Will China Overplay Its Hand? How Beijing’s Confidence Could Shake Up the Trump-Xi Summit

Will China Overplay Its Hand?

How Beijing’s Confidence Could Shake Up the Trump-Xi Summit

Thomas J. Christensen

March 6, 2026

Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, March 2026

Maxim Shemetov / Reuters

Thomas J. Christensen is James T. Shotwell Professor of International Relations at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs and Pritzker Chair at the Center for International and Strategic Studies. From 2006 to 2008, he served as U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs.

At the end of this month, U.S. President Donald Trump is scheduled to visit China for a major summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, the first of what may be as many as four meetings between the two leaders in 2026. The planned three-day summit comes on the heels of discussions the leaders held in October 2025 on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Busan, South Korea, where they reached a fragile truce to calm the rising economic tensions in the U.S.-Chinese relationship. Trump and Xi agreed to forgo, for one year, many of the draconian measures their countries had imposed or threatened to impose on each other in the preceding months. The United States backed down from the threat of sky-high tariffs and suspended a large expansion of the roster of Chinese companies on the U.S. Commerce Department’s Entity List, which limits their access to American business on national security or foreign policy grounds. China, for its part, reversed its refusal to purchase U.S. agricultural products and dropped sweeping restrictions on exports of critical minerals on which the United States and many other industrial economies depend. The agreement left the two countries fairly close to where they started before the economic conflict began earlier in 2025.

Foreign capitals and global stock markets welcomed the outcome because the alternative of further escalation would have been much worse. But the talks left critically important economic issues untouched—including transshipment tariffs that the United States has threatened to impose on countries importing intermediate products from China for use in the final products they export to the United States. There were also no long-term agreements regarding the restrictions on exports of rare-earth elements from China or high-end semiconductors from the United States. Moreover, the durability of the truce is threatened by persistent frictions in other areas of U.S.-Chinese competition, including the tendency of each country to employ economic sanctions as a means of coercion over noneconomic issues and to push back hard whenever such penalties are leveled against them.

But perhaps the most significant factor that will shape the upcoming Trump-Xi meetings will be Beijing’s perception of its own apparent success in 2025 in responding to U.S. threats with resolute counterthreats. The process of escalation and de-escalation that led to the Busan truce bolstered confidence among Chinese elites about their country’s growing power and leverage. Many Chinese experts believe that Beijing, unlike other capitals subjected to Trump’s threats, managed to back Washington into a corner and that this outcome signaled China’s arrival as a global power on par with the United States. The prominent Chinese international relations scholar Jin Canrong declared that the Busan summit’s outcome demonstrated that China and the United States had become “equal great powers.” After all, even before the meeting, Trump had boosted Beijing’s self-assurance by referring on social media to the impending talks as a convening of the “G-2”—a term U.S. officials had long avoided using because they did not want to treat China as a great-power peer and because U.S. allies and partners feared that such a framework would allow Beijing and Washington to make decisions affecting those countries’ interests without them in the room. The political scientist Zheng Yongnian wrote that Trump’s adoption of the G-2 language just before the summit “implicitly acknowledge[d] China’s pivotal global status”—in other words, its arrival as a peer of the United States. Some U.S. experts have also fed this perception. Rush Doshi, a former Biden administration official, called what happened in Busan an “unmistakable demonstration that China could now face America as a true peer.”

These conclusions are overblown. China is no doubt a great power, and it has long had the ability to cause major problems for the United States and its partners, both militarily and economically. This leverage is only increasing as China’s military, economic, and technological power continues to rise—a trajectory that should be taken seriously. But China is still no global peer of the United States. That U.S. efforts to coerce China in early 2025 were poorly conceived and therefore failed to produce many positive results does not mean that China can match the United States in comprehensive national power. Any Chinese perception to the contrary could lead Beijing to adopt assertive and potentially destabilizing policies in Asia.

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/china/will-china-overplay-its-hand

AI Overview

While many Chinese espionage cases involve individuals of Chinese descent, U.S. officials emphasize that intelligence recruitment crosses all ethnic lines, with several white/Western American citizens involved in cases. Examples include Charles Lieber, a Harvard professor convicted of failing to disclose ties to China, and Gregg William Bergersen, a DoD official convicted of passing secrets.

Wikipedia

Notable Examples of Western/Other Individuals in Chinese Espionage Cases:

Charles Lieber: A former chair of Harvard University's department of chemistry and chemical biology, convicted in 2021 for failing to report income from a Chinese university and hiding ties to China's Thousand Talents Program.

Gregg William Bergersen: A Department of Defense weapons systems analyst who pleaded guilty in 2008 to conspiring to disclose classified national defense information to a Chinese agent.

James Fondren: A civilian employee at the Pentagon who was convicted in 2009 of passing sensitive information to a Chinese recruiter.

Kevin Mallory: A former CIA officer sentenced in 2019 to 20 years in prison for conspiring to transmit national defense information to Chinese intelligence.

Wikipedia

These cases underscore that Chinese intelligence targeting focuses on access to technology and information, rather than specific ethnic backgrounds, involving a diverse range of American citizens.

File:Peng Liyuan, Xi Jinping and Barack Obama in the Lincoln Bedroom (Xi Jinping)

Summary

Sept. 25, 2015

"Two days after the visit of Pope Francis, the President and First Lady hosted President Xi Jinping of China and Madame Peng Liyuan for another State Visit. Before the formal State Dinner, the President showed President Xi and Madame Peng the Gettysburg Address in the Lincoln Bedroom." (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

https://picryl.com/media/peng-liyuan-xi-jinping-and-barack-obama-in-the-lincoln-bedroom-0fb552

AI Overview

Economic Interdependence: Despite political tension, Xi is maintaining a "measured approach" that allows popular Japanese brands (Uniqlo, Muji) to continue operating in China, reflecting that the trade relationship is "too big to fail".

Historical Context: Xi previously navigated a complex, often strained, relationship with former PM Shinzo ABE, balancing strategic, sometimes quiet, accommodation with deep-rooted mistrust.

Honest Abe” was a nickname that Abraham Lincoln embraced with pride. He believed in his own integrity and worked diligently to maintain his reputation as an honest politician and lawyer –something that was not always easy in either of those fields.

https://housedivided.dickinson.edu/sites/lincoln/honest-abe/

JOHN P. SCHLEGELMILCH DISTRICT JUDGE

September 9, 2016

William F. Dunn 2031 Lonnie Lane Dayton, NV 89403

STATE OF NEVADA

THIRD JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT

DEPARTMENT I

LYON COUNTY STATE OF NEVADA

911 HARVEY WAY

SECOND FLOOR YERINGTON, NEVADA 89447

(775) 463-6571

FAX (775) 463-6575

Dear Mr. Dunn:

On behalf of the Court, I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincere appreciation for your service as a juror in State of Nevada v. Ryan Joe Coddington. Your conscientious consideration of the challenging and sensitive issues presented to you in this case proves that our Constitutional system of trial by our peers works to ensure fair and unbiased decisions are handed out of our courts.

ABRAHAM Lincoln once said that "A jury is the common sense of a common people." The only way we have justice is through the judicial system in the United States. Justice really means fairness. It means that if you're charged with a crime, you can appear in front of a jury of your peers who will judge the facts fairly as a citizen of this State. A jury of your peers means a mix of people from all walks of life using their common sense to do justice. It is one of the most important civic responsibilities of being a United States Citizen.

I appreciate the fact that you responded to your summons as a juror willing to do your job. Our judicial system only works because citizens like you are interested, concerned and willing to make whatever arrangements are necessary in their personal lives to be able to perform this invaluable service. Your presence on the jury was a great asset in this case.

Once again, I would like to thank you on behalf of the Court and the people of Lyon County for your willingness to serve as a juror and to give so freely of your time and abilities. I admire you for your commitment to this case.

With great respect,

Honorable John P. Schlegelmilch District Court Judge

https://www.facebook.com/john.schlegelmilch.9/

Abraham Lincoln, 1809– 1865

#178

16th President of the United States of America, 1861– 1865

Assassinated by the Military Order of the Society of Jesus, April 15, 1865

Fourth “Heretic” President to be Murdered by the Jesuits Including:

1st President; George Washington, December 14, 1799

10th President; William Henry Harrison, April 4, 1841

12th President; Zachary Taylor, July 9, 1850

Joining the Republican Party in 1856, Abraham Lincoln had already proven himself to be a notorious enemy of the Jesuit Order. Having been the defense attorney for Roman Catholic Priest Charles Chiniquy (falsely accused by two priests sent by his cold-blooded, anti-Bible, anti-Protestant Bishop O’Regan), Lincoln thundered against the nefarious plot calculated to destroy an innocent man thereby incurring the wrath of no less than ten Jesuits in the courtroom.

Vatican Assassins

“Wounded In The House Of My Friends"

THIRD Edition

by Eric Jon Phelps

Case No. 25-CR-276 3G

FILED

2025 OCT 15 PM 12:37

JUSTICE OF THE PEACE

IN THE JUSTICE COURT OF DAYTON TOWNSHIP

IN AND FOR THE COUNTY OF LYON, STATE OF NEVADA

CLERK

9 THE STATE OF NEVADA,

Plaintiff,

VS.

RECUSAL AND ORDER

WILLIAM FRANCIS DUNN IV

OF APPOINTMENT

Defendant.

Pursuant to the provisions of Nevada Revised Statutes 1.230 and inasmuch as there may be actual or implied bias, the undersigned Judge of Dayton Township Justice Court, County of Lyon, State of Nevada, does hereby recues herself from the above-entitled matter.

IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that Judge Lori Matheus be, and hereby appointed to preside over the above-entitled matter. The case is hereby transferred to Canal Township Justice Court for further proceedings. The next court date will be held at 595 Silver Lace Blvd, Fernley, Nevada on October 28, 2025 at 8:00 am.

DATED this 15th day of October, 2025.

Camille Vecchiarelli Justice of the Peace

Lorraine Bramblett Lane

Did I miss your day? Happy birthday!.0.

https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=4363102707042829&set=a.151744931511982

Matheus, Lori Ann

Canal Justice Court

Dept.: 1

Justice Of The Peace

https://ournevadajudges.com/judges/lori-ann-matheus/articles

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

Arraignment at THIRD Judicial District Court 911 Harvey Way Yerington, Nevada 89447 (775)463-6503-52

Fernley Courts 595 Silver Lace Boulevard Fernley, Nevada 89408 Setting Notice

FILED 12/16/2025

Court Clerk

Defendant:

Contact:

William, Dunn IV

25 CR 00438 3F

Restitution- Review- Revocation- Status-

Other-

Arraignment at THIRD Judicial District Court 911 Harvey Way Yerington, Nevada 89447

William FRANCIS Dunn IV

2031 Lonnie Lane Dayton Nevada 89403

Social Security Number: 557-73-0018

DOB: November 12 1980

red birthmark right wrist

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=9 )

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/ahmedabad-times/666-the-devil-or-cupid/articleshow/1621141.cms#

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.

ROME Survey Page Social Security Administration

https://www.ssa.gov/myaccount/lp/landing-page-rome.html

AI Overview

Xi Jinping and Puyi, the last emperor of China, have no known direct familial or genealogical relationship. Puyi was from the Manchu Aisin Gioro clan, while Xi Jinping is of Han ethnicity from Shaanxi province. They belong to entirely different, unrelated family lines and historical backgrounds.

Wikipedia

Puyi (1906–1967): The last emperor of the Qing dynasty.

Xi Jinping (born 1953): Current leader of the People's Republic of China, son of communist revolutionary Xi Zhongxun.

Connection: There is no blood, familial, or ancestral link between the two individuals.

Xi Jinping could potentially remain president of China for life, following the removal of term limits in 2018.

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.

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/

̶A̶ ̶p̶a̶p̶a̶l̶ ̶r̶e̶n̶u̶n̶c̶i̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶(̶L̶a̶t̶i̶n̶:̶ ̶r̶e̶n̶u̶n̶t̶i̶a̶t̶i̶o̶)̶,̶ ̶a̶l̶s̶o̶ ̶c̶a̶l̶l̶e̶d̶ ̶a̶ ̶p̶a̶p̶a̶l̶ ̶a̶b̶d̶i̶c̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶,̶ ̶o̶c̶c̶u̶r̶s̶ ̶w̶h̶e̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶c̶u̶r̶r̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶p̶o̶p̶e̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶C̶a̶t̶h̶o̶l̶i̶c̶ ̶C̶h̶u̶r̶c̶h̶ ̶v̶o̶l̶u̶n̶t̶a̶r̶i̶l̶y̶ ̶r̶e̶s̶i̶g̶n̶s̶ ̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶p̶o̶s̶i̶t̶i̶o̶n̶.̶ ̶

̶h̶t̶t̶p̶s̶:̶/̶/̶e̶n̶.̶w̶i̶k̶i̶p̶e̶d̶i̶a̶.̶o̶r̶g̶/̶w̶i̶k̶i̶/̶P̶a̶p̶a̶l̶_̶r̶e̶n̶u̶n̶c̶i̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶

Pope John Paul I[a] (born Albino Luciani;[b] 17 October 1912 – 28 September 1978) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of Vatican City from 26 August 1978 until his death 33 days later.

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

On 13 May 1981, in St. Peter's Square in Vatican City, Pope John Paul II was shot and wounded by Mehmet Ali Ağca while he was entering the square.

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

SAKO Limited (natively Sako Oy)[1] is a Finnish firearm and ammunition manufacturer located in Riihimäki, Kanta-Häme in southern Finland.

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

And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast.

Revelation 13:3

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

The word asas in Arabic means "PRINCIPLE". The Asāsiyyūn (plural, from literary Arabic) were, as defined in Arabic, the principle people.

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

PRINCIPLE AND FOUNDATION

The Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola

TRANSLATED FROM

THE AUTOGRAPH

FATHER ELDER MULLAN, S.J.

I.H.S.

NEW YORK

P.J. KENEDY & SONS

PRINTERS TO THE HOLY APOSTOLIC SEE

https://ia601603.us.archive.org/32/items/spiritualexercis00ignauoft/spiritualexercis00ignauoft.pdf

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.

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.

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

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.

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

The Burning of Washington, also known as the Capture of Washington, was a successful British amphibious attack conducted by Rear Admiral George Cockburn during Admiral John Warren's Chesapeake campaign.ansion, United States Capitol, and Washington Navy Yard.[5][permanent dead link]

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

London is going to launch nuclear attack on Washington D.C 2030-2031 after false flag attacks in Jerusalem because of the Vatican and CIA.

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.

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

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).

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

The Cheyenne Mountain Complex (CMOC)[a] is a non-public military installation of the United States Department of Defense[b] located inside Cheyenne Mountain, in El Paso County, Colorado.[3]

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

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.

HOTT - MAJESTYTWELVE (hourofthetime.com)

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

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.

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

Easter in 2030

Date: April 21, 2030

Day: Sunday

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

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations (UN) members in 2015, created 17 world Sustainable Development Goals (abbr. 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.

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

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.

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

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.

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.

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

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

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.

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 heat death of the universe (also known as the Big Chill or the Big Freeze)[1][2] is a scientific hypothesis regarding the ultimate fate of the universe which posits the universe will evolve to a state of no thermodynamic free energy and, having reached maximum entropy, will therefore be unable to sustain any further thermodynamic processes.

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

Revelation 21:8

1599 Geneva Bible

8 But the fearful and unbelieving, and the abominable and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars shall have their [a]part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2021%3A8&version=GNV

The Hubble Space Telescope (HST or Hubble) is a space telescope that was launched into low Earth orbit in 1990 and remains in operation. It was not the first space telescope, but it is one of the largest and most versatile, renowned as a vital research tool and as a public relations boon for astronomy. The Hubble Space Telescope is named after astronomer Edwin Hubble and is one of NASA's Great Observatories. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) selects Hubble's targets and processes the resulting data, while the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) controls the spacecraft.[8]

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

Prince of Darkness Dream Sequences

theoncomingstorm

Apr 14, 2008

Prince of Darkness Dream Sequences - I thought it would be interesting to string them all together, don't ask me why I just did :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGsv0pJemTY

https://www.youtube.com/post/Ugkx7DXBZU2K8snxXU47W-HGkpUE5Zwza59z

File:Peng Liyuan, Xi Jinping and Barack Obama in the Lincoln Bedroom (Xi Jinping)

Summary

Sept. 25, 2015

https://picryl.com/media/peng-liyuan-xi-jinping-and-barack-obama-in-the-lincoln-bedroom-0fb552

AI Overview

Historical Context: Xi previously navigated a complex, often strained, relationship with former PM Shinzo ABE, balancing strategic, sometimes quiet, accommodation with deep-rooted mistrust.

https://housedivided.dickinson.edu/sites/lincoln/honest-abe/

JOHN P. SCHLEGELMILCH DISTRICT JUDGE

September 9, 2016

William F. Dunn 2031 Lonnie Lane Dayton, NV 89403

STATE OF NEVADA

THIRD JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT

DEPARTMENT I

LYON COUNTY STATE OF NEVADA

911 HARVEY WAY

SECOND FLOOR YERINGTON, NEVADA 89447

(775) 463-6571

FAX (775) 463-6575

Dear Mr. Dunn:

With great respect,

Honorable John P. Schlegelmilch District Court Judge

https://www.facebook.com/john.schlegelmilch.9/

AI Overview

Wikipedia

Puyi (1906–1967): The last emperor of the Qing dynasty.

Xi Jinping (born 1953): Current leader of the People's Republic of China, son of communist revolutionary Xi Zhongxun.

Connection: There is no blood, familial, or ancestral link between the two individuals.

Xi Jinping could potentially remain president of China for life, following the removal of term limits in 2018.

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First Name:

Susan DUNN

2995 N 1050 E

Last Name:

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City: North OGDEN

State: UT Zip Code: 84414

Kifa1@Comcast.net

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

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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.

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

Sirhan belonged to AMORC “Ancient Mystical Order of the Rose Cross”.

AMORC of the 1960’s in California was different than it is today. In the 1960’s they were big on hypnosis and used LSD and mescalin in their hypnosis sessions. They don't do that in modern times because those drugs are illegal. But in 1960s AMORC in California, the use of LSD and mind altering drugs was more common.

There is also a cross-over between Freemasons and AMORC. AMORC is open to everyone and you don't have to be a Freemason to join. But within Freemasons there is also an Order of the Rose Croix, which is the 18° of masons (Knights of the Rose Cross). So naturally some Rose Cross Masons also join AMORC, but don't assume that all AMORC members are Freemasons.

It is significant because Judge Earl Warren took the Freemason title “Wise Master of the Rose Croix” in 1938. That of course was decades before AMORC began using LSD in hypnosis, but it meant that Judge Warren's Freemason connections in California were Rosicrucians.

https://www.quora.com/Which-specific-Rosicrucian-organization-active-in-the-1960s-did-Sirhan-Sirhan-belong-to

China: The Healing Arts of the Middle Kingdom

Author

George Parulski

Magazines featuring this article

Rosicrucian Beacon - 2016-12

December 2016

https://amorc.org.uk/publications/articles/china-the-healing-arts-of-the-middle-kingdom

This US church with expansion in its DNA wants to open a temple in China

James Griffiths

By James Griffiths, CNN

16 min read

Updated 11:14 PM EDT, Thu June 11, 2020

A statue of the angel Moroni, a key character in Mormon theology, seen on top of the Hong Kong Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Kowloon, Hong Kong. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Hong Kong

CNN

—

Every Sunday, when members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) meet in the conference room of a blue-glass skyscraper in downtown Shanghai, one person always takes a seat right at the back, by the doors.

They are there to intercept the wrong person coming in. This is not to protect any religious mysteries; Mormonism is not a particularly secretive faith and usually seeks out new converts, but because if a Chinese passerby were to join the service, it could mean all those taking part were breaking the law.

There are only five state-sanctioned religious associations in China, all under the tight control of the Communist Party. Others walk a delicate legal tightrope, with the threat of a crackdown always hanging over their heads. While the government tolerates foreigners practicing their religion and attending services together, it takes a hard line against anything approaching proselytising or missionary work, a prohibition the Mormon Church takes seriously.

“We have to ask to see if they have a foreign passport to attend,” said Jason, a lifelong member of the Church who worked in Shanghai for almost a decade until relocating back to the United State in 2018. “I have frequently been this person watching the doors and on many occasions I have sadly had to turn away Chinese citizens who wished to worship with us.”

And that is during the good times. In recent years, the Chinese government has increased its regulation of religious worship, launched crackdowns against underground churches and instituted new restrictions on those faiths which operate in the grey area of only catering to foreigners.

So the Church’s announcement on April 5, that it plans to open a temple in Shanghai, the first ever in mainland China, was seen by some as a bold decision.

The Church claims it won’t change anything, but the idea that a US church with expansion in its DNA could open an official temple in China is likely to be controversial – and may not be allowed by Beijing. Already, authorities in Shanghai have suggested that the announcement was made without their prior approval, even as experts said the Church would likely never have revealed the plans without a clear go ahead.

In Salt Lake City, Utah, the spiritual headquarters of the US-based Church, Jason “could hardly believe” the news.

“I couldn’t have imagined that we would ever have a temple in Shanghai at this time,” he said. “Immediately, my WeChat started lighting up as we were all expressing joy and excitement with our China friends.”

Jason is a pseudonym. Like several other current members of the Church interviewed for this story, he requested anonymity to speak about its functioning in China without the permission of Church leadership.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints declined multiple requests for an interview for this story, referring CNN to a website about its operations in China and President Russell Nelson’s statement on April 5.

Members watch as Russell M. Nelson President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter -Day Saints, makes an announcement in January 2017. Nelson said this April that the Church will open a temple in Shanghai. George Frey/Getty Images North America/Getty Images

In the beginning

Founded in upstate New York by Joseph Smith in 1830, it took the Mormon Church some 117 years to grow from six initial members to its first million. Today, it claims more than 16.5 million members globally, with most outside the US.

While the true size of the church is debated (some say they include members who are no longer active) one thing is clear: the massive growth of the Church has been achieved through the work of thousands of missionaries.

Smith said he received a revelation in February 1831, in which God told his followers to “go forth in my name, every one of you” and “build up my church in every region.”

That is how the Church arrived in China over a century and a half ago.

Its start in the country, however, was less than auspicious. In 1853, its then-leader Brigham Young dispatched three missionaries to British-controlled Hong Kong, then a common staging ground for those seeking to spread the gospel in China.

When they arrived, however, they realized that China was in the midst of a bloody civil war, making travel outside of Hong Kong exceptionally dangerous. Their reception in the city was not much better, as the English-language press ran lurid articles about the Mormon faith and accused the faith of blasphemy. Their funds running out, they struggled even to find a Chinese teacher.

“Our staying here to learn the Chinese language without one friend or one possible recourse to us appears totally impractable (sic),” the missionaries wrote in a letter to church leaders as, less than two months after they had arrived in Asia, they boarded a ship bound for California, historian Stephen Prince recounts in his biography of one of the missionaries, Hosea Stout.

A sign outside the Hong Kong China Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Kowloon, Hong Kong. Wendy Keeler/Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

It was not until 1949 that the Church established a permanent presence in Hong Kong, with the intention again of using the city to get a foothold into China.

“Nearly one billion of our Father’s children live in China,” then-President Spencer Kimball said in 1978. “If we could only make a small beginning in every nation, soon the converts among each kindred and tongue could step forth as lights to their own people.”

Beginning in 1980, Church leadership began reaching out to the Chinese authorities to try to get permission to operate in the country, and in 1986, small church branches – meeting houses – were organized in Beijing and Xi’an, though only those holding foreign passports were permitted to attend. According to the Church, today there are around 10 meeting houses across mainland China. By comparison, there are around the same number in Hong Kong alone, and more than 50 meeting houses in self-governed Taiwan, where the Church claims around 61,000 members.

Despite this apparent lack of progress, Church leaders say they have built a strong relationship with the Chinese authorities, and in 2010 they announced moves to “regularize” their activities in the country.

“The Church deeply appreciates the courtesy of the Chinese leadership in opening up a way to better define how the Church and its members can proceed with daily activities, all in harmony with Chinese law,” spokesman Michael Otterson said at the time. “They have become thoroughly familiar with us through numerous contacts, and they have seen how we and our members operate in China. They know that we are people of our word when it comes to respecting Chinese law and cultural expectations.”

Currently, two types of Mormon worship are permitted in China: services for foreign nationals, and services for Chinese nationals who converted while overseas. The two are kept separate, and the Church is careful to avoid any sign of seeking to expand its Chinese membership within the country. Unlike with other countries in which it operates, however, the church does not provide membership figures for China.

Building trust

The Chinese Communist Party has always had an uneasy relationship with religion. The state is officially atheist, and the tens of millions of Party members are barred from holding religious beliefs.

Despite a constitutional commitment to religious freedom, only a handful of faiths are permitted to operate, each under umbrella organizations with strong links to the Communist Party.

Two are considered domestic faiths – Buddhism and Taoism – while the others are foreign religions, with varying historical pedigrees in the country, Islam, Protestantism and Catholicism, though Chinese Catholic organizations operate separately to Rome.

Other religions fall into a grey area: the State Council says it is “open” to foreign organizations – but only if they respect China’s sovereignty and principle of religious self-administration.

In practice, this means religious bodies’ first loyalty must be to the Communist Party, not a foreign Church leadership. This point has caused a long-standing rift with the Vatican since the establishment of the People’s Republic, and Chinese Catholics operate separately to the global church, though some progress has been made towards rapprochement in recent years.

Despite this, religious practice is on the rise. But alongside this growth in belief has come increased suspicion of “foreign” religions, particularly Islam and Christianity (though both have long-histories in China). Muslims in the far-western region of Xinjiang have had their religious practices strictly curtailed, while underground Christian churches, once broadly tolerated, have been cracked down upon.

Indeed, around the time Nelson was making the announcement of the new temple, International Christian Concern, a US-based advocacy group, said that believers holding Easter services online were raided by the authorities. Local police could not be reached for comment, the Early Rain Covenant Church which organized the service is considered an “underground,” or unlicensed, operation and has previously been ordered to cease activities, according to Human Rights Watch.

“The Chinese government is very suspicious of religion as a vehicle for potential political opposition,” said William Nee, a Hong Kong-based researcher for Amnesty International.

A statue of Brigham Young, second president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints stands in the center of Salt Lake City, Utah with the Mormon Temple spires in the background. GEORGE FREY/AFP/AFP via Getty Images

Pierre Vendassi, an expert on Christianity in China, said that the government “is mainly trying to take back the control over religious activities, and uses full force to do so, after a period of time when people could almost freely opt for unregistered, unmonitored religious activities, without facing any consequences, most of the time.”

“Now the message is clear: either accept state control, monitoring and restrictions, or face state hostility,” he said. “For the Christian activities, the purpose is to get house churches and Catholic underground church back under control.”

As far as non-official faiths go, the Mormon Church is perhaps the gold standard for such a group in China. Current and former members, as well as outside observers, agreed that the Church is scrupulous about following Chinese law and avoiding anything that could be seen as proselytization.

Nee contrasted this with “other forms of Protestant Christianity or evangelical traditions coming out of the US, who have a much more aggressive or underground strategy for spreading the faith.”

Sarah, a Mormon who worked as a university professor for several years in China, said she “did not tell people what church I belonged to or even if I belonged to a church.”

“Some friends would ask me if I was Christian. I would say yes (but) we do not talk about it in China,” she said. “They would nod and agree. That is as far as the conversation would go.”

Marcelo Gameiro, a Church member living in Shanghai, said that he does not talk about the church “because it is against the law.”

“But I don’t hide (that) I am a member of the church,” he added. “When I was in Huzhou, I used to go to the Hangzhou branch, it took me three hours to get there, and people started to notice I was going somewhere every Sunday dressed in a tie, so I did tell them where I was going with no problem, I just did not preach the gospel to anyone.”

Sarah said she would “occasionally see Christian religious groups that would come in and rather openly flout the rules of China.” Korean students would get scholarships in China and then try and convert their classmates.

“Several times I talked to them about it, I asked is this the right thing to do, are you making a good example,” she said. “I heard from Chinese people who got rather angry because people would come from other countries and give away Bibles and start conversations about religion, and they would say we are not allowed to talk about this in China.”

A screenshot of a dedicated website set up by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for members in China.

Playing the long game

John Wakefield, a now ex-Mormon who came to Hong Kong as a missionary in the 1980s and still lives in the city, said a big part of the Mormon religion is “we’re going to convert the whole world” and that it’s the fastest growing church in the world. “For them, numbers are really important,” he said.

Another former Mormon, Bryce Bushman, who lived in China for almost four years, where he worked as an urban planner and designer, said that: “Mormon doctrine states that the LDS Church will eventually cover the whole Earth.”

“It’s considered a prophecy, something that is definitely going to happen at some point in the future,” he said. “This gives both the church organization and the members of the church a kind of patient confidence that eventually every nation on earth will allow Mormon missionaries to proselyte and establish church congregations.”

Mormon doctrine also permits “baptisms for the dead,” allowing for the potential salvation of those already deceased, who can then “choose to accept or reject what has been done in their behalf.” This alleviates somewhat the need to spread the word of Jesus to people before they die, has been stated as a motivation for some evangelical missionaries to take great risks in the name of saving souls.

This patience allows the Church to play the long game in China, confident that one day it will be able to bring its message to the country’s vast population.

Josh Steimle, a practicing Mormon who lived in the Chinese city of Shenzhen for two years, said it “would have been so easy to pass along the URL to a Church website to someone who was curious, or give them a Book of Mormon, or a pamphlet about the Church.”

“It was very difficult because we’re a Church that believes in sharing what we believe, and we’re always being encouraged to be good missionaries, and then to move to China and be told to not say a word about what we believe seems to be contrary to everything we’ve been taught,” he added. “But it’s all about the long term vs. the short term. If we shared our beliefs in violation of Chinese law, a few people might join our Church and then the Church would be shut down and kicked out of the country.”

A woman decorates a grave during the Qing Ming festival, also known as Tomb Sweeping Day, at a cemetery in Shanghai on April 6, 2018. Traditional religious practice is growing in China, but the government tightly controls foreign faiths. JOHANNES EISELE/AFP/AFP via Getty Images

Temple doctrine

On paper, a temple should not be too much for the Chinese authorities to stomach.

In its description of the proposed temple in Shanghai, the Church is clear that this does not represent a climactic shift, nor will the Chinese temple be anything like the grand white stone buildings that dot many American cities.

“It would be modest in appearance. It would fit and be consistent with local custom and environment as a place of peace, tranquility, and dignity,” the Church said of the proposed temple, which it said is intended to serve as a replacement for the Hong Kong building, which is currently closed for “long-planned maintenance and renovation.”

It said that entry will be limited to Chinese members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints – those who have converted overseas and returned to China – adding that this “does not represent a change in the legal status” or the ability of missionaries to operate in China.

Unlike a regular church, Mormon temples are not open to non-members, and even those within the Church must be considered in good standing and receive a “recommend” from a Church official in order to enter.

While the Church appears to be downplaying the significance of a potential temple, all current and former members interviewed by CNN agreed that it would be a major achievement.

Steimle said that it was “difficult to express how big of a deal this is for me, personally, other members of the Church who have ties to China, and really to the entire Church membership worldwide. It’s going to be a very small temple, but it’s a huge thing for the Church.”

Temples are where the most important and sacred Mormon ceremonies are carried out, including baptisms and “celestial marriages.”

If established, the temple would not be the first active place of worship in Shanghai for an unofficial religion. In recent years, limited services have been held at the Ohel Rachel Synagogue, a historic building that predates the establishment of the Communist state. Most Jews in China however continue to practice behind closed doors, in arrangements similar to Mormon meeting houses.

Whether Mormons in China will be able to get nearer to that presence remains to be seen. In a statement issued two days after the Church’s announcement, the Shanghai Municipal Bureau of Ethnic and Religious Affairs said that “according to the relevant laws and regulations of China, foreigners are not allowed to set up religious organizations or venues for religious activities in China.”

The bureau denied any knowledge of plans for a temple in Shanghai, saying they were the “wishful thinking of the Mormon Church in the United States.”

When CNN asked the Church about the current status of the project, a spokesman would only provide a link to the Church’s website detailing plans for the temple and how it would operate. Church representatives would neither confirm nor deny the veracity of the original statement announcing the temple. However, since reporting on this story began, reference to the Shanghai temple has been removed from the Church’s website, though it is still available on an archived version of the page.

Vendassi, the expert on religion in China, said that despite this apparent denial by the authorities, a temple may still end up opening at some point in the near future.

“If an LDS temple has been announced in Shanghai, I think it means they probably had a ‘go’ from Chinese officials to do so,” Vendassi said. “Even if the government says it is a unilateral statement – they actually have no interest in making a bilateral statement, because that would send a message of religious openness.”

Nee, the Amnesty researcher, said that while there was no reason on paper for the Chinese authorities to object to a temple, he doubted whether officials “would be willing to understand the nuances of religions and their theologies” in order to permit such an institution.

As a uniquely American religion, Mormonism’s hopes in China may also be hurt by worsening relations between Washington and Beijing. In the same month the Shanghai temple was announced, Senator Mitt Romney said the coronavirus pandemic had exposed China’s “grand strategy for economic, military and geopolitical domination.”

Romney is by no means alone in criticizing Beijing, but as the country’s highest-ranking elected Mormon, his words may carry more weight with China’s leaders when they are considering the Church’s position there.

Over 20,000 members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square sing a song together at first session of the 189th Annual General conference of the church at the Conference Center on April 6, 2019 in Salt Lake City, Utah. George Frey/Getty Images North America/Getty Images

China change

If the Mormon Church does have to exercise more patience before they open a temple in mainland China, what are a few more years or decades after a century and a half?

Responding to a question of when China would be open to missionaries in 1991, Elder Dallin Oaks – a senior Church leader – said that “I state my belief that China is already ‘open’ – it is we who are closed … We must understand their way of thinking … observe their laws, and follow their example of patience.”

Quoting Mormon scripture, Oaks added that God “will bring His purposes to pass in that great nation ‘in his own time, and in his own way, and according to his own will’.”

Mormons who lived in China spoke of the country with great fondness, despite the restrictions placed on how they worshipped there. Both Jason and Sarah keep in contact with Chinese friends over WeChat, and hope to visit again in future.

Sarah saw many parallels between China and the Mormon people, pointing in particular to the importance of venerating ancestors in Chinese culture.

“My ancestors are special to me,” she said. “Many of them joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints while our first leader, Joseph Smith, was a prophet. Like the people of China who went on the (Long March), my people also traveled across a continent in search of their dream.”

Two of Jason’s four children were born while the family was living in Shanghai, and the kids went to local Chinese schools. Jason and his wife made a concerted effort to integrate into Chinese life more than many other expats around them, doing “many things that few foreigners experience in China.”

“We didn’t speak any Chinese when we came but we did when we left,” he said. This brought him closer both to locals and to other members of the foreign Mormon community who weren’t as comfortable operating in China.

“I can’t possibly begin to count the number of people we had over for dinners, the people we took shopping because everything the supermarket was unfamiliar, how many people we helped to simply get a Chinese phone number and register for WeChat, both for members of our Church and those who were not.”

Both were optimistic about the future of the Church in China, but emphasized the need for patience, a view shared by Steimle.

“Great progress usually doesn’t happen in a straight line,” he said. “Although there have been crackdowns on religion in China, perhaps the obedience of our members and the trust and friendship our Church leadership has built up over the years by working openly with the Chinese government will help open doors.”

This story has been updated to clarify which foreign students were allegedly seen proselytizing in China.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/06/asia/mormon-church-latter-day-saints-china-intl-hnk

Cox Report Overview

Arms Control Today

Back to Cox Report Main Page

Important Note: This declassified report summarizes many important findings and judgments contained in the Select Committee's classified Report, issued January 3, 1999. U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies within the Clinton administration have determined that other significant findings and judgments contained in the Select Committee's classified Report cannot be publicly disclosed without affecting national security or ongoing criminal investigations.

• The People's Republic of China (PRC) has stolen design information on the United States' most advanced thermonuclear weapons.

• The Select Committee judges that the PRC's next generation of thermonuclear weapons, currently under development, will exploit elements of stolen U.S. design information.

• PRC penetration of our national weapons laboratories spans at least the past several decades and almost certainly continues today.

A. The People's Republic of China (PRC) has stolen design information on the United States' most advanced thermonuclear weapons.

The People's Republic of China (PRC) has stolen classified design information on the United States' most advanced thermonuclear weapons. These thefts of nuclear secrets from our national weapons laboratories enabled the PRC to design, develop, and successfully test modern strategic nuclear weapons sooner than would otherwise have been possible. The stolen U.S. nuclear secrets give the PRC design information on thermonuclear weapons on a par with our own.

The PRC thefts from our National Laboratories began at least as early as the late 1970s, and significant secrets are known to have been stolen as recently as the mid-1990s. Such thefts almost certainly continue to the present.

• The stolen information includes classified information on seven U.S. thermonuclear warheads, including every currently deployed thermonuclear warhead in the U.S. ballistic missile arsenal.

• The stolen information also includes classified design information for an enhanced radiation weapon (commonly known as the "neutron bomb"), which neither the United States, nor any other nation, has yet deployed.

• The PRC has obtained classified information on the following U.S. thermonuclear warheads, as well as a number of associated reentry vehicles (the hardened shell that protects the thermonuclear warhead during reentry).

In addition, in the mid-1990s the PRC stole, possibly from a U.S. national weapons laboratory, classified thermonuclear weapons information that cannot be identified in this unclassified Report. Because this recent espionage case is currently under investigation and involves sensitive intelligence sources and methods, the Clinton administration has determined that further information cannot be made public without affecting national security or ongoing criminal investigations.

The W-88, a miniaturized, tapered warhead, is the most sophisticated nuclear weapon the United States has ever built. In the U.S. arsenal, it is mated to the D-5 submarine-launched ballistic missile carried aboard the Trident nuclear submarine. The United States learned about the theft of the W-88 Trident D-5 warhead information, as well as about the theft of information regarding several other nuclear weapons, in 1995.

The PRC has stolen U.S. design information and other classified information for neutron bomb warheads. The PRC stole classified U.S. information about the neutron bomb from a U.S. national weapons laboratory. The U.S. learned of the theft of this classified information on the neutron bomb in 1996.

In the late 1970s, the PRC stole design information on the U.S. W-70 warhead from the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory. The U.S. government first learned of this theft several months after it took place. The W-70 warhead contains elements that may be used either as a strategic thermonuclear weapon, or as an enhanced weapon ("neutron bomb"). The PRC tested the neutron bomb in 1988.

The Select Committee is aware of other PRC thefts of U.S. thermonuclear weapons-related secrets. The Clinton administration has determined that further information about PRC thefts of U.S. thermonuclear weapons-related secrets cannot be publicly disclosed without affecting national security.

The PRC acquired this and other classified U.S. nuclear weapons information as the result of a 20-year intelligence collection program to develop modern thermonuclear weapons, continuing to this very day, that includes espionage, review of unclassified publications, and extensive interactions with scientists from the Department of Energy's national weapons laboratories.

The Select Committee has found that the primary focus of this long-term, ongoing PRC intelligence collection effort has been on the following national weapons laboratories: Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore, OakRidge and Sandia.

The Select Committee judges that the PRC will exploit elements of the stolen design information on the PRC's next generation of thermonuclear weapons. The PRC plans to supplement its silo-based CSS-4 ICBMs targeted on U.S. cities with mobile ICBMs, which are more survivable because they are more difficult to find than silo-based missiles.

The PRC has three mobile ICBM programs currently underway—two road-mobile and one submarine-launched program—all of which will be able to strike the United States.

The first of these new People's Liberation Army (PLA) mobile ICBMs, the DF-31, may be tested in 1999, and could be deployed as soon as 2002. These mobile missiles require small warhead designs, of which the stolen U.S. design information is the most advanced in the world.

In addition, the PRC could choose to use elements of the stolen nuclear weapons design information—including the neutron bomb—on intermediate- and short-range ballistic missiles, such as its CSS-6 missiles.

The PRC has the infrastructure and technical ability to use elements of the stolen U.S. warhead design information in the PLA's next generation of thermonuclear weapons. The Select Committee concludes that the production tools and processes required by the PRC to produce small thermonuclear warheads based on the stolen U.S. design information, including the stolen W-88 information, would be similar to those developed or available in a modern aerospace or precision-guided munitions industry. The Select Committee judges that the PRC has such infrastructure and is capable of such production.

The Select Committee judges that the PRC is likely to continue its work on advanced thermonuclear weapons based on the stolen U.S. design information. The PRC could begin serial production of such weapons during the next decade in connection with the development of its next generation of intercontinental ballistic missiles.

A series of PRC nuclear weapons test explosions from 1992 to 1996 began a debate in the U.S. Government about whether the PRC's designs for its new generation of nuclear warheads were in fact based on stolen U.S. classified information. The apparent purpose of these PRC tests was to develop smaller, lighter thermonuclear warheads, with an increased yield-to-weight ratio.

The United States did not become fully aware of the magnitude of the counterintelligence problem at the Department of Energy national weapons laboratories until 1995. In 1995 the United States received a classified PRC document that demonstrated that the PRC had obtained U.S. design information on the W-88 warhead and technical information concerning approximately half a dozen other U.S. thermonuclear warheads and associated reentry vehicles.

The document was provided by a PRC national, unsolicited by the CIA—a "walk in." This individual approached the CIA outside the PRC, and turned over a number of documents. Among these was an official PRC document classified "Secret" by the PRC.

This PRC document included, among other matters, stolen U.S. design information on the W-88 thermonuclear warhead used on the Trident D-5 missile, as well as U.S. technical information on several other strategic U.S. nuclear warheads. The document recognized that the U.S. weapons represented the state-of-the-art against which PRC nuclear weapons should be measured.

By mid-1996 the CIA had determined that the individual who provided the information was secretly under the direction of the PRC intelligence services. The CIA and other U.S. intelligence community analysts have nevertheless concluded that the classified PRC document contained U.S. thermonuclear warhead design information and other technical information on U.S. nuclear weapons.

The stolen U.S. nuclear secrets give the PRC design information on thermonuclear weapons on a par with our own. Currently deployed PRC ICBMs targeted on U.S. cities are based on 1950s-era nuclear weapons designs. With the stolen U.S. technology, the PRC has leaped, in a handful of years, from 1950s-era strategic nuclear capabilities to the more modern thermonuclear weapons designs. These modern thermonuclear weapons took the United States decades of effort, hundreds of millions of dollars, and numerous nuclear tests to achieve.

Such small, modern warheads are necessary for all of the elements of a modern intercontinental nuclear force, including: road-mobile ICBMs, submarine-launched ICBMs and ICBMs with multiple warheads (MRVs or MIRVs).

The PRC has an ongoing program to use these modern thermonuclear warheads on its next generation of ICBMs, currently in development. Without the nuclear secrets stolen from the United States, it would have been virtually impossible for the PRC to fabricate and test successfully small nuclear warheads prior to its 1996 pledge to adhere to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.

B. The Select Committee judges that elements of the stolen information on U.S. thermonuclear warhead designs will assist the PRC in building its next generation of mobile ICBMs, which may be tested this year.

The stolen U.S. design information will assist the PRC in building smaller nuclear warheads—vital to the success of the PRC's ongoing efforts to develop survivable, mobile missiles. Current PRC ICBMs, which are silo-based, are more vulnerable to attack than mobile missiles.

The PRC has currently underway three intercontinental mobile missile programs—two road-mobile, and one submarine-launched. All of these missiles are capable of targeting the United States.

The first of these, the road-mobile solid-propellant DF-31, may be tested in 1999. Given a successful flight-test program, the DF-31 could be ready for deployment in 2002.

The Select Committee judges that the PRC will in fact use a small nuclear warhead on its new generation ICBMs. The small, mobile missiles that the PRC is developing require smaller warheads than the large, heavy, 1950s-era warheads developed for the PRC's silo-based missiles. The main purpose of a series of nuclear tests conducted by the PRC between 1992 and 1996 was evidently to develop new smaller, lighter warheads with an increased yield-to-weight ratio for use with the PRC's new, mobile nuclear forces.

The Select Committee judges that the PRC will exploit elements of the stolen U.S. thermonuclear weapons designs on its new ICBMs currently under development. The advanced U.S. thermonuclear warheads for which the PRC has stolen U.S. design information are significantly smaller than those for which the PRC's silo-based missiles were designed. The U.S. designs, unlike those in the PRC's currently-deployed arsenal, can be used on smaller mobile missiles.

The Select Committee judges that:

• The PRC is likely to continue to work on small thermonuclear warheads based on stolen U.S. design information;

• The PRC has the infrastructure and ability to produce such warheads, including warheads based on elements of the stolen U.S. W-88 Trident D5 design information;

• The PRC could begin serial production of small thermonuclear warheads during the next decade in conjunction with its new generation of road-mobile missiles;

• The introduction of small warheads into PLA service could coincide with the initial operational capability of the DF-31, which could be ready for deployment in 2002.

These small warhead designs will make it possible for the PRC to develop and deploy missiles with multiple reentry vehicles (MRVs or independently targetable MIRVs).

Multiple reentry vehicles increase the effectiveness of a ballistic missile force by multiplying the number of warheads a single missile can carry as many as ten-fold.

Multiple reentry vehicles also can help to counter missile defenses. For example, multiple reentry vehicles make it easier for the PRC to deploy penetration aids with its ICBM warheads in order to defeat anti-missile defenses.

The Select Committee is aware of reports that the PRC has in the past undertaken efforts related to technology with MIRV applications. Experts agree that the PRC now has the capability to develop and deploy silo-based intercontinental ballistic missiles with multiple reentry vehicles (MIRVs or MRVs).

Experts also agree that the PRC could have this capability for its new mobile intercontinental ballistic missiles within a reasonable period of years that is consistent with its plans to deploy these new mobile missiles. The PRC could pursue one or more penetration aids in connection with its new nuclear missiles.

If the PRC violates the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty by testing surreptitiously, it could further accelerate its nuclear development.

The Select Committee judges that, if the PRC were successful in stealing nuclear test codes, computer models, and data from the United States, it could further accelerate its nuclear development. By using such stolen codes and data in conjunction with High Performance Computers (HPCs) already acquired by the PRC, the PRC could diminish its need for further nuclear testing to evaluate weapons and propose design changes.

The possession of the stolen U.S. test data could greatly reduce the level of HPC performance required for such tasks. For these reasons, the Select Committee judges that the PRC has and will continue to aggressively target for theft our nuclear test codes, computer models, and data.

Although the United States has been the victim of systematic espionage successfully targeted against our most advanced nuclear weapons designs—and although the Select Committee judges that the PRC will exploit elements of those designs for its new generation of ICBMs—the United States retains an overwhelming qualitative and quantitative advantage in deployed strategic nuclear forces. Nonetheless, in a crisis in which the United States confronts the PRC's conventional and nuclear forces at the regional level, a modernized PRC strategic nuclear ballistic missile force would pose a credible direct threat against the United States.

Neither the United States nor the PRC has a national ballistic missile defense system.

In the near term, a PRC deployment of mobile thermonuclear weapons, or neutron bombs, based on stolen U.S. design information, could have a significant effect on the regional balance of power, particularly with respect to Taiwan. PRC deployments of advanced nuclear weapons based on stolen U.S. design information would pose greater risks to U.S. troops and interests in Asia and the Pacific.

In addition, the PRC's theft of information on our most modern nuclear weapons designs enables the PRC to deploy modern forces much sooner than would otherwise be possible.

At the beginning of the l990s, the PRC had only one or two silo-based ICBMs capable of attacking the United States. Since then, the PRC has deployed up to two dozen additional silo-based ICBMs capable of attacking the United States; has upgraded its silo-based missiles; and has continued development of three mobile ICBM systems and associated modern thermonuclear warheads.

If the PRC is successful in developing modern nuclear forces, as seems likely, and chooses to deploy them in sufficient numbers, then the long-term balance of nuclear forces with the United States could be adversely affected.

C. Despite repeated PRC thefts of the most sophisticated U.S. nuclear weapons technology, security at our national nuclear weapons laboratories does not meet even minimal standards.

The PRC stole design information on the United States' most advanced thermonuclear weapons as a result of a sustained espionage effort targeted at the United States' nuclear weapons facilities, including our national weapons laboratories. The successful penetration by the PRC of our nuclear weapons laboratories has taken place over the last several decades, and almost certainly continues to the present.

More specifically, the Select Committee has concluded that the successful penetration of our National Laboratories by the PRC began as early as the late 1970s; the PRC had penetrated the Laboratories throughout the 1980s and 1990s; and our Laboratories almost certainly remain penetrated by the PRC today.

Our national weapons laboratories are responsible for, among other things, the design of thermonuclear warheads for our ballistic missiles. The information at our national weapons laboratories about our thermonuclear warheads is supposed to be among our nation's most closely guarded secrets.

Counterintelligence programs at the national weapons laboratories today fail to meet even minimal standards. Repeated efforts since the early 1980s have failed to solve the counterintelligence deficiencies at the National Laboratories. While one of the Laboratories has adopted better counterintelligence practices than the others, all remain inadequate.

Even though the United States discovered in 1995 that the PRC had stolen design information on the W-88 Trident D-5 warhead and technical information on a number of other U.S. thermonuclear warheads, the White House has informed the Select Committee, in response to specific interrogatories propounded by the Committee, that the President was not briefed about the counterintelligence failures until early 1998.

Moreover, given the great significance of the PRC thefts, the Select Committee is concerned that the appropriate committees of the Congress were not adequately briefed on the extent of the PRC's espionage efforts.

A counterintelligence and security plan adopted by the Department of Energy in late 1998 in response to Presidential Decision Directive 61 is a step toward establishing sound counterintelligence practices. However, according to the head of these efforts, significant time will be required to implement improved security procedures pursuant to the directive. Security at the national weapons laboratories will not be satisfactory until at least sometime in the year 2000.Selected Overview Findings On Missile and Space Technology

The PRC has stolen or otherwise illegally obtained U.S. missile and space technology that improves the PRC's military and intelligence capabilities.

A. The PRC has stolen U.S. missile technology and exploited it for the PRC's own ballistic missile applications.

The PRC has proliferated such military technology to a number of other countries, including regimes hostile to the United States.

….

B. In the late 1990s, the PRC stole or illegally obtained U.S. developmental and research technology that, if taken to successful conclusion, could be used to attack U.S. satellites and submarines.

….

C. Currently deployed PRC ICBMs targeted on the United States are based in significant part on U.S. technologies illegally obtained by the PRC in the 1950s.

This illustrates the potential long-term effects of technology loss.

….

D. In the aftermath of three failed satellite launches since 1992, U.S. satellite manufacturers transferred missile design information and know-how to the PRC without obtaining the legally required licenses.

This information has improved the reliability of PRC rockets useful for civilian and military purposes.

The illegally transmitted information is useful for the design and improved reliability of future PRC ballistic missiles, as well.

….

E. In light of the PRC's aggressive espionage campaign against U.S. technology, it would be surprising if the PRC has not exploited security lapses that have occurred in connection with launches of U.S. satellites in the PRC.

….

F. Foreign brokers and underwriters of satellite and space launch insurance have obtained controlled U.S. space and missile-related technology outside of the system of export controls that applies to U.S. satellite manufacturers.

While existing laws address such exports, U.S. export control authorities may not be adequately enforcing these laws in the space insurance industry context, nor paying sufficient attention to these practices.

….

G. The Strom Thurmond National Defense Authorization Act took important steps to correct deficiencies in the administration of U.S. export controls on commercial space launches in the PRC.

But the aggressive implementation of this law is vital, and other problems with launches in the PRC that the Act does not address require immediate attention.

….

H. It is in the national security interest of the United States to increase U.S. domestic launch capacity.

….

Selected Overview Findings on Export Controls

United States and international export control policies and practices have facilitated the PRC's efforts to obtain militarily useful technology.

A. Recent changes in international and domestic export control regimes have reduced the ability to control transfers of militarily useful technology.

i. The dissolution of COCOM in 1994 left the United States without an effective, multilateral means to control exports of militarily useful goods and technology.

….

ii. The expiration of the Export Administration Act in 1994 has left export controls under different legislative authority that, among other things, carries lesser penalties for export violations than those that can be imposed under the Act.

….

iii. U.S. policy changes announced in 1995 that reduced the time available for national security agencies to consider export licenses need to be reexamined in light of the volume and complexity of licensing activities.

….

B. Dividing the licensing responsibilities for satellites between the Departments of Commerce and State permitted the loss of U.S. technology to the PRC.

The 1996 decision to give Commerce the lead role in satellite exporting was properly reversed by the Congress.

….

C. U.S. policies relying on corporate self-policing to prevent technology loss have not worked.

Corporate self-policing does not sufficiently account for the risks posed by inherent conflicts of interest, and the lack of priority placed on security in comparison to other corporate objectives.

….

D. The PRC requires high performance computers (HPCs) for the design, modeling, testing, and maintenance of advanced nuclear weapons based on the nuclear weapons design information stolen from the United States.

The United States relaxed restrictions on HPC sales in 1996; and the United States has no effective way to verify that HPC purchases reportedly made for commercial purposes are not diverted to military uses.

The Select Committee judges that the PRC has in fact used HPCs to perform nuclear weapons applications.

….

E. The PRC has attempted to obtain U.S. machine tools and jet engine technologies through fraud and diversions from commercial end uses.

In one 1991 case studied by the Select Committee, the Department of Commerce decontrolled jet engines without consulting either the Defense Department or the State Department.

i. In 1994 and 1995 the PRC attempted to divert an export of machine tools by McDonnell Douglas to military uses.

….

ii. In 1991 the Commerce Department decontrolled Garrett jet engines without consulting either the Defense Department or the State Department. This led to a PRC effort to acquire related jet engine production technology. The Commerce Department was prepared to approve this transfer, which was only thwarted when the Defense Department was alerted by the U.S. embassy in Beijing.

….

Selected Overview Findings On Chinese Technology Acquisition

• The PRC seeks advanced military technology to achieve its long-term goals.

• To acquire U.S. technology the PRC uses a variety of techniques, including espionage, controlled commercial entities, and a network of individuals and organizations that engage in a vast array of contacts with scientists, business people and academics.

….

A. The PRC has mounted a widespread effort to obtain U.S. military technologies by any means—legal or illegal.

These pervasive efforts pose a particularly significant threat to U.S. export control and counterintelligence efforts.

….

B. Efforts to deny the PRC access to U.S. military technology are complicated by the broad range of items in which the PRC is interested, and by transfers to the PRC of Russian military and dual-use technologies, which may make the consequences of the PRC's thefts of U.S. technology more severe.

….

C. The PRC uses commercial and political contacts to advance its efforts to obtain U.S. military, as well as commercial, technology.

….

D. The PRC has proliferated nuclear, missile, and space-related technologies to a number of countries.

https://www.armscontrol.org/act/1999-04/cox-report-overview

Case No. 25 PO 00002 3G

PO Rec No.: 323314

254400044

FILED

2025 JAN-7 PM 4:58 JUSTICE PEACE

IN THE JUSTICE COURT OF DAYTON TOWNSHIP

JOSHUA JAMES COX

Applicant,

VS.

BILLY DUNN

Adverse Party.

COUNTY OF LYON, STATE OF NEVADA

TEMPORARY PROTECTION ORDER AGAINST STALKING OR HARASSMENT

Expiration: This order was issued by the Court above on January 7, 2025 and will expire

on FEBRUARY 21, 2025 at 11:59 pm unless the Court orders otherwise. Hearing to Extend:

There will be a hearing to determine whether to extend this order on FEBRUARY 18, 2025 at 3:00 pm at the Court listed above.

If you do not attend, the court may rule against you.

The Applicant filed a verified application for a protective order. The Court has jurisdiction over this matter. See NRS 200.591, et seq. The Court finds that stalking, aggravated stalking and/or harassment has occurred. Accordingly, and good cause appearing, it is the ORDER of the Court that the following orders apply to the Adverse Party:

1. YOU ARE PROHIBITED from threatening, physically injuring, or harassing the

Applicant and/or the following persons:

Protected Parties: The following persons are protected under this order: Applicant: JOSHUA JAMES COX

2. YOU ARE ORDERED to not contact the protected parties at all in any way,

including but not limited to in person, by phone/text, by email, or through social

media.

3. YOU ARE ORDERED to stay away from Applicant's residence located at: 2024 LONNIE LANE, DAYTON, NV 89403

02020 Nevada Supreme Court

Temporary Protection Order Against Stalking or Harassment (Revised October 2020)

Page 1 of 3

How do you know the person you need protection from (check all that apply)?

We are related by blood or marriage. Explain We are or used to be friends/acquaintances.

We are

neighbors

or reside in the same

We are or were co-workers.

Other: (specify relationship):

in any court?

neighborhood.

Are there any other current or prior court cases that involve you and the Adverse Party

No.

Yes. If you know, please list the case type, county, state, and case number:

Firearms/Guns.

Does the Adverse Party own a gun or have a gun in his/her possession or control?

Yes

I don't know.

Most Recent Event. Think about the most recent event. These questions ask about the most recent event only.

Approximate date it happened:

City/State/Location where it happened:

Did the other person use or threaten to use a weapon? No Yes.

What Happened? Explain the most recent event and describe any injuries. Give specific and detailed information about the event. You can list past events on the next page. If you are filing on behalf of a child, include details about who happened to the child.

I WAS LEAVING CALIFORNIA ON JANUARY 2ND WHEN THE CFO

AT MY JAR MESSAGED ME AND

ASKED ME TO MEET HER IN HER OFFICE SOMETIME THAT WEEK. I INFORMED HER THAT I WAS OUT OF TOWN BUT WOULD BE THERE IN THE MORNING (JANUARY 3RD). I ASKED WHAT IT WAS ABOUT AND

02020 Nevada Supreme Court

Application for Protection Order

(Revised October 2020)

Page 3 of 8

SHE SAID THAT SOMEONE THAT SHE DIDN'T KNOW WAS TEXTING HER AND 14 OTHER PHONE NUMBERS. AND THEY SENT HER A VIDEO ALSO, BILLY DUNN who RESIDES AT 2031 LONNIE LANE WAS THE PERSON THE OWNERS SENDING THE TEXTY AND VIDEO, HE SENT THESE TO AND FAMRY MEMBERS THAT HE IS STALKING, HARASSING AND CYBER BULLYING ME AND OTHER PEOPLE ONLINE. HE MIGHT DO: IT IS ESCALATING AND I DON'T KNOW WHAT ELSE

EMPLOY ME.

Attach more pages if you need more room (pages 4a, 4b, 4c).

C2020 Nevada Supreme Court

Application for Protection Order (Revised October 2020)

Page 4 of 8

Past Event(s).

Think about any other times the person you want protection from threatened or abused you happened. and/or the child/children. The following questions ask about any past events that may have

Approximate Date:

What Happened:

JUNE 12TH 2024 I GOT HOME

FROM WORK AND MY NEIGHBOR APPROACHED WE AND ASKED IF I SAW A POST THAT BILLY SUNN HAD POSTED ON A TACEBOOK GROUP (RE DAYTON NEVADA JOB SEEKERS). I TOLD HIM NO I HAVEN'T SEEN IT AND ASKED TO SEE IT HE HAD AN A. I., APP ASE TO MAKE A STORY ABOUT ME COMMITTING SUICIDE. I HAVE REPORTED THE VIDEOS ONLINE, BUT I KNOW IT ISN'T ENDUGH AND MY FAMILY AND EMPLOYERS AFE WORRIED FOR ME AND WHAT HE MIGHT DO NEXT!

Approximate Date: What Happened:

10. Law enforcement involvement.

Was law enforcement informed?

Yes

a. If so, please provide a copy of the police incident report Was anyone arrested? No Yes (Who),

Is the Adverse Party in jail? A No

Yes

C2020 Nevada Supreme Court

Application for Protection Onder (Revised October 2020)

Page 5 of 8

Case No. 25 PO 00002 3G

If you want to dispute this order or have it changed, you can request a

hearing by filing a written request with this court. Court staff will give you information about how to file your request. The court will set a hearing on your request as quickly as

possible.

ORDER TO LAW ENFORCEMENT

Any law enforcement officer, with or without a warrant, may arrest and take into custody the Adverse Party, when the law enforcement officer has probable cause to believe that (a) an Order has been issued pursuant to NRS 33.270 against the Adverse Party; (b) the Adverse Party has been served with a copy of the Order; and (c) the Adverse Party is acting or has acted in violation of the Order. This arrest may occur regardless of whether the violation occurred in the officer's presence.

Any law enforcement agency in this state may enforce a Court Order issued pursuant to NRS 33.270 without regard to the county in which the Order is issued.

January 7, 2025

121

amil

CAMILLE VECCHIARELLI Justice of the Peace

(Revised October 2020)

Temporary Protection Order Against Stalking or Harassment

Page 3 of 3

About Extended Protection Orders: This application automatically asks the judge to issue up to a 45-day temporary protection order without notifying the other person first.

You can also ask for an extended order that could last for up to 2 years.

If you do, the judge will set a hearing. You and the other person will have to appear in court and explain your side before the judge can extend the protection order.

12.

Length of Protection Order.

I want an order up to 45 days only.

I want an order up to 45 days PLUS an extended order that could last up to 2

years.

13. Other Exhibits. You may attach documents, pictures, or anything else that you would like the judge to look at and consider when reviewing your application. The Adverse Party will receive a copy of all documents/evidence you provide.

Describe what you are attaching: Phoras OF TEXTS TO MY EMPLOYER AND PICTURES POSTED ON SOCIAL MEDIA OF ME ALONG WITH THE FICTITIOUS STORY HE HAD MADE AND POSTED. POLICE REPORT FILED ONLINE ALSO.

14. This document does not contain the personal information of any person as defined by NRS 603A.040.

I declare under penalty of perjury under the law of the State of Nevada that the foregoing is true and correct.

Dated MONDAY JAMY 6, 2025.

Submitted by:

Adh

Toster

(your signature)

Joshut J. Cox

(print your name)

VERIFICATION

I declare that I am the applicant in the above-entitled action; that I have read the foregoing application and know the contents thereof; that the pleading is true of my own knowledge, except for those matters therein contained stated upon information and belief, and that as to those matters, I believe them to be true. I declare under penalty of perjury under the law of the State of Nevada that the foregoing is true and correct.

Dated MONDAY ANUARY 6, 2025.

Submitted

by: Vacher

Page 8 of 8

(your signature)

Joshua J. Cox

(print your name)

Application for Protection Order (Revised October 2020)

Work. The Adverse Party should stay away from my workplace.

Do you and the Adverse Party work at the same place?

No Yes

Is your work address confidential? No Yes (do not write details below)

HODGES TRANSPORTATION INC.

Employer

605 FORT CHURCHILL RD.

Address

SILVER SPRINGS, NV 89429 2YON

City, State, Zip Code

County

Employer

Address

City, State, Zip Code

School/Daycare. The Adverse Party should stay away from my school and/or the child's school/daycare.

County

Is the school/daycare address confidential? No Yes (do not write details below)

School/Daycare

Address

City, State, Zip Code

County

School/Daycare

Address

City, State, Zip Code

Other Places. The Adverse Party should stay away from the following places that I and/or the minor children go to regularly.

Location

Why?

Address

Location

Why?

Address

County

City, State, Zip Code

County

City, State, Zip Code

County

Application for Protection Order (Revised October 2020)

Page 7 of 8

Panel: Dayton judge violated rules

Saturday, September 4, 2010

(AP) - A Nevada judicial panels says a Dayton judge violated campaign rules, but without intent.

In a ruling Friday, the Committee on Judicial Ethics and Election Practices said Justice of the Peace Camille Vecchiarelli improperly listed the address and telephone number of the Dayton Justice Court on her campaign blog.

During a hearing last month, she said the information was taken from a biography she had prepared for a judicial conference, and her daughter added it to her campaign blog.

She removed the information when it was brought to her attention on Aug. 18.

The ruling said there was no evidence Vecchiarelli gained an unfair advantage from the listing, and no sanctions were imposed.

A complaint was filed with the ethics panel by Jason Luis, who is running against the judge.

https://www.nevadaappeal.com/news/2010/sep/04/panel-dayton-judge-violated-rules/

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,*

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

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

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

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

Association HHORAGES-France, 66100 Perpignan, France

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.

2.1. Patient 1 (M.) (Table 1, First Column)

Table 1. Clinical features of our four patients with female gender variance, from childhood to adulthood.

Currently a writer and photographer, M. was born in 1961 after in utero exposure to DES given to their mother following a previous miscarriage. At birth, M. had male genitalia and unilateral cryptorchidism. At the age of 4 years, M. started to present gender dysphoria that became clear at the age of 9 years (Table 1, first column). During adolescence, M. expressed the conviction of being a woman. This period was also characterized by important school absenteeism and poor academic performance. In adult life, M. presented severe psychological disorders, particularly a severe self-mutilation episode (external genitalia) at the age of 43 years (2004), with a major, life-threatening hemorrhage. After seeing a psychiatrist, M. began the transition with male to female gender reassignment surgery in France, after the agreement of the French court of first instance. Since this operation, she has been receiving Gender-Affirming Hormone Therapy (GAHT) and she is regularly followed as part of GAHT management.

2.2. Patient 2 (S.) (Table 1, Second Column)

Currently a composer (guitar and vocals), S. was born in 1969 after in utero exposure to DES. At birth, S. had male genitalia with unilateral cryptorchidism. S. started to question the assigned male gender at the age of 4 years: “I remember very clearly that when I was 3–4 years old, one day I went with my mother to a hairdressing salon and having looked at all the ladies, I thought: ‘When I grow up this is what I will do: I will be a woman’”.

During adolescence, S. felt he was a woman and had severe psychological disorders, particularly depression and suicidal ideation (Table 1, second column). As an adult, S. married and had two children. These two girls had prolactinoma, and one has Asperger’s syndrome, androgyny and ovarian cysts. S. began the transition with male to female gender reassignment surgery, in Brighton, United Kingdom (UK), in November 2015. Since then, S. has been receiving GAHT and is followed by the doctor who managed the transition. According to the UK Gender Recognition Act, S. could change their sex recorded on their birth certificate (male to female) and now, she lives in Scotland. Her elder sister, also exposed to DES in utero after her mother’s miscarriage, died due to vaginal adenocarcinoma during adolescence.

2.3. Patient 3 (Chr.) (Table 1, Third Column)

Currently a ULM pilot teacher, Chr. was born in 1963 after in utero exposure to DES and slow-release progestin. At birth, Chr. had male genitalia without any genital malformation and spina bifida. Chr. reported gender dysphoria at the age of 7 years (see Table 1, third column). During adolescence, Chr. had psychological disorders and enuresis up to the age of 16 years. At the age of 22 years, Chr. married and had one son at the age of 23 years. From the age of 30 years, Chr. regularly dressed as a female and finally divorced after 20 years of married life. Chr. began the transition with male to female gender reassignment surgery performed in Thailand, in 2003, at the age of 40 years. Since this operation, she has been receiving GAHT. She lives in a couple with her former female partner and the French court of first instance of her department recognized her identity change on June 2006, at the age of 43 years.

2.4. Patient 4 (J.) (Table 1, Fourth Column)

J. was born in May 1953 in the USA (Kansas, Mid-West) after in utero exposure to DES. At birth, J. had normal male genitalia and no malformation. Gender dysphoria began at about 3–4 years of age. During childhood, J. always liked to wear his sister’s clothing, including panties, slips and dresses (Table 1, fourth column). J. had no girlfriend at the age of 16 years, and later, fantasized to be Annette Funicello, a very feminine movie star. During adolescence, J. always fantasized by looking at women’s apparel and dreamt of wearing all the items featured in catalogues, especially panties and lingerie, and often dressed as a woman. Once an adult, J. married, “But still society pushed me into marriage which is where I am now, taking cross-sex hormones to become a girl!”. Indeed, from 1997, J. has been taking estradiol to change sex, but did not undergo gender reassignment surgery.

3. Results

In this French national retrospective cohort of DES-treated women (i.e., DES mothers; n = 1200) and their families, 253 boys who were exposed in utero to DES (DES sons) and 148 pre-DES sons were identified. The flowchart showing the included and excluded patients is shown in Figure 1. Four of these DES sons identified themselves as transgender women (transgender prevalence =1.58%) versus zero among the pre-DES sons (0%). The prevalence difference was not significant (p-value = 0.30), probably because of the small sample size. The DES doses were documented for all 253 DES sons.

Jox 14 00010 g001

Figure 1. Included and excluded patients of the HHORAGES-France cohort in which four transgender M/Fs were identified. (HHORAGES-France data.) E2 is the synthetic hormone 17-α-estradiol that was often administered in a cocktail with DES and synthetic progesterone during pregnancy, but was banned for pregnant women in Europe in 1980.

In these four DES sons who identified themselves as transgender women, karyotyping did not reveal any abnormality. Major transgender components and behaviors were present already in early childhood and adolescence, as described in the previous section and summarized in Table 1.

4. Discussion

The number of patients seeking gender-specific healthcare has drastically increased (30–40-fold) in the last three decades [32]. In a recent European study, 0.7–1% of the general population reported incongruent gender identity [33]. However, several reports highlighted the important heterogeneity in the published estimates across studies. Moreover, the definition of transgender is often expanded to include broader manifestations of gender diversity. However, non-binary people should not be included in this wide definition. If we consider the highest prevalence of transgender women reported in the literature (1/17,000) [10], the prevalence we observed in our study (1.58%) is 10- to 100-fold higher. Moreover, the prevalence of female transgender identity was 0% among the 148 elder non-exposed sons (AMAB) in the same informative families.

It is generally accepted that fetal androgens play a crucial role in male brain differentiation by directly activating neuronal regions to provide organizational changes. In male individuals, gender identity, gender behavior and sex orientation are driven by prenatal androgen action [34]. Basic gender identity is developed at the age of 2–3 years [35]. By this age, most children have become aware of gender stereotypes, for instance, through toy preference and clothing. It is interesting to note that in our four patients, most diagnostic signs of transgenderism were present early in life and persisted during adolescence and adult life. In addition, mental health disorders, particularly depression, anxiety and suicidal ideation, have frequently been reported by DES children [27,36] and also by our four patients, starting from early adolescence and then in adulthood. Moreover, in many countries, transgender people live at the margin of society, and despite a higher educational level, they have a lower socio-economic status.

Although research in the transgender field is increasing, the causal mechanisms have not been adequately identified yet [13,37]. Genetic [38,39], biological [1,4], anatomical [40,41] and environmental factors [42,43] have mainly been studied. A greater chance of transgender concordance among XY monozygotic tweens than dizygotic tweens [44] supports a genetic component. A significant association between female transgenderism and over-represented alleles and genotypes (estrogen receptor α, ERα; androgen receptor, AR; Steroid 5 Alpha-Reductase 2, SRD5A2; cytochrome 17, CYP17) has been identified by Foreman et al. [38]. These authors suggested that gender dysphoria may have a polygenetic basis that may alter the masculinization of the fetal brain, contributing to the development of a female transgender identity. Moreover, the second-to-fourth digit length ratio (2D:4D), a proxy of prenatal androgen activity, was recently found to be higher, i.e., feminized, in female transgender persons. This finding reinforces the role of reduced prenatal androgen activity in female transgenderism. Unfortunately, we could not scan the left hand of our patients [45]. The primacy of testosterone [19] activity during fetal life is a critical driver of brain androgenization and the subsequent male sex identity and behavior [39,40].

In many animal studies, EDC exposure during development has been associated with changes in sex behavior, such as disruption of the normal social preference behavior (rats) and alteration of the differentiation of relevant sexually dimorphic pathways (mouse, Japanese quail) [42,43]. The most convincing evidence linking testosterone to the establishment of the male gender identity comes from individuals with DSDs, such as XY complete androgen insensitivity syndrome [45], XY 5 alpha reductase deficiency [46] and XX congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) [47]. For example, individuals with 5 alpha reductase deficiency are usually reared as girls on the basis of their female external genitalia [47]. They change the initial gender assignment during puberty, when testosterone concentration increase can organize the brain structures and influence the adolescent gender identity and behavior. XX fetuses with CAH and exposed to a high testosterone level during prenatal life present a high risk of gender incongruence. The transgender prevalence among individuals with DSDs is much higher than in the general population, although there are substantial differences among DSD etiologies. In a European collaborative work from the DSD Life Study, 4% of the 1040 participants with DSDs reported gender variance [48]. In our four patients, no DSD was diagnosed at birth. Patients 1 and 2 presented unilateral cryptorchidism, which cannot be considered a clinical expression of a DSD on its own, but is a minor effect of in utero exposure to DES. The XY DSD related to insufficient or deficient androgen production or activity during fetal life contributes to the low male sex differentiation of the brain [34]. This will lead to disorders of male gender identity, male behavior and male sexual orientation. Therefore, fetal exposure to any chemicals that can reduce androgen production or action should be considered a transgender risk factor [17]. In 1991, Renish et al. reported that male patients exposed in utero to DES appeared to be feminized [49].

In 2005 and 2020, Kerlin et al. conducted a 5-year qualitative study of DES sons via the Association DES-Sons USA and analyzed a sample of 500 men with confirmed DES exposure. In total, 90 individuals with verified DES exposure identified as transsexual, transgender or gender dysphoric (personal data). In addition, 65 individuals with strongly suspected but not confirmed DES exposure also defined themselves as “transsexual, transgender or gender dysphoric”. Kerlin et al. carried out extensive surveys and interviews with several of them for more than 15 years that enabled a stronger verification of the full scope of DES-related effects (personal data).

Based on a study by Tournaire et al. [21,31], the DES doses administered in France (4050 mg < D < 7300 mg) were lower than those administered in the United States (7550 mg < D < 12,742 mg; doses varied in the different states). These authors investigated DES’s role in clear cell carcinoma development in DES daughters in France and proposed that early fetal exposure (administration beginning during the first trimester of pregnancy which represents most cases) is more important than the dose. We think that this hypothesis is valid also for our DES sons.

Conversely, Titus et al. [50] evaluated a cohort of 2694 DES sons and found little support to the hypothesis that prenatal exposure to DES influences the psychosexual characteristics of adult men. Troisi et al. [51], in a group of 1848 DES sons, reported an odds ratio of 1.4 of having a gay identity or bisexual identity (five of these individuals were transgender women). Similarly, our finding of four transgender women among 253 XY patients who were exposed to DES in utero (1.58%), a much higher rate than in the general population and probably underestimated because no epidemiological investigation has been carried out on this topic, strongly suggests that DES plays a role in male to female transgender development. DES displays antiandrogenic activity in all assays used [52]. Northern blotting and RT-PCR showed a significant downregulation of androgen responsive genes upon exposure to DES [53]. As a xenoestrogen, DES can also stimulate production of sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG), the major androgen-binding protein in serum that reduces androgen’s ability to enter into the cell [54]. By reducing androgen production, bioactivity and action in target cells, DES must be considered an anti-androgen substance that can alter male sex differentiation of the brain and/or sex differentiation of the internal/external genitalia.

Differences in sex behavior may have correspondence in the brain architecture. Several studies reported an association between brain structure [15,55,56,57] and gender identity. Zhou et al. [58] first showed by brain imaging that the bed nucleus striae terminalis volume differs in men and women, and this is similar in transgender women and women. Garçia-Falgueras et al. [59], using brain imaging, found that the interstitial nucleus of the anterior hypothalamus volume is different between males and females and that its volume in transgender women is within the female range. Luders et al. reported regional gray matter variations in male-to-female transsexualism [55]. Lastly, Mueller et al. analyzed magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data from transgender men and women and cisgender men and women. Based on their findings, they suggested that transgender persons present a specific brain phenotype [56]. Unfortunately, no MRI data were available for our four patients.

In conclusion, the presented clinical data from our DES cohort, experimental works and the endocrine consequences of environmental disruptors suggest for the first time that male to female transgenderism in DES sons is associated with DES exposure and is not a coincidental finding.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, L.G., M.-O.S.-G. and C.S.; methodology, M.-O.S.-G. and C.S.; validation, F.P. and S.K.; formal analysis, C.S.; investigation, M.-O.S.-G. and C.S.; resources, M.-O.S.-G.; data curation, C.S.; writing—original draft preparation, writing—review and editing, M.-O.S.-G. and C.S.; visualization, F.P. and S.K.; supervision, C.S.; project administration, M.-O.S.-G.; funding acquisition, M.-O.S.-G. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Funding

The APC was funded by HHORAGES Association.

Institutional Review Board Statement

The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, and approved by the Institutional Ethics Committee of CHU Montpellier Pole 0078 Femme Mère Enfant protocol code 202301531/9-11-2023.

Informed Consent Statement

Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in the study.

Data Availability Statement

Data are contained within the article.

Acknowledgments

The authors warmly acknowledge M. D, S. F., Chr. P., and J. R. for their participation in answering questionnaires and interviews and analyses. This work could not continue without the daily ongoing support of the HHORAGES-France families and board, especially Mauricette P. (HHORAGES-France, a patient association, is registered at the Epidemiological Portal of French Health Databases INSERM (French National Institute for Medical Research) and AVIESAN (National Alliance for Life Sciences and Health) (epidemiologiefrance.aviesan.fr)), Yette B. and Aimée I. The authors also thank Elisabetta Andermarcher for corrections and relevant suggestions for the manuscript.

Conflicts of Interest

M-OS-G is a researcher and President of the HHORAGES-France Association and a mother concerned with DES and other synthetic hormones. The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. HHORAGES-France Association is financed exclusively by subscriptions and donations.

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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

"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 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

The Knights Templar

From A Brief Historical Description by Professor Sir John Baker QC LLD FBA

Master of the Bench

The history of the Temple begins soon after the middle of the twelfth century, when a contingent of knights of the Military Order of the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem moved from the Old Temple in Holborn (later Southampton House) to a larger site between Fleet Street and the banks of the River Thames. The new site originally included much of what is now Lincoln’s Inn, and the knights were probably responsible for establishing New Street (later Chancery Lane), which led from Holborn down to their new quarters. Following their custom, the knights built a round church patterned on the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. An inscription on the Round recorded that it was consecrated by the Patriarch Heraclius on 10 February 1185, in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary. It is thought that King Henry II was also present on that day, inaugurating a long association between the royal family and the Temple.

Among the other buildings erected by the knights were dormitories, storehouses, stables, chambers, and two dining halls, one of them in the consecrated central portion and connected with the church by a cloister. It was a house fit for kings to stay in, and several did so. During a visit by King John in January 1215 he received a deputation of barons demanding a charter of liberties; and when the Great Charter was signed later in the year, the Master of the Temple was one of the witnesses. The knights took advantage of their special privileges to make their sanctuary a safe place for depositing treasure, and during the thirteenth century the New Temple became a busy financial centre. It was no doubt during this period that the first handful of lawyers came to live in the Temple, not as distinct societies but as legal advisers to a wealthy international organisation. The Templars thrived, adding to their round church a fine nave, which was consecrated in the presence of King Henry III in 1240. Many knights associated with the order were buried in the church, the most distinguished being William Marshal (d. 1219), first Earl of Pembroke and regent of England, the very model of medieval English chivalry, and one of the instigators of Magna Carta. Marshal’s armoured effigy, battered by time and war, may still be seen in the Round.

After losing the Holy Land in the 1290s, the order of the Temple fell into a decline. The knights were dubiously accused of improprieties, and in 1312 their order was dissolved. Although the pope granted their estates to the Knights Hospitaller of St John of Jerusalem, King Edward II seized the New Temple as forfeit to the Crown. Nevertheless, the consecrated portion was conceded to the Hospitallers, and the remainder was sold to them later.

https://www.innertemple.org.uk/who-we-are/history/the-inner-temple-history/the-knights-templar/

What was the Court of the Gentiles in the Jewish temple?

Answer

Herod’s temple, destroyed along with the rest of Jerusalem by the Romans in AD 70, contained four separate “courts,” separated from one another and each designed for a different purpose: the Court of the Gentiles, the Court of the Women, the Court of Israel (or the Court of Men), and the Court of Priests. The Court of the Gentiles is referred to as “the outer court” in Revelation 11:2.

The Court of the Gentiles was the outermost courtyard and the only area of the temple where non-Jews were allowed. As its name implies, the Court of the Gentiles was accessible to Gentiles, foreigners, and those who were considered impure. There, worshippers could mill about, exchange money, and even buy animals for sacrifices. It was from the Court of the Gentiles that Jesus, on two occasions (John 2:13–17; Matthew 21:12–13), drove out the money changers, declaring, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you make it a den of robbers” (Matthew 21:13). The Court of the Women, the only area of the temple complex in which women could worship, contained the poor boxes. One of these boxes was where the poor widow offered her two mites (Luke 21:1–4). Ceremonially clean Jewish men could enter the Court of Israel, and the Court of Priests, where the altar stood, was accessible only to Levitical priests.

Non-Jews were allowed to enter the Court of the Gentiles, but they were forbidden to go any farther than the outer court. The inner temple courtyards were enclosed by a balustrade, and at the entrances to it notices were posted in both Greek and Latin, warning foreigners and uncircumcised persons that crossing into one of the other courtyards was punishable by death. One of those ancient notices is now on display in a museum in Istanbul. On Paul’s last visit to Jerusalem, some Jews stirred up a crowd and grabbed Paul in the temple, alleging that he had taken Trophimus, a Gentile, into one of the forbidden courtyards (Acts 21:27–29). Paul was innocent of the charge, but the mob beat him with the intent to kill him; it was the quick action of a Roman garrison commander that preserved Paul’s life on that occasion (verses 30–34).

https://www.gotquestions.org/Court-of-the-Gentiles.html

Acts 21

1599 Geneva Bible

21 1 Paul goeth toward Jerusalem: 8 at Caesarea he talketh with Philip the Evangelist: 10 Agabus foretelleth him of his bonds. 17 After he came to Jerusalem, 26 and into the Temple, 27 The Jews laid hands on him: 32 Lysias the captain taketh him from them.

1 And [a]as we launched forth, and were departed from them, we came with a straight course unto Cos, and the day following unto the Rhodes, and from thence unto Patara.

2 And we found a ship that went over unto Phoenicia, and went aboard, and set forth.

3 And when we had discovered Cyprus, we left it on the left hand, and sailed toward Syria, and arrived at Tyre: for there the ship unladed the burden.

4 And when we had found disciples, we tarried there seven days. And they told Paul through the [b]Spirit, that he should not go up to Jerusalem.

5 But when the days were ended, we departed and went our way, and they all accompanied us with their wives and children, even out of the city: and we kneeled down on the shore, prayed.

6 Then when we had embraced one another, we took ship, and they returned home.

7 And when we had ended the course from Tyre, we arrived at Ptolemais, and saluted the brethren, and abode with them one day.

8 And the next day, Paul and we that were with him, departed, and came unto Caesarea: and we entered into the house of Philip the Evangelist, which was one of the [c]seven Deacons, and abode with him.

9 Now he had four daughters, virgins, which did [d]prophesy.

10 And as we tarried there many days, there came a certain Prophet from Judea, named Agabus.

11 And when he was come unto us, he took Paul’s girdle, and bound his own hands and feet, and said, Thus saith the holy Ghost, So shall the Jews at Jerusalem bind the man that owneth this girdle, and shall deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.

12 And when we had heard these things, both we and others of the same place besought him that he would not go up to Jerusalem.

13 Then Paul answered, and said, What do ye weeping and breaking mine heart? For I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die at Jerusalem for the Name of the Lord Jesus.

14 [e]So when he would not be persuaded, we ceased, saying, The will of the Lord be done.

15 And after those days we trussed up our fardels, and went up to Jerusalem.

16 There went with us also certain of the disciples of Caesarea, and brought with them one Mnason of Cyprus, an old disciple, with whom we should lodge.

17 And when we were come to Jerusalem, the brethren received us gladly.

18 And the next day Paul went in with us unto James: and all the Elders were there assembled.

19 [f]And when he had embraced them, he told by order all things, that God had wrought among the Gentiles by his ministration.

20 [g]So when they heard it, they glorified God, and said unto him, Thou seest, brother, how many thousand Jews there are which believe, and they are all zealous of the Law:

21 Now they are informed of thee, that thou teachest all the Jews, which are among the Gentiles, to forsake Moses, and sayest that they ought not to circumcise their sons, neither to live after the customs.

22 What is then to be done? the multitude must needs come together: for they shall hear that thou art come.

23 Do therefore this that we say to thee. We have four men, which have made a vow,

24 Them take, and [h]purify thyself with them, and [i]contribute with them, that they may shave their heads: and all shall know, that those things, whereof they have been informed concerning thee, are nothing, but that thou thyself also walkest and keepest the Law.

25 For as touching the Gentiles, which believe, we have written, and determined that they observe no such thing, but that they keep themselves from things offered to idols, and from blood, and from that that is strangled, and from fornication.

26 Then Paul took the men, and the next day was purified with them, and entered into the Temple, [j]declaring the accomplishment of the days of the purification, until that an offering should be offered for everyone of them.

27 [k]And when the seven days were almost ended, the Jews which were of Asia (when they saw him in the Temple) moved all the people, and laid hands on him,

28 Crying, Men of Israel, help: this is the man that teachest all men everywhere against the people, and the Law, and this place: moreover, he hath brought Grecians into the Temple, and hath polluted this holy place.

29 For they had seen before Trophimus an Ephesian with him in the city, whom they supposed that Paul had brought into the Temple.

30 Then all the city was moved, and the people ran together: and they took Paul, and drew him out of the Temple, and forthwith the doors were shut.

31 [l]But as they went about to kill him, tidings came unto the chief captain of the band, that all Jerusalem was on an uproar.

32 Who immediately took soldiers and Centurions, and ran down unto them: and when they saw the chief captain and the soldiers, they left beating of Paul.

33 Then the chief Captain came near and took him, and commanded him to be bound with two chains, and demanded who he was, and what he had done.

34 And one cried this, another that, among the people. So when he could not know the certainty for the tumult, he commanded him to be led into the castle.

35 And when he came unto the grieces, it was so that he was borne of the soldiers, for the violence of the people.

36 For the multitude of the people followed after, crying, Away with him.

37 And as Paul should have been led into the castle, he said unto the chief captain, May I speak unto thee? Who said, Canst thou speak Greek?

38 Art not thou the [m]Egyptian who before these days raised a sedition, and led out into the wilderness four thousand men that were murderers?

39 Then Paul said, Doubtless, I am a man which am a Jew, and citizen of Tarsus, a famous city of Cilicia, and I beseech thee, suffer me to speak unto the people.

40 And when he had given him license, Paul stood on the grieces, and beckoned with the hand unto the people, and when there was made great silence, he spake unto them in the Hebrew tongue, saying,

Footnotes

Acts 21:1 Not only men simply, but even our friends, and such as are endued with the Spirit of God, do sometimes go about to hinder the course of our vocation: but it is our part to go forward without all stopping or staggering, after that we are sure of our calling from God.

Acts 21:4 They foretold through the Spirit what danger hanged over Paul’s head, and this they did as Prophets: but of a fleshly affection they frayed him from going to Jerusalem.

Acts 21:8 He speaketh of the seven Deacons which he mentioned before, Acts 6.

Acts 21:9 They had a peculiar gift of foretelling things to come.

Acts 21:14 The will of God bridleth all affections in them which earnestly seek the glory of God.

Acts 21:19 God is to be praised, who is the Author of all good sayings and deeds.

Acts 21:20 In things indifferent (of which sort were not the traditions of the Pharisees, but the ceremonies of the Law, until such time as Christian liberty was more fully revealed to the Jews) charity willeth us to conform or apply ourselves willingly so far as we may, to our brethren which do not stubbornly, and maliciously, resist the truth, but are not thoroughly instructed especially if the question be of a whole multitude.

Acts 21:24 That is, consecrate thyself: for he speaketh not here of the unclean, but of such as were subject to the vow of the Nazarites.

Acts 21:24 That it may be known, that thou wast not only present at the vow, but also a chief man in it: and therefore it is said afterwards, that Paul declared the days of purification: for although the charges for the Nazarites’ offerings were appointed, yet they might add somewhat unto them, Num. 6:21.

Acts 21:26 The Priests were to be advertised of the accomplishment of the days of the purification, because there were sacrifices to be offered the same day that their vow was ended.

Acts 21:27 A preposterous zeal is the cause of great confusion, and great mischiefs.

Acts 21:31 God findeth some even amongst the wicked and profane themselves, to hinder the endeavors of the rest.

Acts 21:38 Touching this Egyptian which assembled thirty thousand men, read Josephus, book 2, chap. 12.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Acts%2021&version=GNV

Monumento a Camillo Benso Conte di Cavour

Photographed by James Hulse, March 3, 2024

1. Monumento a Camillo Benso Conte di Cavour / Monument to Camillo Benso Count of Cavour Marker

Inscription. Click to hear the inscription.

The monument in honour of Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour (1810-1861), the work of the Ferrara sculptor Stefano Galletti, was created following a public competition in 1885 and inaugurated in 1895, on the occasion of the celebrations of the 25th anniversary of Rome as the capital of Rome.

The work, about 17 meters high, consists of a granite base, surmounted by a high pedestal in Bardiglio marble, on which is placed the bronze statue of the great Piedmontese statesman, facing the Palace of Justice built by Guglielmo Calderini in 1882-1911. On the base of the pedestal rest four groups of bronze sculptures that allude to the Unification of Italy. To the south, at Cavour's feet, Italy and Rome, represented as warrior women: the first is standing, with the crown and the Savoy cross and a hand resting on the bundle of rods; the second is seated, with the Savoy shield and the helmet on her head. To the west and east are Thought and Action, both depicted as naked young men: the first half-reclining, with his head covered and his head bent; the second in the act of rising up with sword in hand. To the north, the Force, represented Paid Advertisement

from the lion that guards the urn of the plebiscite. Further down is the dedicatory inscription, the date and two bas-reliefs: behind the Action weapons of the House of Savoy from various eras, behind the Thought symbols of science, technology, geographical discoveries and political-philosophical thought, which want to signify Italian excellence and the foundation of Unity.

Great importance was given to the ceremony of laying the first stone in which the royals of Italy participated.

This is how "Il Messaggero" of Sunday, September 22, 1895 describes the event: "On March 14, 1885, in the presence of King Umberto, Queen Margherita, and many authorities, with a mischievous north wind, in a square in the Prati di Castello the policemen lowered the first stone of the monument to Camillo Benso Count of Cavour to the bottom of a hole.

Together with the block of marble that bore the date of the ceremony carved, a parchment and several coins and medals of the present era were lowered into the hole; the king and queen threw a few splatters of lime on it with a silver spoon, the municipal concert played the anthem.

When the notary Luci had finished reading the minutes, Duke Torlonia begged the king to sign it: King Umberto took one of the pens that were on the table located in the middle of the stage, and signed; then he passed the pen to the queen, who signed it too."

The

The view of the Marker in front of the Supreme Court building image. Click for full size.

Photographed by James Hulse, March 3, 2024

2. The view of the Marker in front of the Supreme Court building

Discovery of the First Stone

During the excavations for the construction of the underground car park in Piazza Cavour, in addition to archaeological finds from the Roman, early medieval and Renaissance periods, the foundation stone of the monument was found: a block of travertine (80x80x30 cm) placed about 10 m deep, on the vertical of the statue, inside the imposing foundation nut.

In a rectangular compartment carved into the upper side of the stone was kept the sealed lead tube containing a parchment, two silver coins and one gold coin. The parchment reported the history of the construction of the monument and the description of the ceremony of laying the foundation stone. The tube was opened during a public ceremony on 18 October 2010, in the presence of the Mayor of Rome Giovanni Alemanno, the Secretary General Liborio Iudicello, the Councillor for Cultural Policies and Communication Umberto Croppi and the Superintendent of Cultural Heritage Umberto Broccoli.

Captions

(Photo #1) Inauguration of the monument to Cavour, 20 September 1895. (Museum of Rome, Photographic Archive)

(Photo #2) Piazza Cavour in about

1930 (Photo #3) Inauguration of the monument to Cavour, September 20, 1895. In the background buildings of the square under construction (Museum of Rome, Photographic Archive)

(Photo

The Monument to Camillo Benso Count of Cavour image. Click for full size.

Photographed by James Hulse, March 3, 2024

3. The Monument to Camillo Benso Count of Cavour

#4) Foundation stone of the monument to Cavour found in 2010

(Photo #5) Foundation stone with lead pipe containing parchment and coins (October 2010)

English:

The monument in honour of Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour (1810-1861), work of the sculptor Stefano Galletti of Ferrara, was chosen by public competition in 1885 and inaugurated in 1895 to mark the 25 anniversary of Rome as capital of a United Italy.

The work, which stands 17 meters tall, is composed of a granite base topped with a high pedestal in bardiglio marble upon which a bronze statue of the Piemontese statesman stands facing the Palace of Justice, designed and built by Guglielmo Calderini from 1882-1911.

Resting against the base are four groups of sculptures in bronze that refer to the unification of Italy. On the south face, at Cavour's feet, Italy and Rome are represented as female warriors, the first standing holding a wreath and cross of the House of Savoy with one hand resting on a bundle of rods, the second seated holding a shield of the House of Savoy and wearing a helmet. The east and west faces are Thought and Action both depicted as nude youth, the first semireclining with covered face and downcast head, the other in the act of rising with sword in hand. On the north side is Force represented by a lion that

Camillo Benso Count of Cavour - 1st Prime Minister of Italy image. Click for full size.

Public Domain - Artist Antonio Ciseri - Wikipedia Commons, 1861

4. Camillo Benso Count of Cavour - 1st Prime Minister of Italy

Inscription on the back of the canvas: Ant. Ciseri painted it in Florence from a photograph, towards the end of 1861

guards a ballot box. Beneath is the dedicatory inscription, the date and two bas-reliefs. The relief behind Action shows weapons of the House of Savoy from various periods, while behind Thought are symbols of the sciences, technology, geographical discoveries, and political and philosophical thought which allude to Italian excellence and the fundamental importance of unity.

Great importance was given to the ceremony of the placing of the first stone, attended by the Italian royalty. In its Sunday edition of September 22, 1895, the Roman newspaper "Il Messaggero" described the event with these words:

"On March 14th, 1885 in piazza dei Prati di Castello, under a brisk north wind, King Umberto, Queen Margherita and many high officials presided over the lowering into place of the first foundation stone of a monument to Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour.

Together with the block of marble bearing the date of the ceremony, members of the city police force also lowered into the pit a parchment, and some coins and medals of the time. The King and Queen sprinkled the objects with lime from a silver spoon while the city band an anthem.

The notary, Mr. Luci read a record of the proceedings which the Duke Torlonia asked the King to sign. King Umberto took a pen from the table in the middle of the platform and signed the document before passing the Paid Advertisement

pen to the Queen who also signed it."

The discovery of the foundation stone

During excavations for the construction of an underground car park in Piazza Cavour, in addition to the uncovering of archaeological finds from ancient Rome, the high Middle Ages and the Renaissance, the foundation stone of the monument was discovered. A block of travertine marble (80x80x30 cm), it lay at a depth of 10 meters beneath the statue, within the area of the monument's imposing base. In a rectangular space ace carved in to the top side of the block was a sealed lead tube which contained a parchment, one gold and two silver coins. The parchment reported the story of the monuments design and construction and the ceremony of the placing of the first stone. The tube was opened during a public ceremony on October 18, 2010 in the presence of the Mayor Giovanni Alemanno, the Secretary General Liborio Ludicello, the city Counsellor for Culture and Communication Umberto Croppi and the Superintendent of Monuments and Cultural Properties Umberto Broccoli.

Captions

Photo #1: Inauguration of the Monument to Cavour, September 20, 1895. (Museum of Rome, Photographic Archive)

Photo #2: Piazza Cavour around 1930

Photo #3: Inauguration of the Monument to Cavour, September 20, 1895. In the background, buildings of the square under construction. (Museum of Rome, Photographic Archive)

Photo #4: Foundation stone of the Monument to Cavour found in 2010

Photo #5: Foundation stone with the lead tube containing the parchment and coins (October 2010)

Erected by Roma Capitale, Department of Cultural Policies and Historic Center, Superintendence for Cultural Heritage.

Topics. This historical marker is listed in these topic lists: Architecture • Arts, Letters, Music. A significant historical date for this entry is March 14, 1885.

Location. 41° 54.311′ N, 12° 28.2′ E. Marker is in Roma, Lazio (Latium, Rome), in Città metropolitana di Roma Capitale. It is in Prati. It is at the intersection of Piazza Cavour and Via Cicerone on Piazza Cavour. The marker is located in the Piazza Cavour in front of the Supreme Court building. Touch for map. Marker is at or near this postal address: Piazza Cavour SNC, Roma, Lazio 00193, Italy. Touch for directions.

Other nearby markers. At least 8 other markers are within walking distance of this marker: Ponte Umberto I / Umberto I Bridge (about 240 meters away, measured in a direct line); Church of Saint Mary in the Gate of Paradise (approx. 0.6 kilometers away); Vincenzo Monti and Costanza Monti Perticari (approx. 0.6 kilometers away); Palazzo Incontro (approx. 0.6 kilometers away); Vittorio Emanuele II Bridge (approx. 0.6 kilometers away); Eleonora de Fonseca Pimentel (approx. 0.7 kilometers away); Church of St. Louis of the French (approx. 0.7 kilometers away); Saint Louis of the French (approx. 0.7 kilometers away). Touch for a list and map of all markers in Roma.

Also see . . . Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour. Wikipedia

Camillo Paolo Filippo Giulio Benso, Count of Cavour, Isolabella and Leri (Italian: [kaˈmillo ˈbɛnso]; 10 August 1810 – 6 June 1861), generally known as the Count of Cavour (/kəˈvʊər/ kə-VOOR; Italian: Conte di Cavour [ˈkonte di kaˈvur]) or simply Cavour, was an Italian politician, statesman, businessman, economist, and noble, and a leading figure in the movement towards Italian unification. He was one of the leaders of the Historical Right and Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Sardinia from 1852, a position he maintained (except for a six-month resignation) until his death, throughout the Second Italian War of Independence and Giuseppe Garibaldi's campaigns to unite Italy. After the declaration of a united Kingdom of Italy, Cavour took office as the first Prime Minister of Italy; he died after only three months in office and did not live to see the Roman Question solved through the complete unification of the country after the Capture of Rome in 1870.

(Submitted on February 9, 2025, by James Hulse of Medina, Texas.)

Credits. This page was last revised on February 9, 2025. It was originally submitted on February 6, 2025, by James Hulse of Medina, Texas. This page has been viewed 293 times since then and 46 times this year. Photos: 1, 2, 3, 4. submitted on February 9, 2025, by James Hulse of Medina, Texas.

https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=265971

The Cox Report's 'Dirty Little Secret'

Arms Control Today

Jonathan D. Pollack

Back to Cox Report Main Page

To the uninitiated reader, the Cox Report presents an ominous picture of pervasive, sustained Chinese espionage and illicit technology acquisition breathtaking in its scope, scale and effectiveness. The document alleges extreme laxity in U.S. security procedures and a seriously flawed export control process, both of which were purportedly exploited by China's intelligence organizations and weapons manufacturers. In the committee's view, these actions were knowingly abetted by American scientists prepared to disclose U.S. nuclear weapons secrets and by American aerospace firms intent on securing commercial advantage with China, irrespective of the national security consequences.

Given the substantial excisions in the declassified version of the report, it is impossible to fully assess the potential consequences of China's acquisition of U.S. nuclear weapons design and technical information, however Beijing acquired such data. The report's judgments are sweeping and unequivocal, but the evidence supporting these claims seems far more limited and ambiguous, suggesting that the compromise of information may have been far less extensive than asserted by the report's authors.

But the study's shortcomings extend well beyond its inferences and assertions; they concern its basic premises and assumptions. Despite the document's prodigious bulk and detail, it is remarkably ahistorical. In particular, it is almost totally devoid of reference to the political, military, intelligence, and dual-use technology ties with China assiduously pursued at the highest levels of the U.S. government during the 1970s and 1980s.

Specific espionage claims must be investigated fully, and the acute lapses in security procedures at U.S. weapons laboratories undoubtedly require immediate attention. But instead of telling a larger story, the committee simply accumulates disparate information from an array of sources from which worst-case judgments were then drawn. As a consequence, media coverage focused almost exclusively (and uncritically) on the most sensational allegations, failing to ask how and why the United States and China were drawn into ever-closer dealings with one another.

Amid the report's dire claims and forecasts, a dirty little secret goes entirely unmentioned. From the very onset of the Sino-U.S. relationship in the early 1970s, successive Republican and Democratic administrations believed that the enhancement of Chinese power—as a counterbalance to Soviet power—was in the national security interest of the United States, and persistently sought to advance this goal in the ensuing two decades. This U.S. commitment was repeatedly imparted to senior Chinese officials in both word and deed. The United States was intent on strengthening relations in a host of highly sensitive areas and shaping China's expectations of the United States and its pursuit of U.S. high technology. The Chinese may well have exploited these opportunities by all available means, but they were walking through a door that the U.S. government had long since decided to open.

The U.S. negotiating record with China amply confirms this judgment. From the earliest years of Sino-American relations, senior U.S. officials (including then National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger) provided Chinese interlocutors with highly sensitive U.S. intelligence data on Soviet military capabilities and deployments—without the Chinese having ever solicited this information. The Nixon administration sought to coordinate its diplomatic and security actions with China in Vietnam, in South Asia, and in relation to Taiwan, Japan and Korea. Under President Ford, the United States explicitly encouraged major European allies to relax their export policies toward China, including on weapons sales; the Chinese were regularly kept informed of these actions. U.S. policymakers also sought to find the means to permit sales of U.S. computers to China that it would not export to the Soviet Union.

Under the Carter administration, these ties broadened and deepened. The United States provided Chinese officials with regular intelligence briefings; both countries also undertook active intelligence collaboration (in part to monitor Soviet compliance with the SALT accords). Other programs heightened collaboration against Soviet actions in Afghanistan and Vietnamese actions in Cambodia. These activities accelerated further under the Reagan administration, including the provision (with Chinese assistance) of U.S. Stinger anti-aircraft missiles to mujaheddin insurgents resisting the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

But the Reagan administration's decision to expedite technology transfer to China bears most directly on the report's findings. As the Chinese sought to develop a civilian industrial base where none or little had existed before, technology transfer from the United States was pivotal. Much of this effort involved technologies and know-how with inherent relevance to both civilian and military programs. It included provision of a massive array of technical and design data for assembly of McDonnell-Douglas aircraft in Shanghai, including an MD-82 coproduction agreement signed in 1985—the largest U.S.-Chinese industrial project of the past two decades.

The Cox Report documents Chinese violations of U.S. export control regulations in the purchase and disposition of advanced machine tools from McDonnell-Douglas. But the larger collaborative effort (designed to meet exacting Federal Aviation Administration certification standards for indigenous production of commercial aircraft in China) was comprehensive in its scope. By enhancing a wide array of technical skills and industrial-technology applications required in aircraft manufacture, the project facilitated the skill base of the Chinese aviation industry as a whole, including the military sector.

The report also fails to acknowledge that the Reagan administration initiated foreign military sales (FMS) programs to China, including sales to military end-users, provision of technical know-how to Chinese military research and development, and active collaboration between U.S. defense contractors and Chinese counterparts. By 1987, these programs comprised avionics packages for Chinese combat aircraft, sales of anti-submarine warfare torpedos and gas turbine engines for the Chinese navy (the latter still in use on Chinese destroyers), sales of artillery-locating radar and the upgrading of artillery production capabilities. Other transactions included sales of Blackhawk helicopters and an array of non-lethal military equipment.

Successive U.S. administrations were not oblivious to the multiple implications of U.S. technology transfer to China. The commercial links were undoubtedly important, but the security implications were also inescapable. A more militarily credible China would be better able to counter Soviet power, and it would require the Soviet Union to deploy additional military assets in Asia. It was also assumed that (in return for U.S. technological assistance) the Chinese would exercise political and military restraint in relation to Taiwan, Japan and Korea.

The United States therefore saw China as an asset rather than a threat to U.S. security interests. Senior Chinese leaders acknowledged Chinese industrial and military backwardness to U.S. officials and corporate representatives, and they also made clear the longer-term Chinese intention to emerge as an advanced industrial, technological, scientific and military power. The Chinese repeatedly urged the United States to further relax its export control policies, and likely assumed that the United States would quietly facilitate Chinese efforts to acquire an extensive array of dual-use technologies.

Additional developments throughout the latter half of the 1980s—including purchase of more advanced computers, acquisition of sophisticated machine tools, prospective sales of nuclear reactors, and an explosive growth in the training of Chinese scientists and students in the United States—attested to the consolidation of U.S.-China relations, with an ever-increasing focus on advancing China's technical and industrial capabilities, many with potential relevance to China's military modernization.

In addition, following the Challenger space shuttle disaster, the Reagan administration approved launches of U.S. satellites from Chinese rockets. It was hardly a state secret that Chinese launch vehicles (the Long March 3-B and 2-E) were derived from the same family of missiles used to deliver Chinese nuclear weapons, and that the space launch program was overseen by Chinese military personnel. Underwriting the costs of Chinese launches (there have been approximately 30 launches involving U.S. aerospace companies since 1988) undoubtedly enhanced Chinese space capabilities.

In the aftermath of several egregious launch failures in 1995 and 1996, Hughes, Loral and other major aerospace companies reviewed Chinese assessments of these failures, though Chinese aerospace personnel bristled at the implied criticisms of their programs offered by foreign experts. Alleged violations of U.S. export control provisions and security procedures by several of these companies remain under investigation. But U.S. companies had an obvious incentive to encourage the Chinese to pinpoint and remedy design and manufacturing flaws in the launch vehicles, since further catastrophic failures would have jeopardized their collaborative programs. These reviews by U.S. engineers and technical personnel very likely reinforced modifications in launch vehicle designs that the Chinese themselves had begun to consider. So construed, the Chinese benefitted from U.S. technical expertise. But it defies comprehension that it was in anyone's interest to depend on unreliable launch vehicles.

However, the Tiananmen crisis of 1989 had shattered the working consensus between the executive branch and the Congress on closer U.S.-China relations. Equally significant, the collapse of the Soviet Union eroded the strategic assumptions underlying U.S.-Chinese defense collaboration. The Bush administration sought to retain some of these dealings, but changes in U.S. strategy were already underway, including a substantial augmentation of U.S. military sales to Taiwan as the Chinese increasingly pursued weapons purchases from Russia. The Clinton administration, with intermittent success and also some major setbacks, sought to restore a modicum of civility in Sino-U.S. military relations, but it was not prepared to revisit the post-Tiananmen sanctions precluding military sales to China. At the same time, the scope of U.S. defense links with Taiwan continued to grow during the 1990s.

Thus, the Cox Report appears when the strategic divergence between the United States and China has widened, and when the Chinese are increasingly assertive about longer-term modernization goals that are no longer animated by animosities with Moscow. Indeed, Russia and China share common cause in seeking to inhibit, or at least caution, the United States from the unilateral exercise of its military power. One does not need to subscribe to the more conspiratorial Chinese renderings of U.S. strategy to discern the essential Chinese logic: officials in Beijing see the United States as intent on impeding the growth of Chinese national power and the enhancement of its strategic position.

Given the deliberate pace of Chinese weapons development, it is far from certain that Beijing deems a major acceleration of its weapons programs as either feasible or warranted. Indeed, China's enhancement of its strategic weapons capabilities has remained measured and incremental. If the Cox Committee's claims of Chinese possession of a full array of U.S. nuclear weapons information are accurate, it makes little sense that Beijing would have failed to exploit this knowledge. But if the Chinese conclude that the United States views China in essentially malign terms, an enhanced Chinese national defense effort, quite possibly including accelerated modernization of Chinese strategic weapons capabilities, seems very likely.

But the much larger transformation underway in China concerns the country's mushrooming involvement in global commerce, not its military development. Even as many in the United States exhibit increased unease about the implications of the growth of Chinese military power, the scale and scope of U.S.-Chinese commercial and technological interactions has never been greater. Information and technology flows between the two countries have accelerated dramatically over the past decade; as a consequence, the provision of high-end U.S. technologies to China far exceeds the undertakings of the 1980s. Short of a draconian effort to restrict these transactions and to pursue far more binding multilateral export controls, the momentum of these developments will not be slowed significantly, let alone reversed. Moreover, any such effort would very likely prove self-defeating, both politically and commercially.

Indeed, less than three weeks after release of the report, the committee chairman, Representative Christopher Cox, endorsed a major relaxation of constraints on U.S. computer exports to China. By consenting to a fivefold increase in the allowable speed of computers to be licensed for export to China, he acceded to inescapable commercial and technological realities, even as the committee's report had spoken in worrisome tones about the diverse applications such higher-speed computers could permit.

Although the United States still endeavors to fence off (both literally and figuratively) those activities with immediate national security implications, it is increasingly difficult to square this circle. In the final analysis, the dire tone of the Cox Report says far more about the United States than it does about China. Resolving this fundamental ambivalence about the growth of Chinese power may not prove possible, but the effects of an ominously worded document could make the search for a tolerable center of gravity in the Sino-American relationship ever more difficult.

https://www.armscontrol.org/act/1999-04/cox-reports-dirty-little-secret

Why Mormons Make Great FBI Recruits

What sparked rumors of a “Mormon Mafia”?

by Sarah Laskow

November 4, 2015

Why Mormons Make Great FBI Recruits

At the FBI.

At the FBI. Dave Newman/Flickr

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When the Pew Research Center surveyed Mormons in America about their place in society, more than 60 percent of the participants said that Americans “are uninformed about Mormonism.” Mormons make up about 2 percent of the American population—about the same as Jews—but they’re not sure that the rest of the country quite understands or accepts them. Overwhelmingly, most Mormons described misperceptions about their religion or “lack of acceptance in American society.”

But there’s at least one place in American society where Mormons have found an unusual degree of acceptance—in agencies like the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, and the CIA, which see Mormons as particularly desirable recruits and have a reputation for hiring a disproportionate number of people who belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

While this comes as a surprise to most people, in Washington and particularly among people who work with or report on intelligence and law enforcement, it’s common knowledge. And occasionally it leaks into popular culture: In his 2009 memoir Agent Bishop, Mike McPheters describes his years doubling as an FBI agent and Mormon bishop—a community leadership position he inherited from another FBI agent. In 2015, a (controversial) subplot on ABC’s Quantico featured a Mormon recruit whose upstanding reputation hid a dark secret.

But, in reality, Mormons end up in these agencies for perfectly logical reasons. The disproportionate number of Mormons is usually chalked up to three factors: Mormon people often have strong foreign language skills, from missions overseas; a relatively easy time getting security clearances, given their abstention from drugs and alcohol; and a willingness to serve.

There have been Mormon FBI agents since early in the bureau’s history. Some accounts allege that J. Edgar Hoover had a particular interest in recruiting Mormon agents: one well-known Mormon leader, J. Martell Bird, served in Hoover’s heyday, from the 1940s through the end of the ’60s, and there’s a famous story of a Mormon agent who, in 1940, just five years after the modern FBI was born from an earlier Bureau of Investigation, was tasked with supporting the agency’s first double agent in Germany.

But it wasn’t until the 1970s that outsiders started paying close attention and turning up connections between prominent Mormons and the CIA, Watergate, and other government activities. A 1975 report on the CIA, for instance, included the tidbit that one Mormon-owned PR firm made some “overseas offices available…as cover for Agency employees operating abroad.” And in the 1980s a Brigham Young University professor told the authors of The Mormon Corporate Empire, a 1985 social science study on the church and its power, that “we’ve never had any trouble placing anyone who has applied to the CIA.”

“Every year, they take almost anybody who applies,” he said.

It was around this time, too, that two cases put the Mormon members of the FBI dramatically into the public eye. In 1984, FBI agent Richard W. Miller was arrested; he later became the first FBI agent ever to be indicted for and eventually found guilty of spying for the Soviet Union. (Miller wasn’t the first Mormon to be in this position, though: earlier in 1984, a Mormon who had worked in Army intelligence was arrested for passing secrets to the Soviets.) Miller had been recruited at BYU in the 1960s, the New York Times reported. At the time, the FBI had been particularly interested in candidates with strong Spanish skills, and Miller had minored in the language. By the 1980s, though, he was under close supervision at work and had started dabbling in petty theft, when a Soviet woman approached him.

A class early in the history of BYU. B.F. Larsen (Brigham Young University)

Miller had been assigned to interview émigrés like Svetlana Ogorodnikov, but she was much better at her job than he was at his. His performance as an agent had been lackluster, and his personal life was not going much better, as, not long before his arrest, he was excommunicated from the Mormon church for adultery. Soon, he and Svetlana were sleeping together and discussing plans to exchange information for money. Miller later said he was trying to use Svetlana as a source, not the other way around, but he did pass a classified document to her and her husband, Nikolay.

At Miller’s trial, testimony revealed a tangle of religion and work at the Los Angeles bureau where he worked. One Mormon FBI agent said that he’d understood that Miller had been put under his command, on a prestigious counterintelligence squad, “because of our common religious background.” Another agent, Matt Perez, testified that Richard T. Bretzing, the head of the L.A. bureau and a Mormon bishop, had protected Miller and kept him from being fired.

Not long before Miller’s Soviet dalliance came to light, Perez, a Latino FBI agent, had filed his first discrimination complaint with the equal employment opportunity office. In the course of the next few years, he, along with more than 300 other agents, would file a class action suit against the FBI for racial and religious discrimination. Part of their complaint was that their Mormon higher-ups had favored agents of their own religion.

The judge ruled in the Hispanic agents’ favor on the racial discrimination charge, and though he rejected the religious discrimination charges, he did write that the testimony at the trial showed that Mormon leaders “made personnel decisions which favored members of their church at the expense of Hispanic class members.”

Together, these two cases, which were extensively covered by the media, lodged a new idea in the public mind: There was a “Mormon mafia” in the FBI.

The Mormon Temple in Salt Lake City. Niro87/Wikimedia

It’s hard to put exact numbers on this phenomenon, either then or now. The agency’s public demographic statistics do not include the religious backgrounds of its officers, but the FBI isn’t known for its diversity. Even after its Hispanic officers won that discrimination case and after other lawsuits over similar hiring issues, most people working for the FBI are white men. What is known is that agencies like the CIA and FBI still recruit at BYU, looking for students with language skills and an interest in public service, although even the university doesn’t know how many of its students ultimately end up in these jobs. “We’ve tried to track down employment and recruitment numbers, and it’s really hard to pin this down,” a BYU spokesperson said.

These aren’t necessarily glamorous jobs. Many of the Mormon recruits to the CIA work in analysis, the desk jockeys of the intelligence world, and leave without building a whole career in government. For those who do, though, there’s an easy move to make when they’re ready to leave government service. Often, after a long career in the FBI, agents will join the Latter-day Saints’ Security Department. Bird, the FBI agent who worked with Hoover, became head of church security; Richard Bretzing, the L.A. bureau chief who was so key in the spread of the idea of a Mormon Mafia, left the bureau in 1988—and became managing director of the same office.

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/why-mormons-make-great-fbi-recruits

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Corrupt Mormon church enforcing lawlessness is a Jesuit church drunk on the blood of martyrs gaslight is a satanic church judge John Schlegelmilch

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Temple Cards

Why Do We Wear White in the Temple?

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/friend/2024/12/14-why-do-we-wear-white-in-the-temple?lang=eng

Matthew 23:27-28

New International Version

27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. 28 In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%2023:27-28&version=NIV

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”.

Ms Flake said it was significant that the visitors’ centre of the new temple in Rome features a dramatic Christus sculpture along with sculptures of the 12 apostles.

“There’s a resonance there. It’s a claim...to replicate those statutes, in that place, there’s nothing else it can be. It’s symbolically an assertion of their claim to be the restored Church of Jesus Christ with its apostolic authority,” she said.

Mr Nelson and Pope Francis, she said, are unique. “Are there any other men but those two who believe they stand in the shoes of St. Peter?”

According to the Deseret News, Francis gave Nelson two gifts: some of his writings on the family and on the Islamic faith.

Nelson gave the pope a Christus statue – an image common in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints – and a copy of a core 1995 church document on the family.

Other high-ranking Mormon Church leaders have met with top Catholic leaders in the past, including Henry B Eyring, whose title was the first counselor in the First Presidency. That happened in 2014 when he and Francis spoke at a Vatican conference about marriage, the Deseret News wrote Saturday.

The news site noted that a meeting between men in these positions “would have been unimaginable to leaders and members in both churches” until at least the 1960s, when followers officially were told to limit interactions with other faiths, including weddings and funerals.

But behind-the-scenes connections were happening, the Deseret News reported, and have intensified in the past decade.

The Mormon president, the news site reported, would go in the 1950s to Salt Lake City’s Holy Cross Hospital – which is Catholic-run – “under the guise of visiting a Latter-day Saint patient, then slip into the office of Bishop Duane G Hunt.

They used their private sessions to talk about community issues and the tensions between their members in Utah,” said Monsignor J Terrence Fitzgerald, a Salt Lake City priest interviewed by the site.

“The Catholics were trying to get the Latter-day Saints not to bad-mouth the Catholics at every conference,” Mr Fitzgerald said. “And the Latter-day Saints were trying to get the Catholics to put in a good word for them on the national level.”

Interfaith relations opened significantly with the Second Vatican Council, a major meeting of the Catholic Church in the 1960s.

Both sides have become more open and, in the United States especially, have shared the cause of protecting traditional religious values in public life, such as government-affiliated faith groups’ choice not to offer health benefits to same-sex couples or to place foster or adopted children in their homes.

Leaders of both faith groups have warned about liberalising changes in sexuality, reproductive technology and gender norms and about a decrease in people’s firm belief in God.

“Secularism is prevalent in many Western countries, and many people have lost their faith in Jesus Christ,” Latter-day Saint presiding bishop Gérald Caussé told the Deseret News. “And to have all Christian faiths join together and defend our values is important.”

In Utah, the two communities have developed strong relations in recent decades, the church’s news release said on Saturday.

Washington Post

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/pope-mormon-leader-meeting-rome-vatican-lds-church-latterday-saints-a8816421.html

The Palazzo Moroni is a palace located on Via Porta #12 in the historic center of the upper town of Bergamo, Italy. The palace is a civic art museum, as well as used for cultural functions. The building, noted for its Baroque interior decorations, is presently managed by the Fondazione di Palazzo Moroni in conjunction with the city after a donation by Count Antonio Moroni.

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

Moroni (/məˈroʊnaɪ/) is described in the Book of Mormon as the last Nephite prophet, historian, and military commander who, according to the faith of the Latter Day Saint movement, became the Angel Moroni who presented the golden plates to Joseph Smith.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moroni_(prophet)#

Mantua was settled in the mid-19th century when members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints were sent by Lorenzo Snow to the valley to grow flax. The first group arrived in Mantua in 1863 (although a sign at the main entry route states "Founded 1864"),[6] and were all émigrés from Denmark led by Hans Jens Jensen.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mantua,_Utah

Lagoon is a family owned amusement park in Farmington, Utah, located about 18 miles north of Salt Lake City.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagoon_(amusement_park)

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

Freemasons FDR and Marriner S. Eccles, Fed Chairman, 1935 #363 With the Company using short seller Joseph P. Kennedy and its Federal Reserve Bank to cause the Great Depression of 1929, the Order’s calculated solution was its socialist New Deal. A key player was the son of a rich Utah banker, Mormon Freemason Marriner S. Eccles (far right). Following the socialist rhetoric of the Order’s radio priest, Charles Coughlin, Eccles advocated deficit spending in the form of paternal relief measures, including a minimum wage law, unemployment insurance and old age pensions. Appointed Secretary of the Treasury in 1933, ten months later he became Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board (1934-1948). He wrote the Banking Act of 1935 (signed into law above) thereby perfecting the Fed by centralizing all power in its Federal Reserve Board and establishing the independence of the Board from the Treasury. Eccles, giving the appearance of saving the Bank, in fact created the monster it is today: its New York Branch and Federal Reserve Board in Washington are now ruled by Georgetown Jesuits through key Bank officers who are notorious CFR members. Eccles went on to become the U.S. delegate to New Hampshire’s 1944 Bretton Woods Conference, which created the Black Pope’s World Bank and International Monetary Fund thus paving the way for world commerce under “that man of sin—the beast.” Like Romanism, the Mormon Empire under the guise of religion is a tentacle of the Order’s “Invisible Empire,” Jesuit Pierre De Smet directing Mason Brigham Young to the Great Salt Lake when they met at Council Bluffs, Iowa, in 1846. Know Your Government: The Federal Reserve System, Gary Taylor, (NY: Chelsea House Pubs., 1989) p. 56."

The Eccles Building, Fed Headquarters, Washington, D.C., 1989 #365 As Hawaii’s Laie Mormon Temple was patterned after the ancient Temple of Solomon, even so the Eccles Building resembles the historic Jerusalem Temple. Distinct from the location and function of the Department of the Treasury, this impressive “pagan cathedral” built for the Federal Reserve Board illustrates the power of the Black Pope decreeing the Empire’s economic policies. The Fed is controlled through the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) with offices in both New York City and Washington, D.C. The CFR is overseen and guided by the Jesuits of Georgetown University; the Order’s enforcers, keeping all politicians in line who may be a threat to its Fed, is the FBI/CIA—the co-assassins of JFK! Know Your Government: The Federal Reserve System, Gary Taylor, (NY: Chelsea House Pubs., 1989) p. 56."

Vatican Assassins

by Eric Jon Phelps

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uQl1CmWeLL87RWVtzKttGFKm0frSNR8D/view?usp=sharing

Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed.”

That is the law of God as laid down in the beginning; that if a man shall shed blood, by man shall his blood be shed. Why? Because the blood is the life of the flesh, and is the only atonement a man can make for killing another. A murderer, by the shedding of his blood, may make some atonement for his sin; but he cannot come forth and inherit an exaltation in eternal life, he must be content with a less degree of glory. Still, as Brother Brigham taught, there is a chance for some men who have committed this great transgression if their blood be shed, and there are others who, even if they were willing to have their blood shed, could not obtain forgiveness for their transgressions. You can read about this in the revelation on celestial marriage. (Doctrine and Covenants, Sec. cxxxii,par. 26-7.) They are those who have not only been baptized into the Church of Christ, received the power of the Holy Spirit and been enlightened from on high, but have been in the most sacred places on the earth, ordained of God by His holy law, and have made special covenants in relation to that and other sins; they have been specially enlightened ; they have gone from step to step, from grace to grace, from knowledge to knowledge, and have had keys of power placed in their hands whereby, if they are faithful, they may climb to the highest pinnacle of honor and glory in the presence of our Heavenly Father, and then they turn round and commit this great transgression, the shedding of innocent blood. For them there is no forgiveness. They will be banished from the presence of God; they cannot inherit the glory which was sealed upon them, however repentant they may be; they cannot come up in the first resurrection and enter into their exaltation; but they must be cast out from the presence of God and have the everlasting penalty pronounced,

“Depart from me ye workers of iniquity.”

They will be banished from the presence of God,, which is spiritual destruction, that spiritual death which is called the “second death.”

But, there are other persons who by making thisitonement may obtain redemption—persons that have not advanced to this degree of knowledge in understanding, and whose sins are not of so* heinous a nature. Because sin is guaged by the light of the individual. The depth of man’s infamy is guaged by the degree of his light and is opportunity. He that knows much is expected to do much. Of him that knows but little, only little is expected. If a man has great light and he sins he is the greater sinner. I have heard people argue that all sin is the result of ignorance. Well, it is just the other way. Sin is rather the result of knowledge ; because a man cannot sin without some light. An idiot cannot sin, because he is responsible. It takes a responsible being to do responsible wrong. The more responsible a man is, the greater wrong he does if he commits transgression.

The greater a man’s light is, the greater is sin. The greater the light, the greater the condemnation for doing wrong. That is based upon the eternal principle of justice. From this, then, it would seem that if a man commits a sin unto death there is no redemption : if not unto death, and he pays the penalty, there is for him a chance of salvation.

This divine law for shedding the blood of a murderer has never been repealed. It is a law given by the Almighty and not abrogated in the Christian faith. It stands on record for all time that a murderer shall have his blood shed. He that commits murder must be slain. “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed.” I know there are some benevolent and I philanthropic people in these times who think that capital punishment ought to be abolished.

Yet I think the Lord knows better than they. Their law He has ordained will have the best results to mankind in general.

Well, is there any other sin that a man may commit which is worthy of death? I think there is. I will refer you to one in the Book of Leviticus, 20th chapter and 10th verse:

“And the man that committeth adultery with another man’s wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbor’s wife, the adulterer and; the adulteress shall surely be put to death.”

That was the law of God in the days of Moses. It was the law of God previous to the days of Moses, as you will find by reference to the Book of 1 Genesis. It has been a law of God from the beginning. Some people have an idea that Jesus.

Christ did away with that law, and they bring up the case of the woman that had been taken in transgression. The object of the Pharisees in bringing the woman to the Savior was that they might catch Him in some way. You will find by a reading the history of Jesus Christ’s ministry on the earth that it was then as it is to-day—snares are all the time being laid to catch the servants of God. They tried to entrap Him in many ways but He was able to meet them with the wisdom of the Great God ; for the Spirit of God was given to Him without measure. The woman they brought to Him was taken in this great transgression. The Pharisees knew the law -of Moses was that she should be put to death. They inquired what Jesus had to say. He stooped down and thought a little while, then wrote with His finger on the ground and exclaimed, “Let him that is without sin cast the first stone !

”The Pharisees looked at each other and finally they slipped away. Why ? Because that was “an evil and adulterous generation.’’

Those self-righteous hypocrites were guilty of the transgression themselves, and the person to inflict the penalty justly, had to be one who was not guilty; for how could one such sinner rightly inflict the penalty upon another? Jesus Christ’s words smote them to the heart, and they slunk off and left the woman standing there. Did the sinner go free? Did Jesus say the law ought not to be inflicted? No. He asked: “Woman, where are thine accusers ?” They were gone. “Neither do I accuse thee.” It must be remembered that there must be accusers as well as judges. Jesus set a pattern which judges in these times would do well to follow. He did not act as an attorney for the prosecution or as a witness against the accused as well as a judge to pronounce the sentence. “Woman, where are those thine accusers ? * * *

Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.” pages 26-27

Blood atonement, as taught by leading elders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints : an address delivered in the Twelfth Ward assembly hall, Salt Lake City, October 12, 1884 (archive.org)

Mormon Freemason Brigham Young, 1801 – 1877 “The Prophet” of the Romish-styled Mormon Church, 1844 – 1877 The birth of Masonic Mormonism, and thus the fame of Brigham Young, can only be understood in light of America’s anti-Masonic movement of the 1820s. In August of 1826 Captain William Morgan of the Batavia Lodge of New York made public his Illustrations of Masonry By One of the Fraternity Who Has Devoted Thirty Years to the Subject. For revealing the first three degrees of Blue Lodge Masonry, Morgan was kidnapped; on the 19th of September he was drowned in the Niagara River. The people of western New York, where Morgan had lived, rose in all their might and attempted to find and punish the murderers. But to their surprise, sheriffs, witnesses, jurors and judges hindered the investigation, as they too were secret Masons bound by oaths of loyalty to the brotherhood over all civil oaths of duty to their communities. The outrage led to an anti-Masonic convention in 1828; in 1829 Baptist Preacher David Bernard published his Light On Free Masonry, revealing the first twenty degrees of the Craft. By 1830 tens of thousands of Northern Masons had disbanded their lodges. It was at this time Masonic Mormonism was born! On April 6, 1830, in the very same state out of which arose the anti-Masonic movement, Mason Joseph Smith (boldly calling himself “a Second Mohammed”) privately founded a “New Religious Society” (surnamed after the “Society of Jesus”)—“The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.” Fully intending to build “the temple of Zion, the center of the earthly kingdom of Jesus Christ,” Zionist Smith fell into disrepute over his polygamy. In 1844 he was murdered in jail by a mob while giving the Masonic “Grand Hailing Sign of Distress,” and Brigham Young became “The Prophet.” In 1846 at Council Bluffs, while moving 10,000 of his followers West, Young met with one of the Order’s most powerful American Jesuits, Pierre-Jean De Smet. The Jesuit directed Young to move his “Saints” to the Great Valley of the Salt Lake; Young obeyed, and upon arrival organized his new nation of “Deseret” along the lines of the Order’s socialist Paraguayan Reductions. In 1857 Masonic President James Buchanan, controlled by the Jesuits since his early 1857 arsenic poisoning, began a political agitation over the governorship of Utah, igniting the bloodless “Utah War.” He dispatched a military force led by Masonic Army Colonel Albert Sydney Johnston to put down Masonic Young’s refusal to submit to Federal jurisdiction. In this, Young’s “Deseret” only benefited, Johnston allowing Mormon raiders to “steal” 800 Army oxen. That same year Young ordered Bishop John D. Lee to lead a force composed of Mormons and Paiute Indians to murder nearly 130 “heretic” Protestant emigrants at Mountain Meadows—pursuant to the Order’s wicked Council of Trent and bloody Jesuit Oath. In the Spring of 1858 Masonic President Buchanan arranged for a free pardon if the Mormons would submit to Federal authority. The chief negotiator between both parties was the Jesuit, Pierre-Jean De Smet! Jesuit Coadjutor Brigham Young died in 1877, and will one day answer to the Lord Jesus Christ!" Vatican Assassins Wounded In The House Of My Friends Third Edition by Eric Jon Phelps https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uQl1CmWeLL87RWVtzKttGFKm0frSNR8D/view?usp=sharing

"Figure 18 — Famous Morman/Mason during Anti-Masonic Movement.

3rd degree Joseph Smith (1805-1844)

Founder of the Mormon Church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints). Born in a poor family that migrated to Palmyra NY in 1815.

The angel Moroni is said to have revealed the Book of Mormon to Smith, written on golden plates, which he was able to transcribe by the use of "Urim and Thummim," instruments of magical power.

His critics say that the Book of Mormon is based on an imaginative tale written in Biblical style by a former Presbyterian minister, Samuel Spaulding, but never published.

The manuscript was delivered to Smith by Sidney Rigdon, who helped revise it. Shortly afterwards Rigdon became one of the presidents of the church.

Book of Mormon was printed in Palmyra, NY in 1830, during the height of the Anti-Masonic Movement. The church was founded on April 6 of that year at the home of Peter Whitmer in Fayette, NY. Smith's first wife was the widow of former Freemason Capt. William Morgan, who was murdered by three Masons four years earlier. In 1831, Smith, with his new wife and band of Mormons, moved to Kirtland, OH, then to Missouri in 1838.

The Mormons ran into trouble at Independence and Far West, MO, and were removed from the state by the militia and settled at Commerce, IL.

Smith, Rigdon, and others were arrested for "murder, treason, burglary, arson and larceny," but allowed to escape and join the others at Commerce.

Commerce was renamed Nauvoo by the Mormons. Here Smith governed despotically with the aid of a small group of advisors.

In Commerce was a Masonic Lodge to which the leaders of the Mormons attached themselves. When the Mormons renamed the city Nauvoo, so too was the Lodge renamed. In Smith's journal, March 15, 1842, he wrote:

"I officiated as Grand Chaplain at the installation of the Nauvoo Lodge of Freemasons at the Grove near the Temple. Grand Master Jonas, of Columbus, being present, a large number of people assembled for the occasion. The day was exceedingly fine; all things were done in order. In the evening I received the first degree in Freemasonry in Nauvoo Lodge." The following day Smith added, "I was with the Masonic Lodge and rose to the sublime degree." At the same time Sidney Rigdon received his degrees "at sight" with Smith.

Over the next five months, the Nauvoo Lodge initiated (1O) 256 candidates and raised (3rd degree) 243. Consequently, Bodley Lodge No. 1 of Illinois preferred charges against Nauvoo Lodge on July 15, 1842, asking the Grand Lodge of Illinois to "make inquiry into the manner the officers of Nauvoo Lodge were installed by the Grand Master of this State, and by what authority the Grand Master initiated (1O), passed (2nd degree) and raised (3rd degree) Smith and Rigdon to the first three degrees of Freemasonry all at once. A special Masonic committee visited Nauvoo, inspected the records and work and recommended that the lodge be permitted to resume labor. After this inspection by Grand Lodge, the Mormons did so much Masonic work that two more lodges were established; Rising Sun Lodge at Montrose, IA, and a dispensation requested at Keokuk, IA. Again the Grand Lodge ordered an investigation, and this time the Mormons refused the committee access to the minutes. The Grand Lodge then struck all the Mormon Lodges from its rolls. However, Mormon Lodges refused to recognize this, and continued their Masonic work. On Friday, April 5, 1844 the Mormons dedicated the Masonic Hall at Nauvoo.

In the History of the Church, Smith wrote that he attended the ceremonies; that about 550 Masons from various parts of the world were present and took part in a procession that was formed, accompanied by the Nauvoo brass band; that the ceremonies were in charge of Hyrum Smith, Worshipful Master; that the principal address of the occasion was delivered by Apostle Erastus Snow; and that he, Joseph Smith and Dr. Goforth also addressed the assembly; and that all visiting Masons were given dinner in the Masonic Hall at the expense of Nauvoo Lodge.

If the above dedication is the same ceremony and date as the cornerstone laying, there is a discrepancy. In 1954 the Mormon Church purchased the old hall for restoration as an historic shrine. The cornerstone box was removed and sent to Salt Lake City, where in the presence of President David O. McKay and the twelve apostles, it was opened; the original documents were retained in Utah, and photostatic copies returned, to be redeposited in two new boxes in the cornerstone at Nauvoo. This ceremony took place June 24, 1954, being reported in the newspapers as "exactly 111 years after the first ceremony."

Inside the cornerstone a document states that Smith was not present in the procession or ceremony, as he was then being sought on an extradition warrant issued by Governor Ford of Missouri. (Missouri never had a man named Ford as governor; Gov. Reynolds had recently died and Lt. Gov. Marmaduke had taken his place.) Although Smith's signature is among the 50 or more names of the prominent Mormons on the document, it was noted therein that it was added later.

When Smith claimed the revelation of Polygamy in 1843, the church split. On June 27, 1844, Smith and his brother Hyrum were both arrested and jailed at Carthage IL. Before nightfall, both men were shot and killed by a mob. Smith must have recognized the mob as Masons, for he gave the Masonic grand hailing sign of distress just before he was shot.

Many of the symbols and ceremonies used by the Mormon Church today are of Masonic origin. For example, carved in the stone walls of the Mormon Temple in Utah is the Masonic Square & Compass and all seeing eye. On the building which houses the Mormon Tabernacle Choir is the Masonic 6-pointed star. See S&B, Vol. 1, 3rd ed, Introduction and Appendix 18."

3rd degree Hyrum Smith (? - 1844)

Brother of Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism. Killed with his brother by a mob in the jail at Carthage IL on June 27, 1844. He was first Senior Warden of the Nauvoo Lodge at Nauvoo IL. After the Grand Lodge had ordered the dispensation for this lodge returned, it continued work clandestinely, with Hyrum as Master. In this capacity he officiated at the dedication ceremonies of the Masonic Hall at Nauvoo on April 5, 1844, and his signature is one of those in the cornerstone documents. It has been claimed that both Hyrum and Heber C. Kimball were Masons in Ontario Co. NY, before becoming Mormons.

The Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Missouri is simply an arm of Freemasonry.

32nd degree Frederick M. Smith

(1874-1946)

Scottish Rite Mason — York Rite Mason — Shriner

Frederick was president of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (1915-1946). He was son of Joseph Smith, first president of the reorganized branch, who was the namesake and grandson of Prophet Joseph Smith, founder of Mormonism.

Frederick's father established the reorganized branch of the church in opposition to the Brigham Young group in Utah. Frederick was a graduate of Graceland College in 1898 and 1923; at U. of Missouri, 1908 09; A.M. from U. of Kansas in 1911; and Ph.D. from Clark U. in 1916. He was first counselor of the church, 1902-15, and on the death of his father in 1914, succeeded him as the second president. Frederick was associate editor of The Saints' Herald, 1900-04, and editor after 1917. Frederick became a Mason in 1917. On March 16 of that year, he was raised (3rd degree) in Carbondale Lodge No. 70, Carbondale KN. He was affiliated with Orient Lodge No. 546, Kansas City, MO on April 28, 1928, and was Master of the Lodge in 1934; Grand Orator of the Grand Lodge of Missouri in 1929-30; and Grand Chaplain, Grand Lodge of Missouri, 1940-41.

Frederick was Exalted in Orient Chapter No. 102, R.A.M., Kansas City, June 26, 1928; Greeted in Shekinah Council No. 24, R.&S.M., Kansas City on Sept. 12, 1928; Knighted in Oriental Commandery No. 35, K.T., Kansas City, Dec. 21, 1928; and affiliated with Palestine Commandery No. 17, K.T., of Independence, MO, June 2, 1938. Received 32nd degree AASR (SJ) at Fort Scott KN on April 26, 1927 and affiliated with Western Missouri Consistory in Kansas City, Jan. 25, 1933. He received Shrine in Mirza Temple, Pittsburg KN, May 25, 1927 and affiliated with Ararat in Kansas City, Oct. 8, 1929, and was Potentate in 1941. Served on the board of directors of Shrine Hospital, St. Louis. Was Member of Missouri Lodge of Research."

Two Faces of Freemasonry by John Daniel https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B66Pc9x2hkIrOVNqS0tvbnJXZjA/view?usp=share_link&resourcekey=0-DrJ1Wp9h_PjjBWVMiXcTnw

"The friendliness of the Mormons towards Catholics is attributed to their appreciation that their settlement in the great Salt Lake Valley is due to having been directed to it by Fr. Pierre Jean de Smet, the great Jesuit missionary and explorer, who met and was entertained by Brigham Young in Council Bluffs, while the Mormons were on their trek West. Writing to his nephew, Fr. de Smet said: "They asked me a thousand questions about the regions I had explored, and the valley I have just described to you, pleased them greatly from the account I gave of it. Was that what determined them to settle there? I would not dare affirm it. They are there!"

https://web.archive.org/web/20151020074727/http://www.catholictradition.org:80/Tradition/goldstein70.htm

"The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, informally known as the LDS Church or Mormon Church, is a nontrinitarian Christian church that considers itself to be the restoration of the original church founded by Jesus Christ."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Church_of_Jesus_Christ_of_Latter-day_Saints

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.

L. D. S.

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 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 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 immigrant 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. The party's journey occurred amidst hostilities between Mormon settlers and the US government, with war hysteria rampant amongst the Mormons.[3][4][5] Acting on rumors of hostile behavior on the part of the travelers, local Mormon militia leaders, including Isaac C. Haight and John D. Lee, made plans to attack them as they camped at the meadow. 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 on the wagon train.

During the militia's first assault, the travelers fought back, and a five-day siege ensued. Eventually, fear spread among the militia's leaders that some immigrants 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 travelers. By this time, the travelers 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 immigrants they were protected, and after handing over their weapons, the immigrants 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 travelers. The perpetrators killed all the adults and older children in the group, in the end sparing only seventeen young children ages six and under.[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 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 during the Mormon Reformation. Scholars debate whether senior leadership in the LDS Church, including Brigham Young, directly instigated the massacre or if responsibility for it lay only with the leaders of the militia.

History

Baker–Fancher party

Main article: Baker–Fancher party

In early 1857, the Baker–Fancher party was formed from several groups mainly from Marion, Crawford, Carroll and Johnson counties in northwestern Arkansas. They assembled into a wagon train at Beller's Stand, south of Harrison, to emigrate to southern California. The group was initially referred to as both the Baker train and the Perkins train, but later referred to as the Baker–Fancher train (or party). It was named after "Colonel" Alexander Fancher who, having already made the journey to California twice before, had become its main leader.[7] By contemporary standards the Baker–Fancher party was prosperous, carefully organized and well-equipped for the journey.[8] They were joined along the way by families and individuals from other states, including Missouri.[9] The group was relatively wealthy, and planned to restock its supplies in Salt Lake City, as did most wagon trains at the time.

Interactions with Mormon settlers

See also: War hysteria preceding the Mountain Meadows Massacre

At the time of the Fanchers' arrival, the Utah Territory, though legally a democracy, was effectively a theocracy under the leadership of Brigham Young, the second president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), who had established colonies along the California Trail and the Old Spanish Trail. US President James Buchanan had recently issued an order to send federal troops to Utah, which led to rumors being spread in the territory about its motives. Young issued various orders that urged the local population to prepare for the arrival of the troops. Eventually Young issued a declaration of martial law.[10]

The Baker–Fancher party was refused provisions in Salt Lake City and chose to leave there and take the Old Spanish Trail, which passed through southern Utah.[11] In August 1857, the Mormon apostle George A. Smith traveled throughout the southern part of the territory instructing Mormon settlers to stockpile grain.[12] While on his return trip to Salt Lake City, Smith camped near the Baker–Fancher party on August 25, 1857, at Corn Creek. They had traveled the 165 miles (266 km) south from Salt Lake City, and Jacob Hamblin suggested that the wagon train continue on the trail and rest their cattle at Mountain Meadows, which had good pasture and was adjacent to his homestead.[13]

While most witnesses said that the Fanchers were in general a peaceful party whose members behaved well along the trail, rumors spread about their supposed misdeeds.[14] United States Army Brevet Major James Henry Carleton led the first federal investigation of the murders, and the findings were published in 1859. He recorded Hamblin's account that the train was alleged to have poisoned a spring near Corn Creek, resulting in the deaths of eighteen cows and two or three people who ate the contaminated meat. Carleton interviewed the father of a child who allegedly died from this poisoned spring and accepted the sincerity of the grieving father. He also included a statement from an investigator who did not believe the Fancher party was capable of poisoning the spring, given its size. Carleton invited readers to consider a potential explanation for the rumors of misdeeds, noting the general atmosphere of distrust among Mormons for strangers at the time, and that some locals appeared jealous of the Fancher party's wealth.[15] Modern historians, noting the symptoms of the young boy who died, as well as very similar symptoms in someone in the Francher party who died before reaching Utah, and the difficulty for a party the size of the Francher train to poison a spring, now theorize that the deaths were caused by anthrax, which was a widespread but unrecognized disease in cattle at that time.[16]

Conspiracy and siege

Main article: Conspiracy and siege of the Mountain Meadows Massacre

The Baker–Fancher party left Corn Creek and continued the 125 miles (201 km) to Mountain Meadows, passing Parowan and Cedar City, southern Utah communities led respectively by Stake Presidents William H. Dame and Isaac C. Haight. Haight and Dame were, in addition, the senior regional military leaders of the Iron Military District of the Nauvoo Legion.[17]: 255 Over half the employees of the Iron County iron manufacturing plant were in that militia district.[18]

As the party approached, several meetings were held in Cedar City and nearby Parowan by local LDS Church leaders pondering how to implement Young's declaration of martial law.[19] On the afternoon of Sunday, September 6, Haight held his weekly Stake High Council meeting after church services and brought up the issue of what to do with the immigrants.[20] The plan for a Native American massacre was discussed, but not all the Council members agreed it was the right approach.[20] The Council resolved to take no action until Haight sent a rider, James Haslam,[21]: 3437 out the next day to carry an express to Salt Lake City (a six-day round trip on horseback) for Young's advice, as Utah did not yet have a telegraph system.[20] Following the council, Haight decided to send a messenger Joseph Clewes south to John D. Lee.[21]: 3464 [20] What Haight told Lee remains a mystery, but considering the timing it may have had something to do with Council's decision to wait for advice from Young.[22]: 157

The dispirited Baker–Fancher party found water and fresh grazing for its livestock after reaching grassy, mountain-ringed Mountain Meadows, a widely known stopover on the old Spanish Trail, in early September. They anticipated several days of rest and recuperation there before the next 40 miles (64 km) would take them out of Utah. On September 7, the party was attacked by Nauvoo Legion militiamen dressed as Native Americans and some Native American Paiutes.[23] The Baker–Fancher party defended itself by encircling and lowering their wagons, wheels chained together, along with digging shallow trenches and throwing dirt both below and into the wagons, which made a strong barrier. Seven immigrants were killed during the opening attack and buried somewhere within the wagon encirclement. Sixteen more were wounded.[24][25] The attack continued for five days, during which the besieged families had little or no access to fresh water or game food and their ammunition was depleted.[23] Organization among the local Mormon leadership reportedly broke down.[19] Fear spread among the militia's leaders that some emigrants had caught sight of white men, and had probably discerned the identity of their attackers. This resulted in an order to kill all the emigrants, with the exception of small children.[26][22]: 174, 178–180

Killings and aftermath

Main article: Killings and aftermath of the Mountain Meadows Massacre

Four of the nine Nauvoo Legion militiamen indicted in 1874 for murder or conspiracy

(Not shown: William H. Dame • William C. Stewart • Ellott Willden • Samuel Jukes • George Adair, Jr.)

John D. Lee - Only suspect convicted and executed. Constable, judge, Indian Agent. Lee conspired in advance with Haight; led initial siege; falsely offered emigrants safe passage; led unwitting train of victims to their surprise execution.

Isaac C. Haight— Stake President, battalion commander, director of Deseret Iron Company.[18]

John H. Higbee - Accused by Lee and others of giving the command to begin the killings.[28] Higbee later disavowed responsibility and blamed Lee for the massacre.[29]

Philip Klingensmith- a Bishop in the church and a private in the militia. Participated in the killings. After disaffiliation from the LDS Church he turned state's evidence against his fellow conspirators.

On Friday, September 11, 1857, two militiamen on horseback approached the Baker–Fancher party wagons, one carrying an American flag and the other with a white flag. They were soon followed by Indian Agent and militia officer John D. Lee who told the battle-weary emigrants that he had negotiated a truce with the Paiutes. Under Mormon protection, the wagon-train members would be escorted safely back to Cedar City, 36 miles (58 km) away, in exchange for turning all of their livestock and supplies over to the Native Americans.[30] Accepting this offer, the emigrants were led out of their fortification, with the adult men being separated from the women and children. The men were paired with a militia escort and when the signal was given,[28] the militiamen turned and shot the male members of the Baker–Fancher party standing by their side. The women and children were then ambushed and killed by more militia that were hiding in nearby bushes and ravines. Members of the militia were sworn to secrecy. A plan was set to blame the massacre on the Native Americans.

Survivor Nancy Saphrona Huff (4) was taken away along with her family's possessions by John Willis to reside at his house until she was returned to relatives in Arkansas two years later.[31]: 80

The militia did not kill small children who were deemed too young to relate what had happened. Nancy Huff, one of the seventeen survivors and just over four years old at the time of the massacre, recalled in an 1875 statement that an eighteenth survivor was killed directly in front of the other children. "At the close of the massacre there was eighteen children still alive, one girl, some ten or twelve years old, they said was too big and could tell, so they killed her, leaving seventeen."[32] The survivors were taken in by local Mormon families.[33] Seventeen of the children were later reclaimed by the US Army and returned to relatives in Arkansas.[34] The treatment of these children while they were held by the Mormons is uncertain, but Captain James Lynch's statement in May 1859 said the surviving children were "in a most wretched condition, half starved, half naked, filthy, infested with vermin, and their eyes diseased from the cruel neglect to which they had been exposed."[35]: 247 Lynch's July 1859 affidavit added that they when they first saw the children they had "little or no clothing" and were "covered with filth and dirt".[35]: 250 [36]

Survivor Christopher "Kit" Fancher as an adult.

Leonard J. Arrington, founder of the Mormon History Association, reports that Brigham Young received the rider, James Haslam, at his office on the same day. When he learned what was contemplated by the militia leaders in Parowan and Cedar City, he sent back a letter stating the Baker–Fancher party was not to be meddled with, and should be allowed to go in peace (although he acknowledged the Native Americans would likely "do as they pleased").[25][37] Young's letter arrived two days too late, on September 13, 1857.

The livestock and personal property of the Baker–Fancher party, including women's jewelry, clothing and bedstuffs were distributed or auctioned off to Mormons.[1][38] Some of the surviving children saw clothing and jewelry that had belonged to their dead mothers and sisters subsequently being worn by Mormon women, and the journalist J.H. Beadle said that jewelry taken from Mountain Meadows was seen in Salt Lake City.[39]

Investigations and prosecutions

Main article: Investigations and prosecutions relating to the Mountain Meadows Massacre

An early investigation was conducted by Brigham Young,[25] who interviewed John D. Lee on September 29, 1857. In 1858, Young sent a report to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs stating that the massacre was the work of Native Americans. The Utah War delayed any investigation by the US federal government until 1859, when Jacob Forney and US Army Brevet Major James Carleton conducted investigations.[40][41] In Carleton's investigation, at Mountain Meadows he found women's hair tangled in sage brush and the bones of children still in their mothers' arms.[42] Carleton later said it was "a sight which can never be forgotten." After gathering up the skulls and bones of those who had died, Carleton's troops buried them and erected a cairn and cross.[42]

Carleton interviewed a few local Mormon settlers and Paiute Native American chiefs and concluded that there was Mormon involvement in the massacre. He issued a report in May 1859, addressed to the US Assistant Adjutant-General, setting forth his findings. Jacob Forney, Superintendent of Indian Affairs for Utah, also conducted an investigation that included visiting the region in the summer of 1859. Forney retrieved many of the surviving children of massacre victims who had been housed with Mormon families and gathered them up for transportation to their relatives in Arkansas. Forney concluded that the Paiutes did not act alone and the massacre would not have occurred without the white settlers,[40] and Carleton report to the US Congress called the mass killings a "heinous crime",[15] blaming both local and senior church leaders for the massacre.

In March 1859, Judge John Cradlebaugh, a federal judge brought into the territory after the Utah War, convened a grand jury in Provo concerning the massacre, but the jury declined any indictments.[43][44][45] Nevertheless, Cradlebaugh conducted a tour of the Mountain Meadows area with a military escort.[46] He attempted to arrest John D. Lee, Isaac Haight, and John Higbee, who fled before they could be found.[47] Cradlebaugh publicly charged Brigham Young as an instigator to the massacre and therefore an "accessory before the fact".[46] Possibly as a protective measure against the mistrusted federal court system, Mormon territorial probate court judge Elias Smith arrested Young under a territorial warrant, perhaps hoping to divert any trial of Young into a friendly Mormon territorial court.[48] Apparently because no federal charges ensued, Young was released.[46]

The scene at Lee's execution by Utah firing squad on March 23, 1877. Lee is seated, next to his coffin.

1877 article on John D. Lee's execution.[49]

Further investigations were cut short by the American Civil War in 1861.[50] The US posted bounties of $5000 USD (equivalent to $127,300 in 2025[51]) each for the capture of Haight, Higbee, Stewart, and Philip Klingensmith. Dame, Klingensmith, Ellott Willden, and George Adair Jr. were indicted and arrested while warrants to pursue the arrests of four others who had gone into hiding (Haight, Higbee, William C. Stewart, and Samuel Jukes) were being obtained. Klingensmith escaped prosecution by agreeing to testify.[52] Brigham Young excommunicated some participants, including Haight and Lee, from the LDS Church in 1870. Philip Klingensmith had been a bishop but then had left the church and moved to Nevada by the time of his arrest.[53][54]

Lee was arrested on November 7, 1874.[55] His first trial began on July 23, 1875, in Beaver, before a jury of eight Mormons and four non-Mormons.[56] One of Lee's defense attorneys was Enos D. Hoge, a former territorial supreme court justice.[57] The trial led to a hung jury on August 5, 1875. Lee's second trial began September 13, 1876, before an all-Mormon jury. The prosecution called Daniel Wells, Laban Morrill, Joel White, Samuel Knight, Samuel McMurdy, Nephi Johnson, and Jacob Hamblin.[58] Lee also stipulated, against advice of counsel, that the prosecution be allowed to re-use the depositions of Young and Smith from the previous trial.[59] Lee called no witnesses in his defense,[60] and was convicted.

Lee was entitled under Utah Territorial statute to choose the method of his execution from three possible options: hanging, firing squad, or decapitation. At sentencing, Lee chose to be executed by firing squad.[61] In his final words before his sentence was carried out at Mountain Meadows on March 23, 1877, Lee said that he was a scapegoat for others involved.[62] Brigham Young stated that Lee's fate was just, but it was not a sufficient blood atonement, given the enormity of the crime.[63]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

Dietary Supplements in the Time of COVID-19

Fact Sheet for Health Professionals

Data are insufficient to support recommendations for or against the use of any vitamin, mineral, herb or other botanical, fatty acid, or other dietary supplement ingredient to prevent or treat COVID-19.

Introduction

COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), emerged in 2019 and caused a global pandemic [1]. Common initial signs and symptoms include cough, fever, fatigue, headache, muscle aches and pain, and diarrhea [2]. Some individuals with COVID-19 become severely ill, usually starting about 1 week after symptom onset; severe COVID-19 often involves progressive respiratory failure and may also result in life-threatening pneumonia, multiorgan failure, and death [2,3]. In addition, many individuals who have had COVID-19 report symptoms of post-acute sequelae of COVID (including breathlessness, cough, fatigue, muscle aches and weakness, sleep difficulties, and cognitive dysfunction), commonly known as long COVID, for weeks, months, or years after the acute stage of illness has passed [4-8]. The risk of long COVID appears to be higher in people who are hospitalized following SARS-CoV-2 infection compared with those who have less severe disease. It also appears to be higher in those who are not vaccinated against COVID-19 compared with those who are vaccinated [4].

Currently, data are insufficient to support recommendations for or against the use of any vitamin, mineral, herb, fatty acid, or other dietary supplement ingredient to prevent or treat COVID-19 [9]. Nevertheless, the sales of dietary supplements marketed to support immune health increased after the emergence of COVID-19 [10,11]. By law, dietary supplements are not allowed to be marketed as a treatment, prevention, or cure for any disease; only drugs can legally make such claims [12].

The immune system defends the body from pathogens that cause disease and is comprised of innate responses, which are the first line of defense, and adaptive responses, which become engaged later [13-15].

The innate immune system includes physical barriers, such as the skin and gut epithelium, that help prevent pathogen entry. It also includes leukocytes (white blood cells)—such as neutrophils, macrophages (which release cytokines), and natural killer cells—that attempt to find and eliminate foreign pathogens. However, these components are nonspecific, meaning that unlike the adaptive immune system, they do not recognize and respond to specific pathogens [13,14].

The adaptive immune system is pathogen specific and consists of B lymphocytes (B cells) that secrete antibodies into the blood and tissues (a process known as humoral immunity) and T lymphocytes (T cells) that destroy infected cells (a process known as cell-mediated immunity) [15]. The adaptive response takes several days or weeks to develop, but it generates immunological memory; as a result, a subsequent exposure to the same pathogen leads to a vigorous and rapid immune response [13,15]. Vaccinations enable the adaptive immune system to protect the body from exposures to the same pathogen in the future [14].

The body’s immune response to pathogens leads to inflammation, causing redness, swelling, heat, pain, and a loss of tissue function [16]. Inflammation helps eliminate the pathogen and initiate the healing process, but it can also cause symptoms and severe pathologies [16,17]. For example, the activation of CD8 T cells as part of the adaptive immune response can increase inflammation and cause pulmonary damage. This process can lead to acute respiratory distress syndrome, which has occurred in some patients with COVID-19 [17]. Other signs of inflammation that can appear in patients with COVID-19 include elevated levels of C-reactive protein and interleukin-6 [2]. Some patients with COVID-19 experience a cytokine storm, a critical condition caused by the excessive production of inflammatory cytokines, including tumor necrosis factor-alpha, interleukin-1 beta, and interleukin-6 [3,18]. This condition increases disease severity and the risk of death, so tempering the body’s inflammatory response is an important component of COVID-19 management.

People require several vitamins and minerals—including vitamin C, vitamin D, and zinc—for proper immune function, and clinical deficiencies of these nutrients can increase susceptibility to infections [9,14,19]. Other dietary supplement ingredients, such as botanicals and probiotics, do not have essential roles in the body but might affect immune function.

Some studies have investigated whether dietary supplement ingredients might enhance immune function in people with COVID-19. However, measuring the impact that vitamins, minerals, and other dietary supplement ingredients have on the immune system is difficult because the immune system is a complex network of organs, tissues, and cells. Immune function can be assessed indirectly by examining a person’s risk of infectious diseases and the severity of their symptoms, but there is no single method for directly measuring immune system function and resistance to disease [20,21]. This can make it difficult to interpret the results of clinical trials that evaluate the use of supplements in people with COVID-19. In addition, many of these trials were exploratory, had small sample sizes, were not randomized or placebo controlled, and used varying supplement doses and formulations [22-24].

Other studies have examined the associations between serum or plasma concentrations of vitamins or minerals and the risk of COVID-19 or disease severity. However, serum or plasma nutrient concentrations might not reflect body stores [25]. Furthermore, the onset of disease can alter nutrient concentrations [26,27]; it cannot be assumed that the nutrient concentrations observed in these studies contributed to the onset of COVID-19 or its severity.

This fact sheet summarizes the state of the science on the safety and efficacy of several dietary supplements. Ingredients are presented in alphabetical order. In addition, this fact sheet briefly discusses interactions between dietary supplement ingredients and medications. However, especially for botanicals, this information is often based on individual case reports and theoretical interactions derived from animal studies, cellular assays, or other indirect evidence. In most cases, potential interactions have not been adequately evaluated in clinical settings [28,29].

https://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/COVID19-HealthProfessional/

The CORONA [1] program was a series of American strategic reconnaissance satellites produced and operated by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Directorate of Science & Technology with substantial assistance from the U.S. Air Force. The CORONA satellites were used for photographic surveillance of the Soviet Union (USSR), China, and other areas beginning in June 1959 and ending in May 1972."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CORONA_(satellite)

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019.[7] Most scientists believe the SARS-CoV-2 virus entered into human populations through natural zoonosis, similar to the SARS-CoV-1 and MERS-CoV outbreaks, and consistent with other pandemics in human history.[8][9] Social and environmental factors including climate change, natural ecosystem destruction and wildlife trade increased the likelihood of such zoonotic spillover.[10][11][12][13] The disease quickly spread worldwide, resulting in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The symptoms of COVID‑19 are variable but often include fever,[14] fatigue, cough, breathing difficulties, loss of smell, and loss of taste.[15][16][17] Symptoms may begin one to fourteen days after exposure to the virus. At least a third of people who are infected do not develop noticeable symptoms.[18][19] Of those who develop symptoms noticeable enough to be classified as patients, most (81%) develop mild to moderate symptoms (up to mild pneumonia), while 14% develop severe symptoms (dyspnea, hypoxia, or more than 50% lung involvement on imaging), and 5% develop critical symptoms (respiratory failure, shock, or multiorgan dysfunction).[20] Older people are at a higher risk of developing severe symptoms. Some complications result in death. Some people continue to experience a range of effects (long COVID) for months or years after infection, and damage to organs has been observed.[21] Multi-year studies are underway to further investigate the long-term effects of the disease.[22]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19

Covid origins: Chinese scientists publish long-awaited data Published 7 April

By Victoria Gill Science correspondent, BBC News

A research team in China has published analysis of samples taken more than three years ago from the market linked to the outbreak of Covid-19. The Huanan seafood and wildlife market has been a focal point in the search for the origin of the coronavirus. But this is the first peer-reviewed study of biological evidence gathered from the market back in 2020. By linking the virus with animals sold in the market, it could open new lines of inquiry into how the outbreak began. The research reveals swabs that tested positive for the virus also contained genetic material from wild animals. Some scientists say this is further evidence that the disease was initially transmitted from an infected animal to a human. But others have urged caution in interpreting the findings and it remains unclear why it took three years for the genetic content of the samples to be made public. Another theory has centred on the suggestion that the virus accidentally leaked from a laboratory in Wuhan. No definitive proof The Chinese research team posted an early version of their study online back in February 2022, but they did not publish the full genetic information that was contained in the samples gathered from the market. In March this year, another international group of researchers shared their own assessment of what those crucial market swabs had revealed, after spotting that the genetic sequences had been posted on a scientific data-sharing website. This new analysis, which has been validated by other scientists before being published in the journal Nature, includes more important detail about the content of those samples, which were collected from stalls, surfaces, cages and machinery inside the market. The Chinese research team's paper showed that some samples - collected from areas where wildlife was being sold - had tested positive for the virus. Their analysis also showed that animals now known to be susceptible to the virus, particularly raccoon dogs, were being sold alive in those locations. But the Chinese researchers have pointed out that their discoveries fall short of definitive proof of how the outbreak started. "These environmental samples cannot prove that the animals were infected," the paper explains. The possibility remains, it adds, that the virus was brought into the market by an infected person, rather than an animal. Prof David Robertson, from the University of Glasgow, is a virologist who has been involved in the genetic investigation into the origin of SARS-CoV-2 since it emerged in 2020. He told BBC News: "The most important thing is that this very important dataset is now published and available for others to work on." But he added that the contents of the samples were "compelling evidence that animals there were probably infected with the virus". "It's the whole body of evidence that's important," he said. "When you bring this together with the fact that the early Covid-19 cases in Wuhan are linked to the market, it's strong evidence that this is where a spillover from an animal in the market occurred." The published findings come amid signs that the lab leak theory is gaining ground among authorities in the US. The Chinese government has strenuously denied suggestions that the virus originated in a scientific facility, but the FBI said it now believes that scenario is the "most likely", as does the US Department of Energy. Various US departments and agencies have investigated the mystery and produced differing conclusions, but on 1 March the FBI's director accused Beijing of "doing its best to try to thwart and obfuscate", and disclosed the bureau had been convinced of the lab leak theory "for quite some time now". The FBI has not made their findings public, which has frustrated some scientists. The lead researcher of the new report, from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC) in Beijing, has been contacted by the BBC for comment."

Covid origins: Chinese scientists publish long-awaited data - BBC News

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-65204169

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

Crown Plaza - Chinese restaurant 1 Tiyuguan Rd Wuchang District, Wuhan, Hubei China 430071

"Nowadays, everyone is aware of the word “corona” in the wake of the COVID-19 global pandemic. “Corona” is a Latin word which means “crown or garland”. Coronaviruses have a crown or halo-like appearance of their envelope glycoproteins.[1] Few body structures and dermatoses also share the name corona. This article summarises all such structures and diseases." Coronavirus is Not the Only Corona We Know in Dermatology - PMC (nih.gov)

East Lake High-tech Zone is short for Wuhan East Lake High-tech Development Zone, which is also known as Optics Valley of China (OVC). East Lake High-tech Zone was founded in 1988 and was approved by the State Council in succession as one of the first national high-tech zones, the second National Innovation Demonstration Zone, the China (Hubei) Pilot Free Trade Zone – Wuhan Area and the core area for the Hubei Cross-Straits Industrial Cooperation Zone. Optics Valley has also been recognized as a National Optoelectronic Information Industrial Base, a National Bio-industry Base, a talent base for central SOEs, a National Innovation and Entrepreneurship Demonstration Base, as well as a National Memory Base.

Developmental milestones Establishment of East Lake High-tech Development Zone (1988)

Approved as one of the first national high-tech zones (1991)

Recognized as National Optoelectronics Information Industrial Base, also known as Wuhan Optics Valley of China (2001)

Approved as National Bio-industry Base (2007)

Approved by the State Council as the second National Innovation Demonstration Zone (2009)

Wuhan Future City was set to be a talent base for central SOEs (2011)

Recognized as China (Hubei) Pilot Free Trade Zone Wuhan Area (2016)

Recognized as one of the national innovation and entrepreneurship demonstration bases (2016)

National Memory Base (2016)

Listed as one of the top 10 high-tech zones to receive prioritized support by Ministry of Science and Technology (2017)

The zone has a planned area of 518 square kilometers and a population of about 1.8 million. It has 42 institutes of higher learning, including Wuhan University and Huazhong University of Science and Technology. It also has 56 research institutes at the national, provincial and ministerial levels and more than 300,000 professional and technical personnel, making Optics Valley one of the three most talent-intensive areas in the country. The zone has eight sub-districts: Guandong, Fozuling, Baoxie, Jiufeng, Huashan, Zuoling, Longquan and Binhu. It has eight industrial parks: the Biolake, Wuhan Future City, Wuhan East Lake Free Trade Zone, Optics Valley Optoelectronic Information Industrial Park, Optics Valley Modern Service Industrial Park, Optics Valley Smart Manufacturing Industrial Park, Optics Valley Chinese Sci-tech City and Optics Valley Central City. To augment its industrial ecosystem, the zone is constructing two world-class trillion-yuan-level industry clusters – namely the "Optics, IC, Displays, Terminals and Internet" cluster and the biomedicines cluster. It is also vigorously developing industrial forms of new economy and advancing the layout of future industries such as artificial intelligence, to constantly upgrade its primacy. In accordance with a three-step strategy for its development as a World Optics Valley, the zone is adhering to international standards. It is vigorously implementing a three-year action for high-quality development and is accelerating its construction as an internationally innovative Optics Valley, a modern and prosperous Optics Valley and an environmentally beautiful Optics Valley. OVC is currently home to 144 enterprises recognized among the new group of little giant companies set by the Department of Economy and Information Technology of Hubei Province."

Profile (chinaopticsvalley.com)

http://www.chinaopticsvalley.com/2021-03/23/c_631197.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CORONA_(satellite)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19

Havana syndrome ’ and the mystery of the microwaves by Gordon Carera

"Doctors, scientists, intelligence agents and government officials have all been trying to find out what causes "Havana syndrome" - a mysterious illness that has struck American diplomats and spies. Some call it an act of war, others wonder if it is some new and secret form of surveillance - and some people believe it could even be all in the mind. So who or what is responsible? It often started with a sound, one that people struggled to describe. "Buzzing", "grinding metal", "piercing squeals", was the best they could manage. One woman described a low hum and intense pressure in her skull; another felt a pulse of pain. Those who did not hear a sound, felt heat or pressure. But for those who heard the sound, covering their ears made no difference. Some of the people who experienced the syndrome were left with dizziness and fatigue for months. Havana syndrome first emerged in Cuba in 2016. The first cases were CIA officers, which meant they were kept secret. But, eventually, word got out and anxiety spread. Twenty-six personnel and family members would report a wide variety of symptoms. There were whispers that some colleagues thought sufferers were crazy and it was "all in the mind". Five years on, reports now number in the hundreds and, the BBC has been told, span every continent, leaving a real impact on the US's ability to operate overseas. Uncovering the truth has now become a top US national security priority - one that an official has described as the most difficult intelligence challenge they have ever faced. Hard evidence has been elusive, making the syndrome a battleground for competing theories. Some see it as a psychological illness, others a secret weapon. But a growing trail of evidence has focused on microwaves as the most likely culprit. In 2015, diplomatic relations between the US and Cuba were restored after decades of hostility. But within two years, Havana syndrome almost shut the embassy down, as staff were withdrawn because of concerns for their welfare. Initially, there was speculation that the Cuban government - or a hard-line faction opposed to improving relations - might be responsible, having deployed some kind of sonic weapon. Cuba's security services, after all, had been nervous about an influx of US personnel and kept a tight grip on the capital. That theory would fade as cases spread around the world. But recently, another possibility has come into the frame - one whose roots lay in the darker recesses of the Cold War, and a place where science, medicine, espionage and geopolitics collide. When James Lin, a professor at the University of Illinois, read the first reports about the mysterious sounds in Havana, he immediately suspected that microwaves were responsible. His belief was based not just on theoretical research, but first-hand experience. Decades earlier, he had heard the sounds himself. Since its emergence around World War Two, there had been reports of people being able to hear something when a nearby radar was switched on and began sending microwaves into the sky. This was even though there was no external noise. In 1961, a paper by Dr Allen Frey argued the sounds were caused by microwaves interacting with the nervous system, leading to the term the "Frey Effect". But the exact causes - and implications - remained unclear. In the 1970s, Prof Lin set to work conducting his experiments at the University of Washington. He sat on a wooden chair in a small room lined with absorbent materials, an antenna aimed at the back of his head. In his hand he held a light switch. Outside, a colleague sent pulses of microwaves through the antenna at random intervals. If Prof Lin heard a sound, he pressed the switch. A single pulse sounded like a zip or a clicking finger. A series of pulses like a bird chirping. They were produced in his head rather than as sound waves coming from outside. Prof Lin believed the energy was absorbed by the soft brain tissue and converted to a pressure wave moving inside the head, which was interpreted by the brain as sound. This occurred when high-power microwaves were delivered as pulses rather than in the low-power continuous form you get from a modern microwave oven or other devices. Prof Lin recalls that he was careful not to dial it up too high. "I did not want to have my brain damaged," he told the BBC. In 1978, he found he was not alone in his interest, and received an unusual invitation to discuss his latest paper from a group of scientists who had been carrying out their own experiments. During the Cold War, science was the focus of intense super-power rivalry. Even areas like mind control were explored, amid fears of the other side getting an edge - and this included microwaves. Prof Lin was shown the Soviet approach at a centre of scientific research in the town of Pushchino, near Moscow. "They had a very elaborate, very well-equipped laboratory," Prof Lin recalls. But their experiment was cruder than his. The subject would sit in a drum of salty seawater with their head sticking out. Then microwaves would be fired at their brain. The scientists thought the microwaves interacted with the nervous system and wanted to question Prof Lin on his alternative view. Curiosity cut both ways, and US spies kept close track on Soviet research. A 1976 report by the US Defense Intelligence Agency, unearthed by the BBC, says it could find no proof of Communist-bloc microwave weapons, but says it had learnt of experiments where microwaves were pulsed at the throat of frogs until their hearts stopped. The report also reveals that the US was concerned Soviet microwaves could be used to impair brain function or induce sounds for psychological effect. "Their internal sound perception research has great potential for development into a system for disorienting or disrupting the behaviour patterns of military or diplomatic personnel." American interest was more than just defensive. James Lin would occasionally glimpse references to secret US work on weapons in the same field. And while Prof Lin was in Pushchino, another group of Americans not far away were worried that they were being zapped by microwaves - and that their own government had covered it up. For nearly a quarter of a century, the 10-storey US embassy in Moscow was bathed by a wide, invisible beam of low-level microwaves. It became known as "the Moscow signal". But for many years, most of those working inside knew nothing. The beam came from an antenna on the balcony of a nearby Soviet apartment and hit the upper floors of the embassy where the ambassador's office and more sensitive work was carried out. It had been first spotted in the 1950s and was later monitored from a room on the 10th floor. But its existence was a secret tightly held from all but a few working inside. "We were trying to figure out just what might be its purpose," explains Jack Matlock, number two at the embassy in the mid-70s. But a new ambassador, Walter Stoessel, arrived in 1974 and threatened to resign unless everyone was told. "That caused something like panic," recalls Mr Matlock. Embassy staff whose children were in a basement nursery were especially worried. But the State Department played down any risk. Then Ambassador Stoessel, himself, fell ill - with bleeding of the eyes as one of his symptoms. In a now declassified 1975 phone call to the Soviet ambassador to Washington, US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger linked Stoessel's illness to microwaves, admitting "we are trying to keep the thing quiet". Stoessel died of leukaemia at the age of 66. "He decided to play the good soldier", and not make a fuss, his daughter told the BBC. From 1976 screens were installed to protect people. But many diplomats were angry, believing the State Department had first kept quiet, and then resisted acknowledging any possible health impact. This was a claim echoed decades later with Havana syndrome. What was the Moscow signal for? "I'm pretty sure that the Soviets had intentions other than damaging us," says Matlock. They were ahead of the US in surveillance technology and one theory was that they bounced microwaves off windows to pick up conversations, another that they were activating their own listening devices hidden inside the building or capturing information through microwaves hitting US electronic devices (known as "peek and poke"). The Soviets at one point told Matlock that the purpose was actually to jam American equipment on the embassy roof used to intercept Soviet communications in Moscow. This is the world of surveillance and counter-surveillance, one so secret that even within embassies and governments only a few people know the full picture. One theory is that Havana involved a much more targeted method to carry out some kind of surveillance with higher-power, directed microwaves. One former UK intelligence official told the BBC that microwaves could be used to "illuminate" electronic devices to extract signals or identify and track them. Others speculate that a device (even perhaps an American one) might have been poorly engineered or malfunctioned and caused a physical reaction in some people. However, US officials tell the BBC no device has been identified or recovered. After a lull, cases began to spread beyond Cuba. In December 2017, Marc Polymeropolous woke suddenly in a Moscow hotel room. A senior CIA officer, he was in town to meet Russian counterparts. "My ears were ringing, my head was spinning. I felt like I was going to vomit. I couldn't stand up," he told the BBC. "It was terrifying." It was a year after the first Havana cases, but the CIA medical office told him his symptoms didn't match the Cuban cases. A long battle for medical treatment began. The severe headaches never went away and in the summer of 2019 he was forced to retire. Mr Polymreopolous originally thought he had been hit by some kind of technical surveillance tool that had been "turned up too much". But when more cases emerged at the CIA which were all, he says, linked to people working on Russia, he came to believe he had been targeted with a weapon. But then came China, including at the consulate in Guangzhou in early 2018. Some of those affected in China contacted Beatrice Golomb, a professor at the University of California, San Diego, who has long researched the health effects of microwaves, as well as other unexplained illnesses. She told the BBC that she wrote to the State Department's medical team in January 2018 with a detailed account of why she thought microwaves were responsible. "This makes for interesting reading," was the non-committal response. Prof Golomb says high levels of radiation were recorded by family members of personnel in Guangzhou using commercially available equipment. "The needle went off the top of the available readings." But she says the State Department told its own employees that the measurements they had taken off their own back were classified. A host of problems plagued early investigations. There was a failure to collect consistent data. The State Department and CIA failed to communicate with each other, and the scepticism of their internal medical teams caused tension. Only one out of the nine cases from China was initially determined by the State Department to match the criteria for the syndrome based on Havana cases. That left others who experienced symptoms angry, and feeling as if they were being accused of making it up. They began a battle for equal treatment, which is still going on today. As frustration grew, some of those affected turned to Mark Zaid, a lawyer who specialises in national security cases. He now acts for around two dozen government personnel, half from the intelligence community. "This is not Havana syndrome. It's a misnomer," argues Mr Zaid, whose clients were affected in many locations. "What's been going on has been known by the United States government probably, based on evidence that I have seen, since the late 1960s." Since 2013, Mr Zaid has represented one employee of the US National Security Agency who believed they were damaged in 1996 in a location which remains classified. Mr Zaid questions why the US government has been so unwilling to acknowledge a longer history. One possibility, he says, is because it might open a Pandora's Box of incidents that have been ignored over the years. Another is because the US, too, has developed and perhaps even deployed microwaves itself and wants to keep it secret. The country's interest in weaponising microwaves extended beyond the end of the Cold War. Reports say from the 1990s, the US Air Force had a project codenamed "Hello" to see if microwaves could create disturbing sounds in people's heads, one called "Goodbye" to test their use for crowd control, and one codenamed "Goodnight" to see if they could be used to kill people. Reports from a decade ago suggested these had not proved successful. But the study of the mind and what can be done to it has been receiving increased focus within the military and security world. "The brain is being seen as the 21st Century battle-scape," argues James Giordano, an adviser to the Pentagon and Professor in Neurology and Biochemistry at Georgetown University, who was asked to look at the initial Havana cases. "Brain sciences are global. It is not just the province of what used to be known as the West." Ways to both augment and damage brain function are being worked on, he told the BBC. But it is a field with little transparency or rules. He says China and Russia have been engaged in microwave research and raises the possibility that tools developed for industrial and commercial uses - for instance to test the impact of microwaves on materials - could have been repurposed. But he also wonders if disruption and spreading fear were also the aim. This kind of technology may have been around for a while - and even have been used selectively. But that would still mean something changed in Cuba to get it noticed. Bill Evanina was a senior intelligence official when the Havana cases emerged, and stepped down as the head of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center this year. He has little doubt about what happened in Havana. "Was it an offensive weapon? I believe it was," he told the BBC. He believes microwaves may have been deployed in recent military conflicts, but points to specific circumstances to explain a shift. Cuba, 90 miles off the Florida coast, has long been an ideal site to collect "signals intelligence" by intercepting communications. During the Cold War, it was home to a major Soviet listening station. When Vladimir Putin visited in 2014, reports suggested it was being re-opened. China also opened two sites in recent years, according to one source, while the Russians sent in 30 additional intelligence officers. But from 2015, the US was back in town. With its newly opened embassy and a beefed-up presence, the US was just beginning to establish its footing, collecting intelligence and pushing back against Russian and Chinese spies. "We were in a ground fight," one person recalls. Then the sounds began. "Who had the most to benefit from the closing of the embassy in Havana?" asks Mr Evanina. "If the Russian government was increasing and promulgating their intelligence collection in Cuba, it was probably not good for them to have the US in Cuba." Russia has repeatedly dismissed accusations it is involved, or has "directed microwave weapons". "Such provocative, baseless speculation and fanciful hypotheses can't really be considered a serious matter for comment," its foreign ministry has said. And there have been sceptics about the very existence of Havana syndrome. They argue that the unique situation in Cuba supports their case.

Contagious Stress

Robert W Baloh, a Professor of Neurology at UCLA, has long studied unexplained health symptoms. When he saw the Havana syndrome reports, he concluded they were a mass psychogenic condition. He compares this to the way people feel sick when they are told they have eaten tainted food even if there was nothing wrong with it - the reverse of the placebo effect. "When you see mass psychogenic illness, there's usually some stressful underlying situation," he says. "In the case of Cuba and the mass of the embassy employees - particularly the CIA agents who first were affected - they certainly were in a stressful situation." In his view, every-day symptoms like brain fog and dizziness are reframed - by sufferers, media and health professionals - as the syndrome. "The symptoms are as real as any other symptoms," he says, arguing that individuals became hyper-aware and fearful as reports spread, especially within a closed community. This, he believes, then became contagious among other US officials serving abroad.

There remain many unexplained elements. Why did Canadian diplomats report symptoms in Havana? Were they collateral damage from targeting nearby Americans? And why have no UK officials reported symptoms? "The Russians have literally tried to kill people on British soil in recent years with radioactive materials, yet why are there no reported cases?" asks Mark Zaid. "I would probably put on pause the statement that no-one in the UK has experienced any symptoms," responds Bill Evanina, who says the US is now sharing details with allies to spot cases. Some instances may be unrelated. "We had a bunch of military folk in the Middle East who claimed to have this attack - turned out they had food poisoning," says one former official. "We need to separate the wheat from the chaff," reckons Mark Zaid, who says members of the public, some with mental health issues, approach him claiming to suffer from microwave attacks. One former official reckons around half the cases reported by US officials are possibly linked to attacks by an adversary. Others say the real number could be even smaller. A December 2020 report by the US National Academies of Sciences was a pivotal moment. Experts took evidence from scientists and clinicians as well as eight victims. "It was quite dramatic," recalls Professor David Relman of Stanford, who chaired the panel. "Some of these people literally were in hiding, for fear of further actions against them by whomever. There were actually precautions we had to take to ensure their safety." The panel looked at psychological and other causes, but concluded that directed, high energy, pulsed microwaves were most likely responsible for some of the cases, similar to the view of James Lin, who gave evidence. But even though the State Department sponsored the study, it still considers the conclusion only a plausible hypothesis and officials say they have not found further evidence to support it. The Biden administration has signalled it is taking the issue seriously. CIA and State Department officials are given advice on how to respond to incidents (including 'getting off the X' - meaning physically moving from a spot if they feel they are getting hit). The State Department has set up a task force to support staff over what are now called "unexplained health incidents". Previous attempts to categorise cases as to whether they met specific criteria have been abandoned. But without a definition, it becomes harder to count. This year, a new wave of cases arrived - including Berlin and a larger group in Vienna. In August, a trip by US Vice-President Kamala Harris to Vietnam was delayed three hours because of a reported case at the embassy in Hanoi. Worried diplomats are now asking questions before taking foreign assignments with their families. "This is a major distraction for us if we think that the Russians are doing things to our intelligence officers who are travelling," says former CIA officer Polymreopolous, who finally received the medical treatment he wanted this year. "That's going to put a crimp in our operational footprint." The CIA has taken over the hunt for a cause, with a veteran of the hunt for Osama bin Laden placed in charge.

Markers In The Blood

An accusation that another state has been harming US officials is a consequential one. "That's an act of war," says Mr Polymeropolous. That makes it a high bar to reach. Policymakers will demand hard evidence, which so far, officials say, is still lacking. Five years on, some US officials say little more is known other than when Havana syndrome started. But others disagree. They say the evidence for microwaves is much stronger now, if not yet conclusive. The BBC has learnt that new evidence is arriving as data is collected and analysed more systematically for the first time. Some of the cases this year showed specific markers in the blood, indicating brain injury. These markers fall away after a few days and previously too much time had elapsed to spot them. But now that people are being tested much more quickly after reporting symptoms, they have been seen for the first time. The debate remains divisive and it is possible the answer is complex. There may be a core of real cases, while others have been folded into the syndrome. Officials raise the possibility that the technology and the intent might have changed over time, perhaps shifting to try and unsettle the US. Some even worry one state may have piggy-backed on another's activities. "We like a simple label diagnosis," argues Professor Relman. "But sometimes it is tough to achieve. And when we can't, we have to be very careful not to simply throw up our hands and walk away." The mystery of Havana syndrome could be its real power. The ambiguity and fear it spreads act as a multiplier, making more and more people wonder if they are suffering, and making it harder for spies and diplomats to operate overseas. Even if it began as a tightly defined incident, Havana syndrome may have developed a life of its own."

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-58396698

I want 5G, and even 6G, technology in the United States as soon as possible. It is far more powerful, faster, and smarter than the current standard. American companies must step up their efforts, or get left behind. There is no reason that we should be lagging behind on.........

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 21, 2019

Space Fence surveillance radar site declared operational

The $1.5 billion Space Fence can track tiny objects in low Earth orbit as small as a marble.

Sandra Erwin

March 28, 2020

WASHINGTON — The space surveillance radar site known as the Space Fence is ready for use after five years in construction, the U.S. Space Force announced March 27.

The $1.5 billion Space Fence — located on Kwajalein Island in the Republic of the Marshall Islands — is a ground-based radar system that tracks satellites and space debris primarily in low Earth orbit. Lockheed Martin was selected as the prime contractor in 2014.

The Space Fence can track tiny objects as small as a marble. It also provides a search capability for objects at higher orbits. Data from the Space Fence will feed into the military’s Space Surveillance Network.

The Space Surveillance Network tracks about 26,000 objects. The addition of the Space Fence will increase the catalog size significantly over time, the Space Force said in a news release.

The Space Fence is operated by the 20th Space Control Squadron based in Huntsville, Alabama. The squadron provides data to the 18th Space Control Squadron located at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, the unit responsible for maintaining the space object catalog.

“Space Fence is revolutionizing the way we view space by providing timely, precise orbital data on objects that threaten both manned and unmanned military and commercial space assets,” said Chief of Space Operations Gen. John Raymond.

The solid-state S-band radar will detect closely spaced objects, breakups, maneuvers, launches, conjunction assessments and depleted rocket boosters.

https://spacenews.com/space-fence-surveillance-radar-site-declared-operational/

Lyon County Sheriff's Office - Nevada

February 26, 2020 ·

Sixteen years ago today, the Serenko family lost a loved one and the Lyon County Sheriff's Office lost one of our brothers.

Deputy Mick Serenko was born in Perth Amboy, New Jersey but lived most of his life in Salt Lake City, Utah.

The day after he graduated high school Mick joined the Navy and he always said it was the best move he ever made. The Navy gave him stability and focus in his life, it enabled him to see much of the world, and it helped him gain an education (majoring in Criminal Justice).

When Mick talked about retiring from the Navy it was always with the idea of becoming a law enforcement officer. He and his lovely wife, Sharon, checked out several areas around the country (including Texas and Washington State) but ultimately decided on Nevada as the place to plant their roots.

Mick went to work for the Lyon County Sheriff's Office and served there until the night he suffered a major heart attack on the job. He was hospitalized and passed away a couple days later on February 26, 2004.

Deputy Mick Serenko loved being a cop and he is sorely missed.

https://www.facebook.com/story.php/?story_fbid=1234461393427621&id=100064937010102

Alameda County Sheriff's Office

February 14, 2022 ·

DEATH OF ALAMEDA COUNTY DEPUTY SHERIFF AUBREY PHILLIPS

For Immediate Release:

It is with tremendous sadness we report the sudden and unexpected death of Deputy Sheriff Aubrey Phillips.

On Saturday, February 12, 2022, Deputy Phillips was assigned as a patrol officer to the City of Dublin, California a contract police service of the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office. About 1:46 am, Deputy Phillips conducted a traffic enforcement stop in which she arrested the driver of the vehicle. During the process of that arrest, while seated in her patrol vehicle, Deputy Phillips suffered a severe and acute medical emergency. Another officer noticed Deputy Phillips in distress and immediately began life saving efforts and called for emergency medical services. Deputy Phillips was rushed to Stanford Valley Care Hospital in Pleasanton, California and was listed in critical condition. She was transported to John Muir Medical Center in Walnut Creek for life saving intervention. Tragically, medical professionals were unable to save her life and she passed away.

Deputy Phillips was a registered organ donor and she will donate her organs to others as a result of her death. Sheriff Gregory Ahern stated, “This tragic event has touched each member of this agency. Aubrey’s short life will live on even after her passing. Aubrey will continue to serve her community by giving the gift of life to others in need. She was truly a remarkable person and served this agency and Alameda County with dignity and honor.”

Deputy Phillips was 36 years old. She was a five year veteran of the Agency and assigned as a midnight shift patrol officer in the City of Dublin. Deputy Phillips is the daughter of an honorably retired Alameda County Deputy Sheriff and her husband is a current Deputy Sheriff for Alameda County. Deputy Phillips and her husband have three young children.

Our Agency is heartbroken over the sudden death of Deputy Phillips. We are providing counseling and peer support to our members impacted by her loss.

Further information regarding funeral services will be provided at a later date.

*Photographs of Aubrey Phillips are attached for media use.

Lt. Ray Kelly

Chief of Staff

Public Information officer

Alameda County Sheriff’s Office

1401 Lakeside Dr. 12th Floor

Oakland, CA 94612

https://www.facebook.com/ACSOSheriffs/posts/pfbid03FbGAv9eFcNaheypozH59kCLJkzHLwrL7qgUHbStiV9MtbcBU9pUt7KpTPk8Hbngl

Salvador Miranda (October 18, 1939 – June 1, 2024) was an American bibliographer, librarian and church historian.[1][2]

Biography

Miranda was born on October 18, 1939, in Havana, Cuba.[2] In 1958, he graduated from the Jesuit-run Colegio de Belén in Havana after which he attended the law school at the University of Havana.[2] After the Cuban Revolution in 1963, he moved to Puerto Rico to study humanities at the University of Puerto Rico.[2] As a young Cuban exile, he was a member of the Cuban-American expeditionary force in the failed Bay of Pigs invasion.[1] He then returned to school graduating with a B.A. in History and Philosophy from Biscayne College; an M.A. in Modern European History in 1974 from Villanova University; and an M.S. in Library and Information Science in 1976 from Florida State University.[2] After graduating from Florida State, he accepted a position as the Latin American and Caribbean Bibliographer at the University of Florida Libraries in Gainesville.[2] In 1986, he served as assistant director for Collection Management at Florida International University Libraries in Miami.[2] On June 30, 2001, he retired.[2]

The title of his 319-page master's thesis in history was The Sacred College of Cardinals in the Twentieth Century (1903-1973): Developments, Documents and Biographies[2] which he expanded to include earlier cardinals and then digitized, making it available as an online resource.[1] In appreciation of his research, Bishop Cipriano Calderón Polo, the founding director of the Spanish edition of the Vatican newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano and the vice president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, whom he corresponded with for years over the history of the episcopacy, invited him to present at the first continental meeting of bishops from Latin America in 1999.[1][3]

His research and expertise has been used as a resource by various publications including The New York Times,[4] The Cleveland Plain Dealer,[5] Religion News Service,[6] La Stampa,[7] and The Wall Street Journal.[8]

On 28 June 2023, Miranda posted on The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church's main page that he had been hospitalized with cardiac issues.[9] He died on June 1, 2024, at the age of 84.[10][11]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvador_Miranda_(historian)

REMOTE CONTROL HEART ATTACK WEAPONS

"The brain is on the verge of becoming the next battlefield with weapons currently being designed to hack directly into your nervous system.

"Controlled Personnel Effects"

(see image, right) is one of the Air Force’s ambitious long-term challenges. It starts with better and more accurate bombs, but moves on to discuss devices that "make selected adversaries think or act according to our needs… By studying and modeling the human brain and nervous system, the ability to mentally influence or confuse personnel is also possible."

The first stage is technology to “remotely create physical sensations.”

They give the example of the Active Denial System "people zapper" which uses a high-frequency radiation similar to microwaves as a non-lethal means of crowd control.

Other weapons can affect the nervous system directly. The Pulsed Energy Projectile fires a short intense pulse of laser energy. This vaporizes the outer layer of the target, creating a rapidly-expanding expanding ball of plasma. At different power levels, those expanding plasmas could deliver a harmless warning, stun the target, or disable them – all with pinpoint laser precision from a mile away.

Early reports on the effects of PEPs mentioned temporary paralysis, then thought to be related to ultrasonic shockwaves. It later became apparent that the electromagnetic pulse caused by the expanding plasma was triggering nerve cells

Details of this emerged in a heavily-censored document released to Ed Hammond of the Sunshine Project under the Freedom if Information Act. Called “Sensory consequence of electromagnetic pulsed emitted by laser induced plasmas,” it described research on activating the nerve cells responsible for sensing unpleasant stimuli: heat, damage, pressure, cold. By selectively stimulating a particular nociceptor, a finely tuned PEP might sensations of say, being burned, frozen or dipped in acid — all without doing the slightest actual harm.

The skin is the easiest target for such stimulation. But, in principle, any sensory nerves could be triggered. The Controlled Effects document suggests “it may be possible to create synthetic images…to confuse an individual’ s visual sense or, in a similar manner, confuse his senses of sound, taste, touch, or smell.”

In other words, it may be possible to use electromagnetic means to create overwhelming ‘sound’ or ‘light’, or indeed ‘intolerable smell’ which would exist only in the brain of the person perceiving them.

There is another side as well. The “sensory consequences” document also notes that the nervous system which controls muscles could be influenced to cause what they call “Taser-like motor effects.” The stun gun’s ability to shock the muscles into malfunction is relatively crude; we might now be looking at are much more targeted effects.

The American military may want to attack the nervous system, with pain rays and laser plasma pulses. But they’re not the only ones.

The Russians have long studied such systems, too — including one weapon that could, in theory, remotely trigger heart attacks.

In 2003, at the 2nd European Symposium on Non-Lethal Weapons, Anatoly Korolev and his colleagues from Moscow State University presented a paper with the snappy title "Bioelectrodynamic Criterion of the NLW Effectiveness Estimation and the Interaction mechanisms of the multilayer Skin Tissues with electromagnetic Radiation." This is a study of how radio-frequency weapons — like the American Active Denial System — affect the skin. After wading through a mass of technical data showing how complex the interactions are we reach the punch line:

The sensations modality (pricking, touch, pressure, gooseflesh, touch, burning pain etc) depends on the field parameters and individual concrete human being factors. As a matter of fact, we can really choose the non-lethal bioeffect.

The effects include sensations similar to those discussed previously, and more besides. The paper discusses effects on cell membranes and affecting the body’s normal function, including "information transfer to the organs of control."

At the same conference, V Makukhin of the Trymas Engineering Center in Moscow described "Electronic equipment for complex influence on biological objects." And when he says "biological objects," he means you and me.

His laboratory apparatus uses a modulated beam of radio waves to produce what he terms "disorder of autonomic nervous system," put forward as a possible non-lethal weapon. Makhunin notes that there is no general agreement on how EM waves disrupt nerves – he mentions ion channels similar to those in the plasma paper – but he certainly seems to be seeing the same effects as American researchers.

But it need not be a non-lethal weapon. Makhunin also mentions the effects of "change of electrocardiogram" and what he calls "function break of heart muscle."

The vulnerability of the heart to electrical stimulation (including that produced by EM waves) is well documented.

A lethal device would interfere with the electrical potentials that keep the chambers of the heart synchronized, producing fibrillation and rapid death. A death ray doesn’t need to be a truck-sized laser that

reduces the target to smoking heap; a small device that stops the heart will do the job.

Little has been openly published in this area in the public domain, but this may be the tip of the iceberg. We are likely to be hearing more in future – especially if the Russians manage to find funding.

I don’t think we need tinfoil hats just yet. But a layer of conducting mesh built into body armor might save a lot of heartache in years to come."

REMOTE CONTROL HEART ATTACK WEAPONS

https://www.impactlab.com/2006/02/15/remote-control-heart-attack-weapons/

Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the Weather in 2025

In 2025, US aerospace forces can own the weather by capitalizing on emerging technologies and focusing development of those technologies to war fighting applications. Such a capability offers the war fighter tools to shape the battlespace in ways never before possible. It provides opportunities to impact operations across the full spectrum of conflict and is pertinent to all possible futures. The purpose of this paper is to outline a strategy for the use of a future weather modification system to achieve military objectives rather than to provide a detailed technical road map. A high risk, high reward endeavor, weather modification offers a dilemma not unlike the splitting of the atom While some segments of society will always be reluctant to examine controversial issues such as weather modification, the tremendous military capabilities that could result from this field are ignored at our own peril. From enhancing friendly operations or disrupting those of the enemy via small scale tailoring of natural weather patterns to complete dominance of global communications and counterspace control, weather modification offers the war fighter a wide range of possible options to defeat or coerce an adversary. Some of the potential capabilities a weather modification system could provide to a war fighting commander in chief CINC are listed in table 1. Technology advancements in five major areas are necessary for an integrated weather modification capability 1 advanced nonlinear modeling techniques, 2 computational capability, 3 information gathering and transmission, 4 a global sensor array, and 5 weather intervention techniques. Some intervention tools exist today and others may be developed and refined in the future."

Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the Weather in 2025 (dtic.mil)

As early as 1990, weather force specialists at the U.S. Air Force Academy were hard at work studying how to chemically mix and lay “aerial obscuration” they called “chemtrails.” Project Cloverleaf began quietly enough (as all classified projects do) with the 1994 Hughes Aircraft patent for Welsbach Seeding For Reduction of Global Warming. Welsbach seeding called for spreading highly reflective materials in the atmosphere to reflect back into space 1–2 percent of incoming sunlight and thus slow down “global warming.” However, it was also about beginning to create a more conductive atmosphere in preparation for Bernard Eastlund’s High-frequency Active Auroral Research Project (HAARP) already under construction in Alaska. The reflective material (~10 microns) to be added to jet auxiliary fuel tanks was the highly conductive compound aluminum oxide (Al2O3). The jet’s main tanks would be reserved for takeoff and landing, and the auxiliary loaded with Al2O3 for cruising altitude. Lawrence Livermore National Labs priced the program at US$1 billion per annum (in 1994 dollars). By the late 1990s, aerial grids were being laid over chosen regions and cities of the U.S. and other NATO nations. In 1996, the military went public with two documents that obliquely referenced what Cloverleaf was up to: the Pentagon paper “Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the Weather in 2025” in Air Force 2025,1 which called the chemical whitening effect “cirrus shielding”; and U.S. Space Command’s Vision for 2020 calling for full spectrum dominance of space, land, sea, and air.2 Air traffic controllers (ATC) at major airports were coached to re-route commercial air traffic around military craft engaged in “classified aerial operations” at 37,000–40,000 feet. ATC radar revealed a haze of aluminum and barium—Al2O3 for solar radiation management (SRM) geoengineering, barium stearate Ba(C18H35O2)2 for lubrication, radar imaging, and highpowered RF-microwave beam weapons.

A wide range of particles could be released into the stratosphere to achieve the SRM objective of scattering sunlight back to space. Sulfates and nanoparticles currently favored for SRM include sulfur dioxide, hydrogen sulfide, carbonyl sulfide, black carbon, and specially engineered discs composed of metallic aluminum, aluminum oxide and barium titanate. In particular, engineered nanoparticles are considered very promising. The particles would utilize photophoretic and electromagnetic forces to self-levitate above the stratosphere. These nanoparticles would remain suspended longer than sulfate particles, would not interfere with stratospheric chemistry, and would not produce acid rain. However, while promising, the self-levitating nanodisc has not been tested to verify efficacy, may increase ocean acidification due to atmospheric CO2 entrapment, has uncharacterized human health and environmental impacts, and may be prohibitively expensive.3

The truth is that the 10 billion SRM discs 10 micrometers across and 50 nanometers thick are engineered with a core of aluminum, a top layer of aluminum oxide, and a bottom layer of barium titanate—aluminum to reflect heat up, heavier barium purportedly to push the discs up (photophoresis). Introduce a magnetic component, then spray, and the nanoparticles will follow the Earth’s magnetic field into the upper atmosphere. By 1998, the Ontario Ministry of Environment (Canada) found 7X the safe limit for aluminum in rainwater samples. More and more citizens complained of sudden headaches, joint pains, dizziness, fatigue, acute asthma, gastrointestinal pain, coughs, and feverless flu symptoms. In 2000, Cloverleaf went public in an offhand way with a comment from an anonymous airline executive to independent scientist Clifford Carnicom, then the most visible scientist collecting data on the aerosol fallout over northern New Mexico. According to this “Deep Throat,” the purpose of Cloverleaf was “to allow commercial airlines to assist in releasing these chemicals into the atmosphere.”4 Military jets simply could not keep up with the “global dimming” now called solar radiation management (SRM), so the entire airline industry was being drafted in the name of national security."

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

Lightning bolt hit Vatican not once but TWICE hours after Pope's shock resignation

The lightning touched the roof of St. Peter's Basilica, one of the holiest Catholic churches, hours after Benedict XVI's shock announcement

By Paul Cockerton Mirror Deputy Editor (Live)

12:58, 12 Feb 2013 Updated 00:56, 13 Feb 2013

Lightning struck the Vatican not once but TWICE - hours after Pope Benedict XVI's shock resignation.

The spooky moment, believed by some, to be a sign from God, was caught on camera by AFP photographer Filippo Monteforte.

Today he described how he took the incredible image which has been beamed all over the world.

He said: "I took the picture from St. Peter’s Square while sheltered by the columns. It was icy cold and raining sheets. When the storm started, I thought that lightning might strike the rod, so I decided it was worth seeing whether – if it DID strike – I could get the shot at exactly the right moment.”

Filippo, armed with a 50mm lens, waited for more than two hours and was rewarded for his patience with not one but two bolts.

He added: “The first bolt was huge and lit up the sky, but unfortunately I missed it. I had better luck the second time, and was able to snap a couple of images of the dome illuminated by the bolt.”

The lightning touched the dome of St. Peter's Basilica, one of the holiest Catholic churches, after the Pope's shock admission he lacks strength to do the job.

The Vatican stressed that no specific medical condition prompted Benedict's decision to quit - the first pontiff to do so in 600 years.

The move surprised even his closest aides, even though Benedict, 85, had made clear in the past he would step down if he became too old or infirm.

In recent years, the Pope has slowed down significantly, cutting back his foreign travel and limiting his audiences.

He now goes to and from the altar in St Peter's Basilica on a moving platform, to spare him the long walk down the aisle. Occasionally he uses a cane.

His 89-year-old brother, Georg Ratzinger, said doctors had recently advised the Pope not to take any more trans-Atlantic trips.

"His age is weighing on him," Mr Ratzinger said. "At this age my brother wants more rest."

Benedict announced his resignation in Latin during a meeting of Vatican cardinals, calling it "a decision of great importance for the life of the church."

He emphasised that carrying out the duties of being pope requires "both strength of mind and body."

He told the cardinals: "I have come to the certainty that my strengths due to an advanced age are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry."

Click for Sound

The Vatican will hold a conclave before Easter to elect a new pope, with Benedict holding great sway over who should succeed him to lead the world's one billion Catholics.

Benedict has already hand-picked the bulk of the College of Cardinals - the princes of the church who will elect the next pope - to guarantee an equally-conservative legacy.

There are no obvious front-runners to replace him - the same situation when Benedict was elected in 2005 after the death of Pope John Paul II.

Given half of the world's Catholics live in the global south, there will once again be arguments for a pope to come from the developing world.

When Benedict was elected aged 78, he was the oldest pope chosen in nearly 300 years.

He raised the possibility of resigning if he were too old or sick to continue, when he was interviewed in 2010 for the book "Light of the World."

"If a pope clearly realises that he is no longer physically, psychologically and spiritually capable of handling the duties of his office, then he has a right, and under some circumstances, also an obligation to resign," Benedict said.

The former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger had an intimate view as Pope John Paul II, with whom he had worked closely for nearly a quarter-century, suffered through the debilitating end of his papacy.

The Vatican said immediately after his resignation that Benedict would go to Castel Gandolfo, a summer retreat south of Rome, and then would live in a cloistered monastery.

Benedict said he would serve the church for the remainder of his days "through a life dedicated to prayer."

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/lightning-bolt-hit-vatican-not-1705156

Luke 10:18

1599 Geneva Bible

18 And he said unto them, I saw Satan, like lightning, [a]fall down from heaven.

Read full chapter

Footnotes

Luke 10:18 Paul placeth the devil and his angels, in the air, Eph. 6:12, and he is said to be cast down from thence by force when his power is abolished by the voice of the Gospel.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%2010%3A18&version=GNV

Masonic Hoodwink

The Candidate's Blindfold

Man wearing hoodwink

A Masonic hoodwink is a type of blindfold used in Masonic rituals of initiation.

The image, above is of a man in a Masonic hoodwink which dates from the early 1800's to the early 1900s and were sold by DeMoulin, a Masonic lodge supplies manufacturer, as well as other purveyors (sellers) of lodge supplies.

Freemasonry is not the originator of the hoodwink.

Religious rites and initiations of civilizations and tribes dating back centuries before the believed or known origins of Freemasonry used blindfolds to represent going from darkness (ignorance) to light (knowledge).

Hood: The word, “hood,” in old German and Anglo Saxon refers to a head covering, as in a hat, or helmet. A hood might also be of cloth. To "hood" is to cover. Hooded garments have been worn throughout history.

Wink: The word, “wink,” in old German and Anglo Saxon refers to a closing of the eyes. The word, “wince,” , is similarly derived from the word "wink". The word "wink" pertains to the eye.

Therefore, a hood (to cover) wink (eyes) was a head covering designed to cover the eyes.

Misconception: While Freemasonry has many secrets, the term "hoodwink" is not one of them.

The word is often misconstrued by non-Freemasons as having negative overtones due to our more modern-day definition of the word which defines it as meaning to be deceived or tricked rather than its actual meaning which is to cover the eyes.

A Masonic hoodwink is not used as a method of deception.

It is simply a symbolic and visual method of covering the eyes which is used in the initiation of the candidate into acquiring new knowledge, hence the term, "from darkness to light".

The Masonic symbolism of the hoodwink is not about placing the candidate into the darkness, which is symbolic of ignorance, but about the removal of the darkness to let in the light, which is symbolic of knowledge.

Albert Mackey, Masonic scholar, historian and author described it as:

"A symbol of the secrecy, silence, and darkness in which the mysteries of our art should be preserved from the unhallowed gaze of the profane.

It has been supposed to have a symbolic reference to the passage in Saint John's Gospel (I, 5), "And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not."

But it is more certain that there is in the hoodwink a representation of the mystical darkness which always preceded the rites of the ancient initiations."

Source: Mackey's Revised Encyclopedia of Freemasonry, 1929, Volume 1, Page 464

Somewhat resembling aviator goggles of this same era, this antique Masonic hoodwink is made of metal, leather, cloth and velvet.

Size: 8-1/2 inches long, 3 inches wide and 2 inches in depth.

Front: The front of this hoodwink is made of metal, painted black. The nose covering is made of fabric which has been hand-stitched into place.

Eye "wink": The round metal circles which cover each eye are welded to a cross-piece rod with cones on each end. This entire unit is of one-piece construction.

Masonic hoodwink

It is spring-loaded and can be raised or flipped upward toward the forehead by grasping either of the 2 decorative, cone-shaped metal pieces located on either side of the eyes.

hoodwink open

Back/Interior: The interior, which fits against the face, is made of velvet (original color, unknown), as are the insides of each round eye piece. A leather strap fits around the back of the head.

hoodwink inside

Like other fraternities, such as college fraternities, most Masonic lodges, today, simply use modern-day blindfolds.

The antique Masonic hoodwink, above, would most likely be found in a Masonic museum or owned by a collector of Masonic memorabilia.

https://www.masonic-lodge-of-education.com/masonic-hoodwink.html

Josiah Alipate

December 7, 2025

These old photos of Pope Leo XIV from 1982 have gone viral on social media as many viewers note a strong resemblance to the Blues Brothers. Online discussions claim that during his seminary years he once dressed in their style with sunglasses and a fedora.

https://www.facebook.com/therealcoachjosiah1/photos/these-old-photos-of-pope-leo-xiv-from-1982-have-gone-viral-on-social-media-as-ma/838460678793498/

Pope Leo’s China Dilemma

Paul P. Mariani

December 19, 2025

There is good news and bad news about the Vatican’s policy of engagement with the People’s Republic of China. The good news is that the Vatican is talking to China. The bad news is that the Vatican is talking to China.

The Vatican knows it cannot simply ignore the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It has governed China since 1949, and its current hold over the country seems secure. Furthermore, China is both the second largest economy in the world as well as the second most populous country.

Current CCP orthodoxy holds that China was the center of the world until it proved no match for Western powers. This led to the “hundred years of shame,” which lasted from about 1850 to 1950, when the CCP saved China. Only now does it have the capacity to reassert its rightful place on the world stage. Such is the party’s nationalist and messianic vision.

Naturally, such a grand narrative leaves out important parts of the true history, such as the colonial powers’—and the Church’s—role in education and healthcare in China. It also conveniently leaves out the excesses of the party against its own people. The CCP is now at the center of everything, however, and Xi Jinping is its core leader. The change is easily perceivable. In all my travels to China over the past decades, it was only on my last visit that I often saw the CCP flag with its hammer and sickle nearly as much as I saw the national flag.

The CCP is so self-referential that whenever the Vatican talks to the party, it comes at a high price. Ever since Xi took office as president in 2013 (a day after Pope Francis’s election), he has tightened control over all aspects of society. Increasingly draconian regulations have been imposed on the religious sphere, such that religious leaders must be vetted and indoctrinated by the party, and all finances reported to it. In addition, the CCP has enforced an old rule in which no one under the age of eighteen is allowed to attend religious services.

These policies redound to the Vatican as well. The Vatican has been forced to keep silent about any “embarrassing” situations in China. This silence is seen as complicit in the suppression of the country’s underground Church, which has been a major goal of the CCP. Because of this, the pope himself is never invited to set foot on Chinese soil.

How does the current engagement policy play out in Shanghai, the place I know best? The current bishop there is Joseph Shen Bin. The good news is that there is no second-guessing. Catholics know who their bishop is. Normal functioning of the Church can go on, parishes can be staffed, and the sacraments can be administered. The bad news again is that it comes at a high price. Shen was originally the bishop of a much smaller neighboring diocese. The CCP then brought him to Shanghai and declared him bishop of the city. This was news to the Vatican. Even so, a few months later, it acquiesced to the fait accompli.

There were further difficulties. Shanghai already had a bishop, Thaddeus Ma Daqin, who was consecrated in July 2012. Both Church and state had signed off on him, but he lost the party’s favor within minutes of his consecration as bishop when he announced his resignation from the Catholic Patriotic Association, a party-controlled entity. Since then, Ma has been under close surveillance and confined to a seminary. The Vatican was then forced to sideline him.

One would think this would leave a power vacuum for control of the Church. In reality, this has never been the case, because the CCP controls the Church. Examples of this control speak volumes. In the rest of the Catholic world, the local bishop signs letters to his flock. Not so in China. Official diocesan documents are signed by “the diocese.” The Shanghai diocese is yet one more cog in the machine of the party-state. The same is true for the current bishop. I am told that Shen was from a rural area that relied mainly on the largesse of the government. He has never trained outside of China, and worked his way up through entities controlled by the party. This makes Shen far more a creature of the CCP than of the Church itself.

Where will Pope Leo go from here? So far, he has been following the appeasement policy championed by his predecessor. This appeasement policy is showing its limits, however. It’s possible there will be a course correction after the pope meets with his cardinals in January. Perhaps he will choose to ever so gently push back against the CCP’s overreach. This is especially important in a place like Hong Kong, which still has some freedoms that the mainland does not.

In my book Church Militant, I showed how the CCP dismantled the Church in Shanghai in the 1950s. In its sequel, China’s Church Divided, I showed how, in the 1980s, the CCP allowed greater religious freedom, but it still tried to control the Church. A golden thread runs through this history: The CCP has deep anxieties about any underground Church. It knows the power of underground organizations because, ironically, that is how the CCP began.

The Church has another card to play. It knows it has outlasted both the Roman Empire and the Eastern Bloc. While empires rise and fall, the gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church. I am convinced that this supernatural perspective can best inform our current-day political reality.

https://firstthings.com/pope-leos-china-dilemma/

https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxM73EpPc8etF2eFO0no6Yjoc_hKSXDmWN

Robert Underdunk "Bob" Terwilliger Jr., PhD,[a][5] better known as Sideshow Bob, is a recurring character and an antagonist in the animated television series The Simpsons. He is voiced by Kelsey Grammer and first appeared in the episode "The Telltale Head". Bob is a self-proclaimed genius who is a graduate of Yale University and a champion of high culture, including the adoption of a transatlantic accent, similar to that of Grammer's portrayal of Dr. Frasier Crane from the sitcoms Cheers and Frasier. He began his career as a sidekick on Krusty the Clown's television show, but after enduring constant abuse, Bob framed his employer for armed robbery in "Krusty Gets Busted", only to be foiled by Bart Simpson, and sent to prison. Bob started seeking revenge against Bart while in prison, and the two became feuding archenemies.

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

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.

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

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/

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

Pope John Paul I[a] (born Albino Luciani;[b] 17 October 1912 – 28 September 1978) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of Vatican City from 26 August 1978 until his death 33 days later.

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

On 13 May 1981, in St. Peter's Square in Vatican City, Pope John Paul II was shot and wounded by Mehmet Ali Ağca while he was entering the square.

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

SAKO Limited (natively Sako Oy)[1] is a Finnish firearm and ammunition manufacturer located in Riihimäki, Kanta-Häme in southern Finland.

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

And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast.

Revelation 13:3

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

The word asas in Arabic means "PRINCIPLE". The Asāsiyyūn (plural, from literary Arabic) were, as defined in Arabic, the principle people.

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

PRINCIPLE AND FOUNDATION

The Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola

TRANSLATED FROM

THE AUTOGRAPH

FATHER ELDER MULLAN, S.J.

I.H.S.

NEW YORK

P.J. KENEDY & SONS

PRINTERS TO THE HOLY APOSTOLIC SEE

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

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.

https://thecreationclub.com/historical-basis-for-believing-jesus-was-crucified-in-ad-30/

On Easter Sunday 2021, Warnock's Twitter account tweeted, "The meaning of Easter is more transcendent than the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

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.

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

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

"The Devil Went Down to Georgia" is a song written and recorded by American music group Charlie Daniels Band and released on their 1979 album Million Mile Reflections.[4]

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

Raphael Gamaliel Warnock genetic father is Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako

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

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

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).

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

The Cheyenne Mountain Complex (CMOC)[a] is a non-public military installation of the United States Department of Defense[b] located inside Cheyenne Mountain, in El Paso County, Colorado.[3]

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

https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxJm07jvWODvi0sbbR8Pyjp95dx-OI84ta

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations (UN) members in 2015, created 17 world Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

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

4 American traitors more destructive than Benedict Arnold

Traitors have the ability to cause the most grievous harm to the security of the United States and compromise its military.

By Team Mighty

Updated Sep 22, 2023 7:41 AM PDT

This is a political cartoon, captioned "A Proper Family Re-Union" at the bottom. It depicts Satan and Benedict Arnold welcoming Jefferson Davis to Hell. (Wikimedia Commons)

What causes someone to betray their country, everyone and everything they’ve ever known, and risk their freedom – and maybe even their life – for some kind of short term gain? For some it’s power or prestige. For others, it’s just cold, hard cash. Some are willing to betray their countrymen for a little taste of countrywomen.

No matter what their motivation, traitors have the ability to cause the most grievous harm to the security of the United States and compromise its military and foreign policy objectives. These are the people we trusted the most – and had the most to gain through their subterfuge.

Here are 4 American traitors more destructive than Benedict Arnold

1. John Anthony Walker

John Walker worked within the U.S. Navy’s secretive submarine force and came to manage the submarine force’s entire communications network. With a long career of seemingly excellent service, he was promoted quickly and given a top secret clearance, along with access to the Navy’s most sensitive information.

Walker’s attempt at living a playboy lifestyle caught up to him eventually. In the face of mounting debt, he walked into the Soviet Embassy and offered his services to the USSR. Over the course of more than 20 years, he gave away more than a million decrypted secret messages, the code keys to deciphering more messages, the locations of American nuclear submarines, and the entire planning and operational guides to the ongoing war in Vietnam.

The KGB spy also recruited friends and family members into his growing spy ring, all for his own monetary gain. In the end, his wife and daughter, who he failed to recruit, gave him up to the FBI. In a quick investigation, Walker was finally apprehended aboard the USS Nimitz, caught red handed with a trove of classified information. He had to be escorted under guard to keep him safe from sailors and Marines who wanted to dole out their own punishment.

Walker was convicted and handed a life sentence, which ended when he died in federal custody in 2014.

2. Aldrich Ames

Ames was almost a lifelong CIA employee, first coming to the agency doing clerical work in high school. After a brief stint in Turkey and elsewhere as an operative, he returned to CIA headquarters stateside and began working the Soviet – East European Division. Along the way, he developed a noticeable drinking problem and picked up an expensive mistress. His debts began adding up as he was placed on the Soviet counterintelligence mission.

After releasing what he believed to be harmless information to the USSR, he received a quick payday, and was soon hooked into giving the Soviets more and more information for more and more money. He began giving out the names of counterintelligence assets and operations that the KGB rolled up in a hurry. The quick end of these operations led the CIA to believe a mole was in counterintelligence. Meanwhile Ames was making a fortune to the sum of $4.6 million. Between 1985 and 1994, Ames fed information to the KGB about every western mole in Soviet intelligence, compromising the lives of countless informants.

3. Aaron Burr

Thomas Jefferson’s vice president had a number of plans to betray the United States. He offered to take Louisiana out of the Union for the British in exchange for $500,000 and a few ships of the line. He made this offer to a British agent on no fewer than three separate occasions, even while still sitting as vice-president.

Burr’s grand scheme was creating a group of wealthy planters and Army officers to capture a large swath of North America, specifically, the American Southwest, maybe even conquer Mexico, and form a separate government. He was ultimately betrayed by James Wilkinson in New Orleans and was put on trial. Without credible testimony, he was acquitted.

4. James Wilkinson

Wilkinson was one of the most trusted soldiers in U.S. Army history, serving in both the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812. He took on the role of governor of the newly-acquired Louisiana Territory and became one of the Army’s most senior officers. There were many problems with Wilkinson’s service but the foremost among them was that he had been spying for the Spanish most of the time.

When his role in Aaron Burr’s own treason was nearly discovered, he placed New Orleans under martial law and imprisoned anyone who might be able to prove Wilkinson was complicit in the plot. Wilkinson was never caught during his life, but his papers were discovered in 1854, leading Theodore Roosevelt to say, “In all our history, there is no more despicable character.”

https://www.wearethemighty.com/mighty-history/4-american-traitors-more-destructive-than-benedict-arnold/

https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxedB5pyF3dqgd23IbiAuiZhuh9IiAKWPi

Vatican congratulates first female archbishop of Canterbury

by Cindy Wooden - Catholic News Service

October 3, 2025

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — The head of the Vatican’s ecumenical office congratulated Anglican Bishop Sarah Mullally of London on her appointment as the next archbishop of Canterbury.

“I write to congratulate you on your appointment and to express the good wishes of the Catholic Church to you as you prepare to undertake this important service in your Church,” wrote Cardinal Kurt Koch, prefect of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity.

The British prime minister’s office announced Oct. 3 that King Charles III, supreme governor of the Church of England, had approved Bishop Mullally’s nomination.

“The 106th Archbishop of Canterbury since Saint Augustine arrived in Kent from Rome in 597, Bishop Sarah will be the first woman to hold the office,” said the announcement on the Church of England website.

https://www.americamagazine.org/news/2025/10/03/first-female-archbishop-canterbury-vatican/

Sarah Michelle Prinze (née Gellar /ˈɡɛlər/ GHEL-ər; born April 14, 1977) is an American actress, producer, and entrepreneur. She is known for portraying strong female characters in film and television, and is regarded as a scream queen for her work in the horror genre.

After being spotted by a talent agent as a child, Gellar began her career on television at age five. She obtained her first leading role in the syndicated teen drama series Swans Crossing (1992) and had her breakthrough as Kendall Hart on the ABC soap opera All My Children (1993–1995), for which she won a Daytime Emmy Award. She achieved international recognition for her portrayal of Buffy Summers on the WB/UPN supernatural series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997–2003), which earned her a Saturn Award and a nomination for a Golden Globe.[2]

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

The Mayor also attempted to have Angel lose his soul and become evil in hopes that he would get Buffy out the way and become another asset to the Mayor's team. He initially got Faith to try to seduce him, but she failed due to Angel's ability to refrain from intimacy and his devotion to Buffy. Wilkins then employed a demonic shaman to remove Angel's soul magically. The Mayor then had the seemingly-desouled Angel team up with Faith to capture and torture Buffy (but not kill her as he presumed it would lead to a replacement Slayer). However, it turned out that the loss of Angel's soul was actually a ploy set by the Scooby Gang to trick Faith into revealing that the Ascension would occur during that year's Graduation Day at Sunnydale High, with even the shaman Wilkins had hired being in on the plot. The event revealed Faith's true allegiance to everyone, fully isolating her from the gang and bringing her closer to the Mayor.[5]

https://buffy.fandom.com/wiki/Richard_Wilkins

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.

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

https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxjGefHefbBAUIziNF7CbsBIy5z4GCkrL2

The 7 July 2005 London bombings, sometimes referred to informally as 7/7, were a series of four coordinated suicide attacks carried out by Islamist terrorists that targeted commuters travelling on London's public transport during the morning rush hour.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7_July_2005_London_bombings

Charles III (Charles Philip Arthur George; born 14 November 1948) is King of the United Kingdom and 14 other Commonwealth realms.[b]

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

Princess Charlotte of Wales (Charlotte Elizabeth Diana; born 2 May 2015) is a member of the British royal family. She is the second child and only daughter of William, Prince of Wales, and Catherine, Princess of Wales, and a granddaughter of King Charles III and Diana, Princess of Wales. She is third in the line of succession to the British throne.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princess_Charlotte_of_Wales_(born_2015)

"Killer Queen" is a song by the British rock band Queen. It was written by lead singer Freddie Mercury and recorded for their third album Sheer Heart Attack in 1974.

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

Revelation 17:12-15

1599 Geneva Bible

12 [a]And the ten horns which thou sawest, are [b]ten kings, which yet have not received a kingdom, but shall receive power, as Kings [c]at one hour with the beast.

13 [d]These have one mind, and shall give their power and authority unto the beast.

14 These shall fight with the [e]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 [f]And he said unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, [g]are people, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2017%3A12-15&version=GNV

What are the 10 regions of the United Nations?

Regional groupings used in Report and Statistical Annex

Sub-Saharan Africa. Angola LDC. ...

Northern Africa and Western Asia. Northern Africa. ...

Central and Southern Asia. Central Asia. ...

Eastern and South-Eastern Asia. Eastern Asia. ...

Latin America and the Caribbean. Caribbean. ...

Oceania. Australia and New Zealand. ...

Europe and Northern America.

https://www.studycountry.com/wiki/what-are-the-10-regions-of-the-united-nations#google_vignette

Pope Leo XIV[a] (born Robert Francis Prevost,[b] pronounced /ˈpriːvoʊst/ PREE-vohst,[2][c] September 14, 1955) is the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of Vatican City. He is the first pope to have been born in the United States, the first to hold either U.S. or Peruvian citizenships, the first from the Order of Saint Augustine, and the second (after his immediate predecessor Pope Francis) from the Americas.

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

Roberto Gualtieri (born 19 July 1966) is an Italian historian and politician of the Democratic Party (PD), incumbent Mayor of Rome since 2021 and Minister of Economy and Finances in the second government of Giuseppe Conte from 2019 until 2021.[1] He previously was a Member of the European Parliament from 2009 to 2019, where he chaired the influential Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee within the Parliament from 2014 until 2019.[2]

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

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.

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/

̶h̶t̶t̶p̶s̶:̶/̶/̶e̶n̶.̶w̶i̶k̶i̶p̶e̶d̶i̶a̶.̶o̶r̶g̶/̶w̶i̶k̶i̶/̶P̶a̶p̶a̶l̶_̶r̶e̶n̶u̶n̶c̶i̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶

Pope John Paul I[a] (born Albino Luciani;[b] 17 October 1912 – 28 September 1978) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of Vatican City from 26 August 1978 until his death 33 days later.

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

On 13 May 1981, in St. Peter's Square in Vatican City, Pope John Paul II was shot and wounded by Mehmet Ali Ağca while he was entering the square.

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

SAKO Limited (natively Sako Oy)[1] is a Finnish firearm and ammunition manufacturer located in Riihimäki, Kanta-Häme in southern Finland.

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

And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast.

Revelation 13:3

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

The word asas in Arabic means "PRINCIPLE". The Asāsiyyūn (plural, from literary Arabic) were, as defined in Arabic, the principle people.

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

PRINCIPLE AND FOUNDATION

The Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola

TRANSLATED FROM

THE AUTOGRAPH

FATHER ELDER MULLAN, S.J.

I.H.S.

NEW YORK

P.J. KENEDY & SONS

PRINTERS TO THE HOLY APOSTOLIC SEE

https://ia601603.us.archive.org/32/items/spiritualexercis00ignauoft/spiritualexercis00ignauoft.pdf

Peter Paul "Paulie Walnuts" Gualtieri is a fictional character portrayed by Tony Sirico on the HBO series The Sopranos, one of the chief henchmen of series protagonist Tony Soprano. Sirico auditioned for the role of Uncle Junior with Frank Vincent, but Dominic Chianese landed the role. David Chase instead offered him the role of Paulie Gualtieri and Sirico agreed under the condition that his character would not "become a rat".[3][4] Paulie begins the series as a soldier, later becoming a captain in the DiMeo crime family.[5] He is violent, impulsive, quick-witted, sarcastic and paranoid. Paulie is jovial and quick with a joke but is one of the most ruthless members of the family. Billy Magnussen portrays a young Paulie Gualtieri in the 2021 prequel film, The Many Saints of Newark. Paulie Walnuts is one of the most prominent characters in The Sopranos, and one of the viewers' favorites.[6] Sirico's performance has received acclaim from critics and audiences.[7]

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

Charles "Charlie" Garepe is the son of Angelo "Ange" Garepe.

History

Charlie and his father attend Anthony "Tony B" Blundetto’s casino and he meets Tony and the three men give a toast.

https://sopranos.fandom.com/wiki/Charlie_Garepe

The Carolingian dynasty (/ˌkærəˈlɪndʒiən/ KARR-ə-LIN-jee-ən;[1] known variously as the Carlovingians, Carolingi,[2] 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.[3] 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. Charlemagne's 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.[4] The name originates from a common Germanic word, rendered in Old High German as Karl or Kerl,[5] meaning 'man', 'husband', or 'freeman'.[6]

History

Origins

Pippin I and Arnulf of Metz (613–645)

The Carolingian line first began with two important rival Frankish families, the Pippinids and Arnulfings, whose destinies became intermingled in the early 7th century. Both men came from noble backgrounds on the western borders of the Austrasia territory between the Meuse and Moselle rivers, north of Liège.[7][8]

The first two figures, Pippin I of Landen and Arnulf of Metz, from whom historians have taken the family names,[9] both first appeared in the fourth book of the Continuations of Fredegar as advisers to Chlotar II of Neustria, who 'incited' revolt against King Theuderic II and Brunhild of Austrasia in 613.[10] Through shared interests, Pippin and Arnulf allied their families through the marriage of Pippin's daughter Begga and Arnulf's son Ansegisel.[7]

As repayment for their help during the Austrasian conquest, Chlotar rewarded both men with important positions of power in Austrasia. However, Arnulf was the first to gain. He was bestowed the bishopric of Metz in 614, entrusting him with the management of the Austrasian capital and the education of Chlotar's young son, the future Dagobert I.[11] This is a position he would hold until his retirement in 629 after Chlotar's death, when he left for a small ecclesiastical community near Habendum; he was later buried at the monastery of Remiremont after his death c. 645.[7]

Pippin I (624–640)

Pippin was not immediately rewarded, but eventually was given the position of maior palatti or 'mayor of the palace' of Austrasia in 624. This reward secured Pippin a position of prime importance with the Merovingian royal court. The mayor of the palace would act as the mediator between the King and the magnates of the region; as Paul Fouracre summarises, they were 'regarded as the most important non-royal person in the kingdom.'[8] The reason Pippin was not rewarded sooner is not certain, but two mayors, Rado (613 – c. 617) and Chucus (c. 617 – c. 624), are believed to have preceded him and were potentially political rivals connected to the fellow Austrasian Gundoinings noble family.[11][8] Once elected, Pippin served faithfully under Chlotar until the latter's death in 629, and solidified the Pippinids' position of power within Austrasia by supporting Chlotar's son Dagobert, who became King of Austrasia in 623.[8] Pippin, with support from Arnulf and other Austrasian magnates, even used the opportunity to support the killing of an important political rival Chrodoald, an Agilolfing lord.[10]

Following King Dagobert I's ascent to the throne in c. 629, he returned the Frankish capital back to Paris in Neustria, from whence it had been removed by Chlotar in 613. As a result, Pippin lost his position as mayor and the support of the Austrasian magnates, who were seemingly irritated by his inability to persuade the King to return the political centre to Austrasia.[10] Instead, Dagobert turned to the Pippinids' political rival family, the Gundoinings, whose connections in Adalgesil, Cunibert, archbishop of Cologne, Otto and Radulf (who would later revolt in 642)[10] once again removed the Pippinid and Arnulfing influence in the Austrasia assemblies.[7]

Pippin did not reappear in the historical record until Dagobert's death in 638,[11] when he had seemingly been reinstated as mayor of Austrasia and began to support the new young King Sigebert III. According to the Continuations, Pippin made arrangements with his rival, Archbishop Cunibert, to get Austrasian support for the 10-year-old King Sigibert III, who ruled Austrasia whilst his brother Clovis II ruled over Neustria and Burgundy. Soon after securing his position once again, he unexpectedly died in 640.[10]

Grimoald (640–656)

Following Pippin's sudden death, the Pippinid family worked swiftly to secure their position. Pippin's daughter Gertrude and wife Itta founded and entered the Nivelles Abbey, and his only son Grimoald worked to secure his father's position of maior palatii. The position was not hereditary and therefore passed to another Austrasian noble, Otto, the tutor of Sigebert III.[7] According to the Continuations, Grimoald began to work with his father's accomplice Cunibert to remove Otto from office. He finally succeeded in c. 641, when Leuthari II, Duke of Alamannia killed Otto under Grimoald's and, we must assume, Cunibert's orders.[10] Grimoald then became mayor of Austrasia. His power at this time was extensive, with properties in Utrecht, Nijmegen, Tongeren and Maastricht; he was even called 'ruler of the realm' by Desiderius of Cahors in 643.[7]

This could not have been done if Grimoald had not secured Sigibert III's support. The Pippinids already gained royal patronage from Pippin I's support, but this was further bolstered by Grimoald's role in Duke Radulf of Thuringia's rebellion. Just prior to Otto's assassination, in c. 640 Radulf revolted against the Merovingians and made himself King of Thuringia. Sigibert, with an Austrasian army including Grimoald and Duke Adalgisel, went on campaign and after a brief victory against Fara, son of the assassinated Agilofing lord Chrodoald, the Austrasians met Radulf on the River Unstrut where he had set up a stronghold. What followed was a disorganized battle spread over several days, in which the Austrasian lords disagreed on tactics. Grimoald and Adalgesil strengthened their position by defending Sigibert's interests, but could not establish a unanimous agreement. During their final assault, the 'men of Mainz' betrayed the Austrasians and joined with Radulf. This penultimate battle killed many important Austrasian lords, including Duke Bobo and Count Innowales, and resulted in Sigibert's defeat. The Continuations offers a famous description of Sigibert being 'seized with the wildest grief and sat there on his horse weeping unrestrainedly for those he had lost' as Radulf returned to his camp victorious.[10]

Upon Sigibert's return from Unstruct, Grimoald, now mayor, began to build power for the Pippinid clan. He utilized the existing links between the family and ecclesiastical community to gain control over local holy men and women who, in turn, supported Pippinid assertions of power. Grimoald established links with Aquitanian and Columbianan missionaries Amandus and Remaclus, both of whom came to be influential bishops within the Merovingian court. Remaclus, in particular, was important as after becoming bishop of Maastricht, he established two monasteries: Stavelot Abbey and Malmedy. Under Grimoald's direction, the Arnulfings were also further established with Chlodulf of Metz, son of St. Arnulf, taking the bishopric of Metz in 656.[7]

Grimoald and Childebert (656–657)

The final moment of Grimoald's life is an area that is disputed in both date and event, titled: 'Grimoald's coup'.[8] It involves Grimoald and his son Childebert the Adopted taking the Austrasian throne from the true Merovingian King Dagobert II, son of the late Sigibert who died young at 26 years old. Historians like Pierre Riché are certain that Sigibert died in 656, having adopted Childebert due to his lack of an adult male heir. Following this, young Dagobert II was then exiled and tonsured by Grimoald and Dido of Poitiers, who then installed Childebert as King of Austrasia. Clovis II in Neustria, uncle to Dagobert, then reacted to the revolt and lured Grimoald and Childebert into Neustria, where they were executed.[7]

This story is only confirmed by the pro-Neustrian source,[12] the Liber Historia Francorum (LHF) and selected charter evidence. Other contemporary sources like the Continuations fail to mention the event and Carolingian sources like Annales Mettenses Priores (AMP) ignore the event and even deny Grimoald's existence.[11] As such, historian Richard Gerberding has suggested a different chronology and reading of the LHF, which places Sigibert's death on 1 February 651. According to a Gerberding narrative, Grimoald and Dido organised Dagobert's exile around 16 January 651 to Ireland at Nivelles and then, when Sigibert died a month later, they acted out the plan and tonsured Dagobert, replacing him with Childebert, who ruled until 657. Clovis II then immediately acted and invaded Austrasia, executing Grimoald and his son.[11]

Then, either in 657 or 662, the Neustrians (either Clovis II who died in 657 or his son Chlothar III) installed infant King Childeric II to the throne of Austrasia, marrying him to Bilichild, the daughter of Sigibert's widow Chimnechild of Burgundy.[8] Grimoald and Childebert's deaths brought an end to the direct Pippinid line of the family, leaving the Arnulfing descendants from Begga and Ansegisel to continue the faction.[13]

Pippin II (676–714)

Very little is known about Pippin's early life, but a controversial story from AMP suggests that Pippin reclaimed power in Austrasia by killing a legendary 'Gundoin' as revenge for the assassination of his father Ansegisel. This story is regarded as slightly fantastical by Paul Fouracre, who argues the AMP, a pro-Carolingian source potentially written by Giselle (Charlemagne's sister) in 805 at Chelles, is that Pippin's role primes him perfectly for his future and demonstrates his family to be 'natural leaders of Austrasia.'[12] However, Fouracre does also acknowledge his existence in charter evidence and confirms that he was a political link to rival mayor Wulfoald. These rivalries would make Pippin natural enemies with Gundoin, making the murder plausible as part of Pippin's rise to power.[8]

Rise to power

The Arnulfing clan reappear in the contemporary historical record in c. 676, when the LHF mentions 'Pippin and Martin' rising up against a tyrannical Ebroin, mayor of Austrasia.[7][8] Pippin II, now head of the faction, and Martin, who was either Pippin's brother or relative, rose up against Ebroin and gathered an army (potentially with the aid of Dagobert II who had been brought back to Austrasia by mayor Wulfoald).[8] According to the LHF, the Arnulfing army met Ebroin, who had gained the support of King Theuderic III, at Bois-du-Fays, and they were easily defeated. Martin fled to Laon, from where he was lured and murdered by Ebroin at Asfeld. Pippin fled to Austrasia and soon received Ermenfred, an officer of a royal fisc who had assassinated Ebroin.[7][14]

The Neustrians, with Ebroin dead, installed Waratto as mayor, and he looked for peace with the Austrasians. Despite an exchange of hostages, Warrato's son Gistemar attacked Pippin at Namur and displaced his father.[8] He died shortly thereafter and Warrato resumed his position, wherein peace was reached but tense relations remained until Warrato's death in 686. He left behind his wife Ansfled and his son Berchar, whom the Neustrians installed as mayor. Against his father's policy, Berchar did not maintain peace and incited Pippin into violence.[14]

In 687, Pippin rallied an Austrasian army and led an assault on Neustria, facing Theuderic III and the Neustrian mayor, now Berchar, in combat. They met at the Battle of Tertry, where the AMP records that Pippin, after offering peace which was rejected by Theuderic at Berchar's behest, crossed the river Omignon at the break of dawn and attacked the Neustrians, who believed the battle won when they saw Pippin's camp abandoned. This surprise attack was successful and the Neustrians fled.[14] Following this victory, Berchar was either killed, as the AMP argues, by his own people, but the LHF suggests that it is more likely that he was murdered by his mother-in-law, Ansfled.[14] This moment was decisive in Arnulfing history as it was the first time that any of the faction had national control. Paul Fouracre even argues it is for this that the AMP starts with Pippin II, as a false dawn upon which Charles Martel would rebuild.[12] However, historians have discredited the importance of this victory. Marios Costambeys, Matthew Innes and Simon MacLean all show that the Tertry victory did not establish solid authority over Neustria immediately, evidenced by the fact that Pippin immediately installed 'Norbert, one of his followers' (as written in the LHF) and then his son Grimoald in 696 to ensure continued influence.[15][14]

Consolidation of power

Pippin II then became overall mayor of the royal palace under Theuderic II, becoming mayor of Austrasia, Neustria and Burgundy.[7] His son Drogo, from his wife Plectrude, was also imbued with power when he married Berchar's widow Adaltrude (potentially maneuvered by Ansfled) and was made Duke of Champagne.[16] Pippin was politically dominating and had the power to elect the next two Merovingian kings after Theuderic II died in 691; he installed King Clovis IV (691–695), Childebert III (695–711) and Dagobert III (711–715).[7] Pippin moved to secure further power by consolidating his position in Neustria, installing several bishops like Gripho, Bishop of Rouen and Bainus at the Abbey of Saint Wandrille in 701, which was later owned along with Fleury Abbey (founded by Pippin in 703).[8] Imbued with internal strength, Pippin also began to look outwards from the Frankish Empire to subdue the people, that the AMP records, who once were 'subjected to the Franks ... [such as] the Saxons, Frisians, Alemans, Bavarians, Aquitainians, Gascons and Britons.'[14] Pippin defeated the pagan chieftain Radbod in Frisia, an area that had been slowly encroached upon by Austrasian nobles and Anglo-Saxon missionaries like Willibrord, whose links would later make him a connection between the Arnulfings and the papacy.[7] Following Gotfrid, Duke of Alemannia in 709, Pippin also moved against the Alemans and subjugated them again to royal control.

Later years

As Pippin approached his death in late 714, he was faced with a succession crisis. Drogo, Pippin's oldest son, died in 707 and his second son Grimoald, according to the LHF, was killed whilst praying to Saint Lambert in Liège in 714 by Rantgar, suspected by Paul Fouracre to be a pagan.[16][14][8] Pippin, before his death, made his six-year-old grandson Theudoald (Grimoald's son) his successor in Neustria, a choice that is believed to have been promoted by his wife Plectrude,[7] which was a political choice from within the direct family line, as Pippin had two adult illegitimate children, Charles Martel and Childebrand I, from a second wife or concubine named Alpaida.[11] They were ousted so Theudoald (with Plectrude's regency) could take the throne, a choice that would result in disaster.

Death

When Pippin II died in December 714, the Arnulfings' dominance over Francia disintegrated. The LHF tells us that 'Plectrude along with her grandchildren and the king directed all the affairs of state under a separate government', a system which created tensions with the Neustrians.[14] Theudoald ruled uncontested for around six months, until June 715, when the Neustrians revolted. Theudoald and the Arnulfings' supporters met at the Battle of Compiègne on 26 September 715,[8] and after a decisive victory, the Neustrians installed a new mayor Ragenfrid and, following Dagobert's death, their own Merovingian king Chilperic II.[14] Charter evidence suggests that Chilperic was the son of the former King Childeric II, but this would make Daniel in his 40s, which is quite old to take the throne.[8]

Charles Martel (714–741)

Rise to power

Following their victory, the Neustrians joined with Radbod, King of the Frisians and invaded Austrasia, aiming towards the Meuse river to take the heartland of the faction's support.[10] It is at this moment that Charles Martel is first mentioned in historical records, which note him surviving imprisonment by his step-mother, Plectrude. Charles managed to escape and mustered an Austrasian army to face the encroaching Radbod and the Neustrians. In 716, Charles finally met the Frisians as they approached and, although the AMP attempts equalize the losses, it is confirmed from the descriptions in the LHF and the Continuations that Charles was defeated with heavy losses.[10][14] Chilperic, Raganfred and, according to the Continuations, Radbod, then travelled from Neustria through the forest of the Ardennes and raided around the river Rhine and Cologne, taking treasure from Plectrude and her supporters. As they returned, Charles ambushed the returning party at the Battle of Amblève and was victorious, inflicting heavy losses on the Neustrian invaders.

In 717, Charles mustered his army again and marched on Neustria, taking the city of Verdun during his conquest.[7] He met Chilperic and Raganfred again at the Battle of Vinchy on 21 March 717 and was once again victorious, forcing them back to Paris. He then swiftly returned to Austrasia and besieged Cologne, defeating Plectrude and reclaiming his father's wealth and treasure. Charles bolstered his position by installing the Merovingian king Chlothar IV in Austrasia as an opposing Merovingian to Chilperic II.[14] Despite not having a Merovingian king for around 40 years in Austrasia, Charles' position was weak at this time and he required the support of the established Merovingians to gather military support.[17] Despite his weaknesses, Charles' recent success had made him a greater political entity; as such, Chilperic and Raganfred could not win a decisive victory against him. So, in 718 they too sent embassies and won the support of Duke Eudo of Aquitaine who, at their request, mustered 'a Gascon army' to face Charles. In response, Charles brought an army to the eastern Neustrian borders and faced Duke Eudo in battle at Soissons.[8] Duke Eudo, realising he was outmatched, retreated to Paris, where he took Chilperic and the royal treasury and left for Aquitaine. Charles pursued them, according to the Continuations, as far as Orleans, but Eudo and the Neustrians managed to escape.[10] In 718, King Chlothar IV died and was not replaced; instead, Charles became the primary authority in Francia. He established a peace treaty with Duke Eudo that ensured Chilperic II was returned to Francia; thereafter, until Chilperic's death in 720 at Noyon, the kingship was restored with Carolingian control and Charles became the maior palatii in both Neustria and Austrasia.[17] Following Chilperic II's death, the Merovingian king Theuderic IV, son of Dagobert III, was taken from Chelles Abbey and appointed by the Neustrians and Charles as the Frankish king.

Consolidation of power

With his ascension to the throne, several significant moments in Frankish history occurred. Firstly, the LHF ended, likely composed several years later in 727 and ended one of the several perspectives we have on Charles' ascension.[11] Secondly, and more importantly, the Arnulfing predominance in the faction ended and the Carolingian (translating to 'sons of Charles') officially began.[15]

Once the immediate dangers were dealt with, Charles then began to consolidate his position as sole mayor of the Frankish kingdom. The civil unrest between 714 and 721 had destroyed the continental political cohesion, and peripheral kingdoms like Aquitaine, Alemannia, Burgundy and Bavaria had slipped from the Carolingian's grasp. Even though the faction had, by Charles Martel's time, established strong political control over Francia, loyalty to the Merovingian power within these border regions remained.[15]

Ending the Civil War

Charles first set out to reinstate Carolingian dominance internally within Francia: the Continuations lists Charles' continuous maneuvers which solidified the campaigns generating the Carolingian military foundation. In 718, the AMP records that Charles fought against the Saxons, pushing them as far as the river Weser[14] and following up with subsequent campaigns in 720 and 724 which secured the northern borders of Austrasia and Neustria.[17] He subdued his former enemy Raganfred at Angers in 724 and secured his patronage, removing the remaining political resistance that had continued to thrive in western Neustria.[13]

East of the Rhine

In 725, Charles set out against the peripheral kingdoms, starting with Alemannia. The region had almost gained independence during the reign of Pippin II and under the leadership of Lantfrid, Duke of Alemannia, as (710–730) they acted without Frankish authority, issuing law codes like the Lex Alamannorum without Carolingian consultation. As recorded in the Alemannia source,[18] the Breviary of Erchanbert, the Alemanni 'refused to obey the duces of the Franks because they were no longer able to serve the Merovingian kings. Therefore, each of them kept to himself.'[16] This statement was true for more than just Alemannia and, just like in those regions, Charles brutally forced them into submission. Charles was successful in his first campaign, but returned in 730, the same year that Duke Lantfrid died and was succeeded by his brother Theudebald, Duke of Alamannia.[8]

As successful as campaigning had been, Charles seemingly took inspiration from Anglo-Saxon missionary Saint Boniface, who in 719 was sent by Pope Gregory II to convert Germany, in particular the areas of Thuringia and Hesse, where he established the monasteries of Ohrdruf, Tauberbischofsheim, Kitzingen and Ochsenfurt. Charles, realising the potential of establishing Carolingian-supportive episcopal centres, utilised Saint Pirmin, an itinerant monk, to establish an ecclesiastical foundation on Reichenau Island in Lake Constance. He was expelled in 727 by Lantfrid and he retreated to Alsace, where he established monasteries with the support of the Etichonid clan, who were Carolingian supporters. This relationship gave the Carolingians long-term benefit from Pirmin's future achievements, which brought abbeys in the eastern provinces into Carolingian favour.[7]

In 725, Charles continued his conquest from Alemannia and invaded Bavaria. Like Alemannia, Bavaria had continued to gain independence under the rule of the Agilolfings clan who, in recent years, had increased links with Lombardy and affirmed their own law codes, like the Lex Baiuvariorum.[16] When Charles moved, the region was experiencing a power struggle between Grimoald of Bavaria and his nephew Hugbert, but when Grimoald died in 725, Hugbert gained the position and Charles reaffirmed their support. The Continuations records that when Charles left Bavaria, he took hostages, one of which was Swanachild, who later would become Charles' second wife.[10] Paul Fouracre believes this marriage could have been intentionally forced, based upon the fact that Swanchild's heritage related her both to Alemannia and Bavaria. Not only would their marriage have allowed greater control over both regions, but it also would have cut the existing family ties that the Agilofings had to the Pippinid family branch. Plectrude's sister Regintrud was married to Theodo of Bavaria, and this relation provided an opportunity for disenfranchised family members to defect.[8]

Aquitaine, Burgundy and Provence

Following his conquest east of the Rhine, Charles had the opportunity to assert his dominance over Aquitaine and began committing military resources and performing raids in 731.[19] However, before he could make any major movements, Aquitaine was invaded by Umayyad warlord Abd al-Rahman I. Following Abd al-Rahman's ascension in Spain in 731, another local Berber lord Munuza revolted, set himself up at Cerdanya and forged defensive alliances with the Franks and Aquitainians through a marriage to Eudo's daughter. Abd ar-Rahman then besieged Cerdanya and forced Munuza into retreat into France, at which point he continued his advance into Aquitaine, moving as far as Tours before he was met by Charles Martel. Carolingian sources attest that Duke Eudo begged Charles for assistance, but Ian N. Wood claims these embassies have been invented by later pro-Carolingian annalists. Eudo was a main protagonist in the Battle of Toulouse (721), which famously stopped Muslim lord Al-Samh ibn Malik al-Khawlani's advances in Narbonne and gained Eudo praise in the Liber Pontificalis.[20]

Charles met the Muslim force at the famous Battle of Poitiers (732) and came out victorious. This moment cemented Charles Martel in historical records and gained him international praise. Bede, writing at the same time in Jarrow, England, recorded the event in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, and his victory gained Charles Martel the admiration of seminal historian Edward Gibbon who considered him the Christian saviour of Europe.[21][22] Although his victory was considered famous, in reality his victory was far less impactful, and Charles would not gain much control in Aquitaine until Eudo's death in 735. The victory may have given the Carolingians relative local support that potentially allowed Charles to assert dominance over Eudo's son and successor Hunald of Aquitaine, but records of continued hostilities in 736 only further cemented that relations were strained.[23][15]

With a stronger establishment in Aquitaine, Charles made moves to assert his dominance into Burgundy.[24] The region, at least in the Northern areas, had remained controlled and allied with Frankish interest. Influential nobility like Savaric of Auxerre, who had maintained near-autonomy and led military forces against Burgundian towns like Orléans, Nevers and Troyes, even dying whilst besieging Lyon, were the key to Charles' support. As such, Charles made multiple attempts to both gain the faction's support and remove their authority. When Savaric died during Charles' early reign, he agreed to support Savaric's nephew Bishop Eucherius of Orléans' claim to the bishopric. However, once Charles had established a powerful basis by 737, he exiled Eucherius, with the help of a man called Chrodobert, to the monastery of St Trond.[20] Charles took further military action in the same year to fully assert his authority, and installed his sons Pippin and Remigius as magnates. This was followed by the installation of political supporters from Bavaria and local supporters like Theuderic of Autun and Adalhard of Chalon.[7]

This acquisition of land in southern France was supported by the increased social chaos that seemingly developed during the Civil War years. This was most apparent in Provence, where local magnates, like Abbo of Provence, were incredibly supportive of Charles' attempts to reinstate Frankish power.[25] In 739, he used his power in Burgundy and Aquitaine to lead an attack with his brother Childebrand I against Arab invaders and Duke Maurontus, who had been claiming independence and allying himself with Muslim emir Abd ar-Rahman.[26] It is likely due to Childebrand's sponsorship of the manuscript that his involvement is so extensively recorded in the Continuations.[27] According to the manuscript, Childebrand and Charles noticed the Arab army, with Maurontus' welcome, entering Avignon and quickly moved against the alliance. They besieged the city and claimed victory; the Franks then made the decision to invade Septimania, taking Narbonne and flanking the Arab army. The Franks then fought off a support army sent from Spain under Omar-ibn Chaled at the River Berre. From there the Franks then pursued the retreating Arabs and ravaged the cities of Nîmes, Agde and Béziers before returning to Francia. Later that year, Charles and Childebrand returned to Provence, likely collecting more forces, and then forcing the rebellious Maurontus into 'impenetrable rocky fastnesses out to sea.'[27] Paul the Deacon later records in his Historia Langobardorum Maurontus received help from the Lombards, and his Arab allies then fled.[28] At this time, Charles then assumed control of the region and, judging from Charter evidence, appointed Abbo of Provence as patricius (Patrician) in the region.[29]

Ruling Francia

Charles also ruled the Frankish realm, although the majority of his policies were centred upon his conquests and his military ventures. In 19th century historiography, historians like Heinrich Brunner even centred their arguments around Charles' necessity for military resources, in particular the development of mounted warrior or cavalry that would peak in the High Middle Ages. However, in modern historiography, historians like Pierre Riche and Paul Fouracre have discredited his ideas as too simplistic and have aimed to depict more realistic fragments of development that may or not have been interdependent.[30] This was the period in which the Carolingians first began to establish themselves as fully independent from the Merovingian royalty.

Vassalage and Church

Charles Martel has become notorious in historiography for his role in the development of the concept of feudalism. The debates are rooted in the arguments of historians like François-Louis Ganshof, who viewed Charles' reign as the birth of the 'feudal' relationship between power and property. This results from the increased use of precaria or temporary land grants by the Carolingians, who allocated and spread their power to their subordinates. Ganshof's arguments connect these ties to a military-tenure relationship; however, this is never represented in primary material, and instead is only implied, and likely derived from, an understanding of 'feudalism' in the High Middle Ages. Recent historians like Paul Fouracre have criticised Ganshof's review for being too simplistic, and in reality, even though these systems of vassalage did exist between lord and populace, they were not as standardised as older historiography has suggested. For example, Fouracre has drawn particular attention to the incentives that drew lords and warriors into the Carolingian armies, arguing that the primary draw was 'booty' and treasure gained from conquest rather than 'feudal' obligation.[30]

Although Charles' reign is no longer considered transitional in its feudal developments, it is seen as a transitional period in the spread of the existing system of vassals and precaria land rights. Due to Charles' continued military and missionary work, the political systems that existed in the heartlands, Austrasia and Neustria, officially began to spread to the periphery.[30] Those whom Charles appointed as new nobility in these regions, often with lifetime tenures,[31] ensured that Carolingian loyalties and systems was maintained across the kingdoms. The Carolingians were also far more strict with their land rights and tenure than their Merovingian predecessors, carefully distributing their new land to new families temporarily, but maintaining their control. Merovingians kings weakened themselves by allocating too much of their royal domains to supporting factions; the Carolingians themselves seemingly became increasingly powerful due to their generosity. By giving away their land, the Merovingians allowed themselves to become figureheads and the 'do nothing kings' that Einhard prefaced in the Vita Karoli Magni.[7][32]

Due to his vast military conquests, Charles often reallocated existing land settlements, including Church property, to new tenants. Ecclesiastical property and monasteries in the late Merovingian and Carolingian period were political centres and often closely related to the royal court;[33] as such they often became involved in political matters, which often overlapped with Charles' reallocation of land. This 'secularisation' of Church property caused serious tension between the Carolingian church and state, and often gave Charles a negative depiction in ecclastical sources. The reallocation of church land was not new by Charles' reign; Ian Wood has managed to identify the practice going back to the reigns of Dagobert I (629–639) and Clovis II (639–657).[34] The majority of the sources that depict Charles' involvement in Church land rights come from the 9th century, and are therefore less reliable, but two supposedly contemporary sources also identify this issue.[35] The first, a letter sent by missionary Saint Boniface to Anglo-Saxon king Æthelbald of Mercia, called Charles' a 'destroyer of many monasteries, and embezzler of Church revenues for his own use...', condemning him for his use of Church property. This is supported by the second source, the Continuations, which related that, in 733 in Burgundy, Charles split the Lyonnais between his followers, this likely including Church land.[36] Further chronicles like the Gesta episcoporum Autissiodorensium and the Gesta Sanctorum Patrum Fontanellensis Coenobii recorded monasteries losing substantial land. The monastery at Auxerre was reduced to a hundred mansus by Pippin III's reign, and at the Abbey of Saint Wandrille under Abbot Teutsind, who was appointed by Charles in 735/6, the Church's local property was reduced to a third its size.[30] Wood has also criticised this point and proven that the loss of land by the Church was in reality very small, the remaining land being simply leased as it went beyond the Church's capabilities.[37] Regardless, it is apparent that Charles' expansion of control consumed plenty of reallocated properties, many of which were ecclesiastical domains.

Interregnum, death and divisions

When King Theuderic IV died in 737, Charles did not install a Merovingian successor. Unlike his Carolingian predecessors, Charles was strong enough by the end of his reign to not rely on Merovingian loyalties. He had created his own power bloc through the vassals he installed in Frankish heartlands and peripheral states.[25] Even prior to Theuderic's death, Charles did act with complete sovereignty in Austrasia. It was only in areas like Neustria, where Carolingian opposition historically existed, that Charles knew he would face criticism if he usurped the throne.[38]

Therefore, until his death, Charles ruled as Princeps or First Man/First Citizen, officially gaining the title with his uncontested leadership with the acquisition of Provence in 737.[39] This meant that the issue of kingship remained ever present for his successors who would have to work further to establish themselves as royal.

When Charles died in 741, he was buried at St Denis in Paris. He made secure succession plans, likely learning from his father, that ensured Francia was effectively divided between his sons, Carloman and Pippin as maior palatii. According to the Continuations, the eldest son, Carloman, was given control of the eastern kingdoms in Austrasia, Alammania and Thuringia, while Pippin was given the western kingdoms in Burgundy, Neustria and Provence.[40]

Charlemagne

A map showing Charlemagne's additions (in light green) to the Frankish Kingdom

The greatest Carolingian monarch was Charlemagne, Pepin's son. Charlemagne was crowned Emperor by Pope Leo III at Rome in 800.[41] His empire, ostensibly a continuation of the Western Roman Empire, is referred to historiographically as the Carolingian Empire.

The Carolingian rulers did not give up the traditional Frankish (and Merovingian) practice of dividing inheritances among heirs, though the concept of the indivisibility of the Empire was also accepted. The Carolingians had the practice of making their sons minor kings in the various regions (regna) of the Empire, which they would inherit on the death of their father, which Charlemagne and his son Louis the Pious both did for their sons. Following the death of the Emperor Louis the Pious in 840, his surviving adult sons, Lothair I and Louis the German, along with their adolescent brother Charles the Bald, fought a three-year civil war ending only with the Treaty of Verdun in 843, which divided the empire into three regna while according imperial status and a nominal lordship to Lothair who, at 48, was the eldest.[42] The Carolingians differed markedly from the Merovingians in that they disallowed inheritance to illegitimate offspring, possibly in an effort to prevent infighting among heirs and assure a limit to the division of the realm. In the late ninth century, however, the lack of suitable adults among the Carolingians necessitated the rise of Arnulf of Carinthia as the king of East Francia, a bastard child of a legitimate Carolingian king, Carloman of Bavaria,[43] himself a son of the First King of the Eastern division of the Frankish kingdom, Louis the German.

Weakening and disappearance of the dynasty

Disappearance of Middle Francia

Lothair was the first of the three brothers to die, leaving the empire at the mercy of the other two. Finally, after many twists and turns, his domain was gradually attached to East Francia, with the Scheldt marking the border between West and East Francia. The king of East Francia, at the same time, also recovered the title of emperor.[44][45]

Decline

After Charlemagne's death the dynasty slowly crumbled. His kingdom was split into three, each being ruled over by one of his grandsons. Only the kingdoms of the eastern and western portions survived, becoming the predecessors of modern Germany and France.[46] The Carolingians were displaced in most of the regna of the Empire by 888. They ruled in East Francia until 911 and held the throne of West Francia intermittently until 987. Carolingian cadet branches continued to rule in Vermandois and Lower Lorraine after the last king died in 987, but they never sought the royal or imperial thrones and made peace with the new ruling families. One chronicler of Sens dates the end of Carolingian rule with the coronation of Robert II of France as junior co-ruler with his father, Hugh Capet, thus beginning the Capetian dynasty.[47]

Scandinavian invasions

Viking attack according to a 12th century illumination.

The term Vikings generally designated all the peoples from present-day Scandinavia. In the Carolingian period, they were first known as Normans ("men of the north", origin of the name Normandy) and later as Vikings. They sold amber, animal skins, and metals, and bought honey, wine, and everything they could not produce in their lands. They were present, in small groups, in most coastal towns of the Frankish Empire.[48][49]

Around 800, the Vikings became aware of a new means of enrichment. Since they were not Christians, they did not have to respect the abbeys, which contained, with minimal defensive structure (a wall and sometimes a few guards), considerable treasure, consisting of chasses, reliquaries, precious metal objects for use in worship. These objects were particularly sought after in this period of weak monetary circulation, when metal was important not only for its value but also for the prestige associated with it.[50] Consequently, from 800 to about 850, the Vikings continued their trading practices, while also attempting raids on isolated monastic establishments whenever the opportunity arose. The first establishment to suffer was the monastery of Lindisfarne, on the British coast, attacked by the Vikings in 793.

After this first attack, Viking pressure increased: they sailed up rivers aboard their shallow-draft ships, improperly called “drakkars”, and plundered the treasures of the abbeys before returning to Scandinavia. For the moment, these were only brief expeditions: the Normans plundered, carried off goods, and left, most often after burning the place. These attacks nevertheless terrified the population by their speed, violence, and also because they struck churches which, since the establishment of Christianity, had never been attacked. In 841, the Normans attacked the Abbey of Jumièges and the city of Rouen; the monks had to flee from the danger of raids, carrying with them the relics of their saints. The Île de Noirmoutier was also repeatedly targeted by the Normans, to the point that the monks abandoned their monastery and settled about twenty-five km south of Nantes, at Déas, which became Saint-Philbert-de-Grand-Lieu. In 843, Nantes was taken and part of the population massacred. In the second third of the 9th century, most of the towns located along rivers were visited by the Normans.[51][52] At the end of the 9th century, the phenomenon grew in importance. These were now much more organized bands, who had decided in advance their routes and knew where to go. The expeditions were also more numerous, sometimes a hundred boats, compared to a small dozen at most at the beginning of the century. Finally, they no longer contented themselves with plundering and leaving. More and more often, they carried away the population to be sold as slaves and settled in conquered territories where they sometimes spent the winter.[53][54][55]

The Vikings ravaged Europe but also the Iberian Peninsula, then Muslim, and North Africa, without anyone being able to stop them. As it was impossible to control the entire territory and their strength lay in the speed of their fleets and the brutality of their expeditions, it was difficult to predict where they would attack. When they did not attack, the Vikings demanded the payment of heavy tributes. The quarrels among the sons of Louis the Pious hardly improved the situation. Lothair and his brother Louis took little interest in the problem, which fell almost entirely to Charles, the youngest son, who inherited all the coastal territories. Charles, who would be nicknamed the Bald, tried to build additional fortifications. He asked the leaders of the aristocracy to defend the threatened regions. Robert the Strong (ancestor of the Capetians) was placed by the king at the head of a western march; he died fighting the Vikings in 866. Count Odo defended Paris against an attack coming up the Seine in 885. These great lords acquired immense prestige in the struggle against the Scandinavian invader, prestige that contributed to the weakening of royal power. Military successes were now attributed to the marquises and counts. The inability of the Carolingians to resolve the Scandinavian problem was evident: in 911, by the Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte, King Charles the Simple ceded the Lower Seine to the Viking chief Rollo. He entrusted him with the defense of the estuary and the river downstream of Paris. This decision was at the origin of the creation of the Duchy of Normandy. The Carolingians were forced to cede territories and deliver tributes to counter the Scandinavian threat. They were also absorbed by family quarrels. The climate of insecurity therefore accelerated the disintegration of Carolingian power.[52][56][57]

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

Charlie Kirk, the founder of Turning Point USA, is the genetic son of Pope John Paul II

St. Charles Church in Vienna

Karlskirche Wien

St. Charles Church in Vienna

Karlskirche Wien

The St. Charles Church (Karlskirche) is considered architect Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach's greatest work. It is also a Viennese icon and an expression of the Austrian joie de vivre.

Johann Bernhard Fischer von ErlachIn 1713, one year after the last great plague epidemic, Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor, pledged to build a church for his namesake patron saint, Charles Borromeo, who was revered as a healer for plague sufferers. An architectural competition was announced, in which Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach prevailed over, among others, Ferdinando Galli-Bibiena and Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt. Construction began in 1716. After J.B. Fischer‘s death in 1723, his son, Joseph Emanuel Fischer von Erlach, completed the construction in 1737 using partially altered plans. The church originally possessed a direct line of sight to the Hofburg.

Architecture

As a creator of historic architecture, J.B. Fischer united the most diverse of elements. The façade in the center, which leads to the porch, corresponds to a Greek temple portico. The neighboring two columns, crafted by Lorenzo Mattielli, found a model in Trajan‘s Column in Rome. Next to those, two tower pavilions extend out and show the influence of the Roman baroque (Bernini and Borromini). Above the entrance, a dome rises up above a high drum, which the younger J.E. Fischer shortened and partly altered.

The iconographical program of the church originated from the imperial official Carl Gustav Heraeus and connects St. Charles Borromeo with his imperial benefactor. The relief on the pediment above the entrance with the cardinal virtues and the figure of the patron on its apex point to the motivation of the donation. This sculpture group continues onto the attic story as well. The attic is also one of the elements which the younger Fischer introduced. The columns display scenes from the life of Charles Borromeo in a spiral relief, however they also recall the Pillars of Hercules and act as symbols of imperial power. The entrance is flanked by angles from the Old and New Testaments. This continues in the interior as well, above all, the dome fresco by Johann Michael Rottmayr of Salzburg and Gaetano Fanti which displays an intercession of Charles Borromeo, supported by the Virgin Mary. The cardinal virtues surround the scene. The frescos in a number of side chapels are attributed to Daniel Gran. The high altar painting portraying the ascension of the saint was conceptualized by the elder Fischer and executed by Ferdinand Maximilian Brokoff. The altar paintings in the side chapels are by various artists, including Daniel Gran, Sebastiano Ricci, Martino Altomonte, and Jakob van Schuppen. As strong effect emanates from the directing of light and architectural grouping, in particular the arch openings of the main axis. The color scheme is characterized by marble with sparring and conscious use of gold leaf.

https://www.musicofvienna.com/charles-church.htm

Pope John Paul II (Latin: Ioannes Paulus II; Italian: Giovanni Paolo II; Polish: Jan Paweł II; born KAROL Józef Wojtyła [ˈkarɔl ˈjuzɛv vɔjˈtɨwa];[b] 18 May 1920 – 2 April 2005) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his death in 2005.

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

THE HOLY EUCHARIST ·

Susan E. Gorski

September 11, 2025

A picture of Charlie Kirk and his family visiting the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington DC.

Image courtesy: Erika Kirk

#fblifestyle Sachin Jose

https://www.facebook.com/groups/549008808495323/posts/24963913133244884/

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.

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

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

The name Arturo means "bear" and originates from the Italian and Spanish languages. It is derived from the Celtic name Arthur,

Revelation 13:16-18

King James Version

16 And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:

17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2013:16-18&version=KJV

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.

https://www.jesuits.org/stories/jeffrey-s-burwell-sj-named-next-provincial-of-the-jesuits-of-canada/

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.

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/2025/05/22/trump-pope-leo-florida-maga-brother-louis-prevost-white-house-visit/83773944007/

̶h̶t̶t̶p̶s̶:̶/̶/̶e̶n̶.̶w̶i̶k̶i̶p̶e̶d̶i̶a̶.̶o̶r̶g̶/̶w̶i̶k̶i̶/̶P̶a̶p̶a̶l̶_̶r̶e̶n̶u̶n̶c̶i̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶

Pope John Paul I[a] (born Albino Luciani;[b] 17 October 1912 – 28 September 1978) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of Vatican City from 26 August 1978 until his death 33 days later.

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

On 13 May 1981, in St. Peter's Square in Vatican City, Pope John Paul II was shot and wounded by Mehmet Ali Ağca while he was entering the square.

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

SAKO Limited (natively Sako Oy)[1] is a Finnish firearm and ammunition manufacturer located in Riihimäki, Kanta-Häme in southern Finland.

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

And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast.

Revelation 13:3

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

The word asas in Arabic means "PRINCIPLE". The Asāsiyyūn (plural, from literary Arabic) were, as defined in Arabic, the principle people.

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

PRINCIPLE AND FOUNDATION

The Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola

TRANSLATED FROM

THE AUTOGRAPH

FATHER ELDER MULLAN, S.J.

I.H.S.

NEW YORK

P.J. KENEDY & SONS

PRINTERS TO THE HOLY APOSTOLIC SEE

https://ia601603.us.archive.org/32/items/spiritualexercis00ignauoft/spiritualexercis00ignauoft.pdf

The Iberian Alans, soundly defeated by the Visigoths in 418 CE, subsequently surrendered their autonomy to the Hasdingi Vandals.

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

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]

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.

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

Scottish baronies were historically the only form of British nobility held by prescriptive feudal tenure, capable of being disponed with the land or the caput (seat) rather than passing solely through heritable succession.

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

General Register of Sasines

Last updated: 18 February 2026

The sasine register is the oldest national public land register in the world, dating back to 1617.

https://www.ros.gov.uk/our-registers/general-register-of-sasines

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.

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/

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]

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

Robert I (11 July 1274 – 7 June 1329), popularly known as Robert the Bruce (Scottish Gaelic: Raibeart am Brusach), was King of Scots from 1306 until his death in 1329.[1]

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

Batman's origin[36] comes from how as a young boy he watched his parents, the physician Dr. Thomas Wayne and his wife Martha, be murdered with a gun by a mugger named Joe Chill.

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

The St. Joseph's Cathedral[1] (Arabic: كاتدرائية القديس يوسف) or Latin Cathedral of St. Joseph[2] or Church of the Latins (Arabic: كنيسة اللاتين) or Church of the Virgin Lady (Arabic: كنيسة السيدة العذراء),[3] is a Catholic cathedral located on al-Jumhuriya Street in Baghdad,[4][5] the capital of Iraq.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_Cathedral_of_St._Joseph

Vicki Vale is a beautiful prize-winning photojournalist who attempted to uncover the secret of the mysterious Batman and inadvertently became the object of obsession for the Joker.

https://batman.fandom.com/wiki/Vicki_Vale_(Burtonverse)

Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days, which was longer than those of any of her predecessors, constituted the Victorian era, a period of industrial, political, scientific, and military change within the United Kingdom marked by a great expansion of the British Empire. In 1876, the British parliament voted to grant her the additional title of Empress of India.

Victoria was the daughter of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn (the fourth son of King George III), and Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. After the deaths of her father and grandfather in 1820, she was raised under close supervision by her mother and her comptroller, John Conroy. She inherited the throne aged 18 after her father's three elder brothers died without surviving legitimate issue. Victoria attempted privately to influence government policy and ministerial appointments; publicly, she became a national icon who was identified with strict standards of personal morality.

Victoria married her maternal first cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, in 1840. Their nine children married into royal and noble families across the continent, earning Victoria the sobriquet "grandmother of Europe". After Albert's death in 1861, Victoria plunged into deep mourning and avoided public appearances. As a result of her seclusion, British republicanism temporarily gained strength, but in the latter half of her reign, her popularity recovered. Her Golden and Diamond jubilees were times of public celebration. Victoria died at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight, at the age of 81. The last British monarch of the House of Hanover, she was succeeded by her son Edward VII.

Widowhood and isolation

Photograph by J. J. E. Mayall, 1860

In March 1861, Victoria's mother died, with Victoria at her side. Through reading her mother's papers, Victoria discovered that her mother had loved her deeply;[111] she was heart-broken, and blamed Conroy and Lehzen for "wickedly" estranging her from her mother.[112] To relieve his wife during her intense and deep grief,[113] Albert took on most of her duties, despite being ill himself with chronic stomach trouble.[114] In August, Victoria and Albert visited their son, Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, who was attending army manoeuvres near Dublin, and spent a few days holidaying in Killarney. In November, Albert was made aware of gossip that his son had slept with the actress Nellie Clifden in Ireland.[115] Appalled, he travelled to Cambridge, where his son was studying, to confront him.[116]

By the beginning of December, Albert was very unwell.[117] He was diagnosed with typhoid fever by William Jenner, and died on 14 December 1861. Victoria was devastated.[118] She blamed her husband's death on worry over the Prince of Wales's philandering. He had been "killed by that dreadful business", she said.[119] She entered a state of mourning and wore black for the remainder of her life. She avoided public appearances and rarely set foot in London in the following years.[120] Her seclusion earned her the nickname "widow of Windsor".[121] Her weight increased through comfort eating, which reinforced her aversion to public appearances.[122]

Victoria's self-imposed isolation from the public diminished the popularity of the monarchy, and encouraged the growth of the republican movement.[123] She did undertake her official government duties, yet chose to remain secluded in her royal residences—Windsor Castle, Osborne House, and the private estate in Scotland that she and Albert had acquired in 1847, Balmoral Castle. In March 1864, a protester stuck a notice on the railings of Buckingham Palace that announced "these commanding premises to be let or sold in consequence of the late occupant's declining business".[124] Her uncle Leopold wrote to her advising her to appear in public. She agreed to visit the gardens of the Royal Horticultural Society at Kensington and take a drive through London in an open carriage.[125]

Victoria on a horse

With John Brown at Balmoral, 1863. Photograph by G. W. Wilson

Through the 1860s, Victoria relied increasingly on a manservant from Scotland, John Brown.[126] Rumours of a romantic connection and even a secret marriage appeared in print, and some referred to the Queen as "Mrs. Brown".[127] The story of their relationship was the subject of the 1997 movie Mrs. Brown. A painting by Sir Edwin Henry Landseer depicting the Queen with Brown was exhibited at the Royal Academy, and Victoria published a book, Leaves from the Journal of Our Life in the Highlands, which featured Brown prominently and in which the Queen praised him highly.[128]

Palmerston died in 1865, and after a brief ministry led by Russell, Derby returned to power. In 1866, Victoria attended the State Opening of Parliament for the first time since Albert's death.[129] The following year she supported the passing of the Reform Act 1867 which doubled the electorate by extending the franchise to many urban working men,[130] though she was not in favour of votes for women.[131] Derby resigned in 1868, to be replaced by Benjamin Disraeli, who charmed Victoria. "Everyone likes flattery," he said, "and when you come to royalty you should lay it on with a trowel."[132] With the phrase "we authors, Ma'am", he complimented her.[133] Disraeli's ministry only lasted a matter of months, and at the end of the year his Liberal rival, William Ewart Gladstone, was appointed prime minister. Victoria found Gladstone's demeanour far less appealing; he spoke to her, she is thought to have complained, as though she were "a public meeting rather than a woman".[134]

In 1870 republican sentiment in Britain, fed by the Queen's seclusion, was boosted after the establishment of the Third French Republic.[135] A republican rally in Trafalgar Square demanded Victoria's removal, and Radical MPs spoke against her.[136] In August and September 1871, she was seriously ill with an abscess in her arm, which Joseph Lister successfully lanced and treated with his new antiseptic carbolic acid spray.[137] In late November 1871, at the height of the republican movement, the Prince of Wales contracted typhoid fever, the disease that was believed to have killed his father, and Victoria was fearful her son would die.[138] As the tenth anniversary of her husband's death approached, her son's condition grew no better, and Victoria's distress continued.[139] To general rejoicing, he recovered.[140] Mother and son attended a public parade through London and a grand service of thanksgiving in St Paul's Cathedral on 27 February 1872, and republican feeling subsided.[141]

On the last day of February 1872, two days after the thanksgiving service, 17-year-old Arthur O'Connor, a great-nephew of Irish MP Feargus O'Connor, waved an unloaded pistol at Victoria's open carriage just after she had arrived at Buckingham Palace. Brown, who was attending the Queen, grabbed him; O'Connor was later sentenced to 12 months' imprisonment[142] and a birching.[143] As a result of the incident, Victoria's popularity recovered further.[144]

Empress of India

English Wikisource has original text related to this article:

Proclamation by the Queen in Council, to the princes, chiefs, and people of India

After the Indian Rebellion of 1857, the British East India Company, which had ruled much of India, was dissolved, and Britain's possessions and protectorates on the Indian subcontinent were formally incorporated into the British Empire. The Queen had a relatively balanced view of the conflict, and condemned atrocities on both sides.[145] She wrote of "her feelings of horror and regret at the result of this bloody civil war",[146] and insisted, urged on by Albert, that an official proclamation announcing the transfer of power from the company to the state "should breathe feelings of generosity, benevolence and religious toleration".[147] At her behest, a reference threatening the "undermining of native religions and customs" was replaced by a passage guaranteeing religious freedom.[147]

Victoria admired Heinrich von Angeli's 1875 portrait of her for its "honesty, total want of flattery, and appreciation of character".[148]

In the 1874 general election, Disraeli was returned to power. He passed the Public Worship Regulation Act 1874, which removed Catholic rituals from the Anglican liturgy and which Victoria strongly supported.[149] She preferred short, simple services, and personally considered herself more aligned with the presbyterian Church of Scotland than the episcopal Church of England.[150] Disraeli also pushed the Royal Titles Act 1876 through Parliament, so that Victoria took the title "Empress of India" from 1 May 1876.[151] The new title was proclaimed at the Delhi Durbar of 1 January 1877.[152]

On 14 December 1878, the anniversary of Albert's death, Victoria's second daughter Alice, who had married Louis of Hesse, died of diphtheria in Darmstadt. Victoria noted the coincidence of the dates as "almost incredible and most mysterious".[153] In May 1879, she became a great-grandmother (on the birth of Princess Feodora of Saxe-Meiningen) and passed her "poor old 60th birthday". She felt "aged" by "the loss of my beloved child".[154]

Between April 1877 and February 1878, she threatened five times to abdicate while pressuring Disraeli to act against Russia during the Russo-Turkish War, but her threats had no impact on the events or their conclusion with the Congress of Berlin.[155] Disraeli's expansionist foreign policy, which Victoria endorsed, led to conflicts such as the Anglo-Zulu War and the Second Anglo-Afghan War. "If we are to maintain our position as a first-rate Power", she wrote, "we must ... be Prepared for attacks and wars, somewhere or other, CONTINUALLY."[156] Victoria saw the expansion of the British Empire as civilising and benign, protecting native peoples from more aggressive powers or cruel rulers: "It is not in our custom to annexe countries", she said, "unless we are obliged & forced to do so."[157] To Victoria's dismay, Disraeli lost the 1880 general election, and Gladstone returned as prime minister.[158] When Disraeli died the following year, she was blinded by "fast falling tears",[159] and erected a memorial tablet "placed by his grateful Sovereign and Friend, Victoria R.I."[160]

Victorian farthing, 1884

On 2 March 1882, Roderick Maclean, a disgruntled poet apparently offended by Victoria's refusal to accept one of his poems,[161] shot at the Queen as her carriage left Windsor railway station. Gordon Chesney Wilson and another schoolboy from Eton College struck him with their umbrellas, until he was hustled away by a policeman.[162] Victoria was outraged when he was found not guilty by reason of insanity,[163] but was so pleased by the many expressions of loyalty after the attack that she said it was "worth being shot at—to see how much one is loved".[164]

On 17 March 1883, Victoria fell down some stairs at Windsor, which left her lame until July; she never fully recovered and was plagued with rheumatism thereafter.[165] John Brown died 10 days after her accident, and to the consternation of her private secretary, Sir Henry Ponsonby, Victoria began work on a eulogistic biography of Brown.[166] Ponsonby and Randall Davidson, Dean of Windsor, who had both seen early drafts, advised Victoria against publication, on the grounds that it would stoke the rumours of a love affair.[167] The manuscript was destroyed.[168] In early 1884, Victoria did publish More Leaves from a Journal of a Life in the Highlands, a sequel to her earlier book, which she dedicated to her "devoted personal attendant and faithful friend John Brown".[169] On the day after the first anniversary of Brown's death, Victoria was informed by telegram that her youngest son, Leopold, had died in Cannes. He was "the dearest of my dear sons", she lamented.[170] The following month, Victoria's youngest child, Beatrice, met and fell in love with Prince Henry of Battenberg at the wedding of Victoria's granddaughter Princess Victoria of Hesse and by Rhine to Henry's brother Prince Louis of Battenberg. Beatrice and Henry planned to marry, but Victoria opposed the match at first, wishing to keep Beatrice at home to act as her companion. After a year, she was won around to the marriage by their promise to remain living with and attending her.[171]

Extent of the British Empire in 1898

Victoria was pleased when Gladstone resigned in 1885 after his budget was defeated.[172] She thought his government was "the worst I have ever had", and blamed him for the death of General Gordon during the Siege of Khartoum.[173] Gladstone was replaced by Lord Salisbury. Salisbury's government only lasted a few months, however, and Victoria was forced to recall Gladstone, whom she referred to as a "half crazy & really in many ways ridiculous old man".[174] Gladstone attempted to pass a bill granting Ireland home rule, but to Victoria's glee it was defeated.[175] In the ensuing election, Gladstone's party lost to Salisbury's and the government switched hands again.[176]

Golden and Diamond Jubilees

The Family of Queen Victoria in 1887

The Family of Queen Victoria in 1887, by Laurits Tuxen. The painting, commissioned by the Queen to celebrate her Golden Jubilee, depicts Victoria and members of her family in the Green Drawing Room at Windsor Castle.

In 1887, the British Empire celebrated Victoria's Golden Jubilee. She marked the fiftieth anniversary of her accession on 20 June with a banquet to which 50 kings and princes were invited. The following day, she participated in a procession and attended a thanksgiving service in Westminster Abbey.[177] By this time, Victoria was once again extremely popular.[178] Two days later on 23 June,[179] she engaged two Indian Muslims as waiters, one of whom was Abdul Karim. He was soon promoted to "Munshi": teaching her Urdu and acting as a clerk.[180][181][182] Her family and retainers were appalled, and accused Abdul Karim of spying for the Muslim Patriotic League and biasing the Queen against Hindus and in favour of Muslims.[183] Equerry Frederick Ponsonby (the son of Sir Henry) discovered that the Munshi had lied about his parentage, and reported to Lord Elgin, Viceroy of India, "the Munshi occupies very much the same position as John Brown used to do."[184] Victoria dismissed their complaints as racial prejudice.[185] Abdul Karim remained in her service until he returned to India with a pension, on her death.[186]

The Munshi stands over Victoria as she works at a desk.

With the Munshi Abdul Karim

Victoria's eldest daughter became empress consort of Germany in 1888, but she was widowed a little over three months later, and Victoria's eldest grandchild became German Emperor as Wilhelm II. Victoria and Albert's hopes of a liberal Germany would go unfulfilled, as Wilhelm was a firm believer in autocracy. Victoria thought he had "little heart or Zartgefühl [tact] – and ... his conscience & intelligence have been completely wharped [sic]".[187]

Gladstone returned to power after the 1892 general election; he was 82 years old. Victoria objected when Gladstone proposed appointing the Radical MP Henry Labouchère to the Cabinet, so Gladstone agreed not to appoint him.[188] In 1894, Gladstone retired and, without consulting the outgoing prime minister, Victoria appointed Lord Rosebery as prime minister.[189] His government was weak, and the following year Lord Salisbury replaced him. Salisbury remained prime minister for the remainder of Victoria's reign.[190]

Seated Victoria in embroidered and lace dress

Official Diamond Jubilee photograph by W. & D. Downey

On 23 September 1896, Victoria surpassed her grandfather George III as the longest-reigning monarch in British history. The Queen requested that any special celebrations be delayed until 1897, to coincide with her Diamond Jubilee,[191] which was made a festival of the British Empire at the suggestion of the Colonial Secretary, Joseph Chamberlain.[192] The prime ministers of all the self-governing Dominions were invited to London for the festivities.[193] One reason for including the prime ministers of the Dominions and excluding foreign heads of state was to avoid having to invite Victoria's grandson Wilhelm II, who, it was feared, might cause trouble at the event.[194]

The Queen's Diamond Jubilee procession on 22 June 1897 followed a route six miles long through London and included troops from all over the empire. The procession paused for an open-air service of thanksgiving held outside St Paul's Cathedral, throughout which Victoria sat in her open carriage, to avoid her having to climb the steps to enter the building. The celebration was marked by vast crowds of spectators and great outpourings of affection for the 78-year-old Queen.[195]

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

Revelation 17:12-15

1599 Geneva Bible

12 [a]And the ten horns which thou sawest, are [b]ten kings, which yet have not received a kingdom, but shall receive power, as Kings [c]at one hour with the beast.

13 [d]These have one mind, and shall give their power and authority unto the beast.

14 These shall fight with the [e]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.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2017%3A12-15&version=GNV

The Victor Emmanuel II National Monument (Italian: Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II), also known as the Vittoriano or for synecdoche Altare della Patria ("Altar of the Fatherland"), is a large national monument built between 1885 and 1935 to honour Victor Emmanuel II, the first king of a unified Italy, in Rome, Italy.[2] It occupies a site between the Piazza Venezia and the Capitoline Hill. The monument was realized by Giuseppe Sacconi.

From an architectural perspective, it was conceived as a modern forum, an agora on three levels connected by stairways and dominated by a portico characterized by a colonnade. The complex process of national unity and liberation from foreign domination carried out by King Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy, to whom the monument is dedicated, has a great symbolic and representative value, being architecturally and artistically centred on the unification of Italy—for this reason the Vittoriano is considered one of the national symbols of Italy.

It also preserves the Altar of the Fatherland (Italian: Altare della Patria), first an altar of the goddess Roma, then also a shrine of the Italian Unknown Soldier, thus adopting the function of a secular temple consecrated to Italy. Because of its great representative value, the entire Vittoriano is often called the Altare della Patria, although the latter constitutes only a part of the monument.

It is currently managed by the Polo Museale del Lazio and is owned by the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities.

General description

The Vittoriano

View of the artistic and architectural works present in the Vittoriano

The Vittoriano is on the Capitoline Hill, in the symbolic centre of ancient Rome, and is connected to the modern one thanks to roads that radiate from Piazza Venezia.[3]

Its design is a neoclassical interpretation of the Roman Forum. It features stairways, Corinthian columns, fountains, an equestrian statue of Victor Emmanuel II, and two statues of the goddess Victoria riding on quadrigas. On its summit is a majestic portico characterized by a long colonnade and two imposing propylaea, one dedicated to the "unity of the homeland", and the other to the "freedom of the citizens", concepts metaphorically linked to the figure of Victor Emmanuel II.[3]

The base houses the museum of Italian unification,[4][5] and in 2007 a lift was added to the structure, allowing visitors to access the roof for 360-degree views of Rome.[6] This terrace, which is the highest of the monument, can also be reached via 196 steps that start from the portico.[7]

The structure is 135 m (443 ft) wide, 130 m (427 ft) deep, and 70 m (230 ft) high.[3][8] If the quadrigae and Winged Victorys are included, the height reaches 81 m (266 ft).[4] It has a total area of 17,550 m2 (188,907 sq ft) and possesses, due to the conspicuous development of the interior spaces, a floor area of 717,000 m2 (7,717,724 sq ft).[3][8]

One of the architecturally predominant elements of the Vittoriano are the external staircases, which constitute in the complex 243 steps, and the portico on the top of the monument, which is inserted between two lateral propylaea.[3] The entrance stairway is 41 m (135 ft) wide and 34 m (112 ft) long, the terrace of the Altar of the Fatherland is 66 m (217 ft) wide.[8] The maximum depth of the Vittoriano underground reaches 17 m (56 ft) below street level. The colonnade is formed by columns 15 m (49 ft) high and the length of the porch is 72 m (236 ft).[3]

The Basilica of Santa Maria in Ara Coeli. The Vittoriano can be seen on the left.

The allegories of the monument mostly represent the virtues and feelings, very often rendered as personifications, also according to the canons of the neoclassical style, which animate the Italians during the Italian unification, or from the revolutions of 1820 to the capture of Rome (1870), through which national unity was achieved.[9] Due to the complex process of unification undertaken by Victor Emmanuel II throughout the second half of the 19th century, the Italians gave him the epithet of Father of the Fatherland (Italian: Padre della Patria). The only non-allegorical work is the equestrian statue of Victor Emmanuel II,[3] which is the architectural centre of the Vittoriano.[8]

The entrance stairway of Vittoriano

The monument, as a whole, appears as a sort of marble covering on the northern slope of the Capitoline Hill:[3] it was therefore thought of as a place where it is possible to make an uninterrupted patriotic walk (the path does not in fact have an architectural end, given that the entrances to the highest part are two, one for each propylaeum) among the works present, which almost all have allegorical meanings linked to the history of Italy.[8] Different are the vegetal symbols present, among which the palm, which recalls the "victory", the oak (the "strength"), the laurel (the "victorious peace"), the myrtle (the "sacrifice") and the Olive tree (the "concord").[10]

From a stylistic perspective, the architecture and works of art that embellish the Vittoriano have been conceived with the aim of creating a "national style" to be replicated in other areas.[11] It was designed to communicate the imperial splendours of ancient Rome.[12] Above all, for the realization of the Vittoriano, Giuseppe Sacconi took inspiration from the Neoclassical architecture—the reborn heir of the classical Greek and Roman architecture, on which Italic elements were grafted and eclectic influences added.[8]

The Vittoriano is regarded as a national symbol of Italy and every year it hosts important national celebrations.[2] The largest annual celebrations are Liberation Day (25 April), Republic Day (2 June), and Armed Forces Day (4 November). During these celebrations, the President of the Italian Republic and the highest government officials pay tribute to the Italian Unknown Soldier and those who died in the line of duty by laying a laurel wreath.[8]

History

Main article: History of the Vittoriano

After the death of Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy on 9 January 1878, many initiatives were destined to raise a permanent monument that celebrated the first king of a united Italy, creator of the process of unification and liberation from foreign domination, which is indicated by historiography as "Father of the Fatherland" also due to the political work of the President of the Council of Ministers of the Kingdom of Sardinia Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, and to the military contribution of Giuseppe Garibaldi. The goal was therefore to commemorate the entire Italian unification season ("Risorgimento") through one of its protagonists.[10][9]

For this purpose, the Italian government approved the construction of a monumental complex on the Northern side of Rome's Capitoline Hill. The monument would celebrate the legacy of the first king of a united Italy and would become a symbol of national patriotism. The project was realized by Giuseppe Sacconi in 1885, in an eclectic style.[8][1]

Sacconi was inspired by the Hellenistic sanctuaries, such as the Pergamon Altar and the Sanctuary of Fortuna Primigenia in Palestrina.[8] The Vittoriano was conceived as a vast and modern forum[9] open to citizens, on a sort of elevated square in the historic centre of Rome organized as an agora on three levels connected by tiers, with conspicuous spaces reserved for strolling visitors.[3][12]

To erect the Vittoriano it was necessary, between the last months of 1884 and 1899,[3] to proceed with numerous expropriations and extensive demolitions of the buildings that were on the site.[3] The place chosen was in the heart of the historic centre of Rome and was therefore occupied by ancient buildings arranged according to urban planning that dated back to the Middle Ages.[13] This was considered necessary because the Vittoriano should have been built in the heart of the historic centre of Rome, in a modern urban context, in front of a new large square (the future Piazza Venezia), which at the time was just a narrow open space in front of Palazzo Venezia.[14]

The general objective was also to make Rome a modern European capital that rivaled Berlin, Vienna, London and Paris[12] overcoming the centuries-old pontifical town planning.[12] In this context, the Vittoriano would have been the equivalent of the Brandenburg Gate of Berlin, the Admiralty Arch of London and the Opéra Garnier of Paris; these buildings are all united by a monumental and classical aspect that metaphorically communicates pride and the power of the nation that erected them.[12]

It would then become one of the symbols of the new Italy, joining the monuments of ancient Rome and those of the popes' Rome.[8][10] Having then been conceived as a large public square, the Vittoriano, in addition to representing a memorial dedicated to Victor Emmanuel II, was invested with another role—a modern forum dedicated to the new free and united Italy.[15]

Established Italian sculptors, such as Leonardo Bistolfi, Manfredo Manfredi, Giulio Monteverde, Francesco Jerace, Augusto Rivalta, Lodovico Pogliaghi, Pietro Canonica, Ettore Ximenes, Adolfo Apolloni, Mario Rutelli and Angelo Zanelli, made its sculptures nationwide.[16] The partly completed monument was inaugurated on 4 June 1911, on the occasion of the Turin International world's fair and the 50th anniversary of Italian unification. Construction continued throughout the first half of the 20th century; in 1921 the body of the Italian Unknown Soldier was placed in the crypt under the statue of the goddess Roma, and in 1935 the monument was fully completed amidst the inauguration of the Museo Centrale del Risorgimento Italiano.[4]

The decision to include an altar dedicated to the homeland in the Vittoriano was taken by Giuseppe Sacconi only after the planning phase, during the construction of the monument.[8] The place and the dominant subject were immediately chosen, being a large statue of the goddess Roma that would have been placed on the first terrace after the entrance to the monument, just below the equestrian statue of Victor Emmanuel II.[8] Thus, the Altar of the Fatherland, at least initially and before the burial of the body of the Unknown Soldier, was thought of as a chapel of the deity.[3] In this way, the greatness and majesty of Rome was celebrated, elected to the role of legitimate capital of Italy.[13] Within the Vittoriano are numerous artistic works that recall the history of ancient Rome.[12]

After the First World War the Vittoriano was chosen to house the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, or the burial of an Italian soldier who died during the First World War whose identity remains unknown due to the serious injuries that made the body unrecognizable, which represents all the Italian soldiers who died during the wars.[17] The reason for his strong symbolism lies in the metaphorical transition from the figure of the soldier to that of the people and finally to that of the nation. This transition between increasingly broader and generic concepts is due to the indistinct traits of the non-identification of the soldier.[8]

The Vittoriano was thus consecrated to a wide symbolic value representing a lay temple metaphorically dedicated to a free and united Italy—celebrating by virtue the burial of the Unknown Soldier (the sacrifice for the homeland and for the connected ideals).[11][9][8]

With the rise of Fascism in 1922, the Vittoriano became the setting for the military parades of the authoritarian regime of Benito Mussolini. After World War II, with the institution of the Italian Republic in 1946, the monument was stripped of all its Fascist symbols and reassumed its original function as a secular temple dedicated to the Italian nation and its people.[8] Throughout the second half of the 20th century, however, its significance as a symbol of national identity started to decline as the public opinion started to perceive it as a cumbersome relic.[2] At the turn of the 21st century, Italy's President Carlo Azeglio Ciampi pushed for a revaluation of national symbols of Italy, including the Vittoriano.[3]

Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

Further information: Tomb of the Unknown Soldier (Italy)

Further information: Maria Bergamas

President Sergio Mattarella pays tribute to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier on November 4, 2016

The monument holds the Tomb of the Italian Unknown Soldier with an eternal flame, built under the statue of goddess Roma after World War I following an idea of General Giulio Douhet.[17] The body of the unknown soldier was chosen on 28 October 1921 from among 11 unknown remains by Maria Bergamas, a woman from Gradisca d'Isonzo whose only child was killed during World War I.[17] Her son's body was never recovered. The selected unknown was transferred from Aquileia, where the ceremony with Bergamas had taken place, to Rome and buried in a state funeral on 4 November 1921.[17]

His tomb is a symbolic shrine that represents all the fallen and missing of the war.[10] The side of the tomb of the Unknown Soldier that gives outward at the Altar of the Fatherland is always guarded by a guard of honour and two flames that burn perpetually in braziers.[18] The guard is provided with military personnel of the various weapons of the Italian Armed Forces, which alternate every ten years.[17]

The allegorical meaning of the perpetually burning flames is linked to their symbolism, which is centuries old, since it has its origins in classical antiquity, especially in the cult of the dead. A fire that burns eternally symbolizes the memory, in this case of the sacrifice of the Unknown Soldier moved by patriotic love, and his everlasting memory of the Italians, even in those who are far from their country. The two perennial braziers next to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is placed a plaque whose text reads "Italians Abroad to the Motherland" in memory of donations made by Italian emigrants between the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century for the construction of the Vittoriano.[19]

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

https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxJgRRqSweCdL9I0D9eY8PjWosVa233Z4D

What is the key to victory when struggling with sin?

Answer

The key to victory in our struggles with sin lies not in ourselves, but in God and His faithfulness to us: “The LORD is near to all who call on Him, to all who call on Him in truth” (Psalm 145:18; see also Psalm 46:1).

There’s no getting around it: we all struggle with sin (Romans 3:23). Even the great apostle Paul lamented over his ongoing struggle with sin in his life: “For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me” (Romans 7:18-20). Paul’s struggle with sin was real; so much so that he cried out, “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?” (Romans 7:24).

Yet in the next breath, he answers his own question, as well as ours: “Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:25a). In this passage, Paul not only provides us with the very key to victory when struggling with sin, but explains the never-ending conundrum between our sinful nature and spiritual nature: “So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin” (Romans 7:25b).

Earlier, Paul said, “For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin” (Romans 7:14). Paul is comparing our sinful nature, our flesh, to a slave. Just as a slave obeys his master, so our flesh obeys sin. However, as believers in Christ, we have become spiritual beings under the law of Christ; our inner selves are under the influence and ownership of God’s grace and the life of Christ (Romans 5:21). As long as we are living in this world, our sinful nature and fleshly desire will remain with us. But we also have a new nature in Christ. This leads to a struggle between what we want to do and what we actually do, as sin continues to assault our earthly nature. This struggle is a normal part of living the Christian life.

It’s interesting to note that Paul, the greatest of the apostles, declared that, of all sinners, “I am the worst!” (1 Timothy 1:15). Paul affirms the struggles we all have as we battle with sin and temptation in our lives. The struggles are real, and they’re debilitating. We grow weary from the never-ending temptations and in falling short of God’s glory. Paul, in essence, is telling us that we need not pretend that we’re untouched by our struggles. He’s been there. He understands. Though our efforts to do right seem desperate, we do have hope “through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 7:25; Hebrews 4:15). And He, in fact, is the key to our victory over sin.

A true Christian will war with Satan and his daily efforts to undermine us. The devil is the ruler of this world, and we are living “behind enemy lines” (Ephesians 2:2; Ephesians 6:12; John 12:31). With our focus on Christ, however, we will be able to cultivate a mindset that proclaims we’d rather die than do anything to hurt God. When we give ourselves to Christ totally (Matthew 16:24), Satan will flee from us. When we draw near to God, He, in turn, will draw near to us (James 4:7-8).

Our key to victory in our struggle with sin lies in the very promise of God Himself: “No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation He will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).

As true believers in Christ, even when we “face trials far beyond our ability to endure” (2 Corinthians 1:8), we can echo the reassuring words of Paul, who declares, “God has delivered us and will continue to deliver us” (2 Corinthians 1:10). Finally, the psalmist gives us these words of encouragement: “Trust in the LORD, and do good; dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness. Delight yourself in the LORD, and He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the LORD; trust in Him, and He will act” (Psalm 37:3-5).

https://www.gotquestions.org/struggling-with-sin.html

John 12

1599 Geneva Bible

12 2 As Christ is at supper with Lazarus, 3 Mary anointeth his feet. 5 Judas findeth fault with her. 7 Christ defendeth her. 10 The Priests would put Lazarus to death. 12 As Christ cometh to Jerusalem. 18 The people meet him. 22 The Greeks desire to see him. 42 The chief rulers that believe in him, but for fear do not confess him, 44 he exhorteth to faith.

1 Then Jesus, six days before the Passover, came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, who died, whom he had raised from the dead.

2 There they made him a supper, and Martha served: but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with him.

3 Then took Mary a pound of ointment of Spikenard very costly, and anointed Jesus’ feet, and wiped his feet with her hair, and the house was filled with the savor of the ointment.

4 Then said one of his disciples, even Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, which should betray him:

5 [a]Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor?

6 Now he said thus, not that he cared for the poor, but because he was a thief, and had the bag, and bore that which was given.

7 [b]Then said Jesus, Let her alone: against the day of my burying she kept it.

8 For the poor always ye have with you, but me ye shall not have always.

9 [c]Then much people of the Jews knew that he was there: and they came, not for Jesus’ sake only, but that they might see Lazarus also, whom he had raised from the dead.

10 The high Priests therefore consulted, that they might put Lazarus to death also,

11 because that for his sake many of the Jews went away, and believed in Jesus.

12 ¶ On the morrow a great multitude that were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus should come to Jerusalem,

13 Took branches of palm trees, and went forth to meet him, and cried, Hosanna, Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the Name of the Lord.

14 And Jesus found a young ass, and sat thereon, as it is written,

15 Fear not, daughter of Zion: behold, thy King cometh sitting on an ass’s colt.

16 But his disciples understood not these things at the first: but when Jesus was glorified, then remembered they, that these things were written of him, and that they had done these things unto him.

17 The people therefore that was with him, bare witness that he called Lazarus out of the grave and raised him from the dead.

18 Therefore met him the people also, because they heard that he had done this miracle.

19 [d]And the Pharisees said among themselves, Perceive ye how ye prevail nothing? Behold, the world goeth after him.

20 ¶ Now there were certain Greeks among them that [e]came up to worship at the feast.

21 And they came to Philip, which was of Bethsaida in Galilee, and desired him, saying, Sir, we would see that Jesus.

22 Philip came and told Andrew: and again Andrew and Philip told Jesus.

23 And Jesus answered them, saying, The hour is come, that the Son of man must be glorified.

24 [f]Verily, verily I say unto you, Except the wheat corn fall into the ground and [g]die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.

25 He that loveth his life, shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world, shall keep it unto life eternal.

26 If any man serve me, let him follow me: for where I am, there shall my servant be: and if any man serve me, him will my father honor.

27 [h]Now is my soul troubled: and what shall I say? Father, save me from this [i]hour: but therefore came I unto this hour.

28 Father, [j]glorify thy Name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again.

29 Then said the people that stood by, and heard, that it was a thunder: others said, An Angel spake to him.

30 [k]Jesus answered, and said, This voice came not because of me, but for your sakes.

31 Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out.

32 And I, if I were [l]lift up from the earth, will draw [m]all men unto me.

33 Now this said he, signifying what death he should die.

34 The people answered him, We have heard out of the Law, that that Christ bideth forever: and how sayest thou, that that Son of man must be lift up? Who is that Son of man?

35 [n]Then Jesus said unto them, Yet a little while is the light with you: walk while ye have that light, lest the darkness come upon you: for he that walketh in the dark, knoweth not whither he goeth.

36 While ye have that light, believe in that light, that ye may be the [o]children of the light. These things spake Jesus, and departed, and hid himself from them.

37 ¶ [p]And though he had done so many miracles before them, yet believed they not on him,

38 That the saying of Isaiah the Prophet might be fulfilled, that he said, Lord, who believed our report? and to whom is the [q]arm of the Lord revealed?

39 Therefore could they not believe, because that Isaiah saith again,

40 He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart, that they should not see with their eyes, nor understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.

41 These things said Isaiah when he saw his glory, and spake of him.

42 [r]Nevertheless, even among the chief rulers, many believed in him: but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should be cast out of the Synagogue.

43 For they loved the praise of men, more than the praise of God.

44 [s]And Jesus cried, and said, He that believeth in me, believeth [t]not in me, but in him that sent me.

45 And he that seeth me, seeth him that sent me.

46 I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth in me, should not abide in darkness.

47 And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.

48 He that refuseth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, it shall judge him in the last day.

49 For I have not spoken of myself: but the father which sent me, he gave me a commandment what I should say, and what I should speak.

50 And I know that his commandment is life everlasting: the things therefore that I speak, I speak them so as the Father said unto me.

Footnotes

John 12:5 An horrible example in Judas of a mind blinded with covetousness, and yet pretending godliness.

John 12:7 This Extraordinary anointing, which was for a sign, is so allowed of God, that he witnesseth how he will not be worshipped with outward pomp, or costly service, but with alms.

John 12:9 When the light of the Gospel showeth itself, some are found to be curious, and others (which left ought) to be open enemies: others in a rage honor him, whom they will straightway fall from: and very few do so reverently receive him as they ought: Notwithstanding Christ beginneth his spiritual kingdom in the midst of his enemies.

John 12:19 Even they which go about to oppress Christ, are made instruments of his glory.

John 12:20 After the solemn custom: the Greeks were first so called by the name of the country of Greece, where they dwelt: but afterward, all that were not of the Jew’s religion, but worshipped false gods, and were also called Heathens, were called by this name.

John 12:24 The death of Christ is as it were a sowing, which seemeth to be a dying to the corn, but indeed is the cause of a far greater harvest: and such as is the condition of the head, so shall it be of the members.

John 12:24 A wheat corn dieth when it is changed by virtue of the ground, and becometh a root of a fruitful blade.

John 12:27 Whilst Christ went about to suffer all the punishment which is due to our sins, and whilst his divinity did not yet show his might and power so far as this satisfaction might thoroughly wrought, now when he is stricken with the great fear of the curse of God, he crieth out and prayeth , and desireth to be released: yet notwithstanding he preferreth the will and glory of his Father before all things, whose obedience the Father alloweth even from heaven.

John 12:27 To wit, of death that is now at hand.

John 12:28 So then the Father’s glory is Christ’s glory.

John 12:30 Christ foretelleth to the deaf, the manner of his death, the overcoming of the devil and the world, and in conclusion his triumph.

John 12:32 Christ used a word, which hath a double meaning: for it signifieth either to lift up, or to rid out of the way, for his meaning was to put them in mind of his death, but the Jews seem to take it another way.

John 12:32 Chrysostom and Theophylact refer this word, All, to all nations: that is, not to the Jews only.

John 12:35 Unmeasurable is the mercy of God, but an horrible judgment followed, if it be contemned.

John 12:36 That is, partakers of light.

John 12:37 Faith is not of nature, but of grace.

John 12:38 The arm of the Lord, is the Gospel, which is the power of God to salvation to all that believe: And therefore the arm of the Lord is not revealed to them, whose hearts the Lord hath not opened.

John 12:42 Such as believe, are not only few in number, if they be compared with the unbelievers, but also the most of those few (yea and that especially the chiefest) do fear men more than God.

John 12:44 The sum of the Gospel, and therefore of salvation, which Christ witnessed in the midst of Jerusalem, by his crying out, is this: to rest upon Christ through faith, as the only Savior appointed and given us of the Father.

John 12:44 This word Not, doth not take any whit of this from Christ which is here spoken of, but is in way of correction rather, as if he said, He that believeth in me, doth not so much believe in me, as in him that sent me. So is it in Mark 9:37.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%2012&version=GNV

https://www.youtube.com/@BrockLawRepent/posts

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