Photo of the Week: Afrodite with Dolphin, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli

Afrodite with Dolphin, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli

Babylon's Burning

Nero and the Great Fire of Rome, 64 AD

“We all know our country’s current trajectory isn’t going to end well, but what can we do about it? We need to consider a national divorce, i.e., secession.” ~ Eric Sammons @ EricRSammons, X, Monday, July, 29, 2024 (3:06 PM)

The closer we get to the U.S. presidential election, the harder it is to ignore the sheer evil of American politics and by extension the duplicitous legacy media. Bombarded online with every type of propaganda imaginable and surrounded by unhinged ideologues of every stripe everywhere I go, it is utterly impossible not to get caught up in the madness. People attacking me and trying to persuade me one way or the other has only strengthened my resolve to steer clear of the whole bloody mess.

I never believed in the democratic process and the unsavory events of recent years have only served to further vindicate my opprobrium. Even if I were to vote, living in a non-battleground state makes my ballot count for naught anyway. Whatever the results of the election are in November, you can be sure all hell is going to break loose because neither side trusts or likes one another. Accusations of “voter fraud,” “stealing the election,” “tampering,” you name it, will be trumpeted by the losers—and rightfully so. The system is broken and stinks to high Heaven.

So what do we do? Well, as the saying goes, “Drastic times call for drastic measures.” In an ideal world, we would all just finally come to our senses and behave like normal, rational people and work towards national reconciliation. Since we don’t live in an ideal world and delusional left-wing psychoses have reached critical mass, we should realistically consider national divorce, no matter how outlandish it may sound.

A longtime proponent of secession, I’m always excited to see the idea bandied about in public forums. While nowhere near as popular as it needs to be to realistically consider it an option, we’ve come a long way from my teenage years when the very suggestion of breaking up these United States was inconceivable and met with derision and scorn. Granted, as crazy as it may sound, back in those days I naïvely championed the idea of a sizable autonomous Italian American ethnostate.

Ah, the folly of youth. Seeing how well we assimilated to the prevailing culture and succumbed to modern decadent Americanism (materialism, secularism, etc.), I’m not entirely sure I would want to be lumped together with many of my ethnic compatriots, with whom I have little or nothing in common, anymore. To be clear, being different per se is not the problem, I appreciate and respect pluralism, but it is leftism in all its pernicious and discordant forms (i.e., feminism, egalitarianism, totalitarianism, etc.) that I abhor.

Demoralized and degraded, I don’t believe the American people have the stomach to entertain such a difficult path, even if it is in our best interest to do so. One thing is for certain, the greedy parasites (rich and poor) won’t give up their reluctant hosts (rich and poor) without a fight. Therefore, if we can’t secede and forge a new nation, the only realistic and tenable options at our disposal are to secede as a community, as a family, or at the very least, as individuals. For a better understanding of what I'm advocating here, see the Benedict (Dreher) and Bernard (Salvo) options.

Babylon's burning and our soi-disant leaders fiddle. Corrupt, inept, and evil, the government actively hates us, let alone represents us. Their actions prove it. If you have to be convinced of these facts today, you are utterly hopeless. Working outside the system (electoral politics), it is our duty as counter-revolutionaries to rebuild healthy communities, raise God-fearing families, and see to the salvation of our eternal souls. In a world gone mad, upholding Altar and Hearth are drastic measures.

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, August 22, Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary

Remembering S.A.R. Maria Immacolata Luisa di Borbone, Princess of Bourbon Two Sicilies and Countess of Bardi

21 January 1855 – 23 August 1874

In memory of S.A.R. Maria Immacolata Luisa di Borbone, Princess of Bourbon Two Sicilies, Countess of Bardi, daughter of King Ferdinand II of the Two Sicilies, we pray for the happy repose of her soul.

Eternal rest grant unto her, O Lord and let perpetual light shine upon her. May her soul, and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

A Look at the 2024 Feast of Santa Rosalia on 18th Avenue in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn

Santa Rosalia, ora pro nobis

(L) Outdoor shrine with reclining statue. (R) Processional statue

I picked up a few prayer cards at the shrine for friends and family

Grilling the Stigghiola at Lucy's Sausage Stand

Calamari alla griglia

Polpo alla griglia

Spiedini di gamberi alla griglia

Ham hocks

Stigghiola

Sfincione

Iris al forno

L'Artigiano Gelato Stand

New Book — The Mysteries of the Neapolitan Convents: With a Brief Sketch of the Early Life of the Authoress

New title that may be of interest to our readers. Available at Amazon.com

• The Mysteries of the Neapolitan Convents: With a Brief Sketch of the Early Life of the Authoress by Enrichetta Caracciolo Caracciolo

Publisher: Hensebooks
Publication Date: August 13, 2024
Hardcover: $39.95
Paperback: $34.90
Language: English
Pages:488

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Co-Naming the Southwest Corner of Mulberry & Grand Streets "Vincent 'Vinny Peanuts' Sabatino Corner"

Poster of Vincent "Vinny Peanuts" Sabatino

Tuesday afternoon, scores of community and family members came out to celebrate the official co-naming of the southwest corner of Mulberry and Grand Streets to “Vincent ‘Vinny Peanuts’ Sabatino Corner,” in memory of beloved Little Italy activist and proprietor of Vinny’s Nut House, the oldest Italian nut and nougat confectionery in New York City.

The veiled street sign

The community came out in force to honor local icon Vinny Peanuts

Vittorio Buonocore kicked off the festivities
with a beautiful rendition of Ave Maria

(Above & below) Friends and family fondly remembered Vinny Peanuts

(Above & below) Council Member Christopher Marte
presents family members with a replica sign

The Red Mike Band played some of Vinny's favorite Italian songs

The unveiled sign

Evviva San Rocco! A Look at the 135th Annual Feast of San Rocco di Potenza in Little Italy, New York

San Rocco, ora pro nobis

Despite the threat of rain, hundreds of devotees made their way to Most Precious Blood Church in Little Italy, New York, on Sunday for the 135th Annual Feast of San Rocco di Potenza. Thankfully the rain never came and the over three-hour-long procession through the bustling streets of Chinatown and Little Italy went off without a hitch. Evviva San Rocco!

(Above & below) After Mass, members of the San Rocco Society
depart Most Precious Blood Church with great fanfare

Society President Stephen La Rocca sang a
heartfelt rendition of Appresso al santo

Donations and ex-voto are attached to the statue

Outside the church, the saint is greeted by a throng of revelers

Our friends from the San Giuseppe Society
of Lodi, New Jersey, show their support

The Giglio Band

(Above & below) Departing Most Precious Blood Church the
procession wends its way through Chinatown and Little Italy

Makeshift roadside shrine with first-class relic of San Rocco
and 1905 standard was erected outside the Italian American
Emporium on the corner of Grand and Mulberry Streets

Perhaps unwisely, I decided to wear my vintage San Rocco Society ribbon for the occasion. At some point, during the opening ceremony, I lost the ribbon's ornate badge with the image of San Rocco. A friend pointed it out to me and my heart sank. Retracing my steps with the faint hope of finding it among the crowd and confetti proved to be unsuccessful. Petitioning Sant'Antonio di Padova as a last recourse, my friend immediately spotted the badge at the foot of the statue.

Recounting what had just happened to someone I met during the procession, he quibblingly said that I should have appealed to San Rocco instead. Unsure why he disapproved, especially since my entreaty was answered, I just smiled, nodded, and moved along. Obviously, I meant no disrespect to San Rocco, especially when you consider how often he has come through for me in the past, I just instinctively turned to Sant'Antonio, who is renowned for helping people find lost items. Considering the result, it seems I chose wisely.

(Before and After) My vintage San Rocco Society ribbon

Confetti littered street 

The recovered badge

Novena to St. Augustine of Hippo

Sant'Agostino di Ippona, ora pro nobis

Pray novena to St. Augustine of Hippo for nine consecutive days, August 19th to August 27th, in preparation for the Feast on August 28th. Evviva Sant’Agostino di Ippona!

O holy Saint Augustine, who has famously declared that “Our hearts were made for you, O Lord, and they are restless until they rest in you,” aid me in my own search for our Lord that through your intercession I may be granted the wisdom to determine the purpose God has planned for me. Pray that I be blessed with the courage to follow God’s will even at times when I do not understand. Ask our Lord to lead me to a life worthy of His love, that I may one day share the riches of His kingdom. Petition our Lord and Savior to ease the burden of my problems and grant my special intention, and I will honor you all of my days.

Beloved Saint Augustine the miracles you have performed for the greater glory of God have caused people to seek your intercession for their most pressing concerns. Hear my cries as I invoke your name to petition God for an increased faith and to aid me in my present distress. [Mention your intentions here...]

Glorious Saint Augustine I boldly ask for your intercession confident in your boundless wisdom and compassion. May this devotion lead me to a life dedicated to the fulfilling the will of God that I may one day be deemed worthy of sharing His Kingdom with you and all the saints for all eternity.

* Saint Augustine, limestone with paint and gilding, French, Burgundy, ca. 1450-75. Photo was taken at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Photo of the Week: Flora Farnese, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli

Flora Farnese, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli

New Music — Scarlatti: A Man of Genius

New music that may be of interest to our readers.

• Scarlatti: A Man of Genius performed by Francesco Corti

Label: Arcana Records
Release Date: July 20, 2024
Audio CD: $20.99
Number of Discs: 1

Available at Amazon.com

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One-Year Anniversary Since My Heart Attack

Le chevalier de la mort, Valère Bernard (1860-1937)

“Death is not the worst thing that can happen to man.” ~ Plato [1]

One year on since my heart attack, I like to think I’ve been using my extra time wisely. First and foremost I continue to pray and meditate daily and attend the Traditional Latin Mass as often as I can. True to my word, I still keep the doctors and hospital staff in my prayers as well as the private vows I made to Our Lady of the Assumption and San Rocco di Montpellier for graces received. Also as best I can, I’ve been trying not to take the little things in life for granted or get upset over things I have no control over.

Among my biggest regrets in life [2] was not spending enough time with my dearly departed ancestors, so I’ve been trying to spend as much quality time as possible with my remaining loved ones. Looking to learn as much as I can from our elders in the hopes of passing on our family’s lore to the next generation, this is sadly proving to be more difficult than expected due to the poor memories of some and the apathy of others.

The brown scapular

Not to sound too ungrateful (or morbid), but I have to admit there is a small part of me who wishes I did not make it that night. I attended Mass and went to confession earlier that day and, as always, I was wearing my scapular. [3] Not to presume God’s mercy or downplay my sinful nature, I’m not sure I had a better chance for purgatory up to that point. I hope I don't come off as cowardly, but eternal salvation sounds better to me than a few extra years of life fraught with potential pitfalls, i.e., sins.

More selfishly, I also don’t look forward to growing old and sodded without children. To be clear, I don’t have a death wish and suicide is not an option, but I don’t want to spend my dotage in an old folks home with a bunch of strangers. Let’s be honest, I have no faith in the managerial state and our low-trust society leaves a heck of a lot to be desired. God willing, I won’t be a burden on anyone or have to rely on anybody else. Ideally, I will die fighting for what I believe in.

A friend jokingly assured me that New York City’s violent criminal class may be a blessing in disguise. The perverse irony is that the Left's soft-on-crime policies I despise so much will likely get me killed by a recidivist before I’m bedridden. As you can imagine, the prospect of getting brutally murdered by some low-life scum does not put me at ease. Besides, with my luck the bastard would botch the job and leave me horribly injured instead, but I digress.

Somewhere along the line, I strayed from the path and shamefully turned fat and soft. In order to right the ship, I've committed myself to recommencing my youthful asceticism and, for lack of a better term, Untergang or "down-going" lifestyle, as prescribed by Zarathustra. [4] I’m not sure if I had a change of heart (pun intended) or I’m just feeling better after the operation, but I do feel a lot like my old self again—at least mentally. Consequently, I find myself returning to many of my old intellectual and aesthetic interests, such as books, art, music, poetry, and even women. Considering my penchant for the wrong sort of woman, the last one may not be a good thing.

I was not raised to expect to be happy, it is not an entitlement. I was taught to survive and fulfill my duties. If I found happiness along the way, it was a bonus. Ironically, not expecting to be happy allowed me to find happiness in ways that I would not have if I had obsessed over it.

Ex-voto offering

It’s hard to imagine now, but there was once a time I never thought I would live to see thirty. What a different world we lived in. Promised nothing, pain, hardship, and death were accepted as normal and inevitable, if not indispensable, parts of our lives. Faith, family, and community were everything. Effete, modern secular sensibilities cannot comprehend this, but I never felt more alive than I did back then—that is until now. Faced with mortality again, I am reminded of what is really important.

Funny enough, some presume that I’m burned out because a few of my priorities have changed. In reality, I’ve never felt more committed to our cause. Focussing all my attention on meaningful religious, social, and cultural pursuits, I’ve embraced Jack London’s credo: “The proper function of man is to live, not to exist.” [5] Doing my best to spurn the dead-end political clown show driving mass man insane and other inconsequential materialist things, I'm able to focus my attention on living my life to the fullest, carrying out my duty, and sacrificing myself for a higher purpose (altar and throne). The hardest part is resisting the temptations of an easy life (comfort and security), breaking bad habits, and expunging negative people from my life.

Barring any complications or new issues, I have no desire to talk about my heart anymore, except maybe metaphorically or romantically. Seeing as I don't like to kiss and tell, the latter is improbable. While I understand and appreciate everyone's support and well-wishes, it's old news now and I feel better. Don't get me wrong, in the beginning, with all the uncertainties, it meant the world to me, but now I find it wearisome. Besides I have much greater spiritual concerns to deal with. I said my piece, now it's time to move forward and—with the aid of the saints, angels, and Blessed Virgin Mary—wage spiritual war for the Social Kingship of Christ.

Madonna dell’Assunta, ora pro nobis. San Rocco di Montpellier, ora pro nobis. Cor Jesu sacratissimum, miserere nobis.

~ By Giovanni di Napoli, August 14th, Feast of Sant'Antonio Primaldo and the Eight Hundred Martyrs of Otranto

Notes
[1] Often attributed to Plato, at the time of publication I cannot find the source of this quote. The sentiment, however, can be found in his Phaedo and Apologies.
[2] For the record, my biggest regret was not starting a family of my own.
[3] “Whosoever dies in this garment shall not suffer eternal fire.” ~ the promise Our Lady of Mt. Carmel made to St. Simon Stock on July 16, 1251. According to the Sabbatine Privilege the Blessed Virgin Mary vowed to save those who wear the brown scapular from the fires of Hell and shorten their stay in purgatory, on the condition that they wear the scapular continuously, observe chastity according to their state in life (married/single), and recite the Little Office or observe the fasts of the Church or with the permission of a priest, say five decades of the Holy Rosary.
[4] Thus Spake Zarathustra, 1883-1885, Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)
[5] “I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet. The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.” Quoted in the introduction of Jack London’s Tales of Adventure Illustrated, edited by Irving Shepard, Doubleday & Co., Inc., 1956, p. vii.

Photo of the Week: Antonia Minore in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli

Antonia Minore, 36 BC-37 AD, Herculaneum Theatre

On the Divine Right of Kings

The Crown Jewels by Blaise Alexandre

Reprinted from Western Exile @westernexile

Few phrases have the tendency to lead discussion of monarchy astray quite like the 'divine right of kings'.

Generally speaking, this is because when people think they are defining it, they are often simply repeating slogans employed against a specific understanding of it.

'It meant that the King could do whatever he wanted', is an all too common iteration of this. This is partly because of a lack of understanding, or deliberate obfuscation, of the critical difference between monarchy and dictatorship - legitimacy - and the fatal assumption that the two forms of government are interchangeable.

Put simply, a dictatorship places its legitimacy in the life and competence of a specific individual at a specific time, and that individual's ability to maintain a monopoly of force. The second any is compromised, the entire system abruptly collapses as a result.

Dictatorships are virtually never de jure. That is, a dictatorship almost exclusively exists in a state which is legally something else, generally a republic - forcing the regime to use extra-legal means and expend significant resources to maintain power while also maintaining the public façade of that other system.

A true monarchy exists both de facto and de jure, deriving its legitimacy from the deepest roots of a people's culture and faith, with there being a clear understanding at all times where power flows from, and to whom it will pass upon the expiration of the monarch. It exists within the framework of state, natural and divine law already established before the King is even born.

There has never in Western Europe been a monarchical system where the King could do 'whatever he wanted'. Even Louis XIV himself, the very image of what many refer to as 'absolute monarchy', faced the veto of the French parlements, and prior to the Protestant Reformation undermining it in the North, all Catholic monarchs were subject to the same tremendous check on their earthly power - the Papacy, and its sovereignty over sovereigns.

This returns us to a core tenet of Christian monarchy. Sovereigns swore their coronation oaths to God, not to governments or documents. A monarch's crown is bestowed upon him by Providence, and can be taken away if that oath is broken, and while he will be judged by God after his passing, it is the Church that will hold him to account while he lives. This is why a monarch is, and should always be, crowned in a church, not a secular building.

Hence why excommunication, which released subjects from their oaths of loyalty to their sovereign, was indeed such a dangerous instrument of accountability, as it granted the population the right to legally overthrow their King, and other sovereigns the right to aid them in such an endeavour.

What the 'divine right of kings' actually entailed was understood differently in different realms at different points throughout history. All too often today, however, the term is defined exclusively through the severely distorted lens of Jacobean England - a state that had already revolted against the authority of the Church, and thus its own check on power.

Post-revolutionary Groupthink has for over a century affirmed that 'accountability' can only possibly derive from the ritual of election. Election, however, no longer enjoys widespread popular legitimacy. The vulnerability of that mechanism to bad actors and moneyed interests, its inappropriacy for large and disparate populations, and above all its failure to ensure good governance, have all been exposed to a critical mass of the populace.

No method of course will or can yield perfection, and the last centuries have been a damning indictment of those who claimed otherwise. So the question we need to be asking ourselves is this - which system is more likely to incentivise a ruler to govern well?

Election, whereby the worst case scenario for the ruler is early retirement, to enjoy one's riches for the rest of one's life without public responsibility?

Or hereditary succession, where the ruler has a direct stake in the future of the state - for the neglect of long term vision in the pursuit of short term gain will jeopardise the future of the ruler's own heirs - where there can be no idle retirement (hence why abdication historically was, and should always remain, a tremendous taboo), and where the total aberration of duty will likely place the physical safety of the ruler's own family in danger?