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1. 1 Pingback by ChroniclesMagazine.org » AMERICANISM: June 2007 on 7 June 2007:

   [...] Americanism, Then and Now by Christopher Check [...]

2. 2 Comment by Michael Kenny on 8 June 2007:

   The funny part of Mr Check’s article is that the kind of ranting and raving he engages in is PRECISELY what Catholics outside the US find shocking and objectionable on the part of a handful of noisy extremists in the US. His diatribe is more appropriate to some tub-thumping fundamentalist denouncing the turpitude of the “whore of Rome” than to a Catholic. If you are looking for a perfect example of the “americanist” heresy, Mr Check has provided it! Roman calvinism! Pope Leo is probably laughing his head off!

3. 3 Comment by robert m. peters on 8 June 2007:

   Mr. Kenny,

   I found Mr. Check’s article to be a reasoned counterpoint to the “American heresy.” At its core, the article places the transforming power of the Christ through His Spirit and His Church above that of the state and of the individual. I do not see the acknowledging of the transforming power of the Christ as the living Agnus Dei, having shed His blood to redeem us, as being a rant or a rave. If one has been transformed by the Christ, one will show the fruits thereof. The Church has every obligation to show that those who profess to be Christians are not demonstrating the fruits of the Spirit and to call into question counterfeit standards which give us a false sense of wellbeing and which cheapen our costly Grace. I am not a Roman Catholic but a Protestant.

4. 4 Comment by Dan Hayes on 8 June 2007:

   Those interested in this fascinating topic are directed to the writings of Prof. John Rao (DrJCRao@aol.com). Rao has discussed the “Americanism” vexation in his little tome “Americanism and the Collapse of the Church in the United States,” which is listed under “Writings” at his above cited address.

   Anyone living in the metropolitan New York City area should check out his biweekly lectures on church history which will restart in September 2007. Both the lectures and the Italian wine, cheese and cookies are absolutely first-rate.

5. 5 Comment by Sid Cundiff on 8 June 2007:

   Chris Check is 100% correct in this excellent article, which I first had read in the print edition of the magazine.

   Ever since the days of the New Englander Winthrop and his odious “city on a hill”, Gringos have loved Gringoland more than God.

   Since the days of our worst president, Woodrow Wilson, Gringos have assumed that they have a Divine mission to make the world safe for Gringoism. If you can stomach it, take a gander at Richard Gamble’s outstanding The War for Righteousness.

6. 6 Comment by Leon Haller on 8 June 2007:

   Is CHRONICLES a conservative magazine, or a Christian one? Increasingly, I feel like I’ve wandered into a particularly fundamentalist (or really papist) church when I receive the mag or check out this site.

   Let God worry about His things, Caesar about his own. The genius of the Founders was precisely that they did NOT establish any church (or, as would have been the possibilities then, particular Christian sect), but instead chose a non-denominational / secular form of government, at least nationally, leaving people free to choose thier own beliefs. Thank goodness! Freedom of religion is part of the American way. If you don’t like it, return to your European fatherland, and try to restart an established church there (good luck, you’ll need it!).

   Of course, what’s really interesting about the ‘turn to religion’ of CHRONICLES in recent years (and getting worse all the time) is that it’s real purpose is to prevent a ‘turn to race’ as the focus of a serious American Right – which is ironic: America was not officially founded as a Christian nation, but it was officially a ‘white supremacist’ one. Why don’t we go back to THAT traditional value? (You know the answer, and so do I.)

7. 7 Comment by robert m. peters on 8 June 2007:

   I am a Protestant. In fact, I’m a Southern Baptist. Even worse than that, I am a Sandhill Southern Baptist from North Louisiana. The theological implications of that are well beyond the scope of the website.

   To the point, however, a pastor friend and I discussed this very issue in Germany in 1985. There I was a member of a small Baptist church which was not affiliated with the U.S. military but which served a substantial number of military families. In addition, we had a number of Germans, Russians and Romanians in our congregation. On several evenings, the pastor and I discussed the American heresy, although we did not call it that. We called it the “national god.” We concluded that the “god” on the coin – “in God we trust” was not the God as revealed in the Person of the Christ but a false god. He was well wrapped in the United States flag; on solemn occasions atheist, agnostics and skeptics, particularly in some ceremony, could be found calling upon his name and sending up prayers to him. This “other god” was the metaphysical escape hatch for a rapidly secularizing society. They could call upon him and feel quite good about him and themselves. He was not the God whose wrath makes necessary our redemption from it in the person of and through the blood of the risen Christ. Even then, we two rather simple guys in a quiet German town determined that this American god was naught but the personification of the high-minded quest of empire and provided the cloak of morality to give color to its otherwise banal enterprises.

8. 8 Comment by robert m. peters on 8 June 2007:

   Mr. Haller,

   You have raised some good questions. I would begin by noting that the Christ and not our founders created the secular dichotomy of society within the Christian sphere of influence in the West. The princes, kings and emperors saw themselves as gods. In fact, it was Emperor Augustus, ol’ Octavian himself, who declared an “evangelium” of his reign as a deity or demigod. The Christ, the Ontological Absolute incarnate, stripped him of that claim when He declared render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s (whatever that may be since the Earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof) and unto God the things that are God’s. Now what we have, through out the West and here in America, is an attempt by the state to re-deify itself with its notions of solemn ceremonies, “hallowed ground,” and “sacred honor.” The Congress of the United States even claims to own doves in its jurisdiction, their being migratory creatures. The state demands God’s tithe from each of us. The state claims that all legitimacy rests with it. Therefore, from my perspective, it is the state which is attempting to end the secular and divine; the temporal and the ecclesiastical; and not the other way around.

9. 9 Comment by robert m. peters on 8 June 2007:

   Mr. Haller,

   Is it to be held against our ancestors that they were primarily, although not exclusively, of British stock? Is it to be held against them that they created a republic which was based on the laws of their past and the traditions of their ancestors? Are we of the 21st century who dare anyone to judge us, who claim in great part although not in the whole that values are relative, suddenly going to find some immutable moral imperative coming, seemingly out of thin air, by which we in most high-minded self-righteousness deign to judge our ancestors? Such smacks of an arrogant hubris and lacks even a modicum of understanding that there was a little intervening event called the “fall,” from and through which we all suffer, even unto our own age.

10. 10 Comment by Brian Muza on 9 June 2007:

    I would like to offer an alternative question for sober inquiry among our highly erudite contributors and readers:

    1. Is it possible that the ‘experiment’ of the United States of America, as classicly articulated by the Founders in all of the relevant documents, and chock-full of the errors informing all 18th-century Enlightenment thought, was philosophically – and practically -doomed from its very inception?

    2. If one is willing to concede this possibility, is one not further obliged to admit that the present intellectual and spiritual malaise of the West (America and all those nations subsequently poisoned by her corrupting hegemonic influences) is ultimately nothing more than the sum of those philosophical errors made manifest? In other words, who will wonder why the house has collapsed when its foundation is discovered to have been thoroughly rotten?

    I often think about this unsettling possibility, poorly worded though it undoubtedly is, and I admit I am deeply troubled by it. That’s not to say that I have come to these conclusions, mind you, but the possiblity that there may be a kernel of truth therein gives me pause…

    Any serious discussion in this space is greatly appreciated. My thanks, once again, to the staff of Chronicles and its readership for consistently offering such provocative articles.

11. 11 Comment by GJ Tryon on 9 June 2007:

    Michael Kenny should have let us in on the joke. Where most readers evidently saw in the article a reasoned expostion detailing some of the many contradictions, logical and moral, now catching up to the modernist West, Mr. Kenny discerns only distemper and diatribe. In his pointed and perverse misreading of Mr. Check, he illustrates the underlying theme found here and elsewwhere in Chronicles, that defending freedom of conscience often fronts a need for freedom from conscience.

12. 12 Comment by robert m. peters on 9 June 2007:

    Mr. Haller,

    A quote from John Jay in Federalist #2,

    “Providence has been pleased to give this one connected country to one connected united people – a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion, attached to the same principles of government, very similar in their manners and customs.”

    It would seem, that he, one of the “founders” acknowledged the Ontological Absolute in the form of “Providence” and latter acknowledges “the same religion” whereof we can be sure that he was not speaking of Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Shintoism, or some form of animism. He acknowledges the sameness of that religion despite the differences among denominations from Catholics to Quakers.

    Mr. Jay and men like Mr. Jefferson thought it good that we were a people of one language, common heritage, and common principles.

    Thus, I would note that in your post you challenge those who might not hold your views religion to return to our “fatherlands” of Europe. It would seem, looking at Mr. Jay’s understanding of his America, that we are closer to the ideas of the founders than are you and that you might harbor some later European import into the polity known as Jacobism.

13. 13 Comment by Sid Cundiff on 9 June 2007:

    Mr. Muza raises very compelling questions indeed. I ask him, and the rest of the readers on this blog, to come up with a Syllabus of Errors – the Founders’ errors.

14. 14 Comment by Sid Cundiff on 9 June 2007:

    A Syllabus of Errors of the Founders – or a least some of them. Readers will note my Burkean and Continental Counter-Enlightenment prejudice:

    1. – that the so-called “Middle Ages” were “The Dark Ages”

    2. – that the Revolution of 1688 was “glorious” (i.e. bloodless); that King James II was a wicked Papist out to destroy religious toleration; that this Revolution gives The People the right to alter and abolish at Its whim and caprice; and that this Whig revolution brought about liberty, peace, and prosperity; and that the French Revolution will be just like 1688, if not even more glorious and liberating (Richard Price)

    3. – that Unitarians and Quakers are wonderful; and that High Anglicans, Catholics, and Jews are just OK, provided there are not too many of them

    4. – that the Divine is a celestial clock-maker who mechanically made the universe as a machine, wound it up, and walked away, letting the universe run on its own (Franklin et al.)

    5. – Holy Communion is a silly idea, but the Masons are so wise (Washington?)

    6. – that money should be fiat money, issued by the Federal State through its monopolistic and untaxed central bank (Hamilton, and the Whigs of 1689)

    7. – that a high national debt is a good thing; and if we get too deep in debt, we will just print the money and pay off our bondholders (Hamilton)

    8.– that the Boston Tea Party (by New England Puritans) is great but Shay’s rebellion (by the so-called “Scots Irish) is very wicked (Sam Adams)

    9.– that the (Scots Irish) Whiskey Rebellion was a sin against the Holy Ghost (Hamilton)

    10. – that the Federal State has total sovereignty over the states, the states just franchises of the Feds (Hamilton)

    11. – that England is really swell and France gross (Hamilton)

    12. – that France is really cool and England a bummer (Jefferson)

    13. – that “Palatine boors” are immigrating into Pennsylvania to its detriment (Franklin)

    14. – that corporate welfare is just jim dandy (Hamilton)

    15. – that the executive should be supreme over the legislative and judicial (Hamilton)

    16.– that only the Federal State can regulate interstate commerce, not the individual states (Marshall)

    17. – that the Federal State’s activities and institutions owe no tax to the states (Marshall)

    18. – that the local militias, each man with the right to bear arms, will rise up and overthrow any potential tyrant

    19. – that the 10th Amendment will save us from a totally out of control The Behemoth Federal State

    20. – that King George III is responsible for the slave trade, not New England ship masters

    21. – that when the slave trade stops in A.D. 1808, slavery will soon thereafter bite the dust

    22. – that constitutions made out of paper and ink, not history and habit, will restrain power freaks

    23. – that left alone, the economy will function just fine as a self-correcting machine (Smith)

    24. – that The State will function just groovy as a self-correcting machine of “checks and balances” (Montesquieu and Madison); and that the majority will not do bad things because of these checks and balances (Madison); and that tax-takers will not plunder and despoil taxpayers who aren’t tax-takers because of the same checks and balances

    25. – that King George III is the only tax-taker, and that republics don’t have such leeches

    26. – that political parties are a bad idea

    27.– that “government” means The State – the “vast mechanical man”, Leviathan [and Behemoth]–, that the Greek polis is just a state on a small scale, and that the state existed long before Machiavelli invented it

    28. – that the best political philosophers are Locke, Montesquieu, and Rousseau; and for the Hamiltonians, Machiavelli and Tommy Hobbes

    29. – that Montesquieu’s mechanical version of the mixed constitution is better that Polybius’

    30. – that society is atomic, not organic, every individual his own world with no ties to anyone, be it family or social estate, except through voluntary contract; and such atoms need to be mechanically forced together or they’ll hurt each other (Newton, Locke, Montesquieu, and Hobbes)

    31.– That Montesquieu’s mechanical system is better than the historically evolved Westminster system (Madison)

    32. – that The People as The General Will is sovereign (Rousseau)

    33. – that the common people are a reservoir of wisdom, and deserve to get what they want – good and hard

    34. – that society ought to be built up from a blueprint drafted from scratch by Enlightenment philosophers, not slowly developed out of an ancient and inveterate social order; that we should look to abstractions, not to the concrete, in drafting such a blueprint; that an historical approach – to approach things from behind or from a pre-existing intuitive whole – is stupid; and that every 19 years we need a new such blueprint

    35. – that prescription as no legal or moral authority

    36. – that prejudice is so, so bad

    37. – that we should throw away our history of English liberties and go for the view of “geometers and calculators”

    38. – that man in a natural, silvan condition is a fine chap, and in urban society a blackguard (Rousseau)

    39.– or that man is a creature of passions, and thus bad, but checks and balances will compel him to be reasonable and compromise (Madison)

    40.– that the naturally good man needs only moral guidance, not religious “taboo” (“no sin, only error” of Emerson)

    41. – that habit, history, custom, tradition, ceremony, and religion are at best of little value and at worse make the naturally good man bad.

    42.– that reason is sufficient for all knowledge and all human needs, that all are equal in such reason, and that such reason is universal – and thus Eskimos and Hottentots, using their reason, will come to the same solutions to problems

    43.– that all we need is free soil, free press, and free schools, and the problems of the world will be solved (cf. The Education of Henry Adams) – to say nothing of a free lunch

    44. – that folk of utterly different cultures and religion and ideologies can melt into a pot

    45. – that one man is a as good as another

    46. – that freedom means freedom from, not freedom for – the latter being just a question of personal taste; that freedom does not mean to behave and live in accordance with a moral essence or pre-established harmony, but rather just “doing as one likes”, provided that one not hinder others doing as they like [forget that this concept is contradictory]

    47. – that all we need is a night watchman state, or better a traffic cop state, that keeps atomic individuals from bumping into each other as they go about pursuing their private tastes.

    48.– that all people have nothing but a hedonistic attitude to life, and that we may assume “tacitly that human beings desire nothing beyond ease, security and avoidance of pain”; that they “only want comfort, safety, short working-hours, hygiene, birth control”, safe sex, air-conditioning, cheap gas, lots of TV, and flush toilets – not “struggle, self-sacrifice, drums, flags, and loyalty-parades”; and they will be as enthused about playing with tin pacifists as with tin soldiers; and that how Citizen Robespiere, General Bonaparte, Louis Bonaparte, Comrade Lenin, Benito, ol’ Adi, Uncle Joe, and The Chairman got into power is a strange and impenetrable mystery [quotes and phrases from Orwell’s review of Mein Kampf]

    49.– that dipping snuff and consequently sneezing is good for you

    50. – that if you eat a tomato, you’ll die of food poisoning

15. 15 Comment by ECHS1967 on 9 June 2007:

    omnes honorate fraternitatem diligite Deum timete regem honorificate

16. 16 Comment by Brian Muza on 10 June 2007:

    Mr. Cundiff,

    A ‘Syllabus of Errors’ indeed! Your suggestion that we compile such a list gets to the heart of this matter – the error of Modernism.

    As far as I’m concerned, Americanism is merely a more recent recitation of this benighted school of thought. Leo XIII’s admonitions could just as easily be applied, in toto, to the vast cornucopia of contemporary error subsumed within the Modernist cast of mind.

    Of particular interest to me (an aspiring historian of Late Antiquity/Early Middle Ages) is your distaste for the pejorative term ‘Dark Ages’. For those of us who hope we know better, nothing is more remarkably laughable than William Manchester’s condescending (albeit entertaining) survey, ‘A World Lit Only By Fire’. Manchester, better known, and undoubtedly on safer ground, as an historian of 20th-century politicians, paints the centuries preceeding the Reformation as variously savage, illiterate and in wait of a tranformative personality (Luther, Calvin, Henry VIII) to liberate the disordered minds of heretofore superstitious, malnourished rubes. His book, whose narrative is nevertheless an enjoyable read, is so embarrassingly typical of the perposterous arrogance and egotism which is at root in all Modernist, Americanist cant. Had Manchester never read Augustine’s ‘Confessions’? Or how about St. Patrick’s ‘Confessions’? Both of these works are compelling evidence of Late Antiquity’s discovery of ‘the self’, one’s introspection supposed by Modernists not to have flowered until much, much later. Or Boethius, Athanasius, Ignatius of Antioch, Bede, Anselm, Ambrose, Thomas Aquinas? Surely a female rabble-rouser such as St. Catherine of Siena is worthy of some respect? Not a chance… Today’s Modernists/Americanists are creatures of the latest fashion, enslaved to their notions of liberty and freedom of conscience, ill-informed though their conscience may be.

    Cardinal Newman believed “to be deep in history is to cease being a Protestant.” Tradition derives from Christ, His Apostles, the early Church Fathers, and so on down to our own time. The 16th-century Reformations, in the final analysis, were a repudiation of the first fifteen hundred years of Christian Tradition. Each repudiation found its prime mover in a personality (a ‘reformer’) who imbibed deeply the belief that the Holy Spirit revealed a truth to him personally, a truth heretofore unrevealed to the Church. In all charity (a fair number of my Irish family belongs to Protestant confessions), I marvel at anyone who can so reconcile his conscience and fidelity to purely human machinations.

    My hope for what remains of our Western civilization is that we will rediscover our peerless cultural and religious patrimony; renew our commitment to self-preservation by eradicating the poisonous doubt that has infected our reasoning for the last four centuries; dedicate ourselves to the rebuilding of our decimated society and to the spirit of brotherhood we should enjoy among our common European origin; reacquaint ourselves with the wisdom of ‘Ubi Petrus Ibi Ecclesia’; and, finally, encourage our young people to marry and raise large families.

17. 17 Comment by Johan Dieckmann on 10 June 2007:

    Of course, the problems of Catholic Church in the U.S. can be understood only in cultural context.

    From “American Idolatry” by Spengler (29 August 2006,
    http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page/HH29Aa01.html):

    “… No other nation rejects the notion of a high culture with such vehemence, or celebrates the mediocre with such giddiness. Americans prefer to identify with what is like them, rather than emulate what is better than them…

    … Resentment is simply an expression of envy, the first and deadliest of sins. Adam and Eve envied God’s knowledge of good and evil, Cain envied Abel, Ishmael envied Isaac, Esau envied Jacob, Joseph’s brothers envied the favorite son… Why reject what comes from on high to worship one’s own image, unless you resent the higher authority?

    The culture of resentment runs … deep in the American character … This helps explain why Americans are so stupid … Stupidity attends the culture of resentment. One learns only by accepting a suitable authority. If one rejects authority in favor of one’s own impulses, one cannot learn.

    Most Americans do accept an authority, to one extent or another, namely the Bible. The Bible remains America’s national epic, and the Protestant precept Sola Scriptorum is alive and well in the United States. But the Bible is too difficult a text for the ordinary reader to absorb; it requires a level of culture inaccessible to all but a handful to read it properly. The culture of resentment tends to reduce Bible-reading to slogans and sound-bites, with the result that side-issues such as Creationism sap the emotional energy of American Christians. Quite a shock will be required before any of this changes…”

18. 18 Comment by ECHS1967 on 10 June 2007:

    Spengler’s comments are enormously perceptive, as always, but in the spirit of our much vaunted American pragmatism, one must ask, what then is to be done? We’re worse off today than when Spengler wrote those words; if anyone was paying attention then, it’s clear that they made little difference in the course of events, and even fewer people are paying attention now. As for Mr. Cundiff’s Syllabus of Errors, bravo, bravo, but what then is to be done? It’s ironic that the only European nation that appears to be undergoing an authentic religious revival is Russia, where Catholicism and Protestantism exist mostly on sufferance.

    I’ve never been able to understand why all the big money on the American right has failed to do the obvious — either found or transform an important university, either start or acquire a multimedia powerhouse (talk about mediocrity and culture imperviousness, Fox is far from the answer), etc. There has got to be a way to get the issues discussed here onto the national agenda — and ~keep~ them there.

19. 19 Comment by ECHS1967 on 10 June 2007:

    Oops. I just discovered that “Spengler” is a nom de plume, not the original Oswald. Oh well …

20. 20 Comment by Michael Ezzo on 10 June 2007:

    At the risk of repeating what has been said many times before, I think, to answer ECHS’ question, Chronicles is doing as good a job as anyone. “Ora et labora”; and “Nolite confidere in principibus” are good wholesome means from which to proceed. Don’t seek political solutions to cultural problems. And understand that things are probably going to get even worse before they get better. For most of us, the answer, as Pat Buchanan implies in THE DEATH OF THE WEST, begins at home. Try to raise a solid Christian family to pass along the traditions. I can’t think of any quick solutions.

21. 21 Comment by TJF on 11 June 2007:

    I find it fascinating, in a perverse sort of way, how many people complain about this or that in Chronicles, as if there is or was a Platonic form of the magazine that the current numbers only dimly reflect. Whether the complainant is an obsessive racist, like Mr. Haller, a Fundamentalist, an anti-Semite, or a Zionist, he always asks, in essence, why can’t you put out the magazine that I would put out, supposing I had the talent, brains, and energy? I always suggest, ever so politely, that they start their own magazine. Unfortunately today, every idiot on the planet can have his own blog and never expose himself to other ideas.

    Let’s look for just a moment at the argument that Chronicles is too Christian. In an average year we do at most two issues on religious themes, one always in December. But in the current 50 page issue, about 10 pages are devoted to the theme of Americanism. The rest, apart from book and film reviews, are on policy issues. The previous number is devoted to property rights, with hard-hitting shorter pieces on immigration and racial politicking.

    We write for people who share our civilization, including otherwise well-meaning atheists and materialists. People not interested in poetry, music, philosophy, and theology should start their own blog or, better yet, buy a mirror and argue with their own reflections.

22. 22 Comment by Steve Berg on 11 June 2007:

    I found Captain Check’s article to be very challenging and of considerable import. I have slowly come to the Christian fold after being driven from it many years ago. I long considered church to be a convenient place to corral hypocrites for an hour or so each Sunday morning. Knowing the Chronicles folks and meeting some fine clergy and parishoners here at Newman have jogged me into attending and participating after a hiatus of about 40 years. One of the leading factors I see for our civilizational decline is Modernity itself. Mr. Cundiff’s fine list contains the names of quite a few of the theoretical and practical assaults on Western Civilization, but Modernity is itself at fault. It seeks overtly to replace virtue with vice. As Dr. Fleming knows far better than the rest of us, the Ancients were hardly blameless, but at least most paid some lip service to virtue. Christ shows us what it really is, and gives us a guide through the Scriptures and Tradition to achieving it as best is possible in a fallen world. It is only through the Church that civilization can be nurtured and maintained. politics simply will not do that. One of the sirens tempting modern man is that of salvation by politics. Just elect the right people, get the right people on the courts, implement the right policies, and our troubles are over. We have been trying this for far too many years and can show nothing good coming out of it. Bill Buckley famously stood astride History (the secularists’ version of Divine Providence) and yelled “STOP!” and the result is? Chronicles does have quite a few fine articles about politics and policy, but the main effort is to take back the Civilization one person at a time. This is not as glamorous as being a bunch of policy wonks, but is really the only workable approach. So, what we really have is the Staff and Members of the Rockford Institute standing in front of Modernity, and saying “Begone!” It may seem like a hopeless fight, but if this were not a threat to our Civilization’s enemies, as is the Church, these institutions would not be hated so vehemently, as was shown by the very first response to the article.

23. 23 Comment by Brian Mershon on 13 June 2007:

    Brian,

    You’re premise, as troubling as it is, is right on. Christ is King. The founders’ “liberty, equality and fraternity” were all based upon the French revolution, which of course was a rejection of the Church and the Kingship of Christ.

    As these ideas are falsely glorified and understood in the U.S. (like the right to free speech, condemned also by Pope Leo XIII) and therefore, this country, as France will go away prior to it, will also return to dust–sooner than many think.

24. 24 Comment by John Chance on 13 June 2007:

    Sadly, Americanism won with Catholics:
    -looking to Bush/GOP for Just War Precepts
    -Dems or Repubs
    -Dispensationalism and its kow-towing to Israel and the ultimate plan-Judizing.
    -unremittant flag waving and slogans
    -demonizing Muslims at rates unheard of previous (none of the Zionists that, liek their 1st C ancestors, attack Christ still)

    Muslims, for any faults and a few bad apples, are the only ones standing with the Holy See at UN against abortion, forced sterilization and contraceptions

25. 25 Comment by John Chance on 13 June 2007:

    uh, and full, Calvin inspired Capitalism

26. 26 Comment by John De Friend on 13 June 2007:

    Our Lord has it that “an evil tree cannot bear good fruit.” What is the fruit of the good ole USA?

    1} Abortion and homosexuality, crimes that cry to Heaven for vengeance, institutionalized as “civil rights” domestically and exported by means of strings attached to foreign “aid.”

    2} Perpetual war for perpetual peace. It is an instruction to add up all the wars (and casualities) Uncle Serpent has launced or caused to be launched.

    U.S. equals Uncle Serpent??? Sure. Two examples, out of a multitude, follow demonstrating the corruption at the very root of this evil tree:

    1} “We the People” for sale at the U.S. Capitol Building bookstore displays a portrait of Brother George Washington, in full Masonic costume laying the cornerstone of Capitol Building on Sept. 18, 1793
    amid full Masonic religious ceremony.

    “We the People” declares that “In laying the cornerstone, he placed it on a silver plate marking the date as the 13th year of American independence, the first year of his second term and the year of Masonry 5793.”

    What date is missing??? Anno Domine 1793 is not to be found–And how could it since “there is no concord between Christ and Belial.” It is also worth noting that 13 and 5 are key numbers in Masonic ritual.

    The same format is to be found at ALL the monuments in the “Capitol City.”

    Since The Church has in over 200 documents since 1738 repeatedly taught that “Masony is the “Synagogue of Satan” it is clear that this Uncle Serpent root is foul. A web search easily confirms this.

    2} Jefferson, Rosicrucian, Mason and Illuminist writes in his declaration “that just powers are derived from the consent of the governed.” Really? Does that require the governed to be just? That’s a good trick since “the governed” suffer from a fallen nature.

    The Church teaches that just power descends from God to man and DOES NOT ascend from man to God. Poor Jefferson could not tell up from down…

    Does this sound familiar? “For God doth know that the day ye eat thereof you shall be like unto God.” You would think that Satan would dream up some new tricks to fool the likes of Jefferson…

    2} A little digging shows that ALL of the main “founding fathers” were Masons, Rosicrucians, Illuminati—and worse.

    It is time for us to shake off the americanism most of us imbibed as mother’s milk in both the U.S. Catholic and public schools and return to the teachings of Holy Mother Church. Needless to say that excludes the teaching of the Americanist “catholic” “church.”

27. 27 Pingback by Article: Americanism, Then and Now: Our Pet Heresy « on 13 June 2007:

    [...] Full article here. [...]

28. 28 Comment by Johan Dieckmann on 14 June 2007:

    (Re. comment #23)

    “The founders’ “liberty, equality and fraternity” were all based upon the French revolution, which of course was a rejection of the Church and the Kingship of Christ.”

    The U.S. Constitution was adopted in 1787 (17 September to wit), two years _before_ the French Revolution (1789–1799).

    On the other hand, the ideals of the latter had predated both; hence, the above is true.

29. 29 Comment by Leon Haller on 14 June 2007:

    As this thread is still accepting comments, allow me to respond to Mr. Peters and TJF, who addressed themselves to me personally.

    I agree with much of what Mr. Peters has said, to the extent that I can follow his scattered thoughts, which, however, are hardly germane to my own initial observations. I merely wished then to point out, first, that CHRONICLES seems increasingly to be crossing the line from a theologically informed conservatism, into the realm of sectarian arcana, of little concern to most conservatives, and of even less relevance to the real problems threatening the Republic; and second, that this growing religious emphasis is intentional and not coincidental, and is intended to serve a strategic purpose: to wit, to bind the remnants of the authentic American Right, which comprises several distinct ideological traditions, more closely to the moral traditionalist (Christian) wing – and thereby preempt an equally valid, and, I hold, far more contemporarily useful, coalescence around the issue of defending America’s historic (and almost all conservatives’ common) European racial heritage.

    America has no national church, and political conservatives can be found in many denominations – and among secularists. The Founding Fathers were well acquainted with European history, and clearly wished for their new republic to avoid both religious strife and clerical authoritarianism. Perhaps they were wrong, in some ‘Platonic ideal’ sense, and should have founded a Christian state instead, but they did not. I am neither a Jacobin, nor any other radical ‘innovator’, for accepting the Founders’ handiwork as is. I am not anti-Christian; I do not deny the important Christian elements in the deep roots of the historic American order; and I mostly support the use of state power to enforce some degree of moral virtue amongst the citizenry, at least at the local level. But I also do not think that every political issue needs to be evaluated, nor every policy justified, theologically, and I certainly object to the notion that those issues of narrow Christian (conservative) concern should be treated as paramount for the American Right. Indeed, I assert that the issues that most exercise Christians today (abortion, gays, condoms, stem-cells) are of no importance to, but are major distractions from, the real ‘macro’ or ‘meta’-issues for the American Right, namely, the survival of the traditional American nation, and the restoration of the historic constitutional republic.

    The Right, of which CHRONICLES is an important part, obviously needs to focus its limited political and intellectual capital where it can most further its overall agenda. Where might that be?

30. 30 Comment by Leon Haller on 15 June 2007:

    To continue from above.

    TJF’s comment is odd. Its implication is that it’s acceptable to disagree with a particular article’s content or viewpoint, but that there is something improper about criticizing a magazine’s overall direction. Hmmm. Does that reasoning apply in other situations? I dislike the direction of the GOP in the Bush years – well, why don’t I go off and start my own party? I dislike the hip-hop music played at my urban gym – well, I can join another club if I don’t like it, eh? Of greater relevance: you don’t like the folk music and trendy leftism in the Episcopal Church, so hey, go start your own church!

    This is silly. TJF himself, in various solicitations, has opined that CHRONICLES is as much a “movement” as a magazine. If that’s so, then surely the correct response to a member’s complaint about some aspect of the movement is to dispute or disprove the substance of the complaint, not to reply petulantly, “MY football, MY rules!! nah nah”.

    The brute truth is as I’ve stated above, and is implicitly, if inadvertently, confirmed by TJF’s boorish characterization of me as an “obsessive racist” (that “perfectly useless word”, as Sam Francis has called it). Everything that American conservatives cherish is under assault, and we have two possible political / ideological grounds upon which to make our defensive stand. We can mobilize on the basis of our Christian heritage, or on what Stephen Douglass called “the white basis”. TJF and most, though certainly not all, of his fellow editors favor the former, and are obviously terrified, as are all those further Left, of the potential of the latter. Sam Francis, the National Question conservatives, and here, little ol’ me, have favored the latter. Which is the better ground is a debate the Right needs to have, and CHRONICLES is an ideal forum for it. But TJF is really not as open-minded as he fancies himself to be, so I’m not holding my breath.

31. 31 Comment by Christopher Check on 15 June 2007:

    Dear Mr. Haller–

    You wrote:

    “We can mobilize on the basis of our Christian heritage, or on what Stephen Douglass called ‘the white basis’. ”

    I believe this is a false choice, but if it is not, then the Christian does not have any choice but to chose the former. The reason, however, that your choice seems false to me is that the things you celebrate in the “white basis” are really European, which is to say Christian. You do not, I suspect, want to return to the animism of Druids or the rapaciousness of the Vikings, do you? These folks were white, but they were savages. There are many natural virtues to admire in Europeans, but unsanctified by the Gospel, they are, in the end, of limited use–certainly of limited use so far as the economy of salvation is concerned. It is for this reason that the themes which you label “sectarian arcana” are central to the current difficulties. Insofar as the Founders departed from the fullness of Christian Europe, they hobbled the new nation they admirably sought to found. A “white basis” absent the Gospel will degenerate into the national socialism, to use a tired example, of the Nazis, or it will provoke a multicultural reaction. The only real universalism is that of the Universal Chrurch, which in no way has ever taught against the celebration of ethnic identity as manifested in the stories, songs, art, traditions, of an particular people.

    It will interest you to know, since you are finding popish plots at Rockford, that this particular issue of Chronicles was put together by Aaron Wolf, who is not an RC, but a Missouri Synod Lutheran. Aaron asked me to write the article that has been (all to my surprise) a point of departure for some candid and important debate on this thread about what America is. I am humbled by the remarks of Mr. Cundiff and Dr. Berg and I second Dan Hayes’ advice that anyone interested in a serious exploration of Americanism pick up John Rao’s very important pamphlet on the topic.

32. 32 Comment by Johan Dieckmann on 15 June 2007:

    (Re. comments 30 & 31)

    The discussion therein appears somewhat misplaced and narrow, as if it all is about white racism and Christianity, and not about cultural values and enlightenment.

    “… European, which is to say Christian. …”

    Only by IV century has it become fashionable in Europe to adhere to (various flavors of) the Christian monotheistic import from Middle East, thus enabling Europe’s entrance into the glorious Dark Ages, the glorious rest of Middle Ages, Salem, Holly Inquisition… Hmmm… Else, there would have been no need for Renaissance, no need for Enlightenment, no need for freeing thought from religion…

    “… There are many natural virtues to admire in Europeans, but unsanctified by the Gospel, they are, in the end, of limited use …”

    Thus, for example, the minds behind the gigantic achievements of Greek science and philosophy are “of limited use” ($?), simply because they were “unsanctified” by “the Gospel” (which one?)… If you were around in year 1300, at the threshold of the Late Middle Ages, perhaps you could “place” them all into hell, as “virtuous pagans” of Dante Alighieri’s Inferno, but not in 2007, not even in the cultural Galapagos U.S.A.

    I suppose one need not list here all the giants of the European last half millennium that were “unsanctified by the Gospel”, from Galileo on.

33. 33 Comment by Christopher Check on 16 June 2007:

    Dear Mr. Dieckmann–

    Your post reminds me why I enter web conversations with great reluctance (web, indeed). It is beyond the capacity of this medium to serve as the forum of a conversation among people who, on the one side, regard the Incarnation as the central event of human history, and on the other side, describe the religion that the Incarnation caused as a “monotheistic import from the middle east”–if such a conversation can take place at all. Nothing in my remarks denied the vast contributions of Aristotle and Homer, and the Institute takes pains to promote contributions of the classical world and the continuity of the western canon throughout the history of the West. Saint Thomas picked up Aristotle when he set about writing his system of theology. Where I am eager to claim the contributions of the pagan classical world, you seem eager to dismiss as “the dark ages” the peak period of western civilization . Why? Because they were informed by the teachings of “the Way, the Truth, and the Life”? (N.B. not a way, a truth, a life). The Renaissance was the start of the troubles that you and I agree afflict our nation, precisely because it chose man over He who redeemed man.

34. 34 Comment by robert reavis on 17 June 2007:

    Great article Captain. Anytime the hive stirs these days over written work is a good sign for the author. Most of the real traditionalist and conservatives in America are dead or dieing and of course the kids that have taken over don’t like the way the old people smell and look. You are different Chris and I commend you for it.
    When Pat, Chronicles and a few of the other exiles pass, a crowd will gather for the reading of the will—bleach blond hussies with deep voices from the talking head circuit, the little britches crowd in New York and Washington who have studied everything, everywhere and understand next to nothing, and the libertarians who think the neat thing about Job is that he was really just like them —sorta.
    They won’t be there to honor anyone but to discuss the market share that death or destitution has created. Men like you and Bacevich won’t be smiling and neither will those other faces we have known and loved. Looking forward to the Summer School and the good conversations while they last. Robert Reavis

35. 35 Comment by Johan Dieckmann on 17 June 2007:

    (Re. comment #33)

    “… It is beyond the capacity of this medium to serve as the forum of a conversation among people who, on the one side, regard the Incarnation as the central event of human history, and on the other side, describe the religion that the Incarnation caused as a “monotheistic import from the middle east” – if such a conversation can take place at all. …”

    True.

    “… Nothing in my remarks denied the vast contributions of Aristotle and Homer …”

    yet,

    ” … There are many natural virtues to admire in Europeans, but unsanctified by the Gospel, they are, in the end, of limited use …”

    Id est, Europeans Aristotle and Homer have to their credit vast contributions, but they themselves are “of limited use”.

    “… Saint Thomas picked up Aristotle when he set about writing his system of theology. …”

    It was already XIII century, High Middle Ages, when Thomas Aquinas undertook the task of improving Christian apologetics. He had been shamed by learned Islamic interlocutors, who, in stark contrast, could put forth coherent philosophical arguments in defense of their own Middle Eastern creation.

    He must have found his scripture somewhat, shall we say, lacking, as he chanced turning to Greek giants of another era, if only they would provide bricks to insert under the shaky heavenly house, or at least add a moat to the venerable rack, boiling oil and stake in its defense.

    Fortunately, there was an unintended benefit of this – a gradual reawakening of interest in Greek thought and culture in general, and science, mathematics and logic in particular, something that had been completely stymied by Christian madness in Dark Ages (a common term, synonymous with Early Middle Ages, from V to X century) and beyond.

36. 36 Comment by robert reavis on 17 June 2007:

    Mr. Diekman,
    I hate to impose on the good exchange between you and Mr. Check. Both of you are fully capable of defending your respective positions but I did want to suggest one correction because it is a commonplace among the masses today. You write :”something that had been completely stymied by Christian madness in Dark Ages (a common term, synonymous with Early Middle Ages, from V to X century) and beyond.”
    The truth is just the opposite of this common English historical falsehood. It was the Church that saved everything worth saving from the old exhausted and degenerate culture of the Empire during the Dark ages. St Benedict on his way to college in Rome saw the whole rotten collapse coming ahead of him, as if in another of those mysterious Saintly visions we all cry humbug about today, and staged one of the most magnificent, tactical retreats in our civilizations history. His monastery like the thousand others that would rise in its shadow, was the very beginning of the cultural flowering of the Gospels sanctification for the old empire. This is the simple truth of the dark ages not that the Church created them , the Church was the only light shining amidst the darkness. How could any serious chronicle of culture ignore this obvious and obscure fact, especially with a new dark age of western culture so fast upon us.
    To ask where would we be today but for that papal babel and whore to the dark ages is to simply look around you. It is a vanishing whore and the crowds gathering at the door are becoming more,not less unruly and vicious. But there are still houses of prayer and they will do what they have done before, redeem the times in the Name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Amen rr

37. 37 Comment by Christopher Check on 17 June 2007:

    http://www.americanthinker.com/2005/08/the_notsogolden_age_of_islamic.html

    Dear Mr. Diekman–

    The above article is a useful and short treatment of the overstated contributions of Islam to the preservation of classical learning.

    Best,

    Chris

38. 38 Comment by Michael Ezzo on 17 June 2007:

    THOSE TERRIBLE MIDDLE AGES, by Regine Pernoud, might be a good
    book to recommend here, if I may.

    The lie that Christianity caused the collapse of civilization is just one more to add to the three other BIG LIES — private property is bad; the sexes are interchangeable; marriage is a social construct — that liberals believe.

    Mr. Check — a splendid article, sir. Looking forward to more.

39. 39 Comment by Christopher Check on 18 June 2007:

    The Pernoud book is excellent and by no means a polemic. Regine Pernoud is France’s top Joan of Arc scholar. Her research is very careful.

40. 40 Comment by Karl Seidl on 25 June 2007:

    The hunting and fishing in the United States is the best in the world. That’s the best thing about the place. Wide open places, rivers, lakes, even oceans. It’s great.

    As for the civilization founded here, well, it’s almost entirely based upon various heresies. Thomas Jefferson railed almost endlessly against the Faith and its doctrines, often calling them the creations of “priestcraft”. The rejection of the Church in Rome is an intregal but often overlooked part of American history.

    These heresies have led to the disaster of slavery, the advancement of Freemasonry, wars of conquest against Mexico and Spain to advance the new Masonic religion and its secret agenda, needless participation in the first world war which helped lead us into a second, and many other crisis.

    But, who’s perfect? I’ll take the hunting and fishing.

41. 41 Comment by John Chance on 27 June 2007:

    Karl, while your points are well taken and true to a point, I would rather not have child holcaust, homos,Warmongering (a outgrowth of NWO/Masonic), rampant immorality and the smugness which is characteristic of the USA-something even the Founders could not envision or stomach.

    IF only I had the $$ and my wife was willing to move, I would consider fleeing somewhere else. But…..

    As for books, there is one written by a new author about Charles Carroll that is worth a good read and is fair/balanced (unlike Faux News).

42. 42 Comment by Rocky J. Suhayda on 31 August 2007:

    Mr. Muza,

    Racial Greetings White Brother!

    The American Nazi Party is a Political-Educational Association, dedicated to the 14 WORDS. We are committed to bringing American National Socialism, first created and embodied by our late Commander George Lincoln Rockwell, out of the past Phase One activities which at the time served their purpose well, and into the 21st Century.

    Although National Socialism encompasses many various issues of concern to Aryan Americans, including a healthy environment, children’s welfare, and freedom of belief without fear of System persecution…the two main tenants of National Socialism embodies the Struggle for Aryan Racial survival, and Social Justice for White Working Class people throughout our land.

    As Aryan Revolutionaries, we recognize the fact that behaving in the manner of past activities, little progress has been achieved for our Cause. That is why we have taken a new direction. In the American Nazi Party, you will find no uniforms or ranks, we do not engage in publicly exposing our Comrades to undo publicity through pointless and dangerous Rallies or Marches. We instead stress Small Cell, and Individual Activism as the path for which to build our Movement, as securely and in a responsible manner as possible.

    We are looking for Men and Women, who are willing to sacrifice for the Good of the Folk, not people who are looking for aggrandizement, titillation, or simply causing undirected and useless mayhem. This is not a game or a gang.

    It is a very serious Struggle that we are involved in for the very existence of our White Nation of people. Those who are simply intent on pranks or causing trouble should perhaps look elsewhere for stimulation.

    If you are interested in learning more about the American Nazi Party, we suggest writing to our National Headquarters and requesting an Info Pack.

    Please enclose a $5 donation to cover costs. This information will be relayed to you as quickly as possible.

    Each of us must decide just how far we will let the situation in America deteriorate, before we decide to take action to correct it. If you have had enough, and are willing to join the ranks of your ancestors who forged this land from a wilderness teeming with savages, and to keep it from returning to that state, we urge you to become involved. For your children’s sake, if not for your own. For White WORKER Power!

    Rocky

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