Old Babylonian period support the pronunciation Marutu or Marutuk, with the shortened spelling Martuk or Marduk attested starting from the Kassite period. His name in Hebrew, Merodak, supports the longer version,[6] and First Millennium Assyrian and Babylonian texts employ the long spelling when the circumstances call for the precise form of the name.[7] The personal name Martuku is not to be confused with the god Marduk.[8] Marduk was commonly called Bēl (lord) in the First Millennium BC.[9]


The etymology for the name Marduk is generally understood to be derived from damar-utu-(a)k, meaning "bull-calf of Utu".[7] Sommerfield suggests this is used to explain the name Marduk in the Enuma Elish as "He is the 'son of the sun[a]' of the gods, radiant is he."[11] While the name may suggest a relationship with Shamash, Marduk has no genealogy with the sun god.[12] However, Babylon was closely associated with the city of Sippar in this period, which may have been the reason for the name.[13]


History

3rd millennium BC

Marduk, along with the city of Babylon, was unimportant[14] and sparsely attested in the 3rd millennium BC. The earliest mention of Marduk comes from a fragmentary inscription, most likely dating to the Early Dynastic II period (ED II). It is left by an unnamed ruler of the city of BAR.KI.BAR (likely Babylon[15]) who constructed a temple for Marduk.[16] A text from the Fara period (ED IIIa) seems to mention Marduk without the divine determinative, and a fragment of a contemporary god list from Abu Salabikh contains dutu-ama[r], likely Marduk written with reversed sign order.[17] A dubious reference to Marduk from the subsequent Ur III period comes from the possible personal name "Amar-Sin is the star of Marduk",[18] although Johandi suggests that the god Martu who appeared together with Enki and Damgalnuna in the Ur III period could possibly refer instead to the similarly named Marduk who is otherwise missing in Ur III documentation, as Martu is later attested to have a different parentage (Anu and Urash) and Marduk is later considered the son of Enki/Ea.[19] If so, this could be evidence that Marduk was already part of the pantheon of Eridu during the Ur III period.


Old Babylonian period

Main article: Old Babylonian period

During the First Dynasty of Babylon under the king Sumu-la-El, Marduk appeared in oaths and several year names,[20] namely year name 22, which recorded fashioning a throne for Marduk, and year name 24, which recorded making a statue for the goddess Zarpanitum, his spouse.[21] Marduk also started to appear in theophoric names, which would become more frequent in the following decades but would remain rare, appearing in less than 1% of names, although it would grow to 1-2% under Hammurabi.[22] During the reigns of Sabium, Apil-Sin and Sin-muballit, Marduk started to be mentioned outside of the city of Babylon and was invoked alongside local gods in cities subject to the Babylonian kings.[23] Starting from the reign of Hammurabi, sanctuaries to Marduk were found in other cities.[24]


In the Old Babylonian Period, while Marduk is acknowledged to be the ruler of the people,[25] there is no evidence that Hammurabi or his successors promoted Marduk at the expense of other gods.[26] Enlil was still recognized as the highest authority, and Marduk was far from being the pantheon head,[27] instead appearing to be a mediator between the great gods and Hammurabi.[28] This is also expressed in inscriptions from Hammurabi's successor Samsu-iluna, expressing that he receives Enlil's orders through the other gods, such as Ishtar, Zababa, Shamash and of course Marduk.[29]


A key development during the Old Babylonian period was the association of Marduk with the pantheon of Eridu. Marduk was syncretized with Asalluhi in the later half of the Old Babylonian period, and the opening of the Code of Hammurabi identify Ea as the father of Marduk,[30] a genealogy that would remain canonical. God lists from the Old Babylonian period sometimes place him within the circle of Enki.[31] TCL 15 10 lists Asalluhi and Marduk as separate gods, but close together in the list. Lambert suggests that this may be an intrusion by another scribe, and that the editor scribe did so under the belief that Marduk and Asalluhi were the same god.[31] Johandi on the other hand suggests that Marduk and Asalluhi were not seen as the same god, but were viewed to be related to one another.[32] The Nippur God List also lists Asalluhi and Marduk separately, with Marduk appearing seventy names before Asalluhi.[33] In the Weidner god list, however, it appears that Marduk and Asalluhi were viewed as the same god.[34]


According to the Marduk prophecy and inscriptions of Agum II, the statue of Marduk and Zarpanitum were removed from Babylon by Mursili I during his raid on Babylon (middle chronology 1595 BC), which was returned during the reign of Agum II.[35]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marduk


MAR ():

By: Solomon Schechter, Wilhelm Bacher

Table of Contents

Title and Name.

Aramaic noun meaning "lord." Daniel addresses the king as "Mari" (= "my lord"; Dan. iv. 16 [A. V. 19]; comp. Hebr. "Adoni," used in speaking to the king). In the Palestinian schools "Mari" and "Rabbi" were customarily employed in addressing the sages. It is said of King Jehoshaphat that on seeing a scholar he rose from his throne, and saluted him with the words, "Abi, abi; rabbi, rabbi; mari, mari" (Ket. 103b; Mak. 24a). Jesus was addressed by his disciples both as "Mari" and as "Rabbi" (comp. Dalman, "Die Worte Jesu," i. 269 et seq.). In conversation, "Mari" was used as a respectful form of address in Palestine (comp. Yer. Pes. 21b, lines 48-49: ); "Mar," in Babylonia (comp. Yoma 20b: ). In the latter country "Mar" became also a title preceding the name, and it was sometimes customary to call scholars "Mar" and not "Rab," particularly in the case of the two great contemporaries of Rab (Abba Arika)—Mar Samuel and Mar 'Uḳba. When Abaye was speaking of his uncle and teacher Rabbah bar Naḥmani, he merely said "Mar," without adding any name (Pes. 101a). When Tabyomi, R. Ashi's son, cited in a lecture sentences by his father, he did not refer to him by name, but said "Abba Mari" (= "my father, my lord").


Title and Name.

Tabyomi's contemporaries never referred to him by name, but called him "Mar"; in the Talmud he is, therefore, designated only as "Mar bar Rab Ashi." "Mar" and "Rab" (= "lord" and "master") together became a customary title of the Babylonian scholar in the geonic period. Sherira Gaon is the first one to use this combination, in the letter in which he refers to the first geonim—Mar Rab Hanan at Pumbedita and Mar Rab Mar at Sura (where "Mar" is already a proper name; see Jew. Encyc. v. 568, s.v. Gaon)—and he always prefixes the double title "Mar Rab" to their names (ib. v. 571). In the prayer "Yeḳum Purḳan," dating from the time of the Geonim, the scholars are designated as "Maranan we-Rabbanan" (= "our lords and masters"). The title "Mar Rab," also, was combined with the personal suffix of the first person plural, so that the Geonim were called "Marana Rabbana" (= "our lord, our master"). This seems to have been the official title in the headings of the questions addressed to the Geonim (comp. Harkavy, "Responsen der Gaonen," p. 149; Neubauer, "M. J. C." i. 41, etc.), and it is the exact ramaic counterpart of the Hebrew "Adonenu we-Rabbenu," by which, according to the tannaitic Halakah, the king was to be addressed (Tosef., Sanh. iv. 3). The gaon was called also simply "Marana" (Harkavy, l.c. pp. 83, 107, 140, 143), or the Hebrew "Adonenu" was used instead (ib. pp. 88, 187, 278, 314), which was rendered in Arabic by "Sayyiduna." "Mar Rab" was appliedalso to scholars who were not geonim (Harkavy, l.c. pp. 24, 172).


The title "Mar" was not customary in the West, so that Abraham ibn Daud, in his "Sefer ha-Ḳabbalah," refers to the Geonim merely as "Rab." Menahem Meïri distinguishes only the scholarly and noble Todros and his son Levi of Narbonne by the title "Marana we-Rabbana" (Neubauer, l.c. ii. 229). Isaac Lattes (ib. ii. 238) likewise designates certain scholars of Narbonne by the title "Maran" ( = ), which also means "our lord." This is the title subsequently applied as a mark of respect to Joseph Caro, the author of the Shulḥan 'Aruk (comp. Azulai, "Shem ha-Gedolim," i. 82). One of Lattes' manuscripts has "Morenu" () instead of "Maran." The title "Morenu," which originated in the fourteenth century, is developed from the older form "Marana" (Güdemann, "Gesch." iii. 31). The Hebrew form "Morenu" instead of "Marana" occurs sporadically even in the geonic period (comp. Harkavy, l.c. pp. 275 and 276, where the gaon Saadia is entitled "Morenu we-Rabbenu"). There are other indications, also, which show that the two words were regarded as synonymous (comp. Targ. to Prov. v. 13, where  is translated by  = "my lords, my masters"; Sanh. 98, where  is to be read instead of ; and Dalman, l.c. p. 268). Thus the old Hebrew title "Marana" was changed to "Morenu," with the meaning "doctor noster," perhaps under the influence of the custom which had become prevalent among Christian scholars of addressing one another with the title "doctor." As shown in the examples given above,  itself designated the teacher and sage.

https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/10386-mar


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18 U.S. Code § 666 - Theft or bribery concerning programs receiving Federal funds

U.S. Code

Notes

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(a)Whoever, if the circumstance described in subsection (b) of this section exists—

(1)being an agent of an organization, or of a State, local, or Indian tribal government, or any agency thereof—

(A)embezzles, steals, obtains by fraud, or otherwise without authority knowingly converts to the use of any person other than the rightful owner or intentionally misapplies, property that—

(i)is valued at $5,000 or more, and

(ii)is owned by, or is under the care, custody, or control of such organization, government, or agency; or

(B)corruptly solicits or demands for the benefit of any person, or accepts or agrees to accept, anything of value from any person, intending to be influenced or rewarded in connection with any business, transaction, or series of transactions of such organization, government, or agency involving any thing of value of $5,000 or more; or

(2)corruptly gives, offers, or agrees to give anything of value to any person, with intent to influence or reward an agent of an organization or of a State, local or Indian tribal government, or any agency thereof, in connection with any business, transaction, or series of transactions of such organization, government, or agency involving anything of value of $5,000 or more;

shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both.

(b)The circumstance referred to in subsection (a) of this section is that the organization, government, or agency receives, in any one year period, benefits in excess of $10,000 under a Federal program involving a grant, contract, subsidy, loan, guarantee, insurance, or other form of Federal assistance.

(c)This section does not apply to bona fide salary, wages, fees, or other compensation paid, or expenses paid or reimbursed, in the usual course of business.

(d)As used in this section—

(1)the term “agent” means a person authorized to act on behalf of another person or a government and, in the case of an organization or government, includes a servant or employee, and a partner, director, officer, manager, and representative;

(2)the term “government agency” means a subdivision of the executive, legislative, judicial, or other branch of government, including a department, independent establishment, commission, administration, authority, board, and bureau, and a corporation or other legal entity established, and subject to control, by a government or governments for the execution of a governmental or intergovernmental program;

(3)the term “local” means of or pertaining to a political subdivision within a State;

(4)the term “State” includes a State of the United States, the District of Columbia, and any commonwealth, territory, or possession of the United States; and

(5)the term “in any one-year period” means a continuous period that commences no earlier than twelve months before the commission of the offense or that ends no later than twelve months after the commission of the offense. Such period may include time both before and after the commission of the offense.

(Added Pub. L. 98–473, title II, § 1104(a), Oct. 12, 1984, 98 Stat. 2143; amended Pub. L. 99–646, § 59(a), Nov. 10, 1986, 100 Stat. 3612; Pub. L. 101–647, title XII, §§ 1205(d), 1209, Nov. 29, 1990, 104 Stat. 4831, 4832; Pub. L. 103–322, title XXXIII, § 330003(c), Sept. 13, 1994, 108 Stat. 2140.)

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/666


What is the meaning of 666?

Answer

At the close of Revelation 13, which discusses the beast (the Antichrist) and his false prophet, we read, “This calls for wisdom: let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666” (Revelation 13:18). Somehow, the number 666 is a clue to the identity of the beast. Revelation 13 also mentions the “mark of the beast” (verses 16–17), and popular thought often links 666 with the mark; however, the mark of the beast and 666 appear to be two different things. The mark of the beast is something people must receive in order to buy and sell. The number 666 is somehow associated with the beast/Antichrist as “his” number.

The meaning of 666 is a mystery, and it appears that the apostle John, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, intended it to be that way. Calculating it, John says, requires “wisdom.” Some, using gematria (assigning a number value to each letter of a name or word and then combining the number values to arrive at a total number), have identified the Antichrist as various people in world history. Some of the popular targets have been “Caesar Nero,” “Ronald Wilson Reagan,” “Mikhail Gorbachev,” and various popes in Roman Catholic history. The lengths some will go to in order to get a person’s name to add up to 666 are amazing. Virtually any name can add up to 666 if enough mathematical gymnastics are employed.


Six hundred, sixty-six will somehow identify the beast, but precisely how 666 is connected to the beast is not the main point of Revelation 13:18. The Bible often uses the number 7 to refer to God and His perfection. Traditionally, 6 is thought to be the number of man, created on the sixth day and always “falling short” of God. The beast/Antichrist will strive to be like God. He will likely even claim to be God. But, just as the number 6 falls short of the number 7, so will the beast/Antichrist, with his “trinity” of 6’s, ultimately fail in his effort to defeat God.


Addendum: Interestingly, in some ancient Greek manuscripts of the Book of Revelation, the number is given as 616 instead of 666. The manuscript evidence is strongly in favor of 666, but the alternate reading of 616 should give us pause before we start pounding away on the calculators.

https://www.gotquestions.org/meaning-of-666.html


Head:

1. See Illness, mental

2. The superior general, head of the Society [666]

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


666 1 Samuel 26:15-16. And David said to Abner, Art not thou a valiant man? and who is like to thee in Israel? wherefore then hast thou not kept thy lord the king? for there came one of the people in to destroy the king thy lord. This thing is not good that thou hast done. As the LORD liveth, ye are worthy to die, because ye have not kept your master, the LORD'S anointed. And now see where the king's spear is, and the cruse of water that was at his bolster. 2 Samuel 18:3. But the people answered, Thou shalt not go forth: for if we flee away, they will not care for us; neither if half of us die, will they care for us: but now thou art worth ten thousand of us: therefore now it is better that thou succour us out of the city. Esther 6:2. And it was found written, that Mordecai had told of Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king's chamberlains, the keepers of the door, who sought to lay hand on the king Ahasuerus

THE

WESTMINSTER

LARGER

CATECHISM

https://www.freepresbyterian.org/uploads/Larger_Catechism.pdf


Can. 666 In the use of means of social communication, necessary discretion is to be observed and those things are to be avoided which are harmful to one’s vocation and dangerous to the chastity of a consecrated person."

TITLE II. RELIGIOUS INSTITUTES (Cann. 607 - 709) CODE OF CANON LAW

https://www.vatican.va/archive/cod-iuris-canonici/eng/documents/cic_lib2-cann607-709_en.html


Revelation 13:11-18

1599 Geneva Bible

11 [a]And I beheld, another beast coming out of the earth, [b]which had two horns like the Lamb, but he spake like the dragon.


12 [c]And he did all that the first beast could do before him, and he caused the earth and them which dwell therein, [d]to worship the first beast whose deadly wound was healed.


13 [e]And he did great wonders, so that he made fire to come down from heaven on the earth, in the sight of men.


14 And deceived them that dwell on the earth by the signs which were permitted to him to do in the sight of the beast, saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make the [f]image of the [g]beast, which had the wound of a sword, and did live.


15 [h]And it was permitted to him to give a [i]spirit unto the image of the beast, so that the image of the beast should speak, and should cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.


16 [j]And he made all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive [k]a [l]mark in their right hand or in their foreheads.


17 And that no man might [m]buy or sell, save he that had the [n]mark or the name of the beast or the number of his name.


18 [o]Here is wisdom. Let him that hath wit, count the number of the beast: for it is the [p]number of a man, and his number is six hundred threescore and six.


Read full chapter

Footnotes

Revelation 13:11 The second member of the vision, concerning the ecclesiastical dominion, which in Rome succeeded that which was politic, and is in the power of the corporation of false Prophets, and of the forgers of false doctrine. Wherefore the same body or corporation is called of S. John by the name of false prophet, Rev. 6:13, 19 and 20. The form of this beast is first described in this verse, then his acts, in the verses following, and the whole speech is concluded in the last verse. This beast is by his breed a Son of the earth (as they say) obscurely born, and by little and little creeping up out of his abject estate.

Revelation 13:11 That is, in show he resembled the Lamb (for what is more mild or more humble than to be the servant of the servants of God) but in deed he played the part of the Dragon, and of the Wolf, Matt. 7:15. For even Satan changeth himself into an Angel of light, 2 Cor. 11:14, and what should his honest disciples and servants do?

Revelation 13:12 The history of the acts of this beast containeth in sum three things, hypocrisy, the witness of miracles and tyranny: of which the first is noted in this verse, the second in the 3 verses following: the third in the sixteenth and seventeenth verses. His hypocrisy is most full of leasing, whereby he abuseth both the former beast and the whole world: in that albeit he hath by his cunning, as it were by lime made of the former beast a most miserable … or anatomy, usurped all his authority unto himself and most impudently exerciseth the same in the sight and view of him: yet he carrieth himself so, as if he honored him with most high honor, and did in very truth cause him to be honored of all men.

Revelation 13:12

For unto this beast of Rome, which of civil Empire is made an Ecclesiastical hierarchy, are given divine honors, and divine authority so far as he is believed to be above the Scriptures, which the gloss upon the Decretals declareth by this devilish verse,


Articulos solvit, synodumque facit generalem,


That is,


He changeth the Articles of faith, and giveth authority to general Counsels.


Which is spoken of the Papal power. So the beast is by birth, foundation, feat, and finally substance, one: only the Pope hath altered the form and manner thereof being himself the head both of that tyrannical Empire, and also of the false Prophets, for the Empire hath he taken unto himself, and thereunto hath added this cunning device. Now these words, whose deadly wound was cured are put here for distinction sake, as also sometimes afterwards: that even at that time the godly readers of this prophecy might by this sign be brought to see the things as present: as if it were said, that they might adore this very Empire that now is, whose head we have seen in our own memory to have been cut off, and to be cured again.


Revelation 13:13 The second point of the things done by the beast, is the credit of great wonders or miracles, appertaining to the strength of this impiety: of which signs some were given from above, as it is said, that fire was sent down from heaven by false sorcery, in this verse. Others were showed here below in the sight of the beast to establish idolatry, and deceive souls, which part S. John setteth forth beginning (as they say) at that which is last, in this manner: First the effect is declared in these words, He deceiveth the inhabitants of the earth, Secondly the common manner of working in two sorts, one of miracles. For the signs that were given him to do in the presence of the beasts: the other of the words added to the signs, and teaching the idolatry confirmed by those signs, Saying unto the inhabitants of the earth, that they should make an image unto the beasts which, etc. Thirdly, a special manner is declared: That is given unto him to put life into the image of the beast: and that such a kind of quickening, that the same both speaketh by answer unto those that ask counsel of it, and also pronounceth death against all those that do not obey nor worship it: all which things oftentimes by false miracles through the procurement and inspiration of the Devil, have been effected and wrought in images. The histories of the Papists are full of examples of such miracles, the most of them feigned, many also done by the devil in images: as of old in the serpent, Gen. 3:1. By which examples is confirmed, not the authority of the beast, but the truth of God, and of these prophecies.

Revelation 13:14 That is, images by enallage or change of the number: for the worship of them ever since the second Council of Nice, hath been ordained in the Church by public credit, and authority contrary unto the Law of God.

Revelation 13:14 In the Greek the word is in the Dative case, as much to say, as unto the worship, honor and obeying of the beast: for by this maintenance of images this Pseudoprophetical beast doth mightily profit the beast of Rome, of whom long ago he received them. Wherefore the same is hereafter very fitly called the image of the beast, for that images have their beginning from the beast, and have their form or manner from the will of the beast, and have their end and use fixed in the profit and commodity of the beast.

Revelation 13:15 And of this miracle of the images of the beast (that is, which the beast hath ordained to establish idolatry) which miraculously speak and give judgment, or rather marvelously, by the fraud of the false prophets, the Papists books are full fraughted.

Revelation 13:15 To give life as Jannes and Jambres imitated the wonders that Moses wrought.

Revelation 13:16 The third place, is a most wicked and most insolent tyrrany as was said before, usurped over the persons of men in this verse: and over their goods and actions, in the next verse. For he is said, both to bring upon all persons a tyrannous servitude, that as bondslaves they might serve the beast: and also to exercise over all their goods and actions, a peddler-like abuse of indulgences and dispensations (as they term them) amongst their friends, and against others to use most violent interdictions, and to shoot out cursings, even in natural and civil, private and public contracts, wherein all good faith ought to have place.

Revelation 13:16 That is, their Chrism, by which in the Sacrament (as they call it) of Confirmation, they make servile unto themselves, the persons and doings of men, signing them in their forehead and hands: and as for the sign left by Christ (of which Rev. 7:3) and the holy Sacrament of Baptism they make as void. For whom Christ hath joined unto himself by Baptism, this beast maketh challenge unto them by her greasy Chrism, which he doubteth not to prefer over Baptism, both in authority and efficacy.

Revelation 13:16 The mark of the name of the beast.

Revelation 13:17 That is, have any traffic or intercourse with men, but they only those which have this anointing and consecration of Clearkely tonsure, as they call it. Read Gratian de Consecratione, distinct. s. c. omnes, cap. Spiritus, etc. of these matters.

Revelation 13:17 Here the false Prophets do require three things, which are set down in the order of their greatness, a character, a name and the number of the name. The meaning is, that man that hath not first their anointing and clerical tonsure or shaving: secondly holy orders, by reserving whereof is communicated the same of the beast: or finally hath not attained that high degree of Pontifical knowledge, and of the Law (as they call it) Canonical, and hath not as it were made up in account and cast the number of the mysteries thereof: for in these things consisteth the number of that name of the beast. And this is excellently set forth in the next verse.

Revelation 13:18 That is in this number of the beast consisteth that Popish wisdom, which unto them seemeth the greatest of all others. In these words S. John expoundeth that saying which went before of the number of the beast, what it hath above his mark or acconisance and his name. These things, saith S. John, the mark and the name of the beast, do easily happen unto any man: but to have the number of the beast, is wisdom: that is, only the wise and such as have understanding, can come by that number for they must be most illuminated doctors that attain thereunto, as the words following do declare.

Revelation 13:18 How great and of what denomination this number of the beast is, by which the beast accounted his wisdom, S. John declareth in these words. Dost thou demand how great it is? it is so great, that it occupieth the whole man: he is always learning, and never cometh to the knowledge thereof: he must be a man indeed that doth attain unto it. Askest thou of what denomination it is? verily it standeth of six throughout and perfectly ariseth of all the parts thereof in their several denominations (as they term them) it standeth of six by units, tens, hundreds, etc. so as there is no one part in the learning and order Pontifical, which is not either referred unto the head, and as it were the top thereof, or contained in the same: so fitly do all things in this hierarchy agree one with another, and with their head. Therefore that cruel beast Boniface the eighth doth commend by the number of six those Decretals which he perfected, in the proem of the sixth book. Which book (saith he) being to be added unto five other books of the same volume of Decretals, we thought good to name Sextum the sixth: that the same volume by addition thereof containing a senary, or the number of six books (which is a number perfect) may yield a perfect form of managing all things, and perfect discipline of behavior. Here therefore is the number of the beast, who poureth from himself all his parts and bringeth them all back again unto himself by his discipline in most wise and cunning manner. If any man desire more of this, let him read the gloss upon that place. I am not ignorant that other interpretations are brought upon this place: but I thought it my duty, with the good favor of all and without the offense of any, to propound mine opinion in this point. And for this cause especially, for that it seemed unto me neither profitable, nor like to be true, that the number of the beast, or of the name of the beast should be taken as the common sort of interpreters do take it. For this number of the beast teacheth, giveth out, imprinteth, as a public mark of such as be his, and esteemeth that mark above all others as the mark of those whom he loveth best. Now those other expositions seem rather to be far removed from this property and condition of that number: whether you respect the name Latinus or Titan, or another. For these the beast doth not teach, nor give forth nor imprint, but most diligently forbiddeth to be taught, and audaciously denieth: he approveth not these, but reproveth them: and hateth them that think so of this number, with an hatred, greater than that of Vatinius.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2013%3A11-18&version=GNV


NRA Institute for Legislative Action

Monday, November 17, 2025 at 7:09 AM

Founded on November 17, 1871, the NRA has grown from a small group of marksmen into a nationwide institution dedicated to firearms training, safety, and advocacy.

Together with millions, we celebrate 154 years of heritage and hard work. 🇺🇸

https://www.facebook.com/NationalRifleAssociation/posts/pfbid03jocNQTSajSBMuMKoHGH1ujbXQT8Cd5KGX4rMFkJYeEA4SpGMKHqtWVV3FWJa5m8l


The Act of 1871: The “United States” Is a Corporation – There are Two Constitutions

By POPEYE

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act-of-1871


(POPEYE)   Since the Act of 1871 which established the District of Columbia, we have been living under the UNITED STATES CORPORATION which is owned by certain international bankers and aristocracy of Europe and Britain.


In 1871 the Congress changed the name of the original Constitution by changing ONE WORD — and that was very significant as you will read.


Some people do not understand that ONE WORD or TWO WORDS difference in any “legal” document DO make the critical difference. But, Congress has known, and does know, this.


1871, February 21: Congress Passes an Act to Provide a Government for the District of Columbia, also known as the Act of 1871.


With no constitutional authority to do so, Congress creates a separate form of government for the District of Columbia, a ten mile square parcel of land (see, Acts of the Forty-first Congress,” Section 34, Session III, chapters 61 and 62).


The act — passed when the country was weakened and financially depleted in the aftermath of the Civil War — was a strategic move by foreign interests (international bankers) who were intent upon gaining a stranglehold on the coffers and neck of America.


Congress cut a deal with the international bankers (specifically Rothschilds of London) to incur a DEBT to said bankers. Because the bankers were not about to lend money to a floundering nation without serious stipulations, they devised a way to get their foot in the door of the United States.


The Act of 1871 formed a corporation called THE UNITED STATES. The corporation, OWNED by foreign interests, moved in and shoved the original Constitution into a dustbin. With the Act of 1871, the organic Constitution was defaced — in effect vandalized and sabotage — when the title was capitalized and the word “for” was changed to “of” in the title.


THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA is the constitution of the incorporated UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.


It operates in an economic capacity and has been used to fool the People into thinking it governs the Republic. It does is not!


Capitalization is NOT insignificant when one is referring to a legal document. This seemingly “minor” alteration has had a major impact on every subsequent generation of Americans.


What Congress did by passing the Act of 1871 was create an entirely new document, a constitution for the government of the District of Columbia, an INCORPORATED government. This newly altered Constitution was not intended to benefit the Republic. It benefits only the corporation of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA and operates entirely outside the original (organic) Constitution.


Instead of having absolute and unalienable rights guaranteed under the organic Constitution, we the people now have “relative” rights or privileges. One example is the Sovereign’s right to travel, which has now been transformed (under corporate government policy) into a “privilege” that requires citizens to be licensed.


By passing the Act of 1871, Congress committed TREASON against the People who were Sovereign under the grants and decrees of the Declaration of Independence and the organic Constitution.


The Act of 1871 became the FOUNDATION of all the treason since committed by government officials.

https://web.archive.org/web/20170120040056/https://www.federaljack.com/slavery-by-consent-the-united-states-corporation/


TIM WHITE on the COLUMBINE HIGH COVER UP and WITNESS INTIMIDATION

Subject: Re: TIM WHITE on the COLUMBINE HIGH COVER UP and WITNESS INTIMIDATION

To: "Tim White" <phantom421366@yahoo.com>


Date: Monday, April 27, 2009, 8:28 PM


Hi Tim White,

 

I have never heard of you but I have heard of Devvy Kidd and I would not trust her or anything she has to say. She went to Columbine and is part of the problem. Her husband is/was in the military and she ran a scam here in Colorado where she got people arrested with her phony Right Way Law. She seems to run from state to state having now settled in Texas. If she thinks its  psyops operation, just why would they do that? Two, what about the students who failed polygraphs about their involvement? Also, I distinctly remember her saying in her blog that she only talked with three students. I have talked with over fifty and they say that they saw more than two suspects and that the FBI HRT team was inside the school as the shooting began. Also, I have an FBI Form 302 statement from an FBI agent who claims to have seen Harris and Klebold since April 20, 1999.

 

There is also an adult by the name of Nate Marshall who helped train Harris and Klebold and I have verifiable proof of this person's involvement in the Columbine affair having actually fired a weapon from the library at law enforcment that day!

 

Also this person was indentified by students including Ann Marie Hockhalter as being involved. The entire school knew who he was and that he was involved. Recently Nate Marshall has come very close to admitting to being involved and told a firefighter in New Mexico that, "The Columbine thing" was closing in on him.

 

During the Columbine mess Nate Marshall was a West Metro firefighter and was not noted as being on duty that even though almost all firefighters from West Metro were at Columbine.

 

West Metro also has its problems as it is completely staffed at the management level with former military intelligence members. When was the last time you saw a fire department staffed like this?

 

There are also missing students and parents that disappeared since that day.

 

No insult to you if you are friends with Kidd, but she is a fraud and now is hob nobbing around with the bigger fraud Alex Jones of Infofraud.com Anytime she wants to go up against me on this issue, she is welcome. Columbine High School is a true government school where the kids are taken right out of the classes and recruited into the military. Devvy Kidd knows exactly what this school is and goes along with it. I do not agree with many of her views and I think she works directly for the government most likely the CIA or NSA.

 

How did Kidd know that Klebold's liver was rotting from Luvox, they never released any of the information on Klebold and in fact his full autopsy has never been released and further I was at the opern records meeting in 2001 where Susan Klebold was asked by a reporter if her sone was on this or any other drug and she said no.

 

So if Kidd knows this, it is because she is a government hack. Also I have proof that Klebold's dad was involved in the form of a video taken by the BBC that day that shows Thomas Klebold dressed as a FBI HRT team member leaving the property and I should know I met him when the lawsuits were still at the federal courts in Denver and I looked him in the face and offered my condolensces. This of course before I had seen the video. Bree Pasquale also identified Thomas Klebold as being involved.

 

As far as Kidd's opinion is concerned she never did any indepth investigation, she was here for two days and talked with three kids who escaped early on and did not see anything. I don't trust her or her work and I once again beleive that she is the shill for the government.

 

Also I have been told that the entire Columbine area is what is called; "A Safe Commnity" by the U.S. Military and the CIA, NSA, DIA, etc. This kind of community is created specifically for former and reitred members of the U.S. Intelligence Community. Now not all people living there are ex-intel, but most are and every other family I talked to admits that the father or mother and in some cases both were ONI, G2, OSI, etc. There are also people in the community that were involved in the Denver International Airport land deals, total corruption there.

 

Also in the message below Devvy Kidd states that all the shooters were on these drugs and were white males?

 

Now what does that tell you? If these drugs are really dangerous, then is it possible they were meant to be that way? Once again it still brings the government back into it and her ascertain that the government is involved in everything. Bull crap! The government has made sure that they are invovled in everything and when it comes to public schools, they have a hand in everything either directly or indirectly and the fact that this white twit can not even get their names right. Yes she got Dylan's name right but calls the other suspect Kevin. There was nobody even accused  by the name, "Kevin" which shows that she does not go to the effort to ensure the names are right.

 

If she got that wrong, then what else has she got wrong?

 

Thanks,

 

Bill Zabel

 

P.S. - She talks about a conspiracy about Columbine, well I've got news for this pandering idiot, she and her fradulent Right Way Law that got people thrown in jail here in Colorado is dung!

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Tim White

To: BZ

Sent: Monday, April 27, 2009 2:12 PM

Subject: TIM WHITE on the COLUMBINE HIGH COVER UP and WITNESS INTIMIDATION

 


--- On Wed, 1/21/09, Tim White <phantom421366@yahoo.com> wrote:


 

From: Tim White <phantom421366@yahoo.com>

Subject: TIM WHITE on the COLUMBINE HIGH COVER UP and WITNESS INTIMIDATION


To:  "Ron CO - Aigner"


Cc: "John DeCamp"


Date: Wednesday, January 21, 2009, 12:58 AM


 

Tim White on the Columbine High Cover Up and Witness Intimidation

----- Original Message -----

From: "Tim White" phantom469366@yahoo.com


Sent: Sunday, March 13, 2005 3:48 PM


Subject: Re: Reply/ COLUMBINE HIGH-HARRIS/KLEBOLD-PLATTSBURGH A.F.B


Devvy,


I happen to BE in Denver and have been for 35+years. I SAW the people in the crowd-in the very first video tape to come on air (on KGMH Channel 7, for the 11:00 A.M. news) who were OBVIOUS "suits" and I did indeed see the FEMA comm unit on several video tape scenes -from channels 4, 7, and 9- before it was removed and never seen again , but there are photos of this to prove that it was set-up on the school grounds. I know much more than you assume on this and with all due respect to you, I disagree 100% with your "assessment" from the interviewees that you were in contact with. Did you interview Bill Zabel?

Some of the very best information on the truth was gathered by him-he spoke numerous times on shortwave radio about what he discovered and his life (d family too) was threatened many times because of it. How about Dr. Bill Deagle?

Deagle was there with an EMT team from the Englewood CO area-the first on the scene- and he was about to enter the school to save lives when he was told in no uncertain terms by a Jefferson County sheriff deputy, "DO NOT enter or you will be SHOT DEAD".

Deagle took the remark to mean "by law enforcement", he told me this himself.

Ever see the research of Justin Tribble?

He and Bill Zabel collaborated and finally Justin-who was 18 years old in 1999- had to give it up, also because of threats. I have spoken to all three and you are totally unaware of what is indeed TRUE.

In January of 2001, I left a long message on recorder at the headquarters of the Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI) -having to do with the murders of 4 people who I knew. The murders were all within a 16 month period. About 5 minutes later, I received a call from a CBI Agent, Richard K Griffith, who asked when I would be available to speak with him in person-I said, RIGHT NOW! In just 35 minutes after I left this message, Rick Griffith was at my shop to discuss details.

He and I spoke for about 1 3/4 hours and I very obviously made him very uncomfortable because of what I said, certain details involving organized assassinations were very much at the core of all these murders:

1) A close friend of mine, David Chase, murdered in Evergreen Colorado on 6-6-95 or shortly thereafter,and his body found 47 days later in Bear Creek in front of the GATES MANSION just downstrean from Kittredge....

2)The private investigator looking into David Chase's murder, Phil Harris,"heart-attacked" on 6-13-96 (this was on the TV show, Unsolved Mysteries),I also knew Phil....

3) The "plane crash" of a very prominent Denver aviation attorney, John Breit, who was a customer of mine at the time,7-9-96,his fully restored T-28B Trojan Naval Trainer 'Warbird' seems to have "crashed" in the middle of US 24 East of Colorado Springs...I had heard from sources of mine that John knew something that was CIA related that "certain people" in the Colorado aviation community couldn't chance John knowing about

4) and the murder of Rudy Maestas, "heart-attacked" on 10-13-96. Rudy and Doris Martinez were both former IRS revenue agents who were partners in a tax representative counseling business and as "tax court enrolled agents" that I was using to help me with my own IRS problems... Rudy's murder was intended to keep Doris from testifying (about IRS corruption) at the IRS hearings at the University of Denver on April 15th,1998 and chaired by Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell. In attendance on the hearing panel was IRS Commissioner Charles Rossotti, Norman Brownstein, Steve Farber, Steven Hyatt of Brownstein,Hyatt, Farber, Strickland & Norton (Gale Norton-the current Secretary of Interior), this lawfirm is as corrupt as corrupt can be...Sen Ted Kennedy calls Norman Brownstein "the 101st US Senator".

Six people were "allowed" to testify and I know two of them.

In the conversation that I was having with Rick Griffith-also known as "Griff", I find out from him that he was 22 years with Air Force Intelligence, OSI (Office of Special Investigations) and was at the time of my meeting with him, Chief of Criminal Intelligence for CBI. I discussed much more than these murders with him and part of that was the UK/USA AGREEMENTS. You do know about that-don't you?

Why do you think MI6 was at Columbine? Did you know that Denver has the 2nd largest British diplomatic mission in the U.S. and that Denver is LOADED with MI6 agents?

Did you know that the University of Denver is controlled by MI6 and has been since it's founding? How about the Aspen Institute and the Heritage Foundation? Yup, also controlled by MI6. Rick Griffith and I discussed all of this and then some. He knew damn well what I was talking about was absolutely TRUE. He really got uncomfortable towards the end of our conversation and then decided it was best for him to leave since he was about to blow a hemmorhoid-the guy was 6' 2" and about 500 pounds and was uncomfortable sitting down. I gave him a copy of John Coleman's book, "Conspirators" Hierarchy-The Story of the Committee of 300" , thanked me for it,and then left.

In the following few months,we spoke several times and the last time was a real corker, this was about May 10th of 2001. He on his office phone,and me on my REAL TIME LISTENED TO landline QWEST business phone, Rick Griffith told me that he and other INTELLIGENCE PERSONNEL were in Columbine High-BEFORE entry by ANY LAW ENFORCEMENT SWAT PERSONNEL-looking for BOMBS.

He was talking and sounding animated but in a friendly tone like we were buds or something.I am sure he did not realize that my phone was tapped or he sure didn't act like it-considering what he just told me.We spoke for a few more minutes and then he hung up. Just before Memorial day-2 1/2 weeks later, I called him back at CBI and I was told that Richard K Griffith was NO LONGER WITH THE COLORADO BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION! I had his cell phone number and called him-he was at home-and he told me that he was "suddenly and unexpectedly, MEDICALLY RETIRED". Within the span of 3 months following, Rick sold his home in Denver, liquidated other assets,and moved OUT OF THE U.S. and is now in Panama, with his wife and children. Do I REALLY need to connect the dots on this for a very smart lady such as yourself?

Devvy, you are absolutely WRONG here and needless to say, I was VERY surprised by your reply to me .Of anyone responding to me on this, I would have guessed that this type of response was not what I would get from you.I thought you were much more informed but I am wrong,as I now see. Do know that I am very informed and you can get this verified by a close contact and friend of mine, Ted Gunderson; I will be happy to give you his cell phone number should you be so inclined to speak with him.This is also being sent to Charlotte Iserbyt, who I believe you know. She can also verify who I am.The other addy is going to Lt Col Dan Marvin(USA-Special Forces, Ret. He also knows what I am saying here.

Tim White, Viet Nam Vet(Air Force),Concerned Citizen

--- Devvy Kidd <devvyk@earthlink.net> wrote:


Tim:


I also did an indepth investigation into Columbine and in fact, drove out there from California to interview students, get autopsy reports, etc. The information below is nothing but hysteria and counter intel to make people chase their tail around all day.


Both of those boys were on psychotropic drugs. Kleibold's liver was rotting from the Luvox. Once you know enough about those drugs, you will understand how Dylan and Kevin progressed to the point they did.


I have read this so called report when it first came out. As I said, it's a nifty little piece of disinformation. It caused a stir when it came out, but once people read all my material, hundreds of pages of it and compare it to the dung below, the perpetrators of such crap lost their credibility.


Not everything that happens is the govmint. Every school shooter from 1993-1999 were all white boys between the ages of 11 and 19. All were on


Prozac, Ritilan or Luvox.


Devvy Kidd


[Original Message]


From: Tim White <phantom469366@yahoo.com>


To:


Date: 3/11/2005 6:37:58 PM


Subject: COLUMBINE HIGH-HARRIS/KLEBOLD-PLATTSBURGH A.F.B


This is the TRUTH about what happened at Columbine-NOT the "offical story" which are LIES, LIES, LIES. I have met and spoken to Deputies from the Arapahoe County Sheriffs' Dept who were there that day within minutes-2 of them were off duty but less than a mile from the school when the first call came in on their cell phones and they were among the first 6 or 7 officers on the scene-before the Feds showed up UNUSUALLY FAST from the Denver Federal Center-approx 12 road miles N-N/W of Columbine,and can CONFIRM that the Feds were indeed involved BEFORE the official" start of this because there is NO WAY the Federal SWAT teams could have been THAT PREPARED and be there THAT QUICKLY on a "cold call",a dead giveaway of PRIOR KNOWLEDGE.Almost immediately,a special COMMAND and CONTROL unit-a very large bus like vehicle-from FEMA was set up on the school grounds to direct all law enforcement activities-the FEDS were in charge from the very beginning because it was indeed a FEDERAL BLACK OP from the beginning-the beginnng of which was at least 2 YEARS in advance of the shootings. I know personally the "Denver source" that is mentioned in this article-Jeffery W Swedenburg,now known as Jeff Sweet.I have much more I can write about him but not at this time.


Tim White,Viet Nam Vet(Air Force),Concerned Citizen


Cover-up begins to unravel


**Columbine Update**


September 2nd, 1999


New Columbine Witness Speaks Out


Columbine Massacre & Coverup


Date: Sun, 06 Jun 1999 23:49:23 -0600


Organization: EAGLES NEST HOLDINGS All facts appear to be absolutely correct. Not only was there a Major general at the scene, QUICKLY, but there where CIA, NSA, MI6, NATO and of course the Federal Bureau of Incompetence. Consider these points:


(1) I'm not convinced the two boys where the shooters, or the only shooters. Many of the statements taken from other students state that they DID NOT recognize the (shooters)!


(2) Why are the STUDENTS who witnessed the shootings talking about grenades, not Pipe Bombs? Because pipe bombs where not used! And it was NOT the two students using them, but black clothed terrorists from the ATF.

(3) They DID NOT commit sucicide. I believe, based on evidence I've seen, that they where executed at the end of the shooting spree by another operative.

(4) The ATF where OBSERVED planting two of the 30 lb. bombs found, by Jefferson County Sheriff's deputies (a SGT. and a Captain) who are scared witless by what they saw. And they WILL NOT come out and talk about it.

(5) Why where FBI, ATF, CIA, NSA and NATO spooks on the scene at Columbine literally within minutes of the (beginning of) shootings? BECAUSE they knew about it before hand and where prepared and ready to go, parked only a mile or two away. (6) Not one so-called law enforcement official entered the school during the shooting. Instead, they cowered outside behind fire engines like the compromised cowards and traitors that they really are. Not ONE round was fired by a Law Enforcement official. (7) In conjunction with item 6, WHY where Law Enforcement officials ORDERED, by FBI and ATF officers-in-charge, to NOT enter the building until AFTER the shooting stopped?


The before mentioned facts have been testified to by many people onsite - among them Law Enforcement officials, reporters and concerned citizens. Whom are ALL being completely ignored? As I've told you previously, I spent the day at Columbine, on the day following the shooting, walking through the school as well. The scene was horrific, and the affect was one of a very calculated, scripted event. Just like Oklahoma City. There is absolutely no doubt that this was a.........

http://fourwinds10.com/siterun_data/health/crime_hate_crimes/news.php?q=1247331404


Naval Station Great Lakes (NAVSTA Great Lakes) is the home of the United States Navy's only current boot camp, located near North Chicago, in Lake County, Illinois, along Lake Michigan. Important tenant commands include the Recruit Training Command, Training Support Center and Navy Recruiting District Chicago. Naval Station Great Lakes is the largest military installation in Illinois and the largest training station in the Navy. The base has 1,153 buildings situated on 1,628 acres (6.59 km2) and has 69 mi (111 km) of roadway to provide access to the base's facilities. Within the naval service, it has several different nicknames, including "The Quarterdeck of the Navy".[2] It is also referred to as "second boot camp" for those attending Training Support Command.[3]


The original 39 buildings built between 1905 and 1911 were designed by Jarvis Hunt.[4]


The base functions similarly to a small city, with its own fire department, Naval Security Forces (Police), and public works department.


One of the landmarks of the area is Building 1, also known as the clocktower building. Completed in 1911, the building is made of red brick, and has a tower over the third floor of the building. It faces a large ceremonial parade ground, Ross Field.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naval_Station_Great_Lakes


The Supreme Council, Scottish Rite, Northern Jurisdiction oversees the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry in fifteen states: Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New Hampshire, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Wisconsin and Vermont.[1] This territory has existed since 1827 when the NMJ gained jurisdiction "over the then 14 states situated east of the Mississippi and north of the Mason-Dixon Line. Wisconsin was not yet a state, but part of Michigan."[2]


Formed in 1813, the Northern Jurisdiction is divided into "Valleys."[3] Each Valley has up to four subordinate bodies, and each body confers a set of degrees. The four subordinate bodies are the Lodge of Perfection, which confers degrees 4 through 14, the Council of Princes of Jerusalem, which confers degrees 15 and 16, the Chapter of Rose Croix which confers degrees 17 and 18, and the consistory which confers degrees from 19 to 32.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_Council,_Scottish_Rite,_Northern_Jurisdiction,_USA


Parris Island is a district of the city of Port Royal, South Carolina on an island of the same name. It became part of the city with the annexation of the Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island on October 11, 2002. For statistical purposes, the United States Census Bureau previously defined Parris Island as a census-designated place (CDP) when it was an unincorporated area of Beaufort County. The population was 4,841 at the 2000 census. As defined by the U.S. Census Bureau, Parris Island is included within the Beaufort Urban Cluster and the larger Hilton Head Island–Beaufort Micropolitan Statistical Area.[2]


History

Parris Island was first colonized by Europeans in 1562, when members of a French expedition led by Jean Ribaut temporarily settled on the island. This was the first semi-permanent European settlement in what are now considered the United States. Four years later, a town named Santa Elena was founded here by Spanish Conquistador Pedro Menéndez de Avilés. It was the capital of La Florida from 1566 to 1587, during which time Spanish explorers sailed from Santa Elena to explore the Tennessee Valley and Chesapeake Bay. An expedition also traveled overland into the interior to western North Carolina and points west.


After coming under English control, the island was granted to Robert Daniell in 1706 and became known as Port Royal Island. It later came into the hands of Colonel Alexander Parris, sometimes spelled "Paris", Public Treasurer of South Carolina. After his death in 1736, it gradually became known as Parris Island (and the name Port Royal Island was applied to a different one to the north).[3][4][5]


Parris Island was captured by the Union Army in 1861 during the American Civil War. It became a coaling station during the war. After the war, through the efforts of African American Congressman Robert Smalls, it continued as a coaling station for the United States Navy and became known as the Port Royal Naval Station. The neighboring Port Royal Sound is the deepest natural harbor on the Atlantic coast of the United States south of New York. The island was purchased outright in 1883. In the early 1890s, a dry dock was constructed at the naval station. The dry dock was completed in 1895. The construction of the Charleston Naval Shipyard in 1901 resulted in the closing of the Port Royal Naval Station in 1903.[6]


In 1915, Parris Island became the Marine Corps Recruit Depot. In the early years of the Marine Corps presence it was referred to as Paris Island.[7]


The Charlesfort-Santa Elena Site and Parris Island Drydock and Commanding Generals House are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.[8]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parris_Island,_South_Carolina


On June 24, 1717, six months after the exile of the Stuarts, four lodges in London (names not given) met at Apple-Tree Tavern and united English Freemasonry under the name "United Grand Lodge," which has been nicknamed the Mother Grand Lodge, or Grand Mother Lodge.

The first French Templar Lodge was founded in 1725 by a contingent of exiled Stuart sympathizers. In 1745 Prince Charles Edward Stuart, the Young Pretender, attempted to regain his Scottish throne and was soundly defeated in less than a year. Upon returning to France, the Scottish Templars founded the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry, quickly developing it to 32 degrees by 1755. In 1801 all French lodges accepted the Templar Scottish Rite degrees. That same year the Scottish Rite of Charleston, S.C., created the 33rd and final degree in Templar Freemasonry.

On the continent of Europe, French Freemasonry is known as Scottish Rite, Grand Orient, French Grand Lodge, Continental, or Latin Freemasonry. The Templar York Rite in England was transported to America, where it remains to this day. English Freemasonry continued with the three Craft Degrees until 1860, when it adopted the thirty additional degrees of the Scottish Rite, but for competitive reasons refused to call it "Scottish."'

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://ia803001.us.archive.org/28/items/ScarletAndTheBeastJohnDaniel1995/Scarlet%20and%20the%20Beast,%20John%20Daniel%20(1995).pdf


Valley of Traverse City

ANCIENT ACCEPTED SCOTTISH RITE

The History and Legend of Scottish Rite Origins

The Story Unfolds…

Like much of early Masonic history, the origins of the Scottish Rite are uncertain. This is primarily due to the lack of historic documentation prior to the early 1700’s and not to any great veiled mystery. The few records kept were subject to loss, fire, weather and aging. So we can at best only speculate on many of our origins by looking at the few documents, historical references and legends that remain.

What We Know

n 1754, near Paris, Chevalier de Bonneville established the Chapter of Clermont. The Chapter resided in the College of Jesuits of Clermont, hence the name. It is said to have been created to honor the Duc de Clermont, then Grand Master of the English Grand Lodge of France.

The Chapter of Clermont was a “Chapter of the Advanced Degrees” and initially entailed six degrees and was later extended to 25 known degrees. The six initial degrees were 1˚, 2˚ and 3˚ St John’s Masonry, 4˚ Knight of the Eagle, 5˚ Illustrious Knight or Templar, 6˚ Sublime Illustrious Knight.

Interestingly enough historically, prior to the time of the Rite’s creation, James II had been in residence at Clermont in exile from Britain from 1688 to his death in 1701. As noted by German Masonic historian, Lenning… “whilst in exile, James II residing at the Jesuit College of Clermont in France, allowed his closest associates to fabricate certain degrees in order to extend their political views.” Lenning believed this to have been an attempt on the part of James and his associates to regain control of the British throne for the House of Stuart. If Lenning is right, this places the origins of the “Rite of Perfection” in the hands of James II and the Jacobite (Stuart) Freemasons who at the time were in exile from Great Britain throughout France and Italy. Lenning also contends that these degrees were introduced into French Freemasonry under the name of the Clermont System.

James II died in exile in 1701. His son James III is said to have continued his father’s Masonic legacy and later created further higher degrees.

Perhaps James II saw in the Jesuit morality plays of the College of Clermont a vessel for passing on a set of moral lessons. Some of the world’s greatest playwrights had emerged from Clermont. Jesuit tutelage had previously produced great writers such as Lope de Vega, Moliere, Racine, and the Corneille brothers. Ensconced in exile, I believe James II did find the inspiration and the training to help produce what would later become the first six degrees. From out of the darkness… comes light.

To be continued… (Author’s note… An in depth look at the Templar influence in Scottish Rite masonry’s origins can be found by visiting the Rosslyn Templars’ website.)

https://web.archive.org/.../scottish-rite-history.html


14We ought to act on the principle that everyone who lives under obedience should let himself be carried and directed by Divine Providence through the agency of the superior 15as if he were a lifeless body, which allows itself to be carried to any place and treated in any way; or an old man s staff, which serves at any place and for any purpose in which the one holding it in his hand wishes to employ it. 16For in this way the obedient man ought joyfully to employ himself in any task in which the superior desires to employ him in aid of the whole body of the religious order; 17and he ought to hold it certain that by so doing he conforms himself with the divine will more than by anything else he could do while following his own will and different judgment.[3]

page 221

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


PART VI 1THE PERSONAL LIFE OF THOSE ALREADY ADMITTED AND INCORPORATED INTO THE BODY OF THE SOCIETY

SECTION 1: THE APOSTOLIC CHARACTER OF OUR VOWS IN GENERAL

143 §1. Our consecration by profession of the evangelical counsels, by which we respond to a divine vocation, is at one and the same time the following of Christ poor, virginal, and obedient and a rejection of those idols that the world is always prepared to adore, especially wealth, pleasure, prestige, and power. Hence, our poverty, chastity, and obedience ought visibly and efficaciously to bear witness to this attitude, whereby we proclaim the evangelical possibility of a certain communion among men and women that is a foretaste of the future kingdom of God.[1]

§2. Our religious vows, while binding us, also set us FREE:

FREE, by our vow of poverty, to share the life of the poor and to use whatever resources we may have, not for our own security and comfort, but for service;

FREE, by our vow of chastity, to be men for others, in friendship and communion with all, but especially with those who share our mission of service;

FREE, by our vow of obedience, to respond to the call of Christ as made known to us by him whom the Spirit has placed over the Church, and to follow the lead of all our superiors.[2] [1] See GC 32, d. 4, no. 16; see GC 31, d. 16, no. 4; d. 17, no. 2; d. 18, no. 3. [2] GC 32, d. 2, no. 20. 215

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


MISSIONS FROM THE SUPREME PONTIFF

252 §1. To be truly Christian, our service to the Church must be anchored in fidelity to Christ, who makes all things new; to be proper to the Society, it must be done in union with the successors of Peter[32]

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Robert Rudolph Remus (born August 27, 1948), better known as Sgt. Slaughter, is an American voice actor and retired professional wrestler. He is currently signed to WWE in the ambassador program.[6]


From the late 1970s to the early 1980s, Slaughter had success in the National Wrestling Alliance, American Wrestling Association, and the World Wrestling Federation. He won the WWF Heavyweight Championship and headlined WrestleMania VII in 1991. Slaughter also captured the NWA United States Heavyweight Championship twice. He is a WWE Hall of Famer, inducted as part of the class of 2004. As Sgt. Slaughter, Remus became known for his dark sunglasses, his campaign hat, and his Vietnam War-era military fatigues. In the 1980s, an alternate version of the Sgt. Slaughter character was incorporated into the G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero toy line as well as its animated series and comic books.


The gimmick of Sgt. Slaughter is that of a former U.S. Marine who fought in the Vietnam War. Remus himself never served in the military. He received several draft deferments and even opposed the war, often protesting and demonstrating within the antiwar movement. This has caused controversy because, at times, Remus has talked about military service while seeming to be speaking as himself, and not in character.[7][8]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sgt._Slaughter


Triangle Of Terror

Members

Sgt Slaughter

Col. Mustafa

General Adnan

Promotions

WWF

Debuted

1990

Disbanded

1991

Triangle Of Terror were a stable in the World Wrestling Federation between 1990 and 1991. It consisted of Sgt Slaughter, Col. Mustafa and General Adnan

History

General Adnan, Slaughter and Mustafa were portrayed as Iraqi sympathizers during the first Gulf War and feuded with Hulk Hogan and The Ultimate Warrior. Following Slaughter's face turn after SummerSlam 1991 the team disbanded.

https://prowrestling.fandom.com/wiki/Triangle_Of_Terror


Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, Named Next Provincial of the Jesuits of Canada

March 15, 2024 — The Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) announced the appointment of Fr. Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, as the next provincial of the Jesuits of Canada. This appointment is the culmination of a thoughtful, prayerful process of consultation and discernment, marking a significant milestone for the Canadian Province.


Fr. Jeffrey Burwell, SJ

Fr. Burwell will succeed Fr. Erik Oland, SJ, assuming his new responsibilities on July 31, 2024, with an inaugural Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Toronto. A special celebration will also take place at the Jesuit infirmary in Richelieu, Quebec, on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15, 2024.


Fr. Burwell, 48, is an educational specialist whose doctoral research took him to the Holy Land, where he focused on Catholic schools in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. A lecturer in Catholic studies, first St. Paul’s College at the University of Manitoba and now Campion College at the University of Regina, he balances university work with pastoral service as a chaplain to police (RCMP) and to prisoners. He dedicates his university holidays to ministering in the Dene and Cree Indigenous communities of Saskatchewan and Manitoba.


Holding positions as a local superior since 2017 and a province consultor since 2021, Fr. Burwell brings a profound understanding of the Jesuit mission and a significant appreciation for Canada and Haiti’s diverse cultures.


This leadership change comes at a time when the Society of Jesus seeks to deepen its engagement with contemporary challenges, oriented by their Universal Apostolic Preferences: showing the way to God through the Spiritual Exercises and discernment; walking with the excluded; journeying with youth; and caring for our common home.


A Jesuit provincial leads a specific geographic region. This role is deeply spiritual, with responsibilities that extend beyond administrative tasks to include guiding the province’s mission and providing spiritual and pastoral care for its members. Provincials generally serve a six-year term.


There are five provinces within the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States. The Canadian Province of the Society of Jesus encompasses a wide range of works, including colleges/universities, secondary and pre-secondary schools, parishes, retreat houses, formation in spirituality, Indigenous ministries, social justice center and ecological endeavors.


The Jesuits of Canada, together with their partners, look forward to supporting Fr. Burwell in his new role as they continue to serve the mission of the Church and society in Canada and beyond.

https://www.jesuits.org/stories/jeffrey-s-burwell-sj-named-next-provincial-of-the-jesuits-of-canada/


What is a SIN?

A Social Insurance Number (SIN) is a 9-digit number that you need to work and be paid in Canada and access government programs and benefits. It is also used to file taxes.


If you are not eligible for a SIN, you can apply for an Individual Tax Number (ITN) for tax purposes.


You are responsible for protecting your SIN. Ensure that you store documents containing your SIN and personal information in a safe place. For more information about protecting your SIN, please visit here.


International students get a SIN starting with the number ‘9,’ which lets employers know that you are a temporary resident in Canada.

https://international.northeastern.edu/ogs/student-support/global-campuses/canada/social-insurance-number/


As per numerology, 666 when added comes to 9, a tricky number that stands for greediness, and natural disasters. But 9 (6+6+6+18=1+8=90 is also the number of Mars (Mangal) which means extra energy which can either make or break. It is impulsive, restless, stubborn and inflexible,' adds Jumaani."

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/ahmedabad-times/666-the-devil-or-cupid/articleshow/1621141.cms#


A novena (from Latin: novem, "nine") is an ancient tradition of devotional praying in Christianity, consisting of private or public prayers repeated for nine successive days or weeks.[1] The nine days between the Feast of the Ascension and Pentecost, when the disciples gathered in the upper room and devoted themselves to prayer, is often considered to be the first novena.[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novena


[666] 6. 1On the side of the superior general, what will aid toward this union of hearts are the qualities of his person [G], to be treated in Part IX [723-25], with which he will perform his office, 2which is to be for all the members a head from which the influence required for the end sought by the Society ought to descend to them all. 3It is thus from the general as head that all authority of the provincials should flow, from the provincials that of the local superiors, and from the local superiors that of the individual members. 4And from this same head, or at least by his commission and approval, should likewise come the appointing of missions. And the same should apply to communicating the graces of the Society. 5For the more the subjects are dependent upon their superiors, the better will the love, obedience, and union among them be preserved."

The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus and Their Complementary Norms

https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Civil Twilight:

Begins in the morning, or ends in the evening, when the geometric center of the sun is 6 degrees below the horizon.  Therefore morning civil twilight begins when the geometric center of the sun is 6 degrees below the horizon, and ends at sunrise.  Evening civil twilight begins at sunset, and ends when the geometric center of the sun is 6 degrees below the horizon.  Under these conditions absent fog or other restrictions, the brightest stars and planets can be seen, the horizon and terrestrial objects can be discerned, and in many cases, artificial lighting is not needed. Civil Twilight is also known as Civil Dawn and Civil Dusk.

Nautical Twilight:

Begins in the morning, or ends in the evening, when the geometric center of the sun is 12 degrees below the horizon.  In general, the term nautical twilight refers to sailors being able to take reliable readings via well known stars because the horizon is still visible, even under moonless conditions.  Absent fog or other restrictions, outlines of terrestrial objects may still be discernible, but detailed outdoor activities are likely curtailed without artificial illumination. Nautical Twilight is also known as Nautical Dawn and Nautical Dusk.

Astronomical Twilight:

Begins in the morning, or ends in the evening, when the geometric center of the sun is 18 degrees below the horizon.  In astronomical twilight, sky illumination is so faint that most casual observers would regard the sky as fully dark, especially under urban or suburban light pollution.  Under astronomical twilight, the horizon is not discernible and moderately faint stars or planets can be observed with the naked eye under a non light polluted sky.  But to test the limits of naked eye observations, the sun needs to be more than 18 degrees below the horizon.  Point light sources such as stars and planets can be readily studied by astronomers under astronomical twilight.  But diffuse light sources such as galaxies, nebula, and globular clusters need to be observed under a totally dark sky, again when the sun is more than 18 degrees below the horizon.

https://www.weather.gov/fsd/twilight


Unam Sanctam

One God, One Faith, One Spiritual Authority

Pope Boniface VIII - 1302

Bull of Pope Boniface VIII promulgated November 18, 1302

Urged by faith, we are obliged to believe and to maintain that the Church is one, holy, catholic, and also apostolic. We believe in her firmly and we confess with simplicity that outside of her there is neither salvation nor the remission of sins, as the Spouse in the Canticles [Sgs 6:8] proclaims: ‘One is my dove, my perfect one. She is the only one, the chosen of her who bore her,‘ and she represents one sole mystical body whose Head is Christ and the head of Christ is God [1 Cor 11:3]. In her then is one Lord, one faith, one baptism [Eph 4:5]. There had been at the time of the deluge only one ark of Noah, prefiguring the one Church, which ark, having been finished to a single cubit, had only one pilot and guide, i.e., Noah, and we read that, outside of this ark, all that subsisted on the earth was destroyed.

We venerate this Church as one, the Lord having said by the mouth of the prophet: ‘Deliver, O God, my soul from the sword and my only one from the hand of the dog.’ [Ps 21:20] He has prayed for his soul, that is for himself, heart and body; and this body, that is to say, the Church, He has called one because of the unity of the Spouse, of the faith, of the sacraments, and of the charity of the Church. This is the tunic of the Lord, the seamless tunic, which was not rent but which was cast by lot [Jn 19:23- 24]. Therefore, of the one and only Church there is one body and one head, not two heads like a monster; that is, Christ and the Vicar of Christ, Peter and the successor of Peter, since the Lord speaking to Peter Himself said: ‘Feed my sheep‘ [Jn 21:17], meaning, my sheep in general, not these, nor those in particular, whence we understand that He entrusted all to him [Peter]. Therefore, if the Greeks or others should say that they are not confided to Peter and to his successors, they must confess not being the sheep of Christ, since Our Lord says in John ‘there is one sheepfold and one shepherd.’ We are informed by the texts of the gospels that in this Church and in its power are two swords; namely, the spiritual and the temporal. For when the Apostles say: ‘Behold, here are two swords‘ [Lk 22:38] that is to say, in the Church, since the Apostles were speaking, the Lord did not reply that there were too many, but sufficient. Certainly the one who denies that the temporal sword is in the power of Peter has not listened well to the word of the Lord commanding: ‘Put up thy sword into thy scabbard‘ [Mt 26:52]. Therefore, both are in the power of the Church, namely, the spiritual sword and the material. But indeed, the latter is to be exercised on behalf of the Church; and truly, the former is to be exercised by the Church. The former is of the priest; the latter is by the hand of kings and soldiers, but at the will and sufferance of the priest.


However, one sword ought to be subordinated to the other and temporal authority, subjected to spiritual power. For since the Apostle said: ‘There is no power except from God and the things that are, are ordained of God‘ [Rom 13:1-2], but they would not be ordained if one sword were not subordinated to the other and if the inferior one, as it were, were not led upwards by the other.


For, according to the Blessed Dionysius, it is a law of the divinity that the lowest things reach the highest place by intermediaries. Then, according to the order of the universe, all things are not led back to order equally and immediately, but the lowest by the intermediary, and the inferior by the superior. Hence we must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power whatever, as spiritual things surpass the temporal. This we see very clearly also by the payment, benediction, and consecration of the tithes, but the acceptance of power itself and by the government even of things. For with truth as our witness, it belongs to spiritual power to establish the terrestrial power and to pass judgement if it has not been good. Thus is accomplished the prophecy of Jeremias concerning the Church and the ecclesiastical power: ‘Behold to-day I have placed you over nations, and over kingdoms‘ and the rest. Therefore, if the terrestrial power err, it will be judged by the spiritual power; but if a minor spiritual power err, it will be judged by a superior spiritual power; but if the highest power of all err, it can be judged only by God, and not by man, according to the testimony of the Apostle: ‘The spiritual man judgeth of all things and he himself is judged by no man‘ [1 Cor 2:15]. This authority, however, (though it has been given to man and is exercised by man), is not human but rather divine, granted to Peter by a divine word and reaffirmed to him (Peter) and his successors by the One Whom Peter confessed, the Lord saying to Peter himself, ‘Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound also in Heaven‘ etc., [Mt 16:19]. Therefore whoever resists this power thus ordained by God, resists the ordinance of God [Rom 13:2], unless he invent like Manicheus two beginnings, which is false and judged by us heretical, since according to the testimony of Moses, it is not in the beginnings but in the beginning that God created heaven and earth [Gen 1:1]. Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

https://www.papalencyclicals.net/bon08/b8unam.htm


AI Overview

The NRA's leadership transitioned in mid-2024 after Wayne LaPierre stepped down amid a corruption trial, with Doug Hamlin becoming Executive Vice President & CEO and Bob Barr elected President, though internal power struggles and questions about continued reform remain, with Bill Bachenberg later elected President in April 2025, representing a shift towards a new "NRA 2.0" with a focus on legislative action and ongoing legal battles for the organization's future. 

Key Figures in the New Leadership

Doug Hamlin: The new Executive Vice President & CEO, taking over from LaPierre and overseeing daily operations.

Bill Bachenberg: Elected President in April 2025, previously first vice president, promoting a vision of a reformed "NRA 2.0".

Bob Barr: Elected President in May 2024 after LaPierre's departure but faced internal conflicts and was later succeeded by Bachenberg. 

Context of the Change

Corruption Trial Fallout: LaPierre's exit followed a major New York Attorney General lawsuit finding him liable for misuse of funds, leading to his ban from leading the NRA.

Internal Turmoil: The leadership transition was marked by infighting and disputes over control and reform within the organization, notes Giffords and The New York Times.

"NRA 2.0": The new leadership, particularly Bachenberg, advocates for a fresh start, though some critics question if significant change has occurred, says The New York Times and Brady United. 

Current Focus

The NRA continues its advocacy for Second Amendment rights, legislative action, and navigating ongoing legal challenges, aiming to rebuild trust and financial stability. 

AI responses may include mistakes. Learn more


Hunting is an American Tradition

When it comes to hunting and skills training, America's hunters have known for years where to go: the National Rifle Association. Working in cooperation with the state of New York in 1949, we developed hunter safety training as it's known today. Since then, our proven hunting education principles have been adopted by one state after another. Hunters contribute millions of dollars every year towards wildlife management and conservation projects as well as work to preserve the treasured tradition for future generations.

https://explore.nra.org/interests/hunting/


Nimrod[a][b] is a biblical figure mentioned in the Book of Genesis and the Books of Chronicles. The son of Cush and therefore the great-grandson of Noah, Nimrod was described as a king in the land of Shinar (Lower Mesopotamia). The Bible states that he was "a mighty hunter before the Lord [and] ... began to be mighty in the earth".[2] Biblical and non-biblical traditions identify Nimrod as the ruler who had commissioned the construction of the Tower of Babel, and that identification led to his reputation as a king who had been rebellious against God.


There is no direct evidence that Nimrod was an actual historical person in any of the non-biblical historic records, registers, or king lists (including any of the Mesopotamian ones, which are considered older than the biblical record). Historians have failed to match Nimrod with any real historically attested figure, or to find any historical, linguistic or genetic link between the Sumerian and Semitic Mesopotamians and the distant and later emerging kingdom of kush in modern Sudan. In 2002 one scholar suggested that the biblical Nimrod was inspired by one of the exclusively Mesopotamian historical figures, Naram-Sin of Akkad, grandson of Sargon, and attempts have been made by other scholars to attribute the inspiration behind Nimrod to one or more Assyrian, Akkadian or Babylonian kings, or the Assyro-Babylonian god Ninurta.[3][4]


In more recent times (during the Islamic era), several sites of ruins in the Middle East have been named after Nimrod.[5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nimrod


The oldest written evidence of rose cultivation comes from a tablet discussing the Akkadian king Sargon I’s military campaign to the west. Sargon brought rosebush saplings with him on the campaign so rose cultivation could begin in these newly acquired territories soon after his conquest. It was an act of supreme confidence and evidence of roses’ importance to Akkadian culture.

https://deathscent.com/2022/02/18/rosalia/


Roses and ancient Roman rituals

During the Roman Empire, Rosalia or Rosaria was a festival of roses celebrated on various dates, primarily in May, but scattered through mid-July. The observance is sometimes called a rosatio (rose-adornment) or the dies rosationis, ‘day of rose-adornment’.


Flowers were traditional symbols of rejuvenation, rebirth, and in Greece and Rome, wreaths and garlands of flowers and greenery were worn by both men and women for festive occasions. They were offered to deities, particularly the goddesses Venus, Persephone and Flora, the goddess of Spring.Venus received roses at her ritual cleansing (lavatio) on April 1st and at the wine festival (Vinalia). And, in Athens, roses and violets could be adornments for Dionysian feasts.


The Roman army celebrated the Rosaliae signorum, rose festivals at which they adorned the military standards with garlands. The rose festivals of ancient times are recorded in at least forty-one inscriptions in Latin and sixteen in Greek, where the observance is often called a rhodismos.


An Imperial-era business letter, written on papyrus, documents that 4,000 narcissus flowers were sent from a florist to a wedding. We know too, that men wore a garland of flowers more than women. First century AD Roman poet Statius describes a groom as wearing a wreath of roses, violets, and lilies.


“When the Emperor made a formal arrival – an adventus- at a city, garlands of flowers might be among the gestures of greeting.”


And then, of course, early Christian writers transferred the imagery of garlands and crowns of roses and violets to the cult of the saints. Blood and flowers are linked in divine metamorphosis in mythology.


And in fact every year, at the Pantheon, a place of Christian worship, which was converted from a pagan temple, to the Basilica of Mary and the Martyrs, celebrate Pentecost by dropping rose petals through the roof. Like many pagan rituals, they were continued in Christian times, but with a different meaning.

https://www.italysbestrome.com/roses-and-ancient-roman-rituals/


Rosa Jesuitica, oder Jesuitische Rottgesellen, das ist, Eine Frag ob die Zween Orden, der ganandten Ritter von der Neerscharen Jesu, und der Rosen-Creuzer ein einiger Ordensen: per J. P. D. a S. Jesuitarum Protectorum. Prague, 1620.” (4to).

This is a truly curious tract upon the “relations of the Jesuits and the Rosicrucians."

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1dT28PyPUPfqDfC0iVg7nGFsle8vYBXLf/view?usp=sharing


Rosicrucianism and the Bohemian War

If one wants to understand how the group around Simon Studion gained in influence, the political context of the 1590s must be carefully calibrated with the hopes set out at Tubingen in 1610. The Rosicrucian ideas were published in a period when political activities were set in motion to form an evangelical union in Germany, a union that (according to Studion in 1604) sought support in France, Britain, and Denmark. The rise of Johannes Bureus in Sweden, on

the other hand, confirms Frances Yates’ hypothesis that political initiatives in the Thirty Years’ War were influenced by Rosicrucian types of eschatology both before 1610 and after 1620. This notwithstanding that the year of the defeat at Prague in most of the recent literature has been transformed into a Rosicrucian anno non post quern,

underlined by such writings as Paul Nagel’s Cursus Quinqumali Mundi oder Wundergeheime Offenbarung (Halle, Saxonia, 1620) stating that the whole course of history would repeat itself within the course of four years before the bitter end: “ 1624 nec plus ultra.” Of course, Nagel was immediately attacked by a Jesuit author claiming that his doctrine of compressed repetition was a mere stage-play, falsely transposed to the scene of reality."

Rose Cross Cross Over The Baltic The Spread of Rosicrucianism In Northern Europe

by Susanna Akerman

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vWI_uTVg5lzNCDm16itq-PLSavozNR_F/view?usp=sharing


Politics

Vance says it was "pretty crazy" that he met Pope Francis in his last 24 hours

By Kaia Hubbard

April 23, 2025 / 9:58 AM EDT / CBS News

Vice President JD Vance said Wednesday that it was "pretty crazy" that he was among the last officials to meet with Pope Francis before his death earlier this week.


"When I saw him, I didn't know that he had less than 24 hours still on this earth," Vance told reporters in Agra, India. "I think it was a great blessing."


The vice president is on a four-day trip in India with his wife Usha, the first Hindu American second lady, whose parents emigrated to the U.S. from India. Vance's visit with his family comes after they traveled to Italy last week to participate in Holy Week events. Vance noted that plans remain in flux about whether he will attend the pope's funeral in the coming days.


The vice president outlined his brief visit with Francis on Easter Sunday, saying he knew the pope was "very ill," but he "didn't realize how sick he was."


"The thing that I will always remember Pope Francis for is that he was a great pastor," Vance said. "People on the margins, poor people, people suffering from diseases, they saw in Pope Francis an advocate and I think, a true expression of Christian love."


Vance added that the pontiff "affected a lot of lives," saying that he tries to remember "that I was lucky that I got to shake his hand and tell him that I pray for him every day, because I did and I do."


Vance and Francis' meeting came after the two men had sharp disagreements on immigration as the pontiff had long condemned the Trump administration's approach. Vance, who converted to Catholicism in 2019, told reporters Wednesday that he's aware of the disagreements the pope had with some of the Trump administration's policies, while noting that he would not "soil the man's legacy by talking about politics."


On the selection of the next pope, the vice president said he would "say a prayer for wisdom" for the Cardinals, saying that "I want them to pick somebody who will be good for the world's Catholics."


"But I'll let them make that decision, and obviously they're entitled to do so," he added.


The vice president's trip to India comes amid President Trump's recent actions on tariffs. Vance arrived in India on Monday and met with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, after which the leaders touted progress on trade talks.


The vice president told reporters Wednesday that "we're making progress across the board," though he said of the trade discussions more broadly that it's "a little bit too early to prejudge, to say what any of these deals is going to look like."

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/pope-francis-death-jd-vance-meeting/


EL SABOR DE HEREJIA: THE EDICT OF 1525, THE ALUMBRADOS

AND THE INQUISITORS’ USAGE OF LOCURA

By

Javier A. Montoya

May 2010

Chair: Nina Caputo

Major: History

The alumbrados of Spain were a mystical Christian movement that arose in the 1510s. Initially enjoying noble patronage and an environment of spiritual exploration fostered by the reforms of Cardinal Cisneros, the alumbrados spread their ideas throughout Castile. Led by charismatic female spiritual leaders or beatas, the alumbrados’ brief era of success ended when two of its leaders came before the Tribunal of Toledo in 1524. With a membership consisting mostly of second-generation conversos, the alumbrados advocated an interiorized approach to Christianity under the aegis of dejamiento. The meditational practice of dejamiento called upon its practitioners to “abandon” themselves to God and His will effectively releasing themselves from their ties (ataduras) to the material world that included the Church and the priesthood.

By 1525, convinced of the heretical nature of alumbradismo, the Inquisitors published El edicto contra los alumbrados consisting of 48 alumbrado Propositions followed by official Inquisitorial refutation and condemnation. The Edict of 1525 presented the alumbrados as a dangerous group of heretics in its attempt to delegitimize their beliefs.

This study focuses on the Inquisitors’ diction in their responses to and qualifications of the alumbrado Propositions, specifically their usage of the words loca (crazy) and locura

6

(madness). The usage of loca is then placed within a discourse about the attitudes prevalent in Castilian society towards conversos and beatas with the understanding that stereotyping and general dislike and fear of both groups contributed much to the Inquisitors’ reactions to the alumbrado Propositions. The Edict also reveals the Inquisitors’ interpretative difficulties in classifying alumbradismo and placing it within their continuum of heresy. The usage of loca as a negative qualifier in Inquisitorial responses was meant to highlight the danger the movement posed to Catholic orthodoxy. The alumbrados challenged the Inquisitors’ cosmological views and pre-established categories of heresy. In turn, the Inquisitors designated the alumbrados a novelty placing them in a third space of heresy, one neither crypto-Jewish nor Protestant and lying somewhere between heterodoxy and orthodoxy.

The analysis of the intertwined factors of the Inquisitorial portrayal of the alumbrados and the alumbrados’ status as conversos and women is placed within an overall discourse that addresses the historiographic problems that historians of alumbradismo have faced. As such, the alumbrados are presented as free as possible from labels of heresy or comparison to other contemporary religious movements. Inquisitorial testimonies and documents remain the primary sources of alumbrado history, however, this thesis attempts to set aside the Inquisitors’ interpretation of alumbradismo when representing their ideas. The alumbrados then function as an example of the growing spiritual and religious unrest prevalent in sixteenth century Europe and as an example of a uniquely converso understanding of Christianity.

https://ufdcimages.uflib.ufl.edu/uf/e0/04/13/85/00001/montoya_j.pdf


Trump, Vance meet with Pope Leo's Florida brother, 'a major MAGA fan', at White House

Kim Luciani

USA TODAY NETWORK - Florida

May 22, 2025, 12:58 p.m. ET

Key Points AI-assisted summary

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's brother, Louis Prevost, at the White House.

Trump publicly praised Prevost, a Florida resident, for being a "major MAGA fan."

Louis Prevost acknowledged his political views and stated his intention to "tone it down" to avoid causing issues for the pope.

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's Florida brother Louis Prevost at the White House on May 20, after praising Prevost to reporters at the Capitol earlier in the day, calling him a "major MAGA fan."


Trump told reporters he likes the pope and both of his brothers, but spotlighted the eldest brother, Navy veteran and Port Charlotte resident Louis Prevost.

"I like the new pope and I like the pope's brother. You know, one of the pope's brothers – actually both of them – but one in particular is a major MAGA fan. Did you know that? He lives in Florida," Trump said.

"And I look forward to getting him to the White House. I want to shake his hand, I want to give him a big hug."

Later that day, the White House visit happened. Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah met with Trump and Vice President JD Vance in the Oval Office.

"Great meeting between President Trump, Vice President Vance, and @Pontifex’s brother, Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah," Special Assistant to the President and Communications Advisor Margo Martin posted on X, along with a photo of the meeting.


Louis Prevost excited and happy about brother Pope Leo XVI's papacy

The Prevost brothers — Louis, John and Robert (Pope Leo XIV) — grew up in Chicago in a traditional Catholic family.

Louis Prevost said his youngest brother Robert wanted to "play priest" when he was 6 and set his sights on the priesthood as a freshman in high school. Their parents, neighbors and even strangers told Robert, "You're going to be pope someday," he said.

Robert Prevost's election as Pope Leo XIV left Louis Prevost excited, happy, mind blown and a little worried about how the papacy would impact their relationship.

“I just freaked out and said ‘It’s Rob, OMG.’ I was up, dressed, out, just going nuts,” he told WBBH.

“We can only hope that we can maintain that closeness, and we don't do anything to embarrass him,” he said.

Louis Prevost attended Pope Leo's inaugural mass at the Vatican on May 18. The brothers shared a hug after the service.


Pope Leo's Florida brother Louis Prevost is a MAGA, Trump supporter

Trump told reporters Louis Prevost is a "major MAGA fan."


In an interview with Piers Morgan, Louis Prevost said, "I don’t want to create waves that don’t need to be there because I’m a MAGA type and I have my beliefs,” he said. “I don’t need to create heat for him. He’s going to have enough to handle as it is without the press going ‘the pope’s brother says this.’ He doesn’t need that.”


Asked about his reposts of controversial social media memes, including one calling Nancy Pelosi a drunk (expletive), and how they might affect the pope, Louis Prevost said he will "tone it down."


"He knows I am who I am," he said of the pope. "He's well aware of my position. He knows I'm probably not going to change and I don't think I will, other than to, just like you say, tone it down."

Contributing: Melissa Pérez-Carrillo, Herald-Tribune, Ashley Ferrer, USA TODAY Network-Florida

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/


All historians acknowledge the ascendancy of the popes began in 308 A.D., when King Clovis of the Salian or Merovingian Franks (later France), won the decisive battle in the Catholic and Arian religious war, thereby settling the dispute in favor of the Catholics. But the popes' temporal reign officially began in the year 538 A.D. when Roman Emperor Justinian subdued the last of the three kingdoms, or "horns," that opposed the rise of the Papacy."

-page 137

Chapter 19 "Exposed (Again): 1260 Years of World Domination

Codeword Barbelon book 2

by P.D. Stuart


Clovis is the modern conventional French (and thence English) form of the Old Frankish name ᚺᛚᛟᛞᛟᚹᛁᚷ (in runic alphabet) or *"Hlōdowik" or "Hlōdowig" (in Latin alphabet), equivalent to the modern forms Louis (French), Lodewijk (Dutch), Lewis (English), and Ludwig (German).


Etymology

The name *Hlōdowik or *Hlōdowig is traditionally considered to be composed of two elements, deriving from both Proto-Germanic *hlūdaz ("loud, famous") and *wiganą ("to battle, to fight") respectively, resulting in the traditional practice of translating Clovis' name as meaning "famous warrior".


However, scholars have pointed out that Gregory of Tours consequently transcribes the names of various Merovingian royal names containing the first element as chlodo-. The use of a close-mid back protruded vowel (o), rather than the expected close back rounded vowel (u) which Gregory does use in various other Germanic names (i.e. Fredegundis, Arnulfus, Gundobadus, etc.) opens up the possibility that the first element instead derives from Proto-Germanic *hlutą ("lot, share, portion"), giving the meaning of the name as "loot bringer" or "plunder (bringing) warrior". This hypothesis is supported by the fact that if the first element is taken to mean "famous", then the name of Chlodomer (one of Clovis' sons) would contain two elements (*hlūdaz and *mērijaz) both meaning "famous", which would be highly uncommon within the typical Germanic name structure.[1][2]


Frankish royalty

Clovis I (c. 466 – 511), the first king of the Franks to unite all the Frankish tribes under one ruler

Clovis II (637 – c. 658), king of Neustria and Burgundy

Clovis III (reigned 675–676), the king of Austrasia

Clovis IV (682–695), the sole king of the Franks from 691 until 695

Clovis (died 580), son of Chilperic I and Audovera, assassinated by his father and stepmother

Louis the Pious, son of Charlemagne, King of Aquitaine from 781 and sole ruler of the Franks 814–840, but counted as "Louis I of France" even though West Francia (the nucleus of the later kingdom of France) was formed only after his death.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clovis_(given_name)


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.


Biography

Early life

Sako was born in the city of Zakho, Iraq, on 4 July 1948.[2] He comes from an ethnic Assyrian family of the Chaldean Catholic Church that has roots in a religious community that has had a presence in the city of his birth since the 5th century AD.[3]


He completed his early studies in Mosul and then attended the Dominican-run Saint Jean’s Seminary there. He was ordained a priest on 1 June 1974 and filled his first pastoral assignment at the Cathedral of Mosul until 1979. He then earned a doctorate in Eastern patrology at the Pontifical Oriental Institute. When denied a license to teach because he was only qualified for religious instruction, he earned a second doctorate in history from the Sorbonne in Paris.[4] With this he secured his teaching license and was able to provide religious instruction. From 1997 to 2002 he was rector of the Patriarchal Seminary in Baghdad. He then returned to Mosul and guided the parish of Perpetual Help for a year.[5][6]


Sako speaks Neo-Aramaic, German, French, English, Italian, Kurdish and Arabic.[2]


Archeparch

A synod of the bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church meeting in Baghdad elected Sako Archeparch of Kirkuk on 24 October 2002. Pope John Paul II gave his assent on 27 September 2003.[7] He received his episcopal consecration on 14 November 2003 from his predecessor in Kirkuk, André Sana.[8]


In August 2009, and at the beginning of Ramadan, Sako organized an appeal for national peace, reconciliation and end to violence on the part of more than fifty religious leaders in Kirkuk. He called it "a gesture of closeness to our Muslim brothers. We are all brothers, sons of the same God we must respect and cooperate for the good of the people and our country." The participants included representatives of Ali Sistani and Muqtada al Sadr.[9]


Patriarch

The Synod of Bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church, convoked in Rome on 28 January 2013, elected Sako to succeed Emmanuel III Delly as Patriarch of Babylon. He chose Louis Raphael I as his regnal name. Pope Benedict XVI gave his assent to the election on 1 February[2] and granted him ecclesiastica communio (ecclesiastical communion) as required by the canon law for Eastern-rite Catholic churches in recognition of their unity with the wider Catholic church.[10]


That same year, Iraq's President Jalal Talabani issued a decree recognizing Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Church.[11]


In July 2014 Sako led a wave of condemnation for the Sunni Islamists who demanded Christians either convert, submit to their radical rule and pay a religious levy or face death by the sword.[12] In September 2014 Sako said “The U.S. is indirectly responsible for what is going on in Iraq as it said it would ensure democracy and the well-being of the people, but 10 years have passed and on the contrary we have gone backward." He was responding to a question following remarks attributed to him in the local daily Ad-Diyar in which he accused the U.S. of supporting ISIS. Sako had also criticized Muslim countries for lack of support: "Our Muslim neighbours did not help us." He urged Muslim preachers to issue a religious ruling against the killing of all innocent people and said that "Issuing a fatwa preventing Muslims from killing fellow Muslims is not enough."[13]


In 2014, Sako ordered ten priests who had fled Iraq to return there by 22 October; he suspended them when they failed to comply. The priests, all living in the United States, some for as long as twenty years, appealed to Pope Francis for relief from the order.[14] In January 2015, Pope Francis granted them permission to remain in the United States.[15] Sako later renewed his order despite the pope's decision.[16]


In 2015, Sako proposed a "merger" or reunion of his own Chaldean Catholic Church with the Ancient Church of the East and the Assyrian Church of the East to create one united "Church of the East" with a single patriarch in union with the pope. His proposal would have required both his own resignation and that of Mar Addai II, followed by a joint synod of the bishops of all three churches to elect a new patriarch for the reunited Church of the East. (The patriarchate of the Assyrian Church of the East was vacant at the time, following the death of Mar Dinkha IV.)[17] He wrote that "Unity does not mean uniformity, nor the melting of our own church identity into one style, but it maintains unity in diversity and we remain one apostolic universal church, the Oriental Church, that maintains its independence of administration, laws and liturgies, traditions and support."[18] The Assyrian Church of the East respectfully declined this proposal citing "ecclesiological divergences still remaining" and proceeded with its election of a new patriarch.[19]


On 14 November 2015, the Synod of Bishops announced that Pope Francis had named Sako as one of his three appointments to that body's council.[20]


Cardinal

Pope Francis made Sako a cardinal in a consistory on 28 June 2018.[21] Later that year, Pope Francis named him one of the four cardinals to preside over sessions of the Synod of Bishops on Youth in October.[22]


On 6 October 2018 Sako was named a member of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches,[23] on 22 February 2019 a member of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue,[24] and on 29 September 2021 a member of the Congregation for Catholic Education.[25] On 4 January 2022, Pope Francis made him a member of the Council for the Economy.[26]


Sako was a cardinal elector in the 2025 papal conclave that elected Pope Leo XIV.[27] Patriarch Sako was also the first Chaldean Catholic Patriarch ever to participate in a papal conclave.[28][a] Sako opted not to wear the shash, the traditional headgear of East Syriac Christian bishops, and wore only his scarlet zucchetto.[32]


Government recognition dispute

On 15 July 2023, Iraq's President Abdul Latif Rashid announced the revocation of the government's 2013 decree recognizing Sako as Patriarch. In response that same day Sako announced he was leaving Baghdad to take up residence in Iraqi Kurdistan. He called the revocation "unprecedented in the history of Iraq".[11] Rashid said his action "does not affect the religious or legal status of patriarch Sako" and said it was based on the fact that Sako's office is not recognized by the Iraqi Constitution; Sako viewed as an extension of the government's ongoing "deliberate and humiliating campaign" against him and its wider failure to protect Iraqi Christians.[33] Rashid had recently rejected requests for comparable decrees from the Patriarchs of the Assyrian Church and the Old Assyrian Church. Others cited complex political manoeuvering.[34]


On 15 July 2023, Sako announced his intention to "retire from the Patriarchal See in Baghdad and move to a church, a mission, in one of the monasteries of Iraqi Kurdistan". His announcement followed a decision by the President of Iraq, Abdul Latif Rashid, to revoke a decree established in 2013 by the former Iraq's President, Jalal Talabani, recognising Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Church. The revocation "is unprecedented in Iraq's history," Sako said, highlighting "the government's silence" about the incident and the suffering of the Christian community.[35] For months, Sako had been embroiled in a war of words with a Shia lawmaker and militia leader, Rayan al-Kildani. Both accused each other of exploiting their influence to illegally seize Christian-owned properties. Al-Kildani is the leader of the Babylon Movement, whose militia fought ISIS within the state-linked Popular Mobilisation Forces, a network of largely pro-Iran paramilitaries. Since then, al-Kildani forged strong alliances with powerful Tehran-allied Shiite militias. Sako criticized the Babylon Movement as falsely Christian, noting most of its members and supporters are Shia Muslims using the label for political gain.[36][37] Furthermore, the Babylon Movement, led by al-Kildani, is accused of pillaging homes, unlawful confiscation of land, coercion, extortion, abuse of women, persecution of religious minorities, and torture of detainees. As a result, in 2019, the US imposed sanctions on al-Kildani and another Shiite militia leader, calling them "perpetrators of serious human rights abuse and corruption", and penalizing entities that interact with them.[38]


Cardinal Sako has accused Archbishop Bashar Warda of collaborating and conspiring with Rayan al-Kildani in an effort to subvert his authority and push for his resignation as head of the Chaldean Church. Warda is criticized for supporting al-Kildani despite his horrendous actions, and for not supporting Sako's efforts to counter the Babylon Movement's seizure of Christian assets. This has led to accusations that Warda prioritizes benefits from al-Kildani's support over protecting church interests. Sako has referred to Warda as the "Godfather" of the Babylon Movement.[39][40][41]


On 7 August 2023, Sako told an interviewer that "Withdrawing the decree is very bad. For 15 centuries, there were decrees recognising the Patriarch as head of the Church and administrator of the properties of the Church. Revoking it is a humiliation for the Church. Those behind this move want to put their hands on the properties of the Church and administer them separately from the ecclesiastical authorities. We cannot accept that."[42]


In April 2024, after nine months of exile, Sako returned to Baghdad with the assistance of Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia' Al Sudani.[43][44]


On 28 August 2024, Sako demanded a public apology from five bishops based on perceived disunity in the Chaldean Catholic Church, including absence from a mandatory July episcopal synod, setting a deadline of September 5. The five bishops, led by Bashar Warda, the Archbishop of Erbil, also withdrew from an August spiritual retreat and pulled their students from the Chaldean Seminary. The bishops refused to apologize, citing dissatisfaction with Sako's leadership style and unilateral decision-making. As a result, he would suspend them and ask Pope Francis to impose canonical penalties, including excommunication.[45][46] The actions of Bashar Warda and the other bishops have been described by the Chaldean Patriarchate as a "dangerous precedent" that goes against their episcopal vows to support the patriarch. The 17 bishops who attended the July 2024 synod issued a communiqué, calling for "appropriate legal measures" against the "clear violations" committed by the boycotting group of Warda.[47]


The rivalry between Louis Sako and Bashar Warda is driven by a fierce personal conflict, with Sako perceiving Warda as ruthlessly ambitious to seize the patriarchate. This perception has led Sako to backtrack on his initial plans to retire at 75, driven by a determination to thwart Warda's power grab. Warda's actions are seen as a betrayal of Sako's leadership.[48]


Honours

Defensor Fidei Prize, 2008

Pax Christi International Peace Award, 2010

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


AI Overview

In his 1966 address, Pope Paul VI welcomed Iraq's first ambassador, hoping the new diplomatic ties would strengthen brotherly relations, and assured him of the Holy See's support for Iraq's efforts toward peace based on justice and love. He expressed his confidence that the ambassador would succeed in his mission and conveyed warm greetings to the President and people of Iraq, invoking blessings upon them.

Welcoming the Ambassador: Pope Paul VI began by formally accepting the credential letters, noting they represented the first Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary from the Republic of Iraq to the Holy See.

Hopes for the relationship: He stated that the new diplomatic bond would strengthen already existing brotherly relations and expressed confidence in the ambassador's success.

Commitment to peace: The Holy See conveyed its prayers for the success of Iraq's efforts to establish peace founded on justice and love for all people.

Assurance of support: Pope Paul VI assured the ambassador that the Holy See would remain open and available to assist him in his important duties.

Greetings to Iraq: He sent his warmest greetings to the President and government of Iraq, and invoked the "richest and most abundant blessings of Almighty God" upon the Iraqi people.

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Jean-Claude Cardinal Turcotte appeals for donations to help suffering Iraqis

Format News and Press Release  SourceDevelopment and Peace — Caritas Canada  Posted21 Mar 2003  Originally published21 Mar 2003

MONTRéAL / March 21, 2003 - Montréal Archbishop Jean-Claude Cardinal Turcotte today urged Canadians to support a Canadian Catholic Organization for DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE (CCODP) appeal for additional funds to aid victims of the war in Iraq.

DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE sent an additional $100,000 to Iraq yesterday, just hours after hostilities were declared, to provide medicine, temporary shelter, drinking water, blankets and food, but Cardinal Turcotte said "much more is needed to cope with the enormous humanitarian crisis developing because of the war.


"The Iraqi people have suffered tremendously because of the economic sanctions imposed at the end of the Gulf War," the cardinal said, "and they have little or no resources to cope with this latest tragedy. The world community has an obligation to come to their aid."


DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE is the emergency aid and international development arm of the Canadian Catholic Church.


"DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE funds are at work in Iraq right now, Cardinal Turcotte added. "Money channelled through Caritas Internationalis, the Catholic Church's network of international aid and development agencies in 154 countries, has been used to stockpile medicine in Iraq; train 42 doctors and 220 volunteers to cope with large numbers of casualties; and prepare shelters to house people displaced by bombing."


Church buildings in cities across Iraq (including Baghdad, Mosul, Quarakoush, Kirkuk and Basrah) have been converted into emergency shelters and equipped with such things as water pumps, cots, blankets and latrines.


"Medical equipment has also been sent to 18 Red Crescent centers, 14 Caritas Iraq centers and 8 hospitals to allow them to offer life-saving medical care to injured civilians," Cardinal Turcotte said. "If Iraqi refugees begin moving into neighbouring countries, support will also be provided to help them."


In the longer-term, DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE will work to strengthen its local partners in the region so that they will be better prepared to cope with the aftermath of the war.


DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE has been working for many years to lessen the suffering caused by the trade embargo that the United Nations imposed on Iraq at the end of the Gulf War. Prior to today's contribution DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE had already sent $100,000 to help the poorest and most vulnerable among the population, especially mothers and children.


Cardinal Turcotte made his comments at a news conference attended by actor Luc Picard, a spokesperson for DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE's annual fund drive; DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE Executive Director Robert Letendre; Médecins du Monde President Réjean Thomas; and Monique Simard, Chair of the Board of Directors of Alternatives.


Contributions to DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE can be made by phoning ( 1-888-664-DEVP ) or by mailing a cheque to: DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE, 5633 Sherbrooke St. East, Montréal (QC) H1N 1A3


The Cheque should be marked: "DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE - Iraq"


For additional information:


TORONTO: Jack Panozzo (416) 922-1592 jack.panozzo@devp.org

MONTREAL: François Gloutnay (514) 257-8711 francois.gloutnay@devp.org

https://reliefweb.int/report/iraq/jean-claude-cardinal-turcotte-appeals-donations-help-suffering-iraqis


AI Overview

As of September 2025, there has been no 37th General Congregation of the Society of Jesus. The most recent assembly was the 36th General Congregation (GC 36), which met in Rome in October 2016.

What is a General Congregation?

A General Congregation (GC) is the highest governing body of the Society of Jesus, a Catholic religious order. A GC can be called for two main reasons:

To elect a new Superior General: This happens when the previous Superior General resigns or dies. In 2016, GC 36 was called after Father Adolfo Nicolás announced his resignation.

To address important matters: A GC can be called by the Superior General to discuss and act on significant issues concerning the order, the Church, and the world.

Key outcomes of the 36th General Congregation (GC 36)

The last General Congregation made two major decisions for the Society of Jesus:

Election of a new Superior General: The delegates elected Father Arturo Sosa Abascal of Venezuela as the 31st Superior General.

Declaration on reconciliation and justice: The assembly released a decree titled "Companions in a Mission of Reconciliation and Justice," which recommitted the order to the service of faith and the promotion of justice, continuing a priority first established at the 32nd General Congregation.

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1987 Slammy Awards

The Slammy Awards returned a year later, now honoring the events and individuals involved within the professional wrestling aspect of the World Wrestling Federation. The second edition of the ceremony (referred to in commercials and on-air as the 37th annual Slammy Awards) took place on December 16, 1987, from Caesars Atlantic City in Atlantic City, New Jersey. It aired in syndication on December 19, 1987.[11][14][13] The ceremony was hosted by Jesse Ventura and Gene Okerlund.[15] Musical numbers were performed by Vince McMahon (singing the song "Stand Back")[16] and Jimmy Hart (singing "Girls in Cars"), with the entire WWF roster performing "If You Only Knew" as the show's closing number.[16][15]


Winners are listed first, highlighted in boldface.[11][14][13]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slammy_Award


Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, Named Next Provincial of the Jesuits of Canada

March 15, 2024 — The Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) announced the appointment of Fr. Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, as the next provincial of the Jesuits of Canada. This appointment is the culmination of a thoughtful, prayerful process of consultation and discernment, marking a significant milestone for the Canadian Province.


Fr. Jeffrey Burwell, SJ

Fr. Burwell will succeed Fr. Erik Oland, SJ, assuming his new responsibilities on July 31, 2024, with an inaugural Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Toronto. A special celebration will also take place at the Jesuit infirmary in Richelieu, Quebec, on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15, 2024.


Fr. Burwell, 48, is an educational specialist whose doctoral research took him to the Holy Land, where he focused on Catholic schools in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. A lecturer in Catholic studies, first St. Paul’s College at the University of Manitoba and now Campion College at the University of Regina, he balances university work with pastoral service as a chaplain to police (RCMP) and to prisoners. He dedicates his university holidays to ministering in the Dene and Cree Indigenous communities of Saskatchewan and Manitoba.


Holding positions as a local superior since 2017 and a province consultor since 2021, Fr. Burwell brings a profound understanding of the Jesuit mission and a significant appreciation for Canada and Haiti’s diverse cultures.


This leadership change comes at a time when the Society of Jesus seeks to deepen its engagement with contemporary challenges, oriented by their Universal Apostolic Preferences: showing the way to God through the Spiritual Exercises and discernment; walking with the excluded; journeying with youth; and caring for our common home.


A Jesuit provincial leads a specific geographic region. This role is deeply spiritual, with responsibilities that extend beyond administrative tasks to include guiding the province’s mission and providing spiritual and pastoral care for its members. Provincials generally serve a six-year term.


There are five provinces within the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States. The Canadian Province of the Society of Jesus encompasses a wide range of works, including colleges/universities, secondary and pre-secondary schools, parishes, retreat houses, formation in spirituality, Indigenous ministries, social justice center and ecological endeavors.


The Jesuits of Canada, together with their partners, look forward to supporting Fr. Burwell in his new role as they continue to serve the mission of the Church and society in Canada and beyond.

https://www.jesuits.org/stories/jeffrey-s-burwell-sj-named-next-provincial-of-the-jesuits-of-canada/

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid0mb75yVMhV87NRymgPe8meX2idZj3Hi7AnvXhBwaCgVYtyuaAz2u9jCQ5YLvxBvPMl


Vatican News

Thursday, November 13, 2025 at 9:00 PM

Gospel of the Day (Luke 17,26-37)

Jesus said to his disciples: “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be in the days of the Son of Man;

they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage up to the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all.

Similarly, as it was in the days of Lot: they were eating, drinking, buying, selling, planting, building;

on the day when Lot left Sodom, fire and brimstone rained from the sky to destroy them all.

So it will be on the day the Son of Man is revealed.

On that day, a person who is on the housetop and whose belongings are in the house must not go down to get them, and likewise a person in the field must not return to what was left behind.

Remember the wife of Lot.

Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses it will save it.

I tell you, on that night there will be two people in one bed; one will be taken, the other left.

And there will be two women grinding meal together; one will be taken, the other left."

They said to him in reply, "Where, Lord?" He said to them, "Where the body is, there also the vultures will gather."

https://www.vaticannews.va/.../word-of.../2025/11/14.html

https://www.facebook.com/vaticannews/posts/pfbid0675XwkKYWEoQxdvpQXJL6vQVFkusGgJFHw5sKwrPTJZAFPsYpr7ifJ5Uidewepw5l


What is Masada? What is the history of Masada?

TL;DR:

Masada is not mentioned in the Bible but was a place where the Jewish Zealots hid when the Romans attacked. Masada calls us to trust in God and to stand for what is true.


what does the bible say?

Masada is not explicitly mentioned in the Bible. The events surrounding Masada occurred during the time period between the Old and New Testaments, so it's not directly referenced in biblical texts. However, Masada is a historically significant site, particularly known for the events that took place there during the Jewish-Roman War in the 1st century AD.


Herod the Great built the mountain fortress of Masada in 31 BC above the western shore of the Dead Sea in Israel. He feared revolt and wanted a place to make a stand that was difficult to attack and easy to defend. The fortress, with large places to store food, vast cisterns to store water, and defensive structures, was accessed only by a narrow path up the 1,300-foot mountain.


King Herod, an Edomite appointed by Roman rulers to oversee Judea, built the fortress and made it nearly impregnable, but it was the Jewish Zealots who hid there one hundred years later who made Masada famous.


In AD 70, the Romans attacked Judea and overran Jerusalem. Masada was the last holdout and center of resistance. General Flavius Silva couldn't directly attack the fortress, so in AD 72 he put thousands of slaves to work building a siege ramp. It took months to complete and when the troops broke into the fortress in AD 73, they found 953 people dead of a ceremonial mass suicide. Two women and five children hid in a cistern and survived to tell the story. They quoted Eleazar, their leader, saying, "Since we, long ago, my generous friends, resolved never to be servants to the Romans, not to any other than to God himself, who alone is the true and just Lord of mankind, the time is now come that obliges us to make that resolution true in practice."


from the old testament

Masada is not mentioned in the Old Testament.

from the new testament

Masada is not mentioned in the New Testament.

While Masada itself isn't mentioned in the Bible, some of the events related to the Jewish-Roman War are indirectly referenced in the New Testament, particularly in Jesus' prophecies regarding the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple (Matthew 24:1–2; Mark 13:1–2; Luke 21:20–24). However, Masada is not specifically mentioned in those passages.

implications for today

The story of Masada teaches us the enduring lesson of perseverance and courage in the face of adversity. Despite being outnumbered and facing overwhelming odds, the Jewish Zealots at Masada chose to stand firm in their beliefs and resist Roman rule. While the way we hold onto what is true may vary depending on situation, God calls us to hold onto Him and to build our lives on the Rock on whom we can stand. God is our refuge and strength; in Him we find the courage we need to stand for what is right.

https://www.compellingtruth.org/history-of-Masada.html


UNDER SIEGE

#1 Amazon Bestseller


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Under Siege by Eric Trump

In his new eye-opening memoir, Eric Trump shares gripping moments from his life as a vital part of America’s most powerful family.


From his earliest memories of growing up as part of the Trump family to pivotal roles in the 2016 and 2024 presidential elections, spearheading strategies to combat lawfare, and leading the Trump Organization, Eric has been deeply invested in all aspects of his family’s legacy. As one of his father’s original apprentices, Eric has always strived to build on that foundation.


As the Executive Vice President of the Trump Organization since 2015, Eric has navigated the dual worlds of politics and business, growing the company, while battling unprecedented opposition from the media, Democrats, and ongoing legal challenges.


From raids on his childhood home, Mar-a-Lago, to near assassination attempts, from Russiagate to cold and corrupt court rooms, the fake news media, censorship, and character smears—this wasn’t just an attack on a president, or even his family. America itself was under siege.


In this book, Eric offers an unfiltered look at the highs and lows of life in the Trump world; how he took the reins of a multibillion-dollar empire at thirty-three years old; enlightening stories from real estate to the boardroom of The Celebrity Apprentice, and the chaos of the campaign trail.


Order Now

About The Author

Eric Trump is the Executive Vice President of the Trump Organization, where he leads the global operations of one of the most iconic real estate empires in the world. He oversees an expansive portfolio, including Trump Hotels, Trump Golf, the Trump collection of commercial and residential properties, Trump Estates, and the award-winning Trump Winery. Eric also drives the company’s expansion into emerging industries, including leading-edge cryptocurrency ventures that are reshaping the future of finance.


A fierce defender of America First values, Eric has been a central figure in the Make America Great Again movement and served in pivotal roles during three presidential campaigns, helping shape national strategy and acting as a key spokesperson on major news networks worldwide. Passionate about giving back, he has helped raise more than $50 million for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital to combat pediatric cancer—a cause he has championed since the age of twenty-one.


A proud graduate of Georgetown University with a degree in finance and management, Eric has a deep-rooted passion for building, skiing, the shooting sports, and the outdoors. He lives in Florida with his wife, Lara, and their two children, Luke and Carolina.

https://www.trump.com/lifestyle/books


Erika Lane Kirk (née Frantzve; born November 20, 1988) is an American businesswoman, nonprofit executive, and podcaster. She is CEO and chair of the board of the conservative organization Turning Point USA (TPUSA), which her late husband Charlie Kirk co-founded and led until his assassination in September 2025. She was appointed as his successor following his death.


Kirk previously won Miss Arizona USA in 2012 and participated in Miss USA 2012. She is the founder of Everyday Heroes Like You, a nonprofit supporting under-recognized charities, and BIBLEin365, a faith-based initiative that promotes reading the Bible. She also hosts the Midweek Rise Up podcast. She and Charlie Kirk began dating in 2019, married in 2021, and had two children together.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erika_Kirk


Early Female Transgender Identity after Prenatal Exposure to Diethylstilbestrol: Report from a French National Diethylstilbestrol (DES) Cohort

by Laura Gaspari 1,2,3,†,Marie-Odile Soyer-Gobillard 4,5,†ORCID,Scott Kerlin 6,Françoise Paris 1,2,3 andCharles Sultan 1,*

1

Unité d’Endocrinologie-Gynécologie Pédiatrique, CHU Montpellier, University Montpellier, 34090 Montpellier, France

2

INSERM 1203, Développement Embryonnaire Fertilité Environnement, University of Montpellier, 34295 Montpellier, France

3

CHU Montpellier, University Montpellier, Centre de Référence Maladies Rares du Développement Génital, Constitutif Sud, Hôpital Lapeyronie, 34295 Montpellier, France

4

Laboratoire Arago, Observatoire Océanologique, Sorbonne University, CNRS, 75016 Paris, France

5

Association HHORAGES-France, 66100 Perpignan, France

6

DES International Information and Research Network, Livermore, CA 94551, USA

*

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.

These authors contributed equally to this work.

J. Xenobiot. 2024, 14(1), 166-175; https://doi.org/10.3390/jox14010010

Submission received: 28 November 2023 / Revised: 8 January 2024 / Accepted: 10 January 2024 / Published: 12 January 2024

(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Role of Endocrine-Disrupting Chemicals in the Human Health)

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Abstract

Diagnostic of transsexualism and gender incongruence are terms to describe individuals whose self-identity does not match their sex assignment at birth. A transgender woman is an individual assigned male at birth (AMAB) on the basis of the external or internal genitalia who identifies and lives as a woman. In recent decades, a significant increase in the number of transgender people has been reported. Although, its etiology is unknown, biological, anatomical, genetic, environmental and cultural factors have been suggested to contribute to gender variation. In XY animals, it has been shown that environmental endocrine disruptors, through their anti-androgenic activity, induce a female identity. In this work, we described four XY individuals who were exposed in utero to the xenoestrogen diethylstilbesterol (DES) and were part of the French HHORAGES cohort. They all reported a female transgender identity starting from childhood and adolescence. This high prevalence of male to female transgenderism (1.58%) in our cohort of 253 DES sons suggests that exposure to chemicals with xenoestrogen activity during fetal life may affect the male sex identity and behavior.

Keywords: sexual identity; diethylstilbestrol (DES); prenatal exposure

1. Introduction

Gender identity defines each individual’s deeply held personal sense of their own gender as male or female or something else [1]. Moreover, gender diversity and variance are umbrella terms used to describe the wide range of gender identifications outside the conventional gender categories [2]. Gender dysphoria [3] relates to the distress and unease experienced by individuals who are discontent with their assigned gender and identify with a gender other than the one associated with their birth sex [4]. A transgender man or woman is a person born phenotypically female or male, assigned female or male at birth on the basis of their external or internal genitalia, who identifies and lives as a male or a female. Actually, for many experts [5] this definition should be enlarged to Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming (TGNC) individuals, people with disorders of sex development (DSDs) and people assigned male (AMAB) or female at birth (AFAB) [6].

All studies on secular trends have reported a dramatic increase in the number of transgender people in recent decades [7]. A temporal change in the age of presentation is another notable phenomenon [8]. Quoting Hassler et al. [8] in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, Text Revision (DSM-5), signs of transgender in children include: “A repeated desire to be the other sex or an assertion that they are the other sex; a belief that their assigned sex will change on its own (e.g., thinking they will grow a penis or that their penis will come off when they get older); wanting to change their name to a name typically associated with another gender, or a gender-neutral name; a preference for presenting as another gender (e.g., a child assigned male at birth who prefers long hair and wearing dresses, or a child assigned female at birth who prefers short hair and wearing gender-neutral clothing); resistance or distress when made to present as a gender they do not identify with (such as a ‘girl’ throwing a tantrum over having to wear a dress or a ‘boy’ crying after having to get a haircut); assuming the role of another gender in fantasy games or make-believe; an intense desire to participate in the games and activities typical of the other gender (such as an assigned-male child playing with Barbie and an assigned-female child playing contact sports); a preference for playmates of another gender”.

Hassler et al. also wrote [8]: “In adolescence, signs of transgender includes: feelings of panic or severe discomfort concerning puberty and body changes (e.g., refusing to acknowledge or admit that changes are occurring, refusing to look at their body, or becoming distressed or uncomfortable with body development, menstruation, or ejaculation); discomfort or distress with certain forms of gender presentation, such as disliking long hair or certain types of clothing; increased bullying at school due to differences in acting out one’s perceived gender or lack of self-confidence; isolation from peers due to lack of connection or fear of bullying; depression and/or anxiety as a result of confusion over gender identity or not fitting in with peers; be aware that some adolescents may try to repress their true gender due to outside pressure, such as from family and peers, even if they previously expressed their true gender as a child”.

The literature on the prevalence of transgender people is heterogeneous, depending on the geographic area, inclusion criteria and age at presentation [9]. Specialized centers that manage transgender people estimate a prevalence between 17 and 33/100,000 individuals [10]. Actually, people who identify as transgender represent a sizable proportion of the general population, from 0.1% to 2% [11,12].

Although the biological basis of transgenderism/incongruence is unknown, biological, anatomical, genetic and environmental factors have been suggested to contribute to gender identity [13,14]. The role of sex hormones and genetics in sexual development was described by studies published between 1948 and 2019, and the implication of endogenous steroids in brain sexual differentiation has been widely studied [14,15,16,17,18]. According to the accepted dogma, high levels of fetal testosterone organize the brain towards a male phenotype [19]. Any exogenous chemical that can reduce testosterone action during fetal life can affect the differentiation of genitalia and sex behavior.

Diethylstilbestrol (DES) is a molecule that has strengthened the concepts of endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) and the fetal basis of adult diseases [20]. It is well known that in utero exposure to DES, a compound with estrogenic and anti-androgenic activity, induces a wide range of reproductive tract/function abnormalities in the so-called ‘DES daughters’, e.g., alterations to Müllerian duct development, fertility problems, ectopic pregnancies, miscarriages, premature births and cancers, especially clear cell adenocarcinoma (CCA) of the vagina and cervix in girls and young women [21]. In ‘DES sons’, epididymal cysts, hypospadias, cryptorchidism, hypoplastic testes and micropenises have been observed [22,23,24,25,26]. In addition, although less studied, in utero exposure to synthetic sex hormones, particularly DES, can cause psychological disorders, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorders, eating disorders and suicidal behavior [27]. Interestingly, some studies in patients exposed in utero to DES with psychotic disorders identified methylome changes that affect the expression of ZFP57 and ADAMTS9, two genes implicated in neurodevelopment regulation [28], with potential multigenerational and transgenerational effects [29,30].

In this work, we first describe four transgender women identified among the 253 sons exposed in utero to DES included in the HHORAGES-France cohort (a French National patient association). This high prevalence of male-to-female transgender individuals among DES sons (1.58%) strongly suggests that exposure of male fetuses to this xenoestrogen during fetal life may affect future male sex identity and behavior.

2. Patients and Methods

This study was based on a French national retrospective cohort of DES-treated women (HHORAGES-France Association) (n = 1200) and their families. Detailed standard questionnaires were obtained from all DES mothers when they joined the HHORAGES-France Association and all DES children were already adults at this time. The answers to this online questionnaire were used to select women who met the following inclusion criteria: (1) at least two pregnancies with two viable male babies (same father) among whom the first child was not exposed in utero to DES (pre-DES), followed by one or more children with fetal exposure to DES (DES); (2) confirmed data on the total DES dose (health record or physician’s observation). The cumulative dose D administered to the French pregnant mothers was 4050 mg < D < 7300 mg. This is considered a medium-low-dose cohort, in accordance with the observations by Tournaire et al. [31] and compared with the higher doses administered in the United States (7550 mg < D < 12,742 mg). The answers to the questionnaires were also used to identify women with a DES son who presented female gender variance. We then contacted all DES sons with female gender variance and we carried out an individual interview with them.

The local university hospital ethics committee approved this study (ID IRB No. 202301531), and all patients gave their informed consent through the HHORAGES-France Association (CNIL: J B/EM/DC042793, N° 1006460).

All DES sons who identified as transgender women underwent karyotyping at their local hospital at the moment of transition.

https://www.mdpi.com/2039-4713/14/1/10


Thomas Trace Beatie (born 1974[1]) is an American public speaker, author, and advocate of transgender rights and sexuality issues, with a focus on transgender fertility and reproductive rights.[2]


Beatie came out as a trans man in early 1997. Beatie had gender-affirming surgery in March 2002 and became known as "the pregnant man" after he became pregnant through artificial insemination in 2007.[3] Beatie chose to be pregnant, with donated sperm,[4][5] because his wife Nancy was sterile.


The couple filed for divorce in 2012. The Beatie case is the first of its kind on record, where a documented legal male gave birth within a marriage to a woman, and for the first time, a court challenged a marriage where the husband gave birth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Beatie


Tracing boards are painted or printed illustrations depicting the various emblems and symbols of Freemasonry. They can be used as teaching aids during the lectures that follow each of the Masonic Degrees, when an experienced member explains the various concepts of Freemasonry to new members. They can also be used by experienced members as reminders of the concepts they learned as they went through the ceremonies of the different masonic degrees.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracing_board


Exoteric Masonry, which is only the husks of the Mystic Order formed by the Sons of Cain has in modern times attracted the masculine element with its positively polarized physical vehicles, and educated them in industry and statecraft, thus controlling the material development of the world. The sons of Seth, constituting themselves the Priestcraft have worked their spell over the positive vital bodies of the feminine element to dominate the spiritual development. And whereas, the sons of Cain working through Freemasonry and kindred movements, have openly fought for the temporal power, the Priestcraft has fought as strenuously and perhaps more effectively, by stealth, to retain their monopoly upon the spiritual development of the feminine element. To the casual onlooker it would seem as if there were no decided antagonism between these two movements at the present time, but though Freemasonry of today is but a shell of its true ancient mystic self, and though Catholicism has been terribly tarnished by the touch of time, in that one thing there is no difference, the war is as keen as ever, the efforts of the Church are not concentrated upon the masses however as much as upon those who are seeking to live the higher life, so that they may gain admission to the Mystery Temple and learn how to make the Philosophers’ Stone. As mankind advances in evolution, the vital body becomes more permanently positively polarized giving to both sexes a greater desire for spirituality, and though we change from the masculine to feminine in alternate embodiment, positive polarity of the vital body is becoming more pronounced regardless of sex, and this accounts for the growing tendency towards Altruism which is even being brought out by the suffering entailed by the great war we are now fighting, for all agree that they are seeking to obtain a lasting peace where the swords may be made into plowshares, and the spears into pruning hooks. In the past humanity has been claiming universal brotherhood as a great ideal, but we must come closer than that to be in full accord with the Christ. He said to his Disciples “ye are my friends.” Among brothers and sisters hate and enmity may exist, but friendship is the expression of love and cannot exist apart from that. This is therefore the magic word which will eventually level all distinctions, bring peace upon earth and goodwill among men. This is the great Ideal proclaimed by the Rosicrucian Fellowship, an Ideal which points the shortest way to the New Heaven and the New Earth, where the sons of Cain and the sons of Seth will eventually be united.

FREEMASONRY AND CATHOLICISM

by MAX HEINDEL

https://dn720206.ca.archive.org/0/items/freemasonryandca017137mbp/freemasonryandca017137mbp.pdf


79) Helyas “The Swan-Knight”, epic-hero of the First Crusade 1096-99, the 40th and last Grail-King, who, upon entering Jerusalem [accompanying his son, Geoffrey of Bouillon, the crusade’s leader] following the First Crusade (1096-99) returned The Holy Grail to The Church of The Holy Sepulchre and placed it himself on the high-altar (1099). Helyas “The Swan-Knight” married thrice, and, by each wife had a son: his eldest son inherited the French fiefdom of Bouillon from his mother; his second son married the heiress of Oldenburg [Oldcastle] and inherited the Dutch county through her; and, his third son inherited the German fiefdom of Kleve (Cleves) from his mother, hence, founding three great families. The legend of Helyas “The Swan-Knight” takes place during the last half of the eleventh century. He arrives on the scene when the Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV (1056-1106) held court at Neumagen to decide a claim by the Count of Frankfort for the duchy of Bouillon, then held by Ida of Louvain, the widow of the Duke of Bouillon, its duchess. The matter was decided by hand-to-hand combat between the Count of Frankfort and Helyas of Lorraine, who championed the duchess, who legend says sailed up the Meuse on a boat drawn by a swan by means of a silver chain, whence his epithet. He won the battle, married her, and became the Duke of Bouillon in right of his wife, by whom he begot Geoffrey of Bouillon, Leader of the First Crusade 1096-99; Protector of The Holy Sepulchre 1099-1100. The legend was embellished by medieval romance that says before their marriage Helyas warned the duchess that if she ever asked his identity he would have to leave her. As the story goes she later tempted disregarding her husband’s warning asked him his identity. [The wife’s desire to know her husband’s “true self” appears here to parallel the myth of Cupid and Psyche.] He rebuked her sorrowfully, and, instantly the boat drawn by the swan re-appeared on the river next to where they were, Helyas stepped into the boat, and the swan swam off with him in the boat out of sight of his sorrowing wife. That is medieval romance, but the fact is Helyas divorced Ida of Louvain, soon after the birth of their son, Geoffrey, and she [his ex-wife] married thirdly Eustace II, Count of Boulogne. Helyas, meanwhile, had come to the aid of Elsa of Brabant, divorced wife of Regnier, Count of Hainault, against a suitor, Frederic de Telramund, who claimed she had promised to marry him. Instead, Elsa of Brabant married Helyas of Lorraine. It was his second marriage, as well as hers. The marriage produced a son, Elimar [Egilmar], who married Rixa [Rikissa], the heiress of Oldenburg, and became the Count of Oldenburg [“Oldcastle”] in “right of his wife”. Helyas divorced Elsa of Brabant soon after the birth of their son, Elimar, and, she married thirdly Hajo, Count of Uprustringen. Helyas, meanwhile, married thirdly Beatrix of Cleves [identified with Belayne of Lizaborye in medieval romance], daughter of Rutger II, Count of Cleves, and, widow of the Count of Lizaborye. The marriage produced a son, Dietrich [II]. Soon after, Helyas divorced Beatrix of Cleves, who married thirdly Dietrich I, Count of Cleves. Hence, Helyas “The Swan-Knight”, the last in the long-line of “Grail-Kings”, was the ancestor of three great noble European houses, those of Oldenburg [Oldcastle], Bouillon, and Cleves. Legend says that Helyas was murdered by armed men sent by his ex-wife [not by her parents as one romance says, who had already dead by that time], circa 1100. The three sons of Helyas, all born out of wedlock & were reared by their mothers, who were:


(80A) Geoffrey of Bouillon, Leader of the First Crusade 1096-99, &, “Protector of The Holy Sepulchre” 1099, called “First” Grand-Master of the Knights-Templars, whose mother, Ida of Louvain, widow of the Duke of Bouillon, married 3rdly Eustace II, Count of Boulogne


(80B) Egilmar I, Count of Oldenburg [Oldcastle], 1091, [by virtue of his marriage to Rixa, the heiress of Oldenburg] (d1108), whose mother, Elsa of Brabant, divorced wife of Regnier, Count of Hainault, married 3rdly Hajo, Count of Uprustringen. [note: Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, the Prince-Consort of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II, is a male-line descendant of Helyas “The Swan-Knight” through the Counts of Oldcastle (Oldenburg), though his official genealogy is traced through the royal house of Greece, which may trace its descent from ancient Greek kings.]


(80C) Dietrich II, Count of Cleves 1085/92 (d1114/19?), whose mother, Beatrix (Belayne) of Cleves, daughter of Rutger II, Count of Cleves, widow of the Count of Lizaborye, married 3rdly Dietrich I, Count of Cleves (d1056)


——————————————————————————————————————–


LIST: GRAND MASTERS of the KNIGHTS-TEMPLARS


01. Geoffrey of Bouillon ……………………. 1099-1100


02. Ursus of Calabria ………………………… 1100-1118


03. Hugh de Payens……………………………… 1118-1136


04. Robert I de Craon…………………………… 1136-1146


05. Everard des Barres………………………….. 1146-1149


06. Bernard de Tormelai………………………… 1149-1153


07. Andre de Montbard…………………………… 1153-1156


08. Bertrand de Blanchefort ………………… 1156-1169


09. Philippe I de Milly ……………………….. 1169-1171


10. Eudes de St. Amand………………………….. 1171-1179


11. Arnold de Toroga……………………………. 1179-1184


12. Gerard de Ridfort…………………………… 1185-1189


X. vacant……………………………………………. 1189-1191


13. Robert II de Sable……………………………… 1191-1193


14. Gilbert Erail …………………………………….. 1193-1200


X. vacant …………………………………………… 1200-1201


15. Philippe II de Plessiez ……………………… 1201-1208


X. vacant…………………………………….. 1208-1209


16. Guillaume I de Chartres ……………………… 1209-1219


17. Pierre de Montaigu ………………………….. 1219-1230


X. vacant…………………………………….. 1230-1231


18. Herman de Perigord ………………………… 1231-1244


X. vacant…………………………………….. 1244-1245


19. Richard de Bures ……………………………. 1245-1247


20. Guillaume II de Sonnac ………………………. 1247-1250


21. Reynald de Vichiers …………………………. 1250-1256


22. Thomas Berard ………………………………. 1256-1273


23. Guillaume III de Beaujeu …………………….. 1273-1291


took the “Holy Grail” to Antioch and entrusted it into the care of Tibald de Gaudin, the city’s bishop, who became the next Grand-Master


24. Tibald de Gaudin ……………………………. 1291-1293


25. Jacques de Molay, last Grand-Master………… 1293-1314, executed by the King of France


note: the Knights-Templars were scattered in 1314 by the King of France


——————————————————————————————————————–


POST-SCRIPT


The Holy Grail came to symbolize Christianity and the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem just like the “Ark-of-the-Covenant” came to symbolize Judaism and the ancient Judaic kingdom of Israel/Judah. The Holy Grail was taken out of Jerusalem to Acre at the time of Jerusalem’s fall to the Muslims either in 1187 and/or 1244, and there remained at Acre until 1291 when it was taken by the Knight-Templar Guillaume [III] de Beaujeu to Antioch and entrusted into the care of Tibald de Gaudin, the city’s bishop. The Holy Grail after that disappears from recorded history until 1910 when there was found in the ruins of a church at Antioch, a cup, containing an inner cup, that is thought by able scholars to be the Holy Grail. The inner cup is plain silver, however, its container, the outer cup, is exquisitely carved silver with the figures of Christ and His disciples at the “Last Supper”. The outer cup was obviously made to hold the inner cup, as a sacred, precious object older than itself. The artistic style and workmanship is considered to be of first century date. The Holy Grail, now called “The Chalice of Antioch”, eventually came into the possession of the Cloister’s Museum in New York City and is privately owned today by the Metropolitan Museum, New York, NY.


—————————————————————————————————————Knight of the Swan

Last updated 1 month agoFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaJump to: navigation, search

A tapestry of 1482 showing episodes from the Knight of the Swan story: at the bottom puppies are substituted for babies.The story of the Knight of the Swan, or Swan Knight, is a medieval tale about a mysterious rescuer who comes in a swan-drawn boat to defend a damsel, his only condition being that he must never be asked his name. The earliest variants of the story appear in French chansons de geste attached to the family of Godfrey of Bouillon, the first ruler of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem. Later, the German poet Wolfram von Eschenbach included a version in his Grail epic Parzival. One of the Old French romances inspired a late-fourteenth century version in Middle English.[1] Wolfram von Eschenbach’s version inspired two later romances and the opera Lohengrin by Richard Wagner. A German text, written by Konrad von Würzburg in 1257, features a Swan Knight but without any other name.


Contents [hide]

1 Crusade cycle

1.1 Swan Children

1.2 Swan Knight

2 Lohengrin

3 Notes

4 External links


[edit] Crusade cycleThe Knight of the Swan story first appears in French chansons de geste of the Crusade cycle, where they figure into tales of the ancestry of Godfrey of Bouillon.[2] As the first ruler of the newly-established Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, Godfrey loomed large in the medieval Christian imagination, and his shadowy genealogy became a popular subject for writers of the period. Knight of the Swan stories attached to Godfrey fall into two major versions, identified by Gaston Paris as “I” and “II”. Each version has its own variants.[3]


[edit] Swan Children

Helias, Brabant (16th-century)Version I describes the Swan Children and appears to have been originally separate from the Godfrey cycle and the Swan Knight story generally.[3] Paris identifies four groups of variants, which he classifies usually by the name of the mother of the Swan Children.[4]


In the Dolopathos group, named after the oldest variant, a lord finds a mysterious woman — clearly a swan maiden or fairy — in an enchanted forest and marries her.[4] She bears seven children, six boys and a girl, with golden chains about their necks, but her evil mother-in-law has them quickly removed and abandoned and replaces them with dogs.[5] The father blames the mother for their disappearance and punishes her; in turn, the boys lose their gold chains and turn into swans. Through the efforts of the sister, after seven years the truth is revealed, the mother is redeemed, and the boys are restored to their human form, with the exception of one whose chain has been melted down. The poet asserts that he becomes the swan in the Swan Knight tale.[5] The Eloixe group tells a courtlier version of the same story, in which the mother is less mysterious in origin and dies in childbirth, so she does not suffer before her children are restored.[6] In the Isomberte variants, the woman is a princess fleeing a hated marriage.[7] In the Beatrix variants, the woman had taunted another woman over her alleged adultery, citing a multiple birth as proof of it, and was then punished with a multiple birth of her own.[7] In the Beatrix versions, the mother is also an avenging justice.[8] This makes the tale resemble not only such chivalric romances as The Man of Law’s Tale and Emaré, but such fairy tales as The Girl Without Hands.[9] It also bears resemblance to the fairy tale The Six Swans, where brothers transformed into birds are rescued by the efforts of their sister.[10]


[edit] Swan KnightVersion II involves the Swan Knight himself. These stories are sometimes attached to the story of the Swan Children, but sometimes appear independently, in which case no explanation of the swan is given. All of these describe a knight who appears with a swan and rescues a lady; he then disappears after a taboo is broken, but not before becoming the ancestor of an illustrious family.[11] Sometimes this is merely a brief account to introduce a descendant.[12] The second version of this tale is thought to have been written by the Norman trouvère Jean Renart.


In Brabant the name of the Knight of the Swan is Helias. It has been suggested[by whom?] that this connects him to the Greek solar god, Helios,[13] but the name is in fact a common variant of the name of the prophet Elijah.


[edit] Lohengrin

Lohengrin postcard around 1900 by unknown artistMain article: Lohengrin

In the early 13th century, the German poet Wolfram von Eschenbach adapted the Swan Knight motif for his epic Parzival. Here the story is attached to Loherangrin, the son of the protagonist Parzival and the Grail maiden Condwiramurs. As in other versions Loherangrin is a knight who arrives in a swan-pulled boat to defend a lady, in this case Elsa of Brabant. They marry, but he must leave when she breaks the taboo of asking his name.


In the late 13th century, the poet Nouhusius (Nouhuwius) adapted and expanded Wolfram’s brief story into the romance Lohengrin. The poet changed the title character’s name slightly and added various new elements to the story, tying the Grail and Swan Knight themes into the history of the Holy Roman Empire.[14] In the 15th century an anonymous poet again took up the story for the romance Lorengel.[15] This version omits the taboo against asking about the hero’s name and origins, allowing the knight and princess a happy ending.


In 1848, Richard Wagner adapted the tale into his popular opera Lohengrin, probably the work through which the Swan Knight story is best known today.[16]


—–


Sam wrote: “Greg Presco: I know the synagogue of Charleston.” He was second na formal synagogue in the USA. The first was in RI and the second Bull of Charleston. The two were Portuguese (Sephardic). There is a book of “Elzas” called “The Early Jews of South Carolina”. Listed in 1793 estava Abraão de Mattos. We are the Portuguese/Dutch Amsterdam of the TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS line. They have com WEST INDIES COMPANY, hicieram nel Caribbean and after sugar cane plantations is was to the North of Brazil, precisely, for province of for. They planted canaviales and had açúcar powerhouses. Then on the eternal theme of “assimilacion”, my branch lathe Mattos YUSEF and the other side will continue TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS. The Mattos Yusef if aportuguesaran for the name José DE MATTOS. All the men in my family are José de Mattos, all. Since he likes da Sephardic history in the USA, read this book. In the mentioned FRANCIS SALVADORr. NASCAR in London she went to Charleston and acquired vast plantations of mais and algidon in an area today called CORONACA. I had a House nel Lake Anderson regarding Coronaca. The mother of el Salvador was a Mendes de Mattos. FRANCIS SALVADOR was the first martyr of the independence of the United States, fighting against the English. He was killed in his plantation by a side of Indians allied to British troops. On the road, 56, close to the city of ANDERSON, SC, I think there is a framework historic briefly speaking of Francis Salvador, the first Jewish martyr of da American Revolution. “Goodnight, Sam.”

https://rosamondpress.com/2012/06/25/merovingian-grail-lineage-of-the-swan-knight/

https://www.facebook.com/joshua.swanick

https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=10225468328290154&set=a.1308029555858


The Kingdom of Jerusalem was created in 1098, when the members of the First Crusade captured Jerusalem and elected Godfrey of Boulogne, or Godefroi de Bouillon, duke of Lower-Lorraine, as king of Jerusalem. The city was itself finally taken back by the Muslims in 1291, although the title continued to be claimed for centuries.


The Corpus Inscriptionum Crucesignatorum is online, listing inscriptions from the Crusader times that have been found in the Middle East.


The Arms

The Arms of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem are well-known: Argent a cross potent between four crosses or. It is the most well-known violation of the rule of tinctures.


Insignia or the Order of the Holy Sepulchre

Insignia of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre (from Diderot's Encyclopédie. They are A cross potent between four crosslets gules.

Whether these arms were ever used by the kings of Jerusalem is another matter. According to an article by Hervé Pinoteau in the Cahiers d'Héraldique, vol. 4, the earliest representation of the cross potents between crosslets is on the seal of a nephew and ward of John of Brienne, king from 1210 (the seal is from 1227). The arms of Jerusalem also appear on a reliquary called "la cassette de Saint-Louis" which he dates to 1236. (See also an article by Elliot Nesterman on early evidence of the Cross of Jerusalem).

Claimants to the Throne

The arms of Jerusalem pop up in a number of places. The reason for this is the rather tortuous history of the throne and title. The short version is this: three lines stemmed from Queen Isabeau (d. 1206), the eldest of which ruled in absentia until 1268, at which time the two other lines entered in dispute over the succession. From this dispute stems the claims of (1) the kings of Cyprus and (2) the kings of Sicily. The claim to Cyprus (1) became object of dispute in 1474 as the result of an usurpation: the claims of the usurper (1a) passed to Venice, while those of the displaced ruler (1b) passed to Savoy. As for the claims of the kings of Sicily (2), it became part of the dispute in 1434 between the duke of Anjou and the king of Aragon. The claims of the former (2a) passed briefly to the kings of France (1494-1515) and were later resurrected by the dukes of Lorraine in 1700 (whose descendants became emperors of Austria), while the the claims of the latter (2b) passed along with Sicily itself to the kings of Spain (1506-1700), then becoming the object of yet another dispute until returning to a younger son of the king of Spain in 1738; henceforth the title was used both by the kings of Spain and those of the Two Sicilies.


The kingdom of Jerusalem was founded as a consequence of the 1st crusade of 1099. Godefroi de Bouillon died in 1100 and was succeeded by his brother Baudoin I (+ 1118) and a great-nephew Baudoin II (+ 1131), who left an eldest daughter Mélissende. She passed the throne to her husband Foulques d'Anjou (+ 1147), and to her sons Baudoin III (+ 1163) and Amaury or Amalric (+ 1173). Amaury had a son and successor Baudoin IV (d. 1185), and two daughters, Sybille and Isabeau (1169-1206).


Sybille married in 1176 William of Montferrat (+ 1177), by whom she had a posthumous son Baudoin. She was then married in 1180 to Guy de Lusignan (d. 1194), count of Jaffa and Ascalon who was also appointed regent of the kingdom by the invalid Baudoin IV. But Baudoin IV then changed his mind, took away the regency, and abdicated in 1182 in favor of Sybille's son Baudoin V. This child died in 1186, soon after his uncle, and Sybille became queen of Jerusalem, and was crowned with her husband Guy de Lusignan. However, a rival in the person of Conrad of Montferrat, brother of Sybille's first husband, rose up. In the end an agreement was reached: Guy would retain the title for his life, Conrad would marry Sybille's sister Isabeau and succeed as well as his posterity. By that time, the city itself had actually been lost. Sybille had died in 1190, Conrad was murdered in 1192, leaving only a daughter Marie (1191-1212), and Guy renounced his claim in 1192 and bought the island of Cyprus from Richard Lionheart who had just conquered it from the Byzantine empire.


This left only Isabeau as the heir, and she became queen in 1192. All subsequent claims to the throne of Jerusalem stem from her. She married the same year Henri de Champagne (1166-97), who became king with her and died in 1197, leaving two daughters Alix and Philippa. Queen Isabeau next married Amaury de Lusignan (1145-1205), elder brother of Guy and his successor as king of Cyprus, by whom she had Sybille (married to Leo II of Armenia) and Mélissande. Isabeau died in 1205 and was succeeded by her eldest daughter Marie (1191-1212), married to Jean de Brienne (d. 1237) in 1209. Their only daughter Isabeau (1211-28) was married to the Emperor Frederic II who forced his parents-in-law to turn over the throne to him in 1225. Frederic was succeeded as Emperor and king of Jerusalem by his only child of that marriage, Conrad (1228-54), himself succeeded by his only child Conradin of Hohenstaufen 1252-68), who lost his throne of Naples and his life to Charles of Anjou. With him the issue of queen Isabeau's first daughter died out.


The Hohenstaufens were ruling in absentia, and their rule was not liked. The local barons managed to induce various people to claim the regency. Alix de Brienne, second daughter of queen Isabeau, had married Hughes de Lusignan (d. 1218), son of Amaury by a previous wife, and king of Cyprus. Alix died in 1246 and her son Henri (1218-53) succeeded her as regent of Jerusalem. At his death, his son grandson Hugues II (1252-67) was a minor and the widow Plaisance (d. 1261) was regent of both Cyprus and Jerusalem. At her death, a new regent was required; the late king Henri had two sisters Marie (d. 1252) married to Gauthier de Brienne, and Isabelle (d. 1264), married to Henri de Poitiers. The elder one's son, Hugues de Brienne, was passed over in favor of the younger one's son Hugues d'Antioche as regent of Cyprus, while Isabelle herself was accepted as regent for Jerusalem. On her death in 1267, Hugues de Brienne's attempt to claim his rights was rebuffed and the throne of Cyprus, along with the regency of Jerusalem, passed to Hugues d'Antioche, whose descendants assumed the name of Lusignan and reigned over Cyprus.


At the death of Conradin, the issue of Queen Isabeau's eldest daughter became extinct. Hugues III of Cyprus, descended from her second daughter and already regent, now claimed the throne. But another claim emerged through the third daughter of Queen Isabeau, Mélissende, who married Bohémond IV of Antioch (uncle of Hugues III) and whose only daughter Marie of Antioch claimed the throne as being closer in kinship to Isabeau. She was unsuccessful and Hugues III was crowned king of Jerusalem in 1269. She went to Rome to plead her case with the Pope, and was eventually induced to cede her rights in 1277 to Charles of Anjou, whom the pope had established as king of Naples and Sicily (the same who had defeated Conradin in 1268). Henceforth there were two lines of claimants, the kings of Cyprus and the kings of Naples.


The kings of Cyprus continued to be crowned kings of Jerusalem, although from 1277 to 1282 the remnants of the kingdom (Acre) were actually under Charles d'Anjou's control, and the kings of Cyprus only gradually restored their authority. But soon after, with the fall of Acre in 1291, there was nothing left of the kingdom of Jerusalem. In 1458 Jean III, last male of the line, died without male heirs. His only sister Anne had (d. 1462) married Louis I de Savoie. His only daughter Charlotte (d. 1487) was recognized as queen of Cyprus, Armenia and Jerusalem, and married to her first cousin Louis de Savoie. But she was dethroned in 1460 by a bastard son of her father, namely Jacques II (d. 1473), and fled to Italy. Ultimately, in 1485, she ceded her rights to her husband's nephew Charles I, duke of Savoie, and his successors; at that point the dukes of Savoie (later kings of Sardinia and kings of Italy) added the title of king of Jerusalem, Cyprus and Armenia to their titles and the arms to their achievement. The kings of Italy used the title until 1946.


Jacques II died in 1473, leaving a widow Caterina Cornero (1454-1510), from the Venitian aristocracy. His posthumous son Jacques III soon died. The city of Venice turned Cyprus into a protectorate, and, in 1489, forced Caterina Cornero to return to Venice and cede her rights to the Republic. From then on, the Republic of Venice also added the title and arms of Jerusalem, Cyprus and Armenia to its own, until 1797 when the Republic was abolished and its territories handed over to Austria by the Treaty of Campo-Formio. Cyprus was under Venetian control until 1571 when it was conquered by the Turks. Venice became part of the kingdom of Italy in 1866.


Meanwhile, the kings of Sicily also claimed the title of king of Jerusalem. In 1282, Charles d'Anjou lost Sicily and his descendants reigned in Naples only (albeit under the title of kings of Sicily) while Sicily itself was ruled by branches of the house of Aragon. When the descendants of Charles d'Anjou became extinct in 1434, the two claimants were René d'Anjou and Alfonso, king of Aragon and Sicily, and the latter won, at which point his successors the kings of both Sicilies added the claim of Jerusalem to their own. René's claim was resurrected by his grand-nephew king Charles VIII of France in 1494, who managed to conquer and briefly hold Naples, and who used the title of Jerusalem, as did his successor Louis XII (but no other French king did so). In 1506 the Two Sicilies was finally regained by king Ferdinand of Aragon, and henceforth possessed, along with the claim to Jerusalem, by the kings of Spain, descendants of Fernando's daughter Juana and her husband Philip of Habsburg, until their extinction in male line in 1700.


As a result of the war of Spanish Succession (1701-13), Naples and Sicily were ceded by Spain to the Habsburg emperor Charles VI in 1720, and the pope duly invested the emperor with the titles of king of Sicily and Jerusalem on June 5, 1722 (the kingdom being a papal fief). In the course of the war of Polish Succession (1733-38), the younger son of the king of Spain, Don Carlos, managed to conquer the Two Sicilies, a conquest recognized by the peace of Vienna of 1738, and by the pope in the same year. Carlos became king of Spain in 1759 and left Naples and Sicily to his younger son Ferdinand, whose descendants reigned until 1860. The kings of Spain continued to use the title of Jerusalem until 1931, as did the kings of Two-Sicilies.


On the other hand, René's daughter Yolande married Ferry de Vaudémont, one of whose sons became duke of Lorraine. The modern house of Lorraine took up the claim to Jerusalem in 1700 (although it wasn't the best claimant from a genealogical point of view, as pointed out by W. A. Reitwiesner) when duke Leopold returned to his duchy after 28 years of French occupation, and adopted a closed royal crown and the style of king of Jerusalem. His son François, duke of Lorraine, married the Empress Maria-Theresa, and their descendants as rulers of Austria inherited the claim. The arms of Jerusalem could be seen in the grand arms of State of the Austrian Empire in the 19th century and the title was used until 1918.


Other Crusader States

There is very little evidence on the arms of the Crusader states. The traditional arms of the kingdom of Jerusalem are not known before the 1230s, when the city had already been lost. Numismatic evidence is scant, epigraphic evidence even more so (there are very little heraldic traces of the Crusaders in the Middle East, outside Cyprus; see an interesting exception).


Numismatic evidence

The best work is Gustave Schlumberger's Numismatique de l'Orient Latin (Paris, 1878; reprint Graz 1954). In a coin auction catalogue I recently received, coins from Tripoli feature:


Obverse: horse with cross above, Reverse: a cross between four roundels (bronze, Raymond II 1137-52)

Obv: cross patty, Rev: eight-point star (Bohemond VI, 1251-75, silver gros)

Obv: cross slightly patty, Rev: three-towered castle (Bohemond VII, 1275-87, silver gros)

I believe the 8-pt star was a recurrent motif on Tripoli coins.

Coins of Antioch feature:


Raymond Roupen (1216-19): helmeted head between crescent and 5-pt star, Rev: cross patty with crescent in one quarter. (coins from early 12th c. have a bust of St Peter and inscriptions, or the Mother of God facing nimbate).

Interestingly, coins from Cyprus (1306-1473) constantly feature on the reverse a cross potent between four crosses, never crosslets but sometimes patty or formy. But what is peculiar is that the main cross is "quadrat in the centre", that is, its center is thickened by a square. This is, according to Parker's Glossary, called a cross of S. Chad, because it features in the arms of the see of Lichfield and Coventry, of which S. Chad was the first bishop. The quadrating on the Cyprus coins is much less pronounced than in the drawing in Parker, but this is nevertheless quite intriguing.


Other evidence

monuments (carved arms, epitaphs, etc): two or three epitaphs with arms are known; some graffiti carved on marble columns of the church of the Nativity in Bethleem were made by 14th-15th c. pilgrims. That's all that survived. One notable exception: the tomb of Philippe d'Aubigni in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem.

Monuments in the West: Marguerite, daughter of Louis d'Acre, vicomte de Beaumont, himself son of Jean de Brienne, king of Jerusalem, was married to Bohemond VII, count of Tripoli (d. 1287) and eldest son of Bohemond VI, last prince of Antioch. She died in France in 1328, and her tomb in the abbey of Maubuisson was described as "parsemée de croix de Jérusalem dans des losanges de gueules, et de lions rampants dans des losanges de sable fleurdelisés" in Du Cange's Familles d'Outremer (Paris, 1869, p. 486). The tomb was destroyed in 1793 (reference to Dulaure, Environs de Paris, vol. 2, p. 331, n. 2, which I have not checked).

objects: a handful survive, mainly from Cyprus.

seals: Gustave Schlumberger's Sigillographie de l'Orient Latin (Paris, 1943) is probably quite comprehensive, and there is little heraldry to glean from it. Lots of seals of the kings of Jerusalem, princes of Antioch, counts of Tripoli are known, but they bear no arms. See for example the seals of Baudoin II (1118-31), Amalric (1162-75), Jean de Brienne (1212-37). In Antioch, Raymond of Poitiers (1136-49) is shown riding a horse and bearing a cross on his shield and banner, but that's it. Among lesser barons, the Ibelin family, lords of Arsur and Beyrut apparently had "Or a cross patty gules". The device certainly appears on their shields and banners as shown on their seals. Aside from that, there are arms here and there: Hugues de Giblet (Biblos) has a 8-pointed star, the Porcellet family has a boar passant, the lordship of Loron or Thoron was a lion rampant.

There is more armory from Cyprus and Constantinople; but then, those arms are well known. The Courtenay arms appear on Philippe de Courtenay's seal (d. 1283). Interestingly, the earlier emperors of Constantinople, Baudoin of Flanders (d. 1205), Henri I (d. 1216), Baudoin II (d. 1261) all use the lion of Flanders, although one contemporary cronicler describes Henri riding in battle with a coat-armour gules semy of crosses or. Villehardouin, princes of Achaia, use the family arms of a cross recercelee; later, Louis a cadet of Burgundy who claimed Achaia added a quarter of Villehardouin to his arms of Burgundy ancient (14th c.). Achaia was also claimed by a junior branch of Savoy, who differenced with a bend.

https://www.heraldica.org/topics/national/jerusale.htm


Do you wish to know what the effect of Popery in America will be once she populates all its great cities? Look at the 'enlightened' people of Spam, of Portugal, of Italy, of Ireland, of South America, and the native Indians of Canada!

Speaking of Canada. Well, popery is the established religion of one province, and is liberally assisted in the others. And in that province where she has the greatest influence, the facts speak for themselves What are the facts? On Thursday, October 22, 2009 evidence given to the Canadian Federal Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights revealed that organised crime is more rampant in Quebec than in any other Canadian province. That Montreal-the largest city in the province of Quebec, originally called Ville-Marie, or "City of Mary"-is in fact an "Italian malia hub." Reader, there's something peculiar about Quebec. What is it? According to Journalist André Noel of La Presse for 25 years, Quebec "stands apart from the rest of Canada for the same reasons that Sicily or Vatican City stands apart from the rest of Italy" - the Malia, it seems, opens and closes the doors of city hall in Montreal. There was, not long ago, a headline in one of that city's newspaper Le Devoir-"Break the omerta," "Malia at the doors of city hall?"" Testifying before the above-mentioned Parliamentary Committee. Mr. Daniel Petit, M.P. for Charlesbourg-Haute-Saint-Charles, Quebec posed the following intriguing question to Dr. Margaret Shaw, a Sociologist and Criminologist from Quebec: "Across Canada in the 1950s, Montreal was considered an open city, a sin city, as they say. A clean-up was done. Afterwards we had major mob problems.... Then we had the Commission of Inquiry on Organized Crime,... Then there

8. See verbatim quote from the Canadian Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, 2nd SESSION, 40th PARLIAMENT, Thursday. October 22, 2009, at paragraph 1054 of the "Evidence": www2.parl.gc.ca/HousePublications/Publication.aspx?Docid=4167421&

Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=40&Ses=2

9 See verbatim quote from the Standing Committee, ibid.

10 Omertà is a code of honor among the Mafia organizations in Italy.

442


Romanizing America: Take Over By Illegal Emigration re the biker wars. It's always Montreal-Quebec City, Quebec City-

You live in Montreal.... Why has it been so big in Montreal

Morcal... Y

explan that to me? Is there something in the water we don't know and for such a long time and we can't solve the problem? Can you I would opine to say, that perhaps, if Mr. Petit could read this Book and Book I too) he may yet lind an answer to his conundrum. Campion, prostitution, and the Hells Angels are the norm m Quebee! There is the "Hells Angels Quebec City," the "Hells Angels Mocal," the "Hells Angels Trois-Rivières," and last but not least the Hells Angels Nomads And while law enforcement struggles to keep rol, it is the Italian Mafia who are the real umpires in Quebec." The the Catholic Church backs the Hells Angels is seen in the owing Each spring, the Rev. Joseph Bacevice of St. George's Roman Cabolic Lithuanian Parish, USA, with the acquiescence of the Vatican, ses the motorcycles outside of the Hells Angels clubhouse at the nd of East 67th Street: see Church's website." Frankly, it won't surprise a all if one day it were to be proved conclusively that not only Hell's Als but the Mafia have connections to the "God" "Father"in Rome. At this stage we pose the following interrogatories for His Holiness: Why have the popes been so silent about the Mob? Why, as Dr. Panl Williams writes in his book The Vatican Exposed: Money, Murder, the Mafia, is "the Vatican Bank... under the direct supervision of e pope who has no financial training!"? Why is the pope the one and stockholder? Why, unlike any other financial institution, is the Bank audited by neither internal nor outside agencies? Why is at not even Vatican's ecclesiastical financial agencies can attest to the k's assets or accounts? Why does "the internal auditor of the Holy have no knowledge of its operations. Would 'His Holiness not ee that these are just the 'right' kind of financial 'arrangements (viz.

d) that suit the Mob?

Who readeth let him understand.

See, André Noël, journalist with La Presse for 25 years, giving dence before the Federal Standing Committee on Justice, loc cit.

www.saintgeorgeparish.org

According to Cardinal Edmund Szoka, the internal auditor of the ly See, speaking to investigators in 1996; and as confirmed by the uit Priest Thomas J. Reese in his book, Inside the Vatican... (First mer Editor in Chief of America, a weekly Catholic magazine and a d University Press, Pbk edn., 1998/2003), p. 209. Reese is the or Fellow at Woodstock Theological Center.

443

Codeword Barbelon book Two

by P.D. Stuart


AI Overview

As of September 2025, there has been no 37th General Congregation of the Society of Jesus. The most recent assembly was the 36th General Congregation (GC 36), which met in Rome in October 2016.

What is a General Congregation?

A General Congregation (GC) is the highest governing body of the Society of Jesus, a Catholic religious order. A GC can be called for two main reasons:

To elect a new Superior General: This happens when the previous Superior General resigns or dies. In 2016, GC 36 was called after Father Adolfo Nicolás announced his resignation.

To address important matters: A GC can be called by the Superior General to discuss and act on significant issues concerning the order, the Church, and the world.

Key outcomes of the 36th General Congregation (GC 36)

The last General Congregation made two major decisions for the Society of Jesus:

Election of a new Superior General: The delegates elected Father Arturo Sosa Abascal of Venezuela as the 31st Superior General.

Declaration on reconciliation and justice: The assembly released a decree titled "Companions in a Mission of Reconciliation and Justice," which recommitted the order to the service of faith and the promotion of justice, continuing a priority first established at the 32nd General Congregation.

AI responses may include mistakes. Learn more


1987 Slammy Awards

The Slammy Awards returned a year later, now honoring the events and individuals involved within the professional wrestling aspect of the World Wrestling Federation. The second edition of the ceremony (referred to in commercials and on-air as the 37th annual Slammy Awards) took place on December 16, 1987, from Caesars Atlantic City in Atlantic City, New Jersey. It aired in syndication on December 19, 1987.[11][14][13] The ceremony was hosted by Jesse Ventura and Gene Okerlund.[15] Musical numbers were performed by Vince McMahon (singing the song "Stand Back")[16] and Jimmy Hart (singing "Girls in Cars"), with the entire WWF roster performing "If You Only Knew" as the show's closing number.[16][15]


Winners are listed first, highlighted in boldface.[11][14][13]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slammy_Award


Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, Named Next Provincial of the Jesuits of Canada

March 15, 2024 — The Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) announced the appointment of Fr. Jeffrey S. Burwell, SJ, as the next provincial of the Jesuits of Canada. This appointment is the culmination of a thoughtful, prayerful process of consultation and discernment, marking a significant milestone for the Canadian Province.


Fr. Jeffrey Burwell, SJ

Fr. Burwell will succeed Fr. Erik Oland, SJ, assuming his new responsibilities on July 31, 2024, with an inaugural Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Toronto. A special celebration will also take place at the Jesuit infirmary in Richelieu, Quebec, on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15, 2024.


Fr. Burwell, 48, is an educational specialist whose doctoral research took him to the Holy Land, where he focused on Catholic schools in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. A lecturer in Catholic studies, first St. Paul’s College at the University of Manitoba and now Campion College at the University of Regina, he balances university work with pastoral service as a chaplain to police (RCMP) and to prisoners. He dedicates his university holidays to ministering in the Dene and Cree Indigenous communities of Saskatchewan and Manitoba.


Holding positions as a local superior since 2017 and a province consultor since 2021, Fr. Burwell brings a profound understanding of the Jesuit mission and a significant appreciation for Canada and Haiti’s diverse cultures.


This leadership change comes at a time when the Society of Jesus seeks to deepen its engagement with contemporary challenges, oriented by their Universal Apostolic Preferences: showing the way to God through the Spiritual Exercises and discernment; walking with the excluded; journeying with youth; and caring for our common home.


A Jesuit provincial leads a specific geographic region. This role is deeply spiritual, with responsibilities that extend beyond administrative tasks to include guiding the province’s mission and providing spiritual and pastoral care for its members. Provincials generally serve a six-year term.


There are five provinces within the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States. The Canadian Province of the Society of Jesus encompasses a wide range of works, including colleges/universities, secondary and pre-secondary schools, parishes, retreat houses, formation in spirituality, Indigenous ministries, social justice center and ecological endeavors.


The Jesuits of Canada, together with their partners, look forward to supporting Fr. Burwell in his new role as they continue to serve the mission of the Church and society in Canada and beyond.

https://www.jesuits.org/stories/jeffrey-s-burwell-sj-named-next-provincial-of-the-jesuits-of-canada/


Montreuil (French pronunciation: [mɔ̃tʁœj] ⓘ), also known unofficially as Montreuil-sous-Bois (pronounced [mɔ̃tʁœj su bwa]), is a commune in the eastern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located 6.6 km (4.1 mi) from the centre of Paris, in the Seine-Saint-Denis department and in the Métropole du Grand Paris. With a population of 111,367 as of 2020, Montreuil is the third most populous suburb of Paris after Boulogne-Billancourt and Saint-Denis. It is located north of Paris's Bois de Vincennes (in the 12th arrondissement), on the border with Val-de-Marne.


Name

The name Montreuil was recorded for the first time in a royal edict of 722 as Monasteriolum, meaning "little monastery" in Medieval Latin. The settlement of Montreuil started as a group of houses built around a small Merovingian monastery.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreuil,_Seine-Saint-Denis


Église St-Pierre de Montmartre

Montmartre & Northern Paris,Paris,France,Europe

Montmartre & Northern Paris


All that remains of the former Benedictine Abbey of Montmartre, this church dates back to the 12th century and is one of the oldest in Paris, though it has been much restored. Built atop a Roman temple to Mars, it was witness to the founding of the Jesuits in 1534, who met in the crypt under the guidance of Ignatius of Loyola.


Some say that the name Montmartre is derived from ‘Mons Martis’ (Latin for Mount of Mars); others prefer the Christian ‘Mont Martyr’ (Mount of the Martyr), a reference to the 3rd-century St Denis, who, according to legend, walked across Montmartre and on to the site of today’s Basilique de St-Denis after having been beheaded by Roman priests.

https://www.lonelyplanet.com/france/paris/montmartre-and-northern-paris/attractions/eglise-st-pierre-de-montmartre/a/poi-sig/1264286/1323143


The Carolingian dynasty (/ˌkærəˈlɪndʒiən/ KARR-ə-LIN-jee-ən;[1] known variously as the Carlovingians, Carolingus, Carolings, Karolinger or Karlings) was a Frankish noble family named after Charles Martel and his grandson Charlemagne, descendants of the Arnulfing and Pippinid clans of the 7th century AD.[2] The dynasty consolidated its power in the 8th century, eventually making the offices of mayor of the palace and dux et princeps Francorum hereditary, and becoming the de facto rulers of the Franks as the real powers behind the Merovingian throne. In 751 the Merovingian dynasty which had ruled the Franks was overthrown with the consent of the Papacy and the aristocracy, and Pepin the Short, son of Martel, was crowned King of the Franks. The Carolingian dynasty reached its peak in 800 with the crowning of Charlemagne as the first Emperor of the Romans in the West in over three centuries. Nearly every monarch of France from Charlemagne's son Louis the Pious till the penultimate monarch of France Louis Philippe have been his descendants. His death in 814 began an extended period of fragmentation of the Carolingian Empire and decline that would eventually lead to the evolution of the Kingdom of France and the Holy Roman Empire.


Name

The Carolingian dynasty takes its name from Carolus, the Latinised name of multiple Frankish kings including Charlemagne and Charles Martel.[3] The name originates from a common Germanic word, rendered in Old High German as Karl or Kerl,[4] meaning 'man', 'husband', or 'freeman'.[5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carolingian_dynasty


THE CONFLICT: PRIORY OF SION VERSUS KNIGHTS TEMPLAR

Secret societies by virtue of their very secrecy have often kept historians at bay, and the historians, reluctant to confess their ignorance, prefer to diminish the consequence of their subject. Freemasonry.. is of vital importance to any social, psychological, cultural or political history of eighteenth-century Europe, and even to the founding of the United States; but most history books don't even mention it. It is almost as if an implicit policy obtained: If something cannot be exhaustively documented, it must be irrelevant and thereby not worth discussing I at all. Investigators of the Holy Grail' Freemasonry, French and English, as we know it today, finds its loots in two organizations of the Middle Ages - the Priory of Sion and the Order of the Knights Templar. What follows is the fascinating, if sometimes complicated and obscure history, of how these two modern, anti-Christian secular secret societies - English and French Freemasonry - developed from two groups that themselves had roots in the occult. We will see how the Priory of Sion desired to rule the world from the throne of David in Jerusalem through its counterfeit Jewish Merovingian bloodline, and how its own creation, the Knights Templar, moved beyond its role as police and protector of Sion to financial masters of medieval Europe. We will trace the alliance of Sion and the Templars, their dispute over the discovery of Solomon's treasures, and the terrible intrigues which followed that led to the undoing of the Templars in their struggle over wealth, power, and politics. We will reveal the beliefs of these two groups: that Jesus fathered children by Mary Magdalene; that a spiritual god of good (Satan) battles a material god of evil; that Lucifer, not Jesus, deserves worship; that a "Spear of Destiny" (later sought and possessed by Hitler) allows the holder to rule the world. We will also present data about the whereabouts of King Solomon's wealth, the plan to one day return it to Jerusalem, and reveal that the ultimate goal of these two groups is world government, and that their descendants, English and French Freemasonry, desire the same. The Historical Trail: The Priory of Sion and the Holy Grail In 1982 and 1986 three secular revisionist authors, Michael Baigent~ Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln published Holy Blood, Holy Grail followed by The Messianic Legacy. These two books dramatically reveal a secret order structured in the manner of Freemasonry, and founded in Europe twelve centuries before the Grand Lodge was officially formed in 1717. This order protects both the Holy Grail and the Merovingian bloodline, which bloodline carried Mystery Babylon into the Catholic Church in 496 A.D. 56 The Holy Grail, of course, is the so-called cup from which Jesus drank at the Last Supper. The Merovingians, owners of the Holy Grail, teach that Jesus fathered children by Mary Magdalene. The Merovingians claim to be the offspring of that "holy" union, and as such, assert they are Jews of the Davidic line.

In Revelation 17:3-5 the apostle John describes a vision, which Rev. J. R. Church in Guardians of the Grail believes is fulfilled in the Grail legend. The Whore of Babylon is holding in her hand a golden cup full of blasphemy. Church believes the cup is the blasphemous Holy Grail Another element of the Grail legend is the spear supposed to have pierced the side of Jesus, also known as the Spear of Longinus or the Spear of Destiny. Whoever possesses this spear, so the legend goes, will rule the world. The Merovingians, whose descendants are the Habsburg pretenders to the Austrian throne today, are in possession of the spear. It is on display in the Habsburg museum in Vienna, Austria~ No one, however, knows the location of the Holy Grail. At least no one is telling. Although heretical, this secret society should not be discounted, for it is alive and well today. In fact, in 1956, an Order calling itself the Prieure de Sion, or Priory of Sion, registered itself publicly for the first time with the French government. (Sion is French for Zion.) It is from this Order that the legend of the Holy Grail originated five centuries after Christ's death. Rev. Church remarks of this organization: This mysterious group is presently made up of over 9,000 men, including Protestants, Roman Catholics, Jews, and Moslems. The members of this secret sect should be considered unfaithful to their respective beliefs, for in reality they are neither Christian nor Catholic, they are neither Jew nor Moslem. Their doctrine sidesteps the basic tenets of those beliefs and replaces them with the teachings of their greatest prophet - whom they believe to be Buddha.2 From this secret order J. R. Church believes will come the Anti-Christ, for he writes, "Their ultimate goal is world government!'

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zCd0nFuvnM4OYWuVW5QUBCpsTfBv5bYx/view?usp=sharing


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First Name:

Susan DUNN

2995 N 1050 E

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Kifal Comcast.net

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(EMPLOYER/UNION/EMPLOYMENT AGENCY/APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAM) DOD-Air Force Hill AFB 30g EmxG/QYQC

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Address: 5925 Southgate Ave. Bldg. 205

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There are 14,000 at our Base but 14 in our unit office.

Customer Support.

Number of employees: 15-100 [ ]101-200 [ ] 201-500 [ ] 500+ [ ] Under 15

What reason(s) did your employer give for the action taken against you? Or, what do you believe the employer will tell the EEOC?

I wouldn't be suprised by anything he says. He seems to Act like Eto rules of any kind, and of any rules of CommoN decency, do not Apply to him.

Name others who were treated like you: Witnesses

NAME

TWYLA Bruno

JOB TITLE

RACE/NATIONAL ORIGIN

GS-11 301 Series

SEX

AGE 2

(801) White 586-2562 F

ROSE STANLEY QDR Support White 586-3304 F

DDR Support White

DAWN Gray

586- 5474 F

2

-STACY Soren SON QOR Support.

white

717-

0565 F

Z

Name others who did the same thing you did, but were treated differently:

NAME

Who are your witnesses?

NAME

JOB TITLE

JOB TITLE

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AGE

1..

Mike Perez

HILL AFB.

tool + FOD Manager (801) 775-3431

What will #1 tell us? About how many times

2.

Steve Thomas talked about the Lady in the FOD Video. the prejudicial slanderous embarrassing remans?

What will #2 tell us?

3.

Jeff Titen SoR

(801) 775-3581

he was at the meeting. He might confer/validate.

Clint Perigo

What will #13 tell us? he was at the meeting. He might confer/val date


Twyla Bruno Age: 65

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CHAPTER TWO AT THE ORIGINS OF THE ROSICRUCIANS

Hye lygt begraben Venus, dye schon Fraw, so manchen Hoen Man umb Gluck, Ehr, Scgcn, und Wolfart gcbracht hatt. (in cipher, Chymische Hochzeit)


The universe of reference to the Rosicrucian fiction is the call for a brotherhood, a Christian kabbalist assembly of reformers prepared to spread support for a wave of illumination and religious change throughout Europe. But if the advance of Rosicrucian thinking is difficult to map after the printing of the Farm in Kassel 1614, the origin of these ideas is even more in dispute. It is often maintained that the exciting thesis set forth by Frances Yates in her book on the Rosicrucian Enlightenment is seriously flawed. First, Rosicrucianism never was the successive unfolding of a clearly held together programme o f scientific reform that she believed it to be. Second, a number of scholars point out that the early British influence on the Wiirtemberg Rosicrucians was overemphasized, particularly when Yates concentrated on John Dee and derived the Rosicrucian name from the red cross of St. George, taken together with the Tudor roses of England.1 While the poetic verse on the Red Cross knight in Edmund Spencer’s The Fairie Queen has some resemblance to the Rosicrucian chivalrous quest, and while Spencer’s Castle of Alma is a poetic microcosm of learning with some resemblance to the Rosicrucian tomb, there is little concrete evidence to support Yates’ explicitely stated hypotheses. If one looks closer at her arguments, however, beginning with her interest in the Valois tapestries, one sees that she was reaching for a connection to French court culture and dynastic politics. She felt that Spencer’s poetic passages convey the militant atmosphere of the Elizabethan Leicester-Sidney-circle. This militancy centered on forging a Protestant union with the German Princes in view of the British campaign in the United Provinces in 1586, the legacy of which wouJd be preserved in the legend of Christian Rosencreutz. In her focus on the interplay of poetry and culture, Yates staked much on the hope that more would be found out concerning Philip Sidney’s Dutch, German, and French contacts. As opposed to Yates’ view, recent scholars point out that although the Rosicrucian pamphlets first appeared in print in 1614—15, they were not specifically written in political support o f the marriage at Heidelberg in 1613 between Fredrik V of Wiirtemberg and Princess Elisabeth Stuart, a marriage calculated to eventually strengthen the Protestant presence in Central and Eastern Europe. Most interpreters do agree, however, that the Rosicrucian texts are part of a more profound central European context, a context rooted in late sixteenthcentury Paracelsism and enheartened by theosophy, magic, Christian Kabbalah, and alchemical ideas that at first glance have nothing to do with Dee’s British Imperialism."

Rose Cross Over The Baltic The Spread of Rosicrucianism In Northern Europe by Suzanne Ackerman

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vWI_uTVg5lzNCDm16itq-PLSavozNR_F/view?usp=sharing


Around 1530, more than eighty years before the publication of the first manifesto, the association of cross and rose already existed in Portugal in the Convent of the Order of Christ, home of the Knights Templar, later renamed Order of Christ. Three bocetes were, and still are, on the abóboda (vault) of the initiation room. The rose can clearly be seen at the center of the cross.[34][35] At the same time, a minor writing by Paracelsus called Prognosticatio Eximii Doctoris Paracelsi (1530), containing 32 prophecies with allegorical pictures surrounded by enigmatic texts, makes reference to an image of a double cross over an open rose; this is one of the examples used to prove the "Fraternity of the Rose Cross" existed far earlier than 1614.[36]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosicrucianism


“Rosa Jesuitica, oder Jesuitische Rottgesellen, das ist, Eine Frag ob die Zween Orden, der ganandten Ritter von der Neerscharen Jesu, und der Rosen-Creuzer ein einiger Ordensen: per J. P. D. a S. Jesuitarum Protectorum. Prague, 1620.” (4to). This is a truly curious tract upon the “relations of the Jesuits and the Rosicrucians."

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1dT28PyPUPfqDfC0iVg7nGFsle8vYBXLf/view?usp=sharing


THE RUSSIAN WOODPECKER AND PROJECT SANGUINE

In 1953, the Soviets set up seven radio transmitters and began pulsing the American Embassy in Moscow with an ELF signal measuring 3.26–17.54 MHz. Embassy workers had no idea they were being pulsed while developing emotional and behavioral problems, leukemia (a 40 percent higher than average white blood cell count), cancer, and cataracts. Ambassadors Charles Bohlen and Llewellyn Thompson died; Ambassador Walter Stoessel, Jr. developed a rare blood disease and bled from the eyes. The Moscow Embassy “experiment” would run for thirty years, a full generation.

Meanwhile in the United States under DARPA’s Project Pandora, scientists were studying how low-intensity microwaves might be used to induce heart attacks, blood/brain barrier leaks, auditory hallucinations, etc. This was the MK-ULTRA mind control era whose overarching electromagnetic question was, Can a microwave signal control the mind at a distance? In 1962, the CIA dedicated Project Bizarre to studying the Moscow signal and made a crucial discovery: it was not the strength of the signal that was responsible for loss of biological health—a tiny fraction of the U.S. military (very high) “safe” exposure level—but the pulsing. This information was immediately classified and Pandora went black, along with other projects.

By July 1969, the U.S. had 71,524 microwave towers spaced according to the geometric harmonics of the world magnetic grid. SECOM II’s16 five towers broadcast in the 3–12 MHz range—within the Schumann range—in a round robin from Idaho and New Mexico to Missouri, South Carolina, and Maryland.

In 1968, the secretive JASON Group mounted Project Sanguine’s 6,400-mile buried cable antenna for long radio wave transmissions (SLF 30–300Hz) out of upper Wisconsin. A transmitter on one side would pump ELF waves through the ground and out the other side so that, as bioelectromagnetics expert Robert O. Becker, MD, put it, “ELF waves issuing from it and resonating between the earth’s surface and the ionosphere could be picked up anywhere on the globe.”17 Supposedly, Sanguine was for submarine communication (much like HAARP was sold to the public), but the antenna length produced minuscule frequencies (.3 kHz), which was odd, given that the best frequencies for defense purposes are much higher. The truth is that Sanguine was to be set in sync with the three Soviet Duga antennas at Chernobyl, eastern Siberia, and Ukraine/Croatia.18

Per the requirements of the Environmental Protection Act, U.S. Navy Captain Paul E. Tyler asked Dr. Becker to be on the scientific committee overseeing Sanguine. In 1984, Captain Tyler would author “The Electromagnetic Spectrum in Low-Intensity Conflict,” a watershed paper which the International Committee on Offensive Microwave Weapons (ICOMW) described as “so important in the chain of evidence establishing the existence of an Electronic Concentration Camp System that if our Archive consisted of only two documents, the Tyler paper would surely be one of them!”19

In his 1985 book The Body Electric: Electromagnetism and the Foundation of Life, Dr. Becker detailed the committee’s disturbing Project Sanguine findings: stress responses, desynchronized bio-cycles, cellular metabolism interference, increased cancer rates in hundreds of thousands of people living inside the antenna field, etc. What would happen when the longwave signals resonated throughout the world? The committee recommended that Project Sanguine be shelved and that the 60 Hz power lines carrying far more power than the Sanguine antenna into homes across the nation be reexamined.

Under An Ionized Sky: From Chemtrails To Space Fence Lockdown

by Elana Freeland

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1oneu_kEMMH5AeAffiWOR_7NJ0HptHJrC/view?usp=sharing


Peckerwood is a racial epithet used against white people, especially poor rural whites.[2] Originally an ethnic slur, the term has been reclaimed by a subculture related to prison gangs and outlaw motorcycle clubs.[3][4][5][6] The term was in use as an inversion of woodpecker in the Southern United States by the 1830s; it is also with the sense referring to white people documented from the 1850s.[2] African-American folklore in the 1920s contrasted the white "peckerwood" bird with the African-American blackbird.[6][7] The word became a common term in Jive.


History

Use of the term, an inversion of woodpecker, dates to the early 19th century. The Oxford English Dictionary traces the earliest printed use to an Alabama newspaper in 1835.[2] Peckerwood was in use in reference to white people by 1859; it often suggested a white person who was rustic or poor.[2][3] The shortened form peck was in use in the same sense in the 1920s.[8] In African American folklore during the 1920s, the woodpecker symbolically represented White Americans, in contrast to the blackbird that represented African Americans.[3][6]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peckerwood


The Sinaloa Cartel (Spanish: Cártel de Sinaloa, pronounced [ˈkaɾtel ðe sinaˈloa], CDS, after the native Sinaloa region), also known as the Guzmán-Loera Organization, the Federation, the Sinaloa Cartel,[14][15][16] or the Pacific Cartel,[17] is a large, drug trafficking transnational organized crime syndicate and U.S.-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization based in Culiacán, Sinaloa, Mexico,[18] that specializes in illegal drug trafficking and money laundering.


The cartel's history is marked by evolution from a small crime syndicate to one of the most powerful and violent drug trafficking organizations in the world. Founded in the late 1960s by Pedro Avilés Pérez in Sinaloa, the cartel initially focused on smuggling marijuana into the United States. Pérez is credited with pioneering the use of aircraft for drug smuggling, laying the groundwork for large-scale trafficking operations. His organization was a training ground for the second generation of Sinaloan traffickers.


The Guadalajara Cartel was co-founded by Félix Gallardo between 1978 and 1980, marking the next phase in the cartel's history.[19][20][13] Under Gallardo's leadership, the cartel controlled much of Mexico's drug trafficking corridors along the US border throughout the 1980s. Following Gallardo's arrest in 1989, the cartel splintered into smaller organizations, including the Sinaloa Cartel.


Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, the Sinaloa Cartel, under the leadership of figures like Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán, significantly expanded its operations, establishing itself as one of the most powerful and influential criminal organizations in the world. The cartel was heavily involved in violent conflicts with rival groups such as the Tijuana Cartel, the Gulf Cartel, and later, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), as well as with Mexican federal forces.


During this period, the Sinaloa Cartel diversified its drug portfolio, becoming a major player in the global trade of cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin. It developed sophisticated trafficking networks spanning across the Americas, Europe, and Asia, utilizing methods such as underground tunnels, maritime shipments, and corrupt border officials to smuggle narcotics into the United States and other markets. The cartel also became known for its strategic alliances, brutal enforcement tactics, and the ability to infiltrate local governments and law enforcement agencies, particularly in key trafficking corridors, further solidifying its position as a dominant force in the drug trade. Despite numerous arrests and seizures by law enforcement, the cartel has continued to operate, often employing sophisticated smuggling techniques, including tunnels under the US-Mexico border. It has operations in many world regions but primarily in the Mexican states of Sinaloa, Baja California, Durango, Sonora, and Chihuahua.[14][21] and presence in other regions in Latin America, as well as cities across the U.S.[22][23] The United States Intelligence Community considers the cartel to be the largest and most powerful drug trafficking organization in the world, perhaps more influential than Pablo Escobar's Medellín Cartel of Colombia during its prime.[24][25] According to the National Drug Intelligence Center and other sources within the U.S. the Sinaloa Cartel is primarily involved in the distribution of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, fentanyl, cannabis and MDMA.[26]


As of 2024, the cartel remains Mexico's most dominant drug cartel.[24][27] After the arrest of Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán and his son Ovidio Guzmán López in 2016 and 2023 respectively, the cartel was headed by old-school leader Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada,[28] as well as Guzmán's other sons, Jesús Alfredo Guzmán Salazar, Joaquín Guzmán López and Iván Archivaldo Guzmán Salazar,[29][30] until 2024 when both Zambada and Joaquín Guzmán López were arrested by US authorities in El Paso, Texas.[31] The cartel has had a significant impact on the War on drugs, both international and local politics, as well as in popular culture. Its influence extends beyond Mexico, with operations in the United States, Latin America, and as far as the Philippines. Despite the arrest of key leaders, the cartel remains a significant player in international drug trafficking, driven by demand for narcotics in the US and around the world.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinaloa_Cartel


What is a SIN?

A Social Insurance Number (SIN) is a 9-digit number that you need to work and be paid in Canada and access government programs and benefits. It is also used to file taxes.


If you are not eligible for a SIN, you can apply for an Individual Tax Number (ITN) for tax purposes.


You are responsible for protecting your SIN. Ensure that you store documents containing your SIN and personal information in a safe place. For more information about protecting your SIN, please visit here.


International students get a SIN starting with the number ‘9,’ which lets employers know that you are a temporary resident in Canada.

https://international.northeastern.edu/ogs/student-support/global-campuses/canada/social-insurance-number/


As per numerology, 666 when added comes to 9, a tricky number that stands for greediness, and natural disasters. But 9 (6+6+6+18=1+8=90 is also the number of Mars (Mangal) which means extra energy which can either make or break. It is impulsive, restless, stubborn and inflexible,' adds Jumaani."

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/ahmedabad-times/666-the-devil-or-cupid/articleshow/1621141.cms#


A novena (from Latin: novem, "nine") is an ancient tradition of devotional praying in Christianity, consisting of private or public prayers repeated for nine successive days or weeks.[1] The nine days between the Feast of the Ascension and Pentecost, when the disciples gathered in the upper room and devoted themselves to prayer, is often considered to be the first novena.[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novena


[666] 6. 1On the side of the superior general, what will aid toward this union of hearts are the qualities of his person [G], to be treated in Part IX [723-25], with which he will perform his office, 2which is to be for all the members a head from which the influence required for the end sought by the Society ought to descend to them all. 3It is thus from the general as head that all authority of the provincials should flow, from the provincials that of the local superiors, and from the local superiors that of the individual members. 4And from this same head, or at least by his commission and approval, should likewise come the appointing of missions. And the same should apply to communicating the graces of the Society. 5For the more the subjects are dependent upon their superiors, the better will the love, obedience, and union among them be preserved."

The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus and Their Complementary Norms

https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Civil Twilight:

Begins in the morning, or ends in the evening, when the geometric center of the sun is 6 degrees below the horizon.  Therefore morning civil twilight begins when the geometric center of the sun is 6 degrees below the horizon, and ends at sunrise.  Evening civil twilight begins at sunset, and ends when the geometric center of the sun is 6 degrees below the horizon.  Under these conditions absent fog or other restrictions, the brightest stars and planets can be seen, the horizon and terrestrial objects can be discerned, and in many cases, artificial lighting is not needed. Civil Twilight is also known as Civil Dawn and Civil Dusk.

Nautical Twilight:

Begins in the morning, or ends in the evening, when the geometric center of the sun is 12 degrees below the horizon.  In general, the term nautical twilight refers to sailors being able to take reliable readings via well known stars because the horizon is still visible, even under moonless conditions.  Absent fog or other restrictions, outlines of terrestrial objects may still be discernible, but detailed outdoor activities are likely curtailed without artificial illumination. Nautical Twilight is also known as Nautical Dawn and Nautical Dusk.

Astronomical Twilight:

Begins in the morning, or ends in the evening, when the geometric center of the sun is 18 degrees below the horizon.  In astronomical twilight, sky illumination is so faint that most casual observers would regard the sky as fully dark, especially under urban or suburban light pollution.  Under astronomical twilight, the horizon is not discernible and moderately faint stars or planets can be observed with the naked eye under a non light polluted sky.  But to test the limits of naked eye observations, the sun needs to be more than 18 degrees below the horizon.  Point light sources such as stars and planets can be readily studied by astronomers under astronomical twilight.  But diffuse light sources such as galaxies, nebula, and globular clusters need to be observed under a totally dark sky, again when the sun is more than 18 degrees below the horizon.

https://www.weather.gov/fsd/twilight


Unam Sanctam

One God, One Faith, One Spiritual Authority

Pope Boniface VIII - 1302

Bull of Pope Boniface VIII promulgated November 18, 1302

Urged by faith, we are obliged to believe and to maintain that the Church is one, holy, catholic, and also apostolic. We believe in her firmly and we confess with simplicity that outside of her there is neither salvation nor the remission of sins, as the Spouse in the Canticles [Sgs 6:8] proclaims: ‘One is my dove, my perfect one. She is the only one, the chosen of her who bore her,‘ and she represents one sole mystical body whose Head is Christ and the head of Christ is God [1 Cor 11:3]. In her then is one Lord, one faith, one baptism [Eph 4:5]. There had been at the time of the deluge only one ark of Noah, prefiguring the one Church, which ark, having been finished to a single cubit, had only one pilot and guide, i.e., Noah, and we read that, outside of this ark, all that subsisted on the earth was destroyed.

We venerate this Church as one, the Lord having said by the mouth of the prophet: ‘Deliver, O God, my soul from the sword and my only one from the hand of the dog.’ [Ps 21:20] He has prayed for his soul, that is for himself, heart and body; and this body, that is to say, the Church, He has called one because of the unity of the Spouse, of the faith, of the sacraments, and of the charity of the Church. This is the tunic of the Lord, the seamless tunic, which was not rent but which was cast by lot [Jn 19:23- 24]. Therefore, of the one and only Church there is one body and one head, not two heads like a monster; that is, Christ and the Vicar of Christ, Peter and the successor of Peter, since the Lord speaking to Peter Himself said: ‘Feed my sheep‘ [Jn 21:17], meaning, my sheep in general, not these, nor those in particular, whence we understand that He entrusted all to him [Peter]. Therefore, if the Greeks or others should say that they are not confided to Peter and to his successors, they must confess not being the sheep of Christ, since Our Lord says in John ‘there is one sheepfold and one shepherd.’ We are informed by the texts of the gospels that in this Church and in its power are two swords; namely, the spiritual and the temporal. For when the Apostles say: ‘Behold, here are two swords‘ [Lk 22:38] that is to say, in the Church, since the Apostles were speaking, the Lord did not reply that there were too many, but sufficient. Certainly the one who denies that the temporal sword is in the power of Peter has not listened well to the word of the Lord commanding: ‘Put up thy sword into thy scabbard‘ [Mt 26:52]. Therefore, both are in the power of the Church, namely, the spiritual sword and the material. But indeed, the latter is to be exercised on behalf of the Church; and truly, the former is to be exercised by the Church. The former is of the priest; the latter is by the hand of kings and soldiers, but at the will and sufferance of the priest.


However, one sword ought to be subordinated to the other and temporal authority, subjected to spiritual power. For since the Apostle said: ‘There is no power except from God and the things that are, are ordained of God‘ [Rom 13:1-2], but they would not be ordained if one sword were not subordinated to the other and if the inferior one, as it were, were not led upwards by the other.


For, according to the Blessed Dionysius, it is a law of the divinity that the lowest things reach the highest place by intermediaries. Then, according to the order of the universe, all things are not led back to order equally and immediately, but the lowest by the intermediary, and the inferior by the superior. Hence we must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power whatever, as spiritual things surpass the temporal. This we see very clearly also by the payment, benediction, and consecration of the tithes, but the acceptance of power itself and by the government even of things. For with truth as our witness, it belongs to spiritual power to establish the terrestrial power and to pass judgement if it has not been good. Thus is accomplished the prophecy of Jeremias concerning the Church and the ecclesiastical power: ‘Behold to-day I have placed you over nations, and over kingdoms‘ and the rest. Therefore, if the terrestrial power err, it will be judged by the spiritual power; but if a minor spiritual power err, it will be judged by a superior spiritual power; but if the highest power of all err, it can be judged only by God, and not by man, according to the testimony of the Apostle: ‘The spiritual man judgeth of all things and he himself is judged by no man‘ [1 Cor 2:15]. This authority, however, (though it has been given to man and is exercised by man), is not human but rather divine, granted to Peter by a divine word and reaffirmed to him (Peter) and his successors by the One Whom Peter confessed, the Lord saying to Peter himself, ‘Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound also in Heaven‘ etc., [Mt 16:19]. Therefore whoever resists this power thus ordained by God, resists the ordinance of God [Rom 13:2], unless he invent like Manicheus two beginnings, which is false and judged by us heretical, since according to the testimony of Moses, it is not in the beginnings but in the beginning that God created heaven and earth [Gen 1:1]. Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

https://www.papalencyclicals.net/bon08/b8unam.htm


What is the meaning of 666?

Answer

At the close of Revelation 13, which discusses the beast (the Antichrist) and his false prophet, we read, “This calls for wisdom: let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666” (Revelation 13:18). Somehow, the number 666 is a clue to the identity of the beast. Revelation 13 also mentions the “mark of the beast” (verses 16–17), and popular thought often links 666 with the mark; however, the mark of the beast and 666 appear to be two different things. The mark of the beast is something people must receive in order to buy and sell. The number 666 is somehow associated with the beast/Antichrist as “his” number.

The meaning of 666 is a mystery, and it appears that the apostle John, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, intended it to be that way. Calculating it, John says, requires “wisdom.” Some, using gematria (assigning a number value to each letter of a name or word and then combining the number values to arrive at a total number), have identified the Antichrist as various people in world history. Some of the popular targets have been “Caesar Nero,” “Ronald Wilson Reagan,” “Mikhail Gorbachev,” and various popes in Roman Catholic history. The lengths some will go to in order to get a person’s name to add up to 666 are amazing. Virtually any name can add up to 666 if enough mathematical gymnastics are employed.


Six hundred, sixty-six will somehow identify the beast, but precisely how 666 is connected to the beast is not the main point of Revelation 13:18. The Bible often uses the number 7 to refer to God and His perfection. Traditionally, 6 is thought to be the number of man, created on the sixth day and always “falling short” of God. The beast/Antichrist will strive to be like God. He will likely even claim to be God. But, just as the number 6 falls short of the number 7, so will the beast/Antichrist, with his “trinity” of 6’s, ultimately fail in his effort to defeat God.


Addendum: Interestingly, in some ancient Greek manuscripts of the Book of Revelation, the number is given as 616 instead of 666. The manuscript evidence is strongly in favor of 666, but the alternate reading of 616 should give us pause before we start pounding away on the calculators.

https://www.gotquestions.org/meaning-of-666.html


Head:

1. See Illness, mental

2. The superior general, head of the Society [666]

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


666 1 Samuel 26:15-16. And David said to Abner, Art not thou a valiant man? and who is like to thee in Israel? wherefore then hast thou not kept thy lord the king? for there came one of the people in to destroy the king thy lord. This thing is not good that thou hast done. As the LORD liveth, ye are worthy to die, because ye have not kept your master, the LORD'S anointed. And now see where the king's spear is, and the cruse of water that was at his bolster. 2 Samuel 18:3. But the people answered, Thou shalt not go forth: for if we flee away, they will not care for us; neither if half of us die, will they care for us: but now thou art worth ten thousand of us: therefore now it is better that thou succour us out of the city. Esther 6:2. And it was found written, that Mordecai had told of Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king's chamberlains, the keepers of the door, who sought to lay hand on the king Ahasuerus

THE

WESTMINSTER

LARGER

CATECHISM

https://www.freepresbyterian.org/uploads/Larger_Catechism.pdf


Can. 666 In the use of means of social communication, necessary discretion is to be observed and those things are to be avoided which are harmful to one’s vocation and dangerous to the chastity of a consecrated person."

TITLE II. RELIGIOUS INSTITUTES (Cann. 607 - 709) CODE OF CANON LAW

https://www.vatican.va/archive/cod-iuris-canonici/eng/documents/cic_lib2-cann607-709_en.html


18 U.S. Code § 666 - Theft or bribery concerning programs receiving Federal funds

U.S. Code

Notes

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(a)Whoever, if the circumstance described in subsection (b) of this section exists—

(1)being an agent of an organization, or of a State, local, or Indian tribal government, or any agency thereof—

(A)embezzles, steals, obtains by fraud, or otherwise without authority knowingly converts to the use of any person other than the rightful owner or intentionally misapplies, property that—

(i)is valued at $5,000 or more, and

(ii)is owned by, or is under the care, custody, or control of such organization, government, or agency; or

(B)corruptly solicits or demands for the benefit of any person, or accepts or agrees to accept, anything of value from any person, intending to be influenced or rewarded in connection with any business, transaction, or series of transactions of such organization, government, or agency involving any thing of value of $5,000 or more; or

(2)corruptly gives, offers, or agrees to give anything of value to any person, with intent to influence or reward an agent of an organization or of a State, local or Indian tribal government, or any agency thereof, in connection with any business, transaction, or series of transactions of such organization, government, or agency involving anything of value of $5,000 or more;

shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both.

(b)The circumstance referred to in subsection (a) of this section is that the organization, government, or agency receives, in any one year period, benefits in excess of $10,000 under a Federal program involving a grant, contract, subsidy, loan, guarantee, insurance, or other form of Federal assistance.

(c)This section does not apply to bona fide salary, wages, fees, or other compensation paid, or expenses paid or reimbursed, in the usual course of business.

(d)As used in this section—

(1)the term “agent” means a person authorized to act on behalf of another person or a government and, in the case of an organization or government, includes a servant or employee, and a partner, director, officer, manager, and representative;

(2)the term “government agency” means a subdivision of the executive, legislative, judicial, or other branch of government, including a department, independent establishment, commission, administration, authority, board, and bureau, and a corporation or other legal entity established, and subject to control, by a government or governments for the execution of a governmental or intergovernmental program;

(3)the term “local” means of or pertaining to a political subdivision within a State;

(4)the term “State” includes a State of the United States, the District of Columbia, and any commonwealth, territory, or possession of the United States; and

(5)the term “in any one-year period” means a continuous period that commences no earlier than twelve months before the commission of the offense or that ends no later than twelve months after the commission of the offense. Such period may include time both before and after the commission of the offense.

(Added Pub. L. 98–473, title II, § 1104(a), Oct. 12, 1984, 98 Stat. 2143; amended Pub. L. 99–646, § 59(a), Nov. 10, 1986, 100 Stat. 3612; Pub. L. 101–647, title XII, §§ 1205(d), 1209, Nov. 29, 1990, 104 Stat. 4831, 4832; Pub. L. 103–322, title XXXIII, § 330003(c), Sept. 13, 1994, 108 Stat. 2140.)

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/666


Revelation 13:11-18

1599 Geneva Bible

11 [a]And I beheld, another beast coming out of the earth, [b]which had two horns like the Lamb, but he spake like the dragon.


12 [c]And he did all that the first beast could do before him, and he caused the earth and them which dwell therein, [d]to worship the first beast whose deadly wound was healed.


13 [e]And he did great wonders, so that he made fire to come down from heaven on the earth, in the sight of men.


14 And deceived them that dwell on the earth by the signs which were permitted to him to do in the sight of the beast, saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make the [f]image of the [g]beast, which had the wound of a sword, and did live.


15 [h]And it was permitted to him to give a [i]spirit unto the image of the beast, so that the image of the beast should speak, and should cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.


16 [j]And he made all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive [k]a [l]mark in their right hand or in their foreheads.


17 And that no man might [m]buy or sell, save he that had the [n]mark or the name of the beast or the number of his name.


18 [o]Here is wisdom. Let him that hath wit, count the number of the beast: for it is the [p]number of a man, and his number is six hundred threescore and six.


Read full chapter

Footnotes

Revelation 13:11 The second member of the vision, concerning the ecclesiastical dominion, which in Rome succeeded that which was politic, and is in the power of the corporation of false Prophets, and of the forgers of false doctrine. Wherefore the same body or corporation is called of S. John by the name of false prophet, Rev. 6:13, 19 and 20. The form of this beast is first described in this verse, then his acts, in the verses following, and the whole speech is concluded in the last verse. This beast is by his breed a Son of the earth (as they say) obscurely born, and by little and little creeping up out of his abject estate.

Revelation 13:11 That is, in show he resembled the Lamb (for what is more mild or more humble than to be the servant of the servants of God) but in deed he played the part of the Dragon, and of the Wolf, Matt. 7:15. For even Satan changeth himself into an Angel of light, 2 Cor. 11:14, and what should his honest disciples and servants do?

Revelation 13:12 The history of the acts of this beast containeth in sum three things, hypocrisy, the witness of miracles and tyranny: of which the first is noted in this verse, the second in the 3 verses following: the third in the sixteenth and seventeenth verses. His hypocrisy is most full of leasing, whereby he abuseth both the former beast and the whole world: in that albeit he hath by his cunning, as it were by lime made of the former beast a most miserable … or anatomy, usurped all his authority unto himself and most impudently exerciseth the same in the sight and view of him: yet he carrieth himself so, as if he honored him with most high honor, and did in very truth cause him to be honored of all men.

Revelation 13:12

For unto this beast of Rome, which of civil Empire is made an Ecclesiastical hierarchy, are given divine honors, and divine authority so far as he is believed to be above the Scriptures, which the gloss upon the Decretals declareth by this devilish verse,


Articulos solvit, synodumque facit generalem,


That is,


He changeth the Articles of faith, and giveth authority to general Counsels.


Which is spoken of the Papal power. So the beast is by birth, foundation, feat, and finally substance, one: only the Pope hath altered the form and manner thereof being himself the head both of that tyrannical Empire, and also of the false Prophets, for the Empire hath he taken unto himself, and thereunto hath added this cunning device. Now these words, whose deadly wound was cured are put here for distinction sake, as also sometimes afterwards: that even at that time the godly readers of this prophecy might by this sign be brought to see the things as present: as if it were said, that they might adore this very Empire that now is, whose head we have seen in our own memory to have been cut off, and to be cured again.


Revelation 13:13 The second point of the things done by the beast, is the credit of great wonders or miracles, appertaining to the strength of this impiety: of which signs some were given from above, as it is said, that fire was sent down from heaven by false sorcery, in this verse. Others were showed here below in the sight of the beast to establish idolatry, and deceive souls, which part S. John setteth forth beginning (as they say) at that which is last, in this manner: First the effect is declared in these words, He deceiveth the inhabitants of the earth, Secondly the common manner of working in two sorts, one of miracles. For the signs that were given him to do in the presence of the beasts: the other of the words added to the signs, and teaching the idolatry confirmed by those signs, Saying unto the inhabitants of the earth, that they should make an image unto the beasts which, etc. Thirdly, a special manner is declared: That is given unto him to put life into the image of the beast: and that such a kind of quickening, that the same both speaketh by answer unto those that ask counsel of it, and also pronounceth death against all those that do not obey nor worship it: all which things oftentimes by false miracles through the procurement and inspiration of the Devil, have been effected and wrought in images. The histories of the Papists are full of examples of such miracles, the most of them feigned, many also done by the devil in images: as of old in the serpent, Gen. 3:1. By which examples is confirmed, not the authority of the beast, but the truth of God, and of these prophecies.

Revelation 13:14 That is, images by enallage or change of the number: for the worship of them ever since the second Council of Nice, hath been ordained in the Church by public credit, and authority contrary unto the Law of God.

Revelation 13:14 In the Greek the word is in the Dative case, as much to say, as unto the worship, honor and obeying of the beast: for by this maintenance of images this Pseudoprophetical beast doth mightily profit the beast of Rome, of whom long ago he received them. Wherefore the same is hereafter very fitly called the image of the beast, for that images have their beginning from the beast, and have their form or manner from the will of the beast, and have their end and use fixed in the profit and commodity of the beast.

Revelation 13:15 And of this miracle of the images of the beast (that is, which the beast hath ordained to establish idolatry) which miraculously speak and give judgment, or rather marvelously, by the fraud of the false prophets, the Papists books are full fraughted.

Revelation 13:15 To give life as Jannes and Jambres imitated the wonders that Moses wrought.

Revelation 13:16 The third place, is a most wicked and most insolent tyrrany as was said before, usurped over the persons of men in this verse: and over their goods and actions, in the next verse. For he is said, both to bring upon all persons a tyrannous servitude, that as bondslaves they might serve the beast: and also to exercise over all their goods and actions, a peddler-like abuse of indulgences and dispensations (as they term them) amongst their friends, and against others to use most violent interdictions, and to shoot out cursings, even in natural and civil, private and public contracts, wherein all good faith ought to have place.

Revelation 13:16 That is, their Chrism, by which in the Sacrament (as they call it) of Confirmation, they make servile unto themselves, the persons and doings of men, signing them in their forehead and hands: and as for the sign left by Christ (of which Rev. 7:3) and the holy Sacrament of Baptism they make as void. For whom Christ hath joined unto himself by Baptism, this beast maketh challenge unto them by her greasy Chrism, which he doubteth not to prefer over Baptism, both in authority and efficacy.

Revelation 13:16 The mark of the name of the beast.

Revelation 13:17 That is, have any traffic or intercourse with men, but they only those which have this anointing and consecration of Clearkely tonsure, as they call it. Read Gratian de Consecratione, distinct. s. c. omnes, cap. Spiritus, etc. of these matters.

Revelation 13:17 Here the false Prophets do require three things, which are set down in the order of their greatness, a character, a name and the number of the name. The meaning is, that man that hath not first their anointing and clerical tonsure or shaving: secondly holy orders, by reserving whereof is communicated the same of the beast: or finally hath not attained that high degree of Pontifical knowledge, and of the Law (as they call it) Canonical, and hath not as it were made up in account and cast the number of the mysteries thereof: for in these things consisteth the number of that name of the beast. And this is excellently set forth in the next verse.

Revelation 13:18 That is in this number of the beast consisteth that Popish wisdom, which unto them seemeth the greatest of all others. In these words S. John expoundeth that saying which went before of the number of the beast, what it hath above his mark or acconisance and his name. These things, saith S. John, the mark and the name of the beast, do easily happen unto any man: but to have the number of the beast, is wisdom: that is, only the wise and such as have understanding, can come by that number for they must be most illuminated doctors that attain thereunto, as the words following do declare.

Revelation 13:18 How great and of what denomination this number of the beast is, by which the beast accounted his wisdom, S. John declareth in these words. Dost thou demand how great it is? it is so great, that it occupieth the whole man: he is always learning, and never cometh to the knowledge thereof: he must be a man indeed that doth attain unto it. Askest thou of what denomination it is? verily it standeth of six throughout and perfectly ariseth of all the parts thereof in their several denominations (as they term them) it standeth of six by units, tens, hundreds, etc. so as there is no one part in the learning and order Pontifical, which is not either referred unto the head, and as it were the top thereof, or contained in the same: so fitly do all things in this hierarchy agree one with another, and with their head. Therefore that cruel beast Boniface the eighth doth commend by the number of six those Decretals which he perfected, in the proem of the sixth book. Which book (saith he) being to be added unto five other books of the same volume of Decretals, we thought good to name Sextum the sixth: that the same volume by addition thereof containing a senary, or the number of six books (which is a number perfect) may yield a perfect form of managing all things, and perfect discipline of behavior. Here therefore is the number of the beast, who poureth from himself all his parts and bringeth them all back again unto himself by his discipline in most wise and cunning manner. If any man desire more of this, let him read the gloss upon that place. I am not ignorant that other interpretations are brought upon this place: but I thought it my duty, with the good favor of all and without the offense of any, to propound mine opinion in this point. And for this cause especially, for that it seemed unto me neither profitable, nor like to be true, that the number of the beast, or of the name of the beast should be taken as the common sort of interpreters do take it. For this number of the beast teacheth, giveth out, imprinteth, as a public mark of such as be his, and esteemeth that mark above all others as the mark of those whom he loveth best. Now those other expositions seem rather to be far removed from this property and condition of that number: whether you respect the name Latinus or Titan, or another. For these the beast doth not teach, nor give forth nor imprint, but most diligently forbiddeth to be taught, and audaciously denieth: he approveth not these, but reproveth them: and hateth them that think so of this number, with an hatred, greater than that of Vatinius.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2013%3A11-18&version=GNV


Twyla >

yet. by any Church. I will start the first chapter of the Book of Mormon today.

84

Be sure to read the forward and the testimony of the 3 witnesses and the 8 witnesses that are in the front of the book.

If people believe in Jesus Christ that makes them a Christian by the standards of the world. Tony's attitude is identical to Rusty's. Claim to believe in Christ but doesn't follow any of His teachings. Tony was baptized in the Catholic Church when he was 12 so he could attend the catholic school in the neighborhood.

Wed, Jul 23 at 9:11AM

I watched "Count three and Pray" this morning. With Van Heflin and Joanne Woodward. Her character sure was rowdy and pushy and got results from his skeptical thoughts on her; but he followed through with

Text Message. RCS


The Mountain Meadows Massacre (September 7–11, 1857) was a series of attacks during the Utah War that resulted in the mass murder of at least 120 members of the Baker–Fancher emigrant wagon train.[1][a] The massacre occurred in the southern Utah Territory at Mountain Meadows, and was perpetrated by settlers from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) involved with the Utah Territorial Militia (officially called the Nauvoo Legion) who recruited and were aided by some Southern Paiute Native Americans.[2] The wagon train, made up mostly of families from Arkansas, was bound for California, traveling on the Old Spanish Trail that passed through the Territory.


After arriving in Salt Lake City, the Baker–Fancher party made their way south along the Mormon Road, eventually stopping to rest at Mountain Meadows. As the party was traveling west there were rumors about the party's behavior towards Mormon settlers and war hysteria towards outsiders was rampant as a result of a military expedition dispatched by President Buchanan, and Territorial Governor Brigham Young's declaration of martial law in response.[3][4][5] While the emigrants were camped at the meadow, local militia leaders, including Isaac C. Haight and John D. Lee, made plans to attack the wagon train. The leaders of the militia, wanting to give the impression of tribal hostilities, persuaded Southern Paiutes to join with a larger party of militiamen disguised as Native Americans in an attack. During the militia's first assault on the wagon train, the emigrants fought back, and a five-day siege ensued. Eventually, fear spread among the militia's leaders that some emigrants had caught sight of the white men, likely discerning the actual identity of a majority of the attackers. As a result, militia commander William H. Dame ordered his forces to kill the emigrants. By this time, the emigrants were running low on water and provisions, and allowed some members of the militia – who approached under a white flag – to enter their camp. The militia members assured the emigrants they were protected, and after handing over their weapons, the emigrants were escorted away from their defensive position. After walking a distance from the camp, the militiamen, with the help of auxiliary forces hiding nearby, attacked the emigrants. The perpetrators killed all the adults and older children in the group, in the end sparing only seventeen young children under the age of seven.[a]


Following the massacre, the perpetrators buried some of the remains but ultimately left most of the bodies exposed to wild animals and the climate. Local families took in the surviving children, with many of the victims' possessions and remaining livestock being auctioned off. Investigations, which were interrupted by the American Civil War, resulted in nine indictments in 1874. Of the men who were indicted, only John D. Lee was tried in a court of law. After two trials in the Utah Territory, Lee was convicted by a jury, sentenced to death, and executed by firing squad on March 23, 1877.


Historians attribute the massacre to a combination of factors, including war hysteria about a possible invasion of Mormon territory and Mormon teachings against outsiders, which were part of the Mormon Reformation period. Scholars debate whether senior leadership in Mormonism, including Brigham Young, directly instigated the massacre or if responsibility for it lay only with the local leaders in southern Utah.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Meadows_Massacre


President Nelson About the Church in the Coming Years: "Eat Your Vitamin Pills. Get Some Rest. It's Going to Be Exciting."

By LDS Living October 31, 2018 06:22 PM MDT

"If you think the Church has been fully restored, you're just seeing the beginning," President Russell M. Nelson said about the Church in a video during his South American tour.


While on the nine-day tour, which included the dedication of the Concepción Chile Temple, President Nelson and Elder Gary E. Stevenson shared their thoughts on the Church.


"This is a calling," President Nelson says. "It's a cause. It's the Lord's work and it's a privilege for us to participate in any way. We love it."


Noting the rapid growth in South America over the past 90 years, President Nelson and Elder Stevenson said they were excited to see new converts and families with four-generations of membership among the thousands that greeted them on the tour.


"We go to the venues and the children and others are anxious to be in the room with the prophet," Elder Stevenson shares. "But it's different than a worldly celebrity. . . this is a longing that they have to be with the mouthpiece of a loving Heavenly Father who they have a heartfelt testimony of these plain and precious truths."


And as the gospel continues to reach thousands throughout the world, President Nelson says there is more to come in restoring the gospel to the earth.


"Wait till next year, and then the next year," President Nelson says. "Eat your vitamin pills. Get some rest. It's going to be exciting."

https://www.ldsliving.com/president-nelson-about-the-church-in-the-coming-years-eat-your-vitamin-pills-get-some-rest-its-going-to-be-exciting/s/89632


Mormon President and Pope Francis meet for the first time, after decades of hidden diplomacy

The two leaders met for 33 minutes at the Vatican and exchanged gifts, the day before Russell M. Nelson was due to dedicate the first Mormon temple in Rome

Michelle Boorstein

Sunday 10 March 2019 20:38 GMT


The head of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints met with a pope for the first time on Saturday, an event that reportedly followed decades of behind-the-scenes relationship building between denominations whose leaders share a concern over secularism.


Pope Francis and President Russell. M Nelson – both men who hold offices of profound spiritual significance for their faiths – met for 33 minutes at the Vatican to discuss the shared priorities of protecting religious rights, traditional family values and young people and opposing secularism, according to the Mormon Church-affiliated Deseret News.


The visit comes a day before Nelson was to dedicate the first Mormon temple in Rome.


There are about 16 million Mormons in the world, compared with more than 1.1 billion Catholics.


However, in a chaotic era when many people are leaving organised religion, leaders of the two denominations share goals, including responding together to disasters and poverty and promoting traditional families and involvement with Christian institutions.


“We talked about our mutual concern for the people who suffer throughout the world and want to relieve human suffering,” Mr Nelson told his church’s news website.


“We talked about the importance of religious liberty, the importance of the family, our mutual concern for the youth of the Church, for the secularisation of the world and the need for people to come to God and worship Him, pray to Him and have the stability that faith in Jesus Christ will bring in their lives.”


The two groups work together on relief efforts in 43 countries.


“What a sweet, wonderful man he is,” Mr Nelson said of Francis, the Mormon Church news site reported. “And how fortunate the Catholic people are to have such a gracious, concerned, loving and capable leader.”


The Vatican put out no detailed statement about the meeting Saturday, except to include it on the list of people and groups who had audiences with the Pope that day.


The meeting and the existence of the new temple are especially significant for Mormons, said Kathleen Flake, a historian of American religion and an expert on the Latter-day Saints.


The church teaches that it isn’t just generically “Christian” but is the authentic restoration of Jesus’s church.


Establishing the temple in Rome, a centre of global Christianity, and the meeting with the pope give credibility to the Mormon Church as fully Christian, Ms Flake said. That’s important for a group still fighting for acceptance.


In the United States, for example, 97 percent of Mormons consider themselves Christian, compared with just more than half of US adults who recognise Mormonism as a Christian faith, according to a 2016 analysis by the Pew Research Centre.


Asked to volunteer one word that best describes the group, Pew found, the most commonly offered response by non-Mormons was “cult”.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/pope-mormon-leader-meeting-rome-vatican-lds-church-latterday-saints-a8816421.html


Head:

1. See Illness, mental

2. The superior general, head of the Society [666]

page 463

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Can. 666 In the use of means of social communication, necessary discretion is to be observed and those things are to be avoided which are harmful to one’s vocation and dangerous to the chastity of a consecrated person."

TITLE II. RELIGIOUS INSTITUTES (Cann. 607 - 709) CODE OF CANON LAW

https://www.vatican.va/archive/cod-iuris-canonici/eng/documents/cic_lib2-cann607-709_en.html


Revelation 13:18

New International Version

18 This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man.[a] That number is 666.


Read full chapter

Footnotes

Revelation 13:18 Or is humanity’s number"

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2013


5 children among 8 dead in Utah murder-suicide after wife sought divorce, officials say

Updated on: January 5, 2023 / 5:26 PM EST / CBS/AP


Crime

5 children among 8 dead in Utah murder-suicide after wife sought divorce, officials say

Updated on: January 5, 2023 / 5:26 PM EST / CBS/AP


A Utah man fatally shot his five children, his mother-in-law and his wife, then killed himself two weeks after the woman had filed for divorce, according to authorities and public records.


Enoch Police Chief Jackson Ames said during a Thursday press conference that officers had been involved in investigations involving the 42-year-old man and his family a "couple of years prior." He did not elaborate.


The crime rocked Enoch, a small town in southern Utah about halfway between Salt Lake City and Las Vegas.


It's one of the fastest-growing areas of the country and communities of new homes are made up of large families that belong, like most of Utah, to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, known widely as the Mormon church.


Enoch City Manager Rob Dotson said the deceased were well-known in the town.


"Many of us have served with them in church, in the community and gone to school with these individuals," Dotson said Wednesday night. "This community at this time is hurting. They're feeling loss, they're feeling pain and they have a lot of questions."


Officials said that they believed that Michael Haight had killed his wife, his mother-in-law and the couple's five children, and that each of the victims had gunshot wounds.


Court records show that Tausha Haight, 40, filed for divorce from her husband on Dec. 21. Her lawyer said Thursday that Haight had been served with the divorce papers on Dec. 27.


Tausha Haight and other members of the family were seen the night before the killings at a church group for young women, Mayor Geoffrey Chesnut said.


Police were dispatched to the family's home Wednesday afternoon for a welfare check after someone reported that Tausha Height had missed an appointment earlier in the week, city officials said.


The victims were found inside the house. The children ranged in age from 4 to 17 and included three girls and two boys, authorities said. The other victim was Tausha Haight's 78-year-old mother, Gail Earl.


The five children attended schools in the Iron County School District, officials said in a letter sent to parents.


According to CBS Salt Lake City affiliate KUTV, the letter said, "It is with deep regret that we inform you about a tragic loss to our school community. This afternoon, on Jan. 4, eight members of a family residing in Enoch with five students in our schools tragically passed away. This loss is sure to raise many emotions, concerns, and questions for our entire school district, especially our students."


James Park, who represented Tausha Haight in the divorce case, said she had not expressed any fear that her husband would physically hurt her but he declined to elaborate, citing the investigation into the killings. Park said he only met with her twice, mostly recently on Tuesday, and said she "was an incredibly nice lady."


The home where the victims were found was decorated with Christmas lights and located in a neighborhood of newly built single-family houses on a ridge overlooking the farming community of Enoch. It has a view of houses with snow-covered roofs and mountains in the distance. Half the surrounding block was cordoned off by police tape.


Enoch is on the outskirts of Cedar City, one of the fastest growing cities in Utah, which is one of the U.S.'s fastest-growing states. Cattle and sheep line the highway that runs through the town, along with signs that advertise "Custom New Homes," and recreation in southern Utah's famous national parks and recreation areas.


Sharon Hunstman of Cedar City came to the neighborhood with a bouquet of white flowers Thursday morning. She said the deaths had deeply rattled Iron County and cried as she arranged the bouquet.


"It's just one big community," she said. "We all have one heavenly father."


Archives from the local newspaper show that Haight's first birthday was commemorated with an announcement in the local newspaper in 1981 alongside a baby picture of him laughing.


He was in Boy Scouts as a young boy and earned the "Faith in God" award as a fourth grader. Two years later in 1992, another newspaper article showed that he had won a "Gospel in Action" award from his church.


His picture appeared again in the newspaper in 1998 when he was finalist for an academic award in high school for business and marketing. After high school, he served a church mission in Brazil and then married Tuasha at a church temple in St. George, in 2003. She was from Overton, Nevada, located just two hours south of Cedar City, where he grew up.


As an adult, Haight worked as an insurance agent and Allstate gave him an award for customer satisfaction. His wife's Facebook page showed pictures of the family looking happy in picturesque settings of Utah, and in front of a large statue of Jesus. Haight would have turned 43 on Jan. 7.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/enoch-utah-eight-family-members-five-kids-shot-dead-at-home/


The Psychological Harm of Whitewashing History

By 

Jennifer Blough

General

Posted: February 14, 2025


In today’s chaotic and troubling times, where it sometimes seems like disinformation, historical revisionism, and ignorance reign supreme, it’s important to understand how whitewashing the history of minorities can negatively impact us all. Whitewashing refers to downplaying, denying, or trying to “erase” the historical experiences, contributions, and struggles of minorities, often replacing them with a narrative that favors the majority group. This article explores how this practice not only distorts historical accuracy but also inflicts significant psychological harm on people of all races.


Loss of Identity and Cultural Erasure

Having their history acknowledged and integrated into the mainstream narrative is essential for affirming minority’s identities. When their legacy is whitewashed or dismissed, people from these groups may experience a profound sense of loss and disconnection from their cultural heritage. This can lead to identity confusion, feelings of invisibility, and diminished self-worth, as their stories, achievements, and sufferings are rendered invisible or inconsequential.


Reinforcement of Racial Hierarchies

Whitewashing or denying the history of people of color and other minority groups perpetuates a toxic narrative that centers around and prioritizes the experiences and perspectives of the white population. This not only reinforces racial hierarchies and systemic racism, but also legitimizes societal power dynamics and systemic racism, which can lead to increased racial tensions and a sense of entitlement among the majority, while simultaneously fostering resentment and frustration among minority groups who see their stories and contributions marginalized.


Impact on Mental Health

The psychological toll of whitewashing and historical erasure can have a profound effect on the mental health of those in minority communities. Constantly navigating a world that denies their histories and perspectives can exacerbate feelings of alienation, anxiety, and depression. The cognitive dissonance experienced when one's lived experiences are at odds with the dominant narrative can lead to heightened stress levels and a sense of powerlessness. Furthermore, the erasure of historical traumas, such as slavery, colonization, or genocide, without proper acknowledgment or reparations, can impede healing processes and perpetuate intergenerational trauma.


Promoting Ignorance and Misunderstanding

It comes as no surprise that whitewashing history harms minority groups. But it also deprives the white community of a comprehensive understanding of their own history and its intersection with others. This lack of understanding can breed ignorance, stereotypes, and biases, as people fail to recognize the contributions and struggles of minority groups. Such ignorance often leads to misunderstanding, miscommunication, and conflict between racial and ethnic groups, thereby undermining social cohesion and harmony.


Hindering Social Progress

When we deny or try to erase the historical contributions—and struggles—of minority groups we impede societal progress by stunting the development of inclusive and equitable communities. Without a full acknowledgment of the past, including the injustices and inequities faced by minority groups, we as a society will never be able to address present-day disparities and work towards meaningful change. The whitewashing of history, therefore, serves as a barrier to achieving true social justice and equality, as it prevents a collective reckoning with the past that is necessary for healing and moving forward.


Psychological Impact on the White Majority

While the negative psychological effects on minority groups are more pronounced, people from the majority group are not immune to the harms of whitewashing history. Being exposed to a one-sided and often incorrect or incomplete narrative can lead to a distorted worldview, marked by a lack of empathy and understanding for the experiences of others. This can result in a sense of guilt, defensiveness, or cognitive dissonance when confronted with the realities of historical injustices, as well as a limited capacity for developing cross-cultural competencies and engaging in meaningful dialogue.


Healing through the Acknowledgement of Our Collective Histories

The psychological harm of whitewashing and erasing the histories of minorities is multifaceted, affecting individuals from all racial and ethnic backgrounds. It undermines the identity and mental health of minority groups, perpetuates racial hierarchies, fosters ignorance and misunderstanding, hinders social progress, and limits the psychological growth of the majority. Addressing this issue requires a concerted effort to incorporate diverse perspectives into historical narratives, educational curricula, and public discourse. By acknowledging and valuing the contributions and experiences of all groups, our society can foster a more inclusive, equitable, and psychologically healthy environment for everyone.


Recognizing the psychological impact of historical erasure is a crucial step towards healing and reconciliation. It is imperative for us to push back against disinformation and willful ignorance by actively engaging in truth-telling, celebrating diversity, and ensuring that the history of all people are accurately represented and respected. Only then can we hope to build a future that is truly inclusive and equitable for all.


At Deepwater Counseling, we recognize the profound impact that communities of color and other minority groups have had on our collective history. We are committed to creating a safe and inclusive space where everyone is respected and valued. Our therapists are culturally sensitive and ensure that every client’s unique background and experiences are honored and integrated into their healing journeys. Reach out to us here to schedule an appointment.

https://deepwatermichigan.com/the-psychological-harm-of-whitewashing-history


THE NEW AGE

GOD'S PLAN IN AMERICA C. WILLIAM SMITH, New Orleans, La.  September 1950


THERE are three plans in action in America today and they all have different purposes. The first plan is God's plan, a nonsectarian plan; the second is the Roman Catholic plan, and this is a denominational or sectarian plan, and the third is the Communistic plan, an anticapitalist plan.

God's plan is dedicated to the unification of all races, religions and creeds. This plan, dedicated to the new order of things, is to make all things new-s new nation, a new race, a new civilization and a new religion, a nonsectarian religion that has already been recognized and called the religion of "The Great Light."

Looking back into history, we can easily see that the Guiding Hand of Providence has chosen the Nordic people to bring in and unfold the new order of the world. Records clearly show that 95 percent of the colonists were Nordics-Anglo-Saxons.

Providence has chosen the Nordics because the Nordics have prepared themselves and have chosen God. They are not church worshippers, for they worship God's word-the Holy Bible. The Nordics are. the great Bible-reading people of the world today, and the Nordics-Anglo-Saxons -were the first people to print the Holy Bible in great quantity, and they were known as the people of a book, that book being the Holy Bible.

But, in order to read the Bible, it is necessary to know how to read. In the Nordic race there is no illiteracy. In Norway there has been no illiteracy for more than a hundred years. Another fact that shows clearly that the Nordics are God's chosen people this time is they are always looking for more light on the mission of life.

Looking at their station of life, these great Bible-reading people should open the eyes of the world, King Gustaf of Sweden is a great light in the nonsectarian Masonic Brotherhood, and King Haakon of Norway is a Masonic light in Norway.

The late King Christian of Denmark was a Masonic spirit in his Denmark; also King George of England is a Masonic light to his Anglo-Saxon people.  Just as Providence has chosen the Jewish race-the children of Israel-to bring into the world righteousness by carrying the "Ten Commandments" which emphasize 'Remember the Sabbath Day and keep it holy," so also Providence has chosen the Nordic race to unfold the 'New Age" of the world-a "Novus Ordo Seclorum." One of the first of the Nordics to reach the New World was the Viking, Leif Ericsson. He sailed from Norway to bring his people in Iceland a new message, the message of the Chritian God. But Providence moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform, and so Leif the Lucky was sent by Providence to the New World. From the abundance of grapes found there Leif Ericsson called the place Vinland. It is easy to sense that Leif Ericsson was sent by the Guiding Hand of Providence to bring the Norse spirit of the "All-Father" to the shores of the New World.


The Nordics are the highest branch of the fifth Aryan Civilization.; The Latins are of the fourth Aryan Civilization, and the American race will be the sixth Aryan Civilization. This new and great civilization is like an American Beauty rosebud, ready to open and send its wonderful fragrance to all the world. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Thomas Paine and many others of the founders of the New World were Nordics. Thomas Paine, the spark plug of the American Revolution, loved God but hated sectarianism. In 'These Are the times," he wrote: "We have it in our power to begin the world all over again! A situation familiar to the present hath not happened since the days of Noah, till now. The birthday of a New World is at hand."


As stated before, God's Plan in America is nonsectarian plan. Our Constitution is nonsectarian. Our great American Public Schools-God's chosen schools-are nonsectarian. The Great Spirit behind this great nation is nonsectarian.

Our great American Public Schools have never taken away from any child the freedom of will, freedom of Spirit or freedom of mind. That is the divine reason that Great God our King has chosen the great American Public Schools to pave the way for the new race, the new religion and the new civilization that is taking place in America.

Any mother, father or guardian who is responsible for taking away of freedom of mind, freedom of will or freedom of spirit is the lowest criminal on this earth, because they take away from that child the God-given right to become a part of God's great plan in America for the dawn of the New Age of the world."


The Official Organ of The Supreme Council 33° A. & A. Scottish Rite of Freemasonry S. J. U. S. A.

PUBLISHED AT 1735 SIXTEENTH STREET N, W. WASHINGTON, D. C.

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid02to33PrJYf6jzutXrLE6pgH7bnRdNjL5YodDtNHDrNBooSC3JPMnjw6m9Ti77kiGQl


Raphael Gamaliel Warnock[1] (/ˈrɑːfiɛl ˈwɔːrnɒk/ RAH-fee-el WOR-nok; born July 23, 1969) is an American politician and Baptist pastor serving as the junior United States senator from Georgia, a seat he has held since 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, Warnock has been the senior pastor of Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church since 2005.[2][3]


Warnock was the senior pastor of Douglas Memorial Community Church from 2001 to 2005.[4] He came to prominence in Georgia politics as a leading activist in the campaign to expand Medicaid in the state under the Affordable Care Act. He was the Democratic nominee in the 2020 United States Senate special election in Georgia, defeating incumbent Republican Kelly Loeffler in a runoff election.[5]


Warnock and Jon Ossoff are the first Democrats elected to the U.S. Senate from Georgia since Zell Miller in 2000.[6][7] Their elections were critical in securing a 50–50 Senate majority for Democrats, with Vice President Kamala Harris serving as the tie-breaking vote.[8] Warnock was a reliable supporter of Joe Biden's legislative efforts during his presidency.[9][10] He was reelected to a full term in 2022, defeating Republican nominee Herschel Walker.


Warnock is the first African American to represent Georgia in the Senate, the first Black Democrat elected to the Senate from a Southern state, and the second black U.S. Senator directly elected from a Southern state, after Tim Scott.[11][12][13]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raphael_Warnock


Presidential elections are scheduled to be held in the United States on November 7, 2028, to elect the president and vice president of the United States for a term of four years.


In the 2024 elections, the Republican Party gained a majority of seats in the House of Representatives and Senate. Incumbent president Donald Trump won a non-consecutive second term; per the limits set by the 22nd Amendment, he is constitutionally barred from being elected president again.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2028_United_States_presidential_election


Kamala Devi Harris (English: /ˈkɑːmələ ˈdeɪvi/ ⓘ,[1] born October 20, 1964) is an American politician and attorney who has been the 49th and current vice president of the United States since 2021, serving under President Joe Biden. Harris is the Democratic presidential nominee in the 2024 United States presidential election. She is the first female vice president of the United States, making her the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history. She is also the first African American and first Asian American vice president. From 2017 to 2021, she represented California in the United States Senate. Before that, she was Attorney General of California from 2011 to 2017.


Born in Oakland, California, Harris graduated from Howard University and the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She began her law career in the office of the district attorney of Alameda County. She was recruited to the San Francisco District Attorney's Office and later to the office of the city attorney of San Francisco. She was elected district attorney of San Francisco in 2003 and attorney general of California in 2010, and reelected as attorney general in 2014. As the San Francisco district attorney and the attorney general of California, Harris was the first woman, the first African American, and the first Asian American to hold each office.


Harris was the junior U.S. senator from California from 2017 to 2021. She won the 2016 Senate election, becoming the second Black woman and first South Asian American U.S. senator. As a senator, Harris advocated for stricter gun control laws, the DREAM Act, federal legalization of cannabis, and reforms to healthcare and taxation. She gained a national profile for her pointed questioning of Trump administration officials during Senate hearings, including Trump's second Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh.


Harris sought the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination in 2019, but withdrew from the race before the primaries. Biden selected her as his running mate, and their ticket defeated the incumbent president and vice president, Donald Trump and Mike Pence, in the 2020 election. Presiding over an evenly split Senate upon entering office, Harris played a crucial role as president of the Senate. She cast more tie-breaking votes than any other vice president, which helped pass bills such as the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 stimulus package and the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. After Biden withdrew from the 2024 presidential election, Harris launched her campaign with Biden's endorsement and soon became the presumptive nominee. On August 6, 2024, she chose Tim Walz, the governor of Minnesota, as her running mate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamala_Harris


The University of California College of the Law, San Francisco (abbreviated as UC Law SF or UC Law) is a public law school in San Francisco, California, United States. It was known as the University of California, Hastings College of the Law (abbreviated as UC Hastings) from 1878 to 2023.


Founded in 1878 by Serranus Clinton Hastings, UC Law SF was the first law school of the University of California as well as one of the first law schools established in California. Although part of the University of California, UC Law SF is not directly governed by the Regents of the University of California. UC Law SF is also one of the few prominent university-affiliated law schools in the United States that does not share a campus with the university's undergraduates or other postgraduate programs.


The Battle of Hastings (1066) as depicted on a stained glass window over the main entrance of 100 McAllister Street.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_California_College_of_the_Law,_San_Francisco


The Battle of Hastings[a] was fought on 14 October 1066 between the Norman-French army of William, Duke of Normandy, and an English army under the Anglo-Saxon King Harold Godwinson, beginning the Norman Conquest of England. It took place approximately 7 mi (11 km) northwest of Hastings, close to the present-day town of Battle, East Sussex, and was a decisive Norman victory.


The background to the battle was the death of the childless King Edward the Confessor in January 1066, which set up a succession struggle between several claimants to his throne. Harold was crowned king shortly after Edward's death but faced invasions by William, his own brother Tostig, and the Norwegian king Harald Hardrada (Harold III of Norway). Hardrada and Tostig defeated a hastily gathered army of Englishmen at the Battle of Fulford on 20 September 1066. They were in turn defeated by Harold at the Battle of Stamford Bridge on 25 September. The deaths of Tostig and Hardrada at Stamford Bridge left William as Harold's only serious opponent. While Harold and his forces were recovering, William landed his invasion forces in the south of England at Pevensey on 28 September and established a beachhead for his conquest of the kingdom. Harold was forced to march south swiftly, gathering forces as he went.


The numbers present at the battle are unknown as even modern estimates vary considerably. The composition of the forces is clearer: the English army was composed almost entirely of infantry and had few archers, whereas only about half of the invading force was infantry, the rest split equally between cavalry and archers. Harold appears to have tried to surprise William, but scouts found his army and reported its arrival to William, who marched from Hastings to the battlefield to confront Harold. The battle lasted from about 9 am to dusk. Early efforts of the invaders to break the English battle lines had little effect. Therefore, the Normans adopted the tactic of pretending to flee in panic and then turning on their pursuers. Harold's death, probably near the end of the battle, led to the retreat and defeat of most of his army. After further marching and some skirmishes, William was crowned as king on Christmas Day 1066.


There continued to be rebellions and resistance to William's rule, but Hastings effectively marked the culmination of William's conquest of England. Casualty figures are difficult to assess, but some historians estimate that 2,000 invaders died along with about twice that number of Englishmen. William founded a monastery at the site of the battle, the high altar of the abbey church supposedly placed at the spot where Harold died.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Hastings


Spitfire is the third album by American rock band Jefferson Starship. Released in 1976, a year after the chart-topping Red Octopus, it quickly scaled the charts, peaking for six consecutive weeks at No. 3 in Billboard and attaining an RIAA platinum certification. Stereo and quadraphonic mixes of the album were released.


Background

By early 1976, Jefferson Starship had become one of America's biggest rock bands thanks to the multiplatinum success of 1975's Red Octopus and its smash hit "Miracles". They were playing arenas and stadiums as well as headlining big festivals, and money was pouring in.[1] All seemed well within the group, although the beginnings of dissent began to appear when singer Grace Slick broke up her seven-year relationship with guitarist Paul Kantner, choosing to hook up instead with the group's lighting director Skip Johnson (Johnson was quickly fired from that position, although he would be re-hired in 1978).[1] There were also lingering problems with Marty Balin, who had refused to sign a long-term contract with RCA/Grunt and was working on an album-by-album basis, which gave him much leverage now that he was writing the hit singles.[2] Although he was enjoying his return to prominence within the group, the pressure was now on Balin to come up with another hit that would equal or surpass "Miracles".


In the meantime, there were also increasing charges that the group had betrayed their earlier underground credentials as Jefferson Airplane and "sold out" to corporate rock interests. Slick complained that Grunt kept sending her out to silly publicity stunts like cake-judging contests, later reasoning "I was smiling and going along with it because we had to keep the publicity machine oiled while we were waiting for Marty to decide whether or not he was going to go on the road".[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spitfire_(Jefferson_Starship_album)


Templar Military Lodges

The Templars also stealthily entered America through military lodges. Of particular significance are those chartered by the Irish Grand Lodge, which offered the higher degrees of Jacobite Masonry. Later these lodges incorporated the French Templar Scottish Rite degrees, further dividing colonial America between two rival forms of Freemasonry. While British politics in the colonies was dominated by English Masons in the Northeast, her military was under the influence of French Templar Field Lodges throughout the colonies - not a stable union for governing "13" rebellious colonies.25


European Templars Settle America

Another identifying characteristic of the Beast's revived Roman empire, according to our analysis of Daniel 7:7-8 in chapter 26, is that it must be populated by immigrants from the territory governed by the old Roman empire. Of course colonial America was populated by peoples from a Europe shaped by ancient Rome and later by the Holy Roman Empire. Templar influence in America began after Prince Charles Edward, the Young Stuart Pretender, failed to regain his British throne. As you recall, in 1746 he was soundly defeated, forever dashing the hopes of Scottish Templars recapturing England. As a result, many Irish and Scottish Templar Jacobites who had fought with Charles Stuart fled to America. Those who returned to France with the Prince founded the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry. Between 1745 and 1753, the British and European Templar population in the New World had increased dramatically. In 1754 Benjamin Franklin attempted to relieve population pressure by proposing a plan for the union of all 13 colonies. The British government rejected Franklin's proposal, fearing a united America would be difficult to control. Subsequently, the exploding population was forced to move west into French territory, which precipitated the French and Indian War in America, a phase of the Seven Years War on the continent of Europe. During this war the French military brought to the New World the Templar Scottish Rite, first setting up base at Boston, then Charleston, S.C.26 Michael Baigent, in The Temple and The Lodge, explains: 565 Prior to the Seven Years War, most of the Freemasonry in North America was orthodox pro- Hanoverian, warranted by Grand Lodge [London]. During the Seven Years War, however, "higher degree" [Templar] Freemasonry, by means of regimental field lodges, was transplanted on a large scale to the American colonies and quickly took root. Boston - the soil from which the American Revolution was to spring - exemplifies the process of transplantation and the friction that sometimes arose from it.27

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://ia803001.us.archive.org/28/items/ScarletAndTheBeastJohnDaniel1995/Scarlet%20and%20the%20Beast,%20John%20Daniel%20(1995).pdf

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid02aJBc1TDv8QwUDa7MjJNkWs8Du1cQzrhsgeojdhmeK6XoScosPcjCegKDpwxit4hvl


Inter caetera ('Among other [works]') was a papal bull issued by Pope Alexander VI on 4 May 1493, which granted to the Catholic Monarchs King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile all lands to the "west and south" of a pole-to-pole line 100 leagues west and south of any of the islands of the Azores or the Cape Verde islands.[1]


It remains unclear whether the pope intended a "donation" of sovereignty or an infeudation or investiture. Differing interpretations have been argued since the bull was issued, with some arguing that it was only meant to transform the possession and occupation of land into lawful sovereignty. Others, including the Spanish crown and the conquistadors, interpreted it in the widest possible sense, deducing that it gave Spain full political sovereignty.[2]


Inter caetera and its supplement Dudum siquidem (September 1493) are two of the Bulls of Donation.[3] While these bulls purported to settle disputes between Spain and Portugal, they did not address the exploratory and colonial ambitions of other nations, which became more of an issue after the Protestant Reformation.


Background

Further information: Age of Discovery, Portuguese discovery of the sea route to India, Voyages of Christopher Columbus, and Portugal–Spain relations

Before Christopher Columbus received support for his voyage from Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand of Spain, he had first approached King John II of Portugal. The king's scholars and navigators reviewed Columbus's documentation, determined that his calculations grossly underestimated the diameter of the Earth and thus the length of the voyage, and recommended against subsidizing the expedition. Upon Columbus's return from his first voyage to the Americas, his first landing was made in the Portuguese Azores; a subsequent storm drove his ship to Lisbon on 4 March 1493. Hearing of Columbus's discoveries, the Portuguese king informed him that he believed the voyage to be in violation of the 1479 Treaty of Alcáçovas. The treaty had been ratified with the 1481 papal bull Aeterni regis, which confirmed previous bulls of 1452 (Dum diversas), 1455 (Romanus Pontifex), and 1456 (Inter caetera),[2] recognizing Portuguese territorial claims along the West African coast. It was the King's understanding that the terms of the treaty acknowledged Portuguese claims to all territory south of the Canary Islands (which had been ceded to Spain).[4]


Columbus's arrival in supposedly Asiatic lands in the western Atlantic Ocean in 1492 threatened the unstable relations between Portugal and Spain. With word that King John was preparing a fleet to sail to the west, the King and Queen of Spain initiated diplomatic discussions over the rights to possess and govern the newly found lands.[5] Spanish and Portuguese delegates met and debated from April to November 1493, without reaching an agreement.


Columbus was still in Lisbon when he sent a report of his success to the Spanish monarchs. On 11 April, the Spanish ambassador conveyed the news to Pope Alexander VI, a Spaniard and the former Administrator of Valencia, and urged him to issue a new bull favorable to Spain.[6] At the time, Pope Alexander, as ruler of the Papal States, was embroiled in a territorial dispute with Ferdinand's first cousin, Ferdinand I, King of Naples, hence he was amicable to any requests of Isabella and Ferdinand, to the extent that they could write to Columbus saying that if he thought it necessary, one of the bulls would be modified. They were at Barcelona, in close touch with Rome. The camera apostolica became almost an extension of the Spanish Court, which secured a rapid succession of bulls virtually liquidating Portuguese claims.[7] The Pope issued edicts dated 3 and 4 May 1493. The third superseded the first two. A final edict, Dudum siquidem of 26 September 1493, supplemented the Inter caetera.[2]


The first bull, Inter caetera, dated 3 May, recognized Spain's claim to any discovered lands not already held by a Christian prince, and protected Portugal's previous rights. Both parties found this too vague.

The second bull, Eximiae devotionis, also dated 3 May, granted to the kings of Castile and León and their successors the same privileges in the newly discovered land that had been granted to the kings of Portugal in the regions of Africa, and Guinea.[8]

The third bull, also entitled Inter caetera, dated 4 May, exhorts the Spanish monarchs to spread the faith west from a line drawn "one hundred leagues towards the west and south from any of the islands commonly known as the Azores and Cape Verde". Diffie notes that it has been suggested that this change may have been prompted by the Portuguese ambassador.[4]

The Inter caetera and the following Treaty of Tordesillas defined and delineated a zone of Spanish rights exclusive of Portugal. In relation to other states the agreement was legally ineffective (res inter alios acta). Spain's attempts to persuade other European powers on the legal validity of the Inter caetera were never successful.[2]


Provisions

Inter caetera states:


Among other works well pleasing to the Divine Majesty and cherished of our heart, this assuredly ranks highest, that in our times especially the Catholic faith and the Christian religion be exalted and be everywhere increased and spread, that the health of souls be cared for and that barbarous nations be overthrown and brought to the faith itself. ...[W]e ... assign to you and your heirs and successors, kings of Castile and Leon, ... all islands and mainlands found and to be found, discovered and to be discovered towards the west and south, by drawing and establishing a line from ... the north, ...to ...the south, ... the said line to be distant one hundred leagues towards the west and south from any of the islands commonly known as the Azores and Cape Verde.[9]


The bull notes that the Isabella and Ferdinand "had intended to seek out and discover certain islands and mainlands remote and unknown" but had been otherwise engaged in the conquest of Granada.[9]


The line of demarcation divided Atlantic zones only.[7] Spain and Portugal could pass each other toward the west or east, respectively, on the other side of the globe and still possess whatever lands they were first to discover. The bull was silent regarding whether lands to the east of the line would belong to Portugal, which had only recently reached the southern tip of Africa (1488) and had not yet reached India (1498). These lands yet "to be discovered" lay beyond those along the west coast of Africa as far as Guinea, and were given to Portugal via the 1481 bull Aeterni regis, which had ratified the Treaty of Alcáçovas.[10] For the time being, the question was in abeyance.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter_caetera


Guy Fawkes Day – The Jesuit Treason and the Gunpowder Plot

A plan was hatched by a joint collaboration of the Pope and the Jesuits to blow up the House of Lords during the state opening of Parliament on 5th November 1605. Robert Catesby was the leader of a group of English Catholics who plotted to assassinate the protestant King James 1 in the failed gunpowder plot.


Guy Fawkes, a key member of the group was chosen to bomb the parliament owing to his experience as a soldier in the Spanish army. He smuggled 36 barrels of gun powder into a cellar directly below the Parliament which was enough to obliterate the entire building thereby killing all the key members of the state including the king and high ranking officials.


However, through Divine providence, an anonymous letter was sent to a Catholic called William Parker who was a member of the Parliament. The letter warned him to stay away from the opening of the Parliament. Alarmed by this, he brought this to the attention of King James who then ordered a search of the basement of Parliament. Guy Fawkes was found hiding in one of the cellars guarding a stash of gunpowder and explosives. After being tortured, Guy Fawkes revealed that this was a preplanned Jesuit led Catholic conspiracy to annihilate England’s Protestant government and replace it with a Catholic one.

https://www.secretsunlocked.org/bible/bible-history/guy-fawkes-day-the-jesuit-treason-and-the-gunpowder-plot/


The Crown of Ba'al and Master Trusts of the World  

  The Crown of Ba'al, also known as the Papal Tiara and Triregnum is a three-tiered jewelled papal crown and symbol of claimed papal supremecy since the 16th Century. Since the 16th Century, it has featured prominently as part of the coat of arms of the Vatican, usually with the crossed keys of claims of authority from St Peter. Any text or other claim that alleges the three-tiered crown is older than the 16th Century is deliberately false.

 

  Prior to Pope Boniface VIII (1294-1303) the antipopes of the Roman Cult wore fabric, not metallic headdress, similar to the Persian High Priests of Mithra. However in 1302 Boniface issued his infamous Papal Bull Unam Sanctam, being the first Express Trust claiming control over the whole planet and effectively "King of the world". In celebration, he commissioned a gold plated headdress in the shape of a pinecone, with an elaborate crown at its base.

 

  The pinecone is an ancient symbol of fertility and one traditionally associated with Ba'al as well as the Cult of Cybele.

 

     

  The 1st Crown of Crown Land  

  While Pope Boniface VIII was the first leader in history to create the concept of a Trust, the first Testamentary Trust through a deed and will creating a Deceased Estate was not until Pope Nicholas V in 1455 through the Papal Bull Romanus Pontifex. This is only one of three (3) papal bulls to include the line with the incipit "For a perpetual remembrance." This Bull had the effect of conveying the right of use of the land as Real Property from the Express Trust Unam Sanctam to the control of the Pontiff and his successors in perpetuity. Hence, all land is claimed as "crown land".

 

  This 1st Crown is represented by the 1st cestui Que Vie Trust created when a child is born, depriving them of all their beneficial entitlements and rights on the land at birth.

 

     

  The 2nd Crown of the Commonwealth  

  The second Crown was created in 1481 with the papal bull Aeterni Regis meaning "Eternal Crown" by Sixtus IV being only the 2nd of three papal bulls as deeds of testamentary trusts.

 

  This Papal Bull created what is known as the "Crown of Aragon", later known as the Crown of Spain, being the highest sovereign and highest steward of all Roman Slaves subject to the rule of the Roman Pontiff. Spain lost the crown in 1604 when it was granted to King James I of England by Pope Paul V after the successful passage of the "Union of Crowns" or Commonwealth in 1605 after the false flag operation of the Gunpowder Plot.

 

  The Crown was finally lost by England in 1975 when it was returned to Spain and King Carlos I, where it remains to this day.

 

  This 2nd Crown is represented by the 2nd cestui Que Vie Trust created when a child is born being the sale of the birth certificate as a Bond to the private central bank of the nation, depriving them of ownership of their flesh and condemning them to perpetual servitude as a Roman person, or slave.

 

     

  The 3rd Crown of the Ecclesiastical See  

  The third Crown was created in 1537 by Paul III through the papal bull Convocation also meant to open the Council of Trent being the third an final testamentary deed and will of a testamentary trust, being the trust set up for the claiming of all "lost souls", lost to the See.

 

  The Venetians assisted in the creation of the 1st cestui Que Vie Act of 1540 to use this papal bull as the basis of Ecclesiastical authority of Henry VIII. This Crown was secretly granted to England in the collection and "reaping" of lost souls.

 

  The Crown was lost in 1815 due to the deliberate bankruptcy of England and granted to the Temple Bar, which became known as the Crown Bar, or simply the Crown.

 

  The Bar Associations have been responsible ever since in administering the "reaping" of the souls of the lost and damned, including the registration and collection of Baptismal certificates representing the souls collected by the Vatican and stored in its vaults.

 

  This 3rd Crown is represented by the 3rd cestui Que Vie Trust created when a child is baptized being the grant of the Baptismal certificate by the parents to the church or Registrar being the gift of title of the soul. Thus, without legal title over one's own soul, a man or woman may be "legally" denied right to stand as a person, but may be treated as a creature and thing without legally possessing a soul. Hence, why the Bar Association is able to legally enforce Maritime law against men and women- because they can be treated as things, cargo that does not possess a soul.

https://web.archive.org/web/20220707074738/http://www.friendware.net/final_writs_rome/final_writs_Master_Trusts.html


Templar Military Lodges

The Templars also stealthily entered America through military lodges. Of particular significance are those chartered by the Irish Grand Lodge, which offered the higher degrees of Jacobite Masonry. Later these lodges incorporated the French Templar Scottish Rite degrees, further dividing colonial America between two rival forms of Freemasonry. While British politics in the colonies was dominated by English Masons in the Northeast, her military was under the influence of French Templar Field Lodges throughout the colonies - not a stable union for governing "13" rebellious colonies.25


European Templars Settle America

Another identifying characteristic of the Beast's revived Roman empire, according to our analysis of Daniel 7:7-8 in chapter 26, is that it must be populated by immigrants from the territory governed by the old Roman empire. Of course colonial America was populated by peoples from a Europe shaped by ancient Rome and later by the Holy Roman Empire. Templar influence in America began after Prince Charles Edward, the Young Stuart Pretender, failed to regain his British throne. As you recall, in 1746 he was soundly defeated, forever dashing the hopes of Scottish Templars recapturing England. As a result, many Irish and Scottish Templar Jacobites who had fought with Charles Stuart fled to America. Those who returned to France with the Prince founded the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry. Between 1745 and 1753, the British and European Templar population in the New World had increased dramatically. In 1754 Benjamin Franklin attempted to relieve population pressure by proposing a plan for the union of all 13 colonies. The British government rejected Franklin's proposal, fearing a united America would be difficult to control. Subsequently, the exploding population was forced to move west into French territory, which precipitated the French and Indian War in America, a phase of the Seven Years War on the continent of Europe. During this war the French military brought to the New World the Templar Scottish Rite, first setting up base at Boston, then Charleston, S.C.26 Michael Baigent, in The Temple and The Lodge, explains: 565 Prior to the Seven Years War, most of the Freemasonry in North America was orthodox pro- Hanoverian, warranted by Grand Lodge [London]. During the Seven Years War, however, "higher degree" [Templar] Freemasonry, by means of regimental field lodges, was transplanted on a large scale to the American colonies and quickly took root. Boston - the soil from which the American Revolution was to spring - exemplifies the process of transplantation and the friction that sometimes arose from it.27

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://ia803001.us.archive.org/28/items/ScarletAndTheBeastJohnDaniel1995/Scarlet%20and%20the%20Beast,%20John%20Daniel%20(1995).pdf


James V (10 April 1512 – 14 December 1542) was King of Scotland from 9 September 1513 until his death in 1542. He was crowned on 21 September 1513 at the age of seventeen months. James was the son of King James IV and Margaret Tudor, daughter of Henry VII of England. During his childhood Scotland was governed by regents, firstly by his mother until she remarried, and then by his first cousin once removed, John Stewart, Duke of Albany. James's personal rule began in 1528 when he finally escaped the custody of his stepfather, Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus. His first action was to exile Angus and confiscate the lands of the Douglases.


James greatly increased his income by tightening control over royal estates and from the profits of justice, customs and feudal rights. He founded the College of Justice in 1532 and also acted to end lawlessness and rebellion in the Borders and the Hebrides. The rivalry among France, England and the Holy Roman Empire lent James unwonted diplomatic weight, and saw him secure two politically and financially advantageous French marriages, first to Madeleine of Valois and then to Mary of Guise. James also fathered at least nine illegitimate children by a series of mistresses.


James's reign witnessed the beginnings of Protestantism in Scotland, and his uncle Henry VIII of England's break with Rome in the 1530s placed James in a powerful bargaining position with the papacy, allowing James to exploit the situation to increase his control over ecclesiastical appointments and the financial dividends from church revenues. Pope Paul III also granted him the title of Defender of the Faith in 1537. James maintained diplomatic correspondence with various Irish nobles and chiefs throughout their resistance to Henry VIII in the 1530s, and in 1540 they offered him the kingship of Ireland. A patron of the arts, James spent lavishly on the construction of several royal residences in the High Gothic and Renaissance styles.


James has been described as a vindictive king, whose policies were largely motivated by the pursuit of wealth, and a paranoid fear of his nobility which led to the ruthless appropriation of their lands. He has also been characterised as the "poor man's king", due to his accessibility to the poor and his acting against their oppressors. James died in December 1542 following the Scottish defeat by the English at the Battle of Solway Moss. His only surviving legitimate child, Mary, succeeded him at the age of just six days old.


Early life

James V's parents, King James IV and Margaret Tudor

James was the third son of King James IV and his wife Margaret Tudor, the eldest daughter of Henry VII of England, and was the only legitimate child of James IV to survive infancy. He was born on 10 April 1512 at Linlithgow Palace and baptised the following day,[1] receiving the title Duke of Rothesay.[2] James became king at just seventeen months old when his father was killed at the Battle of Flodden on 9 September 1513.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_V


James VI and I (James Charles Stuart; 19 June 1566 – 27 March 1625) was King of Scotland as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the Scottish and English crowns on 24 March 1603 until his death in 1625. Though he long attempted to get both countries to adopt a closer political union, the kingdoms of Scotland and England remained sovereign states, with their own parliaments, judiciaries, and laws, ruled by James in personal union.


James was the son of Mary, Queen of Scots, and a great-great-grandson of Henry VII, King of England and Lord of Ireland, and thus a potential successor to all three thrones. He acceded to the Scottish throne at the age of thirteen months, after his mother was forced to abdicate in his favour. Although his mother was a Catholic, James was brought up as a Protestant. Four regents governed during his minority, which ended officially in 1578, though he did not gain full control of his government until 1583. In 1589, he married Anne of Denmark. Three of their children survived to adulthood: Henry Frederick, Elizabeth, and Charles. In 1603, James succeeded his cousin Elizabeth I, the last Tudor monarch of England and Ireland, who died childless. He continued to reign in all three kingdoms for 22 years, a period known as the Jacobean era, until his death in 1625. After the Union of the Crowns, he based himself in England (the largest of the three realms) from 1603, returning to Scotland only once, in 1617, and styled himself "King of Great Britain and Ireland". He advocated for a single parliament for England and Scotland. In his reign, the Plantation of Ulster and English colonisation of the Americas began.


At 57 years and 246 days, James's reign in Scotland was the longest of any Scottish monarch. He achieved most of his aims in Scotland but faced great difficulties in England, including the Gunpowder Plot in 1605 and conflicts with the English Parliament. Under James, the "Golden Age" of Elizabethan literature and drama continued, with writers such as William Shakespeare, John Donne, Ben Jonson, and Francis Bacon contributing to a flourishing literary culture.[1] James was a prolific writer, authoring works such as Daemonologie (1597), The True Law of Free Monarchies (1598), and Basilikon Doron (1599).[2] He sponsored the translation of the Bible into English (later named after him, the Authorized King James Version), and the 1604 revision of the Book of Common Prayer.[3][4] Contemporary courtier Anthony Weldon claimed that James had been termed "the wisest fool in Christendom" (wise in small things, foolish otherwise), an epithet associated with his character ever since.[5] Since the latter half of the 20th century, historians have tended to revise James's reputation and treat him as a serious and thoughtful monarch.[6] He was strongly committed to a peace policy, and tried to avoid involvement in religious wars, especially the Thirty Years' War that devastated much of Central Europe. He tried but failed to prevent the rise of hawkish elements in the English Parliament who wanted war with Spain.[7] The first English king of the House of Stuart, he was succeeded by his second son, Charles I.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_VI_and_I


666 1 Samuel 26:15-16. And David said to Abner, Art not thou a valiant man? and who is like to thee in Israel? wherefore then hast thou not kept thy lord the king? for there came one of the people in to destroy the king thy lord. This thing is not good that thou hast done. As the LORD liveth, ye are worthy to die, because ye have not kept your master, the LORD'S anointed. And now see where the king's spear is, and the cruse of water that was at his bolster. 2 Samuel 18:3. But the people answered, Thou shalt not go forth: for if we flee away, they will not care for us; neither if half of us die, will they care for us: but now thou art worth ten thousand of us: therefore now it is better that thou succour us out of the city. Esther 6:2. And it was found written, that Mordecai had told of Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king's chamberlains, the keepers of the door, who sought to lay hand on the king Ahasuerus

THE

WESTMINSTER

LARGER

CATECHISM

https://www.freepresbyterian.org/uploads/Larger_Catechism.pdf


Can. 666 In the use of means of social communication, necessary discretion is to be observed and those things are to be avoided which are harmful to one’s vocation and dangerous to the chastity of a consecrated person."

TITLE II. RELIGIOUS INSTITUTES (Cann. 607 - 709) CODE OF CANON LAW

https://www.vatican.va/archive/cod-iuris-canonici/eng/documents/cic_lib2-cann607-709_en.html


18 U.S. Code § 666 - Theft or bribery concerning programs receiving Federal funds

U.S. Code

Notes

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(a)Whoever, if the circumstance described in subsection (b) of this section exists—

(1)being an agent of an organization, or of a State, local, or Indian tribal government, or any agency thereof—

(A)embezzles, steals, obtains by fraud, or otherwise without authority knowingly converts to the use of any person other than the rightful owner or intentionally misapplies, property that—

(i)is valued at $5,000 or more, and

(ii)is owned by, or is under the care, custody, or control of such organization, government, or agency; or

(B)corruptly solicits or demands for the benefit of any person, or accepts or agrees to accept, anything of value from any person, intending to be influenced or rewarded in connection with any business, transaction, or series of transactions of such organization, government, or agency involving any thing of value of $5,000 or more; or

(2)corruptly gives, offers, or agrees to give anything of value to any person, with intent to influence or reward an agent of an organization or of a State, local or Indian tribal government, or any agency thereof, in connection with any business, transaction, or series of transactions of such organization, government, or agency involving anything of value of $5,000 or more;

shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both.

(b)The circumstance referred to in subsection (a) of this section is that the organization, government, or agency receives, in any one year period, benefits in excess of $10,000 under a Federal program involving a grant, contract, subsidy, loan, guarantee, insurance, or other form of Federal assistance.

(c)This section does not apply to bona fide salary, wages, fees, or other compensation paid, or expenses paid or reimbursed, in the usual course of business.

(d)As used in this section—

(1)the term “agent” means a person authorized to act on behalf of another person or a government and, in the case of an organization or government, includes a servant or employee, and a partner, director, officer, manager, and representative;

(2)the term “government agency” means a subdivision of the executive, legislative, judicial, or other branch of government, including a department, independent establishment, commission, administration, authority, board, and bureau, and a corporation or other legal entity established, and subject to control, by a government or governments for the execution of a governmental or intergovernmental program;

(3)the term “local” means of or pertaining to a political subdivision within a State;

(4)the term “State” includes a State of the United States, the District of Columbia, and any commonwealth, territory, or possession of the United States; and

(5)the term “in any one-year period” means a continuous period that commences no earlier than twelve months before the commission of the offense or that ends no later than twelve months after the commission of the offense. Such period may include time both before and after the commission of the offense.

(Added Pub. L. 98–473, title II, § 1104(a), Oct. 12, 1984, 98 Stat. 2143; amended Pub. L. 99–646, § 59(a), Nov. 10, 1986, 100 Stat. 3612; Pub. L. 101–647, title XII, §§ 1205(d), 1209, Nov. 29, 1990, 104 Stat. 4831, 4832; Pub. L. 103–322, title XXXIII, § 330003(c), Sept. 13, 1994, 108 Stat. 2140.)

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/666


Revelation 13:11-18

1599 Geneva Bible

11 [a]And I beheld, another beast coming out of the earth, [b]which had two horns like the Lamb, but he spake like the dragon.


12 [c]And he did all that the first beast could do before him, and he caused the earth and them which dwell therein, [d]to worship the first beast whose deadly wound was healed.


13 [e]And he did great wonders, so that he made fire to come down from heaven on the earth, in the sight of men.


14 And deceived them that dwell on the earth by the signs which were permitted to him to do in the sight of the beast, saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make the [f]image of the [g]beast, which had the wound of a sword, and did live.


15 [h]And it was permitted to him to give a [i]spirit unto the image of the beast, so that the image of the beast should speak, and should cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.


16 [j]And he made all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive [k]a [l]mark in their right hand or in their foreheads.


17 And that no man might [m]buy or sell, save he that had the [n]mark or the name of the beast or the number of his name.


18 [o]Here is wisdom. Let him that hath wit, count the number of the beast: for it is the [p]number of a man, and his number is six hundred threescore and six.


Read full chapter

Footnotes

Revelation 13:11 The second member of the vision, concerning the ecclesiastical dominion, which in Rome succeeded that which was politic, and is in the power of the corporation of false Prophets, and of the forgers of false doctrine. Wherefore the same body or corporation is called of S. John by the name of false prophet, Rev. 6:13, 19 and 20. The form of this beast is first described in this verse, then his acts, in the verses following, and the whole speech is concluded in the last verse. This beast is by his breed a Son of the earth (as they say) obscurely born, and by little and little creeping up out of his abject estate.

Revelation 13:11 That is, in show he resembled the Lamb (for what is more mild or more humble than to be the servant of the servants of God) but in deed he played the part of the Dragon, and of the Wolf, Matt. 7:15. For even Satan changeth himself into an Angel of light, 2 Cor. 11:14, and what should his honest disciples and servants do?

Revelation 13:12 The history of the acts of this beast containeth in sum three things, hypocrisy, the witness of miracles and tyranny: of which the first is noted in this verse, the second in the 3 verses following: the third in the sixteenth and seventeenth verses. His hypocrisy is most full of leasing, whereby he abuseth both the former beast and the whole world: in that albeit he hath by his cunning, as it were by lime made of the former beast a most miserable … or anatomy, usurped all his authority unto himself and most impudently exerciseth the same in the sight and view of him: yet he carrieth himself so, as if he honored him with most high honor, and did in very truth cause him to be honored of all men.

Revelation 13:12

For unto this beast of Rome, which of civil Empire is made an Ecclesiastical hierarchy, are given divine honors, and divine authority so far as he is believed to be above the Scriptures, which the gloss upon the Decretals declareth by this devilish verse,


Articulos solvit, synodumque facit generalem,


That is,


He changeth the Articles of faith, and giveth authority to general Counsels.


Which is spoken of the Papal power. So the beast is by birth, foundation, feat, and finally substance, one: only the Pope hath altered the form and manner thereof being himself the head both of that tyrannical Empire, and also of the false Prophets, for the Empire hath he taken unto himself, and thereunto hath added this cunning device. Now these words, whose deadly wound was cured are put here for distinction sake, as also sometimes afterwards: that even at that time the godly readers of this prophecy might by this sign be brought to see the things as present: as if it were said, that they might adore this very Empire that now is, whose head we have seen in our own memory to have been cut off, and to be cured again.


Revelation 13:13 The second point of the things done by the beast, is the credit of great wonders or miracles, appertaining to the strength of this impiety: of which signs some were given from above, as it is said, that fire was sent down from heaven by false sorcery, in this verse. Others were showed here below in the sight of the beast to establish idolatry, and deceive souls, which part S. John setteth forth beginning (as they say) at that which is last, in this manner: First the effect is declared in these words, He deceiveth the inhabitants of the earth, Secondly the common manner of working in two sorts, one of miracles. For the signs that were given him to do in the presence of the beasts: the other of the words added to the signs, and teaching the idolatry confirmed by those signs, Saying unto the inhabitants of the earth, that they should make an image unto the beasts which, etc. Thirdly, a special manner is declared: That is given unto him to put life into the image of the beast: and that such a kind of quickening, that the same both speaketh by answer unto those that ask counsel of it, and also pronounceth death against all those that do not obey nor worship it: all which things oftentimes by false miracles through the procurement and inspiration of the Devil, have been effected and wrought in images. The histories of the Papists are full of examples of such miracles, the most of them feigned, many also done by the devil in images: as of old in the serpent, Gen. 3:1. By which examples is confirmed, not the authority of the beast, but the truth of God, and of these prophecies.

Revelation 13:14 That is, images by enallage or change of the number: for the worship of them ever since the second Council of Nice, hath been ordained in the Church by public credit, and authority contrary unto the Law of God.

Revelation 13:14 In the Greek the word is in the Dative case, as much to say, as unto the worship, honor and obeying of the beast: for by this maintenance of images this Pseudoprophetical beast doth mightily profit the beast of Rome, of whom long ago he received them. Wherefore the same is hereafter very fitly called the image of the beast, for that images have their beginning from the beast, and have their form or manner from the will of the beast, and have their end and use fixed in the profit and commodity of the beast.

Revelation 13:15 And of this miracle of the images of the beast (that is, which the beast hath ordained to establish idolatry) which miraculously speak and give judgment, or rather marvelously, by the fraud of the false prophets, the Papists books are full fraughted.

Revelation 13:15 To give life as Jannes and Jambres imitated the wonders that Moses wrought.

Revelation 13:16 The third place, is a most wicked and most insolent tyrrany as was said before, usurped over the persons of men in this verse: and over their goods and actions, in the next verse. For he is said, both to bring upon all persons a tyrannous servitude, that as bondslaves they might serve the beast: and also to exercise over all their goods and actions, a peddler-like abuse of indulgences and dispensations (as they term them) amongst their friends, and against others to use most violent interdictions, and to shoot out cursings, even in natural and civil, private and public contracts, wherein all good faith ought to have place.

Revelation 13:16 That is, their Chrism, by which in the Sacrament (as they call it) of Confirmation, they make servile unto themselves, the persons and doings of men, signing them in their forehead and hands: and as for the sign left by Christ (of which Rev. 7:3) and the holy Sacrament of Baptism they make as void. For whom Christ hath joined unto himself by Baptism, this beast maketh challenge unto them by her greasy Chrism, which he doubteth not to prefer over Baptism, both in authority and efficacy.

Revelation 13:16 The mark of the name of the beast.

Revelation 13:17 That is, have any traffic or intercourse with men, but they only those which have this anointing and consecration of Clearkely tonsure, as they call it. Read Gratian de Consecratione, distinct. s. c. omnes, cap. Spiritus, etc. of these matters.

Revelation 13:17 Here the false Prophets do require three things, which are set down in the order of their greatness, a character, a name and the number of the name. The meaning is, that man that hath not first their anointing and clerical tonsure or shaving: secondly holy orders, by reserving whereof is communicated the same of the beast: or finally hath not attained that high degree of Pontifical knowledge, and of the Law (as they call it) Canonical, and hath not as it were made up in account and cast the number of the mysteries thereof: for in these things consisteth the number of that name of the beast. And this is excellently set forth in the next verse.

Revelation 13:18 That is in this number of the beast consisteth that Popish wisdom, which unto them seemeth the greatest of all others. In these words S. John expoundeth that saying which went before of the number of the beast, what it hath above his mark or acconisance and his name. These things, saith S. John, the mark and the name of the beast, do easily happen unto any man: but to have the number of the beast, is wisdom: that is, only the wise and such as have understanding, can come by that number for they must be most illuminated doctors that attain thereunto, as the words following do declare.

Revelation 13:18 How great and of what denomination this number of the beast is, by which the beast accounted his wisdom, S. John declareth in these words. Dost thou demand how great it is? it is so great, that it occupieth the whole man: he is always learning, and never cometh to the knowledge thereof: he must be a man indeed that doth attain unto it. Askest thou of what denomination it is? verily it standeth of six throughout and perfectly ariseth of all the parts thereof in their several denominations (as they term them) it standeth of six by units, tens, hundreds, etc. so as there is no one part in the learning and order Pontifical, which is not either referred unto the head, and as it were the top thereof, or contained in the same: so fitly do all things in this hierarchy agree one with another, and with their head. Therefore that cruel beast Boniface the eighth doth commend by the number of six those Decretals which he perfected, in the proem of the sixth book. Which book (saith he) being to be added unto five other books of the same volume of Decretals, we thought good to name Sextum the sixth: that the same volume by addition thereof containing a senary, or the number of six books (which is a number perfect) may yield a perfect form of managing all things, and perfect discipline of behavior. Here therefore is the number of the beast, who poureth from himself all his parts and bringeth them all back again unto himself by his discipline in most wise and cunning manner. If any man desire more of this, let him read the gloss upon that place. I am not ignorant that other interpretations are brought upon this place: but I thought it my duty, with the good favor of all and without the offense of any, to propound mine opinion in this point. And for this cause especially, for that it seemed unto me neither profitable, nor like to be true, that the number of the beast, or of the name of the beast should be taken as the common sort of interpreters do take it. For this number of the beast teacheth, giveth out, imprinteth, as a public mark of such as be his, and esteemeth that mark above all others as the mark of those whom he loveth best. Now those other expositions seem rather to be far removed from this property and condition of that number: whether you respect the name Latinus or Titan, or another. For these the beast doth not teach, nor give forth nor imprint, but most diligently forbiddeth to be taught, and audaciously denieth: he approveth not these, but reproveth them: and hateth them that think so of this number, with an hatred, greater than that of Vatinius.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2013%3A11-18&version=GNV


Pope Alexander VI (Italian: Alessandro VI, Valencian: Alexandre VI, Spanish: Alejandro VI; born Roderic Llançol i de Borja;[Note 2] epithet: Valentinus ("The Valencian");[6] c. 1431 – 18 August 1503) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 11 August 1492 until his death in 1503.


Born into the prominent Borja family in Xàtiva in the Kingdom of Valencia under the Crown of Aragon (in present-day Spain), he was known as Roderic de Borja, and he is commonly referred to by the Italianized form as Rodrigo Borgia. He studied law at the University of Bologna. He was ordained deacon and made a cardinal in 1456 after the election of his uncle as Pope Callixtus III, and a year later he became vice-chancellor of the Catholic Church. He proceeded to serve in the Roman Curia under the next four popes, acquiring significant influence and wealth in the process. In 1492, Rodrigo was elected pope, taking the name Alexander VI.


Alexander's papal bulls of 1493 confirmed or reconfirmed the rights of the Spanish crown in the New World following the finds of Christopher Columbus in 1492. During the second Italian war, Alexander VI supported his son Cesare Borgia as a condottiero for the French king. The scope of his foreign policy was to gain the most advantageous terms for his family.[7][8]


Alexander is one of the most controversial of the Renaissance popes, partly because he acknowledged fathering several children by his mistresses. As a result, his Italianized Valencian surname, Borgia, became a byword for libertinism and nepotism, which are traditionally considered as characterizing his pontificate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Alexander_VI


Francis Borgia SJ (Valencian: Francesc de Borja; Spanish: Francisco de Borja; 28 October 1510 – 30 September 1572) was a Spanish Jesuit priest. The great-grandson of both Pope Alexander VI and King Ferdinand II of Aragon, he was Duke of Gandía and a grandee of Spain. After the death of his wife, Borgia renounced his titles and became a priest in the Society of Jesus, later serving as its third superior general. He was canonized on 20 June 1670 by Pope Clement X.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Borgia


Borja (Borgia)

Spanish: habitational name from a place in Zaragoza province named from Arabic burj ‘tower’. See also Borgia .

https://www.ancestry.com/name-origin?surname=borja


Pope Paul V (Latin: Paulus PP. V; Italian: Paolo V) (17 September 1550[5] – 28 January 1621), born Camillo Borghese, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 16 May 1605 to his death, in January 1621. In 1611, he honored Galileo Galilei as a member of the papal Accademia dei Lincei and supported his discoveries.[6] In 1616, Pope Paul V instructed Cardinal Robert Bellarmine to inform Galileo that the Copernican theory could not be taught as fact, but Bellarmine's certificate allowed Galileo to continue his studies in search for evidence and use the geocentric model as a theoretical device. That same year Paul V assured Galileo that he was safe from persecution so long as he, the Pope, should live. Bellarmine's certificate was used by Galileo for his defense at the trial of 1633.[7]


Trained in jurisprudence, Borghese was made Cardinal-Priest of Sant'Eusebio and the Cardinal Vicar of Rome by Pope Clement VIII. He was elected as Pope in 1605, following the death of Pope Leo XI. Pope Paul V was known for being stern and unyielding, defending the privileges of the Church. He met with Galileo Galilei in 1616 and was involved in the controversy over heliocentrism. He canonized and beatified several individuals during his papacy and created 60 cardinals in ten consistories.


His insistence on ecclesiastical jurisdiction led to conflicts with secular governments, notably with Venice, which resulted in an interdict on the city in 1606. This disagreement was eventually mediated by France and Spain in 1607. Pope Paul V's diplomacy also strained relations with England, as his actions were perceived as undermining moderate Catholics in the country.


In Rome, he financed the completion of St. Peter's Basilica, improved the Vatican Library, and restored the ancient Roman aqueduct Aqua Traiana. Pope Paul V established the Banco di Santo Spirito in 1605 and is also known for fostering the rise of the Borghese family through nepotism. He died on 28 January 1621, after suffering from a series of strokes and was succeeded by Pope Gregory XV.


Early life

Camillo Borghese was born in Rome on 17 September 1550 into the Borghese family of Siena which had recently established itself in Rome. He was the eldest of seven sons of the lawyer and Sienese patrician Marcantonio Borghese and his wife Flaminia Astalli, a Roman noblewoman. Camillo was carefully trained in jurisprudence at Perugia and Padua, and became a canonist of marked ability.[8]


Cardinal

In June 1596 Camillo was made the Cardinal-Priest of Sant'Eusebio and the Cardinal Vicar of Rome[8] by Pope Clement VIII, and had as his secretary Niccolò Alamanni. He then opted for other titular churches like San Crisogono and Santi Giovanni e Paolo.


Clement VIII also bestowed upon him episcopal consecration in 1597 after his appointment as Bishop of Jesi; the co-consecrators were Cardinal Silvio Savelli (former Latin Patriarch of Constantinople) and Cardinal Francesco Cornaro (former Bishop of Treviso).[9] Bishop Borghese retained the diocese of Iesi until 1599. He held aloof from all parties and factions, devoting all his spare time to his law-books.


Papacy

Election

Main article: May 1605 papal conclave

When Pope Leo XI died, 1605, Cardinal Borghese became pope over a number of candidates including Caesar Baronius and Robert Bellarmine; his neutrality in the factional times made him an ideal compromise candidate.[10]


In character he was very stern and unyielding, a lawyer rather than diplomat, who defended the privileges of the Church to his utmost. His first act was to send home to their sees the bishops who were sojourning in Rome, for the Council of Trent had insisted that every bishop reside in his diocese.[8]


Papal styles of

Pope Paul V


Reference style His Holiness

Spoken style Your Holiness

Religious style Holy Father

Posthumous style None

Theology

Paul met with Galileo Galilei in 1616 after Cardinal Bellarmine had, on his orders, warned Galileo not to hold or defend the heliocentric ideas of Copernicus. Whether there was also an order not to teach those ideas in any way has been a matter for controversy. A letter from Bellarmine to Galileo states only the injunction that the heliocentric ideas could not be defended or held; this letter was written expressly to enable Galileo to defend himself against rumors concerning what had happened in the meeting with Bellarmine.[11]


In 1618, a Decreto de Nuestro Sanctissimo Padre el Papa Paulo V. en favor dela Immaculada Concepción dela Sanctissima Virgen Madre de Dios y Señora Nuestra (Decree of our most holy father Pope Paul V in favor of the Immaculate Conception of the blessed Virgin Mary,..) was published in Lima, Peru.[12]


Canonisations and beatifications

Paul V canonised Charles Borromeo on 1 November 1610[13] and Frances of Rome on 29 May 1608. He also canonized Pompejanus in 1615 and canonized Cardinal Albert de Louvain on 9 August 1621.


He also beatified a number of individuals which included Ignatius Loyola (27 July 1609), Philip Neri (11 May 1615), Teresa of Avila (24 April 1614), Aloysius Gonzaga (10 October 1605), and Francis Xavier (25 October 1619).


Consistories

Main article: Cardinals created by Paul V

The pope created 60 cardinals in ten consistories held during his pontificate. He named his nephew Scipione Borghese as a cardinal (continuing the trend of nepotism) and also named Alessandro Ludovisi, who would become his immediate successor, Pope Gregory XV, as a cardinal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Paul_V


Borghese

Recorded in many forms including Bourges, Bourgaize, Bourgeois, (France), Burgess, Burges and Burgis (England and Scotland), Borghese, Borgesio and Burgisi (Italy), and others, this interesting surname is of pre 8th century Old French origins. It derives from the word "burgeis", meaning inhabitant and FREEMAN of a fortified town, one which could apply municipal rates, taxes, and duties. A burgeis generally had tenure of land or buildings from a landlord by "burgage", which involved the payment of a fixed money rent. In Scotland, the position of burgess required not only the making of payments, but to be availble to take part in guarding the town. The surname is one of the earliest recorded anywhere in the world. These recordings are from England because this country was the first to adopt both hereditary surnames and to make the necessary registers in which to record them. France was several centuries later, and Italy, not until the 19th century in most areas. Early recordings showing the influence of the Norman-French in England after the Invasion of 1066 include: Ralph le Burgeis, in the Pipe Rolls of the county of Sussex in 1195, and Philip Bourges in the cartulary of Oseney Abbey, Oxford in 1197. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Geoffrey Burgeis, which was dated 1115, in the "Winton Rolls" of Hampshire. This was during the reign of King Henry 1st, known as "The Lion of Justice", 1100 - 1135. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. Over the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop", often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling.

https://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Borghese


Facade of St Peter's

Designed by Carlo Maderno (1608-1614) The inscription (1m letters) states:

"Paul V Borghese, Roman, Pontiff, in 1612, the seventh of his pontificate, [built] in honour of the Prince of Apostles

On February 10, 1608 the first stone of the Facade was laid and on July 21, 1612 most of the work was completed. It took another two years for the ornamentation, and the basilica was finally consecrated by Urban VIII on November 18, 1926.

https://www.stpetersbasilica.info/Exterior/Facade/Facade.htm


AFA-27 [recorded 03/15/87] | The CIA, the Military & Drugs Part IV


Developing a line of inquiry presented in the preceding broadcast, this program focuses on narco-terrorism in Latin America. Particular emphasis is on intelligence-related elements that figured in the Iran-Contra scandal, anti-Castro Cubans in particular. Much of the discussion centers on activities that took place when George Bush was in charge of the CIA.


After reviewing the Latin American narcotics network of Corsican gangster and Third Reich collaborator Auguste Ricord, the broadcast focuses on the role of Ricord associate Klaus Barbie in the 1980 “Cocaine Coup” in Bolivia. The Gestapo chief of Lyons (France) during the war, Barbie found post-war employment with American intelligence, first with the Army’s Counter Intelligence Corps, and later with the CIA.


With the aid of elements of the Central Intelligence Agency and the Unification Church of Sun Myung Moon, Barbie and a group of fascist terrorists associated with the narcotics trade overthrew the Bolivian government and established a dictatorship under General Garcia-Meza. Under this regime, the business of cocaine kingpin Roberto Suarez thrived, aided by Barbie and his “bridegrooms of death.” Doubling as para-fascist terrorists and enforcers for the government, Barbie and his cutthroats aided the bloody suppression of trade unions and the political left in the coup’s aftermath.


Barbie’s cocaine mercenaries included some interesting individuals. German-born Joachim Fiebelkorn (a neo-Nazi and informant for the Drug Enforcement Agency) was joined with Italian fascists, such as Pierluigi Pagliai (a member of the infamous P‑2 lodge discussed in AFAs 18,19) and the notorious fascist Stefano Delle Chiaie, a principal architect of the “strategy of tension.”


The strategy of tension (a major focal point of AFA-19) was an out-cropping of what Danish journalist Henrik Kruger termed “the International Fascista.” (Kruger is the author of The Great Heroin Coup: Drugs, Intelligence and International Fascism, published in softcover by the South End Press of Boston, copyright 1980. Mr. Emory views the work as the best individual volume ever written on the subject of the intelligence community and the narcotics trade.) A consortium of fascists in Europe and Latin America, International Fascista included numerous Latin death squad elements, elements of U.S. intelligence and the Paladin mercenary group (funded by Libyan dictator Khadafy, as well as the weapons empire of SS officer and sometime CIA operative Otto Skorzeny.) A principal figure in the postwar ODESSA organization, Skorzeny is discussed at considerable length in AFA-22.


One of the major cogs of the International Fascista was CORU, arguably the most militant and deadly of the anti-Castro Cuban organizations. CORU was involved in a string of bombings, assassinations and terrorist attacks in the mid 1970’s, including the 1976 assassination of Orlando Letelier in Washington D.C. CORU’s reign of terror took place when George Bush was director of the CIA, and an element of the agency appears to have been involved with it.


Program Highlights Include: “Operation Condor” (an international assassination consortium of Latin American dictatorships); a number of assassinations and attempted assassinations conducted under “Condor;” Argentine fascist and P‑2 lodge member Jose Lopez Rega; Italian fascist and Skorzeny associate Prince Justo Valerio Borghese; former Goebbels Propaganda Ministry official Gerhard Hartmut Von Schubert (the operating manager of the Paladin group); Paladin’s overlap with Spanish intelligence and the CIA; Operation Condor’s attempts at disguising its acts as left-wing terror; the position of the World Anti-Communist League in the milieu set forth in this broadcast


For more related content, please visit:


http://ourhiddenhistory.org/

https://archive.org/details/@altviewstv-fanclub

https://rumble.com/v4e2vto-dave-emory-anti-fascist-archives-27-the-cia-the-military-and-drugs-part-4-o.html


Trump, Vance meet with Pope Leo's Florida brother, 'a major MAGA fan', at White House

Kim Luciani

USA TODAY NETWORK - Florida

May 22, 2025, 12:58 p.m. ET

Key Points AI-assisted summary

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's brother, Louis Prevost, at the White House.

Trump publicly praised Prevost, a Florida resident, for being a "major MAGA fan."

Louis Prevost acknowledged his political views and stated his intention to "tone it down" to avoid causing issues for the pope.

President Donald Trump met with Pope Leo XIV's Florida brother Louis Prevost at the White House on May 20, after praising Prevost to reporters at the Capitol earlier in the day, calling him a "major MAGA fan."


Trump told reporters he likes the pope and both of his brothers, but spotlighted the eldest brother, Navy veteran and Port Charlotte resident Louis Prevost.

"I like the new pope and I like the pope's brother. You know, one of the pope's brothers – actually both of them – but one in particular is a major MAGA fan. Did you know that? He lives in Florida," Trump said.

"And I look forward to getting him to the White House. I want to shake his hand, I want to give him a big hug."

Later that day, the White House visit happened. Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah met with Trump and Vice President JD Vance in the Oval Office.

"Great meeting between President Trump, Vice President Vance, and @Pontifex’s brother, Louis Prevost and his wife Deborah," Special Assistant to the President and Communications Advisor Margo Martin posted on X, along with a photo of the meeting.


Louis Prevost excited and happy about brother Pope Leo XVI's papacy

The Prevost brothers — Louis, John and Robert (Pope Leo XIV) — grew up in Chicago in a traditional Catholic family.

Louis Prevost said his youngest brother Robert wanted to "play priest" when he was 6 and set his sights on the priesthood as a freshman in high school. Their parents, neighbors and even strangers told Robert, "You're going to be pope someday," he said.

Robert Prevost's election as Pope Leo XIV left Louis Prevost excited, happy, mind blown and a little worried about how the papacy would impact their relationship.

“I just freaked out and said ‘It’s Rob, OMG.’ I was up, dressed, out, just going nuts,” he told WBBH.

“We can only hope that we can maintain that closeness, and we don't do anything to embarrass him,” he said.

Louis Prevost attended Pope Leo's inaugural mass at the Vatican on May 18. The brothers shared a hug after the service.


Pope Leo's Florida brother Louis Prevost is a MAGA, Trump supporter

Trump told reporters Louis Prevost is a "major MAGA fan."


In an interview with Piers Morgan, Louis Prevost said, "I don’t want to create waves that don’t need to be there because I’m a MAGA type and I have my beliefs,” he said. “I don’t need to create heat for him. He’s going to have enough to handle as it is without the press going ‘the pope’s brother says this.’ He doesn’t need that.”


Asked about his reposts of controversial social media memes, including one calling Nancy Pelosi a drunk (expletive), and how they might affect the pope, Louis Prevost said he will "tone it down."


"He knows I am who I am," he said of the pope. "He's well aware of my position. He knows I'm probably not going to change and I don't think I will, other than to, just like you say, tone it down."

Contributing: Melissa Pérez-Carrillo, Herald-Tribune, Ashley Ferrer, USA TODAY Network-Florida

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/


All historians acknowledge the ascendancy of the popes began in 308 A.D., when King Clovis of the Salian or Merovingian Franks (later France), won the decisive battle in the Catholic and Arian religious war, thereby settling the dispute in favor of the Catholics. But the popes' temporal reign officially began in the year 538 A.D. when Roman Emperor Justinian subdued the last of the three kingdoms, or "horns," that opposed the rise of the Papacy."

-page 137

Chapter 19 "Exposed (Again): 1260 Years of World Domination

Codeword Barbelon book 2

by P.D. Stuart


Clovis is the modern conventional French (and thence English) form of the Old Frankish name ᚺᛚᛟᛞᛟᚹᛁᚷ (in runic alphabet) or *"Hlōdowik" or "Hlōdowig" (in Latin alphabet), equivalent to the modern forms Louis (French), Lodewijk (Dutch), Lewis (English), and Ludwig (German).


Etymology

The name *Hlōdowik or *Hlōdowig is traditionally considered to be composed of two elements, deriving from both Proto-Germanic *hlūdaz ("loud, famous") and *wiganą ("to battle, to fight") respectively, resulting in the traditional practice of translating Clovis' name as meaning "famous warrior".


However, scholars have pointed out that Gregory of Tours consequently transcribes the names of various Merovingian royal names containing the first element as chlodo-. The use of a close-mid back protruded vowel (o), rather than the expected close back rounded vowel (u) which Gregory does use in various other Germanic names (i.e. Fredegundis, Arnulfus, Gundobadus, etc.) opens up the possibility that the first element instead derives from Proto-Germanic *hlutą ("lot, share, portion"), giving the meaning of the name as "loot bringer" or "plunder (bringing) warrior". This hypothesis is supported by the fact that if the first element is taken to mean "famous", then the name of Chlodomer (one of Clovis' sons) would contain two elements (*hlūdaz and *mērijaz) both meaning "famous", which would be highly uncommon within the typical Germanic name structure.[1][2]


Frankish royalty

Clovis I (c. 466 – 511), the first king of the Franks to unite all the Frankish tribes under one ruler

Clovis II (637 – c. 658), king of Neustria and Burgundy

Clovis III (reigned 675–676), the king of Austrasia

Clovis IV (682–695), the sole king of the Franks from 691 until 695

Clovis (died 580), son of Chilperic I and Audovera, assassinated by his father and stepmother

Louis the Pious, son of Charlemagne, King of Aquitaine from 781 and sole ruler of the Franks 814–840, but counted as "Louis I of France" even though West Francia (the nucleus of the later kingdom of France) was formed only after his death.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clovis_(given_name)


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.


Biography

Early life

Sako was born in the city of Zakho, Iraq, on 4 July 1948.[2] He comes from an ethnic Assyrian family of the Chaldean Catholic Church that has roots in a religious community that has had a presence in the city of his birth since the 5th century AD.[3]


He completed his early studies in Mosul and then attended the Dominican-run Saint Jean’s Seminary there. He was ordained a priest on 1 June 1974 and filled his first pastoral assignment at the Cathedral of Mosul until 1979. He then earned a doctorate in Eastern patrology at the Pontifical Oriental Institute. When denied a license to teach because he was only qualified for religious instruction, he earned a second doctorate in history from the Sorbonne in Paris.[4] With this he secured his teaching license and was able to provide religious instruction. From 1997 to 2002 he was rector of the Patriarchal Seminary in Baghdad. He then returned to Mosul and guided the parish of Perpetual Help for a year.[5][6]


Sako speaks Neo-Aramaic, German, French, English, Italian, Kurdish and Arabic.[2]


Archeparch

A synod of the bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church meeting in Baghdad elected Sako Archeparch of Kirkuk on 24 October 2002. Pope John Paul II gave his assent on 27 September 2003.[7] He received his episcopal consecration on 14 November 2003 from his predecessor in Kirkuk, André Sana.[8]


In August 2009, and at the beginning of Ramadan, Sako organized an appeal for national peace, reconciliation and end to violence on the part of more than fifty religious leaders in Kirkuk. He called it "a gesture of closeness to our Muslim brothers. We are all brothers, sons of the same God we must respect and cooperate for the good of the people and our country." The participants included representatives of Ali Sistani and Muqtada al Sadr.[9]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


The Last Pope: The Decline and Fall of the Church of Rome : The Prophecies of St. Malachy for the New Millennium Hardcover – January 1, 1998

by John Hogue (Author)

According to the prophecies of St. Malachy, only two popes remain before the Holy Church will go through an Apocalypse. In this controversial and definitive study Hogue examines St. Malachy and other gifted saints, popes, monks, and nuns who have been responsible for a covert tradition of prophecy that the Vatican has never officially acknowledged. "The Last Pope" is a unique prophetic examination of papal history--past and future. Four-color insert. 16 b&w plates and line drawings.

https://www.amazon.com/Last-Pope-Decline-Prophecies-Millennium/dp/1862042020


The May Fourth Movement was a Chinese cultural and anti-imperialist political movement which grew out of student protests in Beijing on May 4, 1919. Students gathered in front of Tiananmen to protest the Chinese government's weak response to the Treaty of Versailles decision to allow the Empire of Japan to retain territories in Shandong that had been surrendered by the German Empire after the Siege of Tsingtao in 1914. The demonstrations sparked nationwide protests and spurred an upsurge in Chinese nationalism, a shift towards political mobilization, away from cultural activities, and a move towards a populist base, away from traditional intellectual and political elites.


The May Fourth demonstrations marked a turning point in a broader anti-traditional New Culture Movement (1915–1921) that sought to replace traditional Confucian values and was itself a continuation of late Qing reforms. Even after 1919, these educated "new youths" still defined their role with a traditional model in which the educated elite took responsibility for both cultural and political affairs.[1] They opposed traditional culture but looked abroad for cosmopolitan inspiration in the name of nationalism and were an overwhelmingly urban movement that espoused populism in an overwhelmingly rural country. Many political and social leaders of the next five decades emerged at this time, including those of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).[2]


Background

Further information: Warlord Era

Oxford University historian Rana Mitter observed that the "atmosphere and political mood that emerged around 1919 are at the center of a set of ideas that has shaped China's momentous twentieth century."[3] The Qing dynasty had disintegrated in 1911, marking the end of thousands of years of imperial rule, and ushered a new era in which political power nominally rested with the people, but Confucianism still had a profound influence on social and political relations. After the death of President Yuan Shikai in 1916, China became dominated by warlords who were concerned with building political power and rival regional armies. The government in Beijing could do little to counter foreign influence and control.[3] Chinese Premier Duan Qirui's signing of the secret Sino-Japanese Joint Defence Agreement in 1918 enraged the Chinese public when it was leaked to the press, and sparked a student protest movement that laid the groundwork for the May Fourth Movement.[4] The March 1st Movement in Korea in 1919, the Russian Revolution of 1917, continued defeats by foreign powers and the presence of spheres of influence further inflamed Chinese nationalism among the emerging middle class and cultural leaders.[3]


Leaders of the New Culture Movement blamed traditional Confucian values for the political weakness of the nation.[5][6] Chinese nationalists called for a rejection of traditional values and the adoption of Western ideals of "Mr. Science" (賽先生; 赛先生; Sài xiānsheng) and "Mr. Democracy" (德先生; Dé xiānsheng) in place of "Mr. Confucius" in order to strengthen the new nation.[7][8]: 352  These iconoclastic and anti-traditional views and programs have influenced China's politics and culture to the present day.[9]


Twenty-One Demands

Main article: Twenty-One Demands

The twenty-one demands were a set of proposals presented by the Ōkuma Shigenobu government to the Yuan Shikai administration in hopes of expanding Japanese affairs in China. The demands consisted of a variety of economic, territorial and power-hungry provisions. An important component of these demands were in regards to Chinese territory. These included intentions for expanding Japanese interests in southern Manchuria, eastern Mongolia, in addition to the confirmation of Japan's seizure of German ports in China's Shandong province.


In early 1915, Japan's submission of the twenty-one demands were revealed to the Chinese public, causing an increase in political tension and frustration towards Japan. In light of these revelations, the Chinese press became very critical towards Japan, and Chinese citizens' views of Japan soured. The twenty-one demands ultimately added fuel to the rising tensions between the two countries, playing an important role in triggering the impending May Fourth Movement.


Shandong Problem

Main article: Shandong Problem

China had entered World War I on the side of the Triple Entente in 1917. Although that year, 140,000 Chinese laborers were sent to the Western Front as a part of the Chinese Labor Corps,[10] the Treaty of Versailles ratified in April 1919 awarded rights to the German territories in Shandong to Japan. The representatives of the Chinese government put forth the following requests:


Abolition of all privileges of foreign powers in China, such as extraterritoriality

Cancelling of the Twenty-One Demands

Return to China of the territory and rights of Shandong, which Japan had taken from Germany during World War I.

The Western allies dominated the meeting at Versailles, and paid little heed to Chinese demands. The European delegations, led by French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau, were primarily interested in punishing Germany. Although the American delegation promoted Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points and the ideals of self-determination, they were unable to advance these ideals in the face of stubborn resistance by David Lloyd George and Clemenceau. American advocacy of self-determination at the League of Nations was attractive to Chinese intellectuals, but their failure to follow through was seen as a betrayal. This failure of diplomacy at the Paris Peace Conference created what became known as the "Shandong Problem".[11][12]


Protests

May 4, 1919


Tsinghua University students burning Japanese goods


Peking Normal University students detained by the government during the May Fourth Movement

On the morning of May 4, 1919, student representatives from thirteen different local universities met in Beijing and drafted five resolutions:


To oppose the granting of Shandong to the Japanese under former German concessions.

To draw and increase awareness of China's precarious position to the masses in China.

To recommend a large-scale gathering in Beijing.

To promote the creation of a Beijing student union.

To hold a demonstration that afternoon in protest to the terms of the Treaty of Versailles.

On the afternoon of May 4, over 4,000 students of Yenching University, Peking University and other schools marched from many points to gather in front of Tiananmen. They shouted such slogans as "struggle for the sovereignty externally, get rid of the national traitors at home", "Give Qingdao back to us!",[13] "do away with the Twenty-One Demands", and "don't sign the Versailles Treaty".


Protestors voiced their anger at the Allied betrayal of China, denounced the government's spineless inability to protect Chinese interests, and called for a boycott of Japanese products. Demonstrators insisted on the resignation of three Chinese officials they accused of being collaborators with the Japanese. After burning the residences of these officials and beating some of their servants, student protesters were arrested, jailed, and severely beaten.[14]


Participants


Female students participate in May Fourth demonstrations

On May 4, 1919, a group of Chinese students began protesting the contents of the Paris Peace Conference. Under the pressure, the Chinese delegation refused to sign the Treaty of Versailles. The original participants of the May Fourth Movement were students in Paris and Beijing, who joined forces to strike and take to the streets to express their dissatisfaction with the government. Some advanced students in Shanghai and Guangzhou joined the protest movement as it progressed, gradually forming a wave of mass student strikes across China. In June 1919, the Beijing government carried out the "June 3" arrests, in which nearly 1,000 students were arrested. However, this did not suppress the patriotic student movement, instead further angering the Chinese public and increasing revolutionary sentiment. Workers and businessmen across the country went on strike in support of the students' movement, marking the entrance of the Chinese working class into the political arena.


With the emergence of working-class support, the May Fourth Movement developed to a new stage. The center of the movement shifted from Beijing to Shanghai, and the working class replaced students as the main force of the movement. The Shanghai working class staged a strike of an unprecedented scale. The growing scale of the national strike and the increasing number of its participants led to a paralysis of the country's economic life and posed a serious threat to the government in Beijing. The working class took the place of the students to stand up and resist. The support for this movement throughout the country reflected the enthusiasm for nationalism and national rejuvenation, which was also the foundation for the development and expansion of the May Fourth Movement. Benjamin I. Schwartz added, "Nationalism which was, of course, a dominant passion of the May Fourth experience was not so much a separate ideology as a common disposition."[15]


During the May Fourth era, pledges of celibacy were a means through which participants resisted traditional marriage and devote themselves to revolutionary causes.[16]: 97 


Expansion

On May 5, students in Beijing as a whole went on strike and in the larger cities across China, students, patriotic merchants, and workers joined protests. The demonstrators skillfully appealed to the newspapers and sent representatives to carry the word across the country. On the morning of May 6, students from Shanghai gathered at Fudan University in response to the events in Beijing. By the evening, meetings and special committees were held at various campuses in Shanghai, and telegrams were sent to the Beijing government in the name of the 33 representatives of different campuses in Shanghai to express their protest. Over the next few days, the movement grew in size. Students in Shanghai began striking at the end of May. During this time, disagreements arose within the protesters about the intensity of the protests, but the protests as a whole were seen to be intensifying.


On June 3, police in Beijing arrested a large number of students. To express their disapproval to it, businessmen and workers in Shanghai joined the strike. The center of the movement shifted from Beijing to Shanghai. Chancellors from thirteen universities arranged for the release of student prisoners, and Cai Yuanpei, the principal of Peking University resigned in protest. Although at this point the event was defined as a multi-class protest action, overall it was still a student-led movement.


Newspapers, magazines, citizen societies, and chambers of commerce offered support for the students. Merchants threatened to withhold tax payments if China's government remained obstinate.[17] In Shanghai, a general strike of merchants and workers nearly devastated the entire Chinese economy.[14] On June 12, the general strike ended because under intense public pressure, the Beijing government dismissed Cao Rulin, Zhang Zongxiang and Lu Zongyu that had been accused of being collaborators with the Japanese. Nevertheless, students continued to express their protest against the content of the Versailles Peace Treaty by organizing rallies and other events at that time, and organized the National Student Union. Finally, Chinese representatives in Paris refused to sign the Versailles Treaty: the May Fourth Movement won an initial victory which was primarily symbolic, since Japan for the moment retained control of the Shandong Peninsula and the islands in the Pacific. Even the partial success of the movement exhibited the ability of China's social classes across the country to successfully collaborate given proper motivation and leadership.[14]


Significance


The sculpture of "Wind of May" in Qingdao, Shandong


A monument to the May Fourth Movement in Dongcheng, Beijing

New Culture Movement

Background

Ideologies

Practice

Schools of thought

Major publications

Notable people

vte

Scholars rank the New Culture and May Fourth Movements as significant turning points, as David Der-wei Wang said, "it was the turning point in China's search for literary modernity",[18] along with the abolition of the civil service system in 1905 and the overthrow of the monarchy in 1911. The challenge to traditional Chinese values, however, was also met with strong opposition, especially from parts of the Kuomintang. From their perspective, the movement destroyed the positive elements of Chinese tradition and placed a heavy emphasis on direct political actions and radical attitudes, characteristics associated with the emerging Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Two of the CCP's founding members, Li Dazhao and Chen Duxiu, were leaders of the movement. The CCP viewed it more favorably, although remaining suspicious of the early phase which emphasized the role of enlightened intellectuals, not revolution.[19] Li and Chen were the most influential promoters of Marxism in China during the May Fourth period.[20] In its broader sense, the May Fourth Movement led to the establishment of radical intellectuals who went on to mobilize peasants and workers into the CCP and gain the organizational strength that would solidify the success of the Chinese Communist Revolution.[17]


During the May Fourth Movement, the group of intellectuals with communist ideas grew steadily, such as Chen Tanqiu, Zhou Enlai, Chen Duxiu, and others, who gradually appreciated Marxism's power. This promoted the sinicization of Marxism and provided a basis for the birth of the CCP and socialism with Chinese characteristics.[21]


The legacy of the May Fourth Movement is embraced both by the CCP and its critics, who express different understandings of the movement and its importance.[22]


Kuomintang members such as Luo Jialun, Shao Lizi and Duan Xipeng played an active role in the Movement, and some Kuomintang leaders claimed that their party and its founder Sun Yat-sen were active in leading the movement. However, Kuomintang influence on the Movement was minimal.[23] In British Malaya, May Fourth-influenced riots in Penang and Singapore involving Kuomintang teachers and sympathetic students led the British to pass the Registration of Schools Ordinance, an attempt to remove Kuomintang influence from local education. From 1922, the British also instituted a ban on the Kuomintang itself.[24]


Birth of Chinese communism

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Chairman Mao Zedong and leading revolutionaries proclaim the People's Republic of China on 1 October 1949.

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For many years, the orthodox view in the People's Republic of China was that after the demonstrations of 1919 and their subsequent suppression, the discussion of possible policy changes became more and more politically realistic. Influential leaders such as Chen Duxiu and Li Dazhao shifted to the left and became founders of the CCP in 1921, while other intellectuals became more sympathetic.[25] Originally voluntarist or nihilist figures like Li Shicen and Zhu Qianzhi made similar turns to the left as the 1920s saw China become increasingly turbulent.[26] In 1939, Mao Zedong claimed that the May Fourth Movement was a stage leading toward the fulfillment of the Chinese Communist Revolution:


The May Fourth Movement twenty years ago marked a new stage in China's bourgeois-democratic revolution against imperialism and feudalism. The cultural reform movement which grew out of the May Fourth Movement was only one of the manifestations of this revolution. With the growth and development of new social forces in that period, a powerful camp made its appearance in the bourgeois-democratic revolution, a camp consisting of the working class, the student masses and the new national bourgeoisie. Around the time of the May Fourth Movement, hundreds of thousands of students courageously took their place in the van. In these respects the May Fourth Movement went a step beyond the Revolution of 1911.[27]


Paul French argues that the only victor of the Treaty of Versailles in China was communism, as rising public anger led directly to the formation of the CCP. The Treaty also led to Japan pursuing its conquests with greater boldness, which Wellington Koo had predicted in 1919 would lead to the outbreak of war between China and Japan.[28]


A rally on the 21st anniversary of the October Revolution in Russia

Western-style liberal democracy had previously had a degree of traction among Chinese intellectuals. Still, after Versailles, which was viewed as a betrayal of China's interests, it lost much of its attractiveness. Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points, despite being rooted in moralism, were seen as Western-centric and hypocritical.[29] Many Chinese intellectuals believed that the United States had done little to convince the other nations to adhere to the Fourteen Points and observed that the United States had declined to join the League of Nations. As a result, they turned away from the Western liberal democratic model. With the October Revolution in Russia in 1917, Marxism began to take hold in Chinese intellectual thought, particularly among those already on the Left. Chinese intellectuals such as Chen Duxiu and Li Dazhao began serious study of Marxist doctrine.[30]


Cultural

The May Fourth Movement focused on opposing Confucian culture and promoting a new culture. As a continuation of the New Culture movement, the May Fourth Movement greatly influenced the cultural field. The slogans of "democracy" and "science" advocated in the New Culture Movement were designed to attack the old culture and promote the new culture. This purpose can be summed up in a sentence from David Wang: "It was the turning point in China's search for literary modernity."[18] As historian Wang Gungwu notes, the May Fourth Movement became subsequently identified as the predecessor and inspiration for the later Cultural Revolution.[31]


Participants at the time, such as Hu Shih, referred to this era as the "Chinese Renaissance", because there was an intense focus on science and experimentation.[32] In Chinese literature, the May Fourth Movement is regarded as the watershed after which the modern Chinese literature began and the use of written vernacular Chinese gained currency over Literary Chinese, eventually replacing it in formal works.[33] Intellectuals were driven toward expressing themselves using the spoken tongue under the slogan "my hand writes what my mouth speaks" (我手寫我口), although the change was gradual: Hu had already argued for the use of the modern vernacular language in literature in his 1917 essay "Preliminary discussion on literary reform".[34]


In 1917, Chen Hengzhe published the short story One Day (一日) in an overseas student quarterly (留美学生季报)—a year before the publication of Lu Xun's Diary of a Madman and The True Story of Ah Q (not published until 1921), which has often been incorrectly credited as the first vernacular Chinese fiction.[34][35]


More ordinary people also began to try to get in touch with new cultures and learn from foreign cultures. Joseph Chen said: "This intellectual ferment had already had an effect in altering the outlook of China's new youth."[5] After the May Fourth Movement, the Chinese modern female literature developed a literature with modern humanistic spirit, taking women as the subject of experience, thinking, aesthetics, and speech.[36]


Instead of the formerly euphemistic language for sex, May Fourth reformers used the broader, more explicit term xing.[37]


In honor of the May Fourth Movement, May 4 is now celebrated as Youth Day in China and as Literary Day in Taiwan.


Feminist

The domination of Confucian ideologies shaped gender inequalities in Chinese culture, labeling and treating women as second-class citizens. The May Fourth Movement played a crucial role in women's emancipation in China, representing a social and cultural shift toward societal transformation.


Women in the May Fourth Movement were often restricted to indoor speeches and debates, lacking the same freedom of movement as their male counterparts.[38] Although most activists and protesters were male, male intellectuals believed women's liberation was essential for a stronger and unified China. They argued that Confucian family structures hindered China's development. Stating that "Women's liberation had to be achieved to save China from disarray and humiliation."[39] Many supported the movement as they believed that women's emancipation was essential for a modern China. They saw it as intertwined with nationalism and new democratic values driven by the anti-imperialist movement.


Economic

Anger against Japan led many elements of society to join students in a movement to boycott Japanese products. Many hoped that when Japanese products were suppressed, China's national industry would benefit.[40] However, the strike in Shanghai that occurred in June damaged the economy.[41] One of the main reasons was that shop owners were not willing to open their shops during the strike, despite the use of police force.[40]


Criticism and resistance

Many intellectuals at the time opposed the anti-traditional message, some felt it did not go far enough, and many political figures ignored it. In the late twentieth century, voices more strongly questioned the premise that Chinese traditional culture had to be destroyed rather than developed.


Kuomintang leader Chiang Kai-shek, as a Confucian and a nationalist, was against the iconoclasm of the May Fourth Movement. As an anti-imperialist, he was skeptical of Western culture. He criticized these May Fourth intellectuals for corrupting the morals of youth.[42] When the Nationalist party came to power under Chiang's rule, it carried out the opposite agenda. The New Life Movement promoted Confucianism, and the Kuomintang purged China's education system of western ideas, introducing Confucianism into the curriculum. Textbooks, exams, degrees, and educational instructors were all controlled by the state, as were all universities.[43]


Some conservative philosophers and intellectuals opposed any change, but many more accepted or welcomed the challenge from the West but wanted to base new systems on Chinese values, not imported ones. These figures included Liang Shuming, Liu Shipei, Tao Xisheng, Xiong Shili, Zhang Binglin and Lu Xun's brother, Zhou Zuoren.[44] In later years, others developed critiques, including figures as diverse as Lin Yutang, Ch'ien Mu, Xu Fuguan, and Yu Ying-shih. Li Changzhi believed that the May Fourth Movement copied foreign culture and lost the essence of its own culture. (Ta Kung Pao, 1942). This is consistent with what Vera Schwarcz has said: "Critically-minded intellectuals were accused of eroding national self-confidence, or more simply, of not being Chinese enough."[1]


Another view was that "this limited May Fourth individualist enlightenment did not lead the individual against the collective of the nation-state, as full-scale, modern Western individualism would potentially do."[45]


Chinese Muslims ignored the May Fourth movement by continuing to teach Classical Chinese and literature with the Qur'an and Arabic along with officially mandated contemporary subjects at the "Normal Islamic School of Wanxian".[46] Ha Decheng did a Classical Chinese translation of the Quran.[47] Arabic, vernacular Chinese, Classical Chinese and the Qur'an were taught in Ningxia Islamic schools funded by Muslim General Ma Fuxiang.[48]


Neotraditionalism versus Western thought

Although the May Fourth Movement attack on traditional Chinese culture was largely successful,[49] opponents still argued that China's traditions and values should be the fundamental foundations of the nation. These opponents of Western civilization formed three neotraditional schools of thought: national essence, national character, and modern relevance of Confucianism. Each school of thought denounced the western values of individualism, materialism and utilitarianism as inadequate avenues for the development of China. Each school held to specific objectives. The "national essence" school sought to discover aspects of traditional culture that could potentially serve the national development of China. Such traditional aspects consisted of various philosophical and religious practices that emerged parallel with Confucianism. Most particularly, China imported Buddhism during antiquity from India. Under the "national character" school, advocates promoted the traditional family system, the primary target of the May Fourth Movement. In this school, reformers viewed Westerners as shells without morals. Finally, the modern relevance of Confucianism was centered on the notion that Confucian values were better than Western ones. In response to western culture's primary concentration on rational analysis, China's neo-traditionalists argued that this was misguided, especially in the practical, changing milieu of the world. Most importantly, these three neo-traditionalist thoughts did not consider the individual, which was the main theme of the May Fourth Movement.[19]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_Fourth_Movement


2030: The Year of the Metal Dog

In addition to being associated with a zodiac animal, each new lunar year also aligns with one of the five traditional Chinese elements. These elements are known in Chinese as the 五行 (wǔxíng).


While we won’t delve into the details of this aspect of zodiac philosophy due to its complexity, keep in mind that each lunar year consists of a combination of 10 heavenly stems (干 gàn) and 12 earthly branches (支 zhī). These unite to form a system of 60 stem-branch combinations. Each combination is symbolized by one of the five elements (fire, water, wood, metal and earth).


According to this system, 2030 is the Year of the Metal Dog.


For anyone interested in diving deeper into doctrines of Chinese astrology, the internet provides a great database of resources for continued study.

https://studycli.org/chinese-zodiac/year-of-the-dog/


A famous Jesuit General Michael Angelo Tambourini once boasted, in 1720, to the Duke of Brissac: " See, My Grace  [my Lord], from this room, I govern not only Paris, but China; not only China, but the whole world, without anyone knowing how it is managed."

"Andrew Steinmetz, History of the Jesuits, Vol. 1 (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Lea and Blanchard Publ.,/New York: Richard Bentley, 1848), pp.107, 168-169; see also, Constitution of the Jesuits, edited by Paris Paulin (1843); Eugene Sue (Marie Joseph), The Wandering Jew, (London: Chapman and Hall, 1844/ New York; Harper & Brothers,, 1845), Bk I, Chap. XV, P. 183; see also, p. 618, and Bk. II, p. 21; Abrige de I'Hist. Eccles. de Racine, Chap. xii. P. 77." page 129 Chapter XII "Unhesitating Obedience: The General And The Holy Office" Codeword Barbelon book One by P.D. Stuart

"Steinmetz was fourteen years a Jesuit; see also, Constitutions of the Jesuits, ed. by P. Paulin (1843); Morale Pratique Des Jesuites: Histoire De La Persecution De deux Saints, Vol. I (Cologne, 1669), pp. 50 and 51."

"Epilogue-For Such A Time As This"

Pope Francis Lord of the World

by P.D. Stuart


Pope Francis[b] (born Jorge Mario Bergoglio;[c] 17 December 1936 – 21 April 2025) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 13 March 2013 until his death in 2025. He was the first Jesuit pope, the first Latin American, and the first born or raised outside Europe since the 8th-century Syrian pope Gregory III.


Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to a family of Italian origin, Bergoglio was inspired to join the Jesuits in 1958 after recovering from a severe illness. He was ordained a Catholic priest in 1969, and from 1973 to 1979 he was the Jesuit provincial superior in Argentina. He became the archbishop of Buenos Aires in 1998 and was created a cardinal in 2001 by Pope John Paul II. Following the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI, the 2013 papal conclave elected Bergoglio as pope on 13 March. He chose Francis as his papal name in honor of Saint Francis of Assisi.


Throughout his papacy, Francis was noted for his humility, emphasis on God's mercy, international visibility, commitment to interreligious dialogue, and concern for the poor, migrants, and refugees. Francis believed the Catholic Church should demonstrate more inclusivity to LGBTQ people, and stated that although blessings of same-sex unions are not permitted, individuals in same-sex relationships can be blessed as long as the blessing is not given in a liturgical context.[2] Francis made women full members of dicasteries in the Roman Curia.[3][4] Francis convened the Synod on Synodality, which was described as the culmination of his papacy and the most important event in the Catholic Church since the Second Vatican Council.[4][5][6] Francis was known for having a less formal approach to the papacy than his predecessors by, for instance, choosing to reside in the Domus Sanctae Marthae guesthouse rather than in the papal apartments of the Apostolic Palace used by previous popes. In addition, due to both his Jesuit and Ignatian aesthetic, he was known for favoring simpler vestments devoid of ornamentation, including refusing the traditional papal mozzetta cape upon his election, choosing silver instead of gold for his piscatory ring, and keeping the same pectoral cross he had as cardinal.


Concerning global governance, Francis was a critic of trickle-down economics, consumerism, and overdevelopment;[7] he made action on climate change a leading focus of his papacy.[8] He viewed capital punishment as inadmissible in all cases,[9] and committed the Catholic Church to its worldwide abolition.[10] Francis criticized the rise of right-wing populism and anti-immigration politics, calling the protection of migrants a "duty of civilization".[11] Francis supported the decriminalization of homosexuality.[12] In international diplomacy, Francis helped to restore full diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States, negotiated a deal with the People's Republic of China to define Communist Party influence in appointing Chinese bishops, and encouraged peace between Israel and Palestinians, signing the Vatican's first treaty with the State of Palestine. In 2022 he apologized for the Church's role in the cultural genocide of Canadian Indigenous peoples in residential schools. From 2023 he condemned Israel's military operations in Gaza, calling for investigations of war crimes. Francis made his last public appearance on Easter Sunday before dying on 21 April 2025, Easter Monday.[13][14] The 2025 papal conclave elected Leo XIV as Francis's successor on 8 May. Leo XIV became the second pope from the Americas, after Francis.[15]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Francis


Easter in 2030

Date: April 21, 2030

Day: Sunday


Avril Ramona Lavigne CM (/ˈævrɪl ləˈviːn/ AV-ril lə-VEEN; French: [avʁil ʁamɔna laviɲ]; born September 27, 1984) is a Canadian singer and songwriter. She is a key musician in popularizing pop-punk music, as she paved the way for female-driven, punk-influenced pop music in the early 2000s. Her accolades include ten Juno Awards and eight Grammy Awards nominations.


At age 16, Lavigne signed a two-album recording contract with Arista Records. Her debut album, Let Go (2002), is the best-selling album of the 21st century by a Canadian artist. It yielded the successful singles "Complicated" and "Sk8er Boi", which emphasized a skate punk persona and earned her the title "Pop-Punk Queen", "Pop Punk Princess" and "Teen-Pop Slayer" from music publications.[1] Her second album, Under My Skin (2004), became Lavigne's first to reach the top of the Billboard 200 chart in the United States, going on to sell 10 million copies worldwide.


Lavigne's third album, The Best Damn Thing (2007), reached number one in seven countries worldwide and saw the international success of its lead single "Girlfriend", which became her first single to reach the top of the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States. Her next two albums, Goodbye Lullaby (2011) and Avril Lavigne (2013), saw continued commercial success and were both certified gold in Canada, the United States, and other territories. After releasing her sixth album, Head Above Water (2019), she returned to her pop punk roots with her seventh album, Love Sux (2022).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avril_Lavigne


Regimini militantis Ecclesiae (Latin for To the Government of the Church Militant) was the papal bull promulgated by Pope Paul III on September 27, 1540, which gave a first approval to the Society of Jesus, also known as the Jesuits, but limited the number of its members to sixty.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regimini_militantis_Ecclesiae


"The Day Called 'X' is a dramatized CBS documentary film set in Portland, Oregon, in which the entire city is evacuated in anticipation of a nuclear air raid, after Soviet bombers had been detected by radar stations to the north; it details the activation of the city's civil defense protocols and leads up to the moment before the attack (the ending is left intentionally unknown). The operations were run from the Kelly Butte Bunker, which was the emergency operations center at that time. It was filmed in September 1957[1] and aired December 8 of that year.[2][3] Apart from presenter/narrator Glenn Ford, none of the people shown are actors. They are locals of Portland shown in their real jobs, including Mayor Terry Schrunk.


Its local re-broadcast in 2004[4] and appearance in the on-line Prelinger Archives attracted interest among local history buffs due to its extensive outside shots of the city, and the use of non-actor participants (local officials and broadcasters). Whenever one of these individuals is heard uttering warnings or statements regarding attack, the words "AN ATTACK IS NOT TAKING PLACE" are superimposed over the picture.[2]


On September 27, 1955, Portland actually conducted an exercise evacuation of downtown called "Operation Greenlight",[5][6] and the film is often misattributed to that year. Ford's narration, however, does make direct reference to the 1955 exercise.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_Called_%27X%27


PART X THE PRESERVATION AND INCREASE OF THE SOCIETY

410 §1. As a sign of gratitude and devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, let that feast be solemnly celebrated; and on that day is to be renewed the consecration by which the Society on January 1, 1872, dedicated and consecrated itself totally and perpetually.

§2. The consecration to the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary is to be renewed each year on the feast of the Immaculate Heart.[1]

411 The sense of belonging and responsibility that each individual one of Ours has toward the whole Society should be manifested in a knowledge of our spirituality, our history, our saints, our apostolic labors, and our men, especially of those who are suffering difficulties for the sake of Christ; it is to be manifested as well by maintaining Ignatian mobility and flexibility with a view to helping any region of the Society whatsoever.[2]

412 §1. All our members should have at heart a shared concern for attracting new members to the Society, especially by prayer and the example of their lives as individuals and in community.[3]

§2. Therefore, we must do everything possible actively to present the Society in such a way that those whom God calls will know and appreciate who and what we are and what is our distinctive way of proceeding in the following of Christ.[4]

§3. We must also promote vocations as widely as possible, in order to reflect the culture and experience of those we seek to serve, including minority cultures, immigrants, and indigenous people.[5]

413 The Society should always show itself bound to its benefactors in charity and gratitude. Superiors should ensure that prayers are offered for them and other appropriate signs of our gratitude are shown them.[6]

414 In the perfect observance of all the Constitutions and in the particular fulfillment of our Institute, our formed members should excel, setting a good example and spreading the good odor of Christ, keeping before their eyes the serious obligation they have of giving edification especially to our younger members.[ 7]

415 All by earnest reading and meditation (in particular, at the time of the annual Spiritual Exercises, renewal of vows, monthly recollection, beginning of the year, and so forth) should strive ever to know, esteem, and love better our Constitutions and the special nature of our Institute,[ 8] which are to be faithfully observed, and which for each and all of us are the one, true, and safe way that surely leads to the perfection to which our Lord calls and invites all sons of the Society.[9] §2. Major superiors, especially at the time of the annual visitation, should see that this is faithfully observed.

416 Finally, those means that are proposed by our holy father Saint Ignatius in Part X of the Constitutions for the preservation and development not only of the body or exterior of the Society but also of its spirit, and for the attainment of the objective it seeks, which is to aid souls to reach their ultimate and supernatural end, [10] are to be observed eagerly and diligently by all, with a truly personal sense of responsibility for its increase and development, for the praise and service of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and the help of souls.[11]


L. D. S.

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


The Art of War is an ancient Chinese military treatise dating from the late Spring and Autumn period (roughly 5th century BC). The work, which is attributed to the ancient Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu ("Master Sun"), is composed of 13 chapters. Each one is devoted to a different set of skills or art related to warfare and how it applies to military strategy and tactics. For almost 1,500 years, it was the lead text in an anthology that was formalized as the Seven Military Classics by Emperor Shenzong of Song in 1080. The Art of War remains the most influential strategy text in East Asian warfare,[1] has influenced both East Asian and Western military theory and thinking, and has found a variety of applications in myriad competitive non-military endeavors across the modern world including espionage,[2] culture, politics, business, and sports.[3][4][5][6]


The book contains a detailed explanation and analysis of the 5th-century BC Chinese military, from weapons, environmental conditions, and strategy to rank and discipline. Sun also stressed the importance of intelligence operatives and espionage to the war effort. Considered one of history's finest military tacticians and analysts, his teachings and strategies formed the basis of advanced military training throughout the world.


The book was translated into French and published in 1772 by the French priest Jesuit Jean Joseph Marie Amiot; it was re-published in 1782. A partial translation into English was attempted by British officer Everard Ferguson Calthrop in 1905 under the title The Book of War. The first annotated English translation was completed and published by Lionel Giles in 1910.[7] Military and political leaders such as the Chinese communist revolutionary Mao Zedong, Japanese daimyō Takeda Shingen, Vietnamese general Võ Nguyên Giáp, is cited along with American military generals Douglas MacArthur and Norman Schwarzkopf Jr. as having drawn inspiration from the book.[8]


Outside of military use, The Art of War has also become a source of inspiration in business, politics, sports and esports, and its usage has extended to film and television.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Art_of_War


St. John Lateran Basilica in Rome is considered the mother church of all the Catholic churches in the Western world; inscribed on the church facade for all to see are the Latin words “omnium urbis et orbis ecclesiarum mater et CAPUT,” meaning, “The mother and HEAD of all the churches of the city and of the world.”

https://www.simplycatholic.com/st-john-lateran-basilica/


Caput Mundi is a Latin phrase which literally means "Head of the world" whereas Roma Caput Mundi means "Rome capital of the world" and is one of the many nicknames given to the city of Rome throughout its history.[1]


The phrase is related to the enduring power of the city first as the capital of the Republic and the Empire, and later as the centre of the Catholic Church.[2]


Although it is not known for sure when it was first used, Rome was already named in this way by the poet Ovid in 1st century BC.[3]


Along with "Eternal City" and the "City of Seven Hills", Caput Mundi remains as one of the most commonly used names to refer to the city of Rome.[4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caput_Mundi


France’s Macron and Pope Francis hold unusually long meeting

Reuters

26 June 2018

Macron and Pope Francis spoke for nearly an hour in the Vatican’s Apostolic Palace

The two discussed “protection of the environment, migration, and commitment to conflict prevention and resolution"

VATICAN CITY: French President Emmanuel Macron, accused at home of straining France’s secular foundations by seeking to mend ties with the Catholic Church, had an unusually long and cordial meeting with Pope Francis on Tuesday.

They spoke for nearly an hour in the official papal library in the Vatican’s Apostolic Palace, about twice as long as Francis usually spends with heads of state or government.

A Vatican statement said the two discussed “protection of the environment, migration, and multilateral commitment to conflict prevention and resolution, especially in relation to disarmament.”

They also spoke about prospects for resolving conflicts in the Middle East and Africa and the future of Europe, it said.

At the end of the private part of the audience, Macron gave Francis a rare copy of Goerges Bernanos 1936 book “Diary of a Country Priest.”

“I’ve read this book many times and it has done me good. It is a book that I have always loved very much,” the pope told Macron, 40, who was accompanied in the public parts of the meeting by his wife Brigitte, 65.

Francis gave Macron a medallion depicting Martin of Tours, a 4th century saint who is depicted cutting his cloak in half to give it to a beggar in winter.

“This means the vocation of those who govern is to help the poor. We are all poor,” Francis told Macron as he was giving him the medallion.

As Macron left the library, he and Francis exchanged a two-cheek kiss, another very usually gesture between a pope and a visiting head of state.

The Vatican was expected to issue a statement later on the themes discussed during the private talks.

Two months ago, Macron called for stronger ties between the state and the Catholic Church, a move critics said blurred a line that has kept French government free of religious intervention for generations.

The issue is particularly sensitive in historically Catholic France, where matters of faith and state were separated by law in 1905 and which is now home to Europe’s largest Muslim and Jewish communities.

France’s guiding principles also hold that religious observance is a private matter, for all faiths.

Macron was raised in a non-religious family and was baptized a Roman Catholic at his own request when he was 12.

On Tuesday afternoon Macron was due to be installed as the “First and Only Honorary Canon” of the Rome Basilica of St. John’s in Lateran, which is the pope’s cathedral in his capacity as bishop of Rome.

Under a tradition that began in the 15th century when France was a monarchy, French leaders are automatically given the title.

https://www.arabnews.com/node/1328511/amp


Xi Jinping Exchanges Congratulatory Messages with French President Emmanuel Macron on the 60th Anniversary of the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations between China and France

2024-01-27 19:00

On January 27, 2024, President Xi Jinping exchanged congratulatory messages with French President Emmanuel Macron on the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries.

Xi Jinping pointed out that 60 years ago, China and France broke the ice of the Cold War and bridged the divide between different blocs to establish diplomatic relations at the ambassadorial level. This historical event has pushed the global landscape to evolve in the right direction of dialogue and cooperation, which still offers inspiration for today. Over the past 60 years, the two countries have adhered to making strategic choices independent of external influence and have always been committed to achieving common development through mutually beneficial cooperation, promoting mutual learning among civilizations through exchanges on an equal footing, and jointly addressing global challenges through multilateral coordination. Bilateral relations have created many firsts and yielded fruitful results, which have not only benefited the people of both countries but also played a vital role in maintaining global peace and stability, promoting a multipolar world, and advancing greater democracy in international relations.

Xi Jinping stressed that the world today has once again reached a critical crossroads. Facing the question of the times and of history on where the world should be headed, China and France, both as independent major countries and permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, should stay true to the original aspiration of establishing diplomatic relations, shoulder their responsibility, undertake their mission, and jointly open up a path of peace, security, prosperity, and progress for human development. Attaching great importance to the development of bilateral relations, Xi Jinping said he stands ready to work with President Emmanuel Macron to take the 60th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations as an opportunity to uphold fundamental principles, break new ground, build on past achievements, open up a new future, and make China-France comprehensive strategic partnership more solid and dynamic, so as to make greater contributions to improving the well-being of the people of the two countries and the world.

Emmanuel Macron said in his congratulatory message that the establishment of diplomatic relations between France and China 60 years ago was a visionary and historic decision. In the face of unprecedented global challenges today, it is all the more important for France and China, as well as Europe and China, to work together in search of common solutions for global challenges. The year 2023 witnessed a comprehensive revitalization of France-China relations, and in 2024, cooperation between the two countries is expected to be further enhanced. Emmanuel Macron said he looks forward to working with President Xi Jinping to promote bilateral economic, trade, cultural, youth, and other exchanges and cooperation, strengthen communication and coordination on global issues, and continually deepen the comprehensive strategic partnership between France and China so as to embrace the new 60 years of France-China relations with positive vitality.

https://www.mfa.gov.cn/eng/zxxx_662805/202401/t20240128_11234702


Taiwan cheered, China upset after Trump signs new Taiwan legislation into law

By Reuters

December 3, 202512:04 AM PST Updated December 3, 2025

U.S. President Trump at the White House, in Washington, D.C.

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks inside the Oval Office, at the White House in Washington, D.C., November 12, 2025. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab

TAIPEI/BEIJING, Dec 3 (Reuters) - Taiwan expressed thanks and China was upset on Wednesday after President Donald Trump signed into law legislation requiring the U.S. State Department to regularly review and update guidelines on how the United States officially interacts with Taipei.

The United States is Taiwan's most important international backer despite the lack of formal diplomatic ties, and the issue is a constant source of irritation in Sino-U.S. relations given Beijing views the democratically-governed island as its own.


In 2021 under the first Trump administration, then Secretary of State Mike Pompeo lifted restrictions on contacts between U.S. officials and their Taiwanese counterparts, put in place after Washington recognised Beijing in 1979.

The Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, which Trump signed into law on Tuesday, says the U.S. State Department should carry out reviews of contacts with Taiwan no less than once every five years.

The law "affirms the value of U.S. interaction with Taiwan, supports closer Taiwan-U.S. relations, and stands as a firm symbol of our shared values of democracy, freedom, and respect for human rights", Taiwan Presidential Office spokesperson Karen Kuo said in a statement.

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Taiwan Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung told reporters more frequent reviews of the guidelines would allow Taiwanese officials into federal agencies for meetings, for example, though the legislation does not make explicit mention of this.

In Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said China firmly opposes any form of official contact between the United States and "the Taiwan region of China".

"The Taiwan question is the core of China's core interests and the first red line that must not be crossed in China–U.S. relations," he added.

The United States should exercise "the utmost prudence in handling the Taiwan question, to stop all official interactions between the U.S. and Taiwan, and not to send any wrong signals to 'Taiwan independence' separatist forces", Lin said.

Taiwan's government rejects China's territorial claims and says it has a right to freely engage with countries around the world.

Trump, who met Chinese President Xi Jinping in South Korea in October, is expected to visit China in April.

Reporting by Ben Blanchard and Joe Cash; Editing by Michael Perry 

https://www.reuters.com/world/china/taiwan-cheered-china-upset-after-trump-signs-new-taiwan-legislation-into-law-2025-12-03/

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid0WmCNX2r1Aze3AHnhfhPXbe8TavWsaPJnaRE2JvwT7pcSpJuWA3emXqePqDgZC2h9l


What is 32nd Degree Freemasonry™?

The Scottish Rite degrees (from the 4th degree to the 32nd degree) supplement and amplify the philosophical teachings of the first three degrees conferred in the Symbolic Lodge. 32nd Degree Scottish Rite Freemasonry™ is sometimes called the "University of Freemasonry" because it uses extensive allegory and dramatic presentation to explore the philosophy, history, ethics, and fundamental truths that guide Freemasons' lives.


To attain the 32°, one must first be a Master Mason in good standing. The Master Mason can then apply to the Scottish Rite in his appropriate jurisdiction. Once his application is approved, he must witness five Scottish Rite degrees. This includes the 4° upon initiation, three additional degrees of the member’s choice, and the 32°.


32nd Degree Freemasonry™, also known as Scottish Rite Freemasonry, is a fraternity of Brothers committed to journeying deeper into the highest principles, teachings, and ideals of the Masonic Craft. Scottish Rite Masons aspire to be guided by six Core Values – Reverence for God, Integrity, Devotion to Country, Justice, Tolerance, and Service to Humanity.

https://scottishritenmj.org/faq/what-is-32nd-degree-freemasonry


Valley of Traverse City

ANCIENT ACCEPTED SCOTTISH RITE

The History and Legend of Scottish Rite Origins

The Story Unfolds…

Like much of early Masonic history, the origins of the Scottish Rite are uncertain. This is primarily due to the lack of historic documentation prior to the early 1700’s and not to any great veiled mystery. The few records kept were subject to loss, fire, weather and aging. So we can at best only speculate on many of our origins by looking at the few documents, historical references and legends that remain.

What We Know

n 1754, near Paris, Chevalier de Bonneville established the Chapter of Clermont. The Chapter resided in the College of Jesuits of Clermont, hence the name. It is said to have been created to honor the Duc de Clermont, then Grand Master of the English Grand Lodge of France.

The Chapter of Clermont was a “Chapter of the Advanced Degrees” and initially entailed six degrees and was later extended to 25 known degrees. The six initial degrees were 1˚, 2˚ and 3˚ St John’s Masonry, 4˚ Knight of the Eagle, 5˚ Illustrious Knight or Templar, 6˚ Sublime Illustrious Knight.

Interestingly enough historically, prior to the time of the Rite’s creation, James II had been in residence at Clermont in exile from Britain from 1688 to his death in 1701. As noted by German Masonic historian, Lenning… “whilst in exile, James II residing at the Jesuit College of Clermont in France, allowed his closest associates to fabricate certain degrees in order to extend their political views.” Lenning believed this to have been an attempt on the part of James and his associates to regain control of the British throne for the House of Stuart. If Lenning is right, this places the origins of the “Rite of Perfection” in the hands of James II and the Jacobite (Stuart) Freemasons who at the time were in exile from Great Britain throughout France and Italy. Lenning also contends that these degrees were introduced into French Freemasonry under the name of the Clermont System.

James II died in exile in 1701. His son James III is said to have continued his father’s Masonic legacy and later created further higher degrees.

Perhaps James II saw in the Jesuit morality plays of the College of Clermont a vessel for passing on a set of moral lessons. Some of the world’s greatest playwrights had emerged from Clermont. Jesuit tutelage had previously produced great writers such as Lope de Vega, Moliere, Racine, and the Corneille brothers. Ensconced in exile, I believe James II did find the inspiration and the training to help produce what would later become the first six degrees. From out of the darkness… comes light.

To be continued… (Author’s note… An in depth look at the Templar influence in Scottish Rite masonry’s origins can be found by visiting the Rosslyn Templars’ website.)"

https://web.archive.org/web/20190615041607/http://www.traversecityscottishrite.com/scottish-rite-history.html


PART VI 1THE PERSONAL LIFE OF THOSE ALREADY ADMITTED AND INCORPORATED INTO THE BODY OF THE SOCIETY

SECTION 1: THE APOSTOLIC CHARACTER OF OUR VOWS IN GENERAL

143 §1. Our consecration by profession of the evangelical counsels, by which we respond to a divine vocation, is at one and the same time the following of Christ poor, virginal, and obedient and a rejection of those idols that the world is always prepared to adore, especially wealth, pleasure, prestige, and power. Hence, our poverty, chastity, and obedience ought visibly and efficaciously to bear witness to this attitude, whereby we proclaim the evangelical possibility of a certain communion among men and women that is a foretaste of the future kingdom of God.[1]

§2. Our religious vows, while binding us, also set us FREE:

FREE, by our vow of poverty, to share the life of the poor and to use whatever resources we may have, not for our own security and comfort, but for service;

FREE, by our vow of chastity, to be men for others, in friendship and communion with all, but especially with those who share our mission of service;

FREE, by our vow of obedience, to respond to the call of Christ as made known to us by him whom the Spirit has placed over the Church, and to follow the lead of all our superiors.[2] [1] See GC 32, d. 4, no. 16; see GC 31, d. 16, no. 4; d. 17, no. 2; d. 18, no. 3. [2] GC 32, d. 2, no. 20. 215

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


32nd Degree: Master of the Royal Secret. The lessons taught in this degree are that genuine brotherhood requires mutual regard, opinion, esteem and charity. We always look for the good in all, make allowances for others’ shortcomings. We trust the Supreme Architect to lead us to friendship, morality and brotherly love. The apron worn in this degree is white, lined in black, with a double-headed eagle and a plan of the Camp of the Princes. The jewel worn is a golden Teutonic Cross. In the center are the letters XXXII, surrounded by a green wreath. The cap of a Master of the Royal Secret is black silk with a black band trimmed in gold. In the center front is a double-headed eagle emblem with a rayed equilateral triangle above in gold. The triangle is red, has 32° in its center, and is trimmed with gold.


In this degree the apprentice learns prayerful self-examination. The mistakes today should not be committed tomorrow. Simply, the daily look at ones self to learn to live with the future. No apron is worn in the Supreme Tribunal, but the traditional apron displayed is of pure white lambskin with a Teutonic Cross of black and silver embroidered upon the flap. The jewel is a silver Teutonic cross. The jewel is suspended from a white collar, with a gold triangle with a “31″ inside it.

https://www.scottishrite-siouxcity.org/Degrees


2030-2031 APPARITION CHARACTERISTICS

Another general rule for predicting oppositions of Mars is from the following: the planet has an approximate 15.8-year periodic opposition cycle, which consists of three or four Aphelic oppositions and three consecutive Perihelic oppositions. Perihelic oppositions are also called "favorable" because the Earth and Mars come closest to each other on those occasions. We sometimes refer to this as the seven Martian synodic periods. This cycle is repeated every 79 years (± 4 to 5 days) and, if one were to live long enough, one would see this cycle nearly replicated in approximately 284 years. The 2031 Mars apparition is considered Transitional (between Aphelic and Perihelic) because the orbital longitude at opposition will be 68.4° from the aphelion longitude of 70° Ls and 111.6° Ls from perihelion (250° Ls).

https://www.alpo-astronomy.org/jbeish/2031_MARS.htm


Constantine I[g] (27 February 272 – 22 May 337), also known as Constantine the Great, was Roman emperor from AD 306 to 337 and the first Roman emperor to convert to Christianity.[h] He played a pivotal role in elevating the status of Christianity in Rome, the Edict of Milan decriminalising Christian practice and ceasing Christian persecution. This was a turning point in the Christianisation of the Roman Empire. He founded the city of Constantinople (now Istanbul) and made it the capital of the Empire, which it remained for over a millennium.


Born in Naissus, a city located in the province of Moesia Superior (now Niš, Serbia), Constantine was the son of Flavius Constantius, a Roman army officer from Moesia Superior, who would become one of the four emperors of the Tetrarchy. His mother, Helena, was a woman of low birth, probably from Bithynia. Later canonised as a saint, she is credited for the conversion of her son in some traditions, though others believe that Constantine converted her. He served with distinction under emperors Diocletian and Galerius. He began his career by campaigning in the eastern provinces against the Persians, before being recalled to the west in AD 305 to fight with his father in the province of Britannia. After his father's death in 306, Constantine was proclaimed as augustus (emperor) by his army at Eboracum (York, England). He eventually emerged victorious in Civil wars of the Tetrarchy against the emperors Maxentius and Licinius to become the sole ruler of the Roman Empire by 324.


Upon his accession, Constantine enacted many reforms to strengthen the empire. He restructured the government, separating civil and military authorities. To combat inflation, he introduced the solidus, a new gold coin that became the standard for Byzantine and European currencies for more than a thousand years. The Roman army was reorganised to consist of mobile units (comitatenses), often around the emperor, to serve on campaigns against external enemies or Roman rebels, and frontier-garrison troops (limitanei) which were capable of countering barbarian raids, but less and less capable of countering full-scale barbarian invasions. Constantine pursued campaigns against the tribes on the Roman frontiers—such as the Franks, the Alemanni, the Goths, and the Sarmatians—and resettled territories abandoned by his predecessors during the Crisis of the Third Century with citizens of Roman society.


Although Constantine lived much of his life as a pagan and later as a catechumen, he began to favour Christianity beginning in 312, finally becoming a Christian and being baptised by Eusebius of Nicomedia, an Arian bishop, although the Catholic Church and the Coptic Orthodox Church maintain that he was baptised by Pope Sylvester I. He played an influential role in the proclamation of the Edict of Milan in 313, which declared tolerance for Christianity in the Roman Empire. He convoked the First Council of Nicaea in 325 which produced the statement of Christian belief known as the Nicene Creed. On his orders, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was built at the site claimed to be the tomb of Jesus in Jerusalem and was deemed the holiest place in Christendom. The papal claim to temporal power in the High Middle Ages was based on the fabricated Donation of Constantine. He has historically been referred to as the "First Christian Emperor" but while he did favour the Christian Church, some modern scholars debate his beliefs and even his comprehension of Christianity.[i] He is venerated as a saint in Eastern Christianity, and he did much to push Christianity towards the mainstream of Roman culture.


The age of Constantine marked a distinct epoch in the history of the Roman Empire and a pivotal moment in the evolution from classical antiquity to the Middle Ages. He built a new imperial residence in the city of Byzantium, which was officially renamed New Rome, while also taking on the name Constantinople in his honour. It subsequently served as the capital of the empire for more than a thousand years—with the Eastern Roman Empire for most of that period commonly referred to retrospectively as the Byzantine Empire in English. In leaving the empire to his sons and other members of the Constantinian dynasty, Constantine's immediate political legacy was the replacement of Diocletian's Tetrarchy with the principle of dynastic succession. His memory was held in high regard during the lifetime of his children and for centuries after his reign. The medieval church held him up as a paragon of virtue, while secular rulers invoked him as a symbol of imperial legitimacy. The rediscovery of anti-Constantinian sources in the early Renaissance engendered more critical appraisals of his reign, with modern and contemporary scholarship often seeking to balance the extremes of earlier accounts.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constantine_the_Great


Use of “Camelot” in a sentence

Many historians contrast the perceived elegance and idealism of the “Camelot” era with the political turbulence and social change that marked the late 1960s in the United States.

Despite the tragic end of Kennedy’s presidency, the “Camelot” myth endures, continuing to shape our collective memory of his time in office.

https://politicaldictionary.com/words/camelot/


In 306, the Roman Emperor Constantius Chlorus died while campaigning against the Picts beyond Hadrian's Wall. He was succeeded by his son, Flavius Valerius Aurelius Constantinus, known more commonly as Constantine I or Constantine the Great. He was declared emperor in Eboracum, capital of the province of Britannia Secunda, known today as York. Most of the Empire's provinces accepted his rule.

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/statue-of-constantine-the-great


British Israelism (also called Anglo-Israelism) is a pseudo-historical[1][2] belief that the people of Great Britain are "genetically, racially, and linguistically the direct descendants" of the Ten Lost Tribes of ancient Israel.[3] With roots in the 16th century, British Israelism was inspired by several 19th century English writings such as John Wilson's 1840 Our Israelitish Origin.[4] From the 1870s onward, numerous independent British Israelite organizations were set up throughout the British Empire as well as in the United States; as of the early 21st century, a number of these organizations are still active. In the United States, the idea gave rise to the Christian Identity movement.


The central tenets of British Israelism have been refuted by archaeological,[5] ethnological,[6] genetic,[7]: 181 and linguistic research.[8][9]: 33–34

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Israelism


JAMES II (16 Oct 1430 - 3 Aug 1460) reigned as King of Scots from 1437 on. He was the son of King James I and Joan Beaufort. Nothing is known of his early life, but by his first birthday his twin and only brother, Alexander, who was also the older twin, had died, thus making James the heir apparent and Duke of Rothesay. On 21 February 1437, James I was assassinated and the six-year-old Duke of Rothesay immediately succeeded him as James II. In 1449, nineteen-year-old James married fifteen-year-old Mary of Guelders, daughter of the Duke of Gelderland. She bore him seven children, six of whom survived into adulthood. Subsequently, the relations between Flanders and Scotland improved. James's nickname, Fiery Face, referred to a conspicuous vermilion birthmark on his face which appears to have been deemed by contemporaries an outward sign of a fiery temper.

http://hausegenealogy.com/stuart.html


John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute (1713-1792)

The main influence on the education and early reign of George III, John Stuart, Earl of Bute, was briefly prime minister in the 1760s and quickly became one of the most vilified men in the British world. Burned in effigy (often represented by a jackboot) from London to Virginia, the Scottish Lord Bute was a powerful symbol of pervasive fears that hidden forces behind the throne were bent on corrupting the British constitution.


Bute was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, on May 25, 1713, the oldest son of James, 2nd Earl of Bute, and Lady Anne Campbell, the daughter of the 1st Duke of Argyll. He was educated at Eton College and the University of Leiden. In 1737 Bute was elected one of the 16 Scottish representative peers in the House of Lords, but he rarely attended its sessions. He left Scotland for London in 1745 shortly after the outbreak of the Jacobite rebellion. There he became close to Frederick, the Prince of Wales, who was at the center of the political opposition to George II (Frederick's father). After Frederick's death in 1751, Bute became principal tutor to his oldest son, who would become George III.


It would be difficult to overstate Bute's influence on George III. Bute designed the curriculum that shaped the future king's thoughts on history, law, and politics, relying heavily on works such as a manuscript version of William Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England (not published until 1765) and Henry St. John Bolingbroke's The Idea of the Patriot King (1740). Bolingbroke's idealistic and highly flawed work largely ignores the practical challenges posed by the British constitution and its recent history, but it framed George III's perspective on his broader role as king. Bolingbroke stressed that a king's decisions should be guided by the interests of the nation, without regard to the politics of the day, and a king should choose ministers for their moral virtue rather than more mundane characteristics such as their ability to maintain a majority in the House of Commons. Bute's education plan for the future king led to an unsuccessful attempt in 1752 by Horace Walpole and other Whig leaders to have him removed from the position.


Walpole's fears proved well-founded when George III became king on October 25, 1760, and enacted ideas which resulted in an almost complete transformation — and destabilization — of British politics. It took only two days for George III to appoint Bute to the Privy Council; five months later Bute was named Secretary of State for the Northern Department. His rapid elevation caused confusion in the Cabinet, especially among William Pitt and his ministerial colleagues, who were focused on vigorously prosecuting the Seven Years War against France. The growing divide between Pitt and Bute reached a crisis point over strategy against Spain and over the terms of peace with France (the King and Bute wanted a quick end to the conflict, rather than a comprehensive one). Pitt consequently lost his hold over the Cabinet and resigned his office on October 5, 1761. Pitt's successor, the Duke of Newcastle, followed suit on May 26, 1762, over a dispute with the King and the isolationist Bute about whether to continue a subsidy to Prussia. The very next day, the King seized this opportunity and appointed Bute as First Lord of the Treasury and prime minister. Bute's 317 days at the head of the government would be among the most tumultuous of the century and lay much of the groundwork for the constitutional disputes which culminated in the American War for Independence.


Bute was immediately blasted by the London press as a conniving Scot and a Jacobite-leaning Tory who cared nothing for protecting the British constitution and its hard-won victories in the costly war. The Treaty of Paris that ended the Seven Years War was largely Bute's handiwork — and however skillfully negotiated and advantageous it was to Britain in hindsight, at the time it was derided by leaders such as Pitt and quickly turned into a political disaster for Bute. With the enormously popular Pitt now in opposition, the treaty became rich fodder for political writers such as John Wilkes. Wilkes' North Briton was launched specifically to attack Bute and the peace, and its writings helped establish the theme of constitutional corruption that fueled the political fears of radical Whigs in America and Britain. By the spring of 1763, Bute was the most hated man on both sides of the Atlantic and was attacked — often physically — almost everywhere he went. His decision to impose a cider tax in England led to widespread rioting. He also wanted to tax Americans to raise further revenue to pay for a permanent British army presence in the colonies (the Sugar Act and Stamp Act were eventually put forward by Bute's protégé and successor as Prime Minister, George Grenville).


Recognizing that his continuation in office would only make matters worse for the government, Bute resigned on April 8, 1763, and claimed to withdraw from political life. Rumors soon circulated that he remained George III's chief advisor, perhaps more influential out of office than he was in it. Considerable damage was done to British political culture when the rumors turned out to be true. Grenville demanded Bute's removal from the King's court, and the situation sparked rampant speculation that ministerial policies were the product of an unconstitutional conspiracy surrounding the throne. Pitt's return to office in 1766 effectively ended Bute's relationship with the King, although the myth that the constitution was being actively undermined by secret forces would taint transatlantic politics throughout the American Revolution, and Bute would remain a symbol of that corruption in satirical prints through the 1780s.


Except for a trip to Italy, Bute spent his long retirement from public life at his estate in Hampshire and used his considerable wealth to support Scotland's universities, including several endowed chairs at the University of Edinburgh. He also wrote a number of works on botany. One of his sons, Charles Stuart, fought for Britain in the American War for Independence from 1775 to 1779, eventually commanding the 26th Regiment of Foot. Bute died in London on March 10, 1792, and is buried in Rothesay on the Isle of Bute.

https://www.ouramericanrevolution.org/index.cfm/people/view/pp0049


Georgetown University is a private Jesuit research university in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C., United States. Founded by Bishop John Carroll in 1789,[d] it is the oldest Catholic institution of higher education in the United States, the oldest university in Washington, D.C.,[e] and the nation's first federally chartered university.


The university has eleven undergraduate and graduate schools. Georgetown's main campus is on a hill above the Potomac River and identifiable by Healy Hall, a National Historic Landmark. It is classified among R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity and its undergraduate admissions is considered highly selective. The university offers degree programs in forty-eight disciplines, enrolling an average of 7,500 undergraduate and 10,000 graduate students from more than 135 countries. The school's athletic teams are nicknamed the Hoyas and include a men's basketball team, which is a member of the Big East Conference.


Notable alumni include 32 Rhodes Scholars, 46 Marshall Scholars, 33 Truman Scholars, 543 Fulbright Scholars, 9 living billionaires, 25 U.S. governors, 2 U.S. Supreme Court justices, 2 U.S. presidents, more than 450 members of United States Congress, as well as international royalty and more than a dozen foreign heads of state. Georgetown has educated more U.S. diplomats than any other university, as well as many American politicians and civil servants.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgetown_University


Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time is a work of history written by former Georgetown University professor and historian Carroll Quigley. The book covers the period of roughly 1880 to 1963 and is multidisciplinary in nature though perhaps focusing on the economic problems brought about by the First World War and the impact these had on subsequent events. While global in scope, the book focuses on Western civilization.


The book has attracted the attention of those interested in geopolitics due to Quigley's assertion that a secret society initially led by Cecil Rhodes, Alfred Milner and others had considerable influence over British and American foreign policy in the first half of the twentieth century. From 1909 to 1913, Milner organized the outer ring of this society as the semi-secret Round Table groups.[1]


The book is written based on archived files from the Council on Foreign Relations.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_and_Hope


The President William Jefferson Clinton Birthplace Home National Historic Site is located in HOPE, Arkansas.[2] Built in 1917 by Dr. H. S. Garrett, in this house the 42nd president of the United States, Bill Clinton, spent the first four years of his life, having been born on August 19, 1946, at Julia Chester Hospital in HOPE, Arkansas.[3][4] The house was owned by Clinton's maternal grandparents, Edith Grisham and James Eldridge Cassidy, and they cared for him when his mother, Virginia, was away working as an anesthetist in New Orleans.[5]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_William_Jefferson_Clinton_Birthplace_Home_National_Historic_Site


It was while investigating the Little Rock integration incident in 1957 that I first learned of Pike’s rapid advance in Freemasonry, and knowing that Weishaupt, using Thomas Jefferson and Moses Holbrook, had infiltrated Illuminists into the Masonic Lodges of America, I decided I would find out if the fact that Pike’s mansion in Little Rock had thirteen rooms had any significance. “Thirteen’ figures prominently in Satanic, Luciferian and Cabalistic rituals, codes, and writings, etc. My investigations produced documentary evidence to show that, because of Pike’s exceptional mental ability, he came under the notice of professors in Harvard who were members of the Illuminati, who developed in his mind the ‘idea that a One World Government, a One World Religion and a One World financial and economic system was the ONLY solution to the world’s many and varied problems. I next discovered that his departure from Harvard was not due to lack of finances, or because of a misunderstanding with the faculty over tuition fees, but because of his ‘radical’ ideas and teachings. When he returned home determined that he would ‘fight’ his way to the top despite all opposition, he was in a suitable frame of mind to be recruited as a ‘Minerval’ or ‘apprentice’ into the lower degrees of the Illuminati."

Satan Prince of This World

by William Guy Carr

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Hw94yTrcRzvZjNQOo8T5_w-jqL8v5IMu/view


Early life and education

Harris's childhood home at 1227 Bancroft Way in Berkeley, August 2020

Kamala Devi Harris[a] was born in Oakland, California,[3] on October 20, 1964.[4] Her mother, Shyamala Gopalan (1938–2009), was a biologist who arrived in the United States from India in 1958 to enroll in graduate school in endocrinology at the University of California, Berkeley. A research career of over 40 years followed, during which her work on the progesterone receptor gene led to advances in breast cancer research.[5] Kamala's father, Donald J. Harris (1938–),[6] is an Afro-Jamaican who immigrated to the United States in 1961 and also enrolled in UC Berkeley, specializing in development economics. The first Black scholar to be granted tenure at Stanford University's economics department, he has emeritus status there.[7] Kamala's parents met in 1962 and married in 1963.[8]


The Harris family lived in Berkeley until they moved in 1966, around Kamala's second birthday. The Harrises lived for a few years in college towns in the MIDWEST where her parents held teaching or research positions:[9] Urbana, Illinois (where her sister Maya was born in 1966); Evanston, Illinois; and Madison, Wisconsin.[b][10][9][11] By 1970, the marriage had faltered, and Shyamala moved back to Berkeley with her two daughters;[12][13][9] the couple divorced when Kamala was seven.[8] In 1972, Donald Harris accepted a position at Stanford University; Kamala and Maya spent weekends at their father's house in Palo Alto and lived at their mother's house in Berkeley during the week.[14] Shyamala was friends with African-American intellectuals and activists in Oakland and Berkeley.[11] In 1976, she accepted a research position at the McGill University School of Medicine, and moved with her daughters to Montreal, Quebec.[15][16] Kamala graduated from Westmount High School on Montreal Island in 1981.[17]


Early career

In 1990, Harris was hired as a deputy district attorney in Alameda County, California, where she was described as "an able prosecutor on the way up".[27] In 1994, Speaker of the California Assembly Willie BROWN, who was then dating Harris, appointed her to the state Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board and later to the California Medical Assistance Commission.[27] In February 1998, San Francisco district attorney Terence Hallinan recruited Harris as an assistant district attorney.[28] There, she became the chief of the Career Criminal Division, supervising five other attorneys, where she prosecuted homicide, burglary, robbery, and sexual assault cases—particularly three-strikes cases. In August 2000, Harris took a job at San Francisco City Hall, working for city attorney Louise Renne.[29] Harris ran the Family and Children's Services Division, representing child abuse and neglect cases. Renne endorsed Harris during her D.A. campaign.[30]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamala_Harris


Donald Jasper Harris, OM (born August 23, 1938) is a Jamaican-American economist and professor emeritus at Stanford University, known for applying post-Keynesian ideas to development economics.[1]


He is the father of US Vice President and current Democrat presidential nominee Kamala Harris and lawyer Maya Harris.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_J._Harris


Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump


Danney Lee Williams Jr. (born December 7, 1985) is a man from Little Rock, Arkansas who claims to be the biological son of Bill Clinton, the former President of the United States.[1] Blood tests ruled out Clinton as the father.[1][2]


Background

Williams was born in 1985 to Danney Williams Sr. and Bobbie Ann Williams.


The story came to notice in the late 1990s when reporting by Newsmax led by celebrity tabloid magazine Star to commission a paternity test prove whether Williams is actually Clinton's biological son.[3] Time magazine cited Star on July 18, 1999 to say that there was no match.[4]


The story was revived in 2016 before the 2016 presidential election and pushed by a number of media outlets including Newsmax, the Drudge Report,[3] as well as WorldNetDaily,[1] and the New York Daily News.[1]


Due to some uncertainties with the original test by Star, Snopes concluded that the claim was unproven.[3] The Washington Post stated that, while the test could not prove Clinton was the father, it did conclusively rule him out as the father.[1]


On October 19, 2016, Williams' lawyers announced their intentions to file a paternity suit to prove that Clinton's DNA matched Williams'.[5] Williams wrote to Monica Lewinsky asking for her dress in order to obtain a sample of Clinton's DNA. However, Lewinsky never replied to Williams.[6] A partial analysis of Clinton's blood, and thus his DNA, was already part of the public record because of the Lewinsky affair investigation.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danney_Williams


Early Female Transgender Identity after Prenatal Exposure to Diethylstilbestrol: Report from a French National Diethylstilbestrol (DES) Cohort

by Laura Gaspari 1,2,3,†,Marie-Odile Soyer-Gobillard 4,5,†ORCID,Scott Kerlin 6,Françoise Paris 1,2,3 andCharles Sultan 1,*

All DES sons who identified as transgender women underwent karyotyping at their local hospital at the moment of transition.

https://www.mdpi.com/2039-4713/14/1/10


Thomas Trace Beatie (born 1974[1]) is an American public speaker, author, and advocate of transgender rights and sexuality issues, with a focus on transgender fertility and reproductive rights.[2]


Beatie came out as a trans man in early 1997. Beatie had gender-affirming surgery in March 2002 and became known as "the pregnant man" after he became pregnant through artificial insemination in 2007.[3] Beatie chose to be pregnant, with donated sperm,[4][5] because his wife Nancy was sterile.


The couple filed for divorce in 2012. The Beatie case is the first of its kind on record, where a documented legal male gave birth within a marriage to a woman, and for the first time, a court challenged a marriage where the husband gave birth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Beatie


Tracing boards are painted or printed illustrations depicting the various emblems and symbols of Freemasonry. They can be used as teaching aids during the lectures that follow each of the Masonic Degrees, when an experienced member explains the various concepts of Freemasonry to new members. They can also be used by experienced members as reminders of the concepts they learned as they went through the ceremonies of the different masonic degrees.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracing_board


Exoteric Masonry, which is only the husks of the Mystic Order formed by the Sons of Cain has in modern times attracted the masculine element with its positively polarized physical vehicles, and educated them in industry and statecraft, thus controlling the material development of the world. The sons of Seth, constituting themselves the Priestcraft have worked their spell over the positive vital bodies of the feminine element to dominate the spiritual development. And whereas, the sons of Cain working through Freemasonry and kindred movements, have openly fought for the temporal power, the Priestcraft has fought as strenuously and perhaps more effectively, by stealth, to retain their monopoly upon the spiritual development of the feminine element. To the casual onlooker it would seem as if there were no decided antagonism between these two movements at the present time, but though Freemasonry of today is but a shell of its true ancient mystic self, and though Catholicism has been terribly tarnished by the touch of time, in that one thing there is no difference, the war is as keen as ever, the efforts of the Church are not concentrated upon the masses however as much as upon those who are seeking to live the higher life, so that they may gain admission to the Mystery Temple and learn how to make the Philosophers’ Stone. As mankind advances in evolution, the vital body becomes more permanently positively polarized giving to both sexes a greater desire for spirituality, and though we change from the masculine to feminine in alternate embodiment, positive polarity of the vital body is becoming more pronounced regardless of sex, and this accounts for the growing tendency towards Altruism which is even being brought out by the suffering entailed by the great war we are now fighting, for all agree that they are seeking to obtain a lasting peace where the swords may be made into plowshares, and the spears into pruning hooks. In the past humanity has been claiming universal brotherhood as a great ideal, but we must come closer than that to be in full accord with the Christ. He said to his Disciples “ye are my friends.” Among brothers and sisters hate and enmity may exist, but friendship is the expression of love and cannot exist apart from that. This is therefore the magic word which will eventually level all distinctions, bring peace upon earth and goodwill among men. This is the great Ideal proclaimed by the Rosicrucian Fellowship, an Ideal which points the shortest way to the New Heaven and the New Earth, where the sons of Cain and the sons of Seth will eventually be united.

FREEMASONRY AND CATHOLICISM

by MAX HEINDEL

https://dn720206.ca.archive.org/0/items/freemasonryandca017137mbp/freemasonryandca017137mbp.pdf


“Rosa Jesuitica, oder Jesuitische Rottgesellen, das ist, Eine Frag ob die Zween Orden, der ganandten Ritter von der Neerscharen Jesu, und der Rosen-Creuzer ein einiger Ordensen: per J. P. D. a S. Jesuitarum Protectorum. Prague, 1620.” (4to). This is a truly curious tract upon the “relations of the Jesuits and the Rosicrucians."

Rosa jesuitica, oder, Jesuitische Rottgesellen (1620) - Google Drive

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1dT28PyPUPfqDfC0iVg7nGFsle8vYBXLf/view


The Democratic-Republican Party splintered in 1824 into the short-lived National Republican Party and the Jacksonian movement which in 1828 became the Democratic Party. Under the Jacksonian era, the term "The Democracy" was in use by the party, but the name "Democratic Party" was eventually settled upon[123] and became the official name in 1844.[124] Members of the party are called "Democrats" or "Dems".


The most common mascot symbol for the party has been the donkey, or jackass.[125] Andrew Jackson's enemies twisted his name to "jackass" as a term of ridicule regarding a stupid and stubborn animal. However, the Democrats liked the common-man implications and picked it up too, therefore the image persisted and evolved.[126] Its most lasting impression came from the cartoons of Thomas Nast from 1870 in Harper's Weekly. Cartoonists followed Nast and used the donkey to represent the Democrats and the elephant to represent the Republicans.


In the early 20th century, the traditional symbol of the Democratic Party in Indiana, Kentucky, Oklahoma and Ohio was the rooster, as opposed to the Republican eagle.[129] The rooster was also adopted as an official symbol of the national Democratic Party.[130] In 1904, the Alabama Democratic Party chose, as the logo to put on its ballots, a rooster with the motto "White supremacy – For the right."[131] The words "White supremacy" were replaced with "Democrats" in 1966.[132][127] In 1996, the Alabama Democratic Party dropped the rooster, citing racist and white supremacist connotations linked with the symbol.[128] The rooster symbol still appears on Oklahoma, Kentucky, Indiana, and West Virginia ballots.[129] In New York, the Democratic ballot symbol is a five-pointed star.[133]


Although both major political parties (and many minor ones) use the traditional American colors of red, white, and blue in their marketing and representations, since election night 2000 blue has become the identifying color for the Democratic Party while red has become the identifying color for the Republican Party. That night, for the first time all major broadcast television networks used the same color scheme for the electoral map: blue states for Al Gore (Democratic nominee) and red states for George W. Bush (Republican nominee). Since then, the color blue has been widely used by the media to represent the party. This is contrary to common practice outside of the United States where blue is the traditional color of the right and red the color of the left.[134]


In 2025, a new logo was introduced, which incorporates a white donkey facing to the right instead of the left, with three blue stars in the center instead of four, on a blue background. The modified donkey design has been characterized by some as resembling a piñata.[135]


Jefferson-Jackson Day is the annual fundraising event (dinner) held by Democratic Party organizations across the United States.[136] It is named after Presidents Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson, whom the party regards as its distinguished early leaders.


The song "Happy Days Are Here Again" is the unofficial song of the Democratic Party. It was used prominently when Franklin D. Roosevelt was nominated for president at the 1932 Democratic National Convention and remains a sentimental favorite for Democrats. For example, Paul Shaffer played the theme on the Late Show with David Letterman after the Democrats won Congress in 2006. "Don't Stop" by Fleetwood Mac was adopted by Bill Clinton's presidential campaign in 1992 and has endured as a popular Democratic song. The emotionally similar song "Beautiful Day" by the band U2 has also become a favorite theme song for Democratic candidates. John Kerry used the song during his 2004 presidential campaign and several Democratic congressional candidates used it as a celebratory tune in 2006.[137][138]


As a traditional anthem for its presidential nominating convention, Aaron Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man" is traditionally performed at the beginning of the Democratic National Convention.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Party_(United_States)


Presidential elections are scheduled to be held in the United States on November 7, 2028, to elect the president and vice president of the United States for a term of four years.


In the 2024 elections, the Republican Party gained a majority of seats in the House of Representatives and Senate. Incumbent president Donald Trump won a non-consecutive second term; per the limits set by the 22nd Amendment, he is constitutionally barred from being elected president again.[1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2028_United_States_presidential_election


Raphael Gamaliel Warnock[1] (/ˈrɑːfiɛl ˈwɔːrnɒk/ RAH-fee-el WOR-nok; born July 23, 1969) is an American politician and Baptist pastor serving as the junior United States senator from Georgia, a seat he has held since 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, Warnock has been the senior pastor of Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church since 2005.[2][3]


Warnock was the senior pastor of Douglas Memorial Community Church from 2001 to 2005.[4] He came to prominence in Georgia politics as a leading activist in the campaign to expand Medicaid in the state under the Affordable Care Act. He was the Democratic nominee in the 2020 United States Senate special election in Georgia, defeating incumbent Republican Kelly Loeffler in a runoff election.[5]


Warnock and Jon Ossoff are the first Democrats elected to the U.S. Senate from Georgia since Zell Miller in 2000.[6][7] Their elections were critical in securing a 50–50 Senate majority for Democrats, with Vice President Kamala Harris serving as the tie-breaking vote.[8] Warnock was a reliable supporter of Joe Biden's legislative efforts during his presidency.[9][10] He was reelected to a full term in 2022, defeating Republican nominee Herschel Walker.


Warnock is the first African American to represent Georgia in the Senate, the first Black Democrat elected to the Senate from a Southern state, and the second black U.S. Senator directly elected from a Southern state, after Tim Scott.[11][12][13]


Early life and education

Warnock was born in Savannah, Georgia, on July 23, 1969.[14] He grew up in public housing as the eleventh of twelve children born to Verlene and Jonathan Warnock, both Pentecostal pastors.[15][16] His father served in the U.S. Army during World War II, where he learned automobile mechanics and welding, and subsequently opened a small car restoration business where he restored junked cars for resale.[17] His mother picked cotton and tobacco in the summers in Waycross, Georgia, as a teenager and became a pastor.[18]


Warnock graduated from Sol C. Johnson High School in 1987,[19] and having wanted to follow in the footsteps of Martin Luther King Jr., attended Morehouse College, from which he graduated cum laude in 1991 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology.[20][21] He credits his participation in the Upward Bound program for making him college-ready, as he was able to enroll in early college courses through Savannah State University.[19][21] He then earned Master of Divinity, Master of Philosophy, and Doctor of Philosophy degrees from Union Theological Seminary, a school affiliated with Columbia University.[22][23][17]


Religious work


Warnock with John Lewis at a "Souls to the Polls" event. Warnock later officiated Lewis's funeral at Ebenezer Baptist Church.[24]

Warnock began his ministry as an intern and licentiate at the Sixth Avenue Baptist church in Birmingham, Alabama,[25] under the civil rights movement leader John Thomas Porter.[25][26] In the 1990s, he served as youth pastor and then assistant pastor at Abyssinian Baptist Church in New York.[27][28] While Warnock was pastor at Abyssinian, the church declined to hire workfare recipients as part of organized opposition to then-mayor Rudy Giuliani's workfare program.[29] The church also hosted Fidel Castro on October 22, 1995, while Warnock was youth pastor. There is no evidence Warnock was involved in that decision. During the 2020–21 United States Senate special election in Georgia, his campaign refused to say whether Warnock attended the event.[30]


In January 2001, Warnock was elected senior pastor of Douglas Memorial Community Church in Baltimore, Maryland.[31][32] He and an assistant minister were arrested and charged with obstructing a 2002 police investigation into suspected child abuse at a summer camp run by the church. The police report called Warnock "extremely uncooperative and disruptive". Warnock had demanded that the counselors have lawyers present when being interviewed by police.[33] The charges were later dropped with the deputy state's attorney's acknowledgment that it had been a "miscommunication", adding that Warnock had aided the investigation and that prosecution would be a waste of resources.[34][35] Warnock said he was merely asserting that lawyers should be present during the interviews[36] and that he had intervened to ensure that an adult was present while a juvenile suspect was being questioned.[37] Warnock stepped down as the church's senior pastor in 2005.[4]


On Father's Day 2005, Warnock was named senior pastor of the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, Martin Luther King Jr.'s former congregation;[38] he is the fifth and the youngest person to serve as Ebenezer's senior pastor since its founding.[19][39][40] He has continued in the post while serving in the Senate.[41][42]


As pastor, Warnock advocated for clemency for Troy Davis, who was executed in 2011.[43] In 2013, he delivered the benediction at the public prayer service at the second inauguration of Barack Obama.[44] After Fidel Castro died in 2016, Warnock told his church to pray for the Cuban people, calling Castro's legacy "complex, kind of like America's legacy is complex".[30] In March 2019, Warnock hosted an interfaith meeting on climate change at his church, featuring Al Gore and William Barber II.[45] He presided at Representative John Lewis's funeral at Ebenezer Church in July 2020.[46][24]


On Easter Sunday 2021, Warnock's Twitter account tweeted, "The meaning of Easter is more transcendent than the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Whether you are a Christian or not, through a commitment to helping others we are able to save ourselves." Some conservative Christians and political commentators criticized the tweet, including Benjamin Watson, Allie Beth Stuckey, and Jenna Ellis, who called it "heretical". The tweet was deleted that afternoon, with a spokesperson for Warnock saying, "the tweet was posted by staff and was not approved" but declining to say whether it reflected Warnock's beliefs.[47][48]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raphael_Warnock


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.


Biography

Early life

Sako was born in the city of Zakho, Iraq, on 4 July 1948.[2] He comes from an ethnic Assyrian family of the Chaldean Catholic Church that has roots in a religious community that has had a presence in the city of his birth since the 5th century AD.[3]


He completed his early studies in Mosul and then attended the Dominican-run Saint Jean’s Seminary there. He was ordained a priest on 1 June 1974 and filled his first pastoral assignment at the Cathedral of Mosul until 1979. He then earned a doctorate in Eastern patrology at the Pontifical Oriental Institute. When denied a license to teach because he was only qualified for religious instruction, he earned a second doctorate in history from the Sorbonne in Paris.[4] With this he secured his teaching license and was able to provide religious instruction. From 1997 to 2002 he was rector of the Patriarchal Seminary in Baghdad. He then returned to Mosul and guided the parish of Perpetual Help for a year.[5][6]


Sako speaks Neo-Aramaic, German, French, English, Italian, Kurdish and Arabic.[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


What is the Feast of Tabernacles / Booths / Sukkot?

Answer


The Feast of Tabernacles, also known as the Feast of Booths and Sukkot, is the seventh and last feast that the Lord commanded Israel to observe and one of the three feasts that Jews were to observe each year by going to “appear before the Lord your God in the place which He shall choose” (Deuteronomy 16:16). The importance of the Feast of Tabernacles can be seen in how many places it is mentioned in Scripture. In the Bible we see many important events that took place at the time of the Feast of Tabernacles. For one thing, it was at this time that Solomon’s Temple was dedicated to the Lord (1 Kings 8:2).


It was at the Feast of Tabernacles that the Israelites, who had returned to rebuild the temple, gathered to celebrate under the leadership of Joshua and Zerubbabel (Ezra 3). Later, the Jews heard Ezra read the Word of God to them during the Feast of Tabernacles (Nehemiah 8). Ezra’s preaching resulted in a great revival as the Israelites confessed and repented of their sins. It was also during this Feast that Jesus said, “anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them” (John 7:37–38).


The Feast of Tabernacles takes place on the 15th of the Hebrew month Tishri. This was the seventh month on the Hebrew calendar and usually occurs in late September to mid-October. The feast begins five days after the Day of Atonement and at the time the fall harvest had just been completed. It was a time of joyous celebration as the Israelites celebrated God’s continued provision for them in the current harvest and remembered His provision and protection during the 40 years in the wilderness.


As one of the three feasts that all “native born” male Jews were commanded to participate in, the Feast of Tabernacles is mentioned multiple times in Scripture, sometimes called the Feast of the Ingathering, the Feast to the Lord, or the Feast of Booths (Exodus 23:16; Deuteronomy 16:13). As one of the pilgrim feasts (when Jewish males were commanded to go to Jerusalem), it was also the time when they brought their tithes and offerings to the Temple (Deuteronomy 16:16). With the influx of people coming to Jerusalem at that time, we can only imagine what the scene must have been like. Thousands upon thousands of people coming together to remember and celebrate God’s deliverance and His provision, all living in temporary shelters or booths as part of the requirements of the feast. During the eight-day period, so many sacrifices were made that it required all twenty-four divisions of priests to be present to assist in the sacrificial duties.


We find God’s instructions for celebrating the Feast of Tabernacles in Leviticus 23, given at a point in history right after God had delivered Israel from bondage in Egypt. The feast was to be celebrated each year on “the fifteenth day of this seventh month” and was to run for seven days (Leviticus 23:34). Like all feasts, it begins with a “holy convocation” or Sabbath day when the Israelites were to stop working to set aside the day for worshiping God. On each day of the feast they were to offer an “offering made by fire to the Lord” and then after seven days of feasting, again the eighth day was to be “a holy convocation” when they were to cease from work and offer another sacrifice to God (Leviticus 23). Lasting eight days, the Feast of Tabernacles begins and ends with a Sabbath day of rest. During the eight days of the feast, the Israelites would dwell in booths or tabernacles that were made from the branches of trees (Leviticus 23:40–42).


The Feast of Tabernacles, like all the feasts, was instituted by God as a way of reminding Israelites in every generation of their deliverance by God from Egypt. Of course, the feasts are also significant in that they foreshadow the work and actions of the coming Messiah. Much of Jesus’ public ministry took place in conjunction with the Holy Feasts set forth by God.


The three pilgrim feasts where all Jewish males were commanded to “appear before the Lord in the place he chooses” are each very important in regards to the life of Christ and His work of redemption. We know with certainty that the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread are symbolic of Christ’s atoning sacrifice on the cross. Likewise, we know that Pentecost, which marked the beginning of the Feast of Weeks, was the time of Jesus’ bodily ascension. And most scholars would agree that the Feast of Tabernacles is symbolic of Christ’s second coming when He will establish His earthly kingdom.


There are also some who believe that it was likely during the Feast of Tabernacles that Jesus was born. While we celebrate Christ’s birth on December 25, most scholars acknowledge that this tradition was begun in the fourth century AD by the Roman Catholic Church and that the exact day of Jesus’ birth is unknown. Some of the evidence that Jesus might have been born earlier in the year during the Feast of the Tabernacles includes the fact that it would be unlikely for shepherds to still be in the field with their sheep in December, which is in the middle of the winter, but it would have been likely they were in the fields tending sheep at the time of the Feast of Tabernacles. The strong possibility that Jesus was born at the time of the Feast of Tabernacles is also seen in the words John wrote in John 1:14. “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth” (NKJV). The Greek word translated as “dwelt” here is literally the word for “tabernacle”; Jesus “tabernacled“ with us.


Some believe it is very likely that John intentionally used this word to associate the first coming of Christ with the Feast of Tabernacles. Christ came in the flesh to dwell among us for a temporary time when He was born in the manger, and He is coming again to dwell among us as Lord of Lords. While it cannot be established with certainty that Jesus was born during the Feast of Tabernacles, some believe there is a strong possibility the Feast of Tabernacles not only looks forward to His second coming but also reflects back on His first coming.


The Feast of Tabernacles begins and ends with a special Sabbath day of rest. During the days of the feast, all Israelites were to dwell in booths to remind them that God had delivered them out of the land of Egypt, and to look forward to the coming Messiah who would deliver His people from the bondage of sin. This feast, like all of the feasts of Israel, consistently reminded the Jews of God’s provision, protection, and lovingkindness. As we study the feasts today, we should let them remind us of God’s faithfulness and care. Jesus has accomplished so much for us—He is our all in all—and He has promised to come again. We long for the Promised Land (heaven) and to see our Savior face to face. Our hearts long for the time when our redemption will be complete and Jesus Christ once again “tabernacles” among us.

https://www.gotquestions.org/Feast-of-Tabernacles.html


Revelation 12:9-18

1599 Geneva Bible

9 And the great dragon that old serpent, called the devil and Satan, was cast out, which deceiveth all the world: he was even cast into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.


10 Then I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, [a]Now is salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night.


11 But they overcame him by that blood of that Lamb, and by that word of their testimony, and they [b]loved not their lives unto the death.


12 Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the inhabitants of the earth, and of the sea: for the devil is come down unto you, which hath great wrath, knowing that he hath but a short time.


13 And when [c]the dragon saw that he was cast unto the earth, he persecuted the woman which had brought forth the man child.


14 [d]But to the woman were given two wings of a great Eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her [e]place where she is nourished for a [f]time, and times, and half a time, from the presence of the serpent.


15 [g]And the serpent cast out of his mouth water after the woman, like a flood, that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood,


16 [h]But the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed up the flood, which the dragon had cast out of his mouth.


17 [i]Then the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went and made war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.


18 [j]And I stood on the sea sand.


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Footnotes

Revelation 12:10 The song of victory or triumph containing first, a proposition of the glory of God and of Christ showed in that victory: secondly, it containeth a reason of the same proposition taken from the effects, as that the enemy is overcome in battle in this verse, and that the godly are made conquerors (and more than conquerors, Rom. 8:37) verse 11. Thirdly, a conclusion wherein is an exhortation unto the Angels, and the Saints, and unto the world, a prophecy of great misery, and of destruction procured by the devil against mankind, lest himself should shortly be miserable alone, verse 12.

Revelation 12:11 He is said in the Hebrew tongue, to love his life that esteemeth nothing more precious than his life: and on the other side, he is said not to love his life, who doubteth not to hazard it, wheresoever need requireth.

Revelation 12:13 The third part: an history of the woman delivered, consisting of two members, the second battle of Satan against the Christian Church of the Jewish nation, in four verses: and the battle intended against the seed thereof, that is against the Church of the Gentiles, which is called holy, by reason of the Gospel of Christ in the two last verses.

Revelation 12:14 That is, being strengthened with divine power: and taught by oracle, she fled swiftly from the assault of the devil, and from the common destruction of Jerusalem, and went into a solitary City beyond Jordan called Pella, as Eusebius telleth in the first Chapter of the third book of his Ecclesiastical history, which place God had commanded her by Revelation.

Revelation 12:14 Into that place where God had appointed her.

Revelation 12:14 That is, for three years and a half: so the same speech is taken, Dan. 7:15. This space of time is reckoned in manner from that last and most grievous rebellion of the Jews, unto the destruction of the city and Temple, for their destrution or falling away, began in the twelfth year of Nero, before the beginning whereof, many foresigns and predictions were showed from heaven, as Josephus writeth, lib. 7, chap. 12, and Hegesippus, lib. 5, chap. 44, amongst which this is very memorable, that in the feast of Pentecost, not only a great sound and noise was heard in the Temple, but also a great voice was heard of many out of the Sanctuary which cried out to all, Let us depart hence. Now three years and a half after this defection was begun of the Jews, and those wonders happened, the City was taken by force, the Temple overthrown, and the place forsaken of God: and this compass of time Saint John noted in this place.

Revelation 12:15 That is, he inflamed the Romans and the nations, that they persecuting the Jewish people with cruel arms might by the same occasion invade the Church of Christ, now departed from Jerusalem and out of Judea. For it is an usual thing in Scripture that the raging tumults of the nations, should be compared unto waters.

Revelation 12:16 That is, there was offered in their place other Jews, unto the Romans and nations raging against that people: and it came to pass thereby that the Church of God was saved whole from that violence, that most raging flood of persecution which the Dragon vomited out being altogether spent in the destruction of those other Jews.

Revelation 12:17 Being set on fire by this means, he began to be more mad, and because he perceived that his purpose against the Christian Church of the Jewish remnant was come to nought, he resolved to fall upon her seed, that is, the Church gathered also by God of the Gentiles, and the holy members of the same. And this is that other branch, as I said upon verse 13, in which the purpose of Satan is showed, verse 17, and his attempt, verse 18.

Revelation 12:18 That is, a most mighty tempest, that he rushed upon the whole world (whose prince he is) to raise the floods and provoke the nations, that they might with their furious bellows toss up and down, drive here and there, and finally destroy the Church of Christ with the holy members of the same. But the providence of God resisted his attempt, that he might favor the Church of the Gentiles, yet tender and as it were green. The rest of the story of the Dragon is excellently prosecuted by the Apostle S. John hereafter in the twentieth chapter. For here the Dragon endeavoring to do mischief, was by God cast into prison.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2012%3A9-18&version=GNV


THE MARK OF CAIN

“The mark of Cain is stamped upon our foreheads.

Across the centuries, our brother Abel has lain in blood

which we drew, and shed tears we caused by forgetting Thy

love.”

—Pope John X X I I I , A Prayer (1960),

cited in VICARS OF CHRIST

WE LIVE IN T H E N ew World Order, just as people under

Augustus Caesar did. Not a future thing to be feared or

avoided, the New World Order is a present reality to be

identified, understood, and dealt with in a way most pleasing to

God. It was God, after all, who established the New World Order.

We can read about it in the Bible. In fact, the Bible is the only

record we have that publicly and truthfully sets forth the essentials

of the Order’s origins and development through time.

The Bible records the great decisive events in the progress of

human life up to the close of the first century A D . Creation of earth

and the fullness thereof, creation of man and woman, their turning

away from God, the first conception, the first birth, the first

sacrifice, the first murder, the first insignia, the first city, the first

and only great flood, the surviving family and its peculiar relationship

through time with God – all of this momentous data is given

in the Bible with a stark truthfulness that is invariably supported,

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often to the surprise of many, by the results of scientific inquiry.

The writers of the Bible, Israelite prophets inspired by their God

Yahweh, held no monopoly on reporting these events. Priests of

other nations reported them, too. But in doing so, they cunningly

adapted them to fit prevailing administrative needs. The result of

their adaptations is what we call mythology.

One very persistent myth, based on a crucial event accounted

for in the Bible, explained to people under Babylonian rulership

the divine origin of their government. This was the myth of Marduk.

1

The myth of Marduk begins

with Annu, “the head deity of

Babylonian mythology,”2 looking

down upon earth in dismay.

The land is in chaos, overrun

by flood-waters and monstrous

serpents. Annu senses that

bringing order to such chaos is

a job for Marduk, the first-born

son of the moon goddess Ea. So

Annu summons Marduk and

asks him to organize the earth.

Marduk agrees to the task, but

“only on the condition that he

be made first among the gods

and that his word shall have

the force of the decree of

A n n u . ” 3 Annu accepts Marduk’s

terms and vests him with “the powers and insignia of kingship

– and Marduk’s word was declared to have the authority of

Annu.” Armed with divine power, Marduk goes to earth and separates

dry land from sea. He polices the monsters, and any evildoer

foolish enough to oppose him receives the wrath of God.

The result of Marduk’s ordination was depicted in the Stele of

Naram-Sin, now in the Louvre. In this very ancient Babylonian

monument, A n n u is shown imbuing Naram-Sin (Enoch to the

Marduk policing the evildoer Tiamat w i t h thunderbolts. From a bas-relief on

the walls of the palace of the Assyrian king Assur-nasir-pal (9th century bc at

Calah, now in the British Museum). N o t e the repeated A n n u signature in the

sacred h em of Marduk’s garment. A n d the scythe under his left arm: is the artist

subtly revealing that Marduk was o n c e a farmer?

Hebrews) with power over a mass of other beings. Annu’s name,

seen in the tip of the stele, is the cuneiform symbol for “heaven,”

the double-cross, or

Marduk wears the A n n u signature like a cop with his badge. It

makes him a god. In fact, the ordination-of-power iconography of

ancient Babylonian nations was never without it. Even today (see

Appendix: “Fifty Centuries of the A n n u Signature”), we find it in

the flag of Great Britain, said to be the union of St. Andrew’s Scottish

cross and St. George’s English cross. We find it prominently

displayed in the decor of government buildings, especially courtrooms.

It forms the motif for much of the decorative architecture

of the U.S. Supreme Court Building, interior and exterior. The

pavement surrounding the Obelisk of Caligula in St. Peter’s Piazza,

where the multitudes stand to receive papal edicts and blessings,

is inlaid with a gigantic A n n u signature. No doubt about it: a

very ancient symbol has remained consistently identified with the

presence of rulership. Could it be that a symbol of so much power

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is based on a myth? Or is it based on the fact from which the myth

sprang?

THE sensitive Bible-reader immediately sees in the myth of Marduk

a missionary adaptation of the biblical account of Cain.

The two protagonists are remarkably similar. Both C a i n and Marduk

were firstborn sons of mothers bearing almost the same name:

Marduk, son of Ea; Cain, son of Eve. Both firstborns were appointed

to rule over evil, albeit for different reasons: Marduk because of

his heroism, C a i n because of his own wickedness.4 So that they

might move effectively among evildoers, both were given protective

seals of immunity by the God of Heaven. God said to Cain,

Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken

on him sevenfold. And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, lest any

finding him should kill him.5

In Marduk’s case, the evildoers were chaotic beings ruining

Annu’s earth. Cain’s evildoers were persons who might slay him

because he had become a homeless trespasser. The Bible details

exactly why C a i n became homeless. His farm refused to yield harvests

because he had defiled the soil with the blood of his brother.

C a i n “rose up against Abel his brother and slew him.” We’re not

told why. It may have been jealous rage, and it may not. Nothing

in Scripture indicates that Cain hated Abel. The most we know of

their relationship is that “Cain talked with his brother,” and afterward,

in a field, murdered him.6 Nor are we given details of the

murder, except that it was bloody.7 The blood is an important clue

as to motive.

We know that C a i n was first crestfallen then angry at God for

preferring Abel’s sacrifice to his own.8 Abel, the shepherd, sacrificed

lambs from his flock.9 Cain, the farmer, apparently thinking

sacrifice was about returning the best of his productivity to God,

sacrificed the best of his harvest. God found Cain’s sacrifice offensive

and Abel’s pleasing.1 0 Elsewhere in Scripture we learn why. It

involves a principle that is very difficult for many of us to comprehend.

The principle is this: without shedding of blood there is no

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remission of sin.11 Abel pleased God because he shed blood, the

blood of sacrificial animals.

The great teaching of the Bible is that the death sentence

mankind has inherited from the original breaking of God’s Law by

Cain’s parents (“Thou shalt not eat of the fruit...”) is pardonable

only by death, by the extreme act of shedding blood fatally. This

teaching is the bedrock of the Old Testament and the whole point

of the New. In the Old Testament, the people of G o d were pardoned

the sinfulness inherited from A d am by shedding the blood

of animals, as Abel had dutifully done. In the New, the people of

God were pardoned this same sinfulness by doing exactly as C a i n

had done, shedding the blood of a man. To this day, according to the

Scriptures, all who believe that Jesus Christ’s blood has power to

remit sins are imputed sinless by God.1 2 Imputed sinless, their sentence

of eternal separation from God is commuted, and they are

given eternal life in Heaven.1 3

Now, Scripture does not tell us that God ever explained the

purpose of blood sacrifice to C a i n . 1 4 But we know that G o d is the

greatest of all teachers. And we know he wants the best for

mankind. It’s unthinkable, then, that He would want C a i n ignorant

of the life-saving effect of blood sacrifice. He must have

taught C a i n as thoroughly as he taught Abel. A n d C a i n must have

listened attentively, for we know he was anxious to please G o d –

otherwise, why would he have been angry and crestfallen at learning

of God’s dissatisfaction with his sacrifice? But C a i n was more

creative than obedient. It’s entirely consistent with his character

for him to have decided

Okay, if it’s blood sacrifice He wants, I’ll give Him the sacrifice

He deserves, a better sacrifice than lambs: I’ll give Him the

blood of an innocent man!

Cain’s intent was evil only in that he sought to improve on

what God had commanded, in the way Saul improved on God’s

commandment to annihilate the Amalekites by sparing their king

and certain valuable livestock.1 5 C a i n knew the logic of God – he

was, after all, the first human being born with the knowledge of

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good and evil. A n d we know from what happened to Jesus that

God’s logic calls for the sacrifice of the only One whose perfect

innocence overcame death. In his obsession to please God, wouldn’t

C a i n have regarded spilling Abel’s blood as the ultimate godliness?

What I am suggesting is that, in Cain’s mind, Abel was not so

much murdered as sacrificed, nailed to Annu’s very name —

— hanged upon a cross! Wouldn’t this explain why Scripture shows

no evidence that C a i n sensed any guilt? Wouldn’t it also explain

the hundreds of ancient, pre-Christian myths of young shepherds

(such as Tammuz, Bacchus, Attis, Mithras) who were slain in cold

blood by various villains only to rise from the dead, their shed

blood having supposedly propitiated original sin and resurrected

them to eternal life? T h e myths, obviously based on the fact of

Abel’s crucifixion, all pointed to a universally anticipated event foretold

by the Israelite prophets: Messiah’s death and resurrection,

which would pardon the sins of mankind and restore eternal life.

Thus emerges the possibility that the “lamb slain from the

foundation of the world” mentioned at Revelation 1 3 : 8 might

have indeed been Abel, God’s first obedient servant. For it is a fact

that “the World” – by which the New Testament writers meant the

ordering of human institutional systems which God admitted into

existence – did actually begin, as we are about to see, in the immediate

aftermath of Abel’s death. If this is the case, then mankind

owes a strange debt to Cain. No Cain, no death of Abel. No death

of A b e l , no World. No World, no incarnation of God as only

begotten Son. No Son of God, no true death and resurrection. No

true death and resurrection, no hope of mankind for eternal intimacy

with God.

IT was the complaint of an earth outraged by Abel’s spilt blood

that moved God to banish C a i n from his accustomed habitat

270

forever. Just as Marduk demanded protection from the monsters he

had been asked to control, C a i n demanded protection from possible

assailants in his exile. God graciously accommodated C a i n by

“set[ting] a mark” upon h im which made C a i n seven times more

powerful than any mortal competitor. The mark served as the very

“powers and insignia of kingship” A n n u had granted Marduk. It

empowered C a i n to rule all human beings likely to challenge his

protective mark, beings unafraid of Yahweh’s name,1 6 beings who

shared Cain’s environs “out from the presence of the Lord.”1 7

Armed with his mark, C a i n began the rulership of evil. The

Bible accounts for Cain’s movements after his ordination. He took

a wife and sired a son. Then, he built a city and named it after his

son, “Enoch.”1 8 Centuries later, Enoch disappeared under the silt

of Noah’s flood. It passed from memory to mystery to oblivion,

until the 1840s, when archaeologists following the Bible’s descriptions

of Babylonia began excavating in present-day Iraq. Along

the Euphrates River, near Al Khidr, they discovered numerous

strata of ancient settlements. The deepest stratum, beneath which

there was nothing but bedrock, had called itself Unuk. “Unuk was

founded on the oldest bricks,” declared one of the leading archaeologists,

a renowned classical linguist from Queens College, Oxford,

named Archibald Sayce.

Having deciphered and evaluated large numbers of clay tablets

from the site, Professor Sayce issued the opinion in 1887 that

Unuk was indeed biblical Enoch, the city built by C a i n and his

son.1 9 Lecturing at Oxford, Sayce also pointed out that one of

Cain’s mythological names was Marduk2 0 – an important contribution

to the Marduk-equals-Cain hypothesis. Unuk’s dominant

temple bore the title “house of A n n u , ” further enhancing the

probability that Marduk’s myth was spun from Cain’s murder of

Abel. As ruler of Unuk, C a i n was known as Sargon – or, as other

translators have rendered the spelling, Shargani, Sarrukinu, Sargoni,

etc.2 1 These variations of Sargon are composites of the Babylonian

shar, meaning “king” and gani, kinu, or goni, meaning

“ C a i n . ” 2 2 It would be hard to say Sargon means anything other

than “King Cain.”

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Unuk had been no primitive village. Encyclopedia Britannica

noted that “transparent glass seems to have been first introduced

in the reign of Sargon.”2 3 Sargon built a metropolis of enormous

complexity. But what astonished the archaeologists most was the

city’s miraculous historical suddenness. Unuk seemed to have

materialized from out of nowhere:

We have found, in short, abundant remains of a bronze culture,

but no traces of preceding ages of development such as

meet us on early Egyptian sites.24

The suddenness factor severely challenged those scholars who

viewed history through Darwinian anti-biblicalism, which had

become the fashion in Jesuit-influenced academic circles. To fit

evolutionary theory, Unuk should have evidenced development

from a much older civilization. As a contributor to the London

Times’ prestigious Historians’ History of the World grumbled,

Surely such a people as this could not have sprung into existence

as a Deus ex Machina [a person or thing introduced or

appearing unexpectedly so as to provide an artificial or contrived

solution to an otherwise insoluble problem]. It must have had its

history – a history which presupposes development of several

centuries more.25

But Unuk as a social organization had no previous history. This

maddening circumstance drove the British Museum’s H. R. Hall

to rationalize that its “ready-made” culture must have been

“brought into Mesopotamia from abroad.”2 6 Modern anti-biblicists

find it easier to accept that Unuk’s sudden complexity came from

other galaxies than from something as simple as... acquiring divine

intelligence from biting into a piece of forbidden fruit. Of

course, eating the fruit of disobedience is how the Bible explains

the suddenness factor. C a i n had extraordinary powers because he

inherited from his parents the knowledge of good and evil which

the Trickster had encouraged them to obtain at the price of eternal

life.2 7 In Mrs. Bristowe’s words: “Cain was born and bred in the

272

atmosphere of the miraculous; his parents were possessed of supernatural

knowledge, some of which must have been imparted to

their children.”2 8

King C a i n was no primitive chieftain. On one of his many

autobiographical inscriptions, he boasted that “in multitudes of

bronze chariots I rode over rugged lands ... I governed the upper

countries,” and “three times to the sea I have advanced.”2 9 A brilliant,

well-organized military emperor – the prototypical Caesar –

C a i n controlled a “vast empire.” The Cambridge History tells us

he divided his imperium

from the [Persian Gulf] to the [Mediterranean], from the rising

to the setting of the sun into districts of five double hours march

each, over which he placed the ‘sons of his palace.’ By these delegates

of his authority he ruled the hosts of the lands together.30

Cain’s empire was founded on slavery3 1 – the inevitable result

of one man’s retributive power exceeding all others sevenfold. For

the most part, however, it appears that C a i n exercised his advantage

in the public interest. Professor Sayce tells us that his empire

was “full of schools and libraries, of teachers and pupils, and poets

and prose writers, and of the literary works which they had composed.”

Furthermore,

the empire was bound together by roads, along which there was

a regular postal service, and clay seals which took the place of

stamps are now in the Louvre bearing the name of Sargon and

his son.... It is probable that the first collection of astronomical

observations and terrestrial omens was made for a library established

by Sargon.32

The insignia of power and kingship did not vanish with Cain’s

death. That C a i n built the original city with his son implies that

the mark was intended to be an hereditary entitlement. The son’s

name implies that he received the power of the mark from his father.

“Enoch” in Hebrew means “the initiated” – to be inducted by

special rites, to be instructed in the rudiments or principles of

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something.” Scripture implies that Enoch and perhaps C a i n in

turn initiated other deputies and successors. Four generations after

Cain’s birth, we find Enoch’s great-great grandson Lamech still exercising,

in fact augmenting, the prerogative of divine vengeance:

Lamech said to his wives, “Adah and Zillah, listen to me;

wives of Lamech, hear my words. I have killed a man for wounding

me, a young man for injuring me. If Cain is avenged seven

times, then Lamech seventy-seven times.”34

Receiving authority to govern requires taking an oath which

binds the initiate to a code of rights and responsibilities. Interestingly,

our word “oath” is cognate with the Hebrew WFA (pronounced

“oath”), which is the word translated “mark” at Genesis

4 : 1 5 , “the Lord set a mark upon Cain.” Knowing this, we may accurately

say “the Lord put C a i n under oath,” an oath visibly represented

by the various insignia governments display. The mark,

then, stands for a covenant between G o d and Cain. It is not the

all-encompassing sort of covenant which God struck with the

humbly obedient Abraham – “ A n d I will establish my covenant

between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations

for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed

after thee.”3 5 Cain’s unwillingness to obey the letter of Yahweh’s

commandments made him unfit for intimacy with the divine. In

Cain’s own words, “from thy face shall I be hid.”3 6 The exile

covenant was strictly limited to assuring God’s vengeance against

anyone who would threaten Cain’s life. In matters of wisdom, correction,

instruction in righteousness, C a i n was on his own. He was

on his own, also, if he should try to attack the peaceful. The mark

was a covenant of retribution only.

Early on, C a i n saw there was great profit in provoking assailants.

The more enemies, the more spectacular the displays of

vengeance. The more vengeance, the more justice; the more justice,

the more power to Cain; a more powerful C a i n could do more

excellent public works. Thus, it became essential to the self-interest

of the bearer of the mark – which remains to this day a first 

principle of ordered government – to provoke and encourage evildoing,

particularly the form that manifests itself in rebellion.

Cain terrorized evil with awesome dependability. His faith that

God would avenge his enemies made him a highly reliable public

protector. Down through the ages, righteous people could live

secure in the knowledge that the mark-bearer would stop at nothing

to persecute evildoers. This fact is marvelously declared in

Scripture. In the seventh century BC, the mark-bearing Babylonians

were appointed by God to capture the wayward Israelites and

show them some harsh discipline. Israel couldn’t understand why

God would put a vain, evil Babylonian king over His own chosen

people. God explained saying: “See, he is puffed up, and his desires

are not upright, but the righteous shall live by his faith.”37

How has the mark managed to remain vibrant for nearly six

thousand years? Grand Commander Albert Pike, in his influential

Morals and Dogma, threw valuable light on the subject. He

declared that “from the earliest time,” Freemasonry has been the

“custodian and depository” of the “symbols, emblems, and allegories

... erected by Enoch.”3 8 The Commander was careful to say

he meant not Cain’s son Enoch, but the Bible’s other Enoch,

Enoch-2, the good Enoch, the Enoch “who walked with G o d . ” 3 9

However, his attempt to dissociate his institution from C a i n puts

the Commander at variance with Masonic and biblical chronology.

For if a biblical Enoch erected the earliest imagery of Freemasonry,

it could not possibly have been Enoch-2. It had to have

been Enoch-1. Let’s examine the chronology.

Enoch-2 was descended from Seth, whom Eve conceived after

the death of Abel – “for God, said she, hath appointed me another

seed instead of A b e l , whom C a i n slew.”4 0 When Eve conceived

Seth, A d am was 130 years old.4 1 According to the scripturally

faithful computations of the Archbishop of Armagh, James Ussher

( 1 5 8 1 – 1 6 5 6 ) , A d am was created in 4004 BC. Thus, Seth was born

in 3 8 7 4 BC. Genesis 5:6–20 gives us an exact toll of the years

between Seth and his great-great-great-great grandson Enoch-2:

275

RULERS OF EVIL

Age of father

Father Son at son’s birth

Seth Enos 105

Enos Cainan 90

Cainan Mahaleel 70

Mahaleel Jared 65

Tared Enoch-2 162

Total years 492

According to the Bible, Enoch-2 was born 4 9 2 years after the

birth of Seth, or in 3 3 8 2 BC. NOW, Commander Pike’s book, Morals

and Dogma, reckons its date of publication in both Christian ( 1 8 7 1

AD) and Masonic ( 5 6 8 0 AM) chronology. To find out the beginning

of Masonic history – that “earliest time” in which Enoch erected

his “symbols, emblems, and allegories” – in terms of Christian

chronology, we subtract the given Christian year from its Masonic

equivalent ( 1 8 7 1 from 5 6 8 0 ) . This gives us a first Masonic year of

3 8 0 9 B C . 4 2 But the figures show that Enoch-2 was not born until

3 3 8 2 , some 4 2 7 years after Freemasonry’s “earliest time”! Enoch-2

could not possibly have erected the prototypical symbolic devices

of which Freemasonry has ever been custodian and depository.

However, Cain’s son, Enoch-1, very well could have!

C a i n began his wandering after Abel’s death, which the Bible

marks with Seth’s conception and Adam’s age, 1 3 0 years, in about

3 8 7 6 BC. If we give C a i n ten years to find a wife, settle down, and

sire a child, Enoch-1 would have been born in 3 8 6 6 BC. This

would make him a 5 5-year-old man in the first Masonic year, 3 8 0 9 .

At that age, Enoch-1 would have been fully equipped to erect symbols

and allegories memorializing his father’s divine appointment

to rule populations “out from the presence of the Lord.”4 3

Incidentally, Professor Sayce placed C a i n in Masonry’s early

years against his previous determinations. Sayce admitted to being

compelled by the scholarly diligence of a latter-day Babylonian

king to accept the evidence that Sargon lived as early as four thousand

years before Christ:

The last king of Babylonia, Nabonidas, had antiquarian

276 

tastes, and busied himself not only with the restoration of the

old temples of his country, but also with the disinterment of the

memorial cylinders which their builders and restorers had buried

beneath their foundation. It was known that the great temple of

the Sun-god at Sippara ... had originally been erected by

Naram-Sin [Enoch], the son of Sargon, and attempts had been

already made to find the records which, it was assumed, he had

entombed under its angles. With true antiquarian zeal,

Nabonidas continued the search until he had lighted upon ‘the

foundation stone’ of Naram-Sin himself. This ‘foundation-stone’

he tells us had been seen by none of his predecessors for 3200

years. In the opinion, accordingly, of Nabonidas, a king who was

curious about the past history of his country, and whose royal

position gave him the best possible opportunities for learning all

that could be known about it, Naram-Sin and his father Sargon

lived 3200 years before his own time, or 3750 BC.

What we see in the Bible’s account of how Unuk came about

is nothing less than the foundation of the world’s legal system. That

God would ordain an evil man to administer the law makes sublime

sense to me.

In our final chapter, I shall ask your indulgence in a few personal

reflections of my own as to how a system designed to process

evil can do as much good as it does. 

Rulers of Evil

by F. Tupper Saussy

https://dn790006.ca.archive.org/0/items/rulers-of-evil-f.-tupper-saussy/Rulers%20of%20Evil%20-%20F.%20Tupper%20Saussy.pdf


How to Salvage Electronic Components for DIY Projects and E-Waste Recycling

July 12, 2025

Hidden within discarded electronics are valuable components such as circuit boards, capacitors, motors, and transformers. These elements represent just a fraction of the resources waiting to be reclaimed from old devices. This salvaged bounty offers great potential for DIY enthusiasts eager to create without hefty expenses.


Salvaging electronic components offers three key benefits for makers and engineers. First, it provides significant cost savings by offering parts that might otherwise be costly to purchase new. Second, repurposing these components for new projects extends their useful life beyond their original application. Third, this practice directly reduces electronic waste by keeping valuable materials out of landfills.


From vintage radios to modern computers, almost every electronic device contains parts worth recovering. These salvaged components serve as building blocks for hobbyists creating everything from simple LED circuits to complex robotics projects. The practice not only supports creativity and innovation but also promotes a more sustainable approach to electronics in our increasingly disposable society.

https://www.okonrecycling.com/consumer-recycling-initiatives/learn-about-recycling/value-salvaged-electronic-components/


The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. Its official program name was the Space Transportation System (STS), taken from the 1969 plan led by U.S. vice president Spiro Agnew for a system of reusable spacecraft where it was the only item funded for development.[8]: 163–166 [9][10]


The first (STS-1) of four orbital test flights occurred in 1981, leading to operational flights (STS-5) beginning in 1982. Five complete Space Shuttle orbiter vehicles were built and flown on a total of 135 missions from 1981 to 2011. They launched from the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida. Operational missions launched numerous satellites, interplanetary probes, and the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), conducted science experiments in orbit, participated in the Shuttle-Mir program with Russia, and participated in the construction and servicing of the International Space Station (ISS). The Space Shuttle fleet's total mission time was 1,323 days.[11]


Space Shuttle components include the Orbiter Vehicle (OV) with three clustered Rocketdyne RS-25 main engines, a pair of recoverable solid rocket boosters (SRBs), and the expendable external tank (ET) containing liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. The Space Shuttle was launched vertically, like a conventional rocket, with the two SRBs operating in parallel with the orbiter's three main engines, which were fueled from the ET. The SRBs were jettisoned before the vehicle reached orbit, while the main engines continued to operate, and the ET was jettisoned after main engine cutoff and just before orbit insertion, which used the orbiter's two Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) engines. At the conclusion of the mission, the orbiter fired its OMS to deorbit and reenter the atmosphere. The orbiter was protected during reentry by its thermal protection system tiles, and it glided as a spaceplane to a runway landing, usually to the Shuttle Landing Facility at KSC, Florida, or to Rogers Dry Lake in Edwards Air Force Base, California. If the landing occurred at Edwards, the orbiter was flown back to the KSC atop the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA), a specially modified Boeing 747 designed to carry the shuttle above it.


The first orbiter, Enterprise, was built in 1976 and used in Approach and Landing Tests (ALT), but had no orbital capability. Four fully operational orbiters were initially built: Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, and Atlantis. Of these, two were lost in mission accidents: Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003, with a total of 14 astronauts killed. A fifth operational (and sixth in total) orbiter, Endeavour, was built in 1991 to replace Challenger. The three surviving operational vehicles were retired from service following Atlantis's final flight on July 21, 2011. The U.S. relied on the Russian Soyuz spacecraft to transport astronauts to the ISS from the last Shuttle flight until the launch of the Crew Dragon Demo-2 mission in May 2020.[12]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle


Pope Benedict XVI[a] (born Joseph Alois Ratzinger;[b] 16 April 1927 – 31 December 2022) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 2005 until his resignation in 2013. Following his resignation, he chose to be known as "pope emeritus", a title he held until his death on 31 December 2022.[1][2]


Ordained as a priest in 1951 in his native Bavaria, Ratzinger embarked on an academic career and established himself as a highly regarded theologian by the late 1950s. He was appointed a full professor in 1958 when aged 31. After a long career as a professor of theology at several German universities, he was appointed Archbishop of Munich and Freising and created a cardinal by Pope Paul VI in 1977, an unusual promotion for someone with little pastoral experience. In 1981, he was appointed Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, one of the most important dicasteries of the Roman Curia. In 2002, he also became Dean of the College of Cardinals. Before becoming pope, he had been "a major figure on the Vatican stage for a quarter of a century"; he had had an influence "second to none when it came to setting church priorities and directions" as one of John Paul II's closest confidants.[3] Following the death of John Paul II on 2 April 2005, a conclave elected Ratzinger as his successor on 19 April; he chose Benedict XVI as his papal name in honour of Benedict XV and Benedict of Nursia.


Benedict's writings were prolific and generally defended traditional Catholic doctrine, values, and liturgy.[4] He was originally a liberal theologian but adopted conservative views after 1968.[5] During his papacy, Benedict advocated a return to fundamental Christian values to counter the increased secularisation of many Western countries. He viewed relativism's denial of objective truth, and the denial of moral truths in particular, as the central problem of the 21st century. Benedict also revived several traditions and permitted greater use of the Tridentine Mass.[6] He strengthened the relationship between the Catholic Church and art, promoted the use of Latin,[7] and reintroduced traditional papal vestments, for which reason he was called "the pope of aesthetics".[8] He also established personal ordinariates for former Anglicans and Methodists joining the Catholic Church. Benedict's handling of sexual abuse cases within the Catholic Church and opposition to usage of condoms in areas of high HIV transmission was criticized by public health officials, anti-AIDS activists, and victims' rights organizations.[9][10]


Citing health reasons due to his advanced age, Benedict resigned as pope on 28 February 2013. He became the first pope to resign from office since Gregory XII in 1415, and the first without external pressure since Celestine V in 1294. He subsequently moved into the newly renovated Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in Vatican City for his retirement. The 2013 conclave elected Francis as his successor on 13 March. In addition to his native German language, Benedict had some proficiency in French, Italian, English, and Spanish. He also knew Portuguese, Latin, Biblical Hebrew, and Biblical Greek.[11][12][13] He was a member of several social science academies, such as the French Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Benedict_XVI


Featured Artifact: A Scottish Rite Flag that Went to the Moon

 In the above video, Bro. Joshua Aaron Poole, 32°, House of the Temple Museum Curator and Archival Associate, discusses the history of this unique piece that traveled to the moon with astronaut “Buzz” Aldrin on Apollo XI in 1969 and the flag’s significance to Freemasonry and the Scottish Rite. (Having trouble viewing the video? Watch it on Vimeo.)

https://scottishrite.org/scottish-rite-myths-and-facts/featured-artifact-scottish-rite-flag-went-moon/


Pope Paul VI watched arrival Apollo 11's on the moon and sent a message

Other Popes

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19/07/2019

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Pope Paul VI visited the Vatican Astronomical Observatory to follow the arrival of the first man on the moon.


There, he observed the moon with the the space telescope and followed the landing on television.


Afterward, he sent a greeting praising the work of those involved in this project.


Very few know, but the astronauts of Apollo 11 left on the moon messages from heads of states. On behalf of Pope Paul VI they brought Psalm 8:


“When I see your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and stars that you set in place— What is man that you are mindful of him, and a son of man that you care for him?”


Ever since, popes and astronauts have often been in contact with each other.


Benedict XVI connected in 2011 with the International Space Station, and had fun seeing the effects of no gravity.  


Additionally, Pope Francis had a similar encounter in 2017.


A few months later, he met them at the Vatican. The astronauts brought him a surprise gift: an authentic and personalized space suit.


“We have decided that to begin with, as you are what you wear, to make you one like ours ...”


“Ah okay! And you plan the trip for me...”


It is a story that all began one night in Castel Gandolfo, when the pope wanted to watch the arrival of the first man on the moon.

https://www.romereports.com/en/2019/07/19/pope-paul-vi-watched-arrival-apollo-11s-on-the-moon-and-sent-a-message/


Tranquility Base (Latin: Statio Tranquillitatis) is the site on the Moon where, in July 1969, humans landed and walked on a celestial body other than Earth for the first time. On July 20, 1969, Apollo 11 crewmembers Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed their Apollo Lunar Module Eagle at approximately 20:17:40 UTC. Armstrong exited the spacecraft six hours and 39 minutes after touchdown, followed 19 minutes later by Aldrin. The astronauts spent two hours and 31 minutes examining and photographing the lunar surface, setting up several scientific experiment packages, and collecting 47.5 pounds (21.5 kg) of dirt and rock samples for return to Earth. They lifted off the surface on July 21 at 17:54 UTC.


Tranquility Base was named by Aldrin and Armstrong, and first announced by Armstrong when the Lunar Module Eagle landed. It is located in the south-western corner of the dark lunar plain Mare Tranquillitatis ("Sea of Tranquility").[1]


Due to involvement of facilities within the U.S. states of California and New Mexico with the Apollo program, the relevant government bodies in these states have registered Tranquility Base as a historic site associated with the heritage of the respective state: the California State Historical Resources Commission in the California Register of Historical Resources,[2] and the New Mexico Historic Preservation Division of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs in the New Mexico State Register of Cultural Properties site #1946. However, Texas, the U.S. National Park Service, and UNESCO have declined to do so, citing the procedural technicality that it is not located within their borders (which according to common convention don't extend thousands of miles beyond the Earth's surface).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tranquility_Base


The Latin word mare ('sea') was a pun upon the name Mary, and the phrase Stella maris is an mistranslation of the Hebrew form of her name, Miriam.


Mary as a star, giving guidance to sailors on a stormy ocean, became a popular metaphor for the help she gave to mankind on earth. The great fourteenth-century Italian poet Petrarch, wrote a powerful lyric on the subject:


Bright virgin, steadfast in eternity /

Star of this storm-tossed sea, /

Trusted guide of every trustful pilot, /

Turn your thoughts to the terrifying squall /

In which I find myself, alone and rudderless...


Interestingly, Stella maris was originally an epithet of the goddess Isis in Roman religion. Like Mary, Isis was a divine mother with a very popular cult, and representations of her with her baby son Horus in Egyptian art to some extent influenced the way early artists showed the Virgin and Child.


Here is an example in the Fitzwilliam, dating from between 715 and 525 BCE [E.122.1954].

https://fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/explore-our-collection/highlights/context/sign-and-symbols/the-star-of-mary


On Easter Sunday 2021, Warnock's Twitter account tweeted, "The meaning of Easter is more transcendent than the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Whether you are a Christian or not, through a commitment to helping others we are able to save ourselves." Some conservative Christians and political commentators criticized the tweet, including Benjamin Watson, Allie Beth Stuckey, and Jenna Ellis, who called it "heretical". The tweet was deleted that afternoon, with a spokesperson for Warnock saying, "the tweet was posted by staff and was not approved" but declining to say whether it reflected Warnock's beliefs.[47][48]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raphael_Warnock


Pope Francis[b] (born Jorge Mario Bergoglio;[c] 17 December 1936 – 21 April 2025) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 13 March 2013 until his death in 2025. He was the first Jesuit pope, the first Latin American, and the first born or raised outside Europe since the 8th-century Syrian pope Gregory III.


Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to a family of Italian origin, Bergoglio was inspired to join the Jesuits in 1958 after recovering from a severe illness. He was ordained a Catholic priest in 1969, and from 1973 to 1979 he was the Jesuit provincial superior in Argentina. He became the archbishop of Buenos Aires in 1998 and was created a cardinal in 2001 by Pope John Paul II. Following the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI, the 2013 papal conclave elected Bergoglio as pope on 13 March. He chose Francis as his papal name in honor of Saint Francis of Assisi.


Throughout his papacy, Francis was noted for his humility, emphasis on God's mercy, international visibility, commitment to interreligious dialogue, and concern for the poor, migrants, and refugees. Francis believed the Catholic Church should demonstrate more inclusivity to LGBTQ people, and stated that although blessings of same-sex unions are not permitted, individuals in same-sex relationships can be blessed as long as the blessing is not given in a liturgical context.[2] Francis made women full members of dicasteries in the Roman Curia.[3][4] Francis convened the Synod on Synodality, which was described as the culmination of his papacy and the most important event in the Catholic Church since the Second Vatican Council.[4][5][6] Francis was known for having a less formal approach to the papacy than his predecessors by, for instance, choosing to reside in the Domus Sanctae Marthae guesthouse rather than in the papal apartments of the Apostolic Palace used by previous popes. In addition, due to both his Jesuit and Ignatian aesthetic, he was known for favoring simpler vestments devoid of ornamentation, including refusing the traditional papal mozzetta cape upon his election, choosing silver instead of gold for his piscatory ring, and keeping the same pectoral cross he had as cardinal.


Concerning global governance, Francis was a critic of trickle-down economics, consumerism, and overdevelopment;[7] he made action on climate change a leading focus of his papacy.[8] He viewed capital punishment as inadmissible in all cases,[9] and committed the Catholic Church to its worldwide abolition.[10] Francis criticized the rise of right-wing populism and anti-immigration politics, calling the protection of migrants a "duty of civilization".[11] Francis supported the decriminalization of homosexuality.[12] In international diplomacy, Francis helped to restore full diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States, negotiated a deal with the People's Republic of China to define Communist Party influence in appointing Chinese bishops, and encouraged peace between Israel and Palestinians, signing the Vatican's first treaty with the State of Palestine. In 2022 he apologized for the Church's role in the cultural genocide of Canadian Indigenous peoples in residential schools. From 2023 he condemned Israel's military operations in Gaza, calling for investigations of war crimes. Francis made his last public appearance on Easter Sunday before dying on 21 April 2025, Easter Monday.[13][14] The 2025 papal conclave elected Leo XIV as Francis's successor on 8 May. Leo XIV became the second pope from the Americas, after Francis.[15]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Francis


Easter in 2030

Date: April 21, 2030

Day: Sunday


Avril Ramona Lavigne CM (/ˈævrɪl ləˈviːn/ AV-ril lə-VEEN; French: [avʁil ʁamɔna laviɲ]; born September 27, 1984) is a Canadian singer and songwriter. She is a key musician in popularizing pop-punk music, as she paved the way for female-driven, punk-influenced pop music in the early 2000s. Her accolades include ten Juno Awards and eight Grammy Awards nominations.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avril_Lavigne


Regimini militantis Ecclesiae (Latin for To the Government of the Church Militant) was the papal bull promulgated by Pope Paul III on September 27, 1540, which gave a first approval to the Society of Jesus, also known as the Jesuits, but limited the number of its members to sixty.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regimini_militantis_Ecclesiae


The Day Called 'X' is a dramatized CBS documentary film set in Portland, Oregon, in which the entire city is evacuated in anticipation of a nuclear air raid, after Soviet bombers had been detected by radar stations to the north; it details the activation of the city's civil defense protocols and leads up to the moment before the attack (the ending is left intentionally unknown). The operations were run from the Kelly Butte Bunker, which was the emergency operations center at that time. It was filmed in September 1957[1] and aired December 8 of that year.[2][3] Apart from presenter/narrator Glenn Ford, none of the people shown are actors. They are locals of Portland shown in their real jobs, including Mayor Terry Schrunk.


Its local re-broadcast in 2004[4] and appearance in the on-line Prelinger Archives attracted interest among local history buffs due to its extensive outside shots of the city, and the use of non-actor participants (local officials and broadcasters). Whenever one of these individuals is heard uttering warnings or statements regarding attack, the words "AN ATTACK IS NOT TAKING PLACE" are superimposed over the picture.[2]


On September 27, 1955, Portland actually conducted an exercise evacuation of downtown called "Operation Greenlight",[5][6] and the film is often misattributed to that year. Ford's narration, however, does make direct reference to the 1955 exercise.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_Called_%27X%27


SpaceX Roadster is not a natural celestial object, but rather a man-made object launched by SpaceX in February 2018 as part of the Falcon Heavy test flight. It is a red sports car owned by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, and was launched as a demonstration of the Falcon Heavy's capabilities. The Roadster is not in a stable orbit around the Sun, but is instead on a heliocentric orbit that will take it to the asteroid belt and then back to the inner Solar System in the future. The Roadster also carries a mannequin named Starman, dressed in a spacesuit, in the driver's seat.

https://theskylive.com/roadster-info


PART X THE PRESERVATION AND INCREASE OF THE SOCIETY

410 §1. As a sign of gratitude and devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, let that feast be solemnly celebrated; and on that day is to be renewed the consecration by which the Society on January 1, 1872, dedicated and consecrated itself totally and perpetually.

§2. The consecration to the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary is to be renewed each year on the feast of the Immaculate Heart.[1]

411 The sense of belonging and responsibility that each individual one of Ours has toward the whole Society should be manifested in a knowledge of our spirituality, our history, our saints, our apostolic labors, and our men, especially of those who are suffering difficulties for the sake of Christ; it is to be manifested as well by maintaining Ignatian mobility and flexibility with a view to helping any region of the Society whatsoever.[2]

412 §1. All our members should have at heart a shared concern for attracting new members to the Society, especially by prayer and the example of their lives as individuals and in community.[3]

§2. Therefore, we must do everything possible actively to present the Society in such a way that those whom God calls will know and appreciate who and what we are and what is our distinctive way of proceeding in the following of Christ.[4]

§3. We must also promote vocations as widely as possible, in order to reflect the culture and experience of those we seek to serve, including minority cultures, immigrants, and indigenous people.[5]

413 The Society should always show itself bound to its benefactors in charity and gratitude. Superiors should ensure that prayers are offered for them and other appropriate signs of our gratitude are shown them.[6]

414 In the perfect observance of all the Constitutions and in the particular fulfillment of our Institute, our formed members should excel, setting a good example and spreading the good odor of Christ, keeping before their eyes the serious obligation they have of giving edification especially to our younger members.[ 7]

415 All by earnest reading and meditation (in particular, at the time of the annual Spiritual Exercises, renewal of vows, monthly recollection, beginning of the year, and so forth) should strive ever to know, esteem, and love better our Constitutions and the special nature of our Institute,[ 8] which are to be faithfully observed, and which for each and all of us are the one, true, and safe way that surely leads to the perfection to which our Lord calls and invites all sons of the Society.[9] §2. Major superiors, especially at the time of the annual visitation, should see that this is faithfully observed.

416 Finally, those means that are proposed by our holy father Saint Ignatius in Part X of the Constitutions for the preservation and development not only of the body or exterior of the Society but also of its spirit, and for the attainment of the objective it seeks, which is to aid souls to reach their ultimate and supernatural end, [10] are to be observed eagerly and diligently by all, with a truly personal sense of responsibility for its increase and development, for the praise and service of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and the help of souls.[11]


L. D. S.

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Identifying Retrofitting Opportunities for Federated Satellite Systems

Rustam Akhtyamov, Rob Vingerhoeds and Alessandro Golkar

Published Online:26 Apr 2019https://doi.org/10.2514/1.A34196


Abstract

This paper aims at identifying retrofitting possibilities to incorporate existing spacecraft into a network of federated satellite systems. The paper presents a systematic review of possible retrofitting options, such as direct modifications including replacement and addition of interfaces, and indirect modifications through the addition of intermediary federated negotiators. The paper considers existing frequency regulations for the analysis in the technical domain, but does not take into consideration how complex or time-consuming any legislative changes might be. Although the paper concludes that direct modifications of existing satellites are nonfeasible from a technical point of view, it identifies a possible scenario of retrofitting by adding intermediary negotiator satellites. The link budget for the intersatellite link between an existing satellite mission, such as SPOT-6, and a conceptual satellite negotiator was estimated. The work concludes that from a link budget point of view and existing technology, such a configuration can provide a slant range from several hundred to thousands of kilometers. The work defines models for trade-off analysis identifying correlations between satellite negotiator parameters and the number of covered satellites. The paper concludes proposing several possible satellite negotiator architectures and high-level technical requirements based on analysis of characteristics of existing and planned satellites.

https://arc.aiaa.org/doi/10.2514/1.A34196


Did Tesla detect ancient alien signals? Some called it proof of life beyond earth. Black Knight mystery decoded

SECTIONSDid Tesla detect ancient alien signals? Some called it proof of life beyond earth. Black Knight mystery decodedET OnlineLast Updated: Jul 01, 2025, 08:32:00 PM ISTGoogle

Synopsis

The Black Knight satellite myth claims that a mysterious object—possibly of alien origin—has been orbiting Earth for 13,000 years. This theory combines a mix of unrelated events, including Nikola Tesla’s early radio experiments, unexplained radio echoes, and misidentified space debris. The legend gained momentum in 1998 when NASA's STS-88 mission captured photos of a dark object in orbit, which UFO enthusiasts labeled the Black Knight. However, NASA and experts later confirmed it was a lost thermal blanket from the mission.


Nikola Tesla’s 1899 experiments with radio signals are often cited as the starting point of the Black Knight satellite myth

Nikola Tesla’s 1899 experiments with radio signals are often cited as the starting point of the Black Knight satellite myth

For over a century, the legend of the so-called “Black Knight satellite” has intrigued conspiracy theorists and sparked widespread speculation. Believed by some to be a 13,000-year-old alien spacecraft orbiting Earth, the story has blended scientific anomalies, historical misunderstandings, and space mission photographs to create a myth that refuses to fade.


Origins in Early Radio Experiments

The foundation of the Black Knight myth can be traced back to 1899, when inventor Nikola Tesla detected unusual radio signals while experimenting in Colorado Springs. Some believed he had intercepted alien transmissions, but modern scientists largely attribute these signals to natural causes or Earth-based interference.


Decades later, in 1927, Norwegian amateur radio operator Jørgen Hals observed long-delayed radio echoes—a phenomenon still not fully understood but believed to be atmospheric or ionospheric in nature. These unexplained signals were later tied into the growing lore of mysterious objects and alien communication.

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Claims of Early Satellites and Government Detection

In 1954, retired Air Force major and UFO proponent Donald Keyhoe claimed that the U.S. military had detected two artificial satellites in orbit—years before Sputnik's launch in 1957. However, no solid evidence ever supported these statements. Further confusion came in 1960, when Time magazine reported the U.S. Navy’s detection of a “dark object” in space. Initially thought to be a Soviet satellite, it was soon identified as a piece of the American Discoverer 8 satellite, part of the classified CORONA spy satellite program.


The 1998 STS-88 Incident: Fuel for the Fire

The modern surge in interest around the Black Knight satellite followed NASA’s STS-88 mission in 1998. As astronauts conducted a spacewalk to assemble parts of the International Space Station, photographs captured a black, oddly shaped object floating near Earth. These images quickly circulated online, labeled by some as visual proof of the legendary alien satellite.


However, astronauts on that mission—particularly Jerry Ross—confirmed that the object was a thermal insulation blanket that had accidentally come loose. NASA catalogued it as space object 025570, and it re-entered Earth’s atmosphere and disintegrated within days. Former NASA engineer and space historian James Oberg, who worked on the STS-88 trajectory team, has publicly explained that the object was mundane and has nothing to do with alien technology.


Why the Myth Persists

Despite the logical explanations and repeated debunking, the Black Knight myth continues to thrive. Part of the allure lies in its blend of ancient mystery, space-age intrigue, and modern conspiracy culture. The popularity of UFO narratives, recent attention on unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs), and declassified government documents continue to fuel interest.


Space archaeologist Alice Gorman suggests that some of the fascination is psychological—humans tend to seek patterns and meanings in the unknown. She points out the improbability of a satellite remaining powered and in orbit for 13,000 years without any maintenance, which current human technology cannot achieve.


A Misidentified Thermal Blanket

In scientific terms, the so-called Black Knight satellite is simply debris from a space mission—specifically a lost thermal blanket. These blankets are used to insulate spacecraft from the extreme temperatures of space. During the STS-88 spacewalk, one of these covers drifted away and was later photographed, leading to widespread misinterpretation.


Today, thousands of pieces of space debris orbit Earth. Agencies track them to avoid collisions with satellites or manned spacecraft. While tools like radar, telescopes, and even experimental cleanup technologies are in development, the problem of debris—often mistaken for something more exotic—remains a challenge.


The Black Knight satellite is not an ancient alien relic but a modern myth stitched together from decades of unrelated events, misunderstood science, and internet-fueled imagination. As intriguing as the story is, scientific evidence consistently points to a more grounded explanation—one that doesn't involve extraterrestrial visitors.

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/magazines/panache/did-tesla-detect-ancient-alien-signals-some-called-it-proof-of-life-beyond-earth-black-knight-mystery-decoded/articleshow/122186699.cms


Black Knight is a 2001 American fantasy adventure buddy comedy film directed by Gil Junger and starring Martin Lawrence with Marsha Thomason, Tom Wilkinson, Vincent Regan, and Kevin Conway in supporting roles. In the film, Lawrence plays Jamal, a present-day theme park employee who is transported through time to medieval England. The film was shot at various locations in North Carolina, mainly Wilmington and Carolina Beach. Black Knight was theatrically released on November 21, 2001, to negative reviews and was a box-office bomb, grossing $39.9 million against a production budget of $50 million.


Plot

Slacker Jamal Walker works at Medieval World theme park, which is about to have big competition from Castle World. Mostly Jamal's boss is disappointed in him for running away from responsibility. While cleaning the moat, he tries to retrieve a medallion and gets sucked into 1328 England.


Meeting the drunkard Knolte, then finding what he believes is Castle World, he goes to investigate. They believe he is a French Nubian, Ethiopian, or Malian from Normandy, as he says he is from Florence and Normandie, a famous intersection in LA.


Jamal is taken to King Leo, who assumes he is the Normandy messenger he's expecting to unite England and Normandy. He realizes it isn't a theme park after witnessing the beheading of a rebel leader. Introducing himself as Jamal "Sky" Walker, his high school basketball nickname, he gains the king's trust by accidentally preventing his assassination and is made a lord and head of security.


Nubian Chambermaid, Victoria tells Jamal the king overthrew the former queen, but he tells her he can't help. Debating with her, she insists his medallion deems him to be a man of honor. However she leaves, frustrated with his cowardice.


Later that night, Princess Regina, the king's daughter who is infatuated with Jamal, sneaks into his bed. He believes she is Victoria, so sleeps with her. The real Norman messenger arrives, seeking Princess Regina's hand in marriage for his liege, so Jamal is exposed as a fraud. The infuriated king throws him into the dungeon to be executed.


In the dungeon, two failed assassins talk of the Black Knight, who could not be bought nor bribed, and fought for justice. He had been swallowed whole with a gold sword by a fierce dragon, so he cut himself from its belly and could then breathe the fire of the dragon.


Brought forth for execution, as a last resort Jamal claims to be a sorcerer and attempts to scare the superstitious onlookers to escape. As the executioner begins to choke on an apple, the crowd believes Jamal cast a spell of death upon him. In the commotion, he saves him with the Heimlich Maneuver.


Using this distraction and flaming arrows fired from outside the walls, Jamal escapes the castle with Victoria and Knolte's aid. He learns that Knolte had been the former queen's knight who was disgraced when she lost her throne. Jamal soon understands he must help overthrow King Leo and help restore the queen.


With some effort, Jamal convinces the decimated rebels and townsfolk to overthrow the king together while noting that King Leo is no King Arthur. Using modern-day tactics from American football and pro wrestling, he gives the peasants the means to fight the armed and armored king's guards. Out of gratitude, Knolte teaches Jamal some basic sword-fighting manoeuvres, and also suggests a way to have an advantage in the upcoming battle.


The next day, Knolte and the rebels storm the castle, only to be surrounded by guards and Leo's bodyguard, Percival. Seemingly outmatched, the rebels are pushed back. The tide turns briefly when the legendary Black Knight charges in, breathing fire and scattering the guards, but he falls from his horse and is revealed to be Jamal.


Using their newfound skills, the peasants overpower the guards. But Percival's longbow severely wounds Knolte, and he takes Victoria hostage. When a scared King Leo asks Percival for safety, seeing Leo as pathetic and weak, Percival kills Leo and he is thrown into the moat. Charging to the rescue, Jamal surprises Percival with his fighting skills, knocking him out and rescuing Victoria. However, Percival comes to and is then shot dead by Knolte before he can kill Jamal. Jubilation abounds when the rebels are victorious.


After the queen's reign is restored, Jamal is knighted. During the dubbing, he awakes back at Medieval World surrounded by his co-workers and a medical team, who saved him from the moat, implying that his entire adventure was a dream. Jamal's whole attitude changes from his experience, and he helps to improve Medieval World, so they won't go out of business.


Later on, walking around the new Medieval World, Jamal meets Nicole, who looks just like Victoria. They talk a little, and he asks her out to lunch. Unfortunately, he forgets to get her number, and when he runs after her, he accidentally falls back into the moat, waking up in the Colosseum of Ancient Rome, where he is about to be devoured by lions, so he runs.


Cast

Martin Lawrence as Jamal Walker, a Medieval World worker who ends up in medieval times.

Marsha Thomason as:

Victoria, a chambermaid.

Nicole, a woman in the present day who resembles Victoria.

Tom Wilkinson as Sir Knolte of Marlborough, a knight who allies with Jamal.

Kevin Conway as King Leo, a tyrannical king.

Vincent Regan as Percival, King Leo's bodyguard.

Daryl Mitchell as Steve

Michael Countryman as Phillip

Jeannette Weegar as Princess Regina, the daughter of King Leo.

Erik Jensen as Derek

Dikran Tulaine as Dennis

Helen Carey as The Queen who was overthrown by King Leo.

Robert Alan Harris as King Leo's Squire

Richard Fullerton as Will


Production

Development

The film was announced to release on November 21, 2001, by Fox.[2]


Reception

Box office

The film opened at #4 at the U.S. box office on its opening weekend with $11.2 million.[3] Black Knight grossed $39.9 million worldwide against a $50 million budget, making it a box office bomb.


Critical response

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 15% of 98 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 3.6/10. The website's consensus reads: "Black Knight feels like a lazily constructed movie, filled with lame gags and constant mugging from Lawrence."[4] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 32 out of 100, based on 26 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable" reviews.[5] Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale.[6]


The film has also drawn attention from scholars. Addressing it as one of the few contemporary films that cast African American characters in medieval settings, Laurie A. Finke and Martin B. Shichtman noted that the film provided commentary on early 21st-century race relations in the United States, noting that despite his triumphs in the medieval setting, by the end, Jamal "continues to live in white America, which requires hybridity, not dominance, from African American men. He may be a better man for his excellent medieval adventure, but he is still black, poor, underemployed, and living in the hood.”[7]


Awards and nominations

Nominated for Golden Reel Award for Best Sound Editing - Music - Feature Film, Domestic and Foreign

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Knight_(film)


A black hole is an astronomical body so compact that its gravity prevents anything from escaping, even light. Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity predicts that a sufficiently compact mass will form a black hole.[4] The boundary of no escape is called the event horizon. In general relativity, a black hole's event horizon seals an object's fate but produces no locally detectable change when crossed.[5] In many ways, a black hole acts like an ideal black body, as it reflects no light.[6][7] Quantum field theory in curved spacetime predicts that event horizons emit Hawking radiation, with the same spectrum as a black body of a temperature inversely proportional to its mass. This temperature is of the order of billionths of a kelvin for stellar black holes, making it essentially impossible to observe directly.


Objects whose gravitational fields are too strong for light to escape were first considered in the 18th century by John Michell and Pierre-Simon Laplace. In 1916, Karl Schwarzschild found the first modern solution of general relativity that would characterise a black hole. Due to his influential research, the Schwarzschild metric is named after him. David Finkelstein, in 1958, first published the interpretation of "black hole" as a region of space from which nothing can escape. Black holes were long considered a mathematical curiosity; it was not until the 1960s that theoretical work showed they were a generic prediction of general relativity. The first black hole known was Cygnus X-1, identified by several researchers independently in 1971.[8][9]


Black holes typically form when massive stars collapse at the end of their life cycle. After a black hole has formed, it can grow by absorbing mass from its surroundings. Supermassive black holes of millions of solar masses may form by absorbing other stars and merging with other black holes, or via direct collapse of gas clouds. There is consensus that supermassive black holes exist in the centres of most galaxies.


The presence of a black hole can be inferred through its interaction with other matter and with electromagnetic radiation such as visible light. Matter falling toward a black hole can form an accretion disk of infalling plasma, heated by friction and emitting light. In extreme cases, this creates a quasar, some of the brightest objects in the universe. Stars passing too close to a supermassive black hole can be shredded into streamers that shine very brightly before being "swallowed".[10] If other stars are orbiting a black hole, their orbits can be used to determine the black hole's mass and location. Such observations can be used to exclude possible alternatives such as neutron stars. In this way, astronomers have identified numerous stellar black hole candidates in binary systems and established that the radio source known as Sagittarius A*, at the core of the Milky Way galaxy, contains a supermassive black hole of about 4.3 million solar masses.


History

The idea of a body so massive that even light could not escape was briefly proposed by English astronomical pioneer and clergyman John Michell and independently by French scientist Pierre-Simon Laplace. Both scholars proposed very large stars, analogous to modern models of supermassive black holes.[11]


Michell's idea, in a short part of a letter published in 1784, calculated that a star with the same density but 500 times the radius of the sun would not let any emitted light escape; the surface escape velocity would exceed the speed of light. Michell correctly noted that such supermassive but non-radiating bodies might be detectable through their gravitational effects on nearby visible bodies.[11][12][13]


In 1796, Laplace mentioned that a star could be invisible if it were sufficiently large while speculating on the origin of the Solar System in his book Exposition du Système du Monde. Franz Xaver von Zach asked Laplace for a mathematical analysis, which Laplace provided and published in a journal edited by von Zach.[11]


Scholars of the time were initially excited by the proposal that giant but invisible 'dark stars' might be hiding in plain view, but enthusiasm dampened in the early 19th century, when light was discovered to be wavelike.[14] Since light was understood as a wave rather than a particle, it was unclear what, if any, influence gravity would have on escaping light waves.[11][13]


General relativity

In 1911, Albert Einstein published a paper about the properties of acceleration in special relativity, noting that an object accelerating through space outside of a gravitational field would be physically indistinguishable from an object in a static gravitational field. The paper also predicted the deflection of light by massive bodies.[15] In 1915, Einstein refined these ideas into his general theory of relativity, which explained how matter affects spacetime, which in turn affects the motion of other matter.[16][17][18] This theory formed the basis for black hole physics, although Einstein himself would later try, and fail, to refute the idea that black holes could exist.[19][20][21]


Only a few months after Einstein published the field equations describing general relativity, Karl Schwarzschild found a solution describing the gravitational field of a point mass and a spherical mass.[22][23] A few months after Schwarzschild, Johannes Droste, a student of Hendrik Lorentz, independently gave the same solution for the point mass and wrote more extensively about its properties.[24][25] At a certain radius from the center of the mass, the Schwarzschild solution became singular, meaning that some of the terms in the Einstein equations became infinite. The nature of this radius, which later became known as the Schwarzschild radius, was not understood at the time.[26][27]


In 1924, Arthur Eddington showed that the singularity disappeared after a change of coordinates. In 1933, Georges Lemaître realised that this meant the singularity at the Schwarzschild radius was a non-physical coordinate singularity.[27] Arthur Eddington commented on the possibility of a star with mass compressed to the Schwarzschild radius in a 1926 book, noting that Einstein's theory allows us to rule out overly large densities for visible stars like Betelgeuse because the extreme force of gravity would make light unable to escape from the star, redshift the star's entire light spectrum out of existence, and "produce so much curvature of the spacetime metric that space would close up around the star, leaving us outside (i.e., nowhere)."[28][29]


In 1931, using special relativity, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar calculated that a non-rotating body of electron-degenerate matter above a certain limiting mass (now called the Chandrasekhar limit at 1.4 M☉) has no stable solutions.[30] His arguments were opposed by many of his contemporaries like Eddington and Lev Landau, who argued that some yet unknown mechanism would stop the collapse.[31] They were partially correct: a white dwarf slightly more massive than the Chandrasekhar limit will collapse into a neutron star, which is itself stable.[32]


In 1939, based on Chandrasekhar's reasoning, Robert Oppenheimer and George Volkoff predicted that neutron stars above another mass limit, now known as the Tolman–Oppenheimer–Volkoff limit, would collapse further, concluding that no law of physics was likely to intervene and stop at least some stars from collapsing to black holes.[33] Their original calculations, based on the Pauli exclusion principle, gave it as 0.7 M☉. Subsequent consideration of neutron-neutron repulsion mediated by the strong force raised the estimate to approximately 1.5 M☉ to 3.0 M☉.[34] Observations of the neutron star merger GW170817, which is thought to have generated a black hole shortly afterward, have refined the TOV limit estimate to ~2.17 M☉.[35][36][37][38][39]


Oppenheimer and his co-authors interpreted the singularity at the boundary of the Schwarzschild radius as indicating that this was the boundary of a bubble in which time stopped.[33]: 380–381  This is a valid point of view for external observers, but not for infalling observers.[40] John Wheeler later described black holes viewed from an external reference frame as "frozen stars" because an outside observer would see the surface of the star frozen in time due to gravitational time dilation, never to fully collapse.[40]


Also in 1939, Einstein attempted to prove that black holes were impossible in his publication "On a Stationary System with Spherical Symmetry Consisting of Many Gravitating Masses", using his theory of general relativity to defend his argument.[41] Months later, Oppenheimer and his student Hartland Snyder provided the Oppenheimer–Snyder model in their paper "On Continued Gravitational Contraction",[42] which predicted the existence of black holes. In the paper, which made no reference to Einstein's recent publication, Oppenheimer and Snyder used Einstein's own theory of general relativity to show the conditions on how a black hole could develop, for the first time in contemporary physics.[41]


In 1958, David Finkelstein identified the Schwarzschild surface as an event horizon, calling it "a perfect unidirectional membrane: causal influences can cross it in only one direction". In this sense, events that occur inside of the black hole cannot affect events that occur outside of the black hole.[43] Finkelstein created a new reference frame to include the point of view of infalling observers.[44]: 103  Finkelstein's solution extended the Schwarzschild solution for the future of observers falling into a black hole. A similar concept had already been found by Martin Kruskal, but its significance had not been fully understood at the time.[44]: 103 


Golden age


The first simulated image of a black hole, created by Jean-Pierre Luminet in 1978 and featuring the characteristic shadow, photon sphere, and lensed accretion disk. The disk is brighter on one side due to the Doppler beaming.[45][46]

The era from the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s was the "golden age of black hole research", when general relativity and black holes became mainstream subjects of research.[47][48]: 258 


In this period, more general black hole solutions were found. In 1963, Roy Kerr found the exact solution for a rotating black hole.[49][50] Two years later, Ezra Newman found the cylindrically symmetric solution for a black hole that is both rotating and electrically charged.[51]


In 1967, Werner Israel found that the Schwarzschild solution was the only possible solution for a nonspinning, uncharged black hole, and couldn't have any additional parameters. In that sense, a Schwarzschild black hole would be defined by its mass alone, and any two Schwarzschild black holes with the same mass would be identical.[52] Israel later found that Reissner-Nordstrom black holes were only defined by their mass and electric charge, while Brandon Carter discovered that Kerr black holes only had two degrees of freedom, mass and spin.[53][54] Together, these findings became known as the no-hair theorem, which states that a stationary black hole is completely described by the three parameters of the Kerr–Newman metric: mass, angular momentum, and electric charge.[55]


At first, it was suspected that the strange mathematical singularities found in each of the black hole solutions only appeared due to the assumption that a black hole would be perfectly spherically symmetric, and therefore the singularities would not appear in generic situations where black holes would not necessarily be symmetric. This view was held in particular by Vladimir Belinski, Isaak Khalatnikov, and Evgeny Lifshitz, who tried to prove that no singularities appear in generic solutions, although they would later reverse their positions.[56] However, in 1965, Roger Penrose proved that general relativity without quantum mechanics requires that singularities appear in all black holes.[57][58] Shortly afterwards, Hawking generalized Penrose's solution to find that in all but a few physically infeasible scenarios, a cosmological Big Bang singularity is inevitable unless quantum gravity intervenes.[59] For his work, Penrose received half of the 2020 Nobel Prize in Physics, Hawking having died in 2018.[60]


Astronomical observations also made great strides during this era. In 1967, Antony Hewish and Jocelyn Bell Burnell discovered pulsars[61][62] and by 1969, these were shown to be rapidly rotating neutron stars.[63] Until that time, neutron stars, like black holes, were regarded as just theoretical curiosities, but the discovery of pulsars showed their physical relevance and spurred a further interest in all types of compact objects that might be formed by gravitational collapse.[64] Based on observations in Greenwich and Toronto in the early 1970s, Cygnus X-1, a galactic X-ray source discovered in 1964, became the first astronomical object commonly accepted to be a black hole.[65][66]


Work by James Bardeen, Jacob Bekenstein, Carter, and Hawking in the early 1970s led to the formulation of black hole thermodynamics.[67] These laws describe the behaviour of a black hole in close analogy to the laws of thermodynamics by relating mass to energy, area to entropy, and surface gravity to temperature. The analogy was completed when Hawking, in 1974, showed that quantum field theory implies that black holes should radiate like a black body with a temperature proportional to the surface gravity of the black hole, predicting the effect now known as Hawking radiation.[68]


Modern research and observation

The first strong evidence for black holes came from combined X-ray and optical observations of Cygnus X-1 in 1972.[69] The x-ray source, located in the Cygnus constellation, was discovered through a survey by two suborbital rockets, as the blocking of x-rays by Earth's atmosphere makes it difficult to detect them from the ground.[70][71][72] Unlike stars or pulsars, Cygnus X-1 was not associated with any prominent radio or optical source.[72][73] In 1972, Louise Webster, Paul Murdin, and, independently, Charles Thomas Bolton, found that Cygnus X-1 was actually in a binary system with the supergiant star HDE 226868. Using the emission patterns of the visible star, both research teams found that the mass of Cygnus X-1 was likely too large to be a white dwarf or neutron star, indicating that it was probably a black hole.[74][75] Further research strengthened their hypothesis.[76][77]


While Cygnus X-1, a stellar-mass black hole, was generally accepted by the scientific community as a black hole by the end of 1973,[76] it would be decades before a supermassive black hole would gain the same broad recognition. Although, as early as the 1960s, physicists such as Donald Lynden-Bell and Martin Rees had suggested that powerful quasars in the center of galaxies were powered by accreting supermassive black holes, little observational proof existed at the time.[78][79] However, the Hubble Space Telescope, launched decades later, found that supermassive black holes were not only present in these active galactic nuclei, but that supermassive black holes in the center of galaxies were ubiquitous: Almost every galaxy had a supermassive black hole at its center, many of which were quiescent.[80][81] In 1999, David Merritt proposed the M–sigma relation, which related the dispersion of the velocity of matter in the center bulge of a galaxy to the mass of the supermassive black hole at its core.[82] Subsequent studies confirmed this correlation.[83][84][85] Around the same time, based on telescope observations of the velocities of stars at the center of the Milky Way galaxy, independent work groups led by Andrea Ghez and Reinhard Genzel concluded that the compact radio source in the center of the galaxy, Sagittarius A*, was likely a supermassive black hole.[86][87] In 2020, Ghez and Genzel won the Nobel Prize in Physics for their prediction.[88][89]


The first detection of gravitational waves, imaged by LIGO observatories in Hanford Site, Washington and Livingston, Louisiana

On 11 February 2016, the LIGO Scientific Collaboration and Virgo Collaboration announced the first direct detection of gravitational waves, named GW150914, representing the first observation of a black hole merger.[90] At the time of the merger, the black holes were approximately 1.4 billion light-years away from Earth and had masses of 30 and 35 solar masses.[91]: 6  The mass of the resulting black hole was approximately 62 solar masses, with an additional three solar masses radiated away as gravitational waves.[91][92] The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) detected the gravitational waves by using two mirrors spaced four kilometers apart to measure microscopic changes in length.[93] In 2017, Rainer Weiss, Kip Thorne, and Barry Barish, who had spearheaded the project, were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for their work.[94] Since the initial discovery in 2015, hundreds more gravitational waves have been observed by LIGO and another interferometer, Virgo.[95]


Image by the Event Horizon Telescope of the supermassive black hole in the center of Messier 87

On 10 April 2019, the first direct image of a black hole and its vicinity was published, following observations made by the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) in 2017 of the supermassive black hole in Messier 87's galactic centre.[96][97][98] The observations were carried out by eight observatories in six geographical locations across four days and totaled five petabytes of data.[99][100][101] In 2022, the Event Horizon Telescope collaboration released an image of the black hole in the center of the Milky Way galaxy, Sagittarius A*; The data had been collected in 2017.[102] Detailed analysis of the motion of stars recorded by the Gaia mission produced evidence in 2022[103] and 2023[104] of a black hole named Gaia BH1 in a binary with a Sun-like star about 1,560 light-years (480 parsecs) away. Gaia BH1 is currently the closest known black hole to Earth.[105][106] Two more black holes have since been found from Gaia data, one in a binary with a red giant[107] and the other in a binary with a G-type star.[108]


Etymology

In December 1967, a student reportedly suggested the phrase "black hole" at a lecture by John Wheeler; Wheeler adopted the term for its brevity and "advertising value", and Wheeler's stature in the field ensured it quickly caught on,[44][109] leading some to credit Wheeler with coining the phrase.[110]


However, the term was used by others around that time. Science writer Marcia Bartusiak traces the term "black hole" to physicist Robert H. Dicke, who in the early 1960s reportedly compared the phenomenon to the Black Hole of Calcutta, notorious as a prison where people entered but never left alive. The term black hole was used in print by Life and Science News magazines in 1963, and by science journalist Ann Ewing in her article "'Black Holes' in Space", dated 18 January 1964, which was a report on a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science held in Cleveland, Ohio.[44]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole


Nova music festival massacre

On 7 October 2023, the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Palestinian nationalist organization Hamas, initiated a sudden attack on Israel from the Gaza Strip. As part of the attack, 364 individuals, mostly civilians, were killed and many more wounded at the Supernova Sukkot Gathering, an open-air music festival during the Jewish holiday of Shemini Atzeret near kibbutz Re'im. Hamas also took 40 people hostage, and men and women were reportedly subject to sexual and gender-based violence.[4][5][6][7][8][9][10]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nova_music_festival_massacre


A nova (pl. novae or novas) is a transient astronomical event that causes the sudden appearance of a bright, apparently "new" star (hence the name "nova", Latin for "new") that slowly fades over weeks or months. All observed novae involve white dwarfs in close binary systems, but causes of the dramatic appearance of a nova vary, depending on the circumstances of the two progenitor stars. The main sub-classes of novae are classical novae, recurrent novae (RNe), and dwarf novae. They are all considered to be cataclysmic variable stars.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nova


Revelation 16:8

1599 Geneva Bible

8 [a]And the fourth Angel poured out his vial on the sun, and it was given to him to torment men with heat of fire,

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2016%3A8-10&version=GNV


SpaceX Roadster is not a natural celestial object, but rather a man-made object launched by SpaceX in February 2018 as part of the Falcon Heavy test flight. It is a red sports car owned by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, and was launched as a demonstration of the Falcon Heavy's capabilities. The Roadster is not in a stable orbit around the Sun, but is instead on a heliocentric orbit that will take it to the asteroid belt and then back to the inner Solar System in the future. The Roadster also carries a mannequin named Starman, dressed in a spacesuit, in the driver's seat. The name "Roadster" refers to the type of car that is used as the payload for the Falcon Heavy, while "SpaceX" is the name of the private space exploration company founded by Elon Musk in 2002.

https://theskylive.com/roadster-info


416 Finally, those means that are proposed by our holy father Saint Ignatius in Part X of the Constitutions for the preservation and development not only of the body or exterior of the Society but also of its spirit, and for the attainment of the objective it seeks, which is to aid souls to reach their ultimate and supernatural end, [10] are to be observed eagerly and diligently by all, with a truly personal sense of responsibility for its increase and development, for the praise and service of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and the help of souls.[11]

L. D. S. "

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


A red giant is a luminous giant star of low or intermediate mass (roughly 0.3–8 solar masses (M☉)) in a late phase of stellar evolution. The outer atmosphere is inflated and tenuous, making the radius large and the surface temperature around 5,000 K [K] (4,700 °C; 8,500 °F) or lower. The appearance of the red giant is from yellow-white to reddish-orange, including the spectral types K and M, sometimes G, but also class S stars and most carbon stars.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_giant


In physics, string theory is a theoretical framework in which the point-like particles of particle physics are replaced by one-dimensional objects called strings. String theory describes how these strings propagate through space and interact with each other. On distance scales larger than the string scale, a string acts like a particle, with its mass, charge, and other properties determined by the vibrational state of the string. In string theory, one of the many vibrational states of the string corresponds to the graviton, a quantum mechanical particle that carries the gravitational force. Thus, string theory is a theory of quantum gravity.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory


A chain reaction is a sequence of reactions where a reactive product or by-product causes additional reactions to take place. In a chain reaction, positive feedback leads to a self-amplifying chain of events.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chain_reaction


2 Peter 3:10

1599 Geneva Bible

10 [a]But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in the which the heavens shall pass away with a [b]noise, and the elements shall melt with heat, and the earth with the works that are therein shall be burnt up.


Read full chapter

Footnotes

2 Peter 3:10 A very short description of the least distinction of the world, but in such sort as nothing could be spoken more gravely.

2 Peter 3:10 With the violence as it were of a hissing storm.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Peter%203%3A10&version=GNV


The Roman historian Phlegon is mentioned by Origen who describes a darkening of the sun in the eighteenth year of Tiberius on Nisan 14-Passover which would be 30 AD. A few people have used this Roman history report stating the year of the Crucifixion is 33 AD. They mistakenly start Tiberius’ reign in 14 AD after the death of Augustus instead of the start of his joint reign in 11 AD.


On the Gregorian-Hebrew solar calendar found in ESC, the date of the Crucifixion is Friday April 5-Nisan 14, 30 AD. On this Hebrew solar calendar Nisan 14-Passover always falls on April 5 in a non-leap year and April 3 in a leap or special year on the Gregorian calendar we use today. This is clearly new information about the accuracy and inerrancy of the specific dates in Scripture.


This type of assessment of the Bible’s accuracy was only possible in recent years with computers, Excel spreadsheets, Bible software, and calendar converters like www.rosettacalendar.com.


Resources:


ESC = Earth’s Sacred Calendar: The Dated Events of the Old Testament by Jim Liles; Pub 2014.

CARM: Is there non-biblical evidence of a day of darkness at Christ’s death?

Bible History.net The Crucifixion Darkness

https://thecreationclub.com/historical-basis-for-believing-jesus-was-crucified-in-ad-30/


AI Overview

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When someone says "2000 years of age," it means a period of time spanning 2,000 years, often used in historical or astrological contexts to refer to a specific era or "age" like the "Age of Pisces" which is considered to have lasted for 2,000 years in some interpretations.

Key points about "2000 years of age":

Astrological usage:

In astrology, different "ages" are associated with different zodiac signs, and each age is often calculated as lasting around 2,000 years based on the Earth's axial precession.

Example:

Currently, many astrologers consider the "Age of Aquarius" to be starting around the year 2000, signifying a new era.

Not perfectly accurate:

While 2,000 years is often used for simplicity, the actual length of an astrological age based on precession is closer to 2,160 years.

https://www.google.com/search?q=age+meaning+2000+years&sca_esv=813837a4ab300c6b&sxsrf=ADLYWIIlFsM6w2q46pw2FDIKPtl6eHh4KA%3A1735980154611&ei=evR4Z4uCJdejkPIP2Oay2A4&ved=0ahUKEwiLp8-D1tuKAxXXEUQIHVizDOsQ4dUDCBA&uact=5&oq=age+meaning+2000+years&gs_lp=Egxnd3Mtd2l6LXNlcnAiFmFnZSBtZWFuaW5nIDIwMDAgeWVhcnMyCBAAGIAEGKIEMggQABiABBiiBDIIEAAYgAQYogQyCBAAGIAEGKIEMggQABiABBiiBEjKEVCTCVjSDXACeAGQAQCYAW6gAf8CqgEDMy4xuAEDyAEA-AEBmAIGoAKRA8ICChAAGLADGNYEGEfCAggQABgHGAgYHsICCBAAGAgYDRgewgILEAAYgAQYhgMYigXCAgoQIRigARjDBBgKmAMAiAYBkAYIkgcDNS4xoAfoFA&sclient=gws-wiz-serp


Pope Francis[b] (born Jorge Mario Bergoglio;[c] 17 December 1936 – 21 April 2025) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 13 March 2013 until his death in 2025. He was the first Jesuit pope, the first Latin American, and the first born or raised outside Europe since the 8th-century Syrian pope Gregory III.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Francis


Easter in 2030

Date: April 21, 2030

Day: Sunday


Avril Ramona Lavigne CM (/ˈævrɪl ləˈviːn/ AV-ril lə-VEEN; French: [avʁil ʁamɔna laviɲ]; born September 27, 1984) is a Canadian singer and songwriter. She is a key musician in popularizing pop-punk music, as she paved the way for female-driven, punk-influenced pop music in the early 2000s. Her accolades include ten Juno Awards and eight Grammy Awards nominations.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avril_Lavigne


Regimini militantis Ecclesiae (Latin for To the Government of the Church Militant) was the papal bull promulgated by Pope Paul III on September 27, 1540, which gave a first approval to the Society of Jesus, also known as the Jesuits, but limited the number of its members to sixty.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regimini_militantis_Ecclesiae


The Day Called 'X' is a dramatized CBS documentary film set in Portland, Oregon, in which the entire city is evacuated in anticipation of a nuclear air raid, after Soviet bombers had been detected by radar stations to the north; it details the activation of the city's civil defense protocols and leads up to the moment before the attack (the ending is left intentionally unknown). The operations were run from the Kelly Butte Bunker, which was the emergency operations center at that time. It was filmed in September 1957[1] and aired December 8 of that year.[2][3] Apart from presenter/narrator Glenn Ford, none of the people shown are actors. They are locals of Portland shown in their real jobs, including Mayor Terry Schrunk.


Its local re-broadcast in 2004[4] and appearance in the on-line Prelinger Archives attracted interest among local history buffs due to its extensive outside shots of the city, and the use of non-actor participants (local officials and broadcasters). Whenever one of these individuals is heard uttering warnings or statements regarding attack, the words "AN ATTACK IS NOT TAKING PLACE" are superimposed over the picture.[2]


On September 27, 1955, Portland actually conducted an exercise evacuation of downtown called "Operation Greenlight",[5][6] and the film is often misattributed to that year. Ford's narration, however, does make direct reference to the 1955 exercise.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_Called_%27X%27


SpaceX Roadster is not a natural celestial object, but rather a man-made object launched by SpaceX in February 2018 as part of the Falcon Heavy test flight. It is a red sports car owned by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, and was launched as a demonstration of the Falcon Heavy's capabilities. The Roadster is not in a stable orbit around the Sun, but is instead on a heliocentric orbit that will take it to the asteroid belt and then back to the inner Solar System in the future. The Roadster also carries a mannequin named Starman, dressed in a spacesuit, in the driver's seat.

https://theskylive.com/roadster-info


PART X THE PRESERVATION AND INCREASE OF THE SOCIETY

410 §1. As a sign of gratitude and devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, let that feast be solemnly celebrated; and on that day is to be renewed the consecration by which the Society on January 1, 1872, dedicated and consecrated itself totally and perpetually.

§2. The consecration to the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary is to be renewed each year on the feast of the Immaculate Heart.[1]

411 The sense of belonging and responsibility that each individual one of Ours has toward the whole Society should be manifested in a knowledge of our spirituality, our history, our saints, our apostolic labors, and our men, especially of those who are suffering difficulties for the sake of Christ; it is to be manifested as well by maintaining Ignatian mobility and flexibility with a view to helping any region of the Society whatsoever.[2]

412 §1. All our members should have at heart a shared concern for attracting new members to the Society, especially by prayer and the example of their lives as individuals and in community.[3]

§2. Therefore, we must do everything possible actively to present the Society in such a way that those whom God calls will know and appreciate who and what we are and what is our distinctive way of proceeding in the following of Christ.[4]

§3. We must also promote vocations as widely as possible, in order to reflect the culture and experience of those we seek to serve, including minority cultures, immigrants, and indigenous people.[5]

413 The Society should always show itself bound to its benefactors in charity and gratitude. Superiors should ensure that prayers are offered for them and other appropriate signs of our gratitude are shown them.[6]

414 In the perfect observance of all the Constitutions and in the particular fulfillment of our Institute, our formed members should excel, setting a good example and spreading the good odor of Christ, keeping before their eyes the serious obligation they have of giving edification especially to our younger members.[ 7]

415 All by earnest reading and meditation (in particular, at the time of the annual Spiritual Exercises, renewal of vows, monthly recollection, beginning of the year, and so forth) should strive ever to know, esteem, and love better our Constitutions and the special nature of our Institute,[ 8] which are to be faithfully observed, and which for each and all of us are the one, true, and safe way that surely leads to the perfection to which our Lord calls and invites all sons of the Society.[9] §2. Major superiors, especially at the time of the annual visitation, should see that this is faithfully observed.

416 Finally, those means that are proposed by our holy father Saint Ignatius in Part X of the Constitutions for the preservation and development not only of the body or exterior of the Society but also of its spirit, and for the attainment of the objective it seeks, which is to aid souls to reach their ultimate and supernatural end, [10] are to be observed eagerly and diligently by all, with a truly personal sense of responsibility for its increase and development, for the praise and service of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and the help of souls.[11]


L. D. S.

The Constitutions of The Society of Jesus and Their Complimentary Norms

A Complete English Translation of the Official Latin Texts

THE INSTITUTE OF JESUIT SOURCES

SAINT LOUIS, 1996

https://web.archive.org/web/20200211182223/https://jesuitas.lat/uploads/the-constitutions-of-the-society-of-jesus-and-their-complementary-norms/Constitutions%20and%20Norms%20SJ%20ingls.pdf


Louis Raphaël I Sako (Arabic: لويس روفائيل ساكو;[1] born 4 July 1948) is a Chaldean Catholic prelate who has served as Patriarch of Baghdad since 1 February 2013. Pope Francis made him a cardinal on 28 June 2018.


Biography

Early life

Sako was born in the city of Zakho, Iraq, on 4 July 1948.[2] He comes from an ethnic Assyrian family of the Chaldean Catholic Church that has roots in a religious community that has had a presence in the city of his birth since the 5th century AD.[3]


He completed his early studies in Mosul and then attended the Dominican-run Saint Jean’s Seminary there. He was ordained a priest on 1 June 1974 and filled his first pastoral assignment at the Cathedral of Mosul until 1979. He then earned a doctorate in Eastern patrology at the Pontifical Oriental Institute. When denied a license to teach because he was only qualified for religious instruction, he earned a second doctorate in history from the Sorbonne in Paris.[4] With this he secured his teaching license and was able to provide religious instruction. From 1997 to 2002 he was rector of the Patriarchal Seminary in Baghdad. He then returned to Mosul and guided the parish of Perpetual Help for a year.[5][6]


Sako speaks Neo-Aramaic, German, French, English, Italian, Kurdish and Arabic.[2]


Archeparch

A synod of the bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church meeting in Baghdad elected Sako Archeparch of Kirkuk on 24 October 2002. Pope John Paul II gave his assent on 27 September 2003.[7] He received his episcopal consecration on 14 November 2003 from his predecessor in Kirkuk, André Sana.[8]


In August 2009, and at the beginning of Ramadan, Sako organized an appeal for national peace, reconciliation and end to violence on the part of more than fifty religious leaders in Kirkuk. He called it "a gesture of closeness to our Muslim brothers. We are all brothers, sons of the same God we must respect and cooperate for the good of the people and our country." The participants included representatives of Ali Sistani and Muqtada al Sadr.[9]


Patriarch

The Synod of Bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church, convoked in Rome on 28 January 2013, elected Sako to succeed Emmanuel III Delly as Patriarch of Babylon. He chose Louis Raphael I as his regnal name. Pope Benedict XVI gave his assent to the election on 1 February[2] and granted him ecclesiastica communio (ecclesiastical communion) as required by the canon law for Eastern-rite Catholic churches in recognition of their unity with the wider Catholic church.[10]


That same year, Iraq's President Jalal Talabani issued a decree recognizing Sako as Patriarch of the Chaldean Church.[11]


In July 2014 Sako led a wave of condemnation for the Sunni Islamists who demanded Christians either convert, submit to their radical rule and pay a religious levy or face death by the sword.[12] In September 2014 Sako said “The U.S. is indirectly responsible for what is going on in Iraq as it said it would ensure democracy and the well-being of the people, but 10 years have passed and on the contrary we have gone backward." He was responding to a question following remarks attributed to him in the local daily Ad-Diyar in which he accused the U.S. of supporting ISIS. Sako had also criticized Muslim countries for lack of support: "Our Muslim neighbours did not help us." He urged Muslim preachers to issue a religious ruling against the killing of all innocent people and said that "Issuing a fatwa preventing Muslims from killing fellow Muslims is not enough."[13]


In 2014, Sako ordered ten priests who had fled Iraq to return there by 22 October; he suspended them when they failed to comply. The priests, all living in the United States, some for as long as twenty years, appealed to Pope Francis for relief from the order.[14] In January 2015, Pope Francis granted them permission to remain in the United States.[15] Sako later renewed his order despite the pope's decision.[16]


In 2015, Sako proposed a "merger" or reunion of his own Chaldean Catholic Church with the Ancient Church of the East and the Assyrian Church of the East to create one united "Church of the East" with a single patriarch in union with the pope. His proposal would have required both his own resignation and that of Mar Addai II, followed by a joint synod of the bishops of all three churches to elect a new patriarch for the reunited Church of the East. (The patriarchate of the Assyrian Church of the East was vacant at the time, following the death of Mar Dinkha IV.)[17] He wrote that "Unity does not mean uniformity, nor the melting of our own church identity into one style, but it maintains unity in diversity and we remain one apostolic universal church, the Oriental Church, that maintains its independence of administration, laws and liturgies, traditions and support."[18] The Assyrian Church of the East respectfully declined this proposal citing "ecclesiological divergences still remaining" and proceeded with its election of a new patriarch.[19]


On 14 November 2015, the Synod of Bishops announced that Pope Francis had named Sako as one of his three appointments to that body's council.[20]


Cardinal

Pope Francis made Sako a cardinal in a consistory on 28 June 2018.[21] Later that year, Pope Francis named him one of the four cardinals to preside over sessions of the Synod of Bishops on Youth in October.[22]


On 6 October 2018 Sako was named a member of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches,[23] on 22 February 2019 a member of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue,[24] and on 29 September 2021 a member of the Congregation for Catholic Education.[25] On 4 January 2022, Pope Francis made him a member of the Council for the Economy.[26]


Sako was a cardinal elector in the 2025 papal conclave that elected Pope Leo XIV.[27] Patriarch Sako was also the first Chaldean Catholic Patriarch ever to participate in a papal conclave.[28][a] Sako opted not to wear the shash, the traditional headgear of East Syriac Christian bishops, and wore only his scarlet zucchetto.[32]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Rapha%C3%ABl_I_Sako


Revelation 19

1599 Geneva Bible

19 1 The heavenly company praise God for avenging the blood of his servants on the whore. 9 They are written blessed, that are called to the Lamb’s supper. 10 The Angel will not be worshipped. 11 That mighty King of Kings appeareth from heaven. 19 The battle, 20 wherein the beast is taken, and cast into the burning lake.


1 And [a]after these things I heard a great voice of a great multitude in heaven, saying, [b][c]Hallelujah, salvation, and glory, and honor, and power be to the Lord our God.


2 For true and righteous are his judgments: for he hath condemned the great whore which did corrupt the earth with her fornication, and hath avenged the blood of his servants shed by her hand.


3 And again they said, [d]Hallelujah: and that her smoke rose up for evermore.


4 And the four and twenty Elders, and the four beasts fell down, and worshipped God that sat on the throne, saying, Amen, Hallelujah.


5 [e]Then a voice came out of the [f]throne, saying, Praise our God, all ye his servants, and ye that fear him, both small and great.


6 And I heard [g]like a voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of strong thunderings, saying, Hallelujah: for the Lord that God that Almighty one hath reigned.


7 Let us be glad and rejoice, and give glory to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made [h]herself ready.


8 And to her was granted, that she should be arrayed with [i]pure fine linen and shining, for the fine [j]linen is the [k]righteousness of Saints.


9 [l]Then he said unto me, Write, Blessed are they which are called unto the Lamb’s supper. And he said unto me, These words of God are true.


10 [m]And I fell before his feet, to worship him, but he said unto me, See thou do it not: I am thy fellow servant, and one of thy brethren, which have the [n]testimony of Jesus, Worship God: for the testimony of [o]Jesus is the Spirit of prophecy.


11 [p]And I saw [q]heaven open, and behold a white horse, and he that sat upon him was called faithful and true, and he judgeth and fighteth righteously.


12 And his eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many crowns: and he had a name written, that no man knew but himself.


13 And he was clothed with a garment dipped in blood, and his name is called, THE WORD OF GOD.


14 [r]And the hosts which were in heaven, followed him upon white horses, clothed with fine linen white and pure.


15 [s]And out of his mouth went out a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the heathen: for he shall rule them with a rod of iron, for he it is that treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.


16 [t]And he hath upon his garment, and upon his thigh, a name written, THE KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.


17 [u]And I saw an Angel stand in the [v]sun who cried with a loud voice, saying, to all the fowls that did fly by [w]the midst of heaven, come, and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God,


18 That ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of high captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all freemen, and bondmen, and of small and great.


19 [x]And I saw the beast, and the kings of the earth, and their hosts gathered together to make battle against him that sat on the horse, and against his army.


20 But the beast [y]was taken, and with him [z]that false Prophet that wrought miracles before him, whereby he deceived them that received the beast’s mark, and them that worshipped his image. These both were alive cast into a lake of fire burning with brimstone.


21 And the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sitteth upon the horse, which cometh out of his mouth, and all the fowls were filled full with their flesh.


Footnotes

Revelation 19:1 This chapter hath in sum two parts, one transitory or of passage unto the things that follow unto verse 10, another historical of the victory of Christ gotten against both the beasts unto the end of the chapter, which I said was the second history of this argument, Rev. 17:1. The transition hath two places, one of praising God for the overthrow done unto Babylon in 4 verses, and another likewise of praise, and Prophetical, for the coming of Christ unto his kingdom, and his most royal marriage with his Church, thence unto the tenth verse. The former praise has three branches, distinguished after the ancient manner of those that sing: … , that is, an invitation or provokement in 2 verses, … , a response or answer in the third verse, and … , a close or joining together in harmony: all which I thought good of purpose to distinguish in this place, lest any man should with Porphyrius, or other like dogs, object to Saint John of the heavenly Church, a childish and idle repetition of speech.

Revelation 19:1 Praise the Lord.

Revelation 19:1 The proposition of praise with exhortation in this verse, and the cause thereof, in the next verse.

Revelation 19:3 The song of the Antiphony or response, containing an amplification of the praise of God, from the perpetual and most certain testimony of his divine judgment as was done at Sodom and Gomorrah, Gen. 19.

Revelation 19:5 The second place of praise as I said verse 1, which first is commanded from God in this verse: and then is in most ample manner pronounced of the creatures, both because they see that kingdom of Christ to come, which most they desire, verse 6, also because they see that the Church is called forth to be brought home: into the house of her husband by holy marriage unto the fellowship of his kingdom, verses 7, 8. Wherefore S. John is commanded to write in a book the Epiphonema , or acclamation joined with a divine testimony, verse 9.

Revelation 19:5 Out of the temple from God, as Rev. 11:19.

Revelation 19:6 Without the Temple in heaven.

Revelation 19:7 Namely unto that holy marriage both herself in person in this verse and also furnished of her spouse with marriage gifts princely and divine is adorned and prepared in the next verse.

Revelation 19:8 As an ensign of Kingly and priestly dignity: which dignity Christ bestoweth upon us, Rev. 1:6.

Revelation 19:8 This is a gift given by the husband for marriage sake and a most choice ornament, which Christ bestoweth upon us, as upon his spouse.

Revelation 19:8 Good works which are lively testimonies of faith.

Revelation 19:9 Namely the Angel, as appeareth by the next verse.

Revelation 19:10 The particular history of this verse is brought in by occasion, and as it were besides the purpose, that Saint John might make a public example of his own infirmity, and of the modest sanctimony of the Angel, who hath renounced for himself the divine honors, and recalled all the servants of God, unto the worship of him alone: as also Rev. 22:8.

Revelation 19:10 Which are commanded to bear witness of Jesus.

Revelation 19:10 For Jesus is the mark that all the prophecies shoot at.

Revelation 19:11 The second place of this Chapter (as I said verse 1) is of the victory gotten by Christ against both the beasts: in which first Christ is described as one ready to fight, unto verse 16, then is showed the battle to be begun, thence unto verse 18: lastly is set forth the victory unto the end of the Chapter. In this place do shine most excellent properties of Christ as our heavenly Judge and revenger, according to his person, company, effects, and names.

Revelation 19:11 Properties belonging to his person, that he is heavenly, judge, faithful, true, just, in this verse, searching out all things ruling over all, to be searched out of none, verse 12, the trumpet, and the very essential word of God, verse 13.

Revelation 19:14 The company or retinue of Christ, holy, innumerable, heavenly, judicial, royal and pure.

Revelation 19:15 The effects of Christ prepared unto battle, that with his mouth he striketh the Gentiles, ruleth and destroyeth.

Revelation 19:16 The name agreeing unto Christ according to the former properties, expressed after the manner of the Hebrews.

Revelation 19:17 The second member as I said, verse 11. A reproachful calling forth of his enemies unto battle: in which not themselves (for why should they be called forth of the king of the world, or provoked being his subjects? for that is not comely) but in their hearing, the birds of the air are called to eat their carcasses.

Revelation 19:17 That is, openly, and in sight of all, as Num. 25:4 and 2 Sam. 12:11.

Revelation 19:17 That is, through this inferior heaven, and which is nearer unto us: a Hebrew phrase.

Revelation 19:19 The third member (as was said, verse 11) of the victory obtained by Christ. Unto this apppertaineth two things: his bucking with the beast and his forces in this verse: and the event most magnificent, described after the manner of men, in the verses following. All these things are plain.

Revelation 19:20 Namely, that beast with seven heads, of which before, Rev. 13:1 and 17:3.

Revelation 19:20 That is, that beast with two heads, of which Rev. 13:11. See also Rev. 16:14.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2019&version=GNV 


The Geneva Bible, sometimes known by the sobriquet Breeches Bible,[1] is one of the most historically significant translations of the Bible into English, preceding the Douay Rheims Bible by 22 years, and the King James Version by 51 years.[2] It was the primary Bible of 16th-century English Protestantism and was used by William Shakespeare,[3] Oliver Cromwell, John Knox, John Donne and others. It was one of the Bibles taken to America on the Mayflower (Pilgrim Hall Museum has collected several Bibles of Mayflower passengers), and its frontispiece inspired Benjamin Franklin's design for the first Great Seal of the United States.[4]


The Geneva Bible was used by many English Dissenters, and it was still respected by Oliver Cromwell's soldiers at the time of the English Civil War, in the booklet The Souldiers Pocket Bible.[5]


Because the language of the Geneva Bible was more forceful and vigorous, most readers strongly preferred this version to the Great Bible. In the words of Cleland Boyd McAfee, "it drove the Great Bible off the field by sheer power of excellence".[6]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geneva_Bible


The European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN (/sɜːrn/; French pronunciation: [sɛʁn]; Organisation européenne pour la recherche nucléaire), is an intergovernmental organization that operates the largest particle physics laboratory in the world. Established in 1954, it is based in Meyrin, a western suburb of Geneva, on the France–Switzerland border. It comprises 24 member states.[4] Israel, admitted in 2013, is the only full member geographically out of Europe.[5][6] CERN is an official United Nations General Assembly observer.[7]


The acronym CERN is also used to refer to the laboratory; in 2024, it had 2,704 scientific, technical, and administrative staff members, and hosted about 12,406 users from institutions in more than 80 countries.[8] In 2016, CERN generated 49 petabytes of data.[9]


CERN's main function is to provide the particle accelerators and other infrastructure needed for high-energy physics research – consequently, numerous experiments have been constructed at CERN through international collaborations. CERN is the site of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world's largest and highest-energy particle collider.[10] The main site at Meyrin hosts a large computing facility, which is primarily used to store and analyze data from experiments, as well as simulate events. As researchers require remote access to these facilities, the lab has historically been a major wide area network hub. CERN is also the birthplace of the World Wide Web.[11][12]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CERN


The Pontifical Swiss Guard,[note 1] also known as the Papal Swiss Guard or simply Swiss Guard,[3] is an armed forces, guard of honour, and protective security unit, maintained by the Holy See to protect the Pope and the Apostolic Palace within the territory of the Vatican City State. Established in 1506 under Pope Julius II, it is among the oldest military units in continuous operation[4] and is sometimes called "the world's smallest army".[3]


The Swiss Guard is recognised by its Renaissance-era dress uniform, consisting of a tunic striped in red, dark blue, and yellow; high plumed helmet; and traditional weapons such as the halberd. Guardsmen perform their protective duties in functional attire and with modern firearms. Since the assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II in 1981, the Guard has placed greater emphasis on its nonceremonial roles and has sought more training in anti-irregular military counterintelligence, commando-style raids, counter-sniper tactics, counterterrorism, close-quarters battle, defusing and disposal of bombs, executive protection, hostage rescue, human intelligence, medical evacuation, reconnaissance, tactical driving, tactical medical services, and tactical fast shooting by small arms.


The Swiss Guard is considered an elite military unit. It is highly selective in its recruitment: candidates must be unmarried Swiss Catholic males between 19 and 30 years of age and at least 5 feet 8.5 inches (1.74 meters), who have completed basic training with the Swiss Armed Forces and hold a professional diploma or high school degree.[5][6] As of 2024, there were 135 members.[7]


The Swiss Guard's security mission extends to the Pope's apostolic travels, the pontifical palace of Castel Gandolfo, and the College of Cardinals when the papal throne is vacant. Though the Guard serve as watchmen of Vatican City, the overall security and law enforcement of the city-state is conducted by the Corps of Gendarmerie of Vatican City, which is a separate body.


History

Italian Wars


The conclave of Pius V, with Swiss Guard guarding the entrance, Codex Maggi, 1578

The Pontifical Swiss Guard has its origins in the 15th century. Pope Sixtus IV (1471–1484) had allied with the Swiss Confederacy and built barracks in Via Pellegrino after foreseeing the possibility of recruiting Swiss mercenaries. The pact was renewed by Pope Innocent VIII (1484–1492) in order to use Swiss troops against the Duke of Milan. Alexander VI (1492–1503) later used the Swiss mercenaries during his alliance with the King of France.


During the time of the Borgias, the Italian Wars began, in which the Swiss mercenaries were a fixture on the front lines among the warring factions, sometimes for France, and sometimes for the Holy See or the Holy Roman Empire. The mercenaries enlisted when they heard King Charles VIII of France was going to war with Naples. Among the participants in the war against Naples was Cardinal Giuliano della Rovere, the future Pope Julius II (1503–1513), who was well acquainted with the Swiss, having been Bishop of Lausanne years earlier.[citation needed]


The expedition failed, in part thanks to new alliances made by Alexander VI against the French. When Cardinal della Rovere became Pope Julius II in 1503, he asked the Swiss Diet to provide him with a constant corps of 200 Swiss mercenaries. This was made possible through financing by German merchants from Augsburg, Ulrich, and Jacob Fugger, who had invested in the Pope and saw fit to protect their investment.[8]


In September 1505, the first contingent of 150 soldiers departed on foot to Rome, under the command of Kaspar von Silenen. They entered the city on 22 January 1506, now regarded as the official date of the Guard's foundation.[9][10]


"The Swiss see the sad situation of the Church of God, Mother of Christianity, and realize how grave and dangerous it is that any tyrant, avid for wealth, can assault with impunity, the common Mother of Christianity," declared the Swiss theologian Huldrych Zwingli, who later became a Protestant reformer. Pope Julius II later granted the Guard the title "Defenders of the Church's freedom".[11]


The force has varied greatly in size over the years and on occasion has been disbanded and reconstituted.


Its most significant hostile engagement came on 6 May 1527 during the Sack of Rome. As troops of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V advanced, 147 of the 189 Guards, including their commander Caspar Röist, died fighting to allow Clement VII to escape through the Passetto di Borgo, escorted by the other 42 guards. The last-stand battlefield is located on the southern side of St. Peter's Basilica, close to the Campo Santo Teutonico (German Graveyard).[12]


Clement VII was forced to replace the depleted Swiss Guard with a contingent of 200 German mercenaries (Custodia Peditum Germanorum).[12]


In 1537, Pope Paul III ordered the Swiss Guard to be reinstated and sent Cardinal Ennio Filonardi to oversee recruitment. Anti-papal sentiment in Switzerland hindered recruitment. In 1548, the papacy reached an agreement with the mayor of Lucerne, Nikolaus von Meggen, to swear-in 150 new Swiss Guardsmen under commander Jost von Meggen, the mayor's nephew.[12]


Early modern history


Armour for the Papal Guard of Gregory XIII, c. 1580s, in the Higgins Armory Museum in Worcester, Massachusetts

After the end of the Italian Wars, the Swiss Guard ceased to be used as a military combat unit in the service of the Pope and its role became mostly that of the protection of the person of the Pope and of an honour guard. However, twelve members of the Pontifical Swiss Guard of Pius V served as part of the Swiss Guard of admiral Marcantonio Colonna at the Battle of Lepanto in 1571.[13]


The office of commander of the Papal Guard came to be a special honour in the Catholic region of the Swiss Confederacy. It became strongly associated with the leading family of Lucerne, Pfyffer von Altishofen, a family which between 1652 and 1847 provided nine out of ten of the commanders. The exception was Johann Kaspar Mayr von Baldegg, of Lucerne, who served 1696–1704.[14]


In 1798, commander Franz Alois Pfyffer von Altishofen went into exile with the deposed Pius VI. After the death of the Pope on 29 August 1799, the Swiss Guard was disbanded and then reinstated by Pius VII in 1800. In 1809, Rome was again captured by the French and the guard was again disbanded.[1] Pius VII was exiled to Fontainebleau. The guard was reinstated in 1814,[1] when the Pope returned from exile, under the previous commander Karl Leodegar Pfyffer von Altishofen.[citation needed]


Modern history


Barracks of the Pontifical Swiss Guard in Vatican City.

The guard was disbanded in 1848, when Pius IX fled to Gaeta. In 1849, it was reinstated when the Pope returned to Rome.


After the Piedmontese invasion of Rome, the Swiss Guard declined in the later 19th century into a purely ceremonial body with low standards. Guards on duty at the Vatican were "Swiss" only in name, mostly born in Rome to parents of Swiss descent and speaking the Roman dialect. The guards were trained solely for ceremonial parade, kept only a few obsolete rifles in store and wore civilian dress when drilling or in barracks. Administration, accommodation, discipline and organization were neglected and the unit numbered only about 90 men out of an authorized establishment of 133.[15]


The modern Swiss Guard is the product of the reforms pursued by Jules Repond, commander during the years 1910–1921. Repond proposed recruiting only native citizens of Switzerland, and he introduced rigorous military exercises. He attempted to introduce modern arms, but Pius X permitted the presence of firearms only if they were not functional. Repond's reforms and strict discipline were not well received by the corps, culminating in a week of open mutiny in July 1913, and the subsequent dismissal of thirteen ringleaders from the guard.[16]


In his project to restore the Swiss Guard to its former prestige, Repond dedicated himself to the study of historical costume, with the aim of designing a new uniform that would be both reflective of the historical Swiss costume of the 16th century and suited for military exercise. The result of his studies was published in 1917 as Le costume de la Garde suisse pontificale et la Renaissance italienne. Repond designed the distinctive Renaissance-style uniforms worn by the modern Swiss Guard. The introduction of the new uniforms was completed in May 1914.


In 1929, the foundation of Vatican City as a modern sovereign state was effected by the Lateran Treaty, negotiated between the Holy See and Italy. The duties of protecting public order and security in the Vatican lay with the Papal Gendarmerie Corps, while the Swiss Guard, the Palatine Guard and the Noble Guard served mostly ceremonial functions.[17]


In 1970, the Palatine and Noble Guards were disbanded by Paul VI, leaving the Swiss Guard as the only ceremonial guard unit of the Vatican. At the same time, the Gendarmerie Corps was transformed into a central security office, with the duties of protecting the Pope, defending Vatican City, and providing police and security services within its territory, while the Swiss Guard continued to serve ceremonial functions only. In June 1976, Paul VI in a decree defined the nominal size of the corps at 90 men. In April 1979, this was increased to 100 men by John Paul II . As of 2010 the guard numbered 107 halberdiers, divided into three squads, with commissioned and non-commissioned officers.[17]


Since the assassination attempt on John Paul II of 13 May 1981, a much stronger emphasis has been placed on the guard's non-ceremonial roles.[18] The Swiss Guard has developed into a modern guard corps equipped with modern small arms. Members of the Swiss Guard in plain clothes now accompany the Pope on his travels abroad for his protection.


On 4 May 1998 commander Alois Estermann was murdered on the day of his promotion. Estermann and his wife, Gladys Meza Romero, were killed by the young guardsman Cédric Tornay, who later committed suicide. The case received considerable public attention and became the subject of a number of conspiracy theories alleging Cold War politics or involvement by the Opus Dei prelature. British journalist John Follain, who published a book on the case in 2006, concluded that the killer acted purely out of personal motives.[19]


In 2002, the first non-white Swiss Guard joined the militia.[20][21]


In April–May 2006, on the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the Swiss Guard, 80 former guardsmen marched from Bellinzona in southern Switzerland to Rome, recalling the march of the original 200 Swiss guards to take up Papal service in 1505. The march had been preceded by other celebrations in Lucerne, including a rally of veterans of the Guard and a Mass.[22] In a public ceremony on 6 May 2006, 33 new guards were sworn in on the steps of St. Peter's Basilica, instead of the traditional venue in the San Damaso Courtyard. The date chosen marked the anniversary of the Sack of Rome when the Swiss Guard was nearly destroyed. Present at this event were representatives of the Company of Pikemen and Musketeers of the Honourable Artillery Company of London and the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of Massachusetts.


In December 2014, Pope Francis directed that Daniel Anrig's term as commander should end on 31 January 2015, and that he be succeeded by his deputy Christoph Graf. This followed reports about Anrig's "authoritarian style".[23]


In 2015, with the rise of Islamic terrorism in Europe and open threats against the Vatican issued by the Islamic State (ISIS), Vatican officials collaborated with Italian authorities to improve the protection of Vatican City against attacks that cannot be reasonably defended against by the Swiss Guard and Vatican Gendarmerie, notably against drone attacks.[24]


In October 2019, the Swiss Guard was expanded to 135 men.[25][26] Previously, according to article 7 of the regulations,[which?] the Swiss Guard was made up of 110 men.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_Guard


Kim Jong Un[d] (born 8 January 1982, 1983 or 1984)[b] is a North Korean politician and dictator who has been the third supreme leader of North Korea since 2011 and general secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK) since 2012.[e] He is the third son of Kim Jong Il, who was the second supreme leader of North Korea, and a grandson of Kim Il Sung, the founder and first supreme leader of the country.


From late 2010, Kim was viewed as the successor to the North Korean leadership. Following his father's death in December 2011, state television announced Kim as the "great successor to the revolutionary cause". Kim holds the titles of General Secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea and President of the State Affairs. He is also a member of the Presidium of the WPK Politburo, the highest decision-making body in the country. In July 2012, Kim was promoted to the highest rank of marshal in the Korean People's Army, consolidating his positions as commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces and Chairman of the Central Military Commission. North Korean state media often refer to him as "Respected Comrade Kim Jong Un" or "Marshal Kim Jong Un". He has promoted the policy of byungjin, similar to Kim Il Sung's policy from the 1960s, referring to the simultaneous development of both the economy and the country's nuclear weapons program. He has also revived the structures of the WPK, expanding the party's power at the expense of the military leadership.


Kim Jong Un rules North Korea as a totalitarian dictatorship, and his leadership has followed the same cult of personality as his father and grandfather. In 2014, a United Nations Human Rights Council report suggested that Kim could be put on trial for crimes against humanity. According to reports, he has ordered the purge and execution of several North Korean officials including his uncle, Jang Song-thaek, in 2013. He is also widely believed to have ordered the assassination of his half-brother, Kim Jong-nam, in Malaysia in 2017. He has presided over an expansion of the consumer economy, construction projects and tourist attractions in North Korea.


Kim expanded the country's nuclear weapons program, which led to heightened tensions with the United States and South Korea, as well as China. In 2018 and 2019, Kim took part in summits with South Korean president Moon Jae-in and U.S. president Donald Trump, leading to a brief thaw between North Korea and the two countries, though the negotiations ultimately broke down without progress on reunification of Korea or nuclear disarmament. He has claimed success in combating the COVID-19 pandemic in North Korea, as the country did not report any confirmed cases until May 2022, although several independent observers have questioned this claim. Under his rule, North Korean soldiers have been deployed under Russian command in the Russian invasion of Ukraine.


Early life

North Korean authorities and state-run media have stated that Kim Jong Un was born on 8 January 1982,[4] but South Korean intelligence officials believe that the actual date is a year later, in 1983.[5] The US government lists his birth year as 1984, based on the passport he used while studying in Switzerland.[6] Ko Yong Suk, Kim's aunt who defected to the United States in 1997 also confirmed the 1984 birthdate, claiming that Kim was the same age as her own son who was a playmate from a young age.[7] It is thought that Kim's official birth year was changed for symbolic reasons; 1982 marked the seventieth birthday of his grandfather Kim Il Sung, and forty years after the official birth of his father Kim Jong Il.[8]


Kim Jong Un is the second of three children of Ko Yong Hui and Kim Jong Il; his elder brother, Kim Jong Chul, was born in 1981, while his younger sister, Kim Yo Jong, is believed to have been born in 1987.[9][10] He is a grandson of Kim Il Sung, who was the founder of and led North Korea from its establishment in 1948 until his death in 1994.[11] Kim is the first leader of North Korea to have been born a North Korean citizen, his father having been born in the Soviet Union and his grandfather having been born during the Japanese colonial period.


All of Kim Jong Il's children are said to have lived in Switzerland, as well as the mother of the two youngest sons, who lived in Geneva for some time.[12] First reports said that Kim Jong Un attended the private International School of Berne in Gümligen in Switzerland under the name "Chol-pak" or "Pak-chol" from 1993 to 1998.[13][14] He was described as shy, a good student who got along well with his classmates, and was a basketball fan.[15] He was chaperoned by an older student, thought to be his bodyguard.[16] His elder brother Kim Jong Chul also attended the school with him.[17]


The Liebefeld-Steinhölzli public school in Köniz, Switzerland, reportedly attended by Kim Jong Un

Later, it was reported that Kim Jong Un attended the Liebefeld Steinhölzli state school in Köniz, near Bern, under the name "Pak-un" or "Un-pak" from 1998 until 2000 as the son of an employee of the North Korean embassy in Bern. Authorities confirmed that a North Korean student attended the school during that period. Kim first attended a special class for foreign-language children and later attended the regular classes of the 6th, 7th, 8th and part of the final 9th year, leaving the school abruptly in the autumn of 2000. He was described as a well-integrated and ambitious student who liked to play basketball.[18] However, his grades and attendance rating are reported to have been poor.[19][20] The ambassador of North Korea in Switzerland, Ri Chol, had a close relationship with him and acted as a mentor.[12] One of Kim's classmates told reporters that he had told him that he was the son of the leader of North Korea.[21][22] According to some reports, Kim was described by classmates as a shy child who was awkward with girls and indifferent to political issues, but who distinguished himself in sports and had a fascination with the American National Basketball Association and Michael Jordan. One friend claimed that he had been shown pictures of Kim with Kobe Bryant and Toni Kukoč.[23]


In April 2012, new documents came to light indicating that Kim Jong Un had lived in Switzerland since 1991 or 1992, earlier than previously thought.[24]


The Laboratory of Anatomic Anthropology at the University of Lyon, France, compared the picture of Kim taken at the Liebefeld Steinhölzli school in 1999 with a picture of Kim Jong Un from 2012 and concluded that the faces show a conformity of 95%, suggesting that it is most likely that they are the same person.[25]


The Washington Post reported in 2009 that Kim Jong Un's school friends recalled he "spent hours doing meticulous pencil drawings of Chicago Bulls superstar Michael Jordan".[26] He was obsessed with basketball and computer games,[23][27][28] and was a fan of Jackie Chan action movies.[29]


Most analysts agree that Kim Jong Un attended Kim Il Sung University, a leading officer-training school in Pyongyang, from 2002 to 2007.[30] Kim obtained two degrees, one in physics at Kim Il Sung University and another as an Army officer at the Kim Il Sung Military University.[31][32]


In late February 2018, Reuters reported that Kim and his father had used forged passports—supposedly issued by Brazil and dated 26 February 1996—to apply for visas in various countries. Both 10-year passports carry a stamp saying "Embassy of Brazil in Prague". Kim Jong Un's passport records the name "Josef Pwag" and a date of birth of 1 February 1983.[33]


For many years, only one confirmed photograph of him was known to exist outside North Korea, apparently taken in the mid-1990s, when he was eleven.[34] Occasionally, other supposed images of him surfaced but were often disputed.[35][36] It was only in June 2010, shortly before he was given official posts and publicly introduced to the North Korean people, that more pictures were released of Kim, taken when he was attending school in Switzerland.[37][38] The first official image of him as an adult was a group photograph released on 30 September 2010, at the end of the party conference that effectively anointed him, in which he is seated in the front row, two places from his father. This was followed by newsreel footage of him attending the conference.[39]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Jong_Un


Switzerland - The Oligarchy Strongbox

During the course of nine months, from September 1814 to June 1815, the crowned heads and their renowned diplomats had redrawn the map of Europe. They were not, however, secure in what they had accomplished. Although they scorned the theories of democratic government and opposed the doctrines of national self-determination, they feared the principles of the French Revolution. Not only had the Revolution endangered their sovereignty, it had compromised their wealth as well. The final agenda at the Congress was to remedy that problem.

The House of Rothschild had in the past played a significant role in the transport and protection of royalty's wealth, but in 1815 their banks were not in neutral nations. A nonpartisan location was needed to satisfy all parties. Austria was not acceptable. Moreover, the Merovingians were insecure in their remote headquarters in Vienna. Should the Templar Republicans revive, territory closer to the French border was more desirable for intelligence gathering. Switzerland had proven its strategic worth earlier. When the Big Four were closing in on Napoleon, Metternich had shifted Austrian imperial headquarters from Vienna to Freiburg, Switzerland, to better organize at close range his defense against the Corsican.66 Hence, the decision was made at the Congress of Vienna to create Switzerland as a bank with an army attached.67 Should the revolutions ever again regain momentum, and royalty be exiled from their respective lands, neutral Switzerland would protect them, as well as supply them with ample funds to live several lifetimes in luxury.

England, not hampered by the fears of the Venetian oligarchy and determined to safeguard her commercial and colonial interests, was fully agreed to ratify the neutrality of Switzerland. Before any financial moves were made, however, London required Swiss Grand Orients closed and replaced with Swiss Grand Lodges with English obedience. Only then would England cooperate.

In Paris on November 20, 1815, Switzerland's neutrality was guaranteed by France, Austria, Great Britain, Portugal, Prussia, Sweden, and Russia. A century later, in 1919, at the Treaty of Versailles, neutrality was again confirmed. In 1920 the League of Nations acknowledged Switzerland as "conditioned by a centuries-old tradition explicitly incorporated in international law."68 The tradition of Swiss neutrality was again upheld from 1935 to 1945 - even while war raged around its borders.

The Congress of Vienna adjourned on June 18, 1815. Two days earlier Napoleon had been defeated at Waterloo. Over the next few decades the oligarchy's Grail bloodline moved their financial headquarters from Vienna to Zurich, Switzerland. Immediately they went to work absorbing the French Grand Orient Lodges, placing them under English Masonic obedience. Thirty-second degree Mason A.E. Waite, in A New Encyclopaedia of Freemasonry, gives us a century of history concerning the Masonic maneuvers in Switzerland. He reports that Swiss Freemasonry was founded by the British as early as 1736. In 1775 the Swiss lodges transferred their allegiance from English Masonry to the German Strict Observance. Under Napoleon the French Grand Orient invaded Switzerland, and a certain number of existing lodges came under its obedience. Geneva was ceded to France during the wars of Napoleon, and Swiss Masonry then became an appendage of the French Grand Orient. In 1818, as demanded by London, English Masonic obedience began to replace the Grand Orients, except in Geneva where the aristocracy permitted one Grand Orient Lodge to function.69

By 1844 fourteen lodges in Switzerland had united under English obedience, agreed to a Grand Lodge Constitution, and organized the Grand Lodge Alpina in Zurich.70 Within a few decades Alpina headquarters moved to Geneva, next to its Grand Orient rival. From these two lodges, both within a neutral nation, both headquartered in the same city, Scarlet and the Beast would continue to plot their separate intrigues to dominate the world. From Geneva both the right wing and the left wing revolutions would spread over the face of the earth. In Geneva both would unite a century later.

Scarlet and the Beast

by John Daniel

https://ia803001.us.archive.org/28/items/ScarletAndTheBeastJohnDaniel1995/Scarlet%20and%20the%20Beast,%20John%20Daniel%20(1995).pdf


Lieutenant Harry S.L. Kim was a Human Starfleet officer who served as the operations officer aboard the starship USS Voyager during the seven years it was lost in the Delta Quadrant and, in the 2380s, he served as a tactical officer aboard the USS Dauntless. (VOY: "Caretaker", "Non Sequitur", "The Disease", "Warhead", "Nightingale": PRO: "Supernova, Part 1")

https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Harry_Kim


Operation Warp Speed (OWS) was a public–private partnership initiated by the United States government to facilitate and accelerate the development, manufacturing, and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics.[1][2] The first news report of Operation Warp Speed was on April 29, 2020,[3][4][5] and the program was officially announced on May 15, 2020.[1] It was headed by Moncef Slaoui from May 2020 to January 2021 and by David A. Kessler from January to February 2021.[6] At the end of February 2021, Operation Warp Speed was transferred into the responsibilities of the White House COVID-19 Response Team.[7]


The program promoted mass production of multiple vaccines, and different types of vaccine technologies, based on preliminary evidence, allowing for faster distribution if clinical trials confirm one of the vaccines is safe and effective.[citation needed] The plan anticipated that some of these vaccines will not prove safe or effective, making the program more costly than typical vaccine development, but potentially leading to the availability of a viable vaccine several months earlier than typical timelines.[8]


Operation Warp Speed, initially funded with about $10 billion from the CARES Act (Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security) passed by the United States Congress on March 27, 2020,[1] was an interagency program that includes components of the Department of Health and Human Services, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health, and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA); the Department of Defense; private firms; and other federal agencies, including the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Energy, and the Department of Veterans Affairs.[1]


History

President Donald Trump formally announced Operation Warp Speed on May 15, 2020, in the White House Rose Garden.

On May 15, 2020, President Donald Trump officially announced the public-private partnership.[4][1][9] The purpose of Operation Warp Speed was to coordinate Health and Human Services-wide efforts, including the NIH ACTIV partnership for vaccine and therapeutic development, the NIH RADx initiative for diagnostic development, and work by BARDA.[1]


Operation Warp Speed was formed to encourage private and public partnerships to enable faster approval and production of vaccines during the COVID-19 pandemic.[2] The name was inspired by terminology for faster-than-light travel used in the Star Trek fictional universe, evoking a sense of rapid progress.[10][11]


The Food and Drug Administration announced on June 30, 2020, that a vaccine would need to be at least 50% effective for diminishing the severity of COVID-19 symptoms to obtain regulatory and marketing approval.[12]


In January 2021, White House press secretary Jen Psaki announced that the program was expected to undergo a restructure and renaming under the Biden administration.[13][14] Also in January 2021, Dr. Moncef Slaoui, former Operation Warp Speed lead, was told not to use the name Operation Warp Speed anymore.[15] At the end of February 2021, responsibilities of Operation Warp Speed were transferred into the White House COVID-19 Response Team.[7][16]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Warp_Speed


ANNO LUCIS - The Year of Light

Email from a Mason concerning Anno Lucis


"During my ascension through the ranks of Freemasonry (I will be exhalted in the Royal Arch in a few weeks), one of the things that I am researching vigorously is the origins of the Mason Calendar of Light, or "Anno Lucis" timetable.


I came across an interesting book in the Masonic library last month, refuting the claim (often made by non-Masons or uninformed brethren) that the start of the AL dating, 4000 BC, is due to the Bishop Usher calculation of Genesis.


Usher, you might know, counted backwards using the alleged ages of people in the Old Testament, and came up with the year 4004 BC for the date of creation. Just because the Usher date is close to the AL start date- 4004 instead of 4000 - many people just assume (due to Freemasonry's connections to Christianity) that the Masonic calendar is based on Usher.


However this old book, written in the 1700s, instead asserts that the A.L. date is based on a calendar created by an Isis cult from ancient Egypt. In the year 4000 the star Vela went supernova, and for months, if you were located near in the lattitudes of Egypt, you would have seen two suns.


The Vela explosion effectively created a "year of  Light" by blazing away and preventing any night for most of the year 4000. The Isis priests apparently took this as a sign for a new era being born and started their calendar accordingly."

This quote, from Bill Cooper's writings on the subject, refers to this theory:

"According to many, the great pyramids were built to commemorate and observe a supernova explosion that occurred in the year 4000 B.C.  Dr. Anthony Hewish, 1974 Nobel Prize winner in physics, discovered a rhythmic series of radio pulses which he proved were emissions from a star that had exploded around 4000 B.C.


The Freemasons begin their calendar from A.L., "In the Year of Light," found by adding 4000 to the modern year. Thus 1990 + 4000 = 5990 A.L.


George Michanowsky wrote in The Once and Future Star that;


"The ancient Sumerian cuneiform...described a giant star exploding within a triangle formed by...Zeta Puppis, Gamma Velorum, and Lambda Velorum...located in the southern sky....[An] accurate star catalogue now stated that the blazing star that had exploded within the triangle would again be seen by man in 6000 years."


According to the Freemason's calendar it will occur in the year 2000, and indeed it will."

http://illuminati-news.com/secret-societies-nwo.htm


Cooper seems to be generally "right on", however his last bit, claiming that the star would appear again, obviously turned out to not be true. I have looked (extensively) and not found anything in any official Masonic writings on the subject referring to this prophecy, or the Calendar supposedly being oriented to the year 2000 for this purpose, so maybe he made that up or got it from a spurious conspiracy source.


What seems beyond question is that the Masonic calendar is in fact based on the Egyptian source, and not Usher. You just can't explain away those missing four years, or the fact that both Egyptians and Masons call 4000 BC the "year of Light", the capper being that it actually WAS a "year of Light" if you were in Egypt.


Another website offers more on the Vela stellar explosion, and also contains stuff from Sitchin about how it impacted the Sumerian culture:


"The Vela supernova most likely occurred 6,000 years ago (although estimates range from 5,000 to 11,000 years). At a distance of 1,300 light years from earth the Vela X pulsar is three to four times closer than the Crab Nebula. The supernova would have hung low on the horizon over the Mediterranean, a brilliant star shining as bright as the moon (-12.5 losing brightness at 4.5% per day). Due to defects in the cornea of the eye, a person viewing the supernova would see spikes a quarter to a third the diameter of the full moon (7.5 to 9 minutes of arc).


It would appear as an endlessly dancing, varying mass of fire, shooting spears of intense color every way like a fountain. The landscape and the observer would be flooded with pulsing illumination. Tossed flocks of shadow bands would animate the landscape, moving eerily through forest and town."


- Sources include Science Digest, Mar '81

http://www.mystae.com/restricted/streams/vela/vela.html

_______________________________________________

What Cooper was referring to that didn't happen in 2000 was Project Lucifer.

They had planned a reenactment of 'The Year of Light', and wanted to make us a binary star system,  complete with a capstone ceremony at Giza, but the plans for NWO weren't advanced far enough at the time....


It was cancelled for 1/1/2000 with the Galileo probe and Jupiter, and then attempted in September 2003, and then again with the Cassini probe and Saturn in June 2008

2003 - http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/ciencia/ciencia_luciferproject08.htm


2008 - http://www.optcorp.com/edu/articleDetailEDU.aspx?aid=32


http://theuniversalseduction.com/articles/will-the-cassini-space-probe-be-used-as-a-nuclear-trigger-to-ignite-saturn-and-terraform-its-moons-for-human-colonization

Fortunately is was bad science.


I picked this up from a Masonic site near the end of 1999 when there was the attempt to

create fear and panic with the Y2K bug.

https://reality101blog.blogspot.com/2010/11/anno-lucis-year-of-light.html


James Cooper (born January 5, 1964) is the current Sheriff of Sacramento County[1] and politician who served in the California State Assembly. He is a Democrat who represented the 9th Assembly District, which encompassed portions of Sacramento and San Joaquin counties.


Cooper was a member of the California Legislative Black Caucus and Assistant Majority Floor Leader.[2] Prior to being elected to the Assembly in 2014, he was an Elk Grove Founding Mayor and 15-year City Councilmember and 30-year Sacramento County Sheriff's Captain.


On March 3, 2022, Cooper was stopped by TSA officers at the Sacramento airport for having a loaded gun in his carry on.[3] Cooper was sworn in as the sheriff of Sacramento County, California on December 16, 2022.


Political positions

Cooper was graded an “F” in 2020 by the California Rifle and Pistol Association for his positions associated with the Second Amendment.[4]


Cooper has also been described as a "crusader against criminal justice reform".[5] Examples of this include his opposition to Proposition 47 and support for Proposition 20.[6]


Cooper is opposed to fossil fuel divestment and played a key role in halting the progression of SB 1173, a bill that would have forced CalPERS and CalSTRS to divest from most fossil fuel holdings.[7][8][9][10][11]


Sacramento County Sheriff 2010

Cooper unsuccessfully ran for Sheriff of Sacramento County, California in 2010 and lost against Scott Jones. Before running, he had a thirty-year career in various positions at the Sheriff's office.[12]


He ran again in 2022, where he won the election and currently serves as Sheriff for the County of Sacramento.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Cooper_(California_politician)


Sumerian Anti-Armageddon Device 4,000 Years Older Than Believed

The British Museum’s ongoing Girsu Project discovered the true function of a mysterious structure. Source: British Museum/Dr. Sébastien Rey

ashley cowie

November

18

/ 2023


Drone mappers identified a 19 kilometer (12-mile) long canal in rural Iraq. Built over it, archaeologists excavated what was at first thought to be a bizarre-shaped temple. However, it turns out that ,4,000-years-ago, ancient Sumerians built “a one-of-a-kind anti-drought machine.”


Located near the modern city of Nasiriyah, in southern Iraq, the ancient city of Girsu was occupied by the Sumerian civilization from the 3rd millennium BC. Dedicated to the war and agriculture god Ningirsu, artifacts recovered from the site have illustrated both the religious and political history of early Mesopotamian society.


A recent dig by the British Museum at Girsu revealed “a mysterious structure,” which in the 1920s was interpreted as an unusually shaped temple. However, members of the  museum’s Girsu Project have now announced that the curious discovery was a 4,000-year-old “innovative civilization-saving machine.”


Aerial view of the structure in the ancient city of Girsu (modern Tello). (British Museum)


Aerial view of the structure in the ancient city of Girsu (modern Tello). (British Museum)


A One-Of-A-Kind “Anti-Drought Machine”

The British Museum describe the ancient lifesaving device as a “flume” that was used to deliver water to distant locations for agriculture. Ebru Torun, an architect and conservationist working with the British Museum archeologists in Iraq, said “no other example of it exists in history, really, until the present day. It’s absolutely one-of-a-kind.”


4,500-Year-Old Sumerian Palace Uncovered in Iraqi Desert

Ritual Site Dedicated to Mesopotamian War God Discovered in Iraq

Torun said that what is most surprising about the find is that until now archaeologists thought such technologies didn’t appear until the 18th century AD! However, the ancient Sumerians had invented “an anti-drought machine,” in what was a desperate attempt to save their canals from drying up, to avoid agricultural Armageddon.


The Unique Device Is Also An “Anti-Collapse Bridge”

Ancient Sumer is associated with the emergence of the world’s first civilization and writing. As the civilization expanded, increasing populations depended on more water for sustained survival. This was achieved by redirecting water from the Tigris and Euphrates rivers into canals, which fed wells and reservoirs in population centers.


In a Telegraph article, Dr. Sébastien Rey, an archaeologist and the project’s leader in Iraq, explained that the people “saw the canals drying up, silting up, one by one.” He added that “It is not just a bridge, it’s an anti-drought machine, anti-collapse.” Furthermore, all of the inscribed stone tablets speak of “a water crisis, and one last desperate attempt to save themselves,” added Rey.


A digital reconstruction of the flume, which once straddled a 12-mile canal. (The Girsu Project/British Museum)


A digital reconstruction of the flume, which once straddled a 12-mile canal. (The Girsu Project/British Museum)


The Day The Gods Got Up And Left

Ancient Sumerian writings describe complex sacrifice and libation rituals made in honor of fertility and water gods. Sacrifices involved offering animals to seek divine assistance, while libations included pouring liquids like water or beer as symbolic gestures of nourishment. These rituals, integral to daily temple routines and major festivals, aimed to maintain the favor of the gods and establish a harmonious connection between the Sumerians and their deities.


Sometime around 2000 BC, however, the gods stopped responding to the Sumerians’ traditional rituals. Seeing their canals and wells drying up, the people of Girsu were inspired into inventing, designing, and then building two symmetrical mud-brick structures. Measuring 40 meters (130 feet) long, 10 meters (33 feet) wide, and 3.3 meters (11 feet) tall walls, the structures feature two opposing outward facing curved channels.


Excavating The World’s Oldest Bridge

The team of scientists have been flying drones around the village of Nasr, on the British Museum’s Girsu Project, and they determined that the “life-saving machine” was positioned upon a 19 kilometer (12-mile) long canal. And because the device spans a waterway it’s being called “the world’s oldest known bridge.” Until now, the title of the world's oldest bridge is most often associated with the Jisr al-Hajar Hajirah, or Caravan Bridge, in the ancient city of Edessa, or present-day Urfa, in Turkey, which dates back to around 850 BC.


Looted Iraqi Antiquities Can Finally Return Home After Simple Identification by British Museum

The Mythical Dilmun and The Island of the Dead

The life-saving structure channeled the long canal into a 5-meter (13-foot) wide passage, creating what the researchers refer to as the “Venturi” effect, which wasn’t formally described by scientists until the late 18th century. The Girsu flume was built by the last people living in Girsu, who attempted to push water to distant downstream farming regions, including the administrative capital of Lagash, in a last-ditch attempt to avoid agricultural armageddon.


Changing climate in the second millennium BC altered the traditional courses of Mesopotamian rivers around which communities flourished. However, in the face of being abandoned by the gods, Sumerian ingenuity increased, and this discovery represents the birth of a new generation of hydraulic technologies.


Top Image: The British Museum’s ongoing Girsu Project discovered the true function of a mysterious structure. Source: British Museum/Dr. Sébastien Rey


By Ashley Cowie

https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/sumerian-technology-0019841


The Gilgamesh flood myth is a partial narrative of the Gilgamesh Epic. It is one of three Mesopotamian flood myths alongside the one included in the Eridu Genesis, and an episode from the Atra-Hasis Epic. Many scholars believe that the Gilgamesh flood myth was added to Tablet XI in the "standard version" of the Gilgamesh Epic by an editor who used the flood story, which is described in the Epic of Atra-Hasis.[1] A short reference to the flood myth is also present in the much older Sumerian Gilgamesh poems, from which the later Babylonian versions drew much of their inspiration and subject matter.


History

Gilgamesh's supposed historical reign is believed to have been approximately 2700 BC,[2] shortly before the earliest known written stories. The discovery of artifacts associated with Aga and Enmebaragesi of Kish, two other kings named in the stories, has lent credibility to the historical existence of Gilgamesh.[3]


The earliest Sumerian Gilgamesh poems date from as early as the Third dynasty of Ur (2100–2000 BC).[4] One of these poems mentions Gilgamesh’s journey to meet the flood hero, as well as a short version of the flood story.[5] The earliest Akkadian versions of the unified epic are dated to ca. 2000–1500 BC.[6] Due to the fragmentary nature of these Old Babylonian versions, it is unclear whether they included an expanded account of the flood myth; although one fragment definitely includes the story of Gilgamesh's journey to meet Utnapishtim. The "standard" Akkadian version included a long version of the story and was edited by Sin-liqe-unninni,[7] who lived sometime between 1300 and 1000 BC.


Tablets

The first Gilgamesh flood tablet was discovered by Hormuzd Rassam in Nineveh and was in the collection of the British Museum but had not been translated. In 1872, George Smith, an assistant at the British Museum, translated the tablet from the seventh-century B.C Akkadian. Reportedly, he exclaimed, "I am the first man to read that after more than two thousand years of oblivion".


While on a subsequent archeological expedition to Nineveh in Iraq, Smith found on May 7, 1873 a portion of a tablet containing the missing part of the flood story, describing the provisioning of the ark: "Into the midst of it thy grain, thy furniture, and thy goods, thy wealth, thy woman servants, thy female slaves...the animals of the field all, I will gather and I will send to thee, and they shall be enclosed in thy door."[8][9]


A much older Cuneiform tablet dating to 1646-1626 B.C., about one thousand years before the Book of Genesis is believed to have been written, and known as the Epic of Atra-Hasis describing a great flood was discovered in 1898. J. P. Morgan acquired it and today it is in the Morgan Library & Museum.[citation needed]


In 2007, Andrew George translated a 3,200 year old tablet dating to around 1200 B.C. found during excavations at Ugarit. The tablet contains a fragment of the Epic of Gilgamesh, including parts of the story of Utnapishtim and the flood.[10]


Tablet 11

The Gilgamesh flood tablet 11 (XI) contains additional story material besides the flood. The flood story was included because in it, the flood hero Utnapishtim is granted immortality by the gods and that fits the immortality theme of the epic. The main point seems to be that Utnapishtim was granted eternal life in unique, never-to-be-repeated circumstances. As if to demonstrate this point, Utnapishtim challenges Gilgamesh to stay awake for six days and seven nights. However, as soon as Utnapishtim finishes speaking Gilgamesh falls asleep. Utnapishtim instructs his wife to bake a loaf of bread for every day he is asleep so that Gilgamesh cannot deny his failure. Gilgamesh, who wants to overcome death, cannot even conquer sleep.


As Gilgamesh is leaving, Utnapishtim's wife asks her husband to offer a parting gift. Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh of a boxthorn-like plant at the very bottom of the ocean that will make him young again. Gilgamesh obtains the plant by binding stones to his feet so he can walk on the bottom of the sea. He recovers the plant and plans to test it on an old man when he returns to Uruk. Unfortunately, when Gilgamesh stops to bathe it is stolen by a serpent that sheds its skin as it departs, apparently reborn. Gilgamesh, having failed both chances, returns to Uruk, where the sight of its massive walls provokes him to praise this enduring work of mortal men. The implication may be that mortals can achieve immortality through lasting works of civilization and culture.


Flood myth section


This section is in list format but may read better as prose. You can help by converting this section, if appropriate. Editing help is available. (February 2021)

Lines 1-203, Tablet XI[11] (note: with supplemental sub-titles and line numbers added for clarity)


Ea leaks the secret plan

Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh a secret story that begins in the old city of Shuruppak on the banks of the Euphrates River.

The "great gods" Anu, Enlil, Ninurta, Ennugi, and Ea were sworn to secrecy about their plan to cause the flood.

But the god Ea (Sumerian god Enki) repeated the plan to Utnapishtim through a reed wall in a reed house.

Ea commanded Utnapishtim to demolish his house and build a boat, regardless of the cost, to keep living beings alive.

The boat must have equal dimensions with corresponding width and length and be covered over like Apsu boats.

Utnapishtim promised to do what Ea commanded.

He asked Ea what he should say to the city elders and the population.

Ea tells him to say that Enlil has rejected him and he can no longer reside in the city or set foot in Enlil's territory.

He should also say that he will go down to the Apsu "to live with my lord Ea".


Note: 'Apsu' can refer to a freshwater marsh near the temple of Ea/Enki at the city of Eridu.[12]


Building and launching the boat

Carpenters, reed workers, and other people assembled one morning.

[missing lines]

Five days later, Utnapishtim laid out the exterior walls of the boat of 120 cubits.

The sides of the superstructure had equal lengths of 120 cubits. He also made a drawing of the interior structure.

The boat had six decks [?] divided into seven and nine compartments.

Water plugs were driven into the middle part.

Punting poles and other necessary things were laid in.

Three times 3,600 units of raw bitumen were melted in a kiln and three times 3,600 units of oil were used in addition to two times 3,600 units of oil that were stored in the boat.

Oxen and sheep were slaughtered and ale, beer, oil, and wine were distributed to the workmen, like at a new year's festival.

When the boat was finished, the launch was very difficult. A runway of poles was used to slide the boat into the water.

Two-thirds of the boat was in the water.

Utnapishtim loaded his silver and gold into the boat.

He loaded "all the living beings that I had."

His relatives and craftsmen, and "all the beasts and animals of the field" boarded the boat.

The time arrived, as stated by the god Shamash, to seal the entry door.

The storm

Early in the morning at dawn a black cloud arose from the horizon.

The weather was frightful.

Utnapishtim boarded the boat and entrusted the boat and its contents to his boat master Puzurammurri who sealed the entry.

The thunder god Adad rumbled in the cloud and storm gods Shullat and Hanish went over mountains and land.

Erragal pulled out the mooring poles and the dikes overflowed.

The Anunnaki gods lit up the land with their lightning.

There was stunned shock at Adad's deeds which turned everything to blackness. The land was shattered like a pot.

All day long the south wind blew rapidly and the water overwhelmed the people like an attack.

No one could see his fellows. They could not recognize each other in the torrent.

The gods were frightened by the flood and retreated up to the Anu heaven. They cowered like dogs lying by the outer wall.

Ishtar shrieked like a woman in childbirth.

The Mistress of the gods wailed that the old days had turned to clay because "I said evil things in the Assembly of the Gods, ordering a catastrophe to destroy my people who fill the sea like fish."

The other gods were weeping with her and sat sobbing with grief, their lips burning, parched with thirst.

The flood and wind lasted six days and six nights, flattening the land.

On the seventh day, the storm was pounding [intermittently?] like a woman in labour.

Calm after the storm

The sea calmed and the whirlwind and flood stopped. All-day long there was quiet. All humans had turned to clay.

The terrain was as flat as a rooftop. Utnapishtim opened a window and felt fresh air on his face.

He fell to his knees and sat weeping, tears streaming down his face. He looked for coastlines on the horizon and saw a region of land.

The boat lodged firmly on mount Nimush which held the boat for several days, allowing no swaying.

On the seventh day he released a dove that flew away but came back to him. He released a swallow, but it also came back to him.

He released a raven that was able to eat and scratch, and did not circle back to the boat.

He then sent his livestock out in various directions.

The sacrifice

He sacrificed a sheep and offered incense at a mountainous ziggurat where he placed 14 sacrificial vessels and poured reeds, cedar, and myrtle into the fire.

The gods smelled the sweet odour of the sacrificial animal and gathered like flies over the sacrifice.

Then the great goddess arrived, lifted up her flies (beads), and said

"Ye gods, as surely as I shall not forget this lapis lazuli [amulet] around my neck, I shall be mindful of these days and never forget them! The gods may come to the sacrificial offering. But Enlil may not come, because he brought about the flood and annihilated my people without considering [the consequences]."

When Enlil arrived, he saw the boat and became furious at the Igigi gods. He said "Where did a living being escape? No man was to survive the annihilation!"

Ninurta spoke to Enlil saying "Who else but Ea could do such a thing? It is Ea who knew all of our plans."

Ea spoke to Enlil saying "It was you, the Sage of the Gods. How could you bring about a flood without consideration?"

Ea then accuses Enlil of sending a disproportionate punishment and reminds him of the need for compassion.

Ea denies leaking the god's secret plan to Atrahasis (= Utnapishtim), admitting only sending him a dream and deflecting Enlil's attention to the flood hero.

The flood hero and his wife are granted immortality and transported far away

Enlil then boards a boat and grasping Utnapishtim's hand, helps him and his wife aboard where they kneel. Standing between Utnapishtim and his wife, he touches their foreheads and blesses them. "Formerly Utnapishtim was a human being, but now he and his wife have become gods like us. Let Utnapishtim reside far away, at the mouth of the rivers."

Utnapishtim and his wife are transported and settled at the "mouth of the rivers".

Last third of Tablet XI-Outline

In addition to the flood story material, (lines 1–203), tablet XI contains the following flood story elements:


List of titled subparts, Tablet XI-(by Kovacs):[13]


The Story of the Flood–(1-203)

A Chance at Immortality–(204-240)

Home Empty-Handed–(241-265)

A Second Chance at Life–(266-309)

Comparison between Atrahasis and Gilgamesh

These are some of the sentences copied more or less directly from the Atrahasis version to the Gilgamesh epic:[14]


Atrahasis Epic Gilgamesh Epic, tablet XI

"Wall, listen to me." Atrahasis III,i,20 "Wall, pay attention" Gilgamesh XI,22

"Like the apsu you shall roof it" Atrahasis III,i,29 "Like the apsu you shall roof it" Gilgamesh XI,31

"I cannot live in [your city]" Atrahasis III,i,47 "I cannot live in your city" Gilgamesh XI,40

"Ninurta went forth making the dikes [overflow]" Atrahasis U rev,14 "Ninurta went forth making the dikes overflow" Gilgamesh XI,102

"One person could [not] see another" Atrahasis III,iii,13 "One person could not see another" Gilgamesh XI,111

"For seven days and seven nights came the storm" Atrahasis III,iv,24 "Six days and seven nights the wind and storm flood" Gilgamesh XI,127

"He offered [a sacrifice]" Atrahasis III,v,31 "And offered a sacrifice" Gilgamesh XI,155

"the lapis around my neck" Atrahasis III,vi,2 "the lapis lazuli on my neck" Gilgamesh XI,164

"How did man survive the destruction?" Atrahasis III,vi,10 "No man was to survive the destruction" Gilgamesh XI,173

Material altered or omitted

The Epic of Atrahasis provides additional information on the flood and flood hero that is omitted in Gilgamesh XI and other versions of the Ancient Near East flood myth. According to Atrahasis III ii, lines 40–47 the flood hero was at a banquet when the storm and flood began: "He invited his people ... to a banquet ... He sent his family on board. They ate and they drank. But he (Atrahasis) was in and out. He could not sit, could not crouch, for his heart was broken and he was vomiting gall."[15]


According to Tigay, Atrahasis tablet III iv, lines 6–9 clearly identify the flood as a local river flood: "Like dragonflies they [dead bodies] have filled the river. Like a raft they have moved in to the edge [of the boat]. Like a raft they have moved in to the riverbank." The sentence "Like dragonflies they have filled the river." was changed in Gilgamesh XI line 123 to "Like the spawn of fishes, they fill the sea."[16] Tigay holds that we can see the mythmaker's hand at work here, changing a local river flood into an ocean deluge.


Most other authorities interpret the Atrahasis flood as universal. A. R. George, and Lambert and Millard make it clear that the gods' intention in Atrahasis is to "wipe out mankind".[17] The flood destroys "all of the earth".[18] The use of a comparable metaphor in the Gilgamesh epic suggests that the reference to "dragonflies [filling] the river" is simply an evocative image of death rather than a literal description of the flood[19]


Other editorial changes were made to the Atrahasis text in Gilgamesh to lessen the suggestion that the gods may have experienced human needs. For example, Atrahasis OB III, 30–31 "The Anunnaki, the great gods [were sitt]ing in thirst and hunger" was changed in Gilgamesh XI, line 113 to "The gods feared the deluge." Sentences in Atrahasis III iv were omitted in Gilgamesh, e.g. "She was surfeited with grief and thirsted for beer" and "From hunger they were suffering cramp."[20]


These and other editorial changes to Atrahasis are documented and described in the book by Prof. Tigay (see below) who is associate professor of Hebrew and Semitic languages and literature in the University of Pennsylvania. Prof. Tigay comments: "The dropping of individual lines between others which are preserved, but are not synonymous with them, appears to be a more deliberate editorial act. These lines share a common theme, the hunger and thirst of the gods during the flood."[20]


Although the 18th century BC copy of the Atrahasis (Atra-Hasis) epic post-dates the early Gilgamesh epic, we do not know whether the Old-Akkadian Gilgamesh tablets included the flood story, because of the fragmentary nature of surviving tablets. Some scholars argue that they did not.[21] Tigay, for example, maintains that three major additions to the Gilgamesh epic, namely the prologue, the flood story (tablet XI), and tablet XII, were added by an editor or editors, possibly by Sin-leqi-unninni, to whom the entire epic was later attributed. According to this view, the flood story in tablet XI was based on a late version of the Atrahasis story.[22]


Alternative translations

As with most translations, especially from an ancient, dead language, scholars differ on the meaning of ambiguous sentences.


For example, line 57 in Gilgamesh XI is usually translated (with reference to the boat) as "ten rods the height of her sides",[23] or "its walls were each 10 times 12 cubits in height".[24] A rod was a dozen cubits, and a Sumerian cubit was about 20 inches. Hence these translations imply that the boat was about 200 feet high, which would be impractical[25] with the technology in Gilgamesh's time (about 2700 BC).[26] There is no Akkadian word for "height" in line 57. The sentence literally reads "Ten dozen-cubits each I-raised its-walls."[27] A similar example from an unrelated house building tablet reads: "he shall build the wall [of the house] and raise it four ninda and two cubits." This measurement (about 83 feet) means wall length, not height.[28]


Line 142 in Gilgamesh XI is usually translated as "Mount Niṣir held the boat, allowing no motion." Niṣir is often spelled Nimush,[29] which is described as the newer reading.[30] The Akkadian words translated "Mount Niṣir" are "KUR-ú KUR ni-ṣir".[31] The word KUR could mean hill or country; it is capitalized because it is a Sumerian word.[32] The first KUR is followed by a phonetic complement -ú which indicates that KUR-ú is to be read in Akkadian as šadú (hill) and not as mātu (country). Since šadú (hill) could also mean mountain in Akkadian, and scholars knew the Biblical expression Mount Ararat, it has become customary to translate šadú as mountain or mount. The flood hero was Sumerian, according to the WB-62 Sumerian King List,.[33] In Sumerian the word KUR's primary meaning is "mountain" as attested by the sign used for it.[34] From the word mountain, the meaning "foreign country" is developed due to mountainous countries bordering Sumer. KUR in Sumerian also means "land" in general.[34] The second KUR lacks a phonetic complement and is therefore read in Akkadian as mātu (country). Hence, the entire clause reads "The hill/mound country niṣir held the boat".


Lines 146-147 in Gilgamesh XI are usually translated as "I ... made sacrifice, incense I placed on the peak of the mountain."[35] Similarly "I poured out a libation on the peak of the mountain."[36] But Kovacs[37] provides this translation of line 156: "I offered incense in front of the mountain-ziggurat." Parpola provides the original Akkadian for this sentence: "áš-kun sur-qin-nu ina UGU ziq-qur-rat KUR-i"[38] Áš-kun means I-placed; sur-qin-nu means offering; ina-(the preposition) means on-(upon); UGU means top-of; ziq-qur-rat means temple tower; and KUR-i means hilly. Parpola's glossary (page 145) defines ziq-qur-rat as "temple tower, ziggurat" and refers to line 157 so he translates ziq-qur-rat as temple tower in this context. The sentence literally reads "I placed an offering on top of a hilly ziggurat." A ziggurat was an elevated platform or temple tower where priests made offerings to the temple god. Most translators of line 157 disregard ziq-qur-rat as a redundant metaphor for peak. There is no authority for this other than previous translations of line 157.[39] Kovacs' translation retains the word ziggurat on page 102.


One of the Sumerian cities with a ziggurat was Eridu located on the southern branch of the Euphrates River next to a large swampy low-lying depression known as the apsû.[40] The only ziggurat at Eridu was at the temple of the god Ea (Enki), known as the apsû-house.[41] In Gilgamesh XI, line 42 the flood hero said "I will go down [the river] to the apsû to live with Ea, my Lord."[42]


Lines 189–192 (lines 198–201) in Gilgamesh XI are usually translated as "Then godEnlil came aboard the boat. He took hold of my hand and brought me on board. He brought aboard my wife and made her kneel at my side. Standing between us, he touched our foreheads to bless us."[43] In the first sentence "Then dingir-kabtu came aboard the boat" the Akkadian determinative dingir is usually translated as "god", but can also mean "priest"[44] Dingir-kabtu literally means "divine important-person".[45] Translating this as Enlil is the translator's conjecture.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilgamesh_flood_myth


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In Hebrew, the word saraph means "burning", and is used seven times throughout the text of the Hebrew Bible as a noun, usually to denote "serpent",[4] twice in the Book of Numbers, once in the Book of Deuteronomy, and four times in the Book of Isaiah.[5][6][7] The reason why the word for "burning" was also used to denote a serpent is not universally agreed upon; it may be due to a certain snake species' fiery colors, or perhaps the burning sensation left by its venomous bite. Regardless, its plural form, seraphim, occurs in both Numbers and Isaiah, but only in Isaiah is it used to denote an angelic being; likewise, these angels are referred to only as the plural seraphim – Isaiah later uses the singular saraph to describe a "fiery flying serpent", in line with the other uses of the term throughout the Tanakh.


There is emerging consensus that the motifs used to display seraphs in Hyksos-era Canaan had their original sources in Egyptian uraeus iconography.[8] In Egyptian iconography, the uraeus was used as a symbol of sovereignty, royalty, divinity and divine authority, and later iconography often showed uraei with wings. In the early monarchic period of Israel and Judah, Egyptian motifs were evidently borrowed by the Israelites en masse, as a plethora of personal seals belonging to classes ranging from commonfolk to royalty have been discovered, which incorporate several pieces of ancient Egyptian iconography, including the winged sun, ankh, the hedjet and deshret crowns of Upper and Lower Egypt, scarabs, and the uraeus cobra. These uraei often had four wings, as opposed to the Egyptian standard which only gave them two.[9] These images have been connected with the seraphim angels associated with Isaiah's visions, or perhaps more directly to the aforementioned "fiery flying serpent", but this continues to be debated – and an image of serpentine seraphim clashes with Isaiah's own vision, which clearly envisioned seraphim with heads, legs, and arms – although, on the second matter, some scholars have proposed that the covered "feet" of the seraphim should be identified as genitals, as "feet" are often used in the Hebrew Bible as a euphemism for the penis.[10][11]


The vision in Isaiah Chapter 6 of seraphim in an idealized version of Solomon's Temple represents the sole instance in the Hebrew Bible of this word being used to describe celestial beings.[12] "... I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphim: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly." (Isaiah 6:1–3)[13] And one cried to another, "Holy, holy, holy, is YHWH of hosts: the whole earth is full of His glory." (verses 2–3)[14] One seraph carries out an act of ritual purification for the prophet by touching his lips with a live coal from the altar (verses 6–7)[15] "And he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged."


The text describes the "seraphim" as winged celestial beings with a fiery passion for doing God's good work.[16] Notwithstanding the wording of the text itself, at least one Hebrew scholar claims that in the Hebrew Bible the seraphim do not have the status of angels, and that it is only in later sources (like De Coelesti Hierarchia or Summa Theologiae) that they are considered to be a division of the divine messengers.[17]


Seraphim appear in the 2nd-century BC Book of Enoch,[18] where they are mentioned, in conjunction with cherubim, as the heavenly creatures standing nearest to the throne of God. In non-biblical sources they are sometimes called the Akyəst (Ge'ez: አክይስት "serpents", "dragons"; an alternate term for Hell).[19][20][21]


In the Second Book of Enoch, two classes of celestial beings are mentioned alongside the seraphim and cherubim, known as the phoenixes and the chalkydri (Ancient Greek: χαλκύδραι khalkýdrai, compound of χαλκός khalkós "brass, copper" + ὕδρα hýdra "hydra", "water-serpent"—lit. "brazen hydras", "copper serpents"). Both are described as "flying elements of the sun" that reside in either the 4th or 7th heaven, who have twelve wings and burst into song at sunrise.[22][23]


In the Book of Revelation (4:4–8), the beasts are described as being forever in God's presence and praising him: "[A]nd they rest not day and night, saying, 'Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come.'" This account differs slightly from the account of Isaiah, stating in the eighth verse, "And the four beasts had each of them six wings about him; and they were full of eyes within". They appear also in the Gnostic text, On the Origin of the World.[24]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seraph


Dame Sarah Elisabeth Mullally (née Bowser; born 26 March 1962) is an English Anglican prelate and former nurse. She has been the bishop of London since 2018, and is the first woman to hold this office. By virtue of her office she is also a Lord Spiritual, one of the 26 Church of England bishops who sit in the House of Lords of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. On 3 October 2025, it was announced that Mullally would become the 106th archbishop of Canterbury in January 2026; she will be the first woman to hold the office.


Born in Woking, Surrey, Mullally received clinical training in nursing from St Thomas' Hospital. She practised nursing primarily in South London, where she also began her study for ministry in the Church of England. In 1999 she became Chief Nursing Officer and director of patient experience for the English National Health Service. She left these roles in 2004 to pursue full-time ministry. For her service in nursing, Mullally was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2005.


Mullally was ordained a priest in 2002 and began her ministry in the diocese of Southwark. She served in various London churches, and in 2012 became a canon of Salisbury Cathedral. In 2015 she was consecrated as bishop of Crediton, a suffragan bishop in the diocese of Exeter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Mullally


And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.

◄ 2 Corinthians 11:14 ►


1 In the year of the death of king Uzziah, [a]I saw also the Lord sitting upon an [b]high throne, and lifted up, and the lower [c]parts thereof filled the Temple.


2 The [d]Seraphims stood upon it, every one had six wings: with twain he covered his [e]face, and with twain he covered his [f]feet, and with twain he did [g]fly.


3 And one cried to another, and said, [h]Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts: the whole [i]world is full of his glory.

Isaiah 6:1-3

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah%206&version=GNV


Learned borrowing from Pali Buddha (“the Awakened One, the Enlightened One”), from buddha (“awakened, enlightened”), from Sanskrit बुद्ध (buddha, “awakened, enlightened”), past participle of बोधति (bodhati, “to wake, to awaken”). Distantly related to English bid and bede. Also cognate with Russian будить (buditʹ, “to wake up”)."

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Buddha


Alumbrado, (Spanish: “Enlightened”, ) Italian Illuminato, plural Illuminati, a follower of a mystical movement in Spain during the 16th and 17th centuries. Its adherents claimed that the human soul, having attained a certain degree of perfection, was permitted a vision of the divine and entered into direct communication with the Holy Spirit. From this state the soul could neither advance nor retrogress. Consequently, participation in the liturgy, good works, and observance of the exterior forms of religious life were unnecessary for those who had received the “light.” The Alumbrados came primarily from among the reformed Franciscans and the Jesuits, but their doctrines seem to have influenced all classes of people. The extravagant claims made for their visions and revelations caused them to be relentlessly persecuted. The Inquisition issued edicts against them on three occasions (1568, 1574, and 1623)."

https://www.britannica.com/event/Alumbrado


Entries linking to gautama

Buddha (n.)

an epithet applied to the historical founder of Buddhism, 1680s, from Pali, literally "awakened, enlightened," past participle of budh "to awake, know, perceive," which is related to Sanskrit bodhati "is awake, observes, understands," from PIE root *bheudh- "be aware, make aware." Title given by his adherents to the man who taught this path, Siddhartha Gautama, also known to them as Sakyamuni "Sage of the Sakyas" (his family clan), who lived in northern India 5c. B.C.E."

https://www.etymonline.com/word/gautama


Gautama

surname of the Buddha, from Sanskrit Gotamah, properly a patronymic, literally "descendant of the greatest ox," from superlative of gauh "ox, bull, cow."


Unam Sanctam

One God, One Faith, One Spiritual Authority

Pope Boniface VIII - 1302

Bull of Pope Boniface VIII promulgated November 18, 1302

Urged by faith, we are obliged to believe and to maintain that the Church is one, holy, catholic, and also apostolic. We believe in her firmly and we confess with simplicity that outside of her there is neither salvation nor the remission of sins, as the Spouse in the Canticles [Sgs 6:8] proclaims: ‘One is my dove, my perfect one. She is the only one, the chosen of her who bore her,‘ and she represents one sole mystical body whose Head is Christ and the head of Christ is God [1 Cor 11:3]. In her then is one Lord, one faith, one baptism [Eph 4:5]. There had been at the time of the deluge only one ark of Noah, prefiguring the one Church, which ark, having been finished to a single cubit, had only one pilot and guide, i.e., Noah, and we read that, outside of this ark, all that subsisted on the earth was destroyed.

We venerate this Church as one, the Lord having said by the mouth of the prophet: ‘Deliver, O God, my soul from the sword and my only one from the hand of the dog.’ [Ps 21:20] He has prayed for his soul, that is for himself, heart and body; and this body, that is to say, the Church, He has called one because of the unity of the Spouse, of the faith, of the sacraments, and of the charity of the Church. This is the tunic of the Lord, the seamless tunic, which was not rent but which was cast by lot [Jn 19:23- 24]. Therefore, of the one and only Church there is one body and one head, not two heads like a monster; that is, Christ and the Vicar of Christ, Peter and the successor of Peter, since the Lord speaking to Peter Himself said: ‘Feed my sheep‘ [Jn 21:17], meaning, my sheep in general, not these, nor those in particular, whence we understand that He entrusted all to him [Peter]. Therefore, if the Greeks or others should say that they are not confided to Peter and to his successors, they must confess not being the sheep of Christ, since Our Lord says in John ‘there is one sheepfold and one shepherd.’ We are informed by the texts of the gospels that in this Church and in its power are two swords; namely, the spiritual and the temporal. For when the Apostles say: ‘Behold, here are two swords‘ [Lk 22:38] that is to say, in the Church, since the Apostles were speaking, the Lord did not reply that there were too many, but sufficient. Certainly the one who denies that the temporal sword is in the power of Peter has not listened well to the word of the Lord commanding: ‘Put up thy sword into thy scabbard‘ [Mt 26:52]. Therefore, both are in the power of the Church, namely, the spiritual sword and the material. But indeed, the latter is to be exercised on behalf of the Church; and truly, the former is to be exercised by the Church. The former is of the priest; the latter is by the hand of kings and soldiers, but at the will and sufferance of the priest.


However, one sword ought to be subordinated to the other and temporal authority, subjected to spiritual power. For since the Apostle said: ‘There is no power except from God and the things that are, are ordained of God‘ [Rom 13:1-2], but they would not be ordained if one sword were not subordinated to the other and if the inferior one, as it were, were not led upwards by the other.


For, according to the Blessed Dionysius, it is a law of the divinity that the lowest things reach the highest place by intermediaries. Then, according to the order of the universe, all things are not led back to order equally and immediately, but the lowest by the intermediary, and the inferior by the superior. Hence we must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power whatever, as spiritual things surpass the temporal. This we see very clearly also by the payment, benediction, and consecration of the tithes, but the acceptance of power itself and by the government even of things. For with truth as our witness, it belongs to spiritual power to establish the terrestrial power and to pass judgement if it has not been good. Thus is accomplished the prophecy of Jeremias concerning the Church and the ecclesiastical power: ‘Behold to-day I have placed you over nations, and over kingdoms‘ and the rest. Therefore, if the terrestrial power err, it will be judged by the spiritual power; but if a minor spiritual power err, it will be judged by a superior spiritual power; but if the highest power of all err, it can be judged only by God, and not by man, according to the testimony of the Apostle: ‘The spiritual man judgeth of all things and he himself is judged by no man‘ [1 Cor 2:15]. This authority, however, (though it has been given to man and is exercised by man), is not human but rather divine, granted to Peter by a divine word and reaffirmed to him (Peter) and his successors by the One Whom Peter confessed, the Lord saying to Peter himself, ‘Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound also in Heaven‘ etc., [Mt 16:19]. Therefore whoever resists this power thus ordained by God, resists the ordinance of God [Rom 13:2], unless he invent like Manicheus two beginnings, which is false and judged by us heretical, since according to the testimony of Moses, it is not in the beginnings but in the beginning that God created heaven and earth [Gen 1:1]. Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

https://www.papalencyclicals.net/bon08/b8unam.htm


Exodus 32

1599 Geneva Bible

32 4 The Israelites impute their deliverance to the calf. 14 God is appeased by Moses’ prayer. 19 Moses breaketh the Tables.


1 But when the people saw, that Moses tarried long ere he came down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves together against Aaron, and said unto him, Up, [a]make us gods to go before us: for of this Moses (the man that brought us out of the land of Egypt) we know not what is become of him.

2 And Aaron said unto them, [b]Pluck off the golden earrings, which are in the ears of your wives, of your sons, and of your daughters, and bring them unto me.

3 Then all the people plucked from [c]themselves the golden earrings, which were in their ears, and they brought them unto Aaron.

4 Who received them at their hands, and fashioned it with the graving tool, and made of it a [d]molten calf: then they said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt.

5 When Aaron saw that, he made an Altar before it: and Aaron proclaimed, saying, Tomorrow shall be the holy day of the Lord.

6 So they rose up the next day in the morning, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings: also the people sat them down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.

7 ¶ Then the Lord said unto Moses, Go get thee down: for thy people which thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt, hath corrupted their ways.

8 They [e]are soon turned out of the way, which I commanded them: for they have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have offered thereto, saying, These be thy gods, O Israel, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt.

9 Again the Lord said unto Moses, I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people.

10 Now [f]therefore let me alone, that my wrath may wax hot against them, for I will consume them: but I will make of thee a mighty people

11 But Moses prayed unto the Lord his God, and said, O Lord, why doth thy wrath wax hot against thy people, which thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt, with great power and with a mighty hand?

12 Wherefore shall the Egyptians [g]speak, and say, He hath brought them out maliciously for to slay them in the mountains, and to consume them from the earth? turn from thy fierce wrath, and [h]change thy mind from this evil toward thy people.

13 Remember [i]Abraham, Isaac, and Israel thy servants, to whom thou swarest by thine own self, and saidest unto them, I will multiply your seed, as the stars of heaven, and all this land, that I have spoken of, will I give unto your seed, and they shall inherit it forever.

14 Then the Lord changed his mind from the evil, which he threatened to do unto his people.

15 So Moses returned and went down from the mountain with the two Tables of the Testimony in his hand: the tables were written on both their sides, even on the one side and on the other were they written.

16 And these Tables were the work of God, and [j]this writing was the writing of God graven in the Tables.

17 And when Joshua heard the noise of the people, as they shouted, he said unto Moses, There is a noise of war in the host.

18 Who answered, It is not the noise of them that have the victory, nor the noise of them that are overcome: but I do hear the noise of singing.

19 Now, as soon as he came near unto the host, he saw the calf and the dancing: so Moses’ wrath waxed hot, and he cast the Tables out of his hands, and brake them in pieces beneath the mountain.

20 After, he took the calf, which they had made, and burned it in the fire, and ground it unto powder, and strowed it upon the water, and made the children of Israel [k]drink of it.

21 Also Moses said unto Aaron, What did this people unto thee, that thou hast brought so great a sin upon them?

22 Then Aaron answered, Let not the wrath of my Lord wax fierce: Thou knowest this people, that they are even set on mischief.

23 And they said unto me, Make us gods to go before us: for we know not what is become of this Moses (the man that brought us out of the land of Egypt).

24 Then I said to them, Ye that have gold, pluck it off: and they brought it me, and I did cast it into the fire, and thereof came this calf.

25 Moses therefore saw that the people were [l]naked (for Aaron had made them naked unto their shame among their enemies)

26 And Moses stood in the gate of the camp, and said, Who pertaineth to the Lord? let them come to me. And all the sons of Levi gathered themselves unto him.

27 Then he said unto them, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel: Put every man his sword by his side, go to and fro, from gate to gate, through the host, and [m]slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbor.

28 So the children of Levi did as Moses had commanded: and there fell of the people the same day about three thousand men.

29 (For Moses had said, Consecrate your hands unto the Lord this day, even every man upon his [n]son, and upon his brother, that there may be given you a blessing this day.)

30 And when the morning came, Moses said unto the people, Ye have committed a grievous crime: but now I will go up to the Lord, if I may pacify him for your sin.

31 Moses therefore went again unto the Lord, and said, Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold.

32 Therefore now if thou pardon their sin, thy mercy shall appear: but if thou wilt not, I pray thee, raise me [o]out of thy book, which thou hast written.

33 Then the Lord said to Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me, I will put him out of my [p]book.

34 Go now therefore, bring the people unto the place which I commanded thee: behold, mine Angel shall go before thee, but yet in the day of my visitation I will visit their sin upon them.

35 [q]So the Lord plagued the people, because they caused Aaron to make the calf which he made.


Footnotes

Exodus 32:1 The root of Idolatry is, when men think that God is not at hand, except they see him carnally.

Exodus 32:2 Thinking that they would rather forego idolatry, than to resign their most precious jewels.

Exodus 32:3 Such is the rage of idolaters, that they spare no cost to satisfy their wicked desires.

Exodus 32:4 They smelled of their leaven of Egypt, where they saw calves, oxen and serpents worshipped.

Exodus 32:8 Whereby we see what necessity we have to pray earnestly to God, to keep us in his true obedience, and to send us good guides.

Exodus 32:10 God showeth that the prayers of the godly stay his punishment.

Exodus 32:12 Or, blaspheme.

Exodus 32:12 Or, repent.

Exodus 32:13 That is, thy promise made to Abraham.

Exodus 32:16 All these repetitions show how excellent a thing they defrauded themselves of by their idolatry.

Exodus 32:20 Partly to despite them of their idolatry, and partly that they should have none occasion to remember it afterward.

Exodus 32:25 Both destitute of God’s favor, and an occasion to their enemies to speak evil of their God.

Exodus 32:27 This fact did so please God, that he turned the curse of Jacob against Levi to a blessing, Deut. 33:9.

Exodus 32:29 In revenging God’s glory we must have no respect to person, but put off all carnal affection.

Exodus 32:32 So much he esteemed the glory of God, that he preferred it even to his own salvation.

Exodus 32:33 I will make it known that he was never predestinated in mine eternal counsel to life everlasting.

Exodus 32:35 This declareth how grievous a sin idolatry is, seeing that at Moses’ prayer God would not fully remit

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Exodus%2032&version=GNV


The head priest of the Roman state religion was the Pontifex Maximus, or the greatest of the college of pontifices. While an obviously important and prominent position within the ranks of the Roman system, the Pontifex Maximus was not considered a magistrate comparable to a Consul, Praetor, etc.


During the Republic, the Pontifex was elected by the Comitia Tributa and served for life, while during the Empire, the position was generally held by the Emperor himself.


Originally, the Ponifices were Patrician only, but the social conditions and changes during the late Republic allowed for Plebeian election as well. These men were responsible for the oversight of the state religious cult as a whole and didn't really oversee particular godly cults, though they could if necessary.


AD


By the Imperial period there were 16 pontifices under the high priest, 15 flamines, who were special priests of the main deities, and the Rex Sacrorum (king of the sacrifices) who performed the religious acts that the king had usually done. Perhaps most importantly, he was he was also responsible for the 18 Vestal Virgins.


The main duty of the pontifices was to provide the pax deorum, or the 'peace with the gods'. Interpreting omens, sometimes through augures, controlling and keeping the official calendar, and the oversight of funerals all fell under the domain of the Pontifex Maximus.


He was responsible for an enormous collection of omens (annales maximi); that would be recorded and collected on a nearly constant basis. These heavenly signs would be written down along with accompanying events, and used to determine the divine favor of the gods. Doing so allowed following generations of priests and magistrates to understand the historic will of the gods and interpret future events against past patterns.


Today, the head of the Roman Catholic Church, the Pope, is still called the Pontifex Maximus. It's a political or governing office that has been in existence and in perpetual use for nearly 3,000 years.


Pontifex Maximus List


Roman Office of the Pontifex Maximus


Year


Pontifex


Notes


712 BC


Numa Pompilius


The office was said to begin during the tenure of the Kings of Rome. However, very little recorded evidence exists. This name has been recorded as Numa Marcius and it is difficult to determine if it was a different person, or the actual second king of Rome.


509 BC


Papirius


Complete dates in office unknown.


449 BC


Furius


Complete dates in office unknown.


431 BC


Cornelius Cossas


Complete dates in office unknown.


420 BC


Minucius


Complete dates in office unknown.


390 BC


Follius Flaccinator


Complete dates in office unknown.


332 - 304 BC


Cornelius Callissa


 


304 - ? BC


Cornelius Scipio Barbatus


Complete dates in office unknown.


254 - 243 BC


Tib. Coruncanius


First Plebeian Pontifex Maximus


243 - 221 BC


Caecilius Metellus


 


217 - 213 BC


Cornelius Lentulus Caudinus


 


212 - 183 BC


Licinius Crassus Dives


 


183 - 180 BC


Servilius Geminus


 


180 - 152 BC


Aemilius Lepidus


 


152 -150 BC


No Pontifex Maximus


 


150 - 141 BC


Cornelius Scipio Nasica Corculum


 


141 - 132 BC


Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica Serapio


Described by Plutarch as the first Pontifex to break the religious law not allowing him to leave Italy.


132 - 130 BC


Licinius Crassus Dives Mucianus


Also noted as the first to leave Italy, during the social disorder of the Gracchi Brothers. After which, it became increasingly common and certainly not against the law for the Pontifex to leave Italy.


? - 115 BC


P. Mucius Scaevola


Complete dates in office unknown, but assumedly shortly after his predecessor.


114 - 103 BC


Caecilius Metellus Delmaticus


 


103 - 89 BC


Domitius Ahenobarbus


 


89 - 82 BC


Q. Mucius Scaevola


 


81 - 63 BC


Caecilius Metellus Pius


 


63 - 44 BC


Gaius Julius Caesar


 


44 - 13 BC


Aemilius Lepidus


 


12 BC


Augustus


With the accession of Augustus, the election of the Pontifex Maximus ceased as each successive emperor held the office. In 382 AD, when the Eastern emperor Theodosius established Christianity as the official religion of the empire, the Western Emperor Gratian relinquished the office to the Christian Popes of Rome, who have held it since that time.


Did you know...

Julius Caesar was elected pontifex maximus in 63 BCE and kept the office until his death. The house where he spent the night before he was killed, was the domus publica.

https://www.unrv.com/culture/pontifex-maximus.php

https://www.facebook.com/4williamdunn/posts/pfbid02Fgy3xWjYnUVNC1iBgdT322wDixSXLAtGzDbbguULwQockv7gKLygQ1ECoBwsjRjEl


AMERICAN GRAFFITI

THERE IS A UNIVERSAL legal tradition that requires acts of

a governmental authority to be marked by a seal – otherwise

the acts are not authentic. Typically, a seal discloses the

character of the authority it represents by means of an image

which can be, and usually is, amplified by some sentence, phrase,

or word.

The first seal of the United States of America, designed to

authenticate all governmental actions under the Declaration of

Independence, was presented to Congress in August 1776. Created

by an official committee consisting of Benjamin Franklin, John

Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, the seal illustrates an event based

on Exodus 14:19-27. It is a cameo of Moses leading the Israelites

through the parted waters while a chariot-bound Pharaoh, wielding

a sword and wearing the crown of tyranny, perishes in the

maelstrom. Framing the picture are the words “REBELLION TO

TYRANTS IS OBEDIENCE TO GOD.”

203

RULERS OF EVIL

THE MOSAIC SEAL

of August, 1776

When I first became aware of

this seal many years ago, I thought

it demonstrated how intensely biblical

was the faith of the founding fathers.

But once I began discerning

the hidden makers of American nationalism,

my thinking changed

radically. I now see this seal, despite

the biblical glow of the committee

that designed it, as the profession of

an intensely Roman Catholic faith.

For there is a great disparity between

biblical faith and Roman

Catholic faith. Indeed, this disparity was the crux of the Protestantism

which Pope Paul III commissioned the Society of Jesus to

extirpate.

Biblical faith regards the Bible alone, sola scriptura, apart from

any other source, to be a sufficient and infallible rule of life. In the

Bible’s own words: “All scripture is God-breathed, and is profitable

for teaching, for counseling, for correction, and for training in

righteousness: that the man of G o d may be perfect, completely

outfitted to perform good works” (2 Timothy 3:16).

Roman Catholic faith, on the other hand, while agreeing that

the Bible is God-breathed, considers scripture neither infallible

nor sufficient in itself as a rule of life, unless so interpreted by the

Magisterium (the teaching authority of the Church), and then so

pronounced by the infallible pope.

At Paul Ill’s Council of Trent ( 1 5 4 5 - 6 3 ) , which we have

learned was closely supervised over its eighteen years of existence

by the Jesuits, it was decreed that the Magisterium “receives and

venerates, with a feeling of piety and reverence all the books of the

Old and New Testaments, also the traditions [italics mine], whether

they relate to faith or morals, as having been dictated either orally

by Christ or by the Holy Ghost, and preserved in the Catholic

Church in unbroken succession.”1 Over the centuries, Roman

Catholic faith in Scripture, as modified by tradition, as pro-

nounced by the Magisterium and pope, has bound millions of consciences

to a thousand doctrines not found in scripture and either

unknown or rejected by the apostles and early Christian fathers.2

The 1776 seal agrees with Roman Catholic teaching as much

as it disagrees with the Bible. Whereas the caption “Rebellion to

tyrants is obedience to God” is found nowhere in Scripture, it is

the cornerstone of Bellarminian liberation theology. The Bible

never condones rebellion, not even rebellion to those tyrants under

whom God’s own people, the Israelites, were obliged to suffer continuously.

When Scripture mentions rebellion, it is almost always

referring to the disobedience of the Israelites toward their God

Yahweh. T h e seventeenth chapter of Proverbs teaches that “the

evil man seeks rebellion,” and 1 Samuel 15:23 admonishes that

“rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft.” The God of Scripture cannot

be obeyed by evil-doing and witchcraft. He will not be honored

in the breach. However, sacred tradition authorizes anything in

the service of Rome – Cum finis est licitus, etiam media sunt licita,

the end justifies the means.

Depicting rebellion as a salvational act, the 1776 seal further

harmonizes with the Magisterium on how the sinful soul of man is

saved from eternal punishment. The Magisterium concurs with the

Bible that salvation is the free gift of God’s grace, but adds the

nonscriptutal teaching that salvation can be lost if good works are

not performed through the “sacred channels” of Baptism, Confession,

and the Mass. Scripture (Ephesians 2:8-10) says that Jesus

Christ does not share his saviorhood with anyone or anything (“You

have been saved by grace through faith; and that not of yourselves,

it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one should

boast”), yet the Magisterium says that Christ is no savior without

the sinner’s cooperation with the Church and its traditions.

In fact, Scripture’s account of the Exodus shows the departure

from Egypt not to be a rebellion at all. When called by Yahweh to

represent Israel before Pharaoh, Moses pled himself incapable

(Exodus 3 : 1 1 ) , uninformed (3:13), unauthorized (4:1), ineloquent

(4:10), unadapted (4:13), unproven (5:23), and uncredentialed

(6:12) – hardly the audacious mindset of a great rebel leader. What

205

RULERS OF EVIL

Moses led was no rebellion but a sociological deliverance for

which Yahweh alone claimed responsibility: “Come now, therefore,

and I will send you to Pharaoh so that you can bring my people,

the children of Israel, out of Egypt.... A n d I will stretch out

my hand, and smite Egypt with all my wonders which I will do in

the midst thereof: and after that he will let you go” (Exodus 3:10,

20). If Adams, Franklin, and Jefferson had wished the 1776 seal to

express the true teaching of Scripture, they might have written

“YAHWEH REMOVES TYRANTS FOR HIS FAITHFUL.”

But even with a biblically correct motto the seal fails the biblical

standard. For it is after all a seal, authority represented by a

graven image. Although the use of seals and images is one of

Roman Catholicism’s proudest sacred traditions, Scripture prohibits

it. The only Israelite shown to rule with a seal is king Ahab,

who “did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before

him” (1 Kings 16:30). Ahab’s seal, apparently appropriated from

ancient pagan tradition, was employed by his wife, the quintessentially

wicked Jezebel, to commit fraud and murder ( 2 1 : 8 - 1 6 ) .

Scripture warns of an unlimited potential for evil inherent in

graven-image seals. The apostles of Christ understood this principle

well. They saw the pharisees demand Jesus show them a token

of His authority, and what Jesus showed them was not an image

but Scripture – the book of Jonah (Matthew 12:39). Paul the apostle

had no seal except the people he’d evangelized: “for the seal of

my apostleship are those of you in the Lord” (1 Corinthians 9:2).

Indeed, the seal of the Body of Christ is represented in Scripture

not by the miter and crossed keys of the Holy See, or the doves,

flames, Bibles, bare crosses, and sunbursts of the Protestant denominations,

but by Scripture alone: “The foundation of G o d stands

sure, having this seal: THE LORD KNOWS HIS OWN; AND LET

CHRIST’S FAITHFUL DEPART FROM INIQUITY” (2 Timothy 2:19).

The early Christian leaders, whose faith is historically regarded

as the best-informed of any generation’s, rigorously opposed the

making of images or likenesses of any kind. Scripture had taught

them well that Yahweh’s people always suffered terrible calamity

whenever they violated the commandment not to identify them-

206

selves or their God with “any graven images or any likeness of any

thing” (Exodus 20:4). Edwyn Bevan’s Holy Images: An Inquiry into

Idolatry and Image Worship in Ancient Paganism and in Christianity

cites three important early churchmen who forbade images.

Clement of Alexandria taught that images were “not true,” and

were forbidden by Yahweh “in order that we might not direct our

attention to sensible objects, but might proceed to the intelligential.”

Origen held that images “drag the soul down instead of directing

the mind to a divine invisible reality.” Tertullian instructed

the servants of G o d to avoid every form of imagery, even secular

art. Indeed, as Bevan points out, Christians of the first and second

centuries placed visual artists in a class with harlots, drunkards,

brothel-keepers, and actors.

But for thousands of years Mediterranean cultures had been

receiving their religious and political information from myths narrated

by visual art. Paulinus, Bishop of Nola, said of his congregations,

“They are not devoid of religion, but not able to read.” This

was Paulinus’ excuse for beseeching the Bishop of Rome to permit

him to teach with graven images. Paulinus had forgotten, or perhaps

had never learned, that the basis of the Gospel of Christ was

above all literary – else why had its Author prohibited graphic likenesses?

Knowing this, the apostles devoted a large part of the evangelical

process to spreading literacy – “blessed is he who reads”

(Revelation 1:3). Even so, the apostle Peter foresaw the time of

Paulinus, Bishop of Nola, a time when “false teachers among you

shall bring in damnable heresies denying the Lord” (2 Peter 2:1).

What more damnable heresy could there be than depicting a God

who condemns images... with an image? Could such a God even be

depictable by an image? Wouldn’t an image purporting to be Him

have to be in reality, by sheer force of logic, the image of another

God? The apostle Paul, aware of the compelling nature of images,

and their definitive incapacity to teach Jesus and the Gospel,

warned the Corinthians how easily a false teacher could lead them

to “another Jesus, another gospel” (2 Corinthians 11:4). T h e time

was very close, Paul knew, when Christians “will not endure sound

doctrine, but will heap to themselves teachers who will switch

RULERS OF EVIL

them from truth to myths” (2 Timothy 4 : 3 , 4 ) . And what are

graven images but the very grammar of myths?

The switch began noticeably happening in the third century,

when teachers like Paulinus of N o l a began instructing from pictures

(for which Paulinus was canonized by the Roman Catholic

Church). With Constantine a century later, as we’ve seen, a powerful

new “Christian” visual language developed. Old mythic icons

were renamed to fit Bible stories, and an iconic Christianity was

spread through pagan images processed by missionary adaptation.

What the new converts were not taught is that Scripture categorically

rejects such attempts to iconize its contents, and that therefore

(again, by sheer force of logic) the likenesses upon whom they

reverently gazed were no more than the gods and goddesses originally

pictured, other gods of other gospels. Archaeology traces these

gods and their gospels back to the very earliest Babylonian cathedrals.

It was in these cathedrals, erected nearly four thousand years

before the Christian era, that the Roman Catholic sacred iconographic

tradition was born. We shall explore this subject in some

detail in a forthcoming chapter.

CONGRESS refused to adopt the 1776 seal. We may never know

why. There is no record of any debate, only the notation that

the seal was ordered to lay “on the table.” Five years later, in the

summer of 1781, a fleet of twenty-five French war vessels arrived

in Chesapeake Bay with more than twenty thousand soldiers accompanied

by ninety Roman Catholic chaplains and God only

knows how many secularized Jesuits. A month later, the British

army surrendered to General Washington at Yorktown. The legend-

spinning visible war was over at last.

In June 1782, Benjamin Franklin and John Adams were meeting

in Paris to perfect a treaty with envoys of the newly-elected

British Prime Minister – Robert Petty. We recall Petty, Lord Shelburne,

the ubiquitous “Jesuit of Berkeley Square” who teamed with

Lord Bute to conclude the French and Indian Wars in terms that

had made the Revolution inevitable. Franklin and Adams found

themselves approaching the negotiating table without a national

seal. Nothing they might do on behalf of the United States could

208

be valid without a seal. This was the exigency that moved Congress

to adopt, on June 28, the seal designed by Charles Thomson

and William Barton.

The Great Seal is “written” in cabalah, that style of allegorical

communication composed of seemingly unrelated symbols, numerals,

and phrases. A piece in Le Charivari No. 18 (Paris, 1973), discussing

certain symbolic motifs used by the enlightened French

artist Nicolas Poussin, explains the practical advantage of cabalistic

works:

A single word suffices to illumine connections which the

multitude cannot grasp. S u c h works are available to everyone,

but their significance addresses itself to an elite. A b o v e and

beyond the masses, sender and receiver understand each other.

Cabalah goes beyond mere secret communication. Supposedly,

i t thrusts the sender “into direct contact with the living powers

and forces of the Universe, and through them with the eternal

source of all manifestation,” explains Henrietta Bernstein in her

Cabalah Primer. “In other words, you make contact with God.” To

a cabalist gnostic illuminatus whose special knowledge has liberated

him from the clutch of matter and is speeding h im toward the

pure light of godliness, cabalah is “the royal art, a closed body of

knowledge sacred to the elect.”

Since the Great Seal is written in the language of cabalah, it

appears to be a veritable Gnostic Constitution. In terms well

known to initiates and God Almighty, it sets forth the origin,

nature, purpose, and plan of American government. Of course, as

Charles Thomson and Manly Hall have intimated, the initiates

will never disclose to outsiders the meaning of the Seal’s elements.

But G o d Almighty is not so aloof. He does not resist inquiries. Nor

is He a respecter of persons. Contrary to the cabalist’s boast of privileged

access, Scripture promises more light to any mind that seeks

i t from God in person. Shining that light on commonly available

histories of rulers and religions, anyone can trace the Seal’s elements

back to their ancient origins and in the end know as much

as, if not more than, the gnostics.

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On the front or obverse side of the Seal we find an eagle clutching

an olive branch and thirteen arrows, with a banner in his beak

inscribed with the motto “E PLURIBUS UNUM. ” T h e earliest images

of sacred eagles have been found in that region of present-day Iraq

once known as Babylon. The eagle was identified with the Babylonian

sky-god Annu. When A n n u entered sacred Roman iconography

as Jupiter, the eagle was still his mascot. For the more than

two thousand years since the death of Rome’s first emperor, Julius

Caesar, Jupiter’s eagle has signified Rome’s imperial power – “imperial”

meaning the right of the Caesars to make laws and enforce

them. In many a church, Roman C a t h o l i c and Protestant alike,

the Bible from which lessons are publicly read rests on a hardwood

lectern carved in the shape of a magnificent eagle. Yet in the pages

of this very Bible, God forbids carved images of eagles. What,

then, does the eagle signify, if not a power indifferent to Scripture?

The brilliant cloud hovering over the eagle’s head in the Great

Seal is the aegis. T h e aegis is a goatskin. (We have already examined

how Scripture equates the goat with worldly power and separation

from God.) W h e n Jupiter was a baby he was nursed by a

she-goat named Amaltheia. (The priestly artists often portrayed

the adult Jupiter as a satyr, having a man’s body with the horns,

hair, and legs of a goat.) When Amaltheia died, Jupiter made the

aegis out of her hide.

The aegis of the Great Seal glorifies thirteen five-pointed stars,

or pentagrams. Each pentagram represents an original State. In

gnostic symbology, the pentagram is identified with Jupiter’s wife,

Venus. There is a natural reason for this. A dedicated observer,

from a fixed location over an eight-year period, will discern that

the planet Venus travels a unique celestial pathway that exactly

describes a pentagram. Carl Ljungman, in Dictionary of Symbols,

has written:

As the orbit of Venus is closer to the sun than the earth’s

position, she is never seen more than 48 degrees from the sun.

During a period of 247 days, Venus is visible as the Evening star

that is, within 48 degrees or less of the sun after the sun has set.

T h e n Venus comes too close to the sun for us to see her. She

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remains invisible for 14 days, then reappears as the Morning star

(or Eastern star) immediately before the sun rises in the east. For

245 days we can see Venus each morning at dawn before she

again disappears into the sun’s light by getting too close to the

sun. Venus is now invisible for 78 days. On the 79th evening, she

appears again in the west immediately after the setting sun. Now

she is the Evening star once more.

If one knows the ecliptic [that is, the great circle of the

celestial sphere that is the apparent path of the sun among the

stars] and can pinpoint the present position of the planets in

relation to the constellations of fixed stars in the zodiac, one can

mark the exact place in the 360 degrees of the zodiac where the

Morning star first appears shortly before sunrise after a period of

invisibility. If we do this, wait for the Morning star to appear

again 584 days later [the synodic orbital time of Venus] and mark

its position in the zodiac, and then repeat this process until we

have five positions of Venus as the Morning star, we will find

that exactly eight years plus one day have passed. If we then

draw a line from the first point marked to the second point

marked, then to the third, and so on, we end up w i t h a pentagram.

Only Venus possesses the five-pointed star sign. Not one of

the innumerable stars above us can recreate this by its own

orbit.3

Charles Thomson, the Great Seal’s co-designer, led a group of

dedicated observers of Venus. The first coordinated scientific experiment

of the American Philosophical Society, the club Thomson

founded for politically radical young professionals, focused on

Venus’ celestial pathway. On the evening of June 3, 1769, with

colleagues stationed at three sites in Pennsylvania and Delaware,

Thomson and five others watched, from the Public Observatory

on State House Square in Philadelphia, an eclipse caused by “the

transit of Venus across the Sun.”4

The goddess Venus, as we’ve seen, was absorbed by missionary

adaptation into the Roman Catholic sacred tradition as the Virgin

Mary. The adapters even ascribed to Mary the Venusian epithet

“Queen of Heaven,” a title never ascribed to Mary in the Bible.

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“Queen of Heaven” in Scripture names only one personage, and

that is Ishtar, the Babylonian Venus. Most faithful Catholics, historically

insulated from Scripture by the Magisterium and the

Inquisition, have not known this. Jeremiah 44 explains how the

Israelites violated their covenant with Yahweh by praising the

Queen of Heaven, and in turn lost their dignity, property, freedom,

everything to the Babylonians. Scripture teaches, also, that the

Babylonian interests have much to gain from inducing souls to

praise the Queen of Heaven. A n d as we shall later see, their gain

is divinely approved.

The term “Queen of Heaven” appears nowhere else in the Old

and New Testaments but at Jeremiah 44, and there exactly five

times. Did Jeremiah know that Venus’ celestial trail delineated five

points? A n d did the other thirty-five writers of the Bible’s sixty-six

books know as well? Did all these men, who wrote in different languages

over a period of more than a thousand years, conspire not

to mention “Queen of Heaven” in order to preserve Jeremiah’s five

mentions, so that the link between (a) the Queen of Heaven, (b)

the five-pointed path of Venus, and (c) the curse resulting from

praising her would stand as a divine lesson for the rest of eternity?

Or did it just happen that way by accident? Or, as the Bible teaches,

were Jeremiah and his co-authors inspired by the Author of all

creation to say (and not say) things for reasons beyond their individual

understanding?

THE Great Seal’s eagle holds a banner in its beak inscribed “E

PLURIBUS UNUM.” This phrase, which appears on American

coinage as well, is popularly understood to signify the melting of

many people into one nation, “of many, one.” Or to identify the

coin as one of many identical coins. The gnostic understanding of

this phrase, however, borders on the psychedelic. According to

Manly Hall, e pluribus unum refers to the ancient Bacchic Rites,

which he says was “a forerunner to Freemasonry.” Mysterious and

fantastic, the Bacchic Rites are built upon the following story line:

In a time before the creation of mankind, the twelve Titans

cause Bacchus, Jupiter’s beautiful son, to become fascinated by his

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own image in a mirror. Enthralled by himself, Bacchus is seized by

the Titans. They kill him, tear him to pieces, boil the pieces in

water, and afterwards roast and eat them. This grieves all his loved

ones, hence his name, from bakhah, “to weep” or “lament.” The

strewn body parts of Bacchus become the four elements of matter.

One of Bacchus’ sisters, the virgin Minerva, rescues his sacred

heart from the four elements and places it before Jupiter in Heaven.

From Heaven, Jupiter hurls thunderbolts at his son’s murderers

and reduces the Titans to ashes. The rains further reduce the ashes,

mingling with the four elements, to slime. From this evil slime

Jupiter forms mankind, a “Titanic embodiment” from which the

“Bacchic idea,” or rational soul, must be released. The Bacchic

idea is released by evil slime’s sexual energy, especially when facilitated

by alcoholic drink – hence Bacchus is associated with grapevines,

wild dancing, phallic symbols, and fornication.

When death and sex have rescued the rational soul from the

four slimy corners of the earth, a transfigured, eternal Bacchus is

resurrected as the flaming Sun. He is E PLURIBUS UNUM, One from

Many, a resurrection symbolized by the pentagram, the one rising

out of the four to make five. This, says Manly Hall, is “the magical

formula of man,”

the human soul rising from the bondage of the animal nature.

The pentagram is the true light, the Star of the Morning, marking

the location of five mysterious centers of force, the awakening

of which is the supreme secret of white magic.

With “E PLURIBUS UNUM” flowing from his beak, Jupiter’s

eagle preaches the Bacchic Gospel. It is a gospel of salvation that

antedates that of Jesus Christ by many, many centuries. The Bacchic

Gospel was preached and played out in the pagan cults. A

Holy Virgin would ritually rescue the Son of God’s Sacred Heart

from the slime of humanity imprisoning the Son’s soul. Each cult

initiate – a fractional part of the Son’s soul – supposedly gained

increasing amounts of knowledge from mind-altering substances

and sexual ecstasy administered for money, of course, by the temple

priests and priestesses. The initiate looked forward to being

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released from his slimy humanity by ever-increasing knowledge.

He yearned to be reunited ultimately with the Sacred Heart in

Heaven, resurrected and transfigured for all eternity.

This salvational plan, or some variation of it, can be found at

the core of all the secret or mystery religions – cults of empire. It

persists from the earliest Babylonian prototype right on down

through the Great Seal. It has succeeded not because it calls for

repentance from sin, but because it makes sin an asset in a process

of self-deification. T h e Bacchic Gospel serves an economy of sin

management, in which sins are forgiven upon the payment of

money or performance of some act of contrition valuable to society.

It is about people control. Because it prospers on the addictive

nature of fornication and mind-altering substances, it naturally

facilitates sex and booze and drugs and all their destructive fallout

in order to have a context in which to make itself useful. Unlike

the Christian Gospel, which conditions forgiveness of sins upon

repentance – “and if he repents, forgive him” (Luke 17:3) – the

Bacchic Gospel forgives upon the tendering of appropriate sacrifices

to the priest of the appropriate deity. The congeniality of this

gospel to secular government and Roman Catholicism speaks for

itself.

THE reverse side of the Great Seal contains four elements. First,

the motto “ANNUIT COEPTIS;” second, a thirteen-coursed topless

pyramid with M D C C L X X V I engraved in the foundation;

third, a disembodied eye forming the pyramid’s capstone, and

fourth, the motto “NOVUS ORDO SECLORUM. ” These elements

define exactly the “divine providence” upon whose protection the

signers of the Declaration of Independence firmly relied.

The land of the Pyramid, Egypt, is where Caesarean Rome was

inaugurated. By “Caesarean” I mean the empire whose head commands

not only affairs of state but those of religion as well. Caesarean

Rome officially began in Alexandria, Egypt, at the temple

of Jupiter, on the winter solstice – December 25 – in the year 48

BC, when a fifty-two-year-old priest of Jupiter was declared to be

Jupiter’s incarnation, thus “Son of G o d . ” His name was Caius of

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the family of Marius, Caius Maria. After deification, and occasionally

before, Caius Maria was referred to as “Caesar,” a cabalism

formed by the letter “C” (for Caius) attached to “Aesar,” the Etruscan

word for “God.” The G o d Caius. (Suetonius, the first-century

biographer of the Caesars, suggests that the title was formed

from prefixing Aesar with the numeral “ C , ” meaning “hundred.”

God of the Hundred, or Hundreds.)

According to Scottish theologian Alexander Hislop, Caesar

consented to deification in order to inherit the huge kingdom of

Pergamum.5 Consisting of most of Asia Minor (present-day

Turkey), Pergamum was bequeathed to the Roman people in 133

BC by its king, Attalus III. But there was a catch: the people of

Rome had to regard their leader as God.

The Pergamenian kings had begun ruling as God when the

title of Pontifex Maximus fled the fall of Babylon in 539 BC. In that

eventful year, Persian invaders assassinated the Babylonian king

Belshazzar. Just moments prior, Belshazzar had seen his assassination

prophesied by the famous handwriting on the wall: “Mene

Mene Tekel Upharsin,” (“the Numberer is numbered”).6 Ruling as

God by divine appointment, Belshazzar had profaned the sacred

vessels of the Israelite temple. This was the unpardonable sin of

blasphemy, for which God sent the Persians to destroy him.

Belshazzar’s priests were evidently spared. Rather than submit

to the Persian conquerors, they furtively gathered together all their

portable treasures, entitlements, codes, inscriptions, astrology,

sacred formulae, and insignia and fled with them northwesterly to

Pergamum. Since the rulers of Pergamum were already practicing

Babylonian religion, they were honored to receive the fugitive

Babylonian College and their great endowment.

Pergamum, the new residence of Pontifex Maximus, became a

showplace for despotism. The neighboring Greeks reflected its sudden

transformation with the myth of Midas, the king whose touch

turned everything to gold. Babylonian rule graced Pergamum with

the world’s greatest medical complex, the Asklepion, dedicated to

the god of pharmacological healing, Asklepios. Pergamum became

the most important humanist learning center, its library housing

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more than two hundred thousand scrolls. (Marc Antony would

later move these assets to Alexandria as a gift to Cleopatra. Many

of them eventually found their way from Alexandria to the Medici

Library in Florence.)

When Attalus III died in 133 BC, he bequeathed all his kingdom’s

Babylonian grandeur to the Romans. But no Roman emperor

was deemed fit to receive it because the Roman constitution

had never suffered a man to be deified. The bequest lay unclaimed

until 48 BC, when Caius Maria Caesar was declared God Almighty

in the Serapion, Alexandria’s temple of Jupiter.

Deification entitled Caesar now to assume the title Pontifex

Maximus. To indicate his infinitely holier status, he took the name

“Julius.”7 The name was a claim of descent from Julius Ascanius,

the legendary son of legendary Aeneas, Virgil’s maritime hero who

sailed westward with a band of his Trojan fellow-countrymen fleeing

the sack of Troy by Greek marauders. Assisted by the whole

heavenly network of mythic deities, Aeneas led his followers to

sacrifice their individuality for a glorious collective existence that

would one day be called “Rome.”

Aeneas was considered the offspring of a union between a

human being, Anchises, and Jupiter’s wife Venus. (When Anchises

boasted of his intercourse with the goddess, Jupiter struck him

blind with a thunderbolt. The Aeneid opens with Aeneas carrying

blind old Anchises out of Troy on his shoulders.) By taking the

name of Aeneas’ son Julius and claiming descent from him as well,

Caesar was able to trace his lineage back to the Queen of Heaven.

The divine lineage supposedly flowed through his mother, Maia,

who was purported to have conceived him without losing her virginity.

Maia also claimed to have remained a virgin even in childbirth

by having her son delivered from the side in a surgical

operation that still bears Caesar’s name.

A l l of this “fable and endless genealogy,” which Paul taught

the church not to heed, is foundational to American secular government.

For it is Julius Ascanius, grandson of Venus and claimed

ancestor of the original Caesar, who inspired “ANNUIT COEPTIS,”

the upper motto on the flip side of the Great Seal of the United

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States. The phrase, which the U.S. Department of State interprets

to mean “God hath favored this undertaking,” was spoken by

young Julius Ascanius in the Ninth Book of Virgil’s Aeneid.

The scene is a battleground. The Trojans are outnumbered and

fearful. Young Julius Ascanius takes a position in front of his

shrinking countrymen. He looks up at an evil giant named Remulus,

King of the Rutulus. Remulus mocks the Trojans for sending a

boy to fight him. While the giant quakes with derisive laughter,

Julius slips an arrow onto his bowstring and cries toward the heavens:

A l m i g h t y Jupiter, favor this rebellious undertaking

(AUDACIBUS ADNUE COEPTIS)! Each year, I shall bring to thy

temple gifts in my own hands, and place a white bullock at thy

altar!

Jupiter then hisses an arrow from the sky that strikes Remulus

in the head with such force that it passes clean through his temples.

The Trojans “raise a cheer and laugh aloud; their hearts rise

toward the stars.” Apollo, from his throne of cloud, shouts the

gnostic credo: “By striving so, men reach the stars, dear son of gods

and sire of gods to come!”

A thrilling story. A n d one that leaves no doubt as to the identity

of the god who favored the undertaking of the United States.

It was a pagan deity, the god of Julius Ascanius, and not the God

of the Bible. Surely, if Congress had wanted to show that the new

nation was underwritten by Yahweh, God of the Bible, it could

have referred to the boy-downs-giant story told in the Old Testament.

Who doesn’t know David and Goliath? Charles Thomson’s

biblical scholarship could easily have produced a motto based on I

Samuel 17:47, where David says to Goliath:

“The Lord saves not with sword and spear: for the battle is the Lord’s,

and He will give you into our hands!”

Reduced to an original-language motto at least as comprehenRULERS

OF EVIL

ENEMN EFEF

or even in translation, “THE BATTLE IS THE LORD’S.”

But establishing a national government directly on biblical

scripture was not the intent, I believe, of the founding fathers. Far

more useful to them, and acceptable to the souls they knew would

be populating America in good time, were the fabulous vanities of

Roman religion. These souls required the sacred icons of burgeoning

humanity and uninhibited sexual energy, legends that inspired

hotblooded heroism and patriotism. Consent to images of this

character presumed obedience to the omnipotent intelligence hovering

inscrutably above the ESTABLISHMENT of ancient, stoneheavy,

well-ordered pyramidic hierarchy.

LESS than four years after his deification, Julius Caesar was assassinated

by an executive conspiracy. For another four years, civil

war raged as two of the assassins, Brutus and Cassius, struggled for

control against Caesar’s immediate successor, a Triumvirate comprised

of Lepidus, Marc Antony, and Caesar’s adopted son (his biological

grand-nephew), Caius Octavian Capias.

The Triumvirate defeated the assassins only to war against

each other. Poets lamented that Rome, against whom no foreign

enemy had ever prevailed, was being destroyed by the strength of

her own sons. Obligations of every kind dissolved. Class fought

against class. A fog of guilt and despair settled in. The poets

yearned for escape beyond the world’s borders, to a place of innocence

and peace, perhaps to a new order of things. In his book

about Rome’s revolution from republic to Babylonian autocracy,

Oxford historian Ronald Syme writes:

The darker the clouds, the more certain was the dawn of

redemption. On several theories of cosmic economy it was firmly

believed that one world-epoch was passing, another was coming

into being. The lore of the Etruscans, the calculations of

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astrologers and the speculations of philosophers might conspire

with some plausibility and discover in the comet that appeared

after Caesar’s assassination the sign and herald of a new age.

Vague aspirations and magical science were quickly adopted for

purposes of propaganda by the rulers of the world. Already coins

of the year 43 BC bear symbols of power, fertility and the Golden

Age.s

The most influential and enduring celebration of Golden Age

optimism was Virgil’s prophetic-sounding Fourth Eclogue. This

work was addressed to one of Virgil’s chief benefactors, Caius

Asinius Pollio, who was Consul (roughly equivalent to the office

of President) when Caius Octavian, Antony, and Lepidus were

reconciled in 40 BC by the Peace of Brindisi. Pollio, who represented

Octavian at the Brindisi negotiations, introduced Virgil to

Caius Maecenas, the media mogul of his day. He had risked his fortune

supporting Julius Caesar’s rise to absolute dictatorship, and

he would risk no less to put Caesar’s adopted son, Caius Octavian,

in the same place. He scouted and subsidized the most highly talented

artists, sculptors, and poets to create a totally new kind of

communication. Virgil gave him the most for his money. Virgil

developed a new “civic” literature whose pious rhetorical style

gently guided public opinion toward accepting the rule of a deified

Babylonian autocrat. In writing the Fourth Eclogue, Virgil borrowed

heavily from the messianic verses of Isaiah, whose writings

were freely accessible through the Jewish rabbis of Rome:

Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and call his

name ‘God With Us’.... [Isaiah 7:14] For unto us a child is born,

unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his

shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor,

The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.

[9:6]

Six hundred years after Isaiah, Virgil solemnly announced in

the Fourth Eclogue that the Prince of Peace would be produced by

the unrolling of a New World Order (“NOVUS ORDO SECLORUM”):

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Now returns the Golden Age of Saturn, now appears the

Immaculate Virgin. Now descends from heaven a divine Nativity.

O! Chaste Lucina [Goddess of Maternity], speed the Mother’s

pains, haste the glorious Birth, and usher in the reign of thy

Apollo. Thy consulship, O Pollio, shall lead this glorious

Advent, and the new world order [NOVUS ORDO SECLORUM] shall

then begin to roll. Thenceforth whatever vestige of Original Sin

remains, shall be swept away from earth forever, and the Son of

God shall be the Prince of Peace!

The billionaire Maecenas exploited the Fourth Eclogue in the

media as though it were a divine summons for Caesar’s adopted son

Octavian to take the throne and begin sweeping the world free of

Sin. A fabulous resume of Octavian was already going around –

about how a thunderbolt had blasted the city wall of his birthplace,

Velitre, just prior to his birth. A n d how the priests interpreted

this to be Jupiter’s way of saying the future ruler of the world

would arise from the spot. And about how the Senate, upon hearing

this, had decreed that all male babies should be executed. A n d

how Octavian was saved by his mother, who pilfered the stone

tablet on which the decree was engraved.

Octavian’s mother was Atia of the family of Marius, Atia

Maria, a vestal virgin, niece of Caius Maria, the man who would

become Julius Caesar. When Octavian reached the age of twelve,

great-uncle Caius became his legal father through adoption. Three

years later, in Octavian’s fifteenth year, his adoptive father was deified

as Julius Caesar, Pontifex Maximus. That’s when the propagandists

of Maecenas got busy promoting the Son’s divine origins –

about how the child was born September 28, 63 BC in humble circumstances:

the butler’s pantry at his grandfather’s mansion at

Velitre. About how he had been conceived on December 25 by

Apollo, who came in serpent form and impregnated the virgin

A t i a Maria as she lay sleeping on the floor of the Apollonian temple.

About how, just prior to the child’s advent, the virgin Maria

had dreamed that her body was scattered to the stars and encompassed

the universe. About how her husband, too, had dreamed

that from within her shone the bright beams of the sun, which

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then “rose from between her thighs.” About how the toddler Octavian’s

head was often seen being licked by golden solar flames.

The propaganda circulated the story of how the great astrologer

Theogenes, when told Octavian’s birth sign (Capricorn),

rose and flung himself at the lad’s feet. Theogenes knew the astrological

ruler of Capricorn was Saturn, whose second Golden A g e

was at hand – Saturn, the celestio-mythical Father-God of Rome

and father of Jupiter. Octavian, as the incarnation of Jupiter, would

be ruled by Saturn, the most dictatorial house in the zodiac, terrible

for his restriction, limitation, control, even to the excesses of

fornication and cannibalizing of his own children. No wonder

Theogenes flung himself at Octavian’s feet!

In 28 BC, twelve years after the publication of the Fourth

Eclogue, Octavian entered Rome triumphantly as the Prince of

Peace. Like Julius had done, the new Pontifex Maximus received a

new and holier name, Caesar Augustus (“since sanctuaries and all

places consecrated by the augurs are known as ‘August,’” according

to Suetonius). A n d like Julius, he was hailed as “Son of God.”

Historian Alexander Del Mar describes the universal acceptance

of the divine Octavian in these excerpts from his landmark exposition

of Roman political deification, The Worship of Augustus Caesar

(1899):

In the firm establishment of the Messianic religion and ritual,

Augustus ascended the sacred throne of his martyred sire and

was in turn addressed as the Son of God (Divi filius), whilst Julius

was worshiped as the Father.... This claim and assumption

appears in the literature of his age, was engraved upon his monuments

and stamped upon his coins.... It was universally admitted

and accepted throughout the Roman empire as valid and

legitimate, according to chronology, astrology, prophecy, and tradition....

His actual worship as the Son of God was enjoined and

enforced by the laws of the empire, accepted by the priesthood

and practised by the people.... Both de jure and de facto it constituted

the fundamental article of the Roman imperial and

ecclesiastical constitution.

As supreme pontiff of the Roman empire, Augustus lawfully

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acquired and exercised authority over all cardinals, priests,

curates, monks, nuns, flamens, augurs, vestal virgins, temples,

altars, shrines, sanctuaries and monasteries, and over all religious

rites, ceremonies, festivals, holidays, dedications, canonizations,

marriages, divorces, adoptions, benefices, wills, burying grounds,

fairs, and other ecclesiastical subjects and matters.... The common

people wore little images of Augustus suspended from their

necks. Great images and shrines of the same god were erected in

the highways and resorted to for sanctuary. There were a thousand

such shrines in Rome alone.

Augustus wore on his head a pontifical mitre surmounted by

a Latin cross, an engraving of which, taken from a coin of the

Colonia Julia Gemella, appears in Harduini, de Numiis Antiquis

[1689], plate I.... The images of Augustus upon the coins of his

own mintage, or that of his vassals, are surrounded with the halo

of light which indicates divinity, and on the reverse of the coins

are displayed the various emblems of religion, such as the mitre,

cross, crook, fishes, labarum, and the Buddhic or Bacchic or

Dionysian monogram of PX [the Greek chi-rho, “Cairo,” site of

the great pyramid].

The Augustan writers furnished materials showing that [Augustus’]

Incarnation was the issue of a divine father and mortal

mother, that the mother was a wife-virgin, that the birth occurred

in an obscure place, that it was foretold by prophecy or

sacred oracle, that it was presaged or accompanied by prodigies

of Nature, that the divinity of the child was recognized by sages,

that the Holy One exhibited extraordinary signs of precocity

and wisdom, that his destruction was sought by the ruling powers,

that his miraculous touch was sufficient to cure deformity or

disease, that he exhibited a profound humility, that his deification

would bring peace on earth, and that he would finally ascend

to heaven, there to join the Father.

So universally were his divine origin and attributes conceded,

that many people, in dying, left their entire fortunes to his

sacred personal fisc, in gratitude, as they themselves expressed

it, for having been permitted to live during the incarnation and

earthly sojourn of this Son of God. In the course of twenty years

he thus inherited no less than 35,000,000 gold aurei [nearly $1

billion at 1996 values].... Many potentates bequeathed him not

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only their private fortunes, but also their kingdoms and people

in vassalage.... The marble and bronze monuments to Augustus

still extant contain nearly one hundred sacred titles. Among

them are Jupiter Optimus Maximus, Apollo, Janus, Quirinus,

Dionysus, Mercurius, Volcanus, Neptunus, Liber Pater, Savus

[Saviour], and Hesus.

At his death, Senator Numericus Atticus saw his spirit

ascend to Heaven. The Ascension of Augustus is engraved upon

the great cameo, from the spoils of Constantinople, presented by

Baldwin II to Louis IX, and now in the Cabinet of France. A facsimile

of it is published in Duruy’s History of Rome....

America’s Great Seal, with its obsessive fidelity to Caesarean

Rome, cannot represent a nation more moral than the source of its

scripture. The icons and mysterious cabalistic language of this Seal

introduce a preposterous Babylonian gospel. Taken seriously (and

shouldn’t a government’s solemn statements be taken seriously?),

the Seal’s gospel teaches that America’s high spiritual purpose is

to assist in the resurrection of the Son of God’s mutilated parts

from the evil slime of human flesh. It tells us that already the Holy

Virgin has rescued the Son’s Sacred Heart from the slime – E

PLURIBUS UNUM, “one from many” – and has placed it high in the

vault of Heaven, as her five-pointed celestial path describes for all

to see. It calls for America to exert fervent sexual energy so that

the Son’s many parts on earth might be reunited with the UNUM

in Heaven. It promises that America will rise toward the pure light

of sinlessness and Godliness, into eternal life as part of the solar

body of the Son – the Sun – of God. It signifies that this cosmic

resurrective process is administered by a pyramidic hierarchy conceived

in ancient Babylon, exported to Asia Minor, and bequeathed

to Rome. At the top of the hierarchy sits an unseen

chieftain, an unknown superior, a G o d of the Seal who possesses

universal intelligence and authority over every soul who confederates

with, or subscribes to, the Seal.

The God of the Seal wields the fasces to sweep the earth clean

of the last traces of Original Sin. He is assisted by a new priestly

order, a “new world order” charged with destroying all individual

223

RULERS OF EVIL

224

identity deemed inconsistent with the resurrection to godliness.

Uncooperative governments and dissident citizens alike are cut

down by arts of war so frugal that the liquidation increases popular

faith in the fasces. Because they function in a Golden Era of Saturn,

the chief and his hierarchy can be depended upon to mimic

Saturn’s strictness, cruelty, licentiousness, even cannabilism as the

situation requires. To the charge that such is impossible in America,

one comparison should be sufficient. No sooner was Augustus

Caesar deified than he sacrificially murdered three hundred Senators

in Perugia to atone for the assassination of his adoptive father

Julius.9 Likewise, no sooner was an American president inaugurated

than he, as Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces, authorized

the sacrificial murder of nearly a hundred misguided

Christians near Waco, Texas, to atone for what? A growing popular

disenchantment with federal government?

What the Seal of the United States of America represents, to

anyone who takes it seriously, is a Ministry of Sin. A speech by Jesuit

political scientist Michael Novak, published in the January 28,

1989 issue of America, the weekly magazine of American Jesuits,

sums it up eloquently enough:

The framers wanted to build a “novus ordo” that would

secure “liberty and justice for all”.... The underlying principle of

this new order is the fact of human sin. To build a republic

designed for sinners, then, is the indispensable task.... There is

no use building a social system for saints. There are too few of

them. And those there are are impossible to live with!... Any

effective social system must therefore be designed for the only

moral majority there is: sinners.

In the next chapter, we shall examine how faithfully the

founding fathers reconstructed Babylonian Rome on the banks of

the Potomac.

Rulers of Evil

by F. Tupper Saussy

https://dn790006.ca.archive.org/0/items/rulers-of-evil-f.-tupper-saussy/Rulers%20of%20Evil%20-%20F.%20Tupper%20Saussy.pdf


2 Timothy 2

1599 Geneva Bible

2 2 The better to set out perseverance in the Christian warfare, 3 he taketh similitudes, 4 from soldiers, 6 and from husbandmen. 10 He showeth that his bonds are for the profit of the Saints: 15 Then he warneth Timothy to divide the word of truth aright, 17 to beware of the examples of the wicked, 22 and to do all things modestly.


1 Thou [a]therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.


2 And what things thou hast heard of me, by [b]many witnesses, the same deliver to faithful men, which shall be able to teach others also.


3 [c]Thou therefore suffer affliction as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.


4 No man that warreth, entangleth himself with the affairs of [d]this life, because he would please him that hath chosen him to be a soldier.


5 [e]And if any man also strive for a mastery, he is not crowned, except he strive as he ought to do.


6 [f]The husbandman must labor before he receive the fruits.


7 [g]Consider what I say: and the Lord give thee understanding in all things.


8 [h]Remember that Jesus Christ, made of the seed of David, was raised again from the dead according to my Gospel,


9 [i]Wherein I suffer trouble as an evil doer, even unto bonds: but the word of God is not bound.


10 Therefore I suffer all things for the elect’s sake, that they might also obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus, with eternal glory.


11 [j]It is a true saying, For if we be [k]dead together with him: we also shall live together with him.


12 If we suffer, we shall also reign together with him: if we deny him, he also will deny us.


13 If we believe not, yet abideth he faithful: he cannot deny himself.


14 Of these things put them in remembrance, and [l]protest before the Lord, that they strive not about words, which is to no profit, but to the perverting of the hearers.


15 [m]Study to show thyself approved unto God a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, dividing the word of truth [n]aright.


16 [o]Stay profane, and vain babblings: [p]for they shall increase unto more ungodliness.


17 And their word shall fret as a canker: of which sort is Hymenaeus and Philetus.


18 Which as concerning the truth have erred from the mark, saying that the resurrection is past already, and do destroy the faith of certain.


19 [q]But the foundation of God remaineth sure, and hath this seal, The Lord knoweth who are his: and, Let everyone that [r]calleth on the Name of Christ, depart from iniquity.


20 [s]Notwithstanding in a great house are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth, and some for honor, and some unto dishonor.


21 If any man therefore [t]purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified, and meet for the Lord, and prepared unto every good work.


22 [u]Flee also from the lusts of youth, and follow after righteousness, faith, love, and [v]peace, with them that call on the Lord with pure heart,


23 And put away foolish and unlearned questions, knowing that they engender strife.


24 But the servant of the Lord must not strive, but must be gentle toward all men, apt to teach, [w]suffering the evil,


25 Instructing them with meekness that are [x]contrary minded, proving if God at any time will give them repentance, that they may acknowledge the truth,


26 And come to amendment out of that snare of the devil, of whom they are taken prisoners, to do his will.


Footnotes

2 Timothy 2:1 The conclusion of the former exhortation, which hath also added unto it a declaration how that they do not keep that worthy thing that is committed unto them which keep it to themselves, but they rather which do most freely communicate it with others, to the end that many may be partakers of it, without any man’s loss or hindrance.

2 Timothy 2:2 When many were by, which can bear witness of these things.

2 Timothy 2:3 Another admonition: That the ministry of the word is a spiritual warfare, which no man can so travail in, that he may please his captain, unless he forgo and part with all hindrances which might draw him away from it.

2 Timothy 2:4 With affairs of household, or other things that belong to other ordinary businesses.

2 Timothy 2:5 The third admonition: The ministry is like to a game or justing, wherein men strive for the victory, and no man is crowned unless he strive according to the laws which are prescribed, be they never so hard and painful.

2 Timothy 2:6 Another similitude tending to the same end: no man may look for the harvest, unless he first take pains to plow and sow his ground.

2 Timothy 2:7 All these things cannot be understood, and much less practiced, unless we ask of God and he gives us understanding.

2 Timothy 2:8 He confirmeth plainly two principles of our faith, which are always assaulted of heretics, the one whereof (to wit, that Christ is the true Messiah made man of the seed of David) is the ground of our salvation: and the other is the highest part of it, to wit, that he is risen again from the dead.

2 Timothy 2:9 The taking away of an objection: Truth it is, that he is kept in prison, as an evildoer, yet there is no cause, why therefore some should go about to derogate credit from his Gospel, seeing that notwithstanding God did bless his ministry, nay rather, that example of this his captivity and patience did sundry ways confirm the Church in the hope of a better life.

2 Timothy 2:11 The fourth admonition: we ought not to contend upon words and questions, which are not only unprofitable, but also for the most part hurtful: but rather upon this, how we may frame ourselves to all manner of patience, and to die also with Christ (that is to say, for Christ’s Name) because that is the plain way to the most glorious life: as contrariwise the falling away of men can diminish no part of the truth of God, although by such means, they procure most certain destruction to themselves.

2 Timothy 2:11 If we be afflicted with Christ, and for Christ’s sake.

2 Timothy 2:14 Call God to witness, or as a Judge: as Moses, Joshua, Samuel, and Paul himself did, Acts 20.

2 Timothy 2:15 The fifth admonition: A minister must not be an idle disputer, but a faithful steward in dividing aright the word of truth, insomuch that he must stop the mouths of other vain babblers.

2 Timothy 2:15 By adding nothing to it, neither overslipping anything, neither mangling it, nor renting it in sunder, nor wresting of it: but marking diligently what his hearers are able to hear, and what is fit to edifying.

2 Timothy 2:16 Mark and watch, and see they creep not on further.

2 Timothy 2:16 He discovereth the subtlety of Satan, who beginning with these principles draweth us by little and little to ungodliness through the means of that wicked and profane babbling, still creeping on: which he proveth by the horrible example of them that taught that, the resurrection was already past.

2 Timothy 2:19 A digression: wherein he salveth that offense that rose by their falling away: showing first, that the elect are out of all danger of any such falling away: secondly, that they are known to God and not to us: and therefore it is no marvel if we count hypocrites oftentimes for true brethren: but we must take heed that we be not like them, but rather that we be indeed, such as we are said to be.

2 Timothy 2:19 That serveth and worshippeth him, and is as it were named of him, a faithful man or Christian.

2 Timothy 2:20 The taking away of an objection: it is no dishonor to the good man of the house, that he hath not in a great house all vessels of one sort and for one service, but we must look to this, that we be found vessels prepared to honor.

2 Timothy 2:21 By these words is meant the execution of the matter, and not the cause: for in that we purge ourselves, it is not to be attributeth to any free will that is in us, but to God, who freely and wholly worketh in us a good and an effectual will.

2 Timothy 2:22 Returning to the matter from whence he digressed, verse 16, he warneth him to exercise himself in weighty matters, and such as pertain to godliness.

2 Timothy 2:22 The sixth admonition: We must above all things eschew all bitterness of mind both in teaching all men, and also in calling them back which have gone out of the way.

2 Timothy 2:24 To win them through our patient bearing with them, but not to please them or excuse them in their wickedness.

2 Timothy 2:25 He meaneth such as do not yet see the truth.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Timothy%202&version=GNV

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