26 July 2025
Social Credit: Episode #23: National Accounts
In this video, we will be discussing the National Set of Books, i.e., a National Balance Sheet and a National Profit and Loss Account, which are necessary preambles for the introduction of a National Monetary Policy (see episode 10) that is based on the principles of Douglas Social Credit.
The Ultimate Royalist: Why She’s Devoted to the British Monarchy
Anita Atkinson is Britain's most fanatical monarchist. What is a Monarchist? In the UK, monarchists, or royalists, are in favour of maintaining the British monarchy. Many believe that, during her 70-year reign, Queen Elizabeth II and the British royal family provided stability to the country and, for millions of Brits, the monarchy has shaped British identity.
The UK is a constitutional monarchy, so the monarch rules alongside an elected government. I once interviewed Graham Smith, CEO of Republic, who is leading the charge to abolish Britain's monarchy and replace it with a republic. But I wanted to speak to someone on the other side of the aisle, to learn why they think the monarchy is best for Britain. At her Durham home, Anita once held the world record for the largest personal collection of royal memorabilia. She explained why she is so passionate about the Royal Family and why she is a monarchist.
NOTE: This video was filmed and edited before the death of Queen Elizabeth II in 2022.
Self Directed Study in Philosophy | St Thomas Aquinas' Philosophy | How To Study
With Gregory B. Sadler, PhD, Adjunct Professor, Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design.
Prayer to St Anne, Mother of the Virgin Mary
Today is the Feast of St Anne, mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In the East, she is called the Holy and Righteous Ancestor of God and Anna.
From Aleteia
By Philip Kosloski
St Anne is the patron of mothers, child care workers, and those who experience infertility.St. Anne has been known for centuries for her powerful intercession, especially for mothers, child care workers and those experiencing infertility.
According to legendary stories, Anne was infertile for many years, until she finally conceived and gave birth to the Virgin Mary.
Here is the traditional opening prayer for her feast of July 26.
O God, Who didst vouchsafe to blessed Anne the grace to be the mother of her who was to bring forth Thine only-begotten Son: grant, in Thy mercy, that we who devoutly venerate her memory may be aided by her intercession. Through the same Lord Jesus Christ, Thy Son, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end.
Amen.
Forgotten Customs of St Anne
Today is the Feast of St Anne, mother of the BVM. Mr Plese takes us through the forgotten and neglected Catholic customs attached to today.
From One Peter Five
By Matthew Plese, TOP
Above: Virgin and Child with St. Anne by Leonardo da Vinci.
St. Anne, Mother of the Mother of God
What we know about the Blessed Virgin Mary’s parents, Saints Joachim and Anne, comes from the Protoevangelium Jacobi (The Gospel of James). It is not part of the inerrant Word of God, but the document, which was written c. 170 AD gives insight into the life of Mary and her parents. St. Joachim was a prominent and respected man; however, he had no children, and he viewed this as a punishment from God. The Protoevangelium of St. James describes how St. Anne was even mocked for her barrenness, and how her husband was shamed for not being a father.
In an answer to his prayers, he and St. Anne, his wife, were given the daughter Mary, who was conceived without sin, in her womb. She remained sinless, ever-virgin, and would receive the unparalleled honor of being the Mother of God. Their prayers were answered greater than they could have ever imagined! The Nativity of our Lady, celebrated on September 8th is a day replete with Catholic customs.
St. Anne’s Day as a Former Holy Day of Obligation
Father Weiser in Christian Feasts and Customs recounts the history of liturgical devotion to St. Anne:
Since the Fathers of the Church rejected the use of such legendary sources, the faithful in Europe had no feast in honor of our Lord’s grand-parents. In the Middle East, however, the veneration of Saint Anne can be traced back to the fourth century.
The Crusaders brought the name and legend of Saint Anne to Europe, and the famous Dominican Jacobus de Voragine (1298) printed the story in his Golden Legend. From that time on the popular veneration of the saint spread into all parts of the Christian world. It was encouraged by the religious orders of the Franciscans, Dominicans, Augustinians, and Carmelites. In southern France a Feast of Saint Anne was celebrated as early as the fourteenth century. Pope Urban VI in 1378 extended it to England at the king’s request. Not until 1584, however, did the feast become universal, when Pope Gregory XIII prescribed it for the whole Church.
The feast of St. Anne was made a holy day of obligation under Pope Gregory XV who reigned from 1621 to 1623 as Dom Guéranger relates: “Gregory XV, after having been cured of a serious illness by St. Anne, had ranked her feast among those of precept, with the obligation of resting from servile work.” The Feast of St. Anne was listed as a Holy Day in Pope Urban VIII’s 1642 Universa Per Orbem, and it remained as such in some places like Quebec for some time.
Dom Guéranger also adds that Gregory XIII ordered the celebration of this feast universally “with the rite of a double. Leo XIII in recent times (1879), raised it, together with that of St. Joachim, to the dignity of a solemnity of the second class.”
The Patronage of St. Anne
St. Anne has long been depicted in art as part of a tradition of Catholic art that stretches back at least to the Middle Ages. In medieval art, St. Anne is often depicted teaching her little daughter to read. Medieval depictions of Mary’s birth often place the scene in a richly decorated chamber, with St Anne and her newborn baby being tended by midwives – images of domestic life, of women’s work and care.
Images of Mary’s childhood show her as the object of her parents’ love, holding her mother’s hand, or being taught to read. St Anne was a maternal saint in whom medieval mothers could see themselves reflected and she is accordingly honored as a patron saint for cabinetmakers, carpenters, childless couples, equestrians, grandmothers, grandparents, homemakers, housewives, lace makers, mothers, old-clothes dealers, pregnant women, horse riders, seamstresses, and women in labor, among other causes.
St. Anne is also a patron for women who are seeking a husband, as expressed in the popular old prayer: “Good St. Anne, send me a man!” Why? Father Weiser explains this long standing custom: “According to legend, she was married three times, first to Joachim, after his death to Cleophas, and finally to Salomas. This detail of the ancient story inspired young women to turn for help in finding a husband.” For this end, praying a Novena in honor of St. Anne was widely practiced in former times when the Faith was more widely known and loved. Women today who are seeking a spouse should likewise be familiar with calling on Good St. Anne for this intention!
Father Weiser also adds an interesting custom:
Her patronage of fertility was extended also to the soil. Thus she became a patron of rain. It is a popular saying in Italy that “rain is St. Anne’s gift,” in Germany, July rain is called “Saint Anne’s Dowry.”
Thus, for farmers and those experiencing drought, do not hesitate to call on the prayers of St. Anne!
The Popularity of St. Anne’s Name for Girls
St. Anne, whose name means “grace” became one of the most popular names for gifts in the 18th century. Hence, customs arose for girls celebrating their name days on St. Anne’s Day. Father Weiser again explains:
From the eighteenth century on, Anne, which means “grace,” was used more and more as a favorite name for girls. At the beginning of the nineteenth century it was the most popular girls’ name in central Europe, surpassing even that of Mary. This preference was based on a famous saying of past centuries, “All Annes are beautiful.” Naturally, parents wanted to assure this benefit for their baby daughters by calling them Anne or by adding Anne to a first name. Thus we have the many traditional names containing Anne or Ann (Mary Ann, Marianne, Marian, Ann Marie, Joanne, Elizabeth Ann, Lillian, Martha Ann, Louise Ann, Patricia Ann).
A hundred years ago there still remained the custom in many parts of Europe of celebrating Saint Anne’s Day as a festival “of all Annes,” meaning all beautiful girls. Dressed in their finery the bevy would parade through the streets with their escorts, bands would serenade them in parks and squares, balls would be held (both Johann Strausses composed “Anne Polkas” for this festival).
Saint Anne’s Eve was the day of receptions for debutantes at court and in private homes. Public amusements, including fireworks, entertained the crowds. The warm summer night was alive with laughter, beauty, music, and lights. And all of it was still connected in the hearts and minds of the participants with a tribute to Saint Anne, whose feast day shed its radiance upon this enchanting celebration.
St. Joachim, Father of the Mother of God
In the Protoevangelium of James, St. Joachim is described as a rich and pious man of the house of David who regularly gave to the poor and to the temple. However, as his wife was barren, the high priest rejected Joachim and his sacrifice, as his wife’s childlessness was interpreted as a sign of divine displeasure. Joachim consequently withdrew to the desert where he fasted and did penance for forty days. Angels then appeared to both Joachim and Anne to promise them a child. Some believe it was the Archangel St. Gabriel who also appear to him.
St. Joachim later returned to Jerusalem and embraced Anne at the city gate. The cycle of legends concerning Joachim and Anne were included in the Golden Legend and remained popular in Christian art until the Council of Trent restricted the depiction of apocryphal events.
No liturgical celebration of Saint Joachim was included in the Tridentine Calendar. It was added to the General Roman Calendar in 1584, for celebration on March 20, the day after the feast day of Saint Joseph. In 1738, it was transferred to the Sunday after the Octave of the Assumption of Mary. As part of his effort to allow the liturgy of Sundays to be celebrated, Pope St. Pius X transferred it to August 16, the day after the Assumption, so that Joachim may be remembered in the celebration of Mary’s triumph. It was then celebrated as a Double of the 2nd Class, a rank that was changed in 1960 to that of 2nd Class Feast. Dom Guéranger elaborates on the history of Feast of St. Joachim and how it also came to be highly ranked in the Roman Rite:
From time immemorial the Greeks have celebrated the feast of St. Joachim on the day following our Lady’s birthday. The Maronites kept it on the day after the Presentation in November, and the Armenians on the Tuesday after the Octave of the Assumption of the Mother of God. The Latins at first did not keep his feast. Later on it was admitted and celebrated sometimes on the day after the Octave of the Nativity, September 16, sometimes on the day following the Conception of the Blessed Virgin, December 9. Thus, both East and West agreed in associating St. Joachim with his illustrious daughter when they wished to do him honor.
About the year 1510, Julius II placed the feast of the grandfather of the Messias upon the Roman Calendar with the rank of double major; and remembering that family, in which the ties of nature and of grace were in such perfect harmony, he fixed the solemnity on March 20, the day after that of his son-in-law, St. Joseph. The life of the glorious patriarch resembled those of the first fathers of the Hebrew people; and it seemed as though he were destined to imitate their wanderings also, by continually changing his place upon the sacred cycle.
Hardly fifty years after the Pontificate of Julius II the critical spirit of the day cast doubts upon the history of St. Joachim, and his name was erased from the Roman breviary. Gregory XV, however, re-established his feast in 1622 as a double, and the Church has since continued to celebrate it. Devotion to our Lady’s father continuing to increase very much, the Holy See was petitioned to make his feast a holiday of obligation, as it had already made that of his spouse, St. Anne. In order to satisfy the devotion of the people without increasing the number of days of obligation, Clement XII in 1738 transferred the feast of St. Joachim to the Sunday after the Assumption of his daughter, the Blessed Virgin, and restored to it the rank of double major.
On August 1, 1879, the Sovereign Pontiff, Leo XIII, who received the name of Joachim in baptism, raised both the feast of his glorious patron and that of St. Anne to the rank of doubles of the second class.
Home Customs for St. Anne and Joachim
For those looking to add something special to the table on the feast of either of the grandparents of Our Lord, a great choice would be the Italian dessert known as Torta della nonna, which is Italian for “grandmother’s cake.” It is a classic Tuscan pastry characterized by a short crust pastry base filled with a rich, creamy custard and typically flavored with lemon zest and sometimes vanilla. The top of the tart is usually covered with a layer of pine nuts and dusted with powdered sugar.
Their feast days are also ideal opportunities for us to honor our grandparents with our visits (if they are alive) or our prayers (whether they have passed on to the next world or not). And conversely, if you are a grandparent, these are ideal days to consider what you should do now to help further pass down and transmit the Faith to your grandchildren.
Likewise, the Litany of St. Anne is an ideal prayer to add on her feast day, July 26th. It is a private, not a public litany.
Pilgrimage Sites in Honor of St. Anne and St. Joachim
Lasty, for those in close proximity to one of the great shrines of St. Anne, it would be an ideal day to make a pilgrimage to one of these shrines. For instance, there is a great shrine to St. Anne in Canada – Ste. Anne de Beaupré. The St. Anne Basilica is more than just one of the four major shrines in Québec and the oldest pilgrimage site in North America. It is a site of constant miracles. Cripples have entered the shrine on crutches and left by walking through the door because they were completely healed. Another shrine is Ste. Anne d’Auray in Britanny, France. There is also a church of St. Anne in Jerusalem, and the church is believed to have been built on the location where Ss. Joachim and Anne lived.
Finally, for those in Rome, about six blocks north of the Castel Sant’Angelo, there is a church built in honor of St. Joachim – San Gioacchino ai Prati Castello. It too would be a worthy destination for those seeking to honor one of the grandparents of the Son of God.
Breaking: Grotesque Celebration Of Sin Will Be Held In The Vatican
James Martin must be absolutely prancing with glee while singing showtunes.
Should a Christian Be a “Restorationist”?
From Peter Kwasniewski
Should a Christian be a “restorationist”? Naturally, it depends on what one means. Let us define restorationism as the tendency to think of the past as superior to the present and hence as offering a model for the future. Is this a legitimate or healthy attitude for a Christian to exhibit? In good scholastic fashion, we'll start with some contrary arguments, move to a "sed contra," develop a reply that proves the thesis both theoretically and historically, and finally respond to the objections.
Should a Christian be a “restorationist”? Naturally, it depends on what one means. Let us define restorationism as the tendency to think of the past as superior to the present and hence as offering a model for the future. Is this a legitimate or healthy attitude for a Christian to exhibit? In good scholastic fashion, we'll start with some contrary arguments, move to a "sed contra," develop a reply that proves the thesis both theoretically and historically, and finally respond to the objections.
Cofounder of Wikipedia: From Skeptical Philosopher to Christian
God works in mysterious ways! Now, we need to pray Sanger home to the Mystical Body of Christ, the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.
From Aleteia
By Tina Martinec Selan
Larry Sanger, one of the cofounders of Wikipedia, was born into a Christian family but lost his faith in adolescence. This is how he discovered it again ...
People’s paths to faith are very different. For some, the journey is smooth and without major upheavals; for others it’s more complicated. The latter includes the conversion of Larry Sanger, which he himself described in detail on his blog.
Co-founder of Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia
You may not know Larry Sanger by name, but if we mention the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, everyone who has ever searched for information on the internet is sure to be familiar with it.
We once had extensive encyclopedia collections on our bookshelves at home, where we read about various phenomena of our world. Now, we can simply type a keyword into a search engine and Wikipedia will quickly provide us with at least a brief explanation. Wikipedia was founded in 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger. The latter is not only a web programmer, but also a philosopher.
In search of answers to difficult questions
Philosophy was Larry Sanger's first and greatest love. It was through philosophy that he first became an agnostic in his teenage years, and then several decades later, a believer.
Sanger was born into a Christian family, but in his early teens he began to ask difficult questions. One of them, for example, was how the spirit, soul, and mind are connected, or what the differences between them are.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t find anyone to explain it to him or who wanted to discuss his deeper, philosophical questions about faith. Sanger deduced that “only dogmatic people, who lack curiosity and are unable to answer hard questions, believe in God”—and he wasn’t one of them. So he rejected faith.
After studying philosophy, he taught philosophy at a university for several years. During his studies, of course, he read a great deal of philosophical literature. He never considered himself a true atheist, he says, but rather an agnostic. “I neither believed nor disbelieved in the existence of God,” he explains. “I was always willing to consider seriously the possibility that God exists. They [i.e. atheists] were not.”
In fact, he found most of the arguments put forward by outspoken atheists to be inadequate, and often downright “obnoxious” in their rudeness and superficiality.
Discovering theology and God
A major turning point in his system of disbelief came after two major life events: first his marriage and then the birth of his first child. It was then that he first felt unconditional love for another person, for whom he was willing to give his life.
This meant a crack in his self-sufficient philosophical system. He was shaken to realize that his thinking was beginning to diverge from that of his agnostic and atheist colleagues, whom he had followed during his studies. Then, he discovered theology.
Although he read the Bible to his children, he didn’t have a special relationship with it. For him, it was just a book that was culturally significant and that children should therefore know about. But eventually, for various reasons, he decided he wanted to study the entire Bible, to understand it as believers do, without actually wanting to believe.
Realising he needed guidance in penetrating the biblical texts, he adopted a 90-day study plan and started using a variety of bibles and reference books. He found that there was much more depth and substance in the sacred text and in its interpretations than he had previously allowed. “It slowly dawned on me that I was acquainting myself with the two-thousand-year-old tradition of theology,” he writes.
And slowly, he started “talking to God,” his first attempt at prayer since his childhood.
Conversion
He began to write and publish essays on the subject. He was convinced by theological arguments that were consistent with his worldview. Of course, God's grace played a big role in this, which he himself is well aware of.
Larry Sanger published a lengthy thesis on his blog entitled How a Skeptical Philosopher Became a Christian. (If you prefer listening to reading, he reads the blog post out loud on his YouTube channel.) At the end, he professes his personal belief in the Triune God. Among other things, he writes that he is “thankful to God for adopting me into his family and forgiving my many sins.” He adds, “I thank [God] for the gift of faith that, for most of my life, I never imagined I would have.”
He’s also writing a book about God and his journey from unbelief to faith. He explains in his blog that he has not yet joined a specific church or denomination, but that his journey is ongoing. Let’s pray that God continues to enlighten his intellect and strengthen his faith, that he may continue on the path towards the fullness of the truth in Christ and his Church.