The occasional, often ill-considered thoughts of a Roman Catholic permanent deacon who is ever grateful to God for his existence. Despite the strangeness we encounter in this life, all the suffering we witness and endure, being is good, so good I am sometimes unable to contain my joy. Deo gratias!


Although I am an ordained deacon of the Catholic Church, the opinions expressed in this blog are my personal opinions. In offering these personal opinions I am not acting as a representative of the Church or any Church organization.

Thursday, April 29, 2021

Just Stuff

Sometimes I just feel the need to pass along a few thoughts to my blog’s highly selective cadre of readers. Nothing very astonishing, just experiences or ideas that strike me and seem worth sharing. 

To Mask or Not To Mask. For example, earlier this afternoon dear Diane said she would really like a pizza — specifically, a pepper and onion pizza — from one of our local vendors, NYPD Pizza. Now, I eat neither peppers nor onions (Were I ordering for myself, I would choose a sausage and pepperoni pizza), but because I love Diane more than life itself, I called, ordered the pizza, and was told it would be ready in 15 minutes. When I arrived the pizza was not quite ready (I was a few minutes early), so I simply stood off to the side and waited. There were perhaps a dozen or so people seated at tables enjoying their meals. Of course, none wore masks, but neither did any of the employees. The cooks in the kitchen weren’t masked and neither was the one waitress. How refreshing! 

But then a man entered and approached the take-out counter. He looked to be in his 50s or 60s, but it was hard to tell since his facial features were disguised by a mask. Standing there, he glanced around the room and then uttered, presumably to himself, but loud enough for me to hear, “How come no one’s wearing a mask in here?” Assuming he wanted an answer, I just said, “Maybe like me they’re all vaccinated and know they’re immune.” It seems I was wrong and he wasn’t looking for an answer, at least from me, because he turned and said, “Vaccination means nothing. And why aren’t you wearing a mask?” At this point, I said something very un-pastoral and certainly un-deaconlike, but it just rolled off my uncontrolled tongue before I could stop it: “Because I’m not an idiot.” Fortunately, two seconds later my pizza was ready. I took it and left before he could respond either verbally or physically. I’m not proud of what I said to this confused man, but I won’t apologize for speaking the truth. Let’s get back to normal... now!

Congressional Masks. Other than the content of the president’s speech, the most obvious absurdity witnessed by the nation last night was the masking of everyone in the House chamber. Every person in the room (just 200 people in a space designed to hold 1,600) had been vaccinated. They were all masked and separated by more than six feet. They were also immune from COVID-19, so why the charade? Do you get the feeling that maybe Nancy Pelosi and her friends want to ensure Americans remain afraid and psychologically dependent on government? What other reason could they have?

Georgia On My Mind. President Biden today made a surprise trip to “racist” Georgia and visited an aging President Jimmy Carter, presumably to pick up a few pointers on how to become one of the least effective presidents in American history. Jimmy certainly wrote the script for how not to deal with the Islamic Republic of Iran, and if you’re old enough you’ll never forget how miserable the economy was on his watch. Remember the “misery index” — the sum of inflation and unemployment — that reached over 20% in 1980? More than anything else, I believe that number put Ronald Reagan in the White House. If the federal government continues to spend the trillions Biden wants to spend, it might well break the Carter record. Assuming he’s still in office in 2024 (and still alive), I think the 2023 economy will make him a one-term president.

Attend Mass, Go To Jail. Did you know (probably not, since you won’t read about this in the mainstream media) that in the Republic of Ireland it’s now against the law to attend Mass. Yes, indeed, on April 16, I suppose in the midst of another lockdown, the Irish Health Minister, Stephen Donnelly, signed a “Statutory Instrument” (presumably an official document) that makes attendance at Mass a criminal offense. Now, for all you Irish-Catholic Americans out there, who still believe Ireland is a Catholic country...believe me, it’s not. Like most of Europe, Ireland has devolved into a secular, materialistic, largely agnostic society in which all those formerly Catholic folks and the generations behind them no longer believe in much of anything, leaving the Church with little, if any, influence. Who’s to blame? Sadly, the primary culprit is the Church itself. Like too many of the bishops of our country, the bishops of Ireland slouched into political correctness and ordained a lot of questionable priests, including homosexuals, pedophiles, Marxists, and sadly, even some tacit agnostics, whose subsequent activities destroyed any credibility the Church once had. So now, the few remaining faithful, if they want to participate at Mass, must watch it on TV or prepare for a fine or a stay in the local slammer. Lest you chuckle too much at the expense of the Irish, this has also happened in some states in this country where the First Amendment of our Constitution has been overruled by certain state governors. As my late brother used to say, “Keep your powder dry.”

Whose Racism Is It, Anyway? The president believes we are essentially a racist nation, despite the fact that every conceivable indicator shows tremendous progress since the days when Senator Joe Biden was bosom buddies with the Senate’s old segregationists, especially Senator Robert Byrd (D, WV) the Ku Klux Klan’s “Exalted Cyclops.” Probably the best indicator of who actually are today’s real racists is abortion. The population of African Americans would be double its current level were it not for abortion. Indeed, abortion is the leading cause of death among black Americans. And, of course, Margaret Sanger, the founder of a Planned Parenthood, hoped to decrease birth rates among all those “less desirable” races by means of artificial contraception and abortion. Who supports abortion? Why, the Democrat Party, the party of racism, the party of the KKK, the party that filibustered the Civil Rights Act of 1964 until Republicans forced a cloture vote. And nothing’s changed. This was apparent today when the leftist knives were unsheathed and thrown at Senator Tim Scott who gave the Republican rebuttal to the president’s speech. The racist slurs and other comments by Democrats were despicable, but what else can we expect from those whose intent is to keep African Americans on the Democrat plantation. More and more black Americans are starting to recognize their real enemy.

Catholics and Big Tech. I won’t write about this since someone else has done a far better job than I ever could. But if you’re still enamored of Twitter and Facebook and Instagram and all the rest, follow this link to the National Catholic Register:


That’s enough for today. God’s peace...Pray for our nation.

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