12/28/24

 Saturday, December 28, 2024

D+53

1878 Pope Leo XIII published encyclical Quod apostolici muneris (socialism)

1981 1st American test-tube baby, Elizabeth Jordan Carr was born in Norfolk, Virginia

2015 Japan and South Korea reached an agreement over WWII "comfort women", Japan apologized and paid 1bn yen compensation

In bed at 9, awake around 4:30, half-asleep till up at 5:05.    

Prednisone, day 228,, 7.5 mg., day 43.  Prednisone at 5:15 and other meds at 7:10.  

Brunch with Andy, Anh, Peter, Lizzie, and Drew was lovely.  Anh's egg bake, weisswurst, and Geri's Krusteze gluten-free muffins.  Then we exchanged gifts and continued to schmooze.  They gave a donation to the North Shore Library in our name so we will get a brick with our names engraved.  Also a candle made with sacred chrism.  Peter wont know whether he is accepted at Purdue-Indianapolis until January 15.  Lizzie showed up with a broken foot, the result of dropping an Amazon box left at their front door.  No gymnastic or volleyball for awhile.  Dew was Silent Sam as usual.

Praise for Joe Biden's death sentence commutations.  Biden commuted the death sentences of 37 men in federal prisons.  He declined to commute the death sentences of the Boston marathon bomber, the Tree of Life synagogue killer, and the Mother Emanuel killer.  I am thankful for the executions he prevented and wish he had also included the three he excluded.  It may well be that in popular opinion none of the men 'deserved' to be spared, but Biden has also spared the men who otherwise would have been responsible for the execution of the thirty-seven.  The federal sentences, the Law, would have turned the government's executioners into cold-blooded killers.  Our governments, state and federal, have more than enough blood on their hands.  They ought to get out of the death business and become Pro-Life, even for the undeserving.  

LTMW at 7:20 a.,m., I see a squirrel diligently filling up on sunflower seeds and suet.  Sunrise today is 7:23.  As usual, I am amazed by her agility and athleticism. Then the chickadees arrive, followed by the house finches on the sunflower tube and the goldfinches on the niger tube. A downy woodpecker joins the crowd and I think of the old radio show 'Don McNeill's Breakfast Club' from Chicago.  "Good morning, Breadfastclubbers, good morning to ya'. We woke up bright and early just to howdy-do ya'."  It's a gray, overcast morning, 42°, with a steady wind and a wind chill of 29°.  For late December, this is a mild morning, but I think of the people living in tents on the vacant lot next to Repairers of the Breach and of the people living in tents in Gaza about whom I just read in this morning's NY Times.  The story was about the continuing and worsening humanitarian situation there: the lack of food, clean water, medicines and of course housing.  The thermostat in our vestibule tells me it is 71° in the house but I'm cold despite the turtleneck shirt and sweatpants that I am wearing.  Alas.

At 8 o'clock I notice that the very tall, dying pine tree on the corner of our lot swaying in the wind, reminding me that it has to come down.  I'll be sorry to lose it and rue the cost.

Leo XIII and socialism.  "You understand, venerable brethren, that We speak of that sect of men who, under various and almost barbarous names, are called socialists, communists, or nihilists, and who, spread over all the world, and bound together by the closest ties in a wicked confederacy, no longer seek the shelter of secret meetings, but, openly and boldly marching forth in the light of day, strive to bring to a head what they have long been planning - the overthrow of all civil society whatsoever.  Surely these are they who, as the sacred Scriptures testify, "Defile the flesh, despise dominion and blaspheme majesty."(2) They leave nothing untouched or whole which by both human and divine laws has been wisely decreed for the health and beauty of life. They refuse obedience to the higher powers, to whom, according to the admonition of the Apostle, every soul ought to be subject, and who derive the right of governing from God; and they proclaim the absolute equality of all men in rights and duties. They debase the natural union of man and woman, which is held sacred even among barbarous peoples; and its bond, by which the family is chiefly held together, they weaken, or even deliver up to lust. Lured, in fine, by the greed of present goods, which is "the root of all evils, which some coveting have erred from the faith,"(3) they assail the right of property sanctioned by natural law; and by a scheme of horrible wickedness, while they seem desirous of caring for the needs and satisfying the desires of all men, they strive to seize and hold in common whatever has been acquired either by title of lawful inheritance, or by labor of brain and hands, or by thrift in one's mode of life. These are the startling theories they utter in their meetings, set forth in their pamphlets, and scatter abroad in a cloud of journals and tracts. Wherefore, the revered majesty and power of kings has won such fierce hatred from their seditious people that disloyal traitors, impatient of all restraint, have more than once within a short period raised their arms in impious attempt against the lives of their own sovereigns."

The Church, aligned with the High and Mighty, and always on the side of Property and Power.