Sunday Evening - Litanies in Times of Plague

"The lamps are going out all over Europe, and I doubt we shall see them lit again in our lifetime."

Edward Grey, British Foreign Secretary, Whitehall, 3 August 1914

September 1, 1939
by W. H. Auden, NYC, Oct 1939

I sit in one of the dives
On Fifty-second Street
Uncertain and afraid
As the clever hopes expire
Of a low dishonest decade:
Waves of anger and fear
Circulate over the bright
And darkened lands of the earth,
Obsessing our private lives;
The unmentionable odour of death
Offends the September night.

Accurate scholarship can
Unearth the whole offence
From Luther until now
That has driven a culture mad,
Find what occurred at Linz,
What huge image made
A psychopathic god:
I and the public know
What all schoolchildren learn,
Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return...

From the conservative dark
Into the ethical life
The dense commuters come,
Repeating their morning vow;
"I will be true to the wife,
I'll concentrate more on my work,"
And helpless governors wake
To resume their compulsory game:
Who can release them now,
Who can reach the deaf,
Who can speak for the dumb?

All I have is a voice
To undo the folded lie,
The romantic lie in the brain
Of the sensual man-in-the-street
And the lie of Authority
Whose buildings grope the sky:
There is no such thing as the State
And no one exists alone;
Hunger allows no choice
To the citizen or the police;
We must love one another or die.

Defenceless under the night
Our world in stupor lies;
Yet, dotted everywhere,
Ironic points of light
Flash out wherever the Just
Exchange their messages:
May I, composed like them
Of Eros and of dust,
Beleaguered by the same
Negation and despair,
Show an affirming flame.



A Litany in Time of Plague
by Thomas Nashe, London, 1593

Beauty is but a flower,
Which wrinkles will devour,
Brightness falls from the air,
Queens have died, young and fair,
Dust hath closed Helen's eye.
I am sick, I must die--
Lord have mercy on us.

"To know and to serve God, of course, is why we're here, a clear truth, that, like the nose on your face, is near at hand and easily discernible but can make you dizzy if you try to focus on it hard. But a little faith will see you through.

What else will do except faith in such a cynical, corrupt time? When the country goes temporarily to the dogs, cats must learn to be circumspect, walk on fences, sleep in trees, and have faith that all this woofing is not the last word. What is the last word, then?

Gentleness is everywhere in daily life, a sign that faith rules through ordinary things: through cooking and small talk, through storytelling, making love, fishing, tending animals and sweet corn and flowers, through sports, music and books, raising kids — all the places where the gravy soaks in and grace shines through.

Even in a time of elephantine vanity and greed, one never has to look far to see the campfires of gentle people."

Garrison Keillor

Bill Moyers: ALEC, the Secretive Corporate-Legislative Body Writing US Laws

ALEC in the US Congress

State Legislators with Ties to ALEC By State


International ALEC 'Delegates'

Senator Cory Bernardi – Australia

MEP Philip Claeys – Belgium

Hon Iris Evans (PC - Minister of International and Intergovernmental Relations) - Canada

MEP Ivo Strejcek – Czech Republic

MP David Darchiashvili – Georgia

Assemblywoman Ayesha Javed – Pakistan

MEP Adam Bielan – Poland
MEP Michal Kaminski – Poland
MEP Miroslaw Piotrowski – Poland
MEP Konrad Szymanski – Poland

MEP Cristofer Fjellner – Sweden

MEP Richard Ashworth – United Kingdom
MEP Martin Callanan – United Kingdom
MEP Niranjan Deva – United Kingdom
MEP Daniel Hannan – United Kingdom
MP Chris Heaton-Harris – United Kingdom
MEP Roger Helmer – United Kingdom
MEP Syed Kamall – United Kingdom
MEP Robert Sturdy – United Kingdom

Weekend Reading: The Significance of the Individual

What we do, and what do not do, matters greatly, if not so much in the greater world, but to those around us, and to the resolution of our souls, the essence of our being.

We are free to believe what we will, but we will be held accountable for what we believe and what we do, and the consequences of our beliefs and our unbelief.
There is a simple belief in the Lord, and an equally simple unbelief.   One does not follow the will of God and His love by despoiling His creatures and His creation for their own selfishly destructive ends.  If there is no love in your actions, then you have lost your way.  Where there is no love, there is no living faith.  It is that simple.  No love, no life.

"Not everyone who calls out to me, 'Lord! Lord!' will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven." Matt 7:21

And if you think that the Lord whom you serve calls you to self-righteous hatred, jealousy, intolerance, anger and envy, then you may serve that lord indeed, forever.  So do not bee deceived, and know well whom it is you serve.  It is worth some thought— for the time grows short, and the shadows lengthen.

"God has created me to do Him some definite service; He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another. I have my mission—I never may know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next. Somehow I am necessary for His purposes, as necessary in my place as an Archangel in his—if, indeed, I fail, He can raise another, as He could make the stones children of Abraham.

Yet I have a part in this great work; I am a link in a chain, a bond of connexion between persons. He has not created me for naught. I shall do good, I shall do His work; I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place, while not intending it, if I do but keep His commandments and serve Him in my calling.

Therefore I will trust Him. Whatever, wherever I am, I can never be thrown away. If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him; in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him; if I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him. My sickness, or perplexity, or sorrow may be necessary causes of some great end, which is quite beyond us.

He does nothing in vain; He may prolong my life, He may shorten it; He knows what He is about. He may take away my friends, He may throw me among strangers, He may make me feel desolate, make my spirits sink, hide the future from me—still He knows what He is about."

John Henry Newman, Meditations and Devotions

Bill Black Financial Report - How London Aspired to Be Fraud Capital of the World

Apparently since Blair the FSA has been soliciting financial business by advertising the loosest regulatoary morals on either side of the Atlantic.

Not that the US is any paragon of virtue. Timmy is known as the go-to head boy for the biggest banks.

But this is no surprise, because as Kansas City Fed governor Hoenig said, for the past twenty five years the selection of the US Treasury Secretary has been done by a de facto private auction to the biggest banks.