Category Archives: Nature

2022-05-15 · 5:17 am

Flowers for the Immaculate Conception (Super Flower Blood Moon NASA donkey edition)

That short animated video from NASA demonstrates what’s happening tonight up in North America, Eastern Standard Time.

  • Super = closer than farther, making the moon appear to be quite a bit larger to us here on earth.
  • Flower = when, in the Northern Hemisphere, flowers are in bloom (a bit hemispherist!).
  • Blood = the color thereof, because we’re so dramatic when it comes to astronomy. It’s just atmospherics, I know, but it’s still rather dramatic that the shadow this earth casts is blood red.

This isn’t the solar eclipse – sun to moon to earth – that took place on Calvary as our Lord died on the Cross. This is a lunar eclipse – sun to earth to moon. A dear reader asked me for an analogy using this event. Let’s see, our Lady, clothed with the sun, stands on the crescent moon…

Can we stand with our Lady in the light of the Son?

In thinking about this I do have a story about how I was compared to a jackass by a certain rather influential priest while in Italy. He was standing in the shade of a carport whilst I was standing in the sun.

  • O, Giorgio, che fa un asino nel sole? (Oh, George, what does a donkey to in the sun?)
  • Padre, un asino fa un po di ombra nel sole. (Father, a donkey makes a little bit of shade in the sun.)
  • Hai raggione, Giorgio, asino che sei. (You are correct, George, donkey that you are.)

This made for a round of laughter amongst other ecclesiastics, who were happy both to witness my progress in Italian after having just recently arrived, and to see my willingness to have myself condemned as a being a mere donkey.

It was not yet known that I love donkey history, such as donkeys always being in the midst of the Holy Family from Nazareth to Bethlehem to Egypt and back, and then with Jesus going into Jerusalem to be crucified, every donkey also having his hour.

When we choose to be donkeys, standing in the Light of the Son, we clearly see the blood shadow we have cast upon the universe, not suppressing the truth of who we are before God. It is then that we are brought into the midst of the Holy Family. We have all of us crucified, shed the blood of the Son of the Living God with original sin, our own sin. His dear Mother stands next to Him, she being clothed in the grace of God, “the rays of the sun”, of the Son. We can choose to remain in the shadows (look at how shadowy is that moon under her feet), or we can, by grace, come into the light, becoming the children of God, donkeys that we are.

Methinks it’s good to be a donkey in the sun, in the Son.

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2022-05-12 · 8:44 am

Black-Face White Supremacy Squirrels

These pictures were taken just the other day. There are a good half-dozen to be seen all at once at this location. Here’s two together:

These are Oriental Tree Squirrels from Thailand, the majority squirrel in and around Brevard, NC. Legend has it that they came to this area by way of escape from a carnival truck waaay back in the day. They’ve spread out in perhaps a fifty mile radius.

And no, they were not bred to be this way on behalf of white supremacist democrats who dress up in blackface and who chum around with members of the KKK and put abortuaries in black neighborhoods so as to commit genocide-by-attrition of the black population. These squirrels are just a breed of squirrel.

But the wokistas will want their 2nd amendment rights to gun down innocent white squirrels so that they can congratulate themselves for “having done something.”

Do I mock the wokistas? Yes. Because more than anyone, they are racist and pretend to be triggered so as to have an excuse to smack down, say, Supreme Court Justices as “racist” for the attempt of those justices to save the lives of black babies in the womb. There is no one more racist than a wokista.

So, how is it that I wrote a post like this? Because real racism like that of the wokistas does bother me. Why’s that? Because God is OUR creator and Jesus came into this world to redeem the lot of us. Not all are saved, but that’s their choice. Bottom line: all lives matter. The wokistas have it that no lives matter. I disagree. And that’s not just a religious “opinion.” Respect for life is natural law written on our hearts by the Most High.

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2022-04-25 · 10:23 am

Eagle sighting, every day, but called “The Last”

Not my picture. I couldn’t get a picture of the one I saw, as I was driving at the time and he had been right over the top of the car. Massive white head, gargantuan wingspan, white tail. Yep.

The Bald Eagle, symbol of strength in freedom with God-given rights in the rule of law enshrined in the Constitution is refreshing to see amidst all the betrayal of these USA and of our military. There are so many, so high up, who are treasonous, who are intent on destroying this country, and for what? A couple of bucks from big money with which they can eat ice cream cones and drink from sippy cups while proving senility and dementia as marxist college kids do up subversion for him?

That’s a perpetual rant going on in my heart. But that betrayal of the “powers that be”, that violence against everyone from conception to death, dragging the world into persecution of the Church, fades into insignificance compared to the scandal and destruction of eternal souls by the pastors of the Church.

But that apostle and evangelist who has an eagle as a symbol always has encouragement for us daily at what is called the Last Gospel, exactly parallel with the Proto-Evangelium, the First Gospel of Genesis 3:15 and exactly parallel with the the Apocalypse, and is the Prologue of his Gospel:

  • In principio erat Verbum et Verbum erat apud Deum et Deus erat Verbum. Hoc erat in principio apud Deum. Omnia per Ipsum facta sunt, et sine Ipso factum est nihil quod factum est. In Ipso vita erat, et vita erat Lux hominum. Et Lux in tenebris lucet et tenebrae eam non comprehenderunt. Fuit homo missus a Deo cui nomen erat Iohannes. Hic venit in testimonium ut testimonium perhiberet de lumine ut omnes crederent per Illum. Non erat ille lux, sed ut testimonium perhiberet de lumine. Erat lux vera quae illuminat omnem hominem venientem in mundum. In mundo erat, et mundus per ipsum factus est, et mundus eum non cognovit. In propria venit et sui eum non receperunt. Quotquot autem receperunt eum dedit eis potestatem filios Dei, fieri his qui credunt in nomine Eius. Qui non ex sanguinibus, neque ex voluntate carnis, neque ex voluntate viri, sed ex Deo nati sunt. ET VERBUM CARO FACTUM EST, ET HABITABIT IN NOBIS et vidimus gloriam eius, gloriam quasi unigeniti a Patre, plenum gratiae et veritatis.
  • In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him: and without him was made nothing that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. This man came for a witness, to give testimony of the light, that all men might believe through him. He was not the light, but was to give testimony of the light. That was the true light, which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as many as received him, he gave them power to be made the sons of God, to them that believe in his name. Who are born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw his glory, the glory as it were of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

When I see a Bald Eagle, that’s what flashes through heart and soul and mind.

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2022-04-08 · 5:55 pm

Rectory Rattler? Croatulus Horridus? Yet again?

This doesn’t seem to be a Copperhead. And there are plenty of non-poisonous Eastern Racers or Black Rat Snakes or even “Garden Snakes” with similar patterns for the very young, cleverly making them look more dangerous than they are. And I know that there are a gazillion different patterns for the tiny babies even amongst the poisonous rattlers.

But there are four tell-tale identifiers:

  • One is the super-fat body typical of a poisonous snake, whereas the non-poisonous are super-slender from head to tail, so that you can’t tell the tail from the body which is also about the same circumference as the head. But the specimen above has a super-fat body.
  • Then there’s the ultra-super-slender tail compared to that fat body, and that’s true of our specimen above.
  • Then there’s the rattle, of course, except for the super-young, like this guy. He has the tell-tale “button tail”, though that last button bit is a bit elongated. He just in middle of his first shedding.
  • Then there’s the exaggerated triangular head. Behold:

I think that about settles it. But I’m no herpetologist, though I do have lengthy commentary wrought with historical philology for chapters two and three of Genesis. But that doesn’t count here. If anyone can tell me what this is, I’m open to a correction.

Backing up my hypothesis – just a hypothesis mind you – is the fact that this part of Appalachia seems to be an epicenter for Rattlers. Horribly, people run them over on the road – it seems on purpose – and many then stop and rip out the fangs to use for necklaces. Yep. And then we’re all overrun by varmints.

He was very photogenic, in a rather cold-blooded manner, it being that he’s cold-blooded, and it’s very cold today. After pictures I chased him off to safer territory.

I mentioned this to someone who was horrified (per the name Horridus), afraid for me and Shadow-dog when it grows to some four to five feet long.

But they have rattles to warn you, right? They know how to avoid humans and dogs. They’re after mice and rats and mice and squirrels and… the neighbors’ chickens… and baby kittens and little puppies…

I know, I know.

I assume that they are living on the creek bank next to the rectory, under branches and such. All good.

And, just in case, I know right where my Sawyer’s Extractor is. Just a minute away. Lying down. Calling the neighbors to bring me to EMS or Urgent Care or the Emergency Room. Trying to be still, but using the Extractor a gazillion times.

Today, in the TLM calendar, it’s the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows. Time for another flower for the Immaculate Conception. Give me a minute to put up some pictures for that post after this one. You’ll need to tell the story for that one, though.

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2021-10-21 · 8:45 am

Mysterious garden beast: but don’t you be the beast. Ratzinger on Tradition, Conscience, Truth.

I’m guessing that this guy is a good 4 centimeters, just over 1.5 inches long. He didn’t let me get too close, but I swear I saw the bits pictured at the center bottom of the chart below, the pigeon tremex character. The markings, however, are not similar. But I’m in Western North Carolina, in the Smoky Mountains, not in Washington State. The center white dot is a reflection of the sun on the hard shell.

I’m always, always fascinated by the good creation of our Good Creator. And that doesn’t make me an ecoterrorist, or a green-party wild man, but rather one who sees the Creator also through His Creation.

Saint Paul in his epistle to the Romans, the famous chapter one, and then chapter two, speaks of this for us. Read it!

Firefly (Redemption, #2) by Molly McAdams

;-)

Meanwhile, here in Western North Carolina, in the back ridges of Appalachia, it’s a paradise: praise God!

  • Some don’t seem to see it at all, trashing up everything everywhere, shooting up heroin, taking meth and Fentanyl, beating on each other – even decapitations – loving the power of cynicism.
  • But many do see, as it were, God through His Creation, bringing to the fore the living memory of the first creation only through the living memory of the second creation: “Do this in memory of me…”
  • Once we have the second, we can get to the first, but then realize that it’s all even better:

O felix culpa quae talem et tantum meruit habere redemptorem.

O happy fault which merited such a great Redeemer.

Want a good read of just a few pages? Try Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger’s address to the USCCB in 1991:

Retrieving the Tradition: CONSCIENCE AND TRUTH

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DON’T BE AFRAID! Download it to read later! It’ll do good for your soul. That’s necessary these days.

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2021-07-15 · 7:32 pm

All things work together for the one who loves God, even…

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There are those who say that they will have a question for God if they make it to heaven, such as what’s the deal with wood-ticks and mosquitoes and wasps and hornets and yellow jackets. Myopic. And not recognizing the perfect ecosystems which we go about destroying. Mostly, it’s just not having a bit of humility, not wanting to open one’s eyes and be directed to the Creator by His Creation.

Meanwhile, this bit of stinging horror pictured above is just under the eves of the carport, just where I open the car door, so that when I stand up, all in black, these beasties think they are under attack, just inches away. I often feel them smashing into the “baseball” cap I wear. It’s their favorite spot no matter what I do, year after year. I’m allergic to such critters, a hereditary condition. Sorry, but I got out the ol’ wasp spray.

People say that Saint Francis wouldn’t like harming such innocent creatures, but that’s only because of the myths that have grown up around Saint Francis. No wimp, flowers in the hair hippie he, no, no, no. Go ahead, read the rule for his fledgling community that he wrote. Remember, he was deacon, and had courses in the law of the Church such as it was at the time. He is precise. He wants his friars in heaven. He wants them to be crucified to themselves and the world so as to live for Christ Jesus.

  • “But Father George, you’re talking about being crucified to yourself and to the world and you’re afraid of a little sting? Bwahahahahahahaha!”

I know. I know. But it’s just that a little sting could do me in right quick.

  • “But Father George, you used to have bee hives!”

Well, I never said I was always prudent in having no fear of anything. And these beasties are different than bees.

Our Lord says that we will have no questions when we enter, please God, into heaven. But I insist that I will have a question, but it will be merely rhetorical. When something bad happens to us here on earth, we tend to ask, perhaps with some bitterness: “Why is it always me?”

When we enter, please God, into heaven, it seems to me that we will be so thankful and so awestruck at the love and goodness and kindness of the Lord, that we will ask the same thing: “Why me, Lord? I am a useless servant who only did what he had to do.”

And you know what that is? Going to Confession. Oooo! That stung, didn’t it? ;-) But don’t be afraid of a little sting. The happiness of the grace of absolution, just so wonderful.

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2021-07-03 · 8:09 am

Rattler’s rattle rattles plot twisting. [Update: Father Gordon’s humor.]

Whenever I put up a picture of a snake and say it’s a Timber Rattler (common here in Western North Carolina, especially on the road where I was) there are those who say that that’s impossible, a conspiracy theory, an exaggeration, just more unnecessary drama, all in a laudatory effort, methinks – PLOT TWIST – to normalize the presence of rattlers (which, to be sure, I love to see around as well). I don’t want to step on them. But I also don’t want to run over them. I love to see nature in full force.

The fake nay-sayers will say that surely I didn’t see the tell-tale pattern, or if I did, it was merely being sported by an immature Eastern Racer (Black Snake) or some such.

Then they’ll that surely I wasn’t close enough to see if it had a triangular head, you know, like this:

But then, still pretending to doubt my insistence, will say that is surely didn’t have an actual rattle, and add that some snakes can shake their tails with no rattles and make them kind of sound like rattles (true!). But, then there is this:

Now what? Baiting someone to think that this is not a Timber Rattler and so is therefore great for using in a humorous selfie like this?

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[In the picture immediately above, that IS a Black Snake. But Father George is wearing a black shirt…] But what happens then – and this is the purposed intention of those deceitfully shrieking about conspiracy theories and exaggerations – what happens then is that I’ll pick up what is really a Timber Rattler and I’ll get bit by that serpent and die. [In speaking with Father Gordon this morning, he quipped that “it is unclear who was about to bite whom.” Hahaha. :-) I walked or rather slithered right into this. :-) ]

ANALOGY TIME!

  • “Father George! Father George! You’re exaggerating! You’re a conspiracy theorist! You’re melodramatic! Stop saying that Covid-19 vaccines are taken from living organs of human beings (aborted alive for this reason), because, you know, that means that you, Father George, are taking away our good feelings for getting Covid-19 vaccines! You meanie! You old meanie! Those were miscarriages taken out of dumpsters and, you know, stuff like that! Father George, you’re like that old Serpent, the ancient dragon and Satan, lying about doctrine and morality like you do. Father George, there is no sin, there is no Savior, there is no heaven, no hell, and therefore no Satan, no ancient serpent!”

And these people bait even the elect to fall into sin, getting bit by the demonic rebellion against the Living Truth that the Divine Son of the Immaculate Conception is.

But then, plot twist:

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2021-05-24 · 7:25 am

Evolution over 420,000,000 million years [updated in one day for evolution’s sake]

Zero change.

There’s never been even one instance of macroevolution proven.

There’s plenty of microevolution. I had freckles as a kid. But despite what Planned Parenthood says, I wasn’t a salamander in the womb.

And more than that, Redemption and, please God, Salvation, makes it possible for us to carry within us by created grace, sanctifying grace, the Most Holy Trinity. That ain’t happenin’ with other creatures even though created by… wait for it… our Creator. We are to be Tabernacles of the Holy Spirit with that fiery Love. God is Truth. God is Love.

UPDATE:

  • We are, in fact, creatures with free will and all mankind is fallen. I mean, let’s take a look at how reasonable, how scientific we are:

That looks well organized, thoughtful, surely a factory putting means of production into action out of love of God and neighbor… Shock! Nur Arbeit macht Frei. What’s that mean? Freedom? …

This was all so very scientific! scientific! scientific! just moving evolution along with eugenics! And human mothers only have salamanders in the womb! Margaret Sanger a sycophant of Hitler, literally. Perhaps it is possible that with any scientific theory, there may be some self-serving politics afoot, so that science in that case is not science, but an abuse of science by butt-hurt emotions, you know, the entitlement to be smahht, you know, not dumb.

  • Obviously, I’m baiting people to go on a treasure hunt for Peking Man! There’s even a treasure map: 39°55′4″N 119°34′0″E. I mean, who was that Marxist poet Jesuit guy who fancied himself as an impressive scientist, paleontologist (ooo! a multisyllabic word!), theologian and, of course, philosopher? Oh yes! Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. Now there’s a trustworthy guy! Sigh.
  • I’ve not said one thing about what side of evolution I tend to think answers more questions more consistently in the most simple manner against critics coming from all sides, that is, with the least possibility that we are reading premises into where they must not be or extracting premises from where they must be.
  • What I did say is that pro-death idiocy is butt-hurt emotional greed, making us, as Chesterton has it in, if I remember correctly, The Everlasting Man, less reasonable than the animals, products of our fallen human nature.

One gentleman of Princeton fame chimed in with an article about Ratz from a guy in Vienna (with whom I first had a sit-down way back in the 1990s in Rome), an article which sports this citation:

I couldn’t agree more with those very well chosen words. They are, in fact, exactly what I was expressing in my original post up top. Logically, they mean almost nothing. It’s just baiting for more thought about it all.

In thinking about this, let’s try to limit discussion as to whether faith can purify reason. ;-)

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2021-02-19 · 10:51 am

Moonshiner Crane sighting! Priesthood in the time of Covid-19, like it doesn’t exist

Whilst straightening out the curves and flattening the backside blue ridges of the Appalachian Communion Call routes, Sassy the Subaru had to have her new brakes tested so as not to run over an all too calm Sandhill Moonshiner Crane. He just stood in the middle of the road, eyeing Sassy screech up to this sudden standoff, just barely nervous enough to bat open and shut his six and a half foot wingspan a couple of times, and then ever so slowly tip-toe into some bramble cover in the neighboring field. In this picture you can’t see the head and bill and not much of the neck as he saunters to the left into natural camouflage.

Much more common than cranes on the road are turkey vultures and hawks and ravens and crows all eating the remains of road-kill. Reptiles include snapping turtles and a variety of snakes. Mammalian sightings, often in the form of road pizza, include squirrels and possums. Since there is little traffic, brakes are applied for dogs and cats, as well as, of course, for bears and deer. I’m happy to get a picture of picture of elk. I’ve not been quick enough for actual panthers (not melanistic lions), mountain lions (much heavier, stockier), a variety of lynx. Coyotes (the animal kind) and red wolves are to be seen, once a gray wolf (now also being introduced).

It’s all great therapy for the madness of today’s dark and violent world, the lies, the cover-ups, the manipulations, the power-grabbing, the….

Not everyone in this lock-down world has such opportunities to race round about creation doing Communion Calls with our Eucharistic Jesus, Creator of His beautiful creation. I share these posts for some respite with what few pictures I can get in hopes of assisting the imagination of the home-bound to take flight on the roads with Jesus and I. And it is like flight on these hilly, curvy roads…

Did I say straightening out the curves and flattening the hills? Eeeee Haaaawwww…

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2021-02-09 · 8:54 am

Snow dogs?

A parishioner is up north at the moment. His view for a couple of minutes…

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2020-08-20 · 6:50 am

Cicada! Cikada! CISA beware! Eschatological hopes of heaven to dare!

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It’s enough to spook even the most seasoned of agents of the new CISA (Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency), part of the Department of Homeland Security and headquarted in my favorite small town of Rosslyn, VA. ;-) A good friend is one of the few and the brave who work for CISA. The reason for any nervous spookiness is that these insects sound like transformers in the nanoseconds prior to blowing up, the last thing CISA would want regarding essential online military and intelligence stability:

To do anything about them you have to wear hearing protection. The cicada pictured up top and twice more below did his transformation thing on one of the old fence posts along my driveway.

The transformation thing means that he may well now be fully 17 years old. If he’s in sync with his fellow cicadas, there may be others – by the millions – hatching out right about now. The sound they make is literally deafening. Let the concert begin! That’s what I say. This is one of the coolest wonders of nature, of our good God’s creation. What a great imagination God has! Um… Can one even say that?

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Look, I’m sure we will all look much worse than that if we were buried six feet under for 17 years! That he comes out in bright green (green is for hope) ready to play an orchestral performance is – sorry if the analogy limps – is like the resurrection from the dead…

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Well. Fine. Some may find that the analogy isn’t just limping, but is rather crippled.

I bet such unimaginationed people find everything about cicadas to be annoying.

As for me, I find cicada concerts to be soothing. And I like how they look fierce with the big green hammer-head shark eyes.

I wonder what I will look like at the resurrection unto life before the general judgment wrought by Jesus, Son of God and Son of Man, who will absolutely come to judge the living and the dead and the world by fire. Oh! I remember:

  • “Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we shall be has not yet been revealed. We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.” (1 John 3:2)

By the way, I don’t at all mean to be presumptuous in hoping to make it through the general judgement so as to be on my to heaven so as to be part of the Holy Family. Hope is an infused virtue that comes with sanctifying grace (which I hope to enjoy!). We have to have hope. Confession helps with that, right? It makes for a transformation, right?

If we didn’t have hope, we would only look forward to looking like the empty shell of a bug a couple of pictures above, but not just for 17 years, for all eternity.

As I always say really very frequently: “I wanna go to heaven!”

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2020-08-05 · 6:30 am

Bald Eagle sighting above the Rectory

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Standing next to the American Flag in the driveway, this is best picture I could get of a magnificent Bald Eagle. Sorry it’s not clearer. But my heart thrilled to see this representation of my own patriotic spirit.

On Eagles Wings?

  • “You have seen for yourselves how […] I bore you up on eagle wings and brought you here to myself. (Exodus 19:4)
  • “They that hope in the LORD will renew their strength, they will soar as with eagles’ wings; They will run and not grow weary, walk and not grow faint.” (Isaiah 40:31)

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2020-08-05 · 5:58 am

Beasts of WNC. I love my parish.

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Mama bear and baby bears headed in the direction of the hermitage, about three quarters of a mile as the bear walks, right up and down a back ridge or two.

Then there’s this guy out on the front walk of Holy Redeemer church here in Andrews. Just a baby, and despite the infancy camouflage, I think this is merely an Eastern Racer:

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Then, on a Communion Call to home-bound in the time of Covid-1984, fully 16 dear. It would have been 17, but one died after getting its leg blown off last hunting season. People who have guns but who don’t know how to shoot are so very annoying. I won’t tell you where these are, except that they are within the five state area near Andrews!

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2020-07-25 · 3:56 pm

American Dagger Moth at the rectory? Gun and dagger for a minister?

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Andrews, western NC, July 25, 2020. I doubt this is an American Dagger Moth, as the caterpillar – at least at this tiny stage – has no yellow fuzz at all, just smooth yellow, though with a multitude of dagger-life black spikes. It’s also sitting on a cucumber leaf, not up in various trees of its normal habitat. Maybe this is normal for the beginning stages.

Having said that, the biodiversity in WNC is immense, and the variations of the “norm” seen elsewhere are quite marked both in flora and fauna. Lots of “That’s unique!” going on here. I’m not sure if this one has both pros and cons. Some caterpillars are benign. Some inflict horrific health conditions. Some are to be especially tolerated for what they do later as moths and butterflies.

I’m no Lepidopterologist (I had to look that up…). I’m just putting this up for interest. It’s so easy to love the natural world that our dear Lord created:

  • “For what can be known about God is evident […], because God made it evident […]. Ever since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes of eternal power and divinity have been able to be understood and perceived in what He has made.” (Romans 1:19-20)

The Lord makes it ever so easy to walk with Him when out in the creation He created.

Meanwhile, me being me, I thought of my EDC when I saw the name “American Dagger”:

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This contraption is carried on the belt on the left side, just across from the appendix-carried Glock 19. The easy snap-in holster for the knife is attached to the paddle holster for the magazines, carried semi-horizontally for the quickest possible switch imnsho. The straight blade is 2.5″, just slightly longer than the American Dagger Caterpillar when it is full grown. The knife is upside down, if you will, as my left hand – weak hand – can grab it in what is already, then, an upside-up position for the hand straight out of the holster. Perfect.

The American Dagger Moth is quite benign, just like the caterpillar. The same goes for the Glock 19 and the knife. The knife is used all day long, in gardening, in opening letters and boxes. It’s a tool just like Glock is a tool. The caterpillar has spikes, tools that are useful in defense against unjust aggression.

Speaking of that, some say with a smile: “A minister with a gun?” finding this to be curiously humorous. When I mention that I’m also the police chaplain and that 2nd amendment capacities are prudent and moral, describing some of the situations one can and does get into accompanying officers, their exclamation turns into: “A minister with a gun!”, that is, no longer with a question mark, but with quiet admiration, nodding their heads in agreement.

Mind you, I’m not a law enforcement or any kind of officer. I don’t do that. But if someone’s actively pumping bullets into an officer, it’s entirely within the purview of the 2nd amendment for a citizen, a civilian, to exercise 2nd amendment capacities to protect a victim suffering from mortal unjust aggression wherein the imminent provision of death is actively in progress. One uses the least amount of force to repel that unjust aggression, whatever that least amount happens to be. It’s the last thing you would ever want to be involved in. It is what it is in this fallen world. Lest anyone think that there is such thing as unjust aggression at all, here’s just a few minutes with the great Kayleigh McEnany:

Our Lord has created the animals with tools for their defense.

The greatest of all prophets, John the Baptist, gave advice and encouragement to the law enforcement – even of occupying forces! – so that they too might be saved, not apart from their duties, but as they carry out their duties.

Our Lord Himself does not shy away from The Battle of The War. He also has the proper tools. And… and… He is the last one standing:

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A few scars to be sure in His hands and feet and side. He’s good with that. We thank Him for it. Amen.

Be the caterpillar, with great charity and goodness and kindness. But be the caterpillar. Our Lord expects it of you.

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2020-07-16 · 9:48 am

gardening and walking with the Lord

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That picture was uploaded from the garden June 1, 2020. I was amazed. Gardening is an encouragement to walk with the Lord, to be a co-worker in the garden He planted, as we read way back in Genesis, the Lord desiring that we till the ground, walking with Him.

BTW, however much walking with the Lord is mocked, that walking with the Lord, such as to Emmaus, is not bad and evil. Gardening, walking with the Lord, can be a very fruitful time with the Lord during the day, in the evening, in the morning. Walking with the Lord does not necessarily imply progressivism or anything dialectical, or any kind of tolerant-of-all-mortal-sin-so-called-accompaniment”. We are to pray always. Always means always.

The Lord said that to enter into the kingdom of heaven we are to be like children. To be thankful to the Lord for His creation takes the heart of a child. In this violent drug town I’m quite sure that there are very few who see the paradise in which we live, the mountains and streams and national and state forests and stunning biodiversity.

Meanwhile, the three squarrrsh groupings have continued to grow, edging on 4 feet high and 12 feet wide:

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I’m guessing they’re starting to give up as it’s now mid-July and they’ve really been pumping out the squarrrshes, requiring harvesting twice a day. If it’s your first time gardening, this is a good first plant to plant.

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Meanwhile, the spaghetti squarrrshes are getting way to heavy for their own good. I’m taking the advice of hammocks for the ones which have gotten themselves into impossible situations. And, yes, those are tiny zip-ties. :-)

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The 5-gallon bucket tomato plants are doing well, relatively speaking. These were grown from seeds. There were five seeds thinned out to three plants for each bucket, still too many… but now I know. If you can see them, there are seven tomatoes from this bucket at the moment. These plants are only 1/3 the size of the store-bought seedlings transplanted and given tomato cages. Here’s one of those, also seven tomatoes:

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One of my gardening parishioners laughed when he found out I was taking a census of tomatoes on the plants, saying that they would soon be uncountable. It’s only mid-July and there is a tomato, an early girl, already turning color:

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I know. I know. Gotta do up some weeding, which is not work, btw, if you’re “walking with the Lord.”

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2020-07-05 · 5:21 am

Rectory garden delights day by day

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Besides the Squarrsh (two “Rs”) and Cucumbers and Asparagus, there are some 40 tomatoes at last count on the tomato plants, none of them anywhere near being ripe yet.

Watering and harvesting takes but a few minutes. And for me its a chance to unwind a bit, walking with the Lord in His garden, being thankful to Him. Is that a prayer as well? Yes, it is.

I recommend gardening, even inside if you have no outside space. It’s beneficial on so many levels. We were created to be co-workers with God in His creation. Adam is to “Till the ground”, as his name indicates, being the verbal form for the soil itself. It’s just right.

And if one thinks this to be superfluous in desperate times of Covid-19 insanity lockdowns, of Marxist rioting, of anti-Police defunding, on and on, such normalcy of gardening, if you will, is one of the most practical things one can do.

The most practical thing one can do is pray. Yes. Oh, Confession too.

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2020-07-05 · 5:09 am

Some beasts in the rectory garden

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  • Snapper turtles. There’s a Mr and Mrs in the “Town Branch” that makes up one border on the side of the rectory lot here in town.
  • A wolf spider, which is very helpful in keeping undesirables away.
  • A hammerhead worm, an invasive species, which is terrible, as they eat the most helpful earth worms.
  • Some sort of tiny red spider. Red is a warning. I know nothing about this guy.

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2020-07-01 · 11:48 am

A Decade of Sun

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2020-06-22 · 10:05 am

Oh deer! Seen on Communion Calls…

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The deer on the left has no idea that peeking out from behind a tree with one eye and one ear doesn’t hide the rest of his body. Ha ha. A lesson to learn.

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This is, of course, the best parish in the world. I love bringing the Most Blessed Sacrament around to Jesus’ little flock in what is effectively now a four county area. That puts a few miles in the mountains on Sassy the Subaru, but I am supremely happy rushing about Jesus’ beautiful creation heart to Heart with the Creator Himself.

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2020-02-25 · 6:00 am

Just for nice, because God is good

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This was seen recently whilst racing through round about the winding roads of the back-ridges on the far-side of this parish that I love so very much. Pisgah National Forest, Nantahala National Forest, Smokey Mountains National Forest. I love it. So beautiful. I love those who are here, the criminals, the good people, everyone. Our Heavenly Father does. Jesus does.

Sure, there is – oooh! – this thing wrong in the world. Sure, there is – oooh! – that thing wrong with individuals who put themselves on a power trip in the Church. Yep. Jesus knows all about it. If we get all hyper anxious like “No one is doing anything about all the hell going on!” we might just lose sight of our Heavenly Father sending His only-Begotten Divine Son into this world so as to stand in our place, the Innocent for guilty, redeeming us, and, if we so choose in His grace, saving us. Our Heavenly Father has done and is doing something about it. Jesus took the place of the guilty, us, taking on the punishment we deserve for sin.

Is the beauty of this world passing away like the flower of the field, as Jesus says? Sure. But we can praise our Heavenly Father for this “first memory” of the beauty of creation (as Ratzinger in 1990 had it in Dallas) should we have a “second memory” of re-creation. That second memory – “Do this in memory of Me” – has to be first in our experience before we again begin to see, as it were, the memory of the first creation, the beauty. We have to be courageous enough to see the ugliness of the wounds inflicted upon the Divine Son of the Living God so as to see the beauty of the love of the One bearing them for us.

You see those trees in the picture above? Is there an analogy to help us see them? To be able to see them our robes, our bodies, must be washed clean in the Blood of the Lamb. We see the beauty of nature created by our loving Creator through the Blood of the Lamb.

If not, we are bound not to see any beauty, and then dump rivers of trash down the mountainsides (which can absolutely happen here in Western North Carolina). If not, we are bound not to see that we are to be tabernacles of the Holy Spirit, you know, washed clean in the Blood of the Lamb, and therefore dump rivers of trash of sin down into our souls.

Go ahead, join Jesus in anguish for the redemption of mankind and the salvation of those who want it while He prays in the agony of the garden. Go ahead and don’t fall asleep like the other apostles. Go ahead and don’t deny Jesus like Peter, or betray Him like Judas, or run away like all the other apostles. Be brave! Sure. But know this, you’ll only be able to do that, you’ll only be able to come back as did John to stand next to the Cross, next to Jesus’ good mom, if you yourself are the simplest (in a good sense), smallest child of God able to thank God with joy for His gracious creation.

Can you see some good in the murderous druggy criminal? No? Then you don’t get it. What we are to see in everyone is that God has loved us while we were yet sinners so as to get us out of that state and bring us to be His good children, looking to Him in humble and joyful thanksgiving. None of us are better than anyone else. We all fall short of the glory of God as Saint Paul says. We are have needed to be cleansed in the Blood of the Lamb. None of us has anything to brag about regarding our own salvation. Jesus is the One. He’s the only One.

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