A Short Advent Reflection

 

What a beautiful drive to Mission #2 for evening Mass as the sun tried to break through the clouds. "This," I thought gravely to myself, "is Texas." Mind like a steel trap, you see, but en lieu of anything beyond bears, climate change and impending civil war, here's Austin Farrer on the season, behold wisdom:

OUR journey sets out from God in our creation, and returns to God at the final judgement.  As the bird rises from the earth to fly, and must some time return to the earth from which it rose; so God sends us forth to fly, and we must fall back into the hands of God at last.  But God does not wait for the  failure and the expiry of our days to drop us back into his lap.  He goes himself to meet us and everywhere confronts us.  Where is the countenance which we must finally look in the eyes, and not be able to turn away our head?  It smiles up at Mary from the cradle, it calls Peter from the nets, it looks on him with grief when he has denied his master.  Our judge meets us at every step of our way, with forgiveness on his lips and succour in his hands.  He offers us these things while there is yet time.  Every day opportunity shortens, our scope for learning our Redeemer’s love is narrowed by twenty-four hours, and we come nearer to the end of our journey, when we shall fall into the hands of the living God, and touch the heart of the devouring fire.

 

Touch the heart of the devouring fire. I love that.

Pax,

LSP

Dove

 

We set up at a tank on a friend's ranch and waited for the birds, shotguns ready, but would the avian acrobats arrive? Good question. All the right stuff was in place, Mojo decoys whirring away, sunflowers, water, and shooters, but you never can tell.

At first it was slow, no birds apart from a couple of random kestrels and the odd mockingbird heading into the trees around the tank. Maybe it'd be a washout, but we waited, vigilant, fingers off the trigger but ready to go.

And in they swooped like speeding Messerschmidts out of the sun behind us, right into the flak barrage. Brisk action and big fun, though far more birds escaped than went down; still, we got a few for the pot and it looks like jalapeno poppers are in order tomorrow. Great result, and it was good to get back in the field, it's been awhile.

Afterwards we convened on the tailgate to clean birds, drink cold beer and talk, curiously, of Anglican/Orthodox communion and ut unum sint (may they all be one) in the face of secularist neo-pagan aggression. Regards the former, not much chance while wymxn priestesses are running around. The latter? Better band together, people, regardless of denomination. Perhaps that will be forced on us.

Then it was time for home and a clear drive through the country back to the Compound. We will do this again.

Cheers,

LSP

Boys In The Hood

 

Well, not so much Hood as Cavasos because changing names and removing statues will do so much to raise the fortunes of virtue signalling hypocrite Democrats poverty stricken POCs everywhere. Except that it won't. Regardless, General Cavasos seems to have been the real deal and I enjoyed a brief tour of the post this afternoon.

The place always strikes me as well put together, unlike Killeen, and it was fun to drive around 1 Cav's enormous motor pools. Look at that, tanks! And the new JLTV (Joint Light Tactical Vehicle) which is replacing ancient HMMVs. 

It comes in 2 and 4 seat variants and features a V8 power plant, advanced networking capability, scalable armor and can be fitted with an array of weaponry: light and heavy machine guns, grenade launchers, anti-tank missiles and more. You can read about this demonstrably badass vehicle here.

Tour over, we stopped at the PX for food, which meant something called a "Philly Cheesesteak," which is a kind of sandwich thing, for the boy and a small order of fries for me. Was it cheap? No, it was not cheap. It was expensive. Very expensive. Maybe I will apply for bankruptcy.

That's as maybe. Perhaps you remember when fast food was a quick, inexpensive variant to real food? Those days are well gone, my friends. But the kid liked it, so. And you know what? He's proud of the US Army and his post. I like that a lot.

Then it was back to 57 Signal, a fond farewell, and a drive back to the bucolic farming community that is LSPland. And all was good, with I35 strangely easy and to the West a massive Texan sun sank to the horizon, filling the air with golden light.

God Bless,

LSP

Behold The Light

 

Drive into the light on the way to yesterday's evening Mass at Mission #2, by the lake. There it was, a Texan sunset and there I was, powering into the incandescent beauty of the thing. Is the infinite glory of God revealed to us in creation? It certainly was to me on the way to Lake Whitney and I was reminded of a time, several decades ago now, in London.

It was one of those points when pretty much everything seemed to have collapsed and I was utterly miserable, staying at  Fr. Michael Hollings' eclectic community in Bayswater. He lived, this cousin of the Duke of Norfolk, in a small office which somehow doubled as a bedroom and in I marched to pour out my tale of woe, and it was exceedingly woeful. No kidding.

Well, the priest listened, smiled and said, "Look out of the window at the sky," it was uncharacteristically blue, "and the trees. Beautiful, God is very, very good." So I looked out of the window and yes, it was beautiful, and my heart felt peace at that moment in the revealed goodness our loving God. 

Sentimental, mawkish piety? No. Bear in mind, Hollings had fought at Monte Casino in the Guards, I think as a Major. No small thing, and the point of this story? There's several, not least this. Look out, open your eyes, and behold the glory, goodness and love of God. As even the pagans of antiquity sensed, Sol Invictus. There's immeasurable hope in that.

God bless you all,

LSP

God's Judgement

 

Here we are, running out our few score years until eternity and judgement. How will that fall? Are you good, bad or somewhere in between? Somewhere in between, probably, and that middle ground, neither hot nor cold, equates to being spat out because heaven doesn't admit imperfection.

What can we do, then, but fall down and beg for mercy like the tax collector. God hears this prayer, from a humble and contrite heart, and lifts us up, exalts us to union with Himself. And herein lies divine judgement.

You're either for God or against Him, for life, beauty, truth and all that's good taken to absolute perfection, or you're not. To put it another way, you're either for that which is or that which isn't. Your call, and lest there be confusion, if you go against reality itself, God, it won't go well for you. Judgement. So, on which side of the baseball bat of reality do we fall?

There's only one answer, cry out for mercy, and here we find great hope. The Prodigal is embraced by the Father, the tax collector justified, the thief on the cross lifted to heaven, the sinner redeemed. Reality itself, God, is yes, implacable but Reality reveals himself to be personal, loving and merciful. Judgement, reminds Farrer, runs out into mercy.

Point being? There's hope for us all. See LL for a solid homily on judgement.

Transpontine,

LSP

On The Road

 

On The Road. Did you know that infamous Beat author Jack Kerouac was a Catholic Christian? So was Andy Warhol too, but that's a different story. Studio 54 aside, I climbed in the rig, got on the road and headed West to say Mass.

The church was quiet and beautiful in the evening light while Christ came down to earth to lift us up to heaven, O Salutaris, and time stood strangely still as it always does when we worship God, not least in the Sacrament of the Altar. Then all too soon, "The Mass has ended, go in peace to love and serve the Lord." Ite Missa Est. 

Back in the car park the sun was setting over Texas, no small thing, and I sent the record of it to an old friend who finds himself in LA doing something with pop music. "Look!" I whatsapped, "Sunset. Hope your musicians are behaving themselves." 

Apparently they were, "Big empty production stage. Phase 1 rehearsals. Secret location. All chilled here. Easy. STAY FROSTY." Always. Then back on the road to the Compound with the sun filling the rear-view with its golden radiance. I never tire of the vision and thank God for it, seriously, and therein lies a word to the wise.

Try and make a habit, a discipline of thanking God for the beyond reckoning good that he's given us. Perhaps it's easier to see in the countryside, where creation's comparatively less marred by wickedness than in, say, the DFW metrosprawl. But wherever you are the rule applies, and when followed covers a multitude of sins.

Here Endeth The Lesson,

LSP

What A Beautiful Day

 

Yes, the sun shone, big birds wheeled across the sky, woodpeckers did their thing in the pecan trees and the squirrels got, well, nasty. I guess they thought it was Spring, and it sure felt like it, T shirt weather. So, struck by the beauty of the moment I reflected on the Gospel for Sunday, the miracle at Cana, water into wine.

This struck me, by Farrer:

Christ attended a wedding.  What, then, was Christ’s concern – what is Christ’s concern – in the weddings of his friends?  We do not read that he laid down the law to them at that time, or told them their obligations – we read that he concerned himself with the supply of their wine.  It seemed a shame to him, if anything was lacking that could spread abroad delight.  The bride and bridegroom drank from the cup.  They passed it round, and their friends tasted the very flavour of their joy.  Christ would not bear to see the flow of happiness interrupted, for lack of wine in which to drink it.

Does this surprise you?  Did you not expect Jesus to be the servant of natural delight, the abettor of warm-hearted pleasure?  But have you forgotten what Christ is?  He is the desire of nations, he is the joy of all mankind: he came to take away the cold religion of duty, and to substitute the religion of delight.  We are to do our duty – yes, but we are to delight in it, for the love of our neighbour, and for the dear love of God.  There is nothing else but this, that we can hope for in heaven itself – nothing but to do good unalloyed by any meanness, and to do it with infinite delight.  And how shall we be able to do so?  By feasting on the vision of a face, whose eyes are the deep wells of happiness and love.

It is not surprising at all, then, that Christ should begin his ministry at a wedding: for a true marriage is a special favour of God’s grace, and a direct foretaste of heaven.  God’s glory is reflected, for those who truly love, in one another’s faces; they see the Creator shining through his handiwork, and the vision inspires them with a simple delight in doing one another good, and in furthering God’s will.  Those who are being married know what they want to do: and it is exactly what God desires them to do.  They do not, as the rest of us so often must, make themselves care about the will of God: they do care for it: for they care for one another.

 

I sent this to a churchman who writes books like we shoot, a lot, and he liked it too. "It is clear," he emailed magisterially, "that Jesus loved a good party—that was about 120 litres of the best :)" Well said!

Do not lose heart, punters, whatever the circumstance. Instead, rejoice in the power of the Lord who is joy in Himself and shares that perfection with us, His Bride, the Mystical Body of Christ.

Ad Gloriam,

LSP

Texas Country

 

Look at this exotic wolf, a Pharaoh Dog, right here in Hill County.

Anubis aside, do not scorn the road less traveled.

Or the golden light of a Texan sun.

God Bless,

LSP

In Cars

 

Some days are all about gun, rod and church, others are about cars and that's exactly what went down today. The mission was simple, elegant even in its simplicity. Get a '71 El Camino and a '40s Ford Roadster hot rod out the door of the shop and into a hauler.

Great plan, but it fell apart on contact. The roadster wouldn't start for love or money so we pushed it out of the barn to make room for the Elkie, maybe that'd start and drive straight on through to the hauler and Californian Valhalla. No. It didn't.

Fire the Batteries

Go figure, the battery was dead, so we pumped it up via my rig and a neighbor's heavy duty cables. Throaty SS Chevy growl, the beast was in play and we let it idle. Roadster? After messing with carbs and battery it fired up like the show car it is. Drive that bad boy right up in the hauler.

The Elkie went next and got up to the ramps, and we left it growling at the foot of trailer triumph. Just look at those chrome exhausts and fat back tires standing on the runway waiting for takeoff. Great result. Then it stopped and died. Awful, hideous result.

Drive 'er up!

Maybe the fuel gauge wasn't working and the thing'd run out of gas. Someone went to get more and we refilled the tank. Still no result. Dam. The vehicle had to get on the hauler today and it wasn't running, utter disaster. What to do? 

Long, very long story short, it looked like the coil was busted, power in, no power out. This left us with one option, ratchet, no fooling the thing up into the hauler, which is what we did. A beast, but we got it loaded and off on its way California, harming no one, I think.

Elkie

And that was that. The hauler's long suffering driver was from Kazakhstan, curiously. "Where are you from?" he asked, "From England," I replied, ratcheted out. "Ah! Football! Which team you support?" Good question and I replied "Millwall," and he grinned from ear to ear, "Yes! Much fight! F*ck you Westham!" No kidding, and I grinned back. 

"In Kazakhstan I drink pints, many pints, and watch football, and we fight. Manchester United hates Liverpool!" He even showed me his Man U tattoo, right there on his arm, under the big sky of Texas, "People here, they think I am Korean, but I am from the Caspian Sea."

SS Runs Outta Gas

Respect. Fella sleeps out of his dually until he has the money to get his wife and two children to the land of what used to be the home of the free and the brave. Good luck to him.

Mission Accomplished

More on vehicular action as it plays out. God bless you all,

LSP

Texas is Golden

 

The Mass was offered, ite missa est, go it is sent, and I drove back to the Compound in a golden haze of sunset. It reminded me of the final hour of a dove hunt and I asked myself, "Why is Texas so awesome?" wondering at the providence of it all. 

But why. Frontier spirit, big skies, the world's tenth or eleventh highest GDP, putting the Lone Star State above lesser countries such as Canada, Australia and Mexico? Well yes, opportunity, energy and growth, there is that, to say nothing of relative sanity compared to prison gulags like Australia and New York.

Maybe that's part of it. Unlike Alberta, no one here's about to tell you to get a serf vaxxport before you can enter a store. You can even clean the shotguns and pistols you don't have, put 'em in your rig and go out and shoot in a friend's field, we have that freedom. Texas and liberty, two very large things to conjure with.

Let's pray they continue to walk hand in hand. In the meanwhile, it's time to fry up some absurdly cheap, pre-Bidenflation steak. What?!? 

Yes, we can eat steak here in Texas, if you know where to look. It's hard to find but you can still get it, as opposed to the soylent cubes and insect hash doled out by our transnational elite, private jet, island owning Millionaire Socialist rulers.

#2A,

LSP

Traffic

 

Why is Texas so awesome? Perhaps because of its light and sky, which point to higher things, a vast frontier with all the freedom therein. That said, I35's a nightmare in the Waco chokehold. Get 'round that by exiting the highway and taking 84 through what's left of town to 6 and rejoining 35 from there. Presto, you've missed the hideous traffic jam.

In other news, the POC who shot up a school in metrosprawl Arlington has been released from jail on a 75k bond, as opposed to the Kenosha Kid who shot 3 skateboard revolutionaries in self-defense and spent months in prison and's on a $2 million bond.  Such systemic white privilege. Don't say whitewashed sepulchers of Pharisaical grift, corruption and malfeasance. 

Speaking of privilege, my eldest's been running around the local park, he's on an incredibly racist Columbus Day weekend pass, with something like 80 Lbs weight, maybe more. "Easy, tiger," I urged with paternal affection, "Don't hurt yourself." But what can I say, the youth of today.

Your Old Friend,

LSP

Golden Void

 

I tell you, it's hot enough to melt porch furniture and cast it into bullets (what? Ed.), but whoever said life'd be easy? No one, but the band plays on and this mind blog's mission to document the Apocalypse continues. Steadfast.

 #artphilosophy

Golden Void,

LSP

At The End of The Day

 

Here we are at the end of another clement day in rural Texas, and what did the day bring? Good weather, which is weird because the state's attacking DC for trying on its green new deal job killer gambit. And not only that, our AG's going after retail brokerage hucksters like Robinhood, which may or may not survive the weekend.

Speaking of which, Gamestop shares are holding at a sturdy $325 after hours, AMC and Blockbuster continue up and the great popularist Bull Raid into the nation's kleptocracy continues. Dr. Swankenstein, our financial consultant in Minneapolis, prophecies:

It's only been 24 hours, but I predict that the event will be called GameStopGate, and that it was an attack by domestic terrorists with ties to white supremacy.

And quicker than you can say Harriet Tubman cannibalized Andrew Jackson, out came this, from the appropriately named and pathetic Vice:

What?!? Can't be having all all those serfs making money at the expense of their private jet, yacht owning, billionaire socialist betters, that'd be racist. And Nazi. And racist again. So arrest them for the sheer temerity, the brazen audacity, the literal gall and sedition of taking money from the ultra rich. Can't be having that in our brave new socialist utopia. Oh no.

Let's see how this plays out. Will the most popular president in American history ban retail trading for its transphobic racism? Will Robinhood implode and bring another Lehman moment, in which banksters get bailed out by you, the dirt people? Or will Hedge Funds and their famously rich clients who aren't in Congress and the Senate get a right and well deserved whipping. I hope the latter outcome's in play, but let's see.

In the meanwhile, will $GME go to 1000 and become EPIC ALPHA? As it is, 325 ain't bad at all and looks set to blow up several enemy positions. The enemy being the transnational, keleptocrat elite, call them oligarchs if you like, who've been waxing large at the expense of the people. 

That they hide their evil under the guise of rainbow tolerance and transsexual toilets only compounds their egregious sin. On the Left, AOC gets it, and so does Tulsi, Bernie's silent in one of his several socialist mansions. The rank and file? Not so much, they're shilling for Hedge Funds and don't see it, eyes wide shut.

That is all,

LSP

Fish Fry

"Hey, Padre, good news and bad news," went the early morning text. You see, these days churchpeople tend to text instead of call and in fairness it takes ring-tone beastliness out of your morning coffee, so I'm not complaining. 

The bad news? Someone had to stay in hospital an extra day or two, she's eager to be out, and the good news was a ticket for the FFA (Future Farmers of America) fish fry. Would it be welcome relief from the National Menstrual Equality Day or a trial?

So, after a hard day's sweating over a hot computer I drove off to find out. Turns out it was good, it felt great to be in the countryside and see my friend's place, it's been awhile. I asked him, "How's it been?" and he replied, "Busy, busy, and busy." 

I told him I was "busy learning to walk again," which he seemed to like, "You're doing pretty dang good at that. Could've been doing pretty dang bad." We parted ways, he had work to do, organizing the operation.

And I tell you, what a good crew of straight-up people having fun in the clean country air of a Texan evening, everyone getting convivial and taking it easy, the food was delicious too. But then it was time to leave JM's not inconsiderable Compound and head back to mine in the light of the setting sun. I won't say it wasn't beautiful because it was.

There was a time when I'd have laughed and accused you of being a deluded fool if you'd said I'd end up in rural Texas. God, it seems, is full of surprises.

Your Friend,

LSP

Fish After Mass

One of the many benefits of LSPland is that you can go fishing after Mass, which is what we did, right there on Lake Whitney as the sun was beginning to sink in the large Texan sky.

It was a tranquil scene, no doubt about it, but excitement was in the air as first one then several ferocious Bass surged up out of the water to prey on insects and small, unwary birds. Time to get on the fish, gentlemen.

I tried a variety of lures, a mid size shad, some kind of minnow thing and several topwater torpedoes, to say nothing of worms real and plastic along with delicious strawberry fish treats. But the fish were having none of it.

We weren't catching anything, the anglers to the left and right weren't catching anything and neither was man across the way. And that's just the way it was.

No fish on, we fell back to the Compound for a tasty meal of fried chicken and a celebratory glass of the right stuff in honor of Melania's birthday. 

It's Not Over, Fish. Not by a Long Shot

Would fried fish have been better? Sure, but that's for another day, when the fish are biting.

Your Old Friend,

LSP