BEYOND THE SHADOW OF A DREAM

What happens to a dream deferred?/... Does it stink like rotten meat? Hughes

From time to time, developmentally delayed, religious deviants protest that $GG's continued survival on life support proves "One-Hand Dan" has weathered PL's criticisms and exposés. According to these purblind victims of ecclesiastical imposture, the Wee One is as optimistic as ever about the future of his cult.

We who see the truth recognize that the denial of looming collapse is groundless. If everything were peachy keen in SW Ohio, then Dannie wouldn't be obsessing about money, nor would he be aggressively begging for freebie meals and airport rides. Furthermore, $GG's weekly collection would show a steady increase over time, not the stubborn, below-subsistence flatline we've traced for several years. Volunteerism would be up, so His Impudency wouldn't have to impose upon the same, shrinking core of beleaguered, aging worker bees season after season. Most importantly, the number of bequests would be growing, not shrinking.

At this watershed moment after Junior's "consecration," an event that definitively marked the end of Dannie's rôle as the bench player of Sedelandia, it might be instructive to consider the phantom of defeat pursuing the Dirtbag throughout his lonely hours of tormented self-reflection. This May, he'll turn 67. Approaching one's 70th year on earth, a man naturally takes stock. For life's winners, the assessment is a joy; for life's losers, it's unrelieved agony. If the glittering dreams of youth and early middle age have turned out to be dross, a fortune's fool confronts a bleak future of zero triumphs, particularly as younger, ambitious, and more able men are scrambling to refine golden memories of their own to gild a happy old age.

To garner some insight into what must be Dannie's all-year-long winter of discontent, we must look at the controlling dream of his illicit "episcopacy." Wee Dan's April 27, 1983, expulsion from the SSPX dealt the thirty-something, pipe-dreaming idler a cruel reversal, but not for the reasons many might think. Having very early (and quite without justification) imagined himself a bishop someday, his ouster meant there would be no one to crown his overly wishful noggin with a coveted miter.

When finally, after a self-serving volte-face on the Thục line's validity, he wrested the longed-for headgear from the hoodwinked Pivster, he was free to set his sights on a jet-setting career: One day, he would become the "bishop" of all the sede chapels and groups, traveling the world in style like that globetrotting Archbishop Lefebvre, who had unceremoniously  — and in-person — shown him the backdoor some ten-and-a-half years earlier.

As the days, weeks, months, and years following his unlawful "consecration" passed, that dreamed-of day never dawned. Everybody conspired to thwart the realization of his fantasy.  Pivareeno, whom he thought he could muscle out of the way both in sunny Mexico and at home, prospered, sweeping up chapels all over the map. (In fact, after the 2009 $GG $chool $candal, a well-motivated Pivmeister pitched camp in Li'l Daniel's back yard at the petition of a colony of ex-Gerties.) Within less than a decade of Dan's mitering, Big Don snared a miter for himself, much to Dannie's peevish dismay.  In the meantime, nobody of consequence signed up for the Wee One's "little" Salesian boys' club.

The Jellyfish was the next to elevate its slimy self. It then turned around and consecrated a South American with a large following in Mexico. Sensing a void, a few years later the Ham Sandwich mounted a coup, which almost emptied $GG, leaving only depraved culties. Not too long afterward, the triumphant Sammich — Lower East Tradistan's "Second-Hand Rose" — decorated his own swollen bean with a used miter ordered online (🎶 I'm wearing second-hand hats, second-hand clothes 🎶). One by one, the serious Mexican and French independent "clergy" cut themselves loose.

The upshot of it all is that the Mitered Maggot's fevered vision of VIP airport lounges, luxury hotel suites, smiling concierges too impressed to accept a gratuity, chauffeured limos, fawning maître d's at Michelin-starred eateries, comped lunches at Taco Bell, groveling "clergy," celebrity-struck laity, and painstakingly curated guided tours of Old-World venues never became entries in "The Bishop's (?) Corner." All those hallucinations lay forever out of reach.

Why, he never even got close! 

It was Diminished Don who was asked to England, Down Under, and the Continent (and he may yet fly off again soon if he gets medical clearance). But the Lowly Worm's travel victories over Dan are yesterday's news. Nowadays the title of Mr. Worldwide properly belongs to the hyper-ambitious, always scratching, ever conniving Ham Sandwich, who boasts a European apostolate reaching into Germany, Spain, and Italy, where he'll spend about a month and a half this spring. At best, "One-Hand Dan" has only managed to wrangle short-term invites from (1) a shunned group of Argentine malcontents notorious for their pants-wearing womenfolk and (2) some Trento breakaways in Mexico. (But even one of the latter groups soon grew disillusioned.)

As many a practicing therapist will testify, it's almost impossible to recover from a traumatic psychological setback occasioned by a dream that's toast, particularly if you had your heart set on it. It's worse still if you shared your wild hopes with a lot of people who have long memories. The verismo novelist Federico De Roberto once wrote that only castles in the air "avoid the dissolving hands of time." That's Dreamland Dan's cross to bear. That's what makes hellish the black hours of solitude spent in his room.

His vividly imagined persona as an American nouveau-Marcel trekking about the continents — an image refreshed and augmented over many nights in the delicious minutes before sleep overtakes — stubbornly persists. It cannot be erased, no matter how hard he tries. It reappears at the worst times to mock him. To remind him of the failure of his life, the defeat of his outrageous fancy. To bedevil him over the crumbling cult center and evaporating enthusiasm for his enterprise. To taunt him with the fine restaurants he can no longer afford. To heap abuse upon his useless, contemptible, self-mitered noodle.

Bitter is advancing age absent the sweet consolation of a personal chronicle of dreams fulfilled.  Add disappointment over disappearing resources while mixing in a growing awareness you never had what it takes to begin with, and you've got the makings of the misery of the damned. Although his self-destructive backing of Tony Baloney and the "Principal" triggered the mass exodus of 2009, thereby hurling his already moribund career into its current death spiral, Dannie actually never stood a chance to become a Lefebvre redivivus.

For one thing, he lacked the physical stature, the air of command. (A perpetual risus sardonicus, or rictus grin, inspires no awe.) For another, he didn't have the right formation or the necessary skills. But the greatest drawback to success was an incapacity to attract to his banner men of genuine ability. He had to settle for the third-rate Erroneous Antonius, whose abrasive personality, misplaced self-esteem, and penchant for windmill tilting only magnified the Wee One's defects in the eyes of both "clergy" and lay folk. Perhaps a gifted sidekick might have been able to mask His Deficiency's shortcomings, but then Li'l Daniel probably never could've attracted the allegiance of someone with unalloyed talent anyway. The ungifted needy seem to find each other, don't they?

Ambition is by no means wrong; it is often beneficial for organizations and individuals. But to achieve true success, both collective and personal, ambition must be underpinned by native ability and a desire to improve lives other than your own. To motivate competent people to follow, you need to offer them something besides a life of servitude to your person. The talented "bishop" who figures out that he must first become the servant of the "clergy" and laity, not their overlord, could become the "metropolitan" of Sedelandia, with whatever diminished perks it may now offer in its last days. However, since the sub-par sede impostors opt for adulation, not stewardship, nothing will change. They'll remain strutting, turf-warring, undistinguished daydreamers who cannot transmute airy whimsy into concrete reality.

WAKE 'EM UP: LEAVE THE CULT TODAY!

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.

BUMMER!

We are very disturbed since this consecration [Joey's] perpetuate[s] the cult-like and the sectarian attitude of Most Holy Trinity Seminary and the last-year newly founded priestly institute — Roman Catholic Institute — of Bishop Sanborn. Markus "The Ham Sandwich" Ramolla*

The Readers stood at the ready — fully loaded they were for bear.

It occurred early last Wednesday evening. The 4K UHD TV stretched across the west end of the well-appointed, custom-installed home theater. Latter-day amanuenses manned their MacBooks. In her tailored, designer jeans accented by Manolo peep-toe mules, our fragrant, dark-eyed techie was pertly stationed at the console, fetchingly poised to work her digital magic on state-of-the-art video software.

At her left, jauntily astride a high swivel chair, rockin' the Sennheisers, waited our play-by-play, color-commentary announcer, an occasional consultant who'd emceed two "episcopal consecrations." Close at hand lay a Pontificale Romanum along with a hand-annotated copy of Nabuco's Pontificalis Romani Expositio Iuridico-Practica. Splashed across the monitor to his left were side-by-side scanned images from Moretti and Martinucci.

In the deluxe Barcaloungers deployed before the gargantuan 65" screen sat the Reader-in-Chief flanked by top PL execs, notebooks in hand. Lining the paneled back wall were empty chairs for the next day's guests. Within the fridge cuddled bottles of bubbly for Sanguigno-blood-orange mimosas laced with Grand Marnier to wash down the Panera's brioche breakfast sandwiches and sweet rolls on order. **  Stored in the humidor next to the Breville cappuccino machine beckoned a fresh box of robustos (El Rey del Mundo Choix Supreme, to be specific); atop the immaculate white box awaited a half dozen Romeo y Julieta Julietas for the team's distaff side.

The mood was buoyant as staff braced for the test.  Before returning to their homes on Friday, the Readers knew they'd barely have 12-15 hours after the Sacrilege in the Swamp to draft copy for a special Saturday-morning post. There'd be no time for troubleshooting come Thursday A.M.!

At the press of the power button, the television chimed to life. Then the Internet connection was established. Laptops flickered as a dainty French-manicured manita clicked on the link to the YouTube channel promising to livestream the Bash in the Bog. But within microseconds, the distinguished assembly groaned in worldly-wise dismay as on the screen flashed this dark message.

Curses! Foiled again! The cult took down its own channel!

Making lemonade out of the disappointing lemon handed us, staff set to work. But first our host fixed mimosas as the Reader-in-Chief passed around the Cuban treasures. (It's never too late for mimosas.) After alerting contacts in the swamp and elsewhere, we hatched a plan for gathering all the intelligence available the next day.

By 1:00 P.M. on Thursday, the pix, scans, and hot tips started flooding in (including a droll social-media shot of the new "Bishop" as Sarong Boy).  It wasn't all we'd hoped for, but then again the cult prohibited snaps inside the Big Tent. The first visuals came from Scutty's candid shots of the Wednesday practice session, from which we learned Dubious Dan had been admitted as a co-consecrator. (Later stills from outside the pesthouse confirmed the foolish decision.)

Although on several occasions we had hedged our bet about Dannie's exclusion from the ceremony, we were still mildly surprised. Based on what we know about the Swamplanders' contempt for the Wee One, we surmised the Long-Island Jellyfish must have bailed out, thus forcing the élite to call up the over-eager but validity-challenged pinch hitter from the bench. Seeing it was necessary for the Kid to have the most over-the-top, three-"bishop" extravaganza Tradistan's ever seen, we concluded theatrical considerations had trumped prudence. (The Show is what Tradistan's all about anyway.)

Informants in Michigan earlier passed the word that another "priest" had filled in for Jelly on Sunday, February 18 (reportedly a Mexican national). Although other sources, which got their scoop directly, insisted that no Highlander had planned to attend the Display near the Bay, we still thought the Jellyfish would've surfaced in the peanut gallery for what was in reality a command to dance attendance on Junior. We honestly couldn't imagine Jelly the Nervous Nelly not jumping whenever Big Don nasally bellows, "Frog!" But apparently Its Gelatinacy was a no-show. Perhaps it couldn't abide its fellow scum buckets, so Its Invertebracy pulsed back to home waters to recover. (There have been recent sightings on Long Island.)

When you think about the Big Show dispassionately, apart from the grating presence of His Humpty-Dumptyship on stage before rancor-wracked Swampland culties who despise him, no harm was done to the Kid's validity. The participation of Geert Stuyver, whose priestly and episcopal "orders" come from the Thục-des Lauriers line directly through McKenna, surely counteracted the major threat from Dubious Dan and the far lesser, but still real, hazard of Big Don's Liénart liability. Junior and Jelly now constitute the only relatively certain "episcopal" lineages in Tradistan U.S.A. (Of course, outside that wasteland, there are dozens of valid "bishops" with multiple valid lineages.)

But moving to something more significant, the Readers are most puzzled by all the secrecy. Big Don promised to update us in January but didn't. We could never find the "special schedule" for the "consecration," which was supposed to follow the regular February schedule. Uncharacteristically, Dannie never once blabbed he was to be a co-consecrator, not even to taunt PL. During the three-ring circus itself, photos (you'll recall) were proscribed. And, as we noted above, at almost the last minute, the webcast was suppressed.

All this hush-hush hardly squares with the raucous fanfare that originally advertised the Blast in the Morass.  First there was the big announcement-cum-sheepish-justification in the November 2017 pesthouse newsletter, followed by a comically elaborate e-invitation on the website. Then, with the exception of Gabby Dannie's "Corner," we heard zilch until the February 2018 newsletter, which only gave us a snooty, looking-down-one's-nose clerical fashion review.

What happened? Why the blackout until Scutty's tweet about the practice?

There may be many answers to our questions, but one in particular argues for strong consideration:

  The cult masters were frightened of the scrutiny. 

Discretion, they must have reasoned, was better than worldwide praxis-shaming. Not without foundation would there be a fear that Europe, North America, and Latin America were watching closely for foul ups. Better to put out a heavily edited video later. Furthermore, had Dannie and Checkie's participation been made known too early, Big Don may have faced savage internal opposition from his cult benefactors with a mighty big bone to pick with the Cincy Gruesome Twosome.

The blackout, withal, wasn't disastrous. In the days and weeks to come, there'll be more reports and photos to help us piece together who attended and who didn't. (We may even get a good audience headcount: early dispatches assure us that far fewer than the anticipated 300 showed up.) Since social-media chatter leads us to believe the Swampland will produce a commemorative video, our experts may be able to tease out the liturgical snafus, despite the cult's best endeavors to erase them.  Our expectation is based on the supposition that if the Skipper — the "clerical" clown completer who once omitted the consecration at Mass — acted as the Assistant Priest, it's not unreasonable to infer that gross missteps occurred.

Let's all wait 'n' see.

* Transcribed from his allocution on the episcopal "consecration" of the new Boy "Bishop," the audio of which was made public on the Sammich's website. Click here to listen, but do it fast, for we don't think it will remain there for very long.

**To the extent that the work of Thursday was expected to extend into the wee hours of Friday morning, the younger Readers would've needed their sustenance early. They don't associate with any lawless "bishop," Tradistani or otherwise, who would dispense them from the Lenten fast.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

The only vice that cannot be forgiven is hypocrisy. The repentance of a hypocrite is itself hypocrisy. Hazlitt

Editor's Note:  Before we get started today, we want to take this opportunity to live up to our word. You may remember we promised to retract our formerly good opinion of the B'ville élite's business acumen if "One Hand Dan" were allowed to be one of the "co-consecrators" on February 22. Most of you know by now that His Deficiency played that part on Thursday; consequently, we hereby acknowledge that we gave the élite Bosses of the Bog too much credit. Maybe Wee Dan had to pinch hit if the Jellyfish bailed out at the last minute, excusing itself with, say, some convenient "necessity" on Long Island. (We'll discuss such possibilities next week in our post-mortem of the Sacrilege in the Swamp.) Whatever the cause, putting Dannie in the ceremony (along with the Skipper and Tony Baloney) was as dumb as dumb can be.

The Blast in the Morass imposed without necessity yet another uncanonical episcopus vagans upon a "bishop"-weary Sedelandia. Disgusted traditional Catholics would do well to ponder the following "meditation," with which years ago our favorite Pinheaded Pilgrim concluded a monograph now infamous for his hypocritical about-face (bold-face emphasis ours; quotation marks the author's):

Can we really take all this seriously and suppose that the “bishops” involved in such goings-on are the future of the Church? Impossible. Even to refer to them as “traditional Catholic bishops” lends too much respectability to the whole business, which is, in this writer’s opinion, very disrespectable indeed. 

One theme which dominates the affair from beginning to end is a gross and dangerous lack of prudence regarding the transmission of Apostolic Succession – a matter in which the slightest lack of prudence is inadmissible. St. Paul reminds us: “Lay not hands lightly on any man” – he does not say: “Lay hands quickly on anyone.” 

What is far more serious, however, is that these men claim that they are the “only legitimate authority” of the Catholic Church and that Catholics are “bound” to obey them. Further, they pretend to exclude from the Catholic Church those traditional priests and laymen who refuse to recognize their “authority” – something no traditional organization we know of presumes to do. By making such claims, these “bishops” have set up their own religion, with its own “magisterium,” its own “episcopal hierarchy,” and its own beliefs. It is a new religion, in spite of its trappings – and all its “episcopal consecrations,” self-important proclamations and inflated claims of “canonical authority” cannot make it into the Catholic religion. It is at the very least in the process of creating what will surely become a schismatic sect. 

The story will not end here – it is probable that “instant bishops" will continue to multiply exponentially, as among the “Old Catholics.” Our missionary friend in Mexico offers us his opinion on this rather gloomy prospect: 

We should have within a few years hundreds or thousands of bishops... without true vocations, the one more ignorant than the other, and an unavoidable cause of more division among traditionalists.

It is not impossible that one day these men will decide that their “authority” allows them to elect a “pope” from among their number. Perhaps we will see them trudge along the path already taken by Palmar de Troya, following some man who wears a tiara that looks like a lampshade and who cranks out “encyclicals” by the dozen. 

If such a day comes, we will then see the ultimate consequences of the movement which, for the moment, seems to promise “a prelate in every pot, and two bishops in every garage.” *

My, my! How self-interest and the passage of time can dramatically reverse a supposedly rock-solid conviction. The author may have ingloriously betrayed his stated principles, but his prediction came true: The always-aspirational swamp finally can boast of its very own pair of wandering "bishops."

Will "One-Hand Dan" let $GG fall behind the Swampland Joneses by not "consecrating" for the SW Ohio cult a second "bishop (?)"? Or could it be his "apostolate" is so tiny and his workload so light and airy that he can get by all on his little lonesome?

Or is it because there's no Mr. Moneybags ordering him around?

* If you'd like to read the whole article, click here.

A SCREEN DOOR ON A SUBMARINE

A useless life is an earlier death. Goethe

In last week's "Corner," Wee Dan stepped up to the plate after Big Don broke his promise for January to give us more information about next week's "consecration" in the Swampland:

We had our first practice for Fr. Selway’s consecration last week. Fr. Cekada, reprising his role of twenty-five years ago, has been working very hard preparing the rubrics from our end. One of the fine seminarians will be serving as MC, and organizing the entire affair, a complicated and challenging ceremony to be sure, but truly one for the ages. Many of our faithful will be attending.

There's more to "One Hand's" message than meets the eye. As we'll show, it's a last-ditch effort to appear relevant, to argue he has a purpose for existing and pocketing the laity's money once the Kid asserts his dominance from the top of the Tradistani pecking order.

After next Thursday's Bash in the Bog, all other "bishops" of the SW Ohio/B'ville cult — "One Hand," the Long-Island Jellyfish, the ailing Donster —will be utterly useless beyond their emptying chapels. "The Lowly Worm," the b.s. artist formerly known as Tradzilla, will have passed his sell-by date the moment the Kid wishes him (with fingers crossed behind his back?), "Ad multos annos!"*  Big Don's being stoically closed-mouth about his approaching insignificance, but the Mitered Magpie of West Chester, true to his chattering nature, can't maintain a prudent silence.  Pathetically, he's driven to put his thinly disguised anxieties right out on Front Street for TradWorld to ridicule.

In the futile struggle to keep the Gerties from writing him off, His Irrelevancy intimated he and Tony Baloney might have some material part to play on February 22, with Checkie busily "preparing the rubrics from our end." What a laugh!  What "end"? The short end of the stick?

The Kid already has the ceremonial details from Big Don's "consecration" back in 2002. (They were probably based on copies of the Checkmeister's outline to begin with.) And why would the Cheeseball continue to prepare instructions so close to the date of the Big Show? All Dannie's doing here is trying (unsuccessfully) to make people believe he's somehow a major player in the sacrilegious pantomime destined to change the cult cabal forever.

From the vagueness of the "Corner's" first sentence, we infer that "One Hand" must not have been asked to be a co-consecrator. If he had been, we think he would've shot off his mouth about the supporting rôle in order to reassure the skeptical cultlings he still counts. Instead we get a murky reference to "our first practice."**

Who was practicing? Certainly Checkie wasn't practicing for MC, because Dannie tells us a so-called seminarian has been assigned the job of Master of Ceremonies. Furthermore, the "seminarian" is "organizing the entire affair," so it looks as though Bonehead Tone's been shut out completely. Maybe Lurch, one of Junior's fanboys, was tossed a "mercy" part to play in order to maintain his loyalty to the soon-to-be Numero Uno of Tradistan.

Amid all this angst and transparent face-saving, His Obsolescency couldn't help a little unintentional humor when he reported, "Many of our faithful will be attending [Joey's 'consecration']." That's a hoot! For the past year, the Wee One's been trying everything — including frivolous, illicit dispensations from the Friday abstinence — to herd balking Gerties into the pest-infested cult center for his sideshows. Yet for the Kid's extravaganza, the cult cattle are eager to hoof it about a thousand miles down to Florida to attend the Blast in the Morass.

Think of all that travel and lodging money Dispensin' Dan will never see in the collection basket, not to mention the cash tribute his dirty Gerties'll render to the newly crowned Grand High Panjandrum of Sedelandia. $GG's collection for February 4 was an anemic $3,764, the second collection totaled a miserly $530, and the week before netted a close-fisted $3,836. Have the skinflint cultlings been hoarding their dollars at Dannie's expense? His Indigency must have turned 50 shades of green with envy, but there's nothing he can do except put on a happy face and pretend he approves. After all, he can't afford to alienate the youthful and moneyed capo di tutti capi.

Faking benign approval won't help, either with the Boy "Bishop" or with the cultlings. No crumbs will come Dirtbag Dan's way when the Kid completely takes over pesthouse "ordinations." Likewise, we don't expect Wee Dan will be running My-Way Carlito's "priests'" retreats in the Evergreen State.  Aware of "One Hand's" loss of relevancy, Gerties will look to Junior as the champion of their weird sectarian aspirations,*** leaving the Bantam "Bishop (?)," now reduced to a grinning id bereft of resources and voice, with nothing to do other than once a year "consecrating" doubtful oils that no one but his own dubious "clergy" need or will use.


*  That is, IF the over-the-top Display near the Bay takes place.

** But the jury's still out on that question. As we've written, whether or not "One-Hand Dan" co-consecrates will depend upon how eager the élite are to protect the integrity of the Clone's "episcopate." True, Dannie could co-consecrate along with the Jellyfish, who would offset the stain of dubiety, but do the real chiefs of B'ville want to associate the Kid with the embattled troublemaker who exposed them to so much grief as a result of the catastrophic 2009 $GG $CHOOL $CANDAL?

*** They'll be disappointed, for we predict the Florida cult will soon retreat into itself. The Boy "Bishop" prudently won't write a thing.  The only "missions" he'll undertake are those that generate surplus cash for the boggy cult HQ. From now on, a low profile is necessary to divert Trad Nation's alarmed interest in all that's been going on in the fetid swamp.

THE CLOTHES MAKE THE (WO)MAN

Love matches, as they are called, have illusion for their father and need for their mother. Nietzsche

As Valentine's Day beckons with hearts and flowers, we find it singularly appropriate to put the February 22 Big Show on the back burner for a week so as to direct our scrutiny to Dannie's 2018 YAG in Cincy. 

As you may have observed, $GG is already promoting the event in its weekly bulletin and online. A program of "adult" activities promising to be as lame as last year's hasn't been posted yet on the website. However, we did find the meddling "clergy" have added demands to aggravate the already disordered scruples of the psychasthenic losers tormented enough to register this year. If the site's home-page "art work" is any indication (click here), you'll have a good idea of the mentality of the target audience "One Hand" and Checkie have in mind.

To save you (and us) the time of reading through all that twaddle, PL had a third party with YAG connections to furnish us highlights.

The creepiest difference between the 2018 and 2017 dating meat-markets is there is now "no hard and fast cutoff" for the upper age limit! In other words, "the YAG is now open to singles age 18 and up." An e-mail promo to previous attendees asks recipients to "please pass this info on to your friends who might have been a smidge "too old" last year; tell 'em to c'mon in!"




Whaaaaat? Did they really say, "c'mon in"? Is it going to be a weekend-long pool party with beach-blanket bingo and all? We knew the registrants would get soaked, but we didn't expect the cult masters meant it literally.  And if their running-buddies were "a smidge 'too old'" last year, aren't they more than "a smidge 'too old'" in 2018?


Concerned parents and safety-conscious twenty-somethings have cause to fear what "a smidge 'too old'" entails. In 2017, the upper limit was a nightmarishly high 35 years old. We bristle when we imagine a drooling, heavy-breathing, bloated, goggle-eyed, middle-aged "Mr. Lonelyheart Trad" aggressively stalking an unwary "Miss Sede Distinct Possibility" splashing all alone in the deep end.

Other rule changes are equally disturbing. To further discourage well-adjusted young adults from attending, the YAG dress code's been beefed up to make it much stricter this year — but only with respect to the ladies. Naturally!  This is Tradistan. For 2018, the more intrusive, illustrated regulations obsess in voyeuristic detail about how modest women's attire must be. For instance, a dress

must...generously COVER, not merely skim or come halfway over, the knees BOTH while standing AND sitting down. No slits.... If a skirt needs leggings underneath to make it decent, it's WAY too short. 

More ominously, "cleavage" is forbidden together with the titillatingly mysterious "suggestion of cleavage."

What the latter means is anybody's guess, for it's not spelled out how the "clergy" will determine if what's visible is an authentic sulcus intermammarius or just a pert shadow. Catching and shaming violators, the favorite "clerical" exercise at a sede cult apostolate, might be impossible should all the gals wear turtlenecks. But even absent turtlenecks in June, it'll be tough to police the new interdiction. As our very own Readerette informed the editorial staff, U.S. federal courts have ruled that the intermammary cleft is so vague that no guidance is available to define it (West's federal supplement [First Series], p. 994, West Publishing Co, 1990).*

PL wonders what happened last year to provoke this radical revision of the dress standards. Did one or more of these "good Catholic girls" cross the line of Christian modesty, say, by free-buffing, thus resulting in manly outrage— plus a longer-than-usual line at the confessional? 

Just as the rules are tougher for the womenfolk, so the boys' club members get their customary patriarchal pass. Guys are perfunctorily advised that "slacks or nice jeans [?!] are preferred" and that shirts and pants may not be "tight." (Perhaps a subtle hint for some of those empty-carb-craving sede chow hounds to go on a pre-YAG diet in order to depress the quantity of food consumed?)

Shorts are not allowed on cult premises, but inasmuch as there's no explicit off-property prohibition, we conclude that males may wear loose-fitting shorts at events not held at dilapidated $GG. (Otherwise Dannie and Cheesy wouldn't have limited the ban to the vermin-infested cult campus. We mean, they'd've boldly written "No shorts" period! Right?)


Oh, the pastoral nonfeasance of the sede "Brotopia"!

What if the women in attendance are scandalized — or become ensnared in an unavoidable proximate occasion of sin — through the indecent exposure of virile knees (or even the "suggestion of knees") by men immodest enough to wear baggy shorts in the presence of nubile trad-bachelorettes? Have the cult masters no concern over the effect of bare, hairy, male lower limbs on all these impressionable daughters of Eve? Suppose the bros are not as mindful as the chicks are when they sit: Who of us hasn't heard about, or witnessed, the "manspreading" blight? And why, if shorts are allowed at some activities, wasn't there an express prohibition against going commando?

In their effort to polemicize the weekend for their morbid sectarian purposes, the cult masters have raised the bar for attendance by adding oddly specific religious tests. Registrants, who must be sedes, this year have to agree they condemn certain SSPV practices; they must also affirm they believe in baptism of desire/ baptism of blood, as if that could be a deal-breaker for youthful lovebirds, LOL. ("Sweet cheeks, you know I love you, truly I do, but unless you affirm baptism of blood/desire here and now before our very first kiss, Checkie will never let us go steady," the tradette demurely cooed, rapidly blinking her rheumy eyes. "Oh, honey bunch," trad-boy groaned in reply, "you knooooowwwww that I dooooo! *XOXO*") 

Cult central is sure to publish updates about YAG 2018 in the coming months, which we'll be eager to cover on these pages. But for mature young adults in Traddielandia, we'd suggest the information shared today should be enough for them to

STAY AWAY FROM YAG IN CINCY 2018.

* The gender bias of the dress code is intolerable. For men, polo shirts are among the "preferred" choices, yet, scandalously there's no requirement that guys wear long-tailed polo jerseys so as to prevent shriek-inducing exposure of the crena clunium, a common, unsightly wardrobe malfunction, which the workman's-chic clothier, the Duluth Trading Company, labels "an egregious display of Plumber's Butt," more archly termed in French "le sourire du plombier."

Alas! At $GG, when it comes to modesty or simple good taste, it's still a man's world.