THE RIGHT TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS

Arma virumque cano ("Arms and the man I sing"). Virgil

Whenever there's an "episcopal consecration" in Tradistan, we cringe when our British, Continental, and South American friends kid us about the infamous American habit of plundering others' coats of arms. Our acquaintances aim their barbs not only at the lawless assumption of armorial bearings by bamboozlers who are not bishops of the Roman Catholic Church but also against crudely aspirational goofballs' usurping ancient tokens of gentility on the grounds of a shared surname with a grantee of English arms, who in all likelihood was never a forebear, not even by way of birth on the other side of the blanket.

The Blast in the Morass occasioned another bout of ribbing, this time far less playful owing to the risibly naïve pretense of the description of Junior's DIY heraldic achievement (ROTFL) on pp. II and III of the event's program. However, before we direct our attention to the hideously rococo salmagundi pictured above and its companion valentine to the Clone's last name, we'll first deal with the unrelievable armorial disability attached to the Tradistani religious buccaneers.*

UNARMED BUT STILL DANGEROUS

Ecclesiastical heraldic legislation, which emanates from the Holy See, is a special part of the internal positive law of the Church, wherein it enjoys a special place, for such legislation expressly and clearly identifies an individual's position in the hierarchy by marking rank and dignity. Moreover, it is founded on the dogmatic order, being granted exclusively to the ecclesiastical state, which condition derives from (lawful) ordination or consecration and the exercise of an authentic ecclesiastical office.

Thus, inasmuch as the Tradistanis were illicitly ordained/consecrated outside the Church and accordingly have received no commission from her, they consequently have no jurisdiction or authority. Insofar as they therefore possess no personal or intrinsic right to ecclesiastical insignia (e.g., miter, crozier), their use of emblems of ecclesiastical dignity and office, which they do not possess, is gravely unlawful, not to say patently unnecessary.

Moreover, as a result of their ecclesial position, the sedes won't submit to the rulings of the Congregation of Divine Worship (the successor to the Sacred Congregation of Rites, which had the competence and duty to repress any abuse [see c. 253.1, 1917 CCL]). From the many examples we've seen of their arms, including the above, they must have never forwarded their designs to the Collegio Araldico to determine whether they violated any heraldic rules and/or good taste, as Pope St. Pius X required of new bishops. But in fairness, the counts, nobles, knights, and other swells who compose the college most likely would have consigned, with a very upper-crust sneer, these New-World bumpkins' applications to the round file.

Notwithstanding the defense for receiving illicit holy orders during the ongoing crisis, traditional Catholics must acknowledge that only the Church, insofar as she is a visible, hierarchical, and juridically perfect society, has the right to institute dignities, establish new offices, and confer upon their holders insignia of honor and marks of dignity. Consequently, the mission-less, Tradistani non-clergy, in the eyes of the Church, must necessarily have no right to assume ecclesiastical arms.  If they had an ounce of decency, they would discard their misappropriations at once.

A FAREWELL TO ARMS

Turning now to the gushing paean offered in homage to Junior's surname, found at the beginning of the "consecration's" booklet-length service paper, ** let's evaluate its content in the light of heraldic practice.

As soon as we began to read the program note on Junior's coat of arms, we knew the author, one of the Swampland fake "nuns," was in way over her head. Her very first words assert the Kid's arms are based "on the family crest," and again at the conclusion she writes, "The motto Fiat Voluntas Dei (May the Will of God be Done)... appears on the family crest...." (Emphases ours.)

A very inauspicious beginning and end for the fan letter — second only to the howling violation of the basic rule of composition of arms, the Rule of Tincture, which forbids placement of a color on a color. You can see the howler for yourself above: Azure a saltire engrailed sable!!!  Such arms are called armes fausses ("a false coat of arms") or armes pour enquérir  ("a coat of arms to be investigated"). ***

As Marvin Grosswirth wrote in The Heraldry Book, "It is a clear mark of heraldic ignorance when someone uses the term 'crest' when referring to a coat of arms. Beware of heraldic merchants offering to sell you a 'family crest.'" A crest, according to J.P. Brooke-Little, Clarenceux King of Arms, is "an hereditary device, modeled onto the top of the helm and part of an achievement of arms." It is so called because it crests the helmet.

In The Oxford Guide to Heraldry, T. Woodcock, the incumbent Garter Principal King of Arms, and J. Robinson, Maltravers Herald Extraordinary, bemoan "the indiscriminate use of the word 'crest' to describe armorial bearings when anything but the crest is intended." Bringing home their point with a skewering critique of hopeless souls like our perplexed priory princess, they bitingly add, "The crest is only the part of the design on top of the helmet, but despite the logic of a crest like that of a bird being worn on the head people remain muddled."

But the problems with the program's puff-piece are greater than terminological. The "nun" goes on to reference the coat of arms of a family that shares Junior's surname (and perhaps her own?) without adducing any proof of the Kid's descent in an unbroken male-line from the ancestor for whom the coat of arms referenced was first recorded. Worth noting here is the advice found in the Society of Genealogists' Information Leaflet 15:

Armorial bearings do not appertain to all persons of a given surname but belong to and identify members of one particular family. Coats of arms and crests are a form of property and may rightfully be used only by the male-line descendants of the individual to whom they were first granted or allowed....

Unfortunately, over the centuries, many families have simply assumed arms and crests belonging to other families of the same name, usually without authority and without demonstrating any relationship between the families.... The erroneous and widespread practice of adopting the arms of a family of the same surname (extracted in most cases from one of the printed armorials listing the arms of families alphabetically) is much to be deplored. It detracts from the basic purpose of coats of arms and crests, which is to provide hereditary symbols by which particular families may be identified.

Coats of arms, you, see, do not belong to anyone who happens to bear the same surname as that of an armigerous ancestor of another family. Only those individuals, cautions Burke's General Armory, "who can deduce descent from an ancestor whose armorial bearings have been acknowledged by one of the Visitations [by heralds from the College of Arms] are entitled to carry those arms by right of inheritance."****

The bottom line here is that an individual must substantiate he is descended from someone whose right to bear arms has been admitted before we begin to give credence to his personal claim. In this day of easy Internet access to all manner of squirrelly "family crests," absent proof from a claimant, we should be doubly skeptical of all assertions, especially those coming from Americans. No substantiation, no assent. And it's more than a social or civil matter. "Under no circumstances," wrote Henry McCloud near the beginning of the chapter on ecclesiastical heraldry in his Clerical Dress and Insignia, "should a prelate make use of a coat of arms which belongs to a family other than his own without proper brisure."

Putting aside the ersatz sister's dearth of proof and raft of heraldically imprecise terminology, a dissection of which would render this post unreadable for both its length and complexity, we conclude by noting the bulk of her cheerleading effort busies itself with the symbolism of the charges and tinctures.  "The gold lion symbolizes courage"; "The Saint Andrew's cross...is indicative of suffering for the Faith and of perseverance. The black color of the cross signifies constancy"; "The star is the emblem of our Lady"; "The gold is the symbol of love"; "The shield is of blue lapis to honor Our Lady."

While that twaddle about mystical significations may sound nice and pious to your garden-variety, bug-eyed sede cultling, such "ridiculous fancies," as Joseph Edmondson called them as far back as 1780, are out of keeping with the spirit of the Church in matters armorial. Citing the American ecclesiastical heraldist Pierre de Chaignon la Rose, John Nainfa wrote in his Costume of Prelates of the Catholic Church According to Roman Etiquette:

To avoid mistakes, it is well to start out with the principle that a coat-of-arms is not and needs not be symbolical. A coat-of-arms is only a distinct personal mark or sign. Any or every sort of drawing cannot be used as a heraldic bearing; it must conform to the laws of Heraldry in regard to shape, colors, disposition, etc.; but a "meaning" is not necessary. Asking the meaning of a coat-of-arms is a sure mark of heraldic ignorance....

We would add that overtly assigning to charges and tinctures specific moral or spiritual characteristics or indirectly imputing the symbolized virtues to the bearer underscores that mark of ignorance.*****

In this study of Junior's armorial bearings, it is more than clear that what we have is Play-Church and Play-Heraldry. There is nothing of substance in Tradistan. The whole thing is bogus. The cult masters respect no rules. The whole messy, disedifying business amounts to a pre-adolescent parody of the divinely ordered society of the Church. All these self-promoting, glory-seeking, lawlessly mitered, illicit armigers are useless as well as fake. The pious traditional Catholic can only conclude there is no warrant for this capricious multiplication of unneeded, unwanted, make-believe prelates, who prey upon the laity for prestige, esteem, and financial resources to which they have no right and which they do not deserve.

GET REAL! SEND THESE IMPOSTORS TO THE UNEMPLOYMENT LINE.

* The underlying juridical rationale of the ensuing discussion of the cult masters' inherent disqualification to bear ecclesiastical arms is based on the 1978 Italian translation of Abp. Bruno Bernard Heim's Heraldry in the Catholic Church: Its Origin, Customs, and Laws, pp. 43-45. Much of our text is either a close paraphrase or direct translation.  Heim (1911-2003), possessor of a doctorate of canon law from the Gregorian University, was a celebrated ecclesiastical armorist of the last century.

** A scan of the 67-page (!!!) service paper is available here for download.

*** Nainfa writes in Costume of Prelates of the Catholic Church According to Roman Etiquette, "A rule too often violated in making a coat-of-arms for a Prelate, is that 'color should never be used upon color...." In A Complete Guide to Heraldry, Fox-Davies admonishes:

One of the earliest rules one learns in the study of armory is that colour cannot be placed upon colour.... Now this is a definite rule which must practically always be rigidly observed.

****If the "nun" is referring to this illustration as the Kid's "family crest" (LOL), then in fairness we'll have to admit that the appropriation of the saltire is virtually unnoticeable: the blazon for that shield is simply Sable a satire engrailed or, while Joey's overcrowded arms would demand much more of the blazoner's art and patience. Abp. Heim instructs us:

Another frequent error among ecclesiastics is that of having overly cluttered arms. The oldest, purest, and most beautiful are always those [that are] the simplest. The over complexity of a shield confers on it a very artificial look; instead of a clear and distinct blazon, one gets a mediocre rebus that represents the personal history of the possessor. [Ed. Translated literally from the Italian edition.]

***** Where do you start with someone who, in describing the shield of arms, writes this?

The Saint Andrew's cross, also known as the black saltire, consists of two diagonal lines in the form of an X; it is indicative of suffering for the Faith and of perseverance. The black color of the cross signifies constancy. The gold lion symbolizes courage, strength, and fearlessness; it also represents Christ who is the "Lion of Judah." To the ... emblems of the cross and the lion has been added, in the upper portion of the shield, a star shining above a storm-tossed ship. The star is the emblem of our Lady who is the Star of the Sea. It is she who guides the soul, symbolized by the ship, in its journey over the waves of tribulation. Saint Thomas explains that etc., etc. for a few more paragraphs of heraldic baloney.

How much more tasteful — and impressive  — would it have been to provide a blazon proper for the complete achievement, perhaps followed by a no-nonsense "translation," leaving all the mystical puffery out. But without hoodoo, Tradistan has nothing to offer.