Actu catholique

"Allah Akbar" en Vendée : Ils tirent sur des étudiants catholiques ! (27/03)
Radio Du Clocher | 27 mars 2026
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgLRpuLObdQ

Local Pride in Germany

A young lady from Brazil was visiting every country that she had genes from on a genes test.

The video I saw was her visit to Germany.

Now, one point she made was, people from Brazil are proud to be Brazilians, more than to be Paulistanos or Pernambucanos. In Germany you are more proud to be a Saxon or a Bavarian (perhaps especially a Bavarian) than a German.

One possibility that comes to mind to some is of course, after World War II, Germany to some felt somewhat shameful. No, that's not the main reason. It was actually there before Hitler and Hitler tried to curb it. Gleichschaltung means, "we are no longer Bayern or Niedersachsen, primarily, we are all German" (and after 1938, he would make a similar point about Austria). So, the fact she observed in her visit is actually an acto of resistance.

But since this was so even before Hitler, it didn't start as an act of resistance. So, why the difference?

I looked up saints from Brazil, and each "canonised" saint was "canonised" (if at all) very recently by "John Paul II" or "Francis" ... I couldn't get even one canonised by real and undisputed Popes. Which of course means older ones.

St. Isfried von Ratzeburg (Isfrid of Ratzeburg) is celebrated as an Eigenfeier for the Archdiocese of Hamburg (between Lower Saxony and Sleswick Holstein, by the way). He died in 1204, about two decades before St. Francis of Assisi and St. Dominic of Guzmán. Eigenfeier means, the martyrology for June 15th refers to him in the words "Et alibi aliorum plurimorum sanctorum Martyrum et Confessorum, atque sanctarum Virginum. R. Deo gratias." In Latin, it was "festa quae in aliquibus locis celebrantur" ... but in Hamburg, there is an actual mention by name. Also, he has his feast day.

Hemma of Gurk died before the First Crusade and before the Great Schism. 1045.

Buried at Gurk* Cathedral since 1174, she was beatified on 21 November 1287 and canonised on 5 January 1938 by Pope Pius XI.

Given the burial at a Cathedral and the early veneration by beatification in 1287, she was certainly an attraction for Carinthians before Pius XI.

And given she died pre-schism, it's not surprising that Eastern Orthodox venerate her too.

Heribert of Cologne was formally canonised in 1075 by Pope Gregory VII. No need to guess his region, it's in the name; he was archbishop of Cologne for c. 20 years (a few months less), July 999 to March 1021.

The Category:German Roman Catholic saints has 90 pages. It also links to two subcatregories, so there are probably more than 90 saints or groups of saints. For instance, St. Modestus of Trier is mentioned in a subcategory, not the main one. So, any Catholic would have precisely as a Catholic a good dose of local patriotism not quite imaginable in Brazil.

By the way, the patron saints of Vienna include St. Clement Mary Hofbauer who preached there and St. Leopold III who ruled there. St. Peter Canisius, declined becoming Bishop** of Vienna, but was for one year Apostolic administrator there until the new bishop arrived. St. Coloman may have never set his foot there, but he died in Stockerau, 30 km or 20 miles away.*** Similar things can probably be said for Munich or Cologne, but, critically, probably not for Berlin. One reason more why German speaking Catholics are more attached to their little home than to the whole of a Germany that's ruled from (Protestant and Secularist) Berlin.

I'm not saying the fervour is quite the equal of living in Assisi near St. Francis or in Lisieux near Ste. Thérèse, but it's totally there.

Another reason is, the statehood of Germany starts out as Francia. Yes, Cologne as much as what was later to become Brussells were ruled by Clovis who was anointed in Rheims. Saxons were outside. Bavarians were outside. Bavarians joined voluntarily, more or less, as Tassilo III became a vassal of Pepin the Short, in an assembly held in Compiègne. Saxons joined involuntarily, pretty much, as Charlemagne launched basically a Crusade against them for pillaging Christians. This entity of Franks, Bavarians and Saxons only later became separated from France after the time of Charlemagne. For France, Germany and perhaps Lotharingia, the Lewis I is the same, Lewis the Pious, but each of them has a different Lewis II, as the heritage of Lewis I was split in three. Mid Francia has Lewis II of Italy, West Francia or France Lewis the Stammerer, East Francia or (mostly mainly) Germany had Lewis the German.

So, if different parts of Germany joined at different times when France was attached and Germany became Germany just by the French getting disconnected from them, perhaps that does explain why they value their parts of Germany, rather than Germany as a whole.

Then again, there is some significant difference in food. I'd say Knödel are more popular in Vienna than in Hamburg, and Bouletten more popular in Hamburg (or the West, like Munster) than in Vienna.

Austria was separated from Germany in 1864 and from Czechia, Slovenia, Hungary, Croatia, Slovakia in the aftermath of World War I. Beethoven and Mozart can perfectly well be termed German composers, since both died in a Germany that Vienna was still part of.° Mozart was from Salzburg, not from Vienna, and in his day, Salzburg was Reichsunmittelbar, like Cologne it was a bishop ruling his city directly under the Emperor. Culturally there is probably more of a difference between Sweden and Finland, than between Austria and Bavaria, the closest part of Germany to much of the Austrian border, that's why I include Austrian examples (and I also know Vienna a bit).

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
St. Susanna of Rome
11.VIII.2025

Item Romae sanctae Susannae Virginis, quae, cum ex nobili prosapia esset orta et beati Caji Pontificis neptis, martyrii palmam, tempore Diocletiani, capitis obtruncatione promeruit.

* Gurk isn't here the German word for cucumber — Gurke — but a town on a river once upon a time called Korkóras by Strabo. Unless Strabo meant the one in Slovenia, flowing into Sava, rather than the one in Carinthia, flowing into Drava. ** If the Diocese of Paris became Archdiocese only in the 17th C, in Vienna it was 1716, even later. *** I also have a special devotion to venerable Sr. Restituta Kafka. °Even kind of capital of. At least the Emperor often resided in Hofburg, Vienna.

Two Very Similar Artists

Actors as well as singer-songwriters.

And singer-songwriters in the best early XXth C. Schlager style.

Hans Albers' Das ist die Liebe der Matrosen comes into the film "Bomben auf Monte Carlo", 1931.

Jag kommer i kväll under balkongen is from "Söderkåkar", 1932. Sung by Björn Berglund, but same film you have Edvard Persson singing Lilla Lisa gick och sydde. Couldn't find a youtube for that one. Somewhat later he was main character in "Kalle på Spången", 1939. Featuring lite grann från ovan.

Those were times that seem "a hundred years ago" ... well, they soon are.

A kind of normalcy, which has been taken away from us more recently. And yet, the Christianity which provided the normalcy, was already both in North Germany and Sweden heavily diluted, not just by Reformation (pretty shocking events that lots of Evangelicals don't even imagine, but which were by then in the far past), but also by dechristianisation, secularisation.

Nostalgia, yes. Rock solid loyalty, solidarity, no.

If I want to keep normal in times that are not normal, Bavaria and Austria* are more adequate./HGL

* Or Slovakia, like Litmanová. By the way, at least the sin of Adam is the ultimate cause of all human illness and God sometimes does punish entire groups of peoples for what their leaders do. Well, the reaction of Gebhard or Paul Sigl was not exemplary, obviously.

When Everyone is a Nazi, No One is a Nazi

Take the word of a Nazi for it, here on Babylon Bee:

Actual Nazi Struggling To Stand Out Now That Everyone's A Nazi
The Babylon Bee | 9 May 2025
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8UwMCeD6jU

He feels undervalued as Nazi with swastika armband, now that having a Tesla can get you a swastika (graffitid) on the car. Or being known to have voted for Trump, on the garage door.

There is a certain situation this applies to a bit specially. Being a Nazi in Nazi Germany. Or, in Deutsches Reich for ten years (same actual name as Kaiserreich and Weimar Republic) and then Großdeutsches Reich for the last two.

You could obviously be a Nazi back then because you enjoyed putting Jews you disliked into difficulty. You could be a Nazi because you enjoyed putting Gipsies into difficulty. But chances are, you were more likely to be a Nazi because you thought workers should have fair pay and illegal abortions should be stopped (and not by legalising them). Larry Alex Taunton said "all of them" (list of ten most evil people, he forgot some of the Deformers) "would have voted Democrat" (obviously, his sense of Christian decency is pretty obviously tied to the Republican party). But with Adolf Hitler it is not obviously untrue. Apart from the fact Adolf was a Commie in early 1919, and Commies are all for voting Democrat in the US these days ... there is another point. John Denver was a Democrat. People like John Denver were Nazis in Germany. I don't say John Denver was a Nazi. I say people like him were a few decades earlier on, and East of Atlantic and Rhine.

The Wandervögel were certainly banned and being actively suppressed between 1933 and 1935. The Austrian Wandervögel were not banned under Dollfuss, but they were under Schuschnigg. However, it's not as if Hitler and von Schuschnigg* hated all the ideals of the Wandervögel. It's just that the Wandervögel were being forced to get into the Hitlerjugend instead in Germany, while in Austria, von Schuschnigg* didn't like the apoliticism of them. Dollfuss did, though.

It's a bit as if you from a certain time on could only be a hippie by being a Democrat. Or a singer like John Denver by being a Democrat ... wait ... someone said Taylor Swift is complying?

Most Germans in Germany, and certainly most Austrians in Austria had very little personal involvement in the War guilt of World War II, such as it may be, they ultimately once it was starte clearly supported a hard fight against the Soviets, and I think they were perfectly right, the Soviet victory in the East was an awful thing for most (not necessarily for some Jews, though). But they had not opted to kill civilian Poles or Russians or Jews who were just in the way of an SS battallion. I publically prayed an RIP on FB over Otto Carius, whom some of my friends commemorated. He had been stationed near Riga. There had been deportations to Stutthof near Riga. Before I did so, I checked he wasn't involved in rounding up any civilians, specifically Jews. He's more typical of Germans back then than Dr. Mengele.

I have seen Jews sad at my expressing grief over Germans and especially Austrian casualties at the end of World War II.

Pretending they all of them "had it coming" is like exonerating German actual cruelties against Soviet civilians because they had participated in the Russian Revolution, which was a horrible thing.

On a party in Copenhagen in 2004, I was challenged to admit the Russians had saved Europe from Hitler. I answer "sure, but the Germans saved Europe from Stalin" .... both armies had units that committed cruelties against civilians, the XXth C. was a horror because of the belief in total war. But that doesn't mean the XXIst C. needs to be a continued celebration of some of those acts, just because of others of them.

While, as an Austrofascist, I feel shame that Schuschnigg forbade the Wandervögel (and pride that Dollfuss didn't!), if I get lumped with Nazis because I reject the idea of killing German speaking civilians in either of the two German countries***, I feel this is kind of "making everyone a Nazi" (except for some attacking Nazis). It's somewhat egregious with someone who is honouring a man murdered by Nazis.** Look, I honour Dollfuss, not Planetta!

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
St. Michel Garicoïtz
14.V.2025

In pago Betharram, dioecesis Baionensis, sancti Michaelis Garicoits, Confessoris, Congregationis Presbyterorum Missionariorum a Sacro Corde Jesu Fundatoris, apostolico zelo insignis, quem Pius Papa Duodecimus Sanctorum fastis adscripsit.

* Titulature de politesse. Jusqu'en 1919, il était encore Edler von Schuschnigg. Par contre, pendant sa carrière politique, il était comme tout le monde dans la première république un bourgeois nommé Schuschnigg. (I don't know what "titulature de politesse" is called in English, sorry)
** Otto Planetta killed Engelbert Dollfuss, out of Nazi loyalties, trying to make a Putsch for the Anschluss, on 25th of July 1934. His friends stopped Dollfuss from receiving medical care, so he bled to death. Planetta was then basically executed with "garrote vil" (or its Austrian cousin Würgegalgen), on 31st of July. Under the rules of Dollfuss and Schuschnigg, 45 people were executed, the first for arson and the last for killing a lady in order to commit a theft of food. Planetta was number 13. It's no accident that a biography about Dollfuss calls him "Mussolini's Friend, Hitler's Enemy" ... I can't find it, but here is Dollfuss: An Austrian Patriot
*** Dollfuss, in reference to the name "Deutschland" (back then a nickname for "Deutsches Reich") considered Austria as "ein zweites aber besseres deutsches Land"

Peut un Germanophile célébrer ce jour ?

Fini les euthanasies, fini l'eugénisme (env. 30 ans plus tôt qu'en Suède ou les autres Pays Nordiques), et, pour les Austriacophiles, l'Autriche retrouve l'indépendance de l'Allemagne (mais restera occupée jusqu'en 1955).

Dans l'autre ses, il y a eu des bombardements très lourds, et des viols à l'avancée de l'armée.

Mais la France ? Voyons ceci :

1945 : un historien dévoile les dessous de la capitulation du 8 mai - Pascal Cauchy
Ligne Droite • La matinale de Radio Courtoisie | 8 mai 2025
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJvxoAlsgZE

Ajoutons, si j'avais été plus Hambourg ou Dresde que Vienne, j'aurais aimé le jour moins ...

En fait, j'avais pas entendu parler des bombardements de Vienne :

In 1942 the city suffered its first air raid, carried out by the Soviet air force.		En 1942 la ville souffra la première raide aérienne, exécutée par les avions de la Soviétique.
Only after the Allies had taken Italy did the next raids commence.		Seulement après la prise d'Italie par les Alliés, les prochaines raides commencèrent.
From 17 March 1944, 51 air raids were carried out in Vienna.		Dès le 17 mars 1944, 51 raides aériennes furent exécutées sur Vienne.
Targets of the bombings were primarily the city's oil refineries.		Les cibles primaires étaient les raffineries de pétrol de la ville.
However, around a third of the city center was destroyed, and culturally important buildings such as the State Opera and the Burgtheater were burned, and the Albertina was heavily damaged.		Pourtant, à peu près un tiers du centre-ville fut détruit, et des bâtiments culturellement importants, comme Staatsoper et Burgtheater furent mis à feu, et l'Albertina fut sévèrement endommagée.
These air raids lasted until March 1945, just before the Soviet troops started the Vienna offensive.		Ces raides aériennes durèrent jusqu'en mars 1945, juste avant que les troupes soviétiques commencèrent l'Offensive de Vienne.

Le genre de triste affaire qu'on n'entend pas dans l'école publique à Vienne, au moins pas 3e et 4e années de la Volksschule ...

Du bon côté, les capitulations des troupes à Vienne en avril 1945 et de Jodel et Dönitz en mai, on a au moins été épargnés de la bombe atomique, dont le Japon a souffert ... c'est également le cas pour la France.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
St. Denis de Vienne
8.V.2025

Viennae, in Gallia, sancti Dionysii, Episcopi et Confessoris.

PS, obviement, à Vienne, toutes les Zones d'Occupation des trois Alliés Occidentaux étaient préférables à la Zone d'Occupation de la Soviétique. Je suis né à Alsergrund, jusqu'en 13 ans avant zone américaine ...

Correction à Hannibal (de Rivarol, et il y a pas mal à ne pas corriger aussi)

"Tu n’omets pas de rappeler que c’est à Kiev que fut fondée au IXe siècle la Rous, noyau originel de la Russie."
(dernière page, 3652 du 12 mars 2025)

De l'Ukraine, un peu moins de Biélorussie ...

Pour la Russie, le noyau originel est Souzdal .../HGL

PS, encore (et je passe sur la jeune Volodïa introverti, il était caïd !), l'histoire :

Te voilà donc, jouxtant l’Union européenne, à la tête d’un empire multiculturel, polyethnique, d’ailleurs multireligieux car vous n’avez pas manqué de coloniser le Caucase et les peuples turcs musulmans qui bordent le flanc sud de l’actuelle fédération de Russie.

Ni les Tcherkesses, ni les Tchétchènes, ne sont Turcs.

Les deux étaient davantage Chrétiens avant l'expansion russe./HGL

PPS, histoire ecclésiale :

Tu noteras avec moi que leur mariage eut lieu à Reims sans dispense ni conversion puisqu’il eut lieu avant 1054, année où la triste affaire du Filioque mena la Chrétienté au schisme entre Orient et Occident : nous n’aurions pas eu Luther ni François, ni vous vos popes politiques, sans ce malheur

En fait, l'histoire du filioque, entre Cathos et Orthos, c'était le temps de Photius qui, en discrétion (probablement le monastère anglo-saxon de Constantinople, en auteur de Beowulf, du poëme), mourut bien en communion avec le pape. Si Cérulaire fait certaines références à Photius, il trouvait surtout qu'un "azymos" n'était pas un "artos" (même si quelques siècles en arrière, on aurait probablement compris "azymos" comme bref pour "artos azymos"). En d'autres mots, il accusait nous les Catholiques d'Occident de nous comporter comme si la Dernière Cène était un Séder de la loi de Moïse en même temps que le début du Nouveau Testament. Avec moi, au moins, il aura eu raison là-dessus./HGL

PPPS, histoire de la Pologne :

Vous vous êtes bien goinfrés, avec la Prusse et l’Autriche. Puis vous n’avez pas été très tendres les uns ni les autres en 1830 et 1848.

Russes : mais parlez donc un russe correct, pas votre dialecte rustique, et en passant, en école le Pater Noster est un О́тче наш.
Prussiens : mais un peu davantage de votre terre, s v p, barbares de Slaves catholiques !
Autrichiens : révoltes ? Bon, on annexe Cracovie, en revanche vous aurez de l'autonomie.

Pour ce qui concerne Pilsudski, l'armée autrichienne avait l'ordre de ne pas tirer sur ses troupes. Ne pas confondre l'Autriche avec les autres pouvoirs des Partages de la Pologne, s v p !/HGL

PPPPS, l'Arménie :

La Russie n’a jamais eu l’intention de laisser vivre ses marges vivre leur vie (voir la Géorgie) ni de protéger les Etats chrétiens à ses frontières (voir l’Arménie)

En fait, l'invasion de l'Ukraine était une bonne ruse pour pouvoir dire aux Arméniens "désolé, on a d'autres problèmes" ... comme on vient de le faire pour Gaza aussi.

Poutine est pote avec des Loubavitchers (probablement Juif sur le maternel) et il a 10 % de Musulmans dans la Fédération, vous ne voulez quand même pas qu'il fasse du sérieux pour défendre des civiliens contre l'IDF et des Chrétiens contre les Turcs azeris ? Les deux ont de la compréhension pour des rodomontades./HGL

PPPPPS, la Crimée :

Depuis sa conquête par Catherine II sur la Turquie, la Crimée a toujours été russe.

Tatare. Les Tatars ont été éliminés en faveur des Russes sous Staline.

Une piste pour une vraie paix serait si la Crimée était redonnée aux Tatars./HGL

PPPPPPS, la Rous et l'Ukraine :

J’irai droit au résultat de l’histoire longue : l’Ukraine n’est plus russe, et tu t’en es aperçu en vautrant lamentablement ton opération spéciale.

C'est au contraire l'Ukraine qui a gardé le caractère paléo-russe, tandis que la Moscovie (débutant en Souzdal) est un état tatarisé. D'où le despotisme, et le fait qu'on remplace (sauf en cavallerie) конь avec лошадь pour cheval, conférons divers variantes de turc "alacha" (cheval de bât, chameau) et "at" (cheval tout court) ... tandis que l'ukrainien redéfinit la prononciation de конь en Кінь./HGL

Two Tolkien Related Links

A video not for everybody (as the videast also says at the end), here:

The Top 4 Mature/Uncomfortable Scenes in Tolkien’s Middle-Earth
Tolkien Lore | 18 Dec. 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIO1R2FrxhA

An art calendar, in German and English, Tolkien related:

Mysteries of Westernesse Calendar 2024
[Mythen aus Westernis Kalender 2024]
https://shop.mythenauswesternis.de/en

Art calendars, and quote calendars (a medium I have proposed as an intro for my own work to the neighbourhood), are a big thing in the Germanies.

It was one of these in Austria I learned that the week really isn't Monday to Sunday, but Sunday to Saturday. I had been taught different in the school in Sweden. So, next year's week one will have 6 days (Monday to Saturday) in England and the Germanies, but will end one day later in Sweden and therefore have 7 days (unless they changed it since I was small).

I recall one of those calendars as in Italian (one of the four languages of Switzerland) and a German one involving recipes. I also recall a Tolkien related calendar in the home of a host, a US soldier stationed in Germany who hosted ma and me during a court trial./HGL

PS, it seems the calendar is made by someone considering the week as Monday from Sunday, perhaps that is the standard in Germany, as opposed to Austria?/HGL

Johann Bauer retires from mayor of Schrattenberg

Why?

In a dispute he called someone "du Arschloch" ...

He has set an exemple for the guys who either said or acted as if Palestinians were beasts and to be treated like such./HGL

Sharing About Méjico and Maximilian

The Politically Incorrect Truth About the Mexican Empire
Mad Monarchist | 18 Oct. 2015
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDUN-mKyJn4

Austria-Hungary and Ukraine

Early minutes of this video:

How Ukraine Became Part of the USSR - The Soviet–Ukrainian War (Documentary)
25th March 2022 | The Great War
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Gwuu7TXPwI

As Vienna was better for Poland than St. Petersburg was, so Vienna was better for Ukraine than St. Petersburg was./HGL

Later on - Lenin assumed, "Corsica feels a great attachment to the superior culture and wealth of Paris" (or Bruxelles), to give a parallel ...

Austria

URGENT! Dear family in Christ, please pray for us in Vienna, Austria, as the govt. is enforcing lockdown for unvaxxed next week! God bless! Maranatha Jesus!

Surviving a lockdown is possible, but it is uncomfortable.

Even while the people who made the request are not Catholic, the fact they resist vaccination is a reason to pray for them, both for endurance and wellhap during this persecution, and for becoming Catholic, but not with Bergoglio's sect.

Someone pretended that we cannot oppose Bergoglio, since no bishops were sedevacantist prior to 1981 and since Pope Leo XII had stated that the peaceful acceptance of a pope by all the bishops is a sign he is truly pope.

Thuc had made consecrations as early as 1976, which was not quite in line with peaceful acceptance of Paul VI. Lefebvre had refused to comply with orders given by Paul VI, which was also not quite in line with peaceful acceptance of him. Remember, the quote from St. Robert Bellarmine on resisting a Pope who attacks the faith, it involves a comparison with resisting a Pope with arms if he attacks your body. So, the theologoumenon by St. Robert invoked for Lefebvre's resistance is incompatible with a peaceful acceptance of Paul VI.

But there seems to be some kind of document by Leo XII that actually opposed vaccination too ... /HGL

Update:

LifeSite : EXCLUSIVE: Alexander Tschugguel tells LifeSiteNews he will resist COVID tyranny in Austria
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/exclusive-alexander-tschugguel-tells-lifesitenews-he-will-resist-covid-tyranny-in-austria/

LSN: I think I saw on your Twitter account that you showed a picture of the Gezundheitspass [health pass] of the Nazi era.

AT: I did not post the Nazi Gezundheitspass; someone else did. What is quite interesting is that the Gezundheitspass is exactly what we have to show right now to live a so-called normal life. And not even that: the Gezundheitspass now expires every fourth month, so after four months, you have to get another vaccination, another shot, another shot…

Note, it's actually spelled Gesundheitspass. The English z sound is always s in German, because the letter z is always ts in German./HGL

Just Sharing : "What Muslim 'refugees' say to each other in Austria"

What Muslim 'refugees' say to each other in Austria
Vlad Tepesblog | 14.VIII.2017
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iblYsoDMtmk

The Ideology Behind Wallström's Words Is One Reason I Left Sweden

Here is the story:

Turkey protests to Austria, Sweden over 'child sex' claims
on mail dot com August 15, 2016
https://www.mail.com/int/news/europe/4544788-turkey-protests-to-austria-sweden-child-sex-claims.html

Cavusoglu said the reports that appeared in Austria and Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom's* tweet were a reflection of the "racism, anti-Islamic and anti-Turkish (trend) in Europe." Turkey's Constitutional Court last month scrapped an article in the penal code that defined all sexual acts against children as abuse, triggering concern among children's rights advocates that the move will lead to an increase in child sexual abuse cases.

The court justices voted 7-6 to uphold a local court which argued that all cases should be reviewed individually and that someone who abuses a 4-year-old should not receive the same punishment as someone who has consensual sex with a 15-year-old. The previous law remains in force for six months, giving Parliament time to enact a new law, while children's rights advocates will seek to have the judgment reversed at the European Court of Human Rights.

Wallstrom tweeted on Sunday: "Turkish decision to allow sex with children under 15 must be reversed. Children need more protection, not less, against violence, sex abuse."

In the Catholic Church we agree about the principle - but not about 15 as the age limit. In fact, St Thomas Aquinas defended the age limit which is the traditional one, namely 14/12 - two years later for the bridegroom than for the bride, since boys are two years after girls in puberty - and argued like this:

I answer that, Since marriage is effected by way of a contract, it comes under the ordinance of positive law like other contracts. Consequently according to law (cap. Tua, De sponsal. impub.) it is determined that marriage may not be contracted before the age of discretion when each party is capable of sufficient deliberation about marriage, and of mutual fulfilment of the marriage debt, and that marriages otherwise contracted are void. Now for the most part this age is the fourteenth year in males and the twelfth year in women: but since the ordinances of positive law are consequent upon what happens in the majority of cases, if anyone reach the required perfection before the aforesaid age, so that nature and reason are sufficiently developed to supply the lack of age, the marriage is not annulled. Wherefore if the parties who marry before the age of puberty have marital intercourse before the aforesaid age, their marriage is none the less perpetually indissoluble.

Here is the source:

Summa Theologiae > Supplement > Question 58
Question 58. The impediments of impotence, spell, frenzy or madness, incest and defective age
Article 5. Whether defective age is an impediment to marriage?
http://newadvent.com/summa/5058.htm#article5

Note the underlined specification as to what age we talk about. My emphasis.**

I came to a longdrawn and mostly low intensity conflict with neighbours in one village after falling in love with a girl of 14 (minus some weeks) and declaring my feelings.

They tried - some of them - to solve the conflict by shutting me up in a madhouse, that is by treating this as a kind of symptom of insanity.

I was hospitalised once, and I turned the other cheek.

I was never more hospitalised over that story as such, though I was in police interrogations about it. Nor was I sent to prison for that story.

However, next time there was another conflict, I tried to defend my mother against such an indignity, I was hospitalised, not totally turning the other cheek.

A third time I had done nothing - my passivity was deemed self destructive by people prying into my life, although in reality I had a plan for what I was going to do, if evicted from the apartment.

That time I did not turn the other cheek. I opposed a policeman serving my mental health care harassers, taking his own pistol and shooting one shot in his hip in an attempt to take him hostage so as to oppose hospitalisation.

Two courts refused to even hear my plea of actual and justified self defense, first acquitting me due to "putative self defense", and second scrapping that acquittal. I tried to appeal to Supreme Court, but was by my guards stopped from posting the appeal text in time and after that stopped again over not having posted it in time.

But, even so, my so called punishment - my sentence, that would even be correct, even if it was an unjust sentence - only specified 3 years and 6 months, of which I served two thirds.

THEN there was a society which was NOT ready to accept in any way shape or form either my opposition to psychiatry or my denial of Swedish law being THE one and obliging moral compass over when someone is a child and when someone is not.

Margot Wallström embodies the ideology which made the free years in sweden between 2000 when I came out last of June and 2004 when I left Sweden as a homeless man in March a social nightmare for me.

In the article it appears that Austria had also been mentioned. Fortunately for my dear country of provenance, not a minister, but just a news ticker.

Turkey protested to Austria over a news ticker at Vienna's airport that claimed Turkey allows sex with children under age 15.

Under the Habsburgs, when Dummrath wrote his book, he noted that in Austria a girl of 14 could marry with parental consent, but could do without the consent at 21. So, Austrians are not really advised to hang on to this ideology of 15, since it is a slur against a well respected Austrian past.

That said, Turkey should have asked the news program for air time, not the government to smack down on free speech, even if here the news ticker was wrong.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Nanterre UL
Ember Saturday after Epiphany
14.I.2017

* It is really Margot Wallström with ö (o + ¨ = ö) in last syllable. ** When I was received in the Catholic Church, I did some reading of canon law and during this story, before debating the principle on forums, I actually believed the limit was 16/14, as the "law had been changed", not sure when and not sure if validly.