October 31. An Observation.

Today is Halloween.

It's also Reformation Day.

Everyone sort of knows what Halloween is, although in its extremely secularized form.  It's become so popular in that style that its now the second most popular holiday in the US, and you don't even get the da off from work or school.

Originally, and in Catholic and Orthodox Churches, it was All Hallowed Evening, the day before All Saints Day, which in the Catholic Church is a Holy Day of Obligation.   There are some debates about it, but the secular traditions that are observed stem from Celtic cultures of Great Britain in a much modified form.  The door to door trick or treating stems from a religious tradition in which the poor went door to door for food and were given it in exchange for a promise to pray for the donor's dead.

Reformation Day is a day not much observed in North America commemorating Martin Luther nailing his 95 Theses to the Cathedral door at Worms, which he actually didn't do.  The legend was that he did it on this day.  No matter, he did get the rebellion of the reformation going, and with it the concept that people can make up their own minds on anything, no matter how ill informed they are.  Luther was fairly well informed on some things, but that was the unintentional result of his act of rebellion.  

At the time of his 95 Theses, he hadn't intended a rebellion at all, but he worked his way sort of around to it.  It'd be interesting to know what he thought he'd done by the time of his death, but one thing he knew is that he'd caused others with more radical ideas than his to also break away and create their own Christian sects.

Many of those new denominations have considerably changed over the years.  Some of the Lutherans, who followed Luther, often with no choice due to their localities, have become almost more Catholic than the Catholics, while others have gone in another direction.  The Reformation, at any rate, is winding down,and its really collapsing.

With its collapse has come the mess of contemporary culture, much of which we seeing being fought out in the United States right now, which is a Protestant country.  The massive secularization is a minor example of that, but is evident in all of our religion derived holidays, including this one, but also including Thanksgiving and Christmas.

The last acts of rebellion were those against nature, which we also see playing out doay.  They began in the late 1940s and came into full bloom in the 1960s, and are still enormously playing out today.  Part of that has been the acceptance of rebelling against truth, which we see in the current election in more than one way, and in both political parties, although certainly Donald Trump has manifested it in a heretofore unseen level.

So its Reformation Day and Halloween in 2024.  Lots of tricks on the culture are being played, and not too many treats being received.

Messed Up Animal Ecology. Why you can't separate out your favorite animal, and demonize your least favorite, and make a lick of sense.

The other night on the local news, some guy from some environmental outfit was yapping about "wild horses", equating them "with other wild animals like deer and elk", and suggesting that cattle need to be removed from the range.

One of the things he brought up about cattle were their numbers, in comparison to "wild" horses.

His argument was intellectually bereft, but then arguments in this area often are.

Winslow Homer painting of a (fairly thin looking) plow horse.  Lots of "chunks" were let go in the 30s when their owners droughted out, their descendants still roaming the range today.

There are no wild horses in North America at all.

None, nada, zippo, "0".

There are a little over 64,000 feral horses, all in the West, in the Western United States.  If we include burros, which at least nobody pretends are a wild animal, there are 82,000 feral equines.  

All wild equines stem, at the very oldest, from animals that were brought on to the continent in 1519.  Quite a few probably don't really have any Spanish blood in their veins at all, and hail from horses much more recently brought in. There's fairly good evidence that in the upper West horses came down out of Canada, not up from Mexico.  

Some poor coureur des bois awakened one morning, in other words, and thought "Chu dans marde! Mon cheval est parti!"

"Bourgeois" W---r, and His Squaw" by Alfred Jacob Miller, depicting a coureur des bois and his Native American spouse.  This is a famous painting, but we're not supposed to like it now.  One art museum notes about it:  "These words, which shaped how Miller's contemporaries viewed the watercolors, reveal the racism and sexism embedded in 19th-century exploration and colonization of the western part of what is today the United States."  Oh, horse crap.  Most trappers were culturally French, and the French had intermixed with the native population from day one.  This could just as easily be "guy and his wife."  The comment itself imposed an Anglo-American view on a Franco-American and Native American landscape.

Moreover, the introduction date to the Native Americans, at least on the Northern Plains, is much more recent than supposed, and even then, they didn't take them right up.  Indeed, among the Shoshone it produced a big argument, with the arguers, mostly young men, taking off and acquiring the name "The Arguers", i.e., Comanche.

In the 1930s, a lot of farmers in the West droughted out and simply let their horses go, including stocky draft horses, i.e., "chunks". Then again, in the 1970s the numbers of wild horses expanded as recent imports abandoned pasture pets out on the range and went back to their homes in Port Arthur, or wherever, and even now some of that happens.  The majestic broom tail of the range today may have been Little Becky's 4H project before she left for UW, died her hair purple, and started protesting for Hamas.

Okay, so what about cows?

Long horn in a herd of Angus or Black Baldies.  I'm not really sure how this bovine ended up in this herd.

They came in at just about the same time, or earlier.  Cattle were brought to the Caribbean as early as 1493 by Columbus, which is really early.  "In 1492 Columbus sailed the Ocean Blue", but in 1493 the livestock truck, basically, pulled up to the dock.  Cows can and do go wild, but nobody gets very romantic about it, and there isn't a Wild and Free Ranging Cow Act.  Nobody goes by the moniker "Wild Cow Annie".  A wild cow we had went rogue and recruited other cows to her rogue wild cow band, which shows how wild they can get.  A neighboring rancher, caught her and shipped her as a menace. We got the check, and were happy for that end.

There are about 90,000,000 head of cattle in the United States as of this past summer, down from 100,000,000 in 1998.  

Okay, that's a lot of cows.

Which bring back our ignorant protagonist's point.  Before Columbus came and said "let's stock this range and lose some horses doing it", he seems to argue, the rangeland was empty of large ungulates.

Um, nope.

There were something like 50,000,0000 to 75,000,000 buffalo.

But, gee, Yeoman, that would mean that the entire ungulate supporting range of North America has always had a lot of large ungulates on it. . . 

Yep, that's what it means.

Currently, there are about 20,500 Plains bison in wild herds and an additional 420,000 in commercial herds, which we are supposed to pretend are wild herds.

Given our inability to accurately state how many head of anything were on the Pre Columbian landmass, what this basically tells you is the ungulate population hasn't changed very much.  Overall populations of large wild animals, i.e., "big game" are way up, however, due to water projects and farmed fields.

So the entire Cow Bad/Horse Good argument is pretty flawed.

Now, the line of last defense on this is that cows cause global warming. That's because cows fart.

Buffalo don't.

Umm. . . 

Well, buffalo do, but only Febreeze.

Well, no, they fart methane too.

In reality, all mammals fart, but some fart more than they otherwise would due to diet.  You already know this due to your coworker who has, every day, the Lumberjack Special at Hefty Portions for breakfast, followed by the Ejército del Norte special at El Grande Conquistador for lunch, a quart of scotch around 2:00 p.m., and goes home and has his spouse's Roast Wildebeest Surprise for dinner (all Keto approved, of course).  The only real argument here, therefore, is that maybe cattle ought not to be finished off on corn, which they probably wouldn't normally do unless somebody left a gate down. That likely makes them gassy.

Lascaux painting of aurochs, approximately 36,000 years ago.  Note also the deer/roebucks and horse depicted.

Taking this out worldwide, I'd note, cattle are native to the entire rest of the planet in some form, save for Australia.  Wild cattle ranged Europe, Asia and Africa.  They aren't new here, and they've been wondering around chewing their cuts and farting for longer than we've been a species.

So back to environmental destruction.

The first real notable example of it was Cottonwood bottoms in the American West.  During the winter, buffalo hang out in them.  Feral horses took it up.  And mounted Native Americans, who previously had a pretty limited impact on the environment, did too.

But you can't really say anything about that.

Fish on Fridays, the Environment, and somewhat missing the point.

Here's an odd item that I found through a British newspaper:

Catholic Church can reduce carbon emissions by returning to meat-free Fridays, study suggests

Eh?

This found:

In 2011, the Catholic bishops of England and Wales called on congregations to return to foregoing meat on Fridays. Only around a quarter of Catholics changed their dietary habits—yet this has still saved over 55,000 tons of carbon a year, according to a new study led by the University of Cambridge.

FWIW, 10% of the British population remains or has returned to Catholicism (more Catholics go to services on Sunday than any other religion in Britain).  England in particular was noted for its strong attachment to the Faith before King Henry VIII, and even after that, as it was not at first clear to people at the pew level that he'd severed ties with it.  This gets into our recent discussion on the end of the Reformation.

Indeed, Great Britain's Catholic roots never really completed faded at any one time.  Peasants rose up in 1549 over the Prayer Book, a good 30 years after Henry has severed from Rome.  Catholic hold outs continued on, on the island, under various penalties of the law, some extremely severe.  And the illogical position of the Church of England that it wasn't really Protestant, while not being able to rationally explain why then it wasn't that, or wasn't, if it wasn't that, schismatic, lead High Church Anglicans to continually flirt with returning to Rome. King Charles I was so High Church his position in regard to not joining the Church didn't make sense, something that his son, Charles II, ultimately did, in spite of his libertine lifestyle.The Oxford movement by Anglican churchmen in reaction to Catholic assertions that their Apostolic Succession was severed lead at least one famous Anglican cleric, John Henry Newman, into the Catholic Church, where he ultimately became a Cardinal.  In recent years, notable British figures have converted to the Church, along with many regular people.

Abstaining from meat on all the Fridays in the year, which in Catholic terms doesn't include fish, was a long held Latin Rite tradition that fell in the wake, in some places, but not all, following the reforms of Vatican II.  It was not part of Vatican II, as some improperly assume, but something that occurred in the spirit of that age.  It was a penitential act, not an environmental one.

For a variety of reasons, I'm pretty skeptical of the "blame it on cows" part of the climate change discussion.  But as a localist and killetarian, I am game with grow or capture it on your own. That isn't really what this is about, but it's worth noting that anything you buy at the grocery store, or wherever, has had a fair amount of fossil fuels associated with it.  The Carbon reduction here would be because fish don't burp much, if at all, or fart much, if at all.  But for that matter, neither do deer or rabbits, ducks or geese, or for that matter grass fed cattle.

Go out there, in other words, and get your own if you really want to save on the carbon.

For that matter, I might note, for those who are vegan, production agriculture is the huge killer of animal life.  I always laugh to myself when vegans think they're saving animals, they're slaughtering them in droves.  Anyone who is familiar with the agricultural logistical chain or how production agriculture works knows that.

I'm for growing it yourself as well, of course, although I've now been a hypocrite on that for years.  I need to get back to it.

Anyhow, the "this would be a good thing for the Catholic Church to do globally in the name of the environment" might be true, or might not be, but it misses the overall point.

Related threads:

The secular left's perpetual surprise at arriving at the Catholic past.

Secular suffering for nothing

Pancake Day.

Blog Mirror: “A Good Dish for the Meatless Meal” Recipe

Looking for Constantinople and Rome.

Catholic, Orthodox theologians agree on first new text since 2016

This is huge.

It's a long document, we'll just skip to the conclusion.

Conclusion

5.1 Major issues complicate an authentic understanding of synodality and primacy in the Church. The Church is not properly understood as a pyramid, with a primate governing from the top, but neither is it properly understood as a federation of self-sufficient Churches. Our historical study of synodality and primacy in the second millennium has shown the inadequacy of both of these views. Similarly, it is clear that for Roman Catholics synodality is not merely consultative, and for Orthodox primacy is not merely honorific. In 1979, Pope John Paul II and Ecumenical Patriarch Dimitrios said: ‘The dialogue of charity … has opened up the way to better understanding of our respective theological positions and thereby to new approaches to theological work, and to a new attitude with regard to the common past of our Churches. This purification of the collective memory of our Churches is an important outcome of the dialogue of charity and an indispensable condition for future progress’ (Joint Declaration, 30 November 1979). Roman Catholics and Orthodox need to continue along that path so as to embrace an authentic understanding of synodality and primacy in light of the ‘theological principles, canonical provisions and liturgical practices’ (Chieti, 21) of the undivided Church of the first millennium.

5.2 The Second Vatican Council opened new perspectives by fundamentally interpreting the mystery of the Church as one of communion. Today, there is an increasing effort to promote synodality at all levels in the Roman Catholic Church. There is also a willingness to distinguish what might be termed the patriarchal ministry of the pope within the Western or Latin Church from his primatial service with regard to the communion of all the Churches, offering new opportunities for the future. In the Orthodox Church, synodality and primacy are practised at the panorthodox level, according to the canonical tradition, by the holding of holy and great councils.

5.3 Synodality and primacy need to be seen as ‘interrelated, complementary and inseparable realities’ (Chieti, 5) from a theological point of view (Chieti, 4, 17). Purely historical discussions are not enough. The Church is deeply rooted in the mystery of the Holy Trinity, and a eucharistic ecclesiology of communion is the key to articulating a sound theology of synodality and primacy.

5.4 The interdependence of synodality and primacy is a fundamental principle in the life of the Church. It is intrinsically related to the service of the unity of the Church at the local, regional and universal levels. However, principles must be applied in specific historical settings, and the first millennium offers valuable guidance for the application of the principle just mentioned (Chieti, 21). What is required in new circumstances is a new and proper application of the same governing principle.

5.5 Our Lord prayed that his disciples ‘may all be one’ (Jn 17:21). The principle of synodality-primacy in the service of unity should be invoked to meet the needs and requirements of the Church in our time. Orthodox and Roman Catholics are committed to finding ways to overcome the alienation and separation that occurred during the second millennium.

5.6 Having reflected together on the history of the second millennium, we acknowledge that a common reading of the sources can inspire the practice of synodality and primacy in the future. Observing the mandate of our Lord to love one another as he has loved us (Jn 13:34), it is our Christian duty to strive for unity in faith and life.

This doesn't resolve the schism, but it's really edging up on it.  The Pillar notes that in the head of the Greek Orthodox Church had his way, the schism would likely end immediately.

We're getting pretty close.

The final break, more or less, between the Catholic and Easter Orthodox Churches can somewhat be dated to 1453, making it only a few decades older than the start of the Reformation in 1517.  We've written in regard to the collapse of the Reformation here recently, and here's an example of how that's playing out.

Conservative Anglicans Call for Break With Archbishop of Canterbury Over Same-Sex Blessings

African bishops have emerged as leaders of the church’s conservative wing

African bishops are indeed the leaders of the conservative branch of the Anglican Communion, with the Anglican Communion's conservatives being very close in their outlook to Latin Rite Catholicism.  Indeed, the theological point they assert is that they are a separated church, like the Orthodox, a position that Rome does not agree with.

Anyhow, it's interesting to note that as the Reformation more and more collapses due to the seeds of individuality it inserted into Western Culture in the first place, the more conservative branches pull more and more towards Catholic orthodoxy, something liberal Catholics may wish to take note of as they sometimes try to tack in the opposite direction.

Social fantasy confronted by science. Transgenderism.

And evolutionary biology and science rear their heads:

More children and adolescents are identifying as transgender and are being offered medical treatment, especially in the US—but some providers and European authorities are urging caution because of a lack of strong evidence. Jennifer Block reports

And:

Internationally, however, governing bodies have come to different conclusions regarding the safety and efficacy of medically treating gender dysphoria. Sweden’s National Board of Health and Welfare, which sets guidelines for care, determined last year that the risks of puberty blockers and treatment with hormones “currently outweigh the possible benefits” for minors.24 Finland’s Council for Choices in Health Care, a monitoring agency for the country’s public health services, issued similar guidelines, calling for psychosocial support as the first line treatment.25 (Both countries restrict surgery to adults.)

Medical societies in France, Australia, and New Zealand have also leant away from early medicalisation.2627 And NHS England, which is in the midst of an independent review of gender identity services, recently said that there was “scarce and inconclusive evidence to support clinical decision making”28 for minors with gender dysphoria29 and that for most who present before puberty it will be a “transient phase,” requiring clinicians to focus on psychological support and to be “mindful” even of the risks of social transition.30

And: 

Guyatt, who co-developed GRADE, found “serious problems” with the Endocrine Society guidelines, noting that the systematic reviews didn’t look at the effect of the interventions on gender dysphoria itself, arguably “the most important outcome.” He also noted that the Endocrine Society had at times paired strong recommendations—phrased as “we recommend”—with weak evidence. In the adolescent section, the weaker phrasing “we suggest” is used for pubertal hormone suppression when children “first exhibit physical changes of puberty”; however, the stronger phrasing is used to “recommend” GnRHa treatment.

And, in Scandinavia:

The Norwegian Healthcare Investigation Board, (NHIB/UKOM) has deemed puberty blockers, cross-sex-hormones & surgery for children & young people experimental, determining that the current “gender-affirmative” guidelines are not evidence-based and must be revised. /1

"Transgenderism", in the fashion, at any rate, it's boosted by the political left just frankly really doesn't exist.l  What does exist is mental illness, and this is a symptom of a mental illness, doubtless different in men than women.  But in the world of the "progressive", we've gone to a state where we define our own reality, which in turn, is the epitome of anti reality.  Fantasy is elevated, so that cries for help or distress cannot be heard.

At the end of the day, this is in some ways the ultimate result of October 31, 1517.  On that date, what began as a questioning evolved ultimately into a revolution, defeating its own original thesis pretty quickly.  Questing perceived abuses, and being concerned about actual ones, lead to a radical proposition, that being that we are not subject to any larger existential authority, but can define the nature of an existential authority on our own.  That lead to endless redefinitions, and cemented in, north of the Rhine and west of the Channel, the concept that individuals defined what was existential, not metaphysics.

From there it was only a matter of time that, when wealth and science allowed for it, that those cultures adopting the revolution of 1517 would ultimately reject any concept of the existential at all, and instead go to it being all internal.  Each person would be their own god, at the end of the day, defining a reality which everyone else must acknowledge.  With no external to be considered, no existential standard would exist.

Pundits of the Robert Reich ilk like to claim that the opponents of progressives are fascinated by sex, when in fact the opposite is really the truth.  Progressivism, in a very real sense, only cares about sex in the crudest, most pornographic, terms and in tying people to employment. That's pretty much it.  You'll serve your corporate master, who will be taxed heavily to make you feel better about it, and then go home to your apartment and look at yourself, your own individual special being, a they, them, it, he and she.

Problem is, none of it is real.  And those crying for help keep crying.

A shooting just recently in Colorado Springs was by a person who claimed to be "non-binary".  In Denver, another shooter identified as transgender.  The recent Aberdeen shooter did as well.  The Ulvade shooter pretty clearly was, although the press avoided stating it plainly.

Prior shootings, mostly by males, have tended to almost all be by men who placed on "the spectrum". A recent shooting by a minor was by a child who was such, who had been forced into school on the popular basis that you can socialize people out of organic conditions.

In the 60s, the Who released The Kids Are Alright, which went:

I don't mind other guys dancing with my girl

That's fine, I know them all pretty well

But I know sometimes I must get out in the light

Better leave her behind with the kids, they're alright

The kids are alright

Sometimes, I feel I gotta get away

Bells chime, I know I gotta get away

And I know if I don't, I'll go out of my mind

Better leave her behind with the kids, they're alright

The kids are alright

I know if I go things would be a lot better for her

I had things planned, but her folks wouldn't let her

I don't mind other guys dancing with my girl

That's fine, I know them all pretty well

But I know sometimes I must get out in the light

Better leave her behind with the kids, they're alright

The kids are alright

Sometimes, I feel I gotta get away

Bells chime, I know I gotta get away

And I know if I don't, I'll go out of my mind

Better leave her behind with the kids, they're alright

The kids are alright, the kids are alright, the kids are alright

The song was sort of about rebellion, and sort of not.  The Who was basically safetly rebelling in the song, as the rebellion was against a standard they were implicitly adopting and leaning up.

Well, the kids aren't alright anymore.

Because ignoring reality and the cries of the desperate isn't alright.

The Reassessors: St. Ignatius of Loyola

He was ordained a cleric at an early age, but received a release from his vows and became a soldier.  He was noted to be vainglorious in this period.  A battlefield wound lead to a long period of painful books during which his request for books about chivalry was met instead with religious works as the castle he was recuperating in had those and not the former.

This lead to a profound conversion, lead an austere life, dedicated himself to study, and ultimately returned to the clergy.  He founded the Society of Jesus, the Jesuits.

February 2, 1920. Changes.

Siberian girls pose for camera, February 2, 1920.   Their world was in a state of massive change at the time this photograph was taken.

Monday, February 2, 1920, saw the implementation of changes here and there. Some great, some small, in context, and others temporary.

Chief Clerk R.M. Reese of the Dept. of Agriculture administering the oath of office to Edwin T. Meredith the new Sectary today. On Mr Meredith's right is Mr Houston former Sectary.  Meredith is wearing a decidely modern type of suit showing how the patterns of Edwardian suits were taking a modern form.  The U.S. was slipping into a major depression lead by a major decline in the agricultural section as this photo was snapped.

A new Secretary of Agriculture was sworn in for the United States.

Meanwhile, in Baltimore, the gallant, or self sacrificing, Guy Spiker traveled with his sister in law to meet with Emily Knowles.  Knowles, we are now informed, appeared here for the first time two days ago when she was described as a girl whose relationship with the married Lt. Pearly Spiker had resulted in her pregnancy.

While she was earlier a "girl", we now know that she was a member of the British Women's Auxiliary service, a type of wartime British quasi military body formed to relieve men of some of the service roles they held  normally, thereby relieving them for service elsewhere.  That more easily explains how Lt. Spiker and Miss Knowles met, and as we learned from the entry the other day, it would also explain how she met the man she would, a year later, leave Guy Spiker for, and also abandon her association with her infant as a result of that.  So she turns out, at least, not to be as young as we might fear.

The Casper paper also reported on a perennial problem, that being that graduates of the high school in Casper were expressing a desire to take off as soon as they graduated.  Wyoming continues to suffer this problem today.

In 1919 they could hardly be blamed in some ways.  Casper was a boom town with that boom (about to be a bust) all centered on oil production.  It was busy, dirty, and dangerous, and featured a large district dedicated to vice of the classic types.

In far off Central Asia the Russian protectorate Khanate of Khiva came to an end when its last hereditary ruler abdicated.

The deminished Khiva in 1903

It had existed since 1511.

Khiva (Karasm) in the 18th Century.

Khiva had fallen to Russian aggression in the early 18th Century after which it became a protectorate, becoming increasingly smaller, until the Soviets just wiped it out as an entity entirely.

On the same day as the last Khan resigned in Khiva, the Soviets recognized the independence of Estonia.

Signing of the treaty recognizing Estonian independence.

The Soviets would get over that in 1940.

In the same region, under the Treaty of Versailles, the French occupied Memel, the eastern most region of East Prussia.

Memel was effectively the German frontier in the Baltic's and had long had a mixed population.  Given the German influence in the Baltic's, that in and of itself was a problem of sorts.  The French occupation would have given some time for these issues to be sorted out and in fact an Memel independence movement, an odd thought given its small size, developed during the brief French occupation.  However, in 1923 it became Lithuanian by way of a Lithuanian revolt in the region which the French did not suppress.  Indeed, the French were on their way out due to their occupation of the Ruhr at the time.  The region would become German again in March 1939 when the Nazi German state demanded its return and the Lithuanians acquiesced.  It changed hands again as a result of World War Two and it remains Lithuanian today, with its formerly significant German population having been largely expelled by the Soviets following the war.