Celebrate the Archangels September 29 and the Guardian Angels Oct 2nd

Updated Sept 29, 2025

The week leading up to today’s Feast of the Archangels and the Guardian Angels is a prayerful and celebratory time for Catholics, despite the likes of Gavin Newsom and the legacy media mocking prayer, comparing to waving a magic wand.

In our current uber materialistic world, a secular media and legacy media aka the New Pharisees it is easy to dismiss prayer and angles as medieval superstition, something unimportant to our faith or as the New York Times might say, it may be hazardous to your health. But this would be a denial of God’s design.

No wonder Catholics scientifically, empirically and anecdotally are happier. While happiness and life satisfaction can be tricky to define, happiness has been discussed ad nauseam by philosophers, thinkers and activists, such as Aristippus, Aristotle, Zhuangzi, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Jeremy Benthan and Bertrand Russell, they all have considered happiness and life satisfaction to be one of the highest goals of human motivation. There are all kinds of reasons to be happy: We are all sinners, yet God still loves us. In the words of Dillan Luke writing for Life Teen: “Our God loves us more than we could ever imagine. So much so that instead of making us reach Heaven, He brings Himself to us here on Earth in the form of the Eucharist´- (D Luke) https://lifeteen.com/blog/catholics-many-reasons-smile/

According to The Conversations’ Daniel Merino “Our findings suggest that Protestants, Buddhists and Roman Catholics are happier and more satisfied with their lives, compared with other groups. Jews, Hindus, Muslims, and the non-religious were in between, while Orthodox Christians were found to have the lowest happiness and life satisfaction rates.” Previous research suggested the “happy person” is young, healthy, well-educated, well-paid, optimistic and extroverted. The same research found the happiest people tend to be religious, married, with high self-esteem and job morale and modest aspirations. It seems your gender and level of intelligence don’t necessarily come into it. Around the world, over 84% of people belong to or are connected to a religious group.

In the Words of James Joyce, the Church can be called Here Come Everybody and the secular world doesn’t like it. Given Joyce's commitment to expressing the fullness of life, it became necessary for Joyce to use apparently complex techniques, such as 'interior monologue' and 'portmanteau words'. Joyce's obscenities and tricks are necessary for his art. “ Purity activists campaigned tirelessly against Joyce's work; his writing was considered obscene and indecent. In the US, Joyce's second novel, Ulysses, was suppressed, confiscated, burned and, ultimately, banned in a 1921 court case. In the UK, no one dared to publish the book as printers could themselves be imprisoned for typing obscenities. In 1922, Ulysses was finally published in (less-prudish) Paris. However, the book was not legally available in the US or UK until the 1930s” (Hannaway C, 2012)






Earthly Lady Bea






And it only gets better. We have angels! Im looking forward to seeing my little angel Lady Bea, a 15 year old cavachon that died a couple of months back. I know it is not biblical, but I still can hope. An angel is a pure spirit created by God. Discreet but ever faithful, the angels play a vital role in God's plan for our lives. Created as spiritual beings who mediate between us and God, angels serve as our constant companions, advisers, and protectors, watching over us while standing before God's throne in Heaven. He alone "hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto: whom no man hath seen, nor can see (1 Timothy 6:16)






Hope to see Lady Bea in Heaven






Angels do not have man's shortcomings, and can therefore act for God and represent Him when communicating with men and women. They bridge the huge gap between the holiness and perfection of God in heaven and the shortcomings of people on this planet. Angels were made immortal. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word for angel is malak, also meaning messenger. Although the word "angel" in the Bible, meaning a messenger, nearly always applies to heavenly beings, it can occasionally apply to human messengers. Malachi himself said a priest was a messenger (malak) of the LORD of hosts (Malachi 2:7), and in the Book of Revelation the elders of the seven churches of Asia were called angels (1:20; 2:1 etc.). But when we meet messengers doing supernatural things, there is no doubt they are heavenly beings - God's messengers, working for Him and for the ultimate benefit of mankind.

St. Thomas tells us that the Archangels bear the greatest messages of God to man. They are the chief messengers (arch-aggelos); ruling, as well, over the lesser messengers, or angels, as their chiefs. It is from this latter choir that St. Thomas asserts that the Guardian Angels of individuals are taken.

Seeing Angels: However, the Church has a saint for everyone, not just the young, the healthy or well-educated.  Saint Drogo is a saint for the ugly people and coffee, for example. There is a saint for the bad comedian, the farmer and even the IRS agents! And we are all called to become saints, to be perfected in charity, to grow in holiness (Lumen Gentium, Light to the Nations, 11).  The good news is that we don’t have to move mountains to be a saint. We don’t have to write theological works, be a visionary, or found a religious order. We certainly don’t need any kind of worldly standing or lofty profession. The humblest life can be the pathway to great sanctity.  St. Isidore the Farmer  comes to mind: he was a simple man who worked all his life as a farmer for a wealthy landowner. When St. Isidore, went to Mass in the early morning, his coworkers complained about Isidore being late to work,  but two angels appearing as young men would plow and cultivate his plot and Isidore’s work was always done.

Then there is Saint Germaine.  St. Germaine Cousin was born with a  withered and paralyzed right hand losing her mother when she was only a child. After the death of her mother, her father remarried and St. Germaine was treated harshly by her stepmother and was denied a real place of her own in the family home. She relegated to worked as a shepherdess for the family and slept in the stables. She was denied practically any contact with her stepbrothers and stepsisters. Each morning, St. Germaine would stick her staff in the ground in the middle of her flock. An angel would come to watch the flock while she left to attend Mass. Despite wolves in the area, she never lost a sheep While her homelife was horrible, her inner life was the opposite. She was a pure soul, in constant contact with God, daily praying the rosary and attending Mass. She died at the tender age of 22 and a half century after her death her body was found to be incorrupt.

Then there's The Third Law of Angelic Warfare: In his introduction to The Screwtape Letters, a brilliant work exposing the unseen spiritual warfare taking place around all of us which uses a series of letters between two demons - the older Screwtape, an instructor and the younger student Wormwood - the great apologist CS Lewis wrote - There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. They themselves are equally pleased by both errors and hail a materialist or a magician with the same delight. 

Abrahamic religions often depict angels as benevolent celestial intermediaries between God and humanity. Other roles include protectors and guides for humans, and servants of God. Abrahamic religions describe angelic hierarchies, which vary by religion and sect. Some angels have specific names (such as Gabriel or Michael) or titles such as seraph or archangel. Those expelled from Heaven are called fallen angels, distinct from the heavenly host. Angels in art are usually shaped like humans of extraordinary beauty. They are often identified in Christian artwork with bird wings, halos and divine light. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel

 

Pope Leo XIII composed the St. Michael Prayer:  “Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle. Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him we humbly pray; and do Thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host, by the Power of God, cast into hell Satan and all the evil spirits, who prowl through the world seeking the ruin of souls.  Amen”

He composed the prayer after receiving a terrifying vision of the future of the Church - entrusting the Church to her guardian St. Michael. Most importantly, Jesus himself had deep friendship with the angels who ministered to him in his moments of suffering. And it was the fallen angels who tempted him: The Spirit drove Jesus out into the desert, and he remained in the desert for forty days, tempted by Satan. He was among wild beasts, and the angels ministered to him.  Mark 1:12–13

In the book, Encounters with Angels,  Odile Haumonté combines scripture, tradition, and the testimony of saints who met angels face-to-face to show how to identify the signs of angelic presences here and now, Where angels are present in the Mass and the role they play in your prayers,  about guardian angels and their unique purpose in family prayer and gatherings. How angels help us to nurture our children’s desire for God. And  how to discern the angels' actions in your life.  Haumonté  is a Catholic publisher and is the editor-in-chief of the magazine Patapon, which is designed to enable people to grow as a family with Jesus. She is the author of about fifty books, including biographies and novels.

 

Cheers.  Cheers to Saint Michael, Cheers to all the Angels around us.

 

 

 

War On Life: Mark Houck

You might recall that after the Kyle Rittenhouse trial, there were good news and really bad news for the pro-life movement. The good news were that the judge dismissed seven of the fifteen felony criminal charges against pro-life citizen journalist David Daleiden stemming from his undercover investigation of Planned Parenthood, leaving him facing eight felony counts.

The bad news seemed to be the California Attorney General added a ninth felony charge at David’s arraignment.
Bur the really bad news appeared to be that David may have to stand trial before another San Francisco jury which will decide whether he spends a decade locked away in a state penitentiary.

Why? Because this young man had the courage to lead an undercover investigation that captured video evidence of the abortion goliath conspiring to illegally harvest and sell aborted baby body parts.

But it just got worse:  Days after President Joe Biden's divisive speech to the nation and the FBI designating patriotic symbology as indicative of domestic terrorism, more than 20 FBI agents in full SWAT gear arrested pro-life Catholic husband and father Mark Houck.

According to Congressman Gary Palmer, “If history properly reflects President Biden’s political address to the nation, it will be viewed as one of the most disturbingly divisive speeches from the mouth of an American"  

So why the raid on Mark? Because he was praying outside an abortion clinic and defending his 12-year-old son from being screamed at and chased by a pro-abortion “bodyguard” who tried to stop them from praying.


Contrary to what the DOJ may claim, Mark didn’t commit a single actual crime. He didn’t do anything wrong. All he did was pray and defend his young son from being harassed by a pro-abortion fanatic.


Yet Mark, like David. faces up to 11 years in federal prison on phony, drummed-up charges. So Who approved this outrageous raid? Who decided to put the full weight of the FBI and Department of Justice into targeting pro-life Catholics
And why haven’t the DOJ and FBI arrested one single person responsible for bombing, burning, and vandalizing pro-life pregnancy resource centers and Catholic churches?

Perhaps they wanted this raid to happen. so as to silence the pro-life American who dares to speak out against abortion? 

If you want more information about Mark or want to help his cause, contact the Catholic Vote

St Vincent De Paul, Patron Saint of Charities

In Giovanni Boccacio's stories, Abraham a Jewish businessman converts to Catholicism after visiting Rome. He witnesses the corruption and  concludes "that what these scoundrel clerics so zealously want never takes root." Therefore, Abraham concludes: "It is quite to me your Church must have the Holy Spirit for its foundation & support"

Just like Abraham,  Vincent originally became a priest to pursue a life of leisure, but that changed after he heard the confession of an impoverished dying man;  The deathbed confession of a dying servant opened Vincent de Paul’s eyes to the crying spiritual needs of the peasantry of France. This seems to have been a crucial moment in the life of the man from a small farm in Gascony, France, who had become a priest with little more ambition than to have a comfortable life.

The Countess de Gondi—whose servant he had helped—persuaded her husband to endow and support a group of able and zealous missionaries who would work among poor tenant farmers and country people in general. Vincent was too humble to accept leadership at first, but after working for some time in Paris among imprisoned galley slaves, he returned to be the leader of what is now known as the Congregation of the Mission, or the Vincentians. These priests, with vows of poverty, chastity, obedience, and stability, were to devote themselves entirely to the people in smaller towns and villages. - The Franciscan Media



Later, Vincent established confraternities of charity for the spiritual and physical relief of the poor and sick of each parish. From these, with the help of Saint Louise de Marillac, came the Daughters of Charity. The Daughters of Charity introduced him to low-income families, and Vincent brought them food and comfort. He mobilized wealthy women in his native France to collect funds for hospitals,  victims of war, and to ransom 1,200 enslaved people from North Africa.

These days St. Vincent de Paul is known as the patron saint of charity, and today we celebrate his feast day.  Renowned for his compassion, humility, and generosity.


Like many saints and by his own admission, Vincent was a hard person to get along—even his friends admitted it. He said that except for the grace of God he would have been “hard and repulsive, rough and cross.” But he became a tender and affectionate man, very sensitive to the needs of others.

Vincent was canonized in 1737. Pope Leo XIII made him the patron of all charitable societies, including the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, founded in 1833 by Blessed Frédéric Ozanam.


The Society is a lay Catholic organisation and does not receive any direct funding from the Catholic Church. The Society enjoys a close relationship with the Catholic Church and is assisted through parishes and schools.

Blessed Carlo Acutis, Patron Saint of the Internet

Carlo Acutis, patron saint of the Internet, was noted for his cheerfulness, computer skills, and deep devotion to the Eucharist, which becomes a core theme of his life. He was beatified on 10 October 2020, two days before the 14th anniversary of his death.

At the conclusion of the 27th National Eucharistic Congress Pope Francis reminded Christians there is no eucharistic worship without compassion for the poor

 
Carlo was an English-born Italian Catholic youth and amateur computer programmer, who is best known for documenting Eucharistic miracles around the world and cataloguing them onto a website which he created before his death from leukemia in 2006


He is the youngest contemporary person to be beatified - a path taken by two Portuguese shepherd children living in the early 1900s who were proclaimed Catholic saints; Francisco de Jesus Marto and Jacinta de Jesus Marto were siblings from Aljustrel, a small hamlet near Fátima, Portugal, who with their cousin Lúcia dos Santos reportedly witnessed three apparitions of the Angel of Peace in 1916 and several apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Cova da Iria in 1917. The title Our Lady of Fátima was given to the Virgin Mary as a result, and the Sanctuary of Fátima.

EWTN Beatification Mass 

Carlo is set to be the first millennial saint and is already known as the "patron saint of the internet"


Reportedly Carlo's last words:
"To be always united with Jesus, this is my plan of life. living with Jesus, for Jesus, in Jesus. I am happy to die because I lived my life without wasting even a minute of it on anything unpleasing to God”.



10 things about Carlo Acutis

As a teenager, Carlo was diagnosed with leukemia. He offered his sufferings for Pope Benedict XVI and for the Church, saying “"I offer all the suffering I will have to suffer for the Lord, for the Pope, and the Church.”

He died on Oct. 12, 2006, and was buried in Assisi, at his request, because of his love for St. Francis of Assisi. His cause for canonization began in 2013. He was designated “Venerable” in 2018, and was designated “Blessed” October 10, 2020.

Carlo's witness of faith led to a deep conversion in his mom, because, according to the priest promoting his cause for sainthood, he “managed to drag his relatives, his parents to Mass every day.

He was known for defending kids at school who got picked on, especially disabled kids.

He was a programmer and built a website cataloguing and promoting Eucharistic miracles. On the site, he told people that "the more often we receive the Eucharist, the more we will become like Jesus, so that on this earth we will have a foretaste of heaven."

Happy Feast of Saint Matthew

Today is the Feast of Saint Matthew. Saint Matthew was an IRS agent  for the Romans, not a very popular position with the general public then and certainly not now. He was even less with the Jewish people known as the Pharisees. Jews who held this office were not permitted to marry a Jewish woman nor worship in the synagogue and were generally shunned by civil society.

According to Catholic Culture, St. Matthew is known to us principally as an Evangelist, with his Gospel being the first in position in the New Testament. His Gospel was written to convince the Jews that their anticipated Messiah had come in the person of Jesus. While not much else is known about Matthew. According to tradition, he preached in Egypt and Ethiopia and further places East. Some legends say he lived until his nineties, dying a peaceful death, others say he died a martyr's death. In the traditional symbolization of the evangelists, based on Ezech. 1:5-10 and Rev. 4:6-7, the image of the winged man is accorded to Matthew because his Gospel begins with the human genealogy of Christ.

Today's IRS agents' job description include willingness to use fire arms, even considering that an unarmed IRS agent can be more lethal than 100 armed FBI agents. No wonder tax-collectors are shunned by society, Matthew's life; however. changed when Jesus tells him “Follow me.” Matthew, does not hesitate.  He leaves everything  and becomes a disciple of Jesus, embracing his teachings. When the scribes of the Pharisees saw Jesus eating with tax collectors and sinners, they quickly criticized Him. Whereupon Jesus answered, “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners” (Mark 2:15–17). According to Luke 5:29, the aforementioned dinner was given by Levi in his house after his call.

Because of Matthew's duties as a public official, the Church has designated him as the patron saint of civil servants and all who serve government in some capacity. He is also patron saint of  Accountants; bankers; bookkeepers; customs officers; security guards; stock brokers and  Salerno, Italy.

Symbols: Angel holding a pen or inkwell; bag of coins; loose coins; halberd; inkwell; king; lance; man holding money; man holding money box and/or glasses; money bag; money box; purse; spear; sword; winged man; young man; book; man sitting at a desk.

Sadly, modern day civil servants, like Alexandria Ocasio Cortez don't view themselves as servants, more like bosses Matthew, pray for all civil servants & government workers

 

Today is Feast of the Assumption

On August 15, the Feast of the Assumption (The Assumption) is widely celebrated all over Christendom. This holy day marks the occasion of the Virgin Mary’s bodily ascent to heaven at the end of her life. In some places, the Assumption celebrations are accompanied by festivals, street processions, fireworks, pageantry and the blessing the summer harvest. The devoted light candles, attend masses, and pray for peace all over the world.

Assumption of the Virgin, by Pierre-Paul Prud’hon (1758-1823) (WikiPaintings

The Catholic Church teaches as dogma that the Virgin Mary “having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.” This doctrine was dogmatically defined by Pope Pius XII on November 1, 1950, in the Apostolic Constitution Munificentissimus Deus, (The Most Bountiful God)



Munificentissimus Deus is the apostolic constitution defining ex cathedra the dogma of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. It was the first ex-cathedra infallible statement since the official ruling on papal infallibility was made at the First Vatican Council.-
"for an encyclical to be infallible the Pope must speak ex cathedra

The declaration did not imply the belief in the Assumption was something new, as there is evidence of the belief as early as the 4th century in text that covers several different languages and a fairly wide geographical dispersion. Teaching of the Assumption of Mary became widespread across the Christian world, having been celebrated liturgically as early as the 5th century in the East. It was celebrated in the West under Pope Sergius I in the 8th century and Pope Leo IV then confirmed the feast as official.

In 1950 Pope Pius XII defined the Assumption as dogma for the Catholic Church. 

Sola Scriptura was Martin Luther's answer to the question of where the authentic teaching of Christ is found on Scripture alone, rejecting the Catholic Church's belief that oral teachings of the Apostols transmitted by the Church (Tradition, literally, “the handing on” as also Sacred and Spirit-inspired,) as well as the dogmatic teachings of the Pope's and councils.   Given Sola Scritura, Luther decided to do away with priests, religious, most of the sacraments and the hierarchy. When he realized that there had to be an authority to settle disputes within the Lutheran community, he appealed to the local duke.



The word Assumption or dormition of Mary are not mentioned in the Bible. Assumption is based on a theological conclusion because of other indirect references to it in the Scriptures. For example, at the Annunciation (celebrated March 25th, nine months before December 25th), the Angel Gabriel declared Mary to be “full of Grace” and “God’s highly favored daughter.” (Lk 1:28) Mary conceived Jesus, the Son of God, by the power of the Holy Spirit as a consequence of accepting God’s plan for her. Further, when Mary visited her cousin Elizabeth, who herself was pregnant with John the Baptist, she addressed Mary with the words, “Who am I that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (Lk 1:42) All these biblical statements led the Church to conclude that because of her role as Mother of the Messiah, Mary would be preserved from original sin and its consequences. Her freedom from sin was accomplished by reason of Jesus’ foreseen redemptive death on the cross. As such it would not be possible for Mary, whose womb carried the Son of God, to suffer the corruption of the body that all people experience after death. 


In Munificentissimus Deus (item 39), Pope Pius XII pointed to the Book of Genesis (3:15) as scriptural support for the dogma in terms of Mary’s victory over sin and death as also reflected in 1 Corinthians 15:54: “then shall come to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.” In this passage Paul alludes to Genesis 3:15 (in addition to the primary reference of Psalms 8:6), where it is prophesied that the seed of the woman will crush Satan with his feet. Since, then, Jesus arose to Heaven to fulfill this prophecy, it follows that the woman would have a similar end, since she shared this enmity with Satan. 

The pope also mentioned Psalm 132, a liturgical psalm commemorating the return of the Ark of God to Jerusalem and lamenting its subsequent loss. The second half of the psalm says that the loss will be recompensed in the New Covenant, and so it is hopefully prayed, “Arise, O Lord, into thy resting place: thou and the ark, which thou hast sanctified.” (v. 8) Since the Church sees this New Covenant ark in Mary, it understands that she was taken into Heaven in the same manner as the Lord – that is, body and soul. 

Finally, he mentioned in the next paragraph “that woman clothed with the sun [Revelation 12:1–2] whom John the Apostle contemplated on the Island of Patmos” as support for the doctrine.

Assumption of the Virgin, by Pierre-Paul Prud’hon (1758-1823) (WikiPaintings) 

Myra Flores & Faith, Family, Country Homily

Father Nathe Homily was based on  Luke 12:49: “I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!." Father Nathe explained how Jesus talked about His desire to have the world follow Him.  Father Nathe mentioned U.S. Rep. Mayra Flores, “the first Mexican-born member of Congress, run on a Faith, Family, Country Campaign - That is, the right priorities and the associated challenges:  How can a person choose faith over hir or her own family.  Is that even possible.

“I am pro-God, pro-life, pro-family, pro-America. I am the American dream.”
-  Mayra Flores 

The first Mexican- American ever elected to Congress.

Born in Mexico, Flores immigrated to the United States when she was 6 years old and became a legal citizen at 14. She won her seat in Congress last night in a special election held after a Democrat in that district resigned.

She is the first Republican to win a seat in the Rio Grande Valley in over 150 years! 

Father Nathe went on to conclude that faith is family, indivisible. Hence, the decision is not either or.

For the record, "fact-checkers" immediately after Flores was elected, they

 got on the story:  When "fact-checkers" want to split hairs to rain on cobservatives' parade


"Although Flores, who was born in Burgos, Tamaulipas, Mexico, is the first Mexican-born woman elected to Congress, she is not the first Mexican-born member of Congress."

https://www.statesman.com/story/news/politics/politifact/2022/07/17/politifact-mayra-flores-not-first-mexican-born-member-of-congress/65374410007/

Of Saints, The Devil's Advocate and the Grunt Padre's Sainthood Process

While the sainthood cause for the Grunt Padre, Father Vincent Capodanno - who died from 27 bullet wounds on a Vietnam battlefield as a military chaplain to U.S. Marines is experiencing a snag since Consultants to the Vatican body tasked with judging possible saints have recommended the suspension of Capodanno’s cause, the process is illustrative of the Devil's Advocate:  The Devil's Advocate is a Church's construct. In the early days of Christianity, local communities would determine who was a saint, post mortem.  To better authenticate the canonization, the Church at around 1450 devised a position known as Diaboli Advocatus - Devil's Advocate. The Devil's Advocate job was to cast doubt on the virtues and miracles reported when a holy man or woman was brought to the pope to be recognized as a saint. Sort of what the New York Times does today.

The Church knew that miracles can often be confused with other things, and that, unfortunately, fallen humans sometimes make up stories for the purposes of fame or attention. She also knew that demons have certain powers that can make certain things appear miraculous. The Church has also developed a protocol to validate miraculous occurrence, focusing on those that have public repercussions, such as the miraculous healings attributed to the saints that, if validated, will advance their cause for canonization. Eucharistic miracles are another form of miracle that often warrants her attention, since they draw venerators and it is important to ensure that the miracle is authentic. 

In all these investigations, the Church is careful, not only using a Devil's Advocate but also doctors, scientists, and competent authorities in order to rule out natural explanations or to understand the phenomenon better. Only when she has completed this stringent process does she validate the miracle. In response to my piece celebrating the Unsung American Heroines during the recent International Women’s Day, Norinda Rosario Yancey has this to say about Saint Mother Teresa “I would recommend reading a little more about Mother Teresa. She was quite troubled emotionally and spiritually. Though morbid, there is speculation based on her writings that she was oddly fascinated and may have even taken some pleasure in witnessing the starvation and illness of those she is said to have cared for. It’s fascinating really, but I no longer regard her as a hero.” Yancey describes herself as an educator and a Metro Parks Tacoma, Washington employee and a JEDAI

Servant of God Father Vincent Capodanno died shielding a fellow Marine. He died from 27 bullet wounds. (photo: Public domain / Public domain)

Meanwhile, Vincent Robert Capodanno was born on Staten Island, New York, to Italian immigrant parents. In 1957, he was ordained a Catholic priest by Cardinal Francis Spellman, then vicar of the U.S. Military Ordinariate. He entered the Maryknoll religious order and served as a missionary in Taiwan and Hong Kong from 1958 to 1965. After he successfully petitioned his Maryknoll superiors to release him to serve as a U.S. Navy chaplain. In Vietnam, he held the rank of lieutenant and took part in seven combat operations. During the Operation Swift campaign, Father Capodanno was injured by an exploding mortar round that caused multiple injuries to his arms and legs and severed part of his right hand. He continued to tend to the wounded and nearly lost his hand to shrapnel. Despite his wounds, he refused care so that medical supplies could go to his injured Marines.The priest directed Marines to help the wounded and continued to move about the battlefield, encouraging them with his words and example. While seeking to aid one particular Marine, he put his own body between the wounded man and an enemy machine gunner who opened fire. He died from 27 bullet wounds. He was posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, the Navy Bronze Star medal, the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry with Silver Star, and the Purple Heart Medal.

In May, an advisory panel of theological consultants considered the positio document prepared by the postulator and its arguments in favor of and against Father Capodanno’s beatification. In the Catholic Church, a positio is a document or collection of documents used in the process by which a person is declared Venerable, the second of the four steps on the path to canonization as a saint. The consultants voted to recommend to the dicastery that Father Capodanno’s cause be suspended. At the Vatican, the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints is responsible for canonization decisions. The piece by Kevin J. Jones titled, Sainthood Cause for Father Vincent Capodanno Sees Setback illustrates the Devil's Advocate position for Father Grunt, as well as that of his supporters and concludes that Fagther Grunt's "supporters remain hopeful that an appeal will resume the efforts

Infamy Lives On. Journalistic Integrity Drained

Poison was not involved, domestic terrorism, bribery, corruption, and abuse of power not involved either. Last year  Alexei Navalny was sentenced during a hearing in Moscow after being charged with violating his probation by travelling to Germany for life-saving treatment and was sentenced to two and a half years in prison, having already spent one year under house arrest, then police beat and arrested protesters who came out to support Navalny.  Meanwhile Chinese President Xi Jinping's biggest rival at one time, Sun Zhengcai, was just sentenced to life in prison.Zhengcai, the former Communist Party secretary for the city of Chongqing, was found guilty on of taking $26.7 million in bribes. He was given a life sentence and all his personal property and "illegal gains" will be confiscated. Sun is the most senior leader to be caught up in Xi's anti-corruption crackdown which has focused on bribery and misuse of public funds, but it has also drawn criticism for its focus on Xi's political enemies.  Then there is the outrageous case of the abuse of human rights, as the Hugo Chávez regime in Venezuela  arrested anti-communist activist Alejandro Peña Esclusa on trumped-up charges of being a terrorist. The president of UnoAmerica, an anti-communist alliance, and the author of The Foro de São Paulo: A Threat to Freedom in Latin America, Peña Esclusa is a former Venezuelan presidential candidate who has opposed efforts by the Chavez regime to spread Marxist revolution in Venezuela and throughout the region. 

Much More consequential is Department of Justice sending the FBI last night to raid former President Trump’s private home in Florida:  This is just what authoritarian regimes do.  This day will live in Infamy. The "Day of Infamy" speech was delivered by Franklin D. Roosevelt, the 32nd president of the United States, to a joint session of Congress on December 8, 1941. The previous day, the Empire of Japan attacked the United States military bases at the Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and the Philippines, and declared war on the United States and the British Empire. Yesterday's DOJ attack on a political opponent is an existential threat to the United States of America.  Yet Reuters Legal minimizes the even as merely a fund raising ruse! NY Times Charlie Savage fantasized about banning President Trump from ever holding office.  They framed President Trump with a Russian Hoax aided by 17 Intelligence Agencies, but they are not giving up.  The want to cancel the Trump Family

And CNN minimizes the even as simply a partisan issue: "Top congressional Republicans are rushing to former President Donald Trump's defense after the FBI executed a search warrant at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida as part of an investigation into the handling of potentially classified material."  It is not!  It is an attack on the United States of America by an out of control bureaucracy that just last week characterized patriotic symbols as symptomatic of domestic terrorism.

Even Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, when asked about the DOJ comes up with a vacuous, "no one is above the law" response.  The good news is that Former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang, tweeted: “This raid strengthens that case for millions of Americans who will see this as unjust persecution.” Former former NY Governor Andrew Cuomo opined: “DOJ must immediately explain the reason for its raid…and it must be more than a search for inconsequential archives or it will be viewed as a political tactic and undermine any future credible investigation & legitimacy of January 6 investigations.”

 As of this moment, the Department of Justice has yet to explain why they raided Trump’s home. Asked today, the White House press secretary said President Biden had no advance notice of the raid and learned about it from the news like everyone else. There are some so-called journalists speculating that the raid may be related to President Trump or his aides holding on to classified documents.  Get it? Louis Keene even defends Judge Bruce Reinhart, a former prosecutor who as been criticized for representing former employees of Jeffrey Epstein related to his sex-trafficking scandal tries to connect the judge as being on  the board of a South Florida synagogue.  As if  that was some sort of absolution,  The Day will live in Infamy and any Journalistic Integrity left has been drained. 

TX Woman Partnered With Coyote Charged After Holding 17 Hostage

The U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Chad E. Meacham announced today that Manuela Magdalena Jimon Castro, 30, who held 17 undocumented immigrants hostage in her home has been charged with alien harboring. According to the complaint, Ms. Castro and a family member partnered with a coyote  operation to hold undocumented individuals hostage at their home, threatening to deprive them of food and water and refusing to allow them to leave until they paid $11,000 to $12,000 or “worked off” the debt. A coyote or pollero is someone who specializes in human smuggling, bringing people across the United States border from Mexico. Coyotes typically have extensive experience in smuggling people and other goods, and they use a variety of techniques to get their clients over the border, ranging from sneaking across the desert to hiding smuggled immigrants in trucks. Illegal border crossings are often extremely dangerous, and many coyotes command a high fee as a result; often, this fee must be paid up front, in case an immigrant does not make it across

The investigation began when law enforcement in California received a tip from a woman who claimed her sister was being held for ransom in Texas. The woman reported that her sister had traveled from Guatemala to Mexico with the intention of seeking asylum in the United States, then crossed the border at the behest of a Mexican cartel who held her captive. She said her sister sent her a pin of a location in Friona before she escaped.

The woman said that while in Mexico, she was forced into a car at gunpoint by individuals she believed to be members of a smuggling cartel. After several months, they walked her across the southern border, then shuttled her from house to house in Texas and New Mexico, refusing to let her go until she paid off her debt. Eventually, she ended up at the Castro residence, where she was told she would be detained until she paid $12,000.

After  law enforcement searched the Castro home, they recovered 17 undocumented immigrants, including two minor children. Most of the individuals attempted to hide, concealing themselves in the attic, in cupboards, or inside totes covered in blankets.  The recovered immigrants admitted that they had entered the country illegally with smugglers. They indicated that the smugglers had confiscated their cell phones, and only allowed intermittent contact with family members in order to obtain money to pay their “entrance fees.” Several stated that they believed they had to stay at the residence in Friona until their entrance fee had been paid in full.

The case is a vivid reminder of the dangers of illigal immigration, as well as the consequences of lax border security as  Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas when he spoke at the Aspen Security Forum a couple of weeks ago claimed that the southern border "is secure" – even as Border Patrol agents are facing historic migrant numbers.He was asked about the situation at the southern border , which has seen more than 200,000 migrant encounters a month in the last four months. But, even though he acknowledged the situation is a historic challenge, the secretary claimed the border is "secure.  And Washington, D.C.’s Democrat Mayor Muriel Bowser admitted that the capital city is overwhelmed by an influx of illegal immigrants who are being bused in from the U.S.-Mexico border. New York City’s Democrat Mayor Eric Adams later echoed Bowser’s frustrations. Texas and Arizona started busing illegal immigrants to D.C. earlier this year in an effort to alleviate the strain border communities are feeling due to the mass influx of migrants across the Southern border

Overview of FBI's Wray Statement to Judiciary Committee: CommissionS and Omissions

The FBI's Director Wray submitted a 42,000+ word statement Thursday to the Senate Judiciary Committee holding up the exemplary work the Bureau is doing addressing its top priorities, which the Federalist's Jordan Boyd  characterizes as  FBI Director Sets New Record For Lies, Dodges, And Obfuscations To Avoid Slight Attempts At Congressional Oversight:  FBI Director Christopher Wray refused to answer legislators’ questions about his agency’s history of corruption and cover-ups and instead doubled down on defending the FBI’s actions against U.S. citizens during a Senate Judiciary hearing on Thursday. Senators on both sides of the aisle explained their frustrations with the FBI’s lack of transparency and response to their various letters inquiring about threats around the country. “There is the perception that there are two tiers of justice: one for people that are favored and one for ordinary Americans,” Sen. Marsha Blackburn noted during her interrogation

This piece, an overview includes Wray's commissions and omissions.  The FBI Priorities are to protect the United States from terrorist attacks, Protect the United States against foreign intelligence operations, espionage, and cyber operations, Combat significant cyber criminal activity, Combat public corruption at all levels, Protect civil rights, Combat transnational criminal enterprises, Combat major white-collar crime, Combat significant violent crime

As for terrorism, Wray discussed both domestic and international terrorism, and characterized them both as evolving, According to Wray's statement, the top domestic terrorism threat the FBI categorizes as racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists, including those who advocate for the superiority of the white race, who were the primary source of lethal attacks in recent years." 

In his testimony, Wray's view of Domestic Terrorists not unlike Branco's illustration 

And added that "It is important to note that we have also recently seen an increase in fatal domestice violent attacks perpetrated by anti-government or anti-authority violent extremists, specifically militia violent extremists and anarchist violent extremists" and apparent reference to the January 6, 2020 Capitol breach.  Wray dismisses the riots, looting and violence across America, Mainstream Media characterizes as mostly peaceful protests by ANTIFA and Black Lives Matters 

In discussing foreign terrorist organizations (FTO) Wray states that the Bureau " remains concerned that FTOs, such as ISIS and al-Qa’ida and their affiliates, intend to carry out or inspire large-scale attacks in the United States. Despite its loss of physical territory in Iraq and Syria, ISIS remains relentless in its campaign of violence against the United States and our partners—both here at home and overseas." And added that  Al-Qa’ida maintains its desire to both conduct and inspire large-scale, spectacular attacks, while "Iran and its global proxies and partners, including Iraqi Shia militant groups, continue to attack and plot against the United States and our allies throughout the Middle East in response to U.S. pressure"

According to Wray, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF) continues to provide support to militant resistance groups and terrorist organizations. Iran also continues to support Lebanese Hizballah and other terrorist groups. Hizballah has sent operatives to build terrorist infrastructures worldwide. The arrests of individuals in the United States allegedly linked to Hizballah’s main overseas terrorist arm, and their intelligence collection and procurement efforts, demonstrate Hizballah’s interest in long-term contingency planning activities here in the homeland. Hizballah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah also has threatened retaliation for the death of IRGC-QF Commander Qassem Soleimani. Wray 's statement did not mention  that Iran gave the White House a reason to abandon appeasement but still will not do i - when  the leaders of Iran’s Islamist regime  removed 27 cameras that were supposed to allow the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to monitor its nuclear program. or as Jonathan S Tobin might say:  Perhaps they meant it to test the mettle of the West and its willingness to hold them accountable for their behavior?  It could be one more bargaining trick they’ve pulled out of their sleeve as they wait patiently for the Biden administration to crack and offer more concessions in order to get Tehran to sign on to a new and even weaker nuclear deal than the bargain it struck in 2015 under the Obama administration.

Director Wray then went on to discus cyber threats and extol the work has been doing in the area: In total, the FBI took over 1,100 actions against cyber adversaries last year, to include arrests, criminal charges, convictions, dismantlements, and disruptions and enabled many more actions through our dedicated partnerships with the private sector, foreign partners, and with federal, state, and local entities. We also provided thousands of individualized threat warnings and disseminated more than 100 public threat advisories by way of Joint Cybersecurity Advisories, FBI Liaison Alert System (FLASH) reports, Private Industry Notifications (PINs), and Public Service Announcements (PSAs), many of which were jointly authored with other U.S. agencies and international partner.  Director Wray, did not discuss how the premier law enforcement in the world's email system was compromised by hackers who sent fake cyberattack alert

Wray discussed how the FBI following the 2018 midterm elections, reviewed the threat of foreign influence and the effectiveness of its coordination and outreach. As a result of the  review, it further expanded the scope to widened its aperture to confront malign foreign operations of the PRC, Iran, and other global adversaries. Conspicuously  absent  from Wray's statement was the role the FBI and the 17 Intelligence Agencies played in the handling of the Russian Dossier Hoax.  Wray added The FBI will continue to investigate this threat leading up to the FY 2022 mid-term election and will not stop working with our partners to impose costs on adversaries who have or are seeking to influence or interfere in our elections"

Addressing criminal threats, Wray wrote that the Bureau continues to face many criminal threats, from complex white-collar fraud in the financial, health care, and housing sectors to transnational and regional organized criminal enterprises to violent crime and public corruption, and attributed high crime rate to gang activity.  

Wray did not mention that politicians promoting Defund the Police policies, inciting riots or soft-on-crime district attorneys played a role in the all time high crime sweeping the nation

 "Many of today’s gangs are sophisticated and well organized and use violence to control neighborhoods and boost their illegal money-making activities, which include robbery, drug and gun trafficking, fraud, extortion, and prostitution rings. These gangs do not limit their illegal activities to single jurisdictions or communities. The FBI is able to work across such lines, which is vital to the fight against violent crime in big cities and small towns across the nation. Every day, FBI special agents work in partnership with federal, state, local, and tribal officers and deputies on joint task forces and individual investigations.  

 FBI’s work in Indian Country increased significantly due to the July 9, 2020, Supreme Court ruling in McGirt v. Oklahoma, and Wray appealed for additional resources as a result of the recent McGirt v. Oklahoma  - McGirt v. Oklahoma, 591 U.S.  (2020), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case which ruled that, as pertaining to the Major Crimes Act, much of the eastern portion of the state of Oklahoma remains as Native American lands of the prior Indian reservations of the Five Civilized Tribes, never disestablished by Congress as part of the Oklahoma Enabling Act of 1906. As such, prosecution of crimes by Native Americans on these lands falls into the jurisdiction of the tribal courts and federal judiciary under the Major Crimes Act, rather than Oklahoma's courts. In the wake of McGirt, Oklahoma state courts began reviewing and vacating past criminal cases heard at state courts involving Native Americans and transferred their overview to federal courts. However, this included crimes where the defendants were non-Native Americans but the victims were, which state government and law authorities believed was beyond the intent of the McGirt decision. In 2022 the Supreme Court ruled in Oklahoma v. Castro-Huerta that prosecution of non-Native Americans on tribal lands was jointly held by federal and the state. Wray did not discuss  How Progressive policies, Tribal Leaders & corrupt politicians have failed Native Americas & Alaska Natives

As for Transnational Organized Crime (TOC) Wray says that TOC groups increasingly exploit jurisdictional boundaries to conduct their criminal activities overseas. Furthermore, they are expanding their use of emerging technology to traffic illicit drugs and contraband across international borders and into the U.S.

Wray said that FBI’s ability to learn about and investigate child sexual exploitation is being threatened by the proliferation of sites online on the Darknet. Wray did not discuss how FBI agents disregarded allegations by Olympic gymnasts that they were sexually assaulted by former national team doctor Larry Nassar and later made false statements to cover their mistakes, Justice Department investigators said in a long-awaited report on the bureau’s handling of one of the biggest abuse cases in U.S. sports history. Or why Ghislaine Maxwell’s got [referential treatment by Judge Alison Nathan and brief sentence and why the FBI has not gone after Epstein’s Clients

As to civil rights, Wray said the FBI remains dedicated to protecting the cherished freedoms of all Americans. Civil rights crimes including color of law violations, hate crimes, Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act violations, voter suppression, and human trafficking.  Director Wray did not mention that most reports conclude that although completely accurate numbers are probably not available, researchers generally agree that among ethnic minority groups in the United States, Blacks are the most likely to experience domestic violence followed by Hispanics and then Whites. In 1965 25% of African American children were raised fatherless. Today is up to 75% and soon The African American nuclear family may join Sea Turtles on the most endangered species list

. In an earlier piece, we wrote “Appointing a Diversity Officer (such as the FBI’s first CDO) based on her color or sexual preference, or the FBI teaming up with the Girl Scouts, or even the FBI’s incessant press releases warning the nation about reporting hate crime may result in unintended consequences, such as hate crime hoaxes or promoting the LGBT lifestyle.

 All these are cultural signs, where culture is used as a form of social control. If you do not like the culture or the signs or language that define that culture, you do not belong! That is not diversity! That is indoctrination.“  Wray did not say who, on a prorated basis, is more likely to commit hate crimes 

Director Wray also lobbied for additional tools in the area of "lawful access:" The problems caused by law enforcement agencies’ inability to access electronic evidence continue to grow. Increasingly, commercial device manufacturers have employed encryption in such a manner that only the device users can access the content of the devices. This is commonly referred to as “user-only-access” device encryption. Similarly, more and more communications service providers are designing their platforms and apps such that only the parties to the communication can access the content. This is generally known as “end-to-end” encryption. The proliferation of end-to-end and user-only-access encryption is a serious issue that increasingly limits law enforcement’s ability, even after obtaining a lawful warrant or court order, to access critical evidence and information needed to disrupt threats, protect the public, and bring perpetrators to justice. Wray did not discuss how The FBI conducted as many as 3.4 million searches of data in the U.S. without a warrant over the year 2021, according to the  Annual Statistical Transparency Report published by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Thursday and focuses on the intelligence community’s use of national security authorities for surveillance under U.S. law. The information was previously gathered by the National Security Agency, the U.S. military’s signals intelligence agency, but was transferred to the civilian-led FBI per the U.S.A. FREEDOM Act, passed in 2015.

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Can't Let a Crisis Go to Waste: Two arrested in $39M PPE Fraud Scheme

In the Can't Let a Crisis Go to Waste Category,  two suburban Houston men Caleb Jordan McCreless, 32, Richmond, and Christopher Luke McGinnis, 39, Spring, were arrested today in $39M  a personal protection equipment (PPE) fraud scheme. In a six-count indictment returned July 28 McCreless and McGinnis are charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud. McCreless also faces an additional five counts of wire fraud.

According to the indictment, McCreless represented to have access to medical-grade nitrile gloves during heavy demand for medical personal protection equipment amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. During this period, healthcare professionals  on the frontlines were expected to use the gloves.Medical companies allegedly paid him $39 million to buy the in-demand gloves. However, McCreless did not have any gloves at all and never delivered them to anyone that had made purchases, according to the charges. McGinnis served as a logistics operator and delayed or stalled the delivery process when companies became concerned about their order of gloves not arriving, according to the charges.

As a result of the PPE scheme, one victim  lost over $13 million.The indictment also includes the forfeiture of the residence of McCreless in Ft. Bend County which is valued at over $2 million. The charges allege the house was purchased with money profited during the scheme.   If convicted, both men face up to 20 years in federal prison and a possible $250,000 maximum fine.

The FBI and Harris County Constable’s Office - Precinct 1 conducted the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas H. Carter is prosecuting the case.

FBI Publishes Major Handwriting Analysis Study - Use With Caution

Forensic handwriting examination involves the comparison of writing samples by forensic document examiners (FDEs) to determine whether or not they were written by the same person. The FBI’s Laboratory Division, in conjunction with Noblis, Inc., published a major scientific research paper today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences about the accuracy and reliability of forensic handwriting comparison. The study is the largest of its kind, involving more than 80 document examiners from U.S. and international crime laboratories and private practice. Collectively, these examiners made more than 7,000 document comparisons and provided information with which to correlate results to levels of education and experience, along with other metadata.

The paper, “Accuracy and Reliability of Forensic Handwriting Comparisons,” summarizes the results of a five-year project to examine how often forensic handwriting examiners reach correct conclusions when determining whether a document was written by a specific individual by comparing it to samples of known handwriting from that person. The FBI Laboratory undertook this research to provide estimates of error rates—how often document examiners make correct writership decisions—as well as how often an examiner reaches the same conclusion when seeing the same documents again, and how often other examiners reach the same conclusions.

 In the study, eighty-six practicing FDEs each conducted up to 100 handwriting comparisons, resulting in 7,196 conclusions on 180 distinct comparison sets, using a five-level conclusion scale. Erroneous “written by” conclusions (false positives) were reached in 3.1% of the nonmated comparisons, while 1.1% of the mated comparisons yielded erroneous “not written by” conclusions (false negatives). False positive rates were markedly higher for nonmated samples written by twins (8.7%) compared to nontwins (2.5%). 

Notable associations between training and performance were observed: FDEs with less than 2 y of formal training generally had higher error rates, but they also had higher true positive and true negative rates because they tended to provide more definitive conclusions; FDEs with at least 2 y of formal training were less likely to make definitive conclusions, but those definitive conclusions they made were more likely to be correct (higher positive predictive and negative predictive values). The authors did not observe any association between writing style (cursive vs. printing) and rates of errors or incorrect conclusions. The report also provides details on the repeatability and reproducibility of conclusions, and reports how conclusions are affected by the quantity of writing and the similarity of content.

“This large-scale study demonstrates the commitment of the FBI and our partners to critically evaluate forensic examinations widely used throughout the criminal justice system,” said FBI Director Christopher Wray. “Using scientific rigor to affirm the accuracy and reliability of forensic techniques helps protect the integrity of our judicial process and ensure that everyone is treated fairly under the law.”

However, as we have seen with the Pandemic, the problem is not the science, but those who weaponize it, an inside job, or a process flow:  For 2000-plus years we have been warned about the risk of using lawyers, as they are mostly interested in arriving at the best argument money can buy, not uncovering the truth.  This study just feeds into that narrative:  Figures (Science) Dont Lie - Liars figure.