Why I Use the Word Catholic to Describe the Ideal Economy

By John Horvat II

The adjective Catholic is rarely employed to describe the ideal economy we need. Many would see its use as mere window dressing to make the free market appear a bit more compassionate. Everyone knows that the business of creating wealth comes from industry and business. The accountant’s ledger is the only true measure of this wealth. Catholic can only be, at best, a timid adjective that modifies the more efficient noun, economy.

I am the first to recognize that that the role of economics is to define norms by which goods and services are produced, exchanged and consumed. These norms are reflected in ledgers. However, economic activities also involve moral acts that are influenced by our free and rational nature and the pull of our sentiments. Thus, the Church can play an important role in the concrete functioning of an economy, although it is often hidden.

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Generating Wealth in a Catholic Society

I was reminded of this fact by a news item that triggered these considerations.  A 2017 Merrill Lynch report found that some 34.2 million people provide unpaid care to older people in America. Most of these caregivers are family. Together they form the backbone of the nation’s long-term elderly care system, supplying an estimated $500 billion in free care every year. This is three times the amount spent by Medicare’s long-term care budget.

I was struck by this example of a current economic problem – the cost of caring for the elderly. It is resolved with almost medieval means by non-monetary processes.  While not all these care-givers are Catholic, their actions are modeled by Christian virtues reflecting the Church’s charity and solicitude for the suffering. This charity can far outperform government programs at no cost to the taxpayer. It provides better and loving care. There is no question that this care helps the formal economy.

And that is where my Catholic economy offers great benefits. In a Catholic society, there are many social and cultural structures like the care-givers that generate enormous value. The non-monetary processes found in family, religion and communities are sources of immense material and spiritual wealth that largely go uncompensated, remain unrecorded, or defy quantification. Saint Thomas Aquinas called this economic activity, economia pura. It is that pure domestic economy that modern economists ignore because it cannot be found on spreadsheets. French historian Fernand Braudel claimed that one third or more of dealings in modern industrialized economies are found in this sector.

I believe these vast sectors constitute the heart and soul of all economy and merit my use of the august adjective of “Catholic.” Perhaps the most productive thing a person can do to fuel prosperity is to help make the economy more Catholic.

What Does Saint Thomas Say About Immigration?

Defining These Areas

These wealth-generating social structures can be found everywhere in Catholic society. Most of them were unknown in pagan society, At the same time, they are systematically rejected and disparaged in our neo-pagan modern culture.

The first institution is the family based on the Catholic insistence of the indissolubility of marriage. This extremely stable relationship is a dynamic source of uncompensated activity that freely provides its members with shelter, nourishment, education, affection, and healthcare.

The Church raises marriage to the level of a sacrament and thus, provides the couple with the necessary graces and strength to bring new souls into the world and provide for their formation and education. The Catholic family becomes not just a basic social unit but an economic unit that generates and distributes wealth and benefits to its members.

There are other lesser institutions influenced by the Church that display similar qualities. We can refer to local, cultural, or religious associations that generate arts, civic spirit, and works of charity that enrich the community in ways that cannot be quantified. This can also be seen in any kind of organic neighborhood or ethnic community where inhabitants receive the great benefits of solidarity and a distinctive local identity.

What does Saint Thomas Aquinas say about Marriage?

Inside a climate of mutual trust provided by the Church, common local transactions, barter, or acts of neighborliness are clearly valuable actions that strengthen economy. We might also point to the long history of the Church’s support of agriculture where the land, besides freely giving its fruits and creating abundant wealth, also creates a sense of self-sufficiency, the development of character and a strong attachment to property.

All of these institutions and activities enrich society and culture. They have an indirect impact upon the formal economy and truly nourish and sustain it.

The Church Enriches Culture

However, it is the Church that is the principle agent in this society that supports the economy. It is not just a generic “Christian” outlook that made Western civilization economically great. The Church served as the foundation for our civilization, which includes our economy. That is why I use the adjective Catholic, and not the ecumenical Christian, to modify the ideal economy we need.

In the first place, the Church is an institution that enriches culture and generates enormous value in society in the spiritual sphere. We can look at Her liturgical, moral, and religious acts that communicate untold spiritual benefits to a community. Giving meaning and purpose to life is a priceless commodity in today’s world of depression, hedonism and loneliness.

What Does a Society Based on Faith and Charity Look Like?

The Church further gratuitously bestows culture, charity, and learning upon Her children and society as a whole. It was the Church that first established universities and hospitals. Her religious orders freely served the poor in their hospitals and even went to the point of seeking out patients in the highways and byways. The Church has the unique ability to get people to think of serving others for the love of God.

 Direct Support for the Economy

These indirect means are joined by more direct means by which the Church helped facilitate the smooth running of economies.

Transactions depend upon trust and honesty.  As guardian of the moral law, the Church naturally issues objective norms that concretely help identify and denounce injustice in the economy and create a climate of trust. In addition, the Sacrament of Confession not only insists upon honest dealings but enforces restitution for theft or damage done.

Even in the field of economic theory, it was the Church that led the way.  Contrary to the popular myth, the science of economics was not invented by Adam Smith (who saw Catholic charity as disruptive). The early foundations of economics are found in the writings of medieval figures like Saint Bernardine, Saint Antoninus, Saint Thomas Aquinas, and other early Scholastics.

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Libertarians, the Austrian School of Economics and other economic schools all trace their origins back to Spain’s School of Salamanca (1500-1650). Its Dominican friars developed complex economic concepts like the theory of utility, the quantity theory of money, opportunity cost, and liquidity preference long before modern economists.

We cannot underestimate the role of the traditional teachings of the Church in forming modern economy. This same moral guidance is still much needed in increasingly impersonal economies run by algorithms and quarterly earnings reports.

The Limitations of Catholic Economy

However, there are limitations to a Catholic economy.

Economy must be governed by justice, whereas the Church depends much upon charity and poverty. That is why an economy cannot be governed by charity lest it leave the marketplace in the hand of those who would take advantage of the honest.

The Church is limited to creating the conditions for economy to flourish. It can do no more. The marketplace can never be a church although markets were often situated in the Church squares. Nor can a Church become a marketplace.

What Does Saint Thomas Say About Immigration?

“Catholic” must always be an adjective to the noun economy. Whenever this adjective tries to become the noun, it quickly leads to the money changers of the temple who Our Lord so violently casted out.

 A Terrible Alternative

I fear for the time when all vestiges of the Church are scrubbed from economy. Then there will be no more caregivers. The family will be reduced to a mere collections of selfish individuals. The moral law will be erased by the unbridled passions of frenetic markets. The marketplace will once more be left to the dog-eat-dog brutality of those who seek only their own profit. Society will fall apart, as it is today, and no amount of tax dollars, jobs or economic policies will put it back together.

That is why I use the adjective Catholic to describe the ideal economy we need. When the Catholic element is expunged, the heart and soul of economy will also be gone and we will be left with the terrifying ledger of a world without God.

Why I Use the Word Catholic to Describe the Ideal Economy - RTO.org:

Why Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

By John Horvat II

“Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,” wrote poet Robert Frost. In the opening line to his famous poem, “Mending Wall,” Frost explores one of the mysteries of fallen human nature. Everyone feels both a need and aversion for order. His questioning of the role of walls tries to explain this contradiction.

Exercising the simple task of mending a stone wall on his farm, the poet works with his neighbor to repair the damages of time and weather that have thrown down stones from the barrier. He surveys the work of hunters who have created gaps by ferreting out hidden rabbits. The stone wall has breaches that “even two can pass abreast.”

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Frost’s consideration of the stone fence can shed some light on the troubles on the American border. Truly “something there is that doesn’t love a wall.” There is a violent urge “that wants it down,” Frost declares with emphasis. There is a hidden sympathy for letting things run down, while there is a suspicion that order is needed.

The Nature of Borders

In the present debate about the border, there is something of Frost’s dilemma. A good part of the squabble about a border wall is not about the size and shape of an eventual barrier to bar those entering illegally.

The liberal rage against the wall has much to do with the nature of boundaries. Indeed, walls, borders and fences are manifestations of restraint. They indicate that there are differences between things on one side and the other. Limits affirm that some things are better left separate to keep the peace. Boundaries secure the property of individuals against those who have none. They protect the sovereignty of nations against those who might enter without permission or do them harm.

Thus, walls are not loved, because walls say “no.” Many mistakenly believe that any saying of “no” is hurtful and causes people to suffer. And so, radicals claim, fences must be eliminated; they are not inclusive. The earth belongs to everyone. Walls must come crashing down.

What Does Saint Thomas Say About Immigration?

A Rousseauian Perspective

Thus, borders and walls have always had enemies that are ready to take them down.

Such is the case of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who already in the eighteenth century, promoted an anti-wall outlook. The famous French philosopher affirmed that “The first person who, having fenced off a plot of ground, and took it into his head to say this is mine and found people simple enough to believe him was the true founder of civil society.”

Rousseau further speculates saying “What crimes, wars, murders, what miseries and horrors would the human race have been spared by someone who, uprooting the stakes or filling in the ditch, had shouted to his fellowmen: Beware of listening to this imposter: you are lost if you forget that the fruits belong to all and the earth to no one!”

Rousseau’s dramatic screed contains a major error that contrasts with the teachings of the Church and the experience of reality.

The Earth Is Made to Be Shared by All

The great error is the affirmation that the earth belongs to no one. Radicals might be surprised to learn that the Church teaches that the earth was made to be shared by all.

However, natural Law does not give rules about how the earth is to be shared. That was left to human reason. Thus, Saint Thomas Aquinas teaches: “Community of goods is ascribed to the natural law, not that the natural law dictates that all things should be possessed in common and that nothing should be possessed as one’s own: but because the division of possessions is not according to the natural law, but rather arose from human agreement which belongs to positive law, as stated above (Q 57, Arts 2,3). Hence the ownership of possessions is not contrary to the natural law, but an addition thereto devised by human reason.”

Thus, the antipathy for walls has some foundation in reality. Were there no sin or disorder, all mankind would live together harmoniously without boundaries.

However, the sad reality of experience is that disorder and sin do exist no matter how much the world tries to suppress them. Fallen humanity naturally resists the restraints of order that keep the unbridled passions under control. Walls are needed to keep the peace.

Keeping Peace and Harmony

Although the earth was made to be shared by all, fallen nature calls for private property, so that by caring for that which is strictly one’s own, peace and harmony of society are preserved. It is well known that what is common to all is often cared for by none. For as Aristotle points out if property is commonly owned, “complaints are bound to arise between those who enjoy or take much but work little and those who take less but work more.”

Justice thus demands that there be property and the walls that secure it. Saint Thomas Aquinas further observes that “quarrels arise more frequently when there is no division of the things possessed.”

These divisions that take the form of fences or walls are therefore needed to preserve harmony and prosperity. When individuals clearly know what belongs to them, they will make the most efficient use of their own resources. They will see themselves adequately compensated for their efforts. Everyone benefits from this division. Christian charity becomes possible since people possess that which can be given to others.

Thus, Saint Albert the Great affirms that “everybody is by nature inclined to pay more attention to what is his own than to what is common; so that if this will be better cultivated it will also grow to good fruition where all are concerned.”

The proper Christian concept of property with walls facilitates the well-being of a world shared by all. It avoids the savagery of Rousseau’s hellish world without fences where “the fruits belong to all and the earth to no one!”

Constant Mending

Returning to Frost’s poem, it is not enough that there be walls. They must also be periodically mended. It takes continuous effort to define those limits that separate farmers and farms. Unrepaired walls can also lead to quarrels and disputes. When borders become unclear, they can quickly degenerate into ambiguous situations that the same fallen human nature exploits to disturb the peace.

Even when harmony appears to reign, mended walls are needed. Frost playfully asks his neighbor what they are “walling in or walling out.” Frost observes that “my apple trees will never get across and eat the cones under his pines.”

To which the neighbor replies: “Good fences make good neighbors.” It is his age-old acknowledgment of fallen nature. He does not understand the theology of Original Sin or desire “to go behind his father’s saying.” He merely repeats the tradition handed down to him.

Likewise, so many do not understand the need for limits and restraint. They want to tear down walls because they say “no.” Those who defend order are like the neighbor who repeats axioms from time immemorial without understanding why saying “no” is essential.

They need to understand that walls exist because sin and disorder exist. People must overcome the mysterious attraction for disorder that haunts fallen humanity. Only by constantly restraining the unbridled passions can earth escape the Rousseauian hell.

Indeed, “something there is that doesn’t love a wall.” However, the alternatives without walls are much too disastrous to contemplate. It is far better to mend walls and make good neighbors than to take the descending road to a new barbarity.

Why Good Fences Make Good Neighbors - Return to Order: Frost’s consideration of the stone fence can shed light on the troubles on the urge “that wants it down,” but also the sympathy for the order it brings.

Why Society Needs to Cultivate a True Elite Class

By John Horvat II

There was a time when the nation was ruled by a group of people that set the course for the country. Their children usually followed in their footsteps. This group of people tended to consolidate their wealth and pass it along to future generations. They formed what has been called a social elite—one that possessed complex connections within society, a network of civil obligations, and many leadership commitments.

Like all things human, this social arrangement of leaders had its defects. No one can deny this fact. But neither can one contest the historic reality that this system did help usher in an era of American prosperity with a certain amount of social mobility, stability and national unity.

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In the post-World War II period, this system was largely replaced by a meritocracy, based on personal talent. The new system sought to level all advantages of birth. It emphasized individual achievement and not contribution to society. It stressed intelligence not character.

A Social Revolution Turns Everything Upside Down

To effect this change, many social structures were changed. The university system was opened up to everyone. During the sixties, social conventions were turned upside down, and sexual mores were thrashed everywhere. Extreme individualism became the norm. All this was done in the name of social justice, personal fulfillment and equality.

This social revolution was supposed to create a more just society. And yet, the contrary happened. The social order has not improved. Inequality ratios have soared. Morality has plummeted and created an underclass of those without stable family life. Institutional and civic involvement has declined dramatically. Social trust at all levels has fallen. Government is dysfunctional, and the nation is polarized.

The Rise of New Elites

Instead of the old group of social elites, the nation is now run by a new group of meritocratic elites. Their children are now following in their footsteps. They also tend to consolidate and concentrate their wealth and pass it along.

What Does Saint Thomas Say About Immigration?

Thus, the new social justice warriors are back on the warpath demanding the destruction of these new elites simply because they are elites.

They do not realize that all healthy societies must have elites. Destroying elites in a society will eventually lead to the forming of another set of elites. This is because there will always be those in society who take upon themselves the task of leading and directing affairs. There will always be a one percent, a top ten percent in any society. Taking out these top percentages will only give their place to others, usually less qualified.

Eliminating layers of elites is also the way to totalitarian governments, which insist upon absolute power.

Cultivating True Elites

The real issue is not eliminating but cultivating true elites who will fully carry out their proper role in society. The problem with the present elites is that they do not know how to carry out these obligations. The present model has created what Charles Murray calls “hollow elites” who have “abdicated their responsibility to set and promulgate the standards,” while keeping the benefits of their social status.

What does Saint Thomas Aquinas say about Marriage?

Unlike former elites, today’s new elites have fewer social or civic obligations; they are not compelled to be role models or set standards. The meritocratic elites are content to live separately in their gated communities, insulated from those outside.

They can still be called elites since they do assume some responsibility for directing society and industry. They have however lost the notion of what their proper role is. They do not know how to be true elites.

The problem is further complicated by a culture that has done everything to malign elites as exploiters of the people. Thus, many elites do not even wish to admit their status.

Not All Rich People Are Elites

If this is to be remedied, there are two main misconceptions about elites that need to be addressed.

The first misconception is the idea that being an elite simply means being rich. Thus, people become elites by the size of their bank accounts. They care only about themselves, ignoring the plight of the poor.

This idea of elites is entirely wrong. Such people are merely rich people. They play no major role in society beyond their contribution to the economy. They cannot be counted upon to act beyond their self-interest.

The Need for Representative Characters

Real elites are what sociologists call representative characters. They exist in all prosperous societies. They do not consist of rich people enjoying life. They are the movers and shakers who find fulfillment in seeking the common good. They are those who perceive the ideals, principles, and qualities that are desired and admired by a community or nation, and translate them into concrete programs of life and culture.

These representative figures serve to set the tone and harmonize society. They are embedded in the community and by their influence shape the demand, fashions, and trends of the day. By their devotion and self-sacrifice, they move society ahead toward excellence.

“Mankind would never have reached the present state of civilization without heroism and self-sacrifice on the part of an elite,” writes Ludwig von Mises. “Every step forward on the way toward an improvement of moral conditions has been an achievement of men who were ready to sacrifice their own well-being, their health, and their lives for the sake of a cause that they considered just and beneficial.”

Essential characteristics of elites have always been a notion of civic obligations, a spirit of sacrifice for community, and a celebration of civic virtue practiced in common. When elites are Christian, they will also have a great zeal for God, the Church and the practice of charity. These are obligations that are absent in the present meritocratic model centered in self-realization.

A Second Misconception

A second misconception about elites is that they are limited to those who are rich. Though wealth can be helpful in fulfilling their role, it is not essential.

Elites should exist at all levels of society, not just the highest ones. Elites can and do exist in small communities, occupations, schools and family groups. They are those who by their deeds, excellence or works, elevate the communities in which they are embedded. They need not have great wealth but do need great vision.

Such heroes, for that is what they are, are like leaven that rises without special planning or government intervention. These figures might include self-sacrificing clergy, devoted teachers, established farmers or selfless community leaders who draw and fuse society together and set the tone for their communities. They hold themselves up to high standards and commit themselves to being role models for those around them.

Shattered Unity and Common Purpose

American society today is coming apart. This is largely because, in the name of a leveling egalitarianism, so many of the social structures that held society together were discarded. Among these was the notion of true elites. In their place was put an individualistic model of achievement that shattered social unity and common purpose.

Many of the social ills that plague modern society are caused by the lack of elites. There is no one to harmonize society and provide vision and goals. Worst of all, modern culture discourages the idea of true and representative elites and proposes false and unrepresentative pseudo-elites who correspond to the worst and most selfish tendencies of a hedonistic culture.

Elites are not the problem. They will always exist, from among the highest to the lowest levels of society. The problem is cultivating true elites at all levels of society who can revitalize the culture and formulate a rich social life. This is especially true in times of crisis. Elites need to learn how to be elites again. And this will involve the enormous sacrifice of going beyond self-interest.

As seen on The Imaginative Conservative.

Why Society Needs to Cultivate a True Elite Class - ReturntoOrder.org

New Book Lighting the Way; Gives Hope

YORK, Penn. (June 5, 2018) An exciting new book addressing the restoration of America’s moral compass has just been released. Lighting the Way: Stories that Show How Our Culture Went Wrong and How We Can Restore Order is co-authored by John Horvat II and Norman Fulkerson. They put together a collection of essays and stories that represent hope for America.

This book is written as a long-awaited companion to John Horvat’s award-winning work, Return to Order: From A Frenzied Economy to An Organic Christian Society – Where We’ve Been, How We Got Here, and Where We Need to Go.

“I contributed to this book because I want to show people that restoring order is something doable,” writes Horvat. “We put together a collection of stories and essays that illustrate the themes of Return to Order.”

John Horvat is vice president of The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property(TFP) and an acclaimed author. His book Return to Order has received eleven awards with over 315,000 copies in circulation. He has written hundreds of articles that have appeared worldwide, including in The Wall Street Journal, The Christian Post, The Washington Times, Crisis Magazine, C-SPAN, American Thinker, and The Stream.

Fellow TFP Member Norman Fulkerson is also the author of the widely praised book, An American Knight: The Life of Colonel John W. Ripley, USMC. His book won the Military Writers Society of America’s coveted 2010 Gold Medal for biography.

Order Now: Lighting the Way: Stories that Show How Our Culture Went Wrong and How We Can Restore Order

In Lighting the Way, the authors collected a wide variety of stories of both the good and the bad in society. These stories reflect America’s polarized state. Some will make readers shake their heads in disbelief and others that will fill them with wonder and joy.

“This work is written to give hope to countless Americans who believe America is worth fighting for,” says Fulkerson. “I meet these people and tell their stories.”

Those who liked Return to Order will certainly cherish Lighting the Way. The book is a part of the nationwide Return to Order campaign. For more information about this new book and the Return to Order campaign, or to schedule an interview with the authors, please call 717-309-7147 or e-mail jh1908@aol.com.

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New Book ‘Lighting the Way’ Gives Hope - Return to Order

The Return of the Druids in Ireland

By John Horvat II

The Return of the Druids in Ireland

The abortion referendum in Ireland is over, and many are devastated by the tragic outcome. Some now conclude that Ireland has surrendered to the secular European agenda. It has lost its Catholic identity. The progressives are now giddy with joy proclaiming a new modern Ireland that has left behind the old.

However, there is nothing new in the present battle for the soul of Ireland. Throughout its history, the struggle for the Irish soul has always been over its Druids. Ireland only abandons the ardor of the Faith when it allows its hidden Druids to return and dominate.

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What the Druids Believed

This is what has happened now. The Druid label fits perfectly on the political caste that has imposed divorce, same-sex “marriage” and now abortion on the Emerald Isle. The diviners, charmers, priest, magicians, astrologists and wizards of old were amazingly similar to their neo-pagan counterparts today.

The Druids’ principal doctrine supported a life without moral consequences since they believed the soul did not die but passed at death from one person to another. Although these frequenters of sacred oak groves are viewed as a priestly sect, they were quite secular. Their influence was much more social than religious since their role was mostly administrative and ceremonial. The Druids had no god of their own nor did they introduce any new divinity. They merely lived with the local gods as they were.

Finally, as a part of their duties, the Druids performed human sacrifices. It was their custom to have large wickerwork structures that were filled with people and then burned as part of their offerings to appease local divinities.

The Rise of the Neo-Druids

To those who have observed modern Ireland, these and other similarities make the Druid appear quite familiar. With the approval of abortion, modern Irish progressives are fully neo-Druids. With the killing of the unborn, they will lead the nation back to its cruel and barbarous origins. Likewise, they will be the bitterest opponents of Christianity, not to be appeased until the light of Christ is snuffed out. That is how it was in the past, and is again today.

What Does Saint Thomas Say About Immigration?

The battle for the Irish soul is over this return of the Druids. Abortion, same-sex “marriage” and divorce are the important issues that dominate the headlines, but the core debate is the titanic clash between two opposing irreconcilable worldviews.

The only way to fight Druids is with the bold audacity that so characterized Saint Patrick, the Apostle of Ireland, and which even today molds the fiery Celtic souls of those he brought into the Church.

The Way to Fight Neo-Druids

This helps explains the devastating loss of the abortion referendum. Neo-Druids are not moved by emotional pleas for the lives of innocent unborn babies. They promote their immolation. Barbarians only think about gratifying their unbridled passions; they care little for who they hurt. They follow their radical urges and are unimpressed by those who defend their views weakly or are mired in mediocrity.

The only way to fight Druids is with the bold audacity that so characterized Saint Patrick, the Apostle of Ireland, and which even today molds the fiery Celtic souls of those he brought into the Church. The dark passions and superstitions of the neo-Druids must be denounced and overturned. The liberating true Faith must be presented with zeal and daring.

The Example of Saint Patrick

Indeed, such was the scene on that fateful Easter vigil in 433 when a decree went forth over the kingdom of Erin that all fires were to be extinguished until the signal fire on the Hill of Tara was lit by the Druids at the royal palace. At the opposite end of the valley, atop the Hill of Slane, Saint Patrick kindled a massive Paschal fire in defiance. The Druids implored the king to take action for they claimed the “fire will blaze forever in this land unless it be this very night extinguished.”

What does Saint Thomas Aquinas say about Marriage?

By God’s protection, all efforts to put out this fire or harm the missionary archbishop failed, and the saint boldly led a procession with miter and crosier, arrayed in full episcopal attire, to the Hill of Tara where he confronted the Druids and put them to flight. The evangelization of Ireland began with this confrontation. Many of the Druids were so astonished that they requested Baptism.

What Impresses Druids

The example of Saint Patrick is full of lessons on how to deal with Druids and today’s neo-Druids. Druids are impressed by faith-filled certainty and conviction. They are intimidated by a manly courage that despises and challenges their myths and superstitions. They are marveled by ceremonial beauty. Above all, God showers His graces upon those who dare to confront the evils of the day. He blesses their actions. Such is the stuff of the legends and song that are so much a part of the poetic Irish soul.

Alas, this dramatic example was not heeded in the referendum on abortion. It was judged “prudent” that the Church play a subdued part in the debate over the taking of innocent lives. There were no dramatic challenges on the part of churchmen to denounce the promiscuous neo-Druid lifestyles that are so much a part of the abortion culture. There was no fire lit to illuminate the darkness of the postmodern wasteland that makes abortion so prevalent.

The Civilization of the Lie and Its Rejection of Truth

And that is why the center of the struggle for the Irish soul must always be over the return of its Druids. It is the only way Ireland will again be Catholic.

What is needed are fiery souls that will contest not just social issues, necessary for sure, but all the neo-Druid falsehoods that undermine the Faith. There must be an unapologetic proclamation of the Faith that defies the diktats of modern secular society. Ireland must implore Saint Patrick to raise new disciples who can rekindle the embers of Christianity that remain, so that the Pascal fire may yet continue to “blaze forever” on the Hill of Slane, and put the neo-Druids to flight.

The Return of the Druids in Ireland - Return to Order: