Christmas, Canada, Becket and the Truth

A blessed continuing merrie Christmas to all our readers, as we celebrate all these twelve days, right up to the Epiphany and the Baptism of our Lord. So keep those lights and candles burning, the decorations up! Christmas has just begun!

Today is the memorial of Saint Thomas a Becket, the glorious bishop of Canterbury – in its own glory days before its usurpation by the Anglican reformers, which is to say, by the State and her minions. Thomas was martyred on this day in 1170, a century after the cathedral’s completion, offering his life for the rights of the Church, as independent of the King. Henry II’s encroached upon the Church’s lawful autonomy, to the resistance of his former friend, Thomas, whom he had appointed bishop of the primary see of England. The king’s ungoverned anger and harsh words led to Thomas’ murder before the altar in his own very cathedral – a sin for which Henry repented publicly. But what Henry began another Henry – an unrepentant one – would bring to completion four centuries afterward in the bitter fruit of the Protestant ‘reformation’. As a definitive sign of the end of what was once England, Henry VIII had the shrine of Becket – the destination of the Canterbury Tales pilgrims, and the most popular holy site of England, along with Walshingham – destroyed in 1541, and the martyr’s relics dispersed to the four winds, which is about where the faith of England is now going, or gone.

I must confess I find it rather odd that the great English poet Thomas Stearns Eliot could write a brilliant dramatic play on the murder, yet not see the deeper issues at work, that Becket’s death presaged the loss of the Faith in England, that Anglicanism has not the foundation to withstand the assaults of secularism and, now, Islamism, and is now in its own death throes. There is only one, true Church, as countless martyrs before and after the bishop Thomas saw so clearly, and for which they were willing to suffer and die.

Please do feel free to peruse my thoughts on Canterbury upon my pilgrimage there last summer.

While on the theme of England, Sister Wendy Beckett has also gone to her reward, a semi-contemplative nun who garnered unlikely fame as a televised art critic, whose BBC show was watched by millions, and her books read by the same numbers. From what I could garner, her vocation was, shall we say, unique, beginning as a teaching sister, then an enclosed contemplative, then living in a mobile home on the grounds of the Carmelite monastery as a consecrated virgin and ‘hermit’, spending two hours a day to earn her living. Hmm. Although I may not agree with everything she said or wrote, Sister did popularize many great works of art, which she often discussed from a religious perspective –as all art ultimately should be seen. May what good work and example she offered live on in eternity.

Yes, there is always a tinge of sorrow in our feasts, as I wrote the other day, for some more than others, for the world does not cease to be a vale of tears, and people lose loved ones, in tragic, unnecessary ways, bombings, terrorism, murder and mayhem. But what feasts do give us is hope in the midst of what would otherwise be tragic despair, and light in an otherwise stygian darkness.

And many brokers are despairing, as the stock market continues its roller-coaster ride, signifying the fragility inherent in our global economic system, so prey to fear and panic. David Warren has a fine piece on the fakeness of so much of our economy, with a good portion of it now run by ‘robots’, algorithmic machines which not only build much of our ‘stuff’, but now also do much of the trading, ever more disconnected from the very humans the economy is supposed to benefit.

And China seems to be continuing its tit-for-tat game in its punitive measures against Canada for the detention of Meng Wanzhou, the Chief Financial Officer of tech giant Huawei, whom the United States wanted deported. Now President Trump says a trade deal may be reached with China, in exchange for lenient treatment of Ms. Wanzhou, placing Canada in a very precarious position between the two nations, who control much of the world’s economy and military power. China’s is – to put things mildly – not a morally sound regime, founded as it is on Communistic principles, governed by a totalitarian oligarchy with little respect for the rule of law, and almost none for natural law. Woe to be a Canadian in China, much less a Catholic, unless one wants to be martyr; not a bad calling, but only for the right cause.

We’re not much better in our own Dominion, as I was pondering in light of yesterday’s feast of the Innocents, for our own Trudeau has his own dictatorial tendencies, and his vehemence for ‘abortion rights’ seems bizarre even by his own ‘values’. No limits whatsoever for all nine months of pregnancy, and even a bit beyond with the visible barbarity partial-birth abortion? If society ever returns to sanity – something of which I am almost in despair, seeing, on the contrary, more and more the ‘gradual ascendancy of evil’ of which the Catechism warns- Trudeau and his compliant Liberals, along with all of us as a nation, will be judged rather harshly. If Christ brought down woes upon Bethsaida and Corazin, what are we to say of Canada, with the blood of millions of her children on her hands, and now the murder of the elderly, the sick, women and children? Still, hold your heads high, and do what you can to spread the truth, in what ways we are able, with boldness, and with confidence.

And on the note of witnessing, two University of Laurier professors are suing Lindsay Shepherd for recording her disciplinary meeting, during which said professors’ rant against Jordan Peterson and their gestapo-esque browbeating of Ms. Shepherd went viral, to near-universal condemnation and mockery. All I can say is, may more of what passes for ‘education’ in the halls of academe be exposed to public view, and I sympathize with those who must suffer the ideology of the modern university, which offers anything but universal truth; and now the bully boys are using the full brunt of the legal system to intimidate whistleblowers like Ms. Shepherd, and cover up their sad, pinched little world, all generously supported by the State and our tax dollars.

All I can say is, may the truth win out in the end, as it will.

Carney’s Amoral Majority

After five defections – euphemistically described as ‘crossing the floor’ – and three by-elections, Mark Carney and his Liberals how have their coveted majority. One wonders what bowls of pottage were offered in back-room deals. In the archaic monarchical system that is the Dominion of Canada, this majority allows the newly-minted Prime Minister to rule[…]Continue reading→

Saint Kateri , Canada’s Protectress

This was the title given to Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, by Pope Benedict XVI, when he canonized her on October 28th, 2012, along with six others, in Saint Peter’ Square (she had been beatified by Pope John Paul II back in 1980). With Saint Joseph as our protector, along with the Canadian martyrs, we seem to[…]Continue reading→

A Closed, Unsustainable, Descending Loop

As a follow-up to my thoughts on Payette’s payout, here be a stark image of where are here in Canada. As the graph shows in, well, graphic terms, since 2025, the public sector has contributed to 95.5% of economic growth. The private sector – which funds the public sector, or is supposed to – has[…]Continue reading→

A Tale of Two Benedicts

A grace-filled Holy Week to all our readers! As we await and prepare for the Resurrection about to dawn upon us, we might keep in mind two Benedicts: Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, requiescat in pace, elected on this day in 2005; and today’s commemoration of the mystic pilgrim, Benedict Joseph Labre, who died on this[…]Continue reading→

My Name is Bernadette

April 16th is a propitious day, for besides the anniversary of Father de Valk’s death, who founded Catholic Insight in its print form decades ago, and the commemoration of the ‘two Benedicts’, mentioned in accompanying posts, today we also recall Saint Bernadette Soubirous, the young visionary to whom the Virgin Mary appeared numerous times at[…]Continue reading→

Presidential Pardon of Weronika Krawczyk

As a good news, follow-up to our story from Poland, of the persecution of Weronika Krawczyk for her pro-life views, we heard that she has been granted a presidential pardon. One might still wonder why one needs a presidential pardon for simply holding the long-held belief that the child within the womb is a child,[…]Continue reading→

Saint Lydwina of Schiedam and Suffering Joyfully

Saint Lydwina of Schiedam (1380 – 1433) was one of the countless and glorious ‘victim souls’ in the history of the Church, those whose lives are filled with suffering, often of an unimaginable intensity, but who suffer joyfully. She was a fifteen-year old Dutch girl, out skating one day, when she fell and broke one[…]Continue reading→

The Glorious Martyrdoms of Martin and Maximus

As we enter into Eastertide, we recall on this 13th of April Pope Saint Martin I (+655), one of the noblest, if most tragic, of the successors of Saint Peter. Born in Umbria, Italy, he was of noble lineage, with great intelligence combined with charity and love of the poor and the Church. While still[…]Continue reading→

Pope Leo and a Rosary for Peace

Pope Leo XIV has asked Catholics across the world to join him in a Rosary for peace today, at 18:00 Rome time (6 pm), which would be noon from where I write (EST). If you are able, whether at that time or another, and in whatever way you pray, to join in intercession with the[…]Continue reading→

Payette’s Payout

I was glancing through some headlines, and noticed a mention of Julie Payette – engineer and astronaut and sometime the Queen’s representative in Canada – which brought back vague memories. She was appointed Governor-General by Justin Trudeau in 2017. Ms. Payette resigned in 2021, amidst claims that she created a ‘toxic work environment’, with allegations[…]Continue reading→