Taking Thoughts Captive

In final stanza of Longfellow's long poem, “The Building of the Ship,” we find out this page was long poem is not about building a ship but about building a nation. These words ring just as true as they did nearly 200 years ago when Longfellow first penned them

Many are cynical and discouraged about the future of America. I used to be, though I am not now. But we must no longer be complacent. I have realized that what our Founding Fathers struggled to establish, we must similarly struggle to maintain. Entropy, entitlement, historical amnesia, and indifference threaten our blessed inheritance as much as Socialism, division, and foreign threats. Ours is the time to re-learn from books and put into practice through political involvement before we have to re-learn from suffering and put into practice through arms.

Read Longfellow's words, then read them again, then re-read the Declaration, and have a blessed Independence Day, America!

Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State! Sail on, O Union, strong and great! Humanity with all its fears, With all the hopes of future years, Is hanging breathless on thy fate! We know what Master laid thy keel, What Workmen wrought thy ribs of steel, Who made each mast, and sail, and rope, What anvils rang, what hammers beat, In what a forge and what a heat Were shaped the anchors of thy hope! Fear not each sudden sound and shock, 'T is of the wave and not the rock; 'T is but the flapping of the sail, And not a rent made by the gale! In spite of rock and tempest's roar, In spite of false lights on the shore, Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea! Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee, Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, Our faith triumphant o'er our fears, Are all with thee, — are all with thee!

#culture #history #politics

I don't often wade into politics here, but in light of the 250th anniversary of the most important political document ever drafted, I'm making an exception. The recent Supreme Court ruling that President Trump's Executive Order interpreting the 14th Amendment's language on citizenship is unconstitutional was not surprising to me. Chief Justice Roberts, Justice Kavanaugh, and Justice Barrett, though appointed by Presidents Bush and Trump, have disappointing track records. Perhaps the shining points in this ruling were the dissenting opinions of Justices Thomas and Alito, whose 90 and 40 page dissents present brilliant lessons in history and law. They should not go unread. Given their length, here are a few excerpts that I found brilliant. (Note: I removed numerous legal citations to make them more easily readable)

In America, you were generally a citizen if you were born here and this was your home. The legal word for home was domicile. The concepts were so linked as to be taken as effectively synonymous at time...Citizens were not the people who were temporarily passing through a territory or who happened to be born within it. Citizens were the permanent members of the body politic—the people whose roots were in a place, who called that place home, and who would, if necessary, go to war for that place...

The Court’s decision to hold the Citizenship Order facially (i.e., always) unconstitutional, in other words, makes it unlawful for the President to enforce the Order against a single person. He cannot enforce the Order against a child of an alien enemy or a child of a foreign spy. He cannot even enforce the Order against children who are raised in foreign countries, join foreign armies, and fight wars against the United States. The Court, without considering any of these individual circumstances, holds unconstitutional the application of the Citizenship Order in all of them.

In my view, the Citizenship Order is not facially unconstitutional. The Order is consistent with the original meaning of the Citizenship Clause, at least insofar as it applies to children born to parents, here lawfully or unlawfully, who are not domiciled in the United States. The Citizenship Clause was enacted for people who were born in this country and called it home. It was enacted for freed slaves such as Dred Scott, who had “a domicil” here and therefore were entitled to sue as citizens. It was enacted for men such as Frederick Douglass, who demanded citizenship “not as aliens nor as exiles,” but as “Americans.” Its authors and supporters promised, over and over again, that it would exclude the children of “persons temporarily resident” here, whom “we would have no right to make citizens.” In Senator Trumbull’s words: “What do we mean by ‘subject to the jurisdiction of the United States?’ Not owing allegiance to anybody else. That is what it means.” And, for decades after ratification, it was interpreted by all three branches of Government and by a wide range of legal authorities to be limited to people who were already Americans.

— Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, dissenting opinion, Trump v. Barbara

This is one of the most important decisions in the history of the Court, and in my judgment, the Court has made a serious mistake. As interpreted by the Court today, the Fourteenth Amendment confers citizenship on virtually everyone who happens to be born in this country, including the children of “birth tourists,” women who come here solely for the purpose of giving birth to a child and then promptly return home. Careful analysis of the text of the Fourteenth Amendment and the process that led to its adoption shows that it does not degrade the concept of United States citizenship in this way. Instead, the Fourteenth Amendment confers citizenship on only those children who, at birth, owe allegiance solely to this country...

According to the Court, the Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause codified the British rule of birthright subjecthood with only one new exception, which was needed to accommodate the unique status of American Indians. That is a curious claim, and it is ironic that the Court should embrace it only days before we celebrate the 250th anniversary of our Declaration of Independence, which emphatically renounced the foundation on which the British rule rested. That rule did not concern “citizenship.” There was no such thing as a “citizen” of England, Scotland, or Ireland. The inhabitants of the British Isles were the King’s “subjects.”

— Supreme Court Associate Justice Samuel Alito, dissenting opinion, Trump v. Barbara

If you're interested—and I daresay you should be—read the entire decision and opinions here.

#history #politics

We have men of science, too few men of God. We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount. Man is stumbling blindly through a spiritual darkness while toying with the precarious secrets of life and death. The world has achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we know about peace, more about killing than we know about living.

— Omar N. Bradley, 1948 (h/t: A Layman's Blog)

#culture #quotes

OK, so this hopefully won't be come a daily post, but our President posted this image of himself yesterday (12 April). Utter blasphemy. He should delete it and repent. Hopefully he doesn't really think this about himself...but I tend to take people at their word.

Here's the direct link if you don't believe me...

#politics

A man who has read a thousand books is armed for life; a man who has read none is easy prey. The man who has read a thousand books has lived a thousand lives. He has seen cities he has never visited, spoken to men who died centuries ago, and walked in worlds that no longer exist. Reading does not merely inform him; it enlarges him. It stretches the boundaries of his own experience until he becomes something more than himself.

— G.K. Chesterton

#life #quotes #reading

Music makes us smile, sing along, nostalgic, weep, hurt, pause, reflect...and sometimes, it makes us laugh. I'm not sure why Providence conspired to put all these songs in my ears in the last two days, but it did, and the laughter these oxymoronic lyrics created was a true treat in an otherwise long week.

But she ain't goin' nowhere, she's just leavin'.

— Guy Clark

Well I sat there at the table, and I acted real naive, for I knew that topless lady had something up her sleeve.

— John Prine

She's no lady, she's my wife.

— Lyle Lovett

If we weren't all crazy, we would go insane.

— Jimmy Buffett

Happy Friday!

#quotes

Today is the celebration of the Annunciation of the angel Gabriel to the Blessed Virgin Mary, as recorded in Luke 1.26-38:

Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And having come in, the angel said to her, “Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!”
But when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and considered what manner of greeting this was. Then the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name JESUS. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David. And He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end.” Then Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I do not know a man?”
And the angel answered and said to her, ”The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore, also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God. Now indeed, Elizabeth your relative has also conceived a son in her old age; and this is now the sixth month for her who was called barren. For with God nothing will be impossible.”
Then Mary said, “Behold the maidservant of the Lord! Let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.

The Western Church celebrates this announcement on March 25th, nine months before we celebrate Christmas. It is a blip of celebration in the otherwise austere season of Lent.

If you're interested in the history of how this date came to be, as well as how December 25th came to be celebrated as the Nativity of Christ (hint, it's NOT because of pagan holidays), check out Pr. Peters post today. As usual, it's gold.

Here's the historic collect (prayer) of the day for today's celebration:

We beseech thee, O Lord, pour thy grace into our hearts; that, as we have known the incarnation of thy Son Jesus Christ by the message of an Angel, so by his cross and passion we may be brought unto the glory of his resurrection; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Merry early Christmas!

#history #theology #worship

War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.

J.R.R. Tolkien

#history #politics #quotes #Tolkien

I bind unto myself today The strong Name of the Trinity, By invocation of the same The Three in One and One in Three.

I bind this today to me forever By power of faith, Christ’s incarnation; His baptism in Jordan river, His death on Cross for my salvation; His bursting from the spicèd tomb, His riding up the heavenly way, His coming at the day of doom I bind unto myself today.

I bind unto myself the power Of the great love of Cherubim; The sweet ‘Well done’ in judgment hour, The service of the Seraphim, Confessors’ faith, Apostles’ word, The Patriarchs’ prayers, the prophets’ scrolls, All good deeds done unto the Lord And purity of virgin souls.

I bind unto myself today The virtues of the star lit heaven, The glorious sun’s life giving ray, The whiteness of the moon at even, The flashing of the lightning free, The whirling wind’s tempestuous shocks, The stable earth, the deep salt sea Around the old eternal rocks.

I bind unto myself today The power of God to hold and lead, His eye to watch, His might to stay, His ear to hearken to my need. The wisdom of my God to teach, His hand to guide, His shield to ward; The word of God to give me speech, His heavenly host to be my guard.

Against the demon snares of sin, The vice that gives temptation force, The natural lusts that war within, The hostile men that mar my course; Or few or many, far or nigh, In every place and in all hours, Against their fierce hostility I bind to me these holy powers.

Against all Satan’s spells and wiles, Against false words of heresy, Against the knowledge that defiles, Against the heart’s idolatry, Against the wizard’s evil craft, Against the death wound and the burning, The choking wave, the poisoned shaft, Protect me, Christ, till Thy returning.

Christ be with me, Christ within me, Christ behind me, Christ before me, Christ beside me, Christ to win me, Christ to comfort and restore me. Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ in quiet, Christ in danger, Christ in hearts of all that love me, Christ in mouth of friend and stranger.

I bind unto myself the Name, The strong Name of the Trinity, By invocation of the same, The Three in One and One in Three. By Whom all nature hath creation, Eternal Father, Spirit, Word: Praise to the Lord of my salvation, Salvation is of Christ the Lord. Amen.

#prayers

Very well said, Representative Whitsett! Finally a Democrat with the courage to say the unspoken things out loud.

#quotes #politics #theology