On Thursday, Joe Biden’s Injustice Dept. and its Gestapo arm, the FBI, raided dozens of people associated with Donald Trump’s White House and campaign staff. Steve Bannon was the first to break the story of this huge escalation in the White House war to outlaw all opposition – after he surrendered on bogus charges to the Manhattan DA.  Then I saw that Harmeet Dhillon was able to confirm at least part of it. Dhillon is the Republican National Committeewoman from California and is also part of David Daleiden’s team of lawyers. I know her peripherally – and well know her credibility. Today, the story has been completely confirmed, even though the establishment media doesn’t seem to want to touch it – perhaps because they know that when it gets fully out, this is unlikely to have the effect that Biden and Atty. Gen. Merrick Garland hope it will.

Some find the raw brazenness of the politicization of federal law enforcement to be unbelievable. But brazenness is now a feature for the budding tyrants, not a flaw. They want you to know they will come after anyone for any reason with no apology or remorse. It is designed to get you into line. If, then, this is already a police state, why are they not already coming after you? Because it is a baby police state. They do not have the manpower to take out all the dissenters and they are not yet sure the population will submit without a fight. If there is a serious fight, they know they lose. Yet if we allow this cub to grow into a full-blown tiger, there will be a lot of bloodshed before it can be contained.

Why, then, is the virulent left accusing “MAGA Republicans” of being the totalitarian threat, of advocating violence and all other things dark and diabolical? They are just following one of their great hero’s most basic rules: always accuse your opponent of what you are actually doing – Saul Alinsky – who actually dedicated his book on the matter to Satan. If you look at Biden and company’s rhetoric from this perspective, you can see with clarity both what they are doing and what they are planning to do. Steve Bannon is right that this a signal of their desperation. The top tiers of the left have figured out the only way they can secure their hold on power is through force and violence – and they have chosen to go that route.

Very quickly, our only choice will be to submit or to fight. The third article in the trilogy of pieces I have been working on will cover effective non-violent means of making this attempted putsch so painful that the left is more likely to pull back. I am no Pollyanna. I know that ordinary people are often wont to hesitate before acting vigorously against a small problem until it has become a huge threat. But we have to endeavor to force the tyrants back by non-violent means before getting into a full-blown fight – to live our duty to God. Alas, as Abraham Lincoln once told a peace delegation at the White House, sometimes the only path to peace is through war.

For now, the putsch is being orchestrated against political dissidents. If the left managed to secure that beachhead, the next target would be their religious opponents. This is why, already, I am identifying safe places of refuge for Bishops, Priests, Pastors and Orthodox Rabbis.

I am both astonished and bemused at how eagerly and viciously the leftist rank and file is calling for the abandonment of due process in order to crush their opponents through the power of the state, confident that empowering a totalitarian government could never turn against them. Both Leon Trotsky and Maximilien Robespierre could tell them that is a malignantly erroneous confidence. I always knew the road to hell was paved with good intentions. I am a bit surprised to see it lined with frenzied partisans cheering on their own destruction.

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With the death of Queen Elizabeth I have been startled to see some Catholics sorrowfully conclude that her soul is in deep jeopardy because she was not Catholic – and a (thankfully small) few gloat that she is doomed for the same reason.

This cuts to the bone with me. Although always doubtful, I was 16 years old when I made the definitive internal break with my family’s fundamentalist denomination. Like many sects, it insisted that only those who were overtly its members could go to heaven.

My paternal grandfather, Wilbert Andrew Johnston, was one of the best men I have ever known. Incredibly physically strong (enough so that it was noted for many miles around his little Alabama community), he was also incredibly kind and gentle. Before he was disabled from a serious injury, he had a profound knack for soothing people who were hurting or scared and turning down the heat in any emotionally charged atmosphere. Shoot, he was able to do this pretty well even after he was disabled. I deeply loved and admired him. Woe to anyone who mistook his gentle kindness for weakness, though. If someone persisted in troubling the innocent, Poppo Johnston’s strength came dramatically into play – and he truly defended the faithful. He was a Methodist in life. When he died, that meant that the family’s then-religious beliefs condemned him to hell. But there was an escape clause. I overheard my Mother say, tearfully, that she was certain he converted in his last breath. (I need to note that my Mom eventually abandoned that doctrine she had been taught. Though an old Protestant woman to her death, she had, at her request, a Rosary draped around her hand in her casket). What I overheard caused an absolute raw fury to erupt in me. I found a huge stick and battered an old oak in the backyard with it for 10 or 15 minutes in my frenzied rage. I then went for a very long walk. It seemed to me that if my grandfather, one of the kindest, gentlest and most just men I had ever known had to say the magic words before he could be received into glory, then it was all a fixed game. I decided that if I was going to go to hell anyway, I would do it for what I actually believed, not for pretending to believe what I actually found contemptible. I had long studied the Bible. This event launched my study into the history of Christianity. (It was in the course of this study that I had my first hard tickle about Catholicism. I began to trace back to the founder of almost every denominational movement. It was with no little astonishment that I realized that the Catholic Church was the only one that could legitimately claim historically to have been founded by Christ, Himself).

I am Catholic. I completely believe that the fullness of truth is held in trust in the deposit of faith with the Catholic Church. However, I believe that is a gift to me, not a golden ticket. My salvation is dependent on how vigorously I do the Lord’s will as best I can understand it. It is the fruit of my faith in action that will weigh decisively for or against me when I stand in judgment. It is a great inheritance. Just as an heir to a large fortune has a leg up in temporal matters on a fellow born to poverty, it is what he does with the treasure bequeathed him that is decisive as to who he is. Everyone is born with a sense of the good. And so I insist that the fellow who is born with a thousand talents and squanders 500 of them is in danger of the judgment while the fellow born with a single talent who has two to offer on judgment day will be warmly received by the Lord, even though he objectively has 498 fewer talents to offer than the wastrel. The man who seeks the good and seeks to do it is far superior to the man who is born to a wealth of good and lives smugly and complacently.

I LOATHED Protestant triumphalism when I was a Protestant and I LOATHE Catholic triumphalism now that I am a Catholic. My Dad, in a deep religious conversation, once asked me if I thought only Catholics will go to heaven. I told him that, since I believed that the fullness of truth is preserved in the deposit of faith by the Catholic Church and that in heaven we will know all truth, I did believe that everyone in heaven would be functionally Catholic – but that it is how we live and what we do that most heavily influences our chances of salvation. So many of those heavenly Catholics would have been Protestants, Jews, Muslims, and even atheists while they walked this earth. As Jesus said, it is the son who does His Father’s will who will be saved, not the one who gave lip service to it. My Dad thought that was an excellent answer, indeed. And I was delighted, when I was a catechumen, to discover this was pretty much what the Church – and many of her saints – taught, as well.

So I beg you, if you are inclined to think you have a golden ticket to heaven because of your denominational choice, please stop that. You have a mighty inheritance – and the Lord expects a return on what He has given you. Physician, heal thyself and leave the judging of others on last things to Christ.

It has been a matter of embarrassment to me that the historical kings who have been named Charles have been a sad lot. They rarely even rise to mediocrity. I suppose the very best was King Charles XII of Sweden. But in his ruinous war with Peter the Great’s Russia, he ended Sweden’s tenure as a great power – a loss from which it has never recovered.

If the bulk of those named King Charles embarrass me, Charles VII of France (the one whose crown was secured by St. Joan of Arc) absolutely mortifies me. He gladly took the decisive help of St. Joan to win the victories which secured his throne, then completely abandoned her when she was captured and murdered, not lifting a finger to help his great patroness. Only when he realized, decades later, that her conviction undermined the legitimacy of his throne, did he vigorously support her rehabilitation trial. It was always about him. Contemplating this lowlife, I long ago pledged to St. Joan, who I consider my great patroness, that I am one Charles who will keep faith with her to the end in service to our one Lord.

Queen Elizabeth was a notably dignified woman and sovereign. I pray that newly crowned Charles III of England will somehow manage to rise to the level of mediocrity.

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Alas, I find I will have to skip over the U.S. Senate race in Colorado. I saw an interview with the Republican nominee, Joe O’Dea, who said he supports banning abortion after the 22^nd week except for cases of rape, incest, or the HEALTH (not the life) of the mother. The “health” of the mother has long been the weasel word to obscure a politician’s support of abortion for any reason up to the moment of birth – because they interpret health to mean even if the woman just would feel sad to have to carry to term.

I know that Republicans, generally, are weasels who will not effectively defend freedom and opportunity for anyone but themselves, but I do demand that they do better than the Democrats who actively attack freedom and opportunity. If they can’t do even that, I can’t bring myself to care whether the seat is held by an open enemy of liberty or a stealth enemy of liberty.

I do know that, in hostile territory, you have to choose what you will emphasize in order to have a chance of prevailing. But that is not as hard and fast as some think. I have a friend who, running in a heavily Democrat area (hadn’t elected a Republican since the 1930’s) was very diplomatic and refined. He lost a couple of times. In his last race, he figured a Republican couldn’t win there, so he was just going to be completely candid about his passionate support for faith, family, and freedom in order to hearten the many faithful there. He won.

I think a lot of ordinary people are starved for people who will champion their values. But they will not rally to the sound of the uncertain trumpet. And neither will I. All the Joe O’Dea’s, Mitch McConnell’s, Paul Ryan’s, and Mitt Romney’s can go pound sand. I have voted for a lot of weenie Republicans in my time, but I will not vote for one who signals from the start that he will join with the establishment club in oppressing ordinary people.

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I was delighted to hear from a woman in Memphis that she sheltered in place a week ago when the deadly shooter was killing at random, because she had been alerted to the danger by her regional CORAC Signal group. She had not heard anything on the news about the ongoing danger, probably because the media knew from the start that the killer was a black guy – and that doesn’t fit their preferred narrative. I encourage everyone who reads this to sign up with CORAC and join their regional Signal group. It doesn’t cost anything. We are neighbors working with neighbors to weather the great storm that has come upon us.

The lady wrote us, in part:

“…I have to heartily thank you for the alert you sent the other night about sheltering in place due to the shooter.  Our local news station did not show anything on TV about the developing situation, the Corac network was the only one which alerted us.  The shooter did wind up in our area and carjacked someone before he was apprehended.  It shows the value of the Corac alert system when you cannot depend on regular sources for info.”

I should also note that the virtual talk I will give on Tuesday, September 20, is open only to members of CORAC. We only have 300 slots, so we have to reserve the space for those who have already committed to helping us and each other.

If you have not already donated to CORAC, please do so today. We charge nothing for the many things we do – and we do a lot together. Help us remain strong for all who love faith, family, and freedom, as the dark storm of modern ignorance and malice breaks over us. Check out our website to get a sense of all that we are doing together.  

If communication goes out for any length of time, meet outside your local Church at 9 a.m. on Saturday mornings. Tell friends at Church now in case you can’t then. CORAC teams will be out looking for people to gather in and work with.

Find me on Gab at Charliej373 or at the CORAC group.

Find me on Twitter at @Charlie62394802