For your amusement, please note the chart below showing the geographical distribution of Democrats and Republicans in Taos County, New Mexico. Red represents Republican strongholds, blue represents Democrat strongholds.
Your Tatler is asked occasionally why there is so little political commentary in this blog concerning his own environs. The answer is, the audience read it before posting.
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What shall become of the Church of England with her brand new Archbishop of Canterbury, Sarah Mullally or, as the estimable William Tighe has titled her, L’Archflaminica (the definite article added by your Tatler, with apologies to the good professor)? Things don’t look good.
Despite their shared heritage, the Church of England (C of E) and the Episcopal Church in the US have far different futures facing them, neither happy ones.
As per Wikipedia:
“The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies.” It is officially headed by the Supreme Governor of the Church of England, Charles III.
In short, the C of E is a state institution. Though attendance at that institution has fallen drastically over the years and continues to do so, at the pleasure of the monarch she will continue to be funded, so long as there is an England. To this blogger, the greater possible threat to the C of E, at least her “physical plant,” may well be a “guest religion” in England, whose numbers increase by leaps and bounds. Should its leadership begin eying enviously all those empty churches, they could make the not unreasonable argument the buildings would be put to far better use by their religion. Perhaps a future Archbishop monarch will agree and the Church of England will slowly, but slowly disappear, or become a greater non-entity than she already is.
The best and most concise description of the possible end of the Church of England might be by a poem by one of her most devout members, Mr Eliot, in the oft-used closing lines, used by many, including this blogger, for whatever suits their purposes, no matter how far afield, his The Hollow Men.
For Thine is the Kingdom
For Thine isLife is
For Thine is the
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.
A foreshadowing? St Mark’s Parish, converted in 1980 to New Peckham Mosque, Cobourg Road, London SE5
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The C of E’s American counterpart, the Episcopal Church of the United States of America, faces extinction, in that, not enjoying royal favor, she must depend mostly on her worshippers for offerings and bequests in various forms. They are not likely to come from members who have left the church. Their number is increasing, owing to the church’s never-ending pursuit of wackiness, including the elimination of strictures pertaining to many personal morals that the Holy Catholic Church (nor the “guest church,” for that matter) has not budged an inch in her teachings .
In short, when Episcopalians choose to stay at home Sunday mornings, or to hit the links, they will, if not immediately, eventually quit funding the church. There are too many other, more enticing options. That, in time, will lead to the end of the Episcopal Church.
Meet the new Archbishop of Canterbury.
Pity the poor Church of England. This is the best, most qualified candidate it could come up with after many, many months of the chair being empty, as her new Archbishop of Canterbury.
Your Tatler was disappointed at first with the election of Robert Prevost as pope and expressed that disappointment in a none-to-complimentary blog post. In time, however, Leo XIV gave small, but encouraging signs that he might be the reformer pope for whom many Catholics had been praying. Alas, those small signs have proved to be just that, and nothing more. Leo may be, at best, a status quo pope, content with the way things are, with no desire to ruffle the waters.
Adding to the disappointment of those desiring true reform in modern Catholicism, it looks as if Leo is susceptible to quackery, having fallen for one of the great frauds of our age, so-called “climate change.” He recently opened a conference of the Raising Hope Conference, an organization composed of liberal do-gooders, and firm believers in the pseudo science of climate change. To open the conference his holiness, bizarrely blessed a large inanimate object, in the shape of a large block of ice from Greenland, though l have always assumed ice is fungible,
What is disappointing about all this is, church liturgy is in such ill repair at present, many worshippers wish the pope would devote more time to its repair, and less to silliness like blessing oversized ice cubes, not to mention climate change. So far, in Leo’s reign, he seems to be relatively unconcerned over it. That is a shame, as the history of the Holy Catholic Church is so glorious in that regard, one would hope he would tackle the matter. Not to be, sadly. The mediocrity of Catholic worship shall continue for some time to come. Our desire for orthodoxy has yet to be answered.
A friend writes:
I unworthily propose a prayer for Pontifical blessings of ice cubes of various sizes in times of Climate Change. It may be used in time of global cooling as it is frozen, or in time of global warming as it melts.
Almighty God by whose sovereign breath frost is given and running rivers have been made solid (Job 37:10), and whose Providence hath gendered the hoary frost of heaven (Job 38:29): we humbly thank Thee for having cast ice like morsels when climates cool, and for turning that same ice in time of warming verily to limpid water that doth quench the thirst of wild asses (Psalm 104:11): forgive our selfish pride for making ozone to change the face of soft waters into waters that are hard, and hard waters into waters that are soft. From shrinking pole to expanding pole may all living creatures join the ice and snow in blessing Thee (Daniel 3:69) whose only Begotten Son was able to walk on water that was not frozen, and with whom there is no variableness neither shadow of turning (James 1:17). Amen.
President Trump addressed the UN yesterday
The hard working diplomats at the United Nations undoubtedly were bracing for the worst while awaiting President Trump’s address yesterday, but they couldn’t possibly have forseen what they heard. Trump was in fine fettle, not in the mood for mincing words. He let them have it and it was wonderful to behold. The full address is above, but please allow a cheerful observation by your Tatler.
The United Nations was flawed from the start by having Josef Stalin involved in its founding. He saw it correctly as an instrument of job preservation, his, and the expansion of his soviet empire. He was the only world leader who, with soviet realism, saw a future United Nations in those terms and little else. He was able to conform it to his will and his successors did likewise. The naive United States and most other countries, on the other hand, sent delegates who really believed in the UN’s ability to preserve and create peace. Silly asses.
Here is a list of successful United Nations “peace keeping missions” to prevent hegemony and force warring parties to cease and negotiate:
Donald Trump has shared millions of Americans’s skepticism of the UN. He brought that skepticism to 46th Street and First Avenue yesterday and shared it with world leaders. As the BBC reported it so succinctly, “Six years ago Trump’s UN audience laughed at him, this year they were silent.”
by Shannon Gallagher Prior
It has been [two weeks] since Charlie Kirk was taken from us in such a brutal way. If your heart still feels heavy, let it be. We weren’t made to witness an assassination in real time and then return to “business as usual.” Grief is not weakness. It is proof of love, of conscience, of being alive to what matters.
Some have even called his death “ironic” because he defended the Second Amendment. But there is no irony in violence, no wit in tragedy. The only reason such cruelty feels acceptable is because too many surround themselves with people who normalize it. Mockery may feel safe in that echo chamber, but it doesn’t make it right.
Charlie stood for truth and liberty, and his death does not silence that. It makes it resonate louder, a reminder of what courage looks like in the face of darkness.
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A society that mocks virtue prepares its own collapse–attr Plato
The author is the Tatler’s niece. Posted by permission
Your Tatler doesn’t tarry much at Facebook these days, but I was alerted to a post by Fr Peter West, an estimable man and an estimable Catholic. The list he compiled, posted below, speaks for itself (res ipsa loquitur) and requires no commentary. None is offered, save for thanks to Fr West.
You may find Fr West’s original list here.
‘Drugs’ found at NY seminary actually priceless relics of Brooklyn’s Saint Raphael
NY Post: “Drug-sniffing dogs swarmed St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary last week when cops were alerted to possible illegal narcotics that had spilled out of their special container on the scenic, tree-covered campus, WABC reported.”
It turns out it was a seminarian who took the relics for smack, instead of the American saint, St Raphael, who died in Brooklyn in 1915. The poor fellow will likely have a tough time living living this down among his fellow seminarians. Still, there was no harm done and Father Michael Nasser used the occasion to do a good deed.
“We got to meet the K-9 units who came out here for a special prayer and blessing and allowed us to thank them for all they do for us at the seminary and the whole community,” Nasser told WABC.
All dog lovers should heartily approve of Fr Nasser’s worthy act.
Kids, don’t try this at home without an adult present . . . oh.
(A newly commissioned mural at St Patrick’s Cathedral opened to the public yesterday.)
h/t GWR
Someone please inform our Catholic leadership.
The excellent journalist and artist Maureen Mullarkey, whom all reasonable people should read, has posted on her website Studio Matters, a fine essay about the aftermath of the assassination of Charlie Kirk, the likeable and earnest founder of the conservative advocacy group, Turning Point.
In prose both clear and lucid, she describes how Kirk’s assassination has been the long-awaited catalyst that has, at last, transformed millions of Americans’s attitudes from resigned complacency into genuine anger, with reaction against the increasingly violent, left-wing activists infecting this nation, and a host of others. The awakened citizenry, in this and other nations, are finally standing up and firmly informing the radical left, we will no longer meekly acquiesce to your thuggery, nor pay the least heed to your sycophants in major media who, like a cancer, have taken over most of it. Already, some of the overpaid newsreaders have been cashiered, or have quit their cushy jobs. These newly unemployed rich are taking it about as well as a toddler having his favorite sucking toy snatched away from him, while simultaneously needing a diaper change.
Mullarkey singles out for criticism perhaps the most useless organization in the Holy Catholic Church, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (the USCCB). You will not find in our Holy Church a more ineffectual bunch of wimps, who go about wringing their hands, speaking platitudes and little else. Lately they are half-apologizing for the increasing terror attacks on the good people they ought to be lionizing, such as the late Charlie Kirk, who, though not a Catholic, vigorously promoted our Catholic morals. Instead, the brave souls of the USCCB, following Kirk’s brutal murder, issued a milquetoast response in which they expressed, again, their abhorence of terrorist violence. Your Graces, just how many observant Catholics would you hazard are comforted by such uninspired, banal words?
Your Tatler’s disappointment was compounded Sunday by the words coming from the pulpit by our new pastor, who up to now has impressed by his cleaning up the considerable liturgical detritus left behind by his predecessor. What did we hear? A statement sounding as if it were dictated to be read by all priests in New Mexico by our yet-to-resign Archbishop of Santa Fe. In it, we heard, of all things, an abhorence of violence, but zero reference to Charlie Kirk’s murder. To be fair, I like our new pastor, but his fear of going out on a limb was a disappointment. Reverend Sir, you are far better than that, and capable of far better, by a wide margin. I pray for you because you and other priests are on the battleground.
THE TAOS TATLER. 