“Do not think that I have come to bring peace on earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” -Matthew 10:34

 When goals are similar, people and representatives can argue vociferously on implementation and make noble compromises. When foundational goals are contradictory and incompatible, compromise is not feasible: one side must win and the other must lose. If one large segment of a group insists on going east while the other side insists on going west, the only compromise is to stay where you are – and that won’t get you anywhere.

A large contingent of American society has unmoored itself from the principle of Constitutional government under law, founded on fidelity to faith, family and freedom. These anti-God leftists insist on having a command society (with themselves in charge) where a small elite class rules and everyone else simply obeys or is banished from society – when not actually jailed. There is no compromise possible with these authoritarians. They must lose and we must win.

The big question is how to accomplish that with the least strife and violence. It becomes clearer and clearer that the anti-God left will make war rather than tolerate dissent. People on the right, as it is currently understood, including the secular right and the faithful, will accept war rather than submit to tyranny. This is a formula for revolutionary and/or civil war. Thank God we are a country founded on federalism. It presents the last, best, hope for resolving this crisis without going directly into open war.

We may well soon have to divide into free states and captive states. Do not underestimate how many people are with those of you who cherish the American values of faith, family, and freedom. Courage is contagious. Under withering assault, Texas Right to Life (TRTL) set records in all categories at both its main Houston Event a week and a half ago and its burgeoning Dallas event this last weekend. In Dallas, Rev. Rafael Cruz (father of Sen. Ted Cruz) gave a barnburner of a keynote speech calling for the Churches to stand for Christ, for their flocks, and for liberty. My hands got sore from applauding. The only sour note, for me, was that, at the end, when Rev. Cruz called all the Pastors and Religious in attendance to come forward to pray over this great group of nearly 500 people, a nice contingent of Pastors came forth – but not a single Catholic Priest or Nun was to be found among their number. But the point is, courage is contagious. If you make your stand, many will come out of the woodwork to stand with you. You must also not underestimate how many people have bought into the new “norm” of governmental tyranny. The voters of both California and Canada in the last few weeks voted  to give a mandate to nakedly incompetent and malicious authoritarians (and yes, I know there was some fraud – but don’t deceive yourself on these that fraud ruled the day). These people chose to be ordered what to do, no matter how pathetically it fails.

The states offer a fruitful potential organizing principle, one that would be hard for soyboy activists to intimidate. But whether or not the states take up the mantle of liberty on behalf of their citizens against a rogue federal government, if we are to bequeath our children something other than chains, misery and poverty we must form a coalition of the willing so that freedom never dies – and forms a base from which to rebuild after the inevitable crash of the authoritarians (a crash, I might note, that is already well underway). Alas, failure is always a more fruitful option for the anti-God left: when it fails, it just wallows in misery and complaint; when it succeeds, it carries the seeds of destruction with it and destroys everything in its path.

Secularism, by its very nature, carries the seeds of destruction because it always degenerates into a contest over who will wield power. At best, you have roving bands of rival warlords all seeking to be king of the hill and destroying a multitude of innocents in their path. At its worst, one of the warlords captures the hill for a time and hurts a lot of people before his rule collapses from its own internal contradictions and abuses. This is why, as America has become more secular, it has become less free. Without God, there is only a raw contest for power – in which everyone who plays ultimately loses.

As the country so many of us loved and in which we thrived goes through its death throes, it is easy to be taken hold of by a furious anger. We must be vigorous in defending the liberty of all – and I include violent defense in that when either we or our fellows are violently attacked. If I lived in Australia, I would be engaged in setting up defense measures against their hideous and tyrannical police – and probably the overthrow of their now-fully totalitarian government. But that is not where we are. We have other options in America.

Having said that, we must remember that first and foremost we are called to invite the lost, the confused and those who are now destroying themselves back to communion with God. In these days, the minds of many of the very best are clouded over badly. Vengeance is God’s. Like St. Joan of Arc or Abraham Lincoln, our job is to limit the strife to no more than is needed to defend ourselves and our fellows from violent assault and the overthrow of liberty.

Since January, I have been quietly working with people from several states on what I call my “panic room” strategy. It involves, at the very least, nullification of the multitude of blatantly unconstitutional edicts flooding out of Washington, D.C. – and encompasses the possibility of actual secession if our federal officials insist on continuing their secession from Constitutional government. In January, many of my more sober friends tried to convince me this was not possible with the preponderance of force in federal hands. I maintained that the feds are now so maliciously incompetent that, by the summer, they would begin to reap such a multitude of crises that they would be badly enfeebled in trying to suppress such a move – and that they would forfeit the loyalty of many who they would need to have a chance to do so. Just this week, one of the political prisoners, John Steven Anderson, from the January incursion on the Capitol building died in jail – even as video previously suppressed by lying prosecuters proved that the charges against him were a lie and a fraud. Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller, who publicly asked for accountability from the top military brass for the Afghanistan debacle, has been put in jail for criticizing his superiors. This from a military that excused treasonous acts by top brass against Pres. Trump. Now the chaos is so large and growing that the feds might well be happy to have all the “troublemakers” gravitate to free states and not have to deal with them so intensely anymore. That would set up a very stark contrast between which sort of system thrives and which dies amidst so much sound and fury. It would also relieve a LOT of pressure that otherwise could explode in violence and war – while giving ordinary people the option not to go down with the flaming federal ship on its self-destructive course.

Even earlier than that, in July of 2020, I formed CORAC to give people a means of acting collectively to help each other and to reach out to those who had been wounded by the storm of dysfunction growing in the land. We divided the nation into 15 regions and appointed a regional coordinator in each. The regional coordinator is the leader of each region, who works to connect people and subdivide the region into smaller, workable units reporting to him. They focus on education, activism, and primarily getting people together to talk about and plan for difficult times, while lifting each other up as friends and neighbors. Each coordinator has broad autonomy to follow their own enthusiasms, so long as they are consistent with our mission and they have people within their region assigned to help carry out the fundamental national CORAC priorities. At first, some were critical of such a simple mission statement and that coordinators were given such broad autonomy. But I hate the inefficient bureaucratic mindset that pervades all of modern society while calling itself “professional.” It is a system that suppresses individual creativity and initiative – when I want to ignite a profusion of it, channeled through basic, foundational principles. How do you promote freedom while using a tightly regimented, centrally overbearing control system? I also hate long mission statements. As far as I am concerned, a mission statement should include all that is vital and nothing that is not. One of the moments that sticks in my mind is, decades ago, when a reporter asked President Ronald Reagan what his strategy was in dealing with the Soviet Union. His answer was a masterpiece: “Well,” he said, “It’s very simple: we win, they lose.” Perfect in every way.

One of my great joys this last month is that almost all the larger team is seeing the wisdom in my politically unorthodox manner. Different regions, having different priorities that they are free to pursue, have developed different types of expertise – that they all can and are sharing with each other. When a problem arises in one region, they have a friend in another region who has real-world experience in how to deal with it. Meantime, they are doing what they love – and the only price they have to pay is to also do what we need nationally. What do you think: do people work harder and more joyfully at what they love or at what they don’t? Pretty easy answer, I think. And as they grow, they encourage their own people to do the same. Freedom and joyful collaboration: what a concept! All of our people have the freedom and joy of savoring the work of their own hands – and sharing it with others who have other priorities. Meantime, a lot of our coordinators initially were leery because they feared this was too big for them. Applying my next right step philosophy, I told them their primary job was to reach out to others in their region – that we would provide them updates on all who were signing up – and just get them to know each other and come up with ideas that could help and hearten people. God bless ‘em, they were game to give it a try. Now so many who were uncertain they could do this have hit their stride, walking confidently and joyfully in leading and growing their regions, while working closely with their friends in other regions. The big secret that they had to learn was that they were not alone – that when they operated with a servant mentality rather than a ruling mentality, they would create real communities of people working together in harmony. And so it is. Remember, we are never alone when we go forth, under God, doing the little we can in His service and not fretting too much over what we cannot do. Next right step under God…that’s all we are called to.

We then set up national committees to deal with problems that might arise in difficult times. Our health and wellness teams have developed classes in natural and homeopathic medical techniques that people can use if modern medicine became unavailable (and even if it doesn’t). To date, over 110 people have taken these classes – which we provide free of charge (though people may spend money to get supplies from other outlets – none of which we sell or benefit from). Almost a thousand have participated in demonstrations on how to make medicinal tinctures.

We have set up a ham radio network that now spans the entire continental United States. A government can shut down internet and cell towers. It cannot shut down radio waves, only license them. If everything collapses, who cares about the license? We are moving into some other methods and technologies to keep communication alive under all circumstances. Some methods are as old as civilization, itself; some technologies would impress Luke Skywalker. We are not cursing the darkness, but lighting thousands of candles.

I will talk more later this week about the amazing things the Sustainability Team and the Prayer Teams are doing. Mainly lighting more candles. All of this and, as we have grown to over 1,500 members nationwide, our costs have been kept to a pittance. All of our administrative, website development and maintenance, and vendor costs remain under $12,000 per month.

You can join with us here and find your region at the bottom of the same page. Just click on the region to email your regional coordinator. There is no charge for membership, and it is open to all people of good will, without regard to ethnicity, sex, religious or political affiliation. Yet all members must support the traditional definitions of religious liberty, family life, and human rights as defined by natural law in the American Bill of Rights.

We have now begun our fall fundraising campaign. Our target is $50,000. Many of you have already been generous in the little over a year since we began this family that now stretches from sea to shining sea. I have shown you how some of the money is used. I hope to both expand our reach and cover more needs if we meet our goal. Next week, I will begin to publish a thermometer showing you how close to our goal we have gotten. So I ask you once more to generously open your wallet, join us, and help us to grow. We are busily working on crisis scenarios, teaching people how to develop the skills they need so they can deal with whatever may come, and help others do the same. In many ways, as the old government increasingly aligns itself against the people it is supposed to serve, we have become a sort of shadow government that is, as Lincoln once memorably said, “of the people, by the people, and for the people.” Whether America collapses, separates, or miraculously rights itself we are prepared – with malice towards none, but with no timidity in the face of oppression; with charity for all, but charity that defends the friend or neighbor who is under assault by those who have no charity; we are become a great family. Won’t you join the family and become one of our people?

The great Dennis Prager’s latest column poignantly asks, “Who Would Hide a Jew if Nazis Took Over America?” We would. Join us.

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One of our members, Darby Duffin, is a documentary filmmaker. His whole family have been wonderful supporters since CORAC was founded. Duffin’s film, “Fish and Men,” was just named the best documentary film at the Berkshire International Film Festival.  As you can see from the link, it is now available for order from Amazon or Apple. I had lunch with Darby last week – and he is already at work planning his next piece. I thought you would want to know.

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Make sure to join me on Gab. You can find me there under Charliej373 or at the group, CORAC. I have dramatically cut back on Facebook and now use Gab as my primary social media site.