✪ THE BIG FRIDAY SOOPER THREAD

Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost Becomes The First American Pope

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he Catholic Church elected its new leader on Thursday when the conclave ended with the selection of Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost; the first American pope in history.

Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost may come as a surprise for many, considering the church had yet to elect a pope from the United States; a prospect that seemed almost unthinkable prior to Thursday.

Prevost chose the name of Pope Leo XIV in succession with Pope Leo XIII, who most famously penned the Encyclical Rerum Novarum, which condemned socialism. As noted in 2019, the Encyclical came at a time when the world faced multiple questions about the nature of labor in the midst of the industrial revolution.

Moreover, it’s no coincidence that Leo’s Rerum Novarum (“Of New Things”) appeared in 1890; which is to say, at around the same time that the U.S. established Labor Day.  In that era, factories and mass production were churning the old agricultural economy, dislocating ancient folkways, and creating new kinds of economic challenges, as well as, of course, new opportunities.  Amidst all this flux, people were understandably desperate to find ways to re-establish social equilibrium.  

And yet precisely because the old conservative political system was failing to maintain a just order, radical alternatives—including anarchism, socialism, and communism—were gathering strength.  

In response, enlightened leaders in the center  stepped in, realizing that new and creative thinking was needed to fend off revolution.  

Born September 14, 1955, in Chicago, Illinois, Prevost, 69, may very well have a 20+ year papacy if he lives into his late 80s. His clerical life began in 1977 when he entered the novitiate of the Order of Saint Augustine (OSA) before taking his solemn vows in 1981 and being ordained a priest in 1982. Over the next several decades, Prevost spent time in both the United States and Peru before Pope Francis appointed him apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru, in 2014.

According to various accounts, Prevost holds similar views to his predecessor, Pope Francis, with some differences on contentious issues. Per the College of Cardinals Report:

On key topics, Cardinal Prevost says little but some of his positions are known. He is reportedly very close to Francis’ vision regarding the environment, outreach to the poor and migrants, and meeting people where they are. He said last year “the bishop is not supposed to be a little prince sitting in his kingdom.”

He supported Pope Francis’ change in pastoral practice to allow divorced and civilly remarried Catholics to receive Holy Communion. Prevost appears somewhat less favorable to currying favor with the LGBTQ lobby than Francis, but he showed mild support for Fiducia Supplicans.

As Bishop of Chiclayo, he also opposed a government plan for teaching gender theory in schools. “The promotion of gender ideology is confusing, because it seeks to create genders that don’t exist,” he told local news media.

According to the New York Times, Prevost faced some controversy while Bishop of Chiclayo when handling the investigation of two priests who were accused of sexual abuse, though his supporters claim he was subjected to a smear campaign

One woman in Chiclayo who said she and two other women were sexually abused by two priests as girls long before Cardinal Prevost was bishop accused him of mishandling an investigation and of not stopping one of the priests from celebrating Mass.

The diocese of Chiclayo said Cardinal Prevost opened an investigation that the Vatican closed. After a new bishop arrived, the investigation was reopened. Supporters of Cardinal Prevost say he is the target of a smear campaign by members of a Peruvian-based Catholic movement that Francis disbanded.

Close friends have described Prevost as a more reserved man than Pope Francis, saying he “holds himself back a bit.”

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Here is an English translation of the full transcript of Pope Leo XIV’s first address:

Peace be with all of you! Dearest brothers and sisters, this is the first greeting of the Risen Christ, the Good Shepherd who gave His life for God’s flock.

I, too, would like this greeting of peace to enter your hearts, to reach your families, and all people, wherever they are, all of the people, all over the earth. Peace be with you!

This is the peace of the Risen Christ, an unarmed peace and a disarming peace, humble and persevering. It comes from God, God who loves us all unconditionally. We still have in our ears that weak, but always courageous voice of Pope Francis as he blessed Rome!

The Pope who blessed Rome, gave his blessing to the world, to the entire world, that Easter morning. Allow me to follow up on that same blessing: God loves us, God loves you all, and evil will not prevail! We are all in the hands of God.

Therefore, without fear, united hand in hand with God and among ourselves, we move forward. We are disciples of Christ. Christ precedes us. The world needs His light. Humanity needs Him as the bridge to allows it to be reached by God and by His love.

Help us, too, and help each other to build bridges, with dialogue, with meetings, uniting us all to be one people, always in peace. Thank you, Pope Francis! I also want to thank all my brother cardinals who have chosen me to be Peter’s Successor, and to walk together with you, as a united Church always seeking peace, justice, always seeking to work as men and women who are faithful to Jesus Christ, without fear, to proclaim the Gospel, to be missionaries.

I am a son of Saint Augustine, an Augustinian, who said: “with you I am a Christian and for you I am a bishop.” In this sense, we can all walk together towards that homeland that God has prepared for us.

To the Church of Rome, a special greeting! We must seek together how to be a missionary Church, a Church that builds bridges, dialogue, always open to receive like this square with its open arms, all, all who need our charity, our presence, dialogue, and love.

And if you allow me a word, a greeting to all and especially to my beloved diocese of Chiclayo, in Peru, where a faithful people accompanied their bishop, shared their faith and gave so, so much to continue being a Church that is faithful to Jesus Christ.

To all of you, brothers and sisters of Rome, of Italy, of the whole world, we want to be a Church of the Synod, a Church that walks, a Church that always seeks peace, that always seeks charity, that always seeks to be close, especially to those who suffer.

Today is the day of the Supplication to Our Lady of Pompeii. Our Mother Mary always wants to walk with us, to be close, to help us with her intercession and her love. So, I would like to pray together with you. Let us pray together for this new mission, for the whole Church, for peace in the world and let us also ask Mary, our Mother, for this special grace. ✪

⭐️ Pi In The Sky

VE Day: The Day The Nazis Were Defeated

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onald Trump has declared May 8 Victory Day for World War II because on this day in 1945, the Nazis surrendered, marking the end of the Second World War in the European theater, a great victory for the Allies; especially America.

While America had yet to defeat genocidal imperial Japan; which would occur by the beginning of September, 1945, the defeat of the German Nazis and Italian fascists was a pivotal point and the close of the Western arena of conflict in WWII. U.S. soldiers were still battling Japanese troops on the other side of the world, but Americans at home were understandably joyous as they celebrated Victory in Europe or V-E Day. The mass murdering Nazis had lost, and freedom had triumphed.

Trump lamented the fact that modern Americans don’t celebrate our many military victories in the way that some other nations celebrate theirs. Thus, Trump, who already established Vietnam Veterans’ Day in 2017, now hopes to inspire Americans to honor our “Greatest Generation,” the World War II heroes who, on May 8, 1945, celebrated Germany’s unconditional surrender to the Allies with “Victory in Europe.” Trump also established a holiday to commemorate the end of World War I in November.

President Trump posted on Truth Social Thursday:

“Many of our allies and friends are celebrating May 8th as Victory Day, but we did more than any other Country, by far, in producing a victorious result on World War II. I am hereby renaming May 8th as Victory Day for World War II and November 11th as Victory Day for World War I.”

In his usual ebullient style, Trump praised the USA:

“We won both Wars, nobody was close to us in terms of strength, bravery, or military brilliance, but we never celebrate anything — That’s because we don’t have leaders anymore, that know how to do so! We are going to start celebrating our victories again!”

The U.S. Army website provided the following information on V-E Day:

Emissaries of the German government surrendered on 7 May 1945, at General Eisenhower’s Headquarters in Reims, France. The next day, 8 May, was designated as V-E Day (Victory in Europe), the official end of the war in Europe. The American contributions to the liberation of Europe had been predominant in both manpower and as an “arsenal for democracy” with American factories producing weapons, tanks, ships, and planes for ourselves and our allies… [It was] the steadfast determination, courage and tenacity of the American Soldier that broke the German ability and will to resist.

The National WWII Museum explains:

In the Spring of 1945, Allied forces were converging on Germany from East and West. As they crossed into Germany, advancing soldiers encountered fierce resistance, cities devastated by bombing, and horrific evidence of Nazi crimes. Seeing the looming collapse of his regime, Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler took his own life on April 30, 1945. Within days, his successors surrendered unconditionally to Allied forces.

On May 7, 1945, the Chief of Staff of the German Armed Forces High Command, Alfred Jodl, surrendered at General Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Allied headquarters in Reims. At the ceremony in which Jodl signed the Act of Military Surrender were representatives of the major Allied powers who also signed: France, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the United States.

So why isn’t V-E Day May 7? The WWII Museum clarifies that, too:

At Soviet request, another surrender document with few significant changes was signed in Berlin on May 8, 1945, by German Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel, bringing a formal end to nearly six years of bloody fighting in Europe.

U.S. President Harry Truman shared the good news with the American public and designated May 8 as V-E Day.

Today, we should celebrate all the brave American soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines who fought during and won WWII, leaving us a freer world. And we should also dedicate ourselves to the cause of liberty and to fighting tyranny, terrorism, antisemitism, socialism, and all the other war crimes and evil ideologies that contributed to the cause and fuel WWII but did not die with it. The task of defending freedom has been handed on from the “Greatest Generation” to our own generation, and we cannot let them down.✪

The Random Black Woman Statue In Times Square Is More Leftist Cultural Warfare

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he cultural parasites of the left have struck again. This time, they have erected a bronze statue of a 12-foot-tall anonymous overweight black woman in New York City’s Times Square, where it will stand for the next month. This kind of ‘artwork’ is designed to denigrate and tear down western civilization for the purpose of seizing cultural and political power.

Matt Walsh asked whether it was a particular person “or just a statue of a random black woman for no apparent reason?”

It is indeed a random black woman, and the randomness is for a very specific reason. Having torn down beautiful statues of American heroes and icons, the Left is now erecting intentionally ugly statues designed to attack the very idea of greatness and undermine the notion that exceptional people should be memorialized and honored in public. And they’re doing it for the ultimate purpose of seizing and wielding cultural and political power.

But don’t just take my word for it. The statue, we’re told, “disrupts preconceived ideas of what defines a triumphant figure and challenges who should be rendered immortal through monumentalization.”

These people do not come to build but to destroy, and what they erect in the place of what they have destroyed isn’t just boring and narcissistic, it’s also cultural propaganda that insists on a neo-Marxist paradigm pitting the supposedly marginalized and oppressed against the oppressors. And we all know who the oppressors are.

Recall that in recent years New York City removed a statue of Thomas Jefferson that had stood in city hall for 187 years and took down a statue of Theodore Roosevelt outside the American Museum of Natural History that had been there for nearly a century. The monuments to these great Americans were, in the Left’s telling, nothing more than celebrations of racism and bigotry, and had to be torn down as part of their cultural revolution.

And what do they offer as a replacement for the likes of Jefferson and Roosevelt in the public square? A celebration of both mediocrity and identity. The official description of the ground-level statute states “the woman … cuts a stark contrast to the pedestaled permanent monuments — both white, both men — which bookend Duffy Square, while embodying a quiet gravity and grandeur.”

A stark contrast indeed. Historically, we have put statues of American heroes on pedestals because we’re meant to look up at them, to admire them, honor them, and aspire to their greatness. By putting a statue of a random black woman at ground level, the message, at least on one level, is clear: Do not aspire to greatness, do not honor those who achieve objectively great things. What undergirds this message is a diabolical philosophy: There is no such thing as greatness, or honor, or beauty, goodness, or truth.

But the ultimate purpose of this kind of propaganda isn’t merely to push cultural relativism. It’s to accumulate power. Once the Left has “disrupted” the idea of greatness and destroyed our cultural patrimony, it can impose a new set of standards that divides Americans into identity groups based on immutable characteristics like race and sex.

Hence the white man of the past becomes the universal villain and the anonymous fat black woman becomes the true American hero, the one who should be immortalized in bronze. The fact that the artist didn’t choose a specific black woman is part of the propaganda. Unchosen things like race and sex, according to the cultural left’s ideology, are more important than any one individual’s accomplishment or contribution to public life, however heroic or unique.

The statue need not be any particular black woman, because every black woman is a “hero” based on her race and sex alone. That’s why our American history, full of actual heroes like Jefferson and Roosevelt and George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, must become a parade of villains, a litany of lies. 

In carrying out their assault on American history and culture, the revolutionary left can’t help but mock what they would destroy. Hence the official description of the statute notes that, “In her depiction, one recognizes a shared humanity, yet the contrapposto pose of her body and the ease of her stance is a subtle nod to Michelangelo’s David.” What nonsense. No one who looks at this statue is going to think of Michelangelo’s David. Even mentioning that masterpiece in the description is intended to denigrate it.

This cultural warfare isn’t new, and it isn’t confined to America. Leftist ideologues are putting similar statues of random black women all over western Europe, right in the heart of western civilization, which is what the left ultimately wants to destroy.

We shouldn’t let them, and that means recognizing this kind of cultural warfare for what it is, taking down their statues, and restoring the ones they tore down. ✪

Pothole Pete Is Back Again

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here are a few varieties of politicians. There’s shamelessness, and then politician shamelessness.  There are the relatively smart con men, the clueless followers who barely attain midwit status; and the vanishingly few politicians who believe in things and mostly tell the truth as they see it. 

The first group amounts to about 10%, the middle about 80%, and if we are lucky, we get about 10% who are there to actually make America a better place. 

Pete Buttigieg definitely fits into that first group, which are basically con men. Adam Schiff and Dan Goldman are in the same category; although frankly, they are much worse at conning anybody but the marks who are eager to buy what they are selling. 

Buttigieg is nowhere as talented a con man as, say, Obama, but he has a seemingly artless charm and wonkiness that appeals to “thoughtful” centrists who believe he really is a good-hearted man trying to accomplish good things. 

Uh, yeah. No. Buttigieg is hardly outright evil, but he is still an opportunistic political grifter with a knack for sounding sincere as he relieves you of your cash. 

I know plenty of people who see Pothole Pete as just the kind of technocrat this country needs. He’s not a culture warrior, and he doesn’t come off as an ideological zealot. He is NOT an ideological zealot. He is an ambitious guy with a talent for getting into positions of power and using that power to spread the cash around while accomplishing not one thing he promises. In other words, a typical Democrat.

As Pete sets himself up for another run for the White House, he first has to solve a few problems he faces. The biggest one being that he will be aiming to run in the “non-threatening competent technocrat” lane that appeals to a small slice of the Democrat Party, yet his record as Transportation Secretary is uniquely undistinguished. He had about as much positive impact as any Secretary of Housing and Urban Development ever has, which is to say none to not one little bit. 

Worse, his record is marked by numerous failures, which tarnish the brand quite a bit. He needs an explanation; and even better, will use his failures (as Democrats always do) as proof that you need even more Pete Buttigieg to solve the problems that Pete Buttigieg has created. 

Hence his new “too many regulations” shtick. One could point out the obvious fact that Republicans have been arguing this for decades, and have endured nothing but ridicule from the Pete Buttigiegs of the world. 

However, we all know that anything said by Republicans is de facto evil, and when they happen to be right, they only say those things to push an evil agenda. Of course, you need a Democrat to fix the problems Democrats create. 

And Pete Buttigieg certainly was one of the major authors of the problem he now decries. Much of the money authorized under the Inflation Reduction Act flowed through Mayor Pete’s hands, so he helped craft the absurd regulations that tied up all that money and made it evaporate while accomplishing not a damn thing. 

If it is impossible to build anything in America, the fault lies almost entirely with the Democrats, who kinda like it that way. California’s high-speed rail project is the ideal Democrat construction project–billions of dollars being tossed around, lots of makework jobs created, lawyers and lobbyists making bank, and all it requires to make it justified is building a foot or two of infrastructure a year. 

✪ Not building things is better than building things, if you think like a Democrat. Much better.

✪The problem you are trying to “solve” never gets solved, so more money is needed. 

✪ No silly expenditures on actually DOING things, so the money goes straight into the pockets of the preferred recipients. 

✪ The recipients of the money are incentivized to lobby for more and bigger projects. 

✪ The longer things go, the more cushy and lucrative jobs are waiting for the politicians and regulators to land in. 

✪ And a fraction of the money flows back into Democrat coffers, keeping the cycle going. 

The only thing Pothole Pete has built are the roadblocks he now decries. Removing those roadblocks will be his rallying cry to gain political support for his run for president. “Let’s focus on building things” appeals to middle-class Democrats frustrated with the radical Left and who want things just to work. 

It’s a great grift, if you think about it. It has worked for Democrats for years. The “war on poverty” is a great example. It has been as successful as the war in Afghanistan, which similarly sucked up a trillion dollars and left behind a mess as bad as when it began. Combating urban decay? We build public housing, watch it deteriorate and become breeding grounds for crime, and then tear it down. 

Wash, rinse, repeat. 

Pothole Pete’s problem is that while the technocrats in the Democrat Party like his style of “governance,” and he did quite well under Biden, the appetite among Democrat voters for this style of politics is waning by the month. Democrat voters want anger and passion, and while an angry Democrat president will be happy to feed the pigs at the trough, the base will prefer an AOC-style president over a technocrat. 

Pothole Pete will have to content himself with a secondary gig. ✪

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