Free Republic

Thanks for your comments--and good for your relatives. God Save the Tsar!

What are you talking about? Nicholas II WAS "a very nice person." Indeed, arguably that was part of his problem: he was TOO nice, with the result that he often appeared indecisive and lacked the resolve necessary to preserve the monarchy.

Read Robert K. Massie's Nicholas and Alexandra. The picture of the last Tsar that emerges from this moving book is one of a kind-hearted and honorable man.

It makes me sick to see the extent to which leftist revolutionary thinking has penetrated a so-called "conservative" forum. Tsar Nicholas II was a patriot, a devout Christian, and a devoted husband and father who while perhaps unsuited to the role he inherited did his best for his country and did not deserve what happened to him.

Otto von Habsburg and Franz Duke of Bavaria are intelligent, well-educated, and accomplished men who are more than worthy of the thrones of their ancestors.

Even the less impressive royals could hardly do worse than the current crop of European politicians.

Assuming that Europe's rejection of monarchy refutes monarchism is as illogical as it would be to assume that Europe's rejection of Christianity refutes Christianity.

I admit that neither "Henri VII" nor "Louis XX" are ideal candidates for the throne, and that this is a problem for French royalists. Nevertheless it is traditional French royalists (who do exist, by the way!) with whom I sympathize. The point is to promote the theoretical ideal of monarchy as an integral part of European culture, even if restoration currently seems implausible.

The right in France has always been statist, often ultramontane Catholic, and, even before Vichy and Petain, had close ties to the Action Francaise, the French fascist movement. This right has always been hostile to America and its classical liberal values, just as since the 19th century and the Bourbon restoration it has been hostile to the notions of liberty and equality before the law which came out of the Enlightenment.

And this is bad...why, exactly? ;)

Count me in as one of those evil, real (i.e. monarchist) European-style right-wingers, who wants nothing to do with the American so-called "right." I wonder if Goetz, Kjvail and I are the only ones left on FR? (Time to summon the "Crown Crew"?)

I am terribly disappointed in Le Pen. But I shouldn't be surprised. What France needs is a King, not a President. The French Republic is an abomination built on the murder of Their Most Christian Majesties King Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette, always has been, and always will be.

Vive le roi! Down with Democracy and Republicanism! Out with the Muslims! And long live France--not the phony secular multiculturalist republican France which is hated by the neocons for all the wrong reasons, but the Catholic and Royal France of the ages!

The new answer doesn't even answer the person's questions. I have seen many of Fr. Echert's answers edited or removed from the EWTN expert forum, answers in which he refused to condemn the SSPX as being "in schism".

I hardly ever post here anymore, but a traditionalist friend from another forum, intrigued by what you wrote, asked me to ask you if you have more information, and anything to document these edits.

Russia started to lose its lofty principles when the Russian ambassador was permitted to stand at a playing of la Marseillaise. I am fairly certain that this was in the very late nineteenth century.

Yes. But according to Robert K. Massie in Nicholas and Alexandra it wasn't just the ambassador:

Despite the great differences in their political systems, the needs of diplomacy had made military allies of Europe's greatest republic and its most absolute autocracy...In 1891, the French fleet visited Kronstadt, and the Autocrat of all the Russias stood bareheaded while the bands played the Marseillaise. Until that moment it had been a criminal offense to play this revolutionary song anywhere in the Tsar's dominions. (p. 60)

An unfortunate exception to Alexander III's otherwise "reactionary" reign.

So the French monarchy was bankrupted by its support for the American rebels, only to be toppled later by its own rebels, with the ungrateful Yankees cheering on the executioners of their former beneficiary.

That's about the most concise and accurate summary of the events of the 18th century I've read. Today, of course, American neocon dimwits despise the French (for all the wrong reasons), forgetting that if it hadn't been for French aid there might not be a United States to dominate the world...

I didn't realize you were still here. (I'm usually not either.)

I doubt very much that Tsar Nicholas II or his government in 1914 knew about the connections between Gavrilo Princip, the Black Hand, and the Serbian government.

What I don't know is whether Kaiser Wilhelm II personally authorized the deal with Lenin. I get the impression that he was not really in control of much by 1918. Certainly Bl. Emperor Karl was horrified when he learned of the plan. But of course no one on either side was listening to him...

Except it isn't done. American troops are still getting killed for no apparent reason. If New Oxford Review is still hammering Bush on the Iraq war, good for them.

I'm not sure if I'll renew Chronicles or not. While I wish the publication well, frankly there are a lot of articles in it that don't interest me that much. Also, as far as I can tell Chronicles has no contributors who write from a non-republican (small r!) perspective. While infinitely superior to the neocons, most paleos are still Americanist republicans and therefore their ideology is not a perfect fit for royalists like us.

The American Conservative, in contrast, publishes monarchists Peter Hitchens (British) and R.J. Stove (Australian), as well as Taki, who was married to an Austrian princess and occasionally writes sympathetically about both the British and Greek monarchies.

To be fair, Cafe Press does offer these great products:

http://www.cafepress.com/vendee
http://www.cafepress.com/catholicmonarch

Here in the New Orleans area there are no Latin masses in parish churches- at least not to my knowledge.

http://www.oldstpatricks.org

It would do a lot of good for Catholics, and the world in general, to be reminded that the Church is a monarchy, not a democracy.

It would be hard not to see the post-Vatican II popes' renunciation of the tiara and coronation as a reversal of the Church's traditional support of monarchy, which Pope Pius VI had called "the best of all governments." Of all the deplorable changes of the past forty years, after the abandonment of the Latin mass and the sacred music associated with it, this is the one I regret the most.

I don't approve. Please, please, please don't drop the tiara. It's bad enough there's no more coronation. ... The tiara is an historic symbol of long standing and should not be eliminated.

We've disagreed in the past, but of course as a monarchist I'm with you here 100%.

Cardinal Pell is one of the Good Guys. One of the best we've got.

Sorry, I can't consider an Australian prelate who endorsed the anti-monarchist side in the 1999 referendum "one of the Good Guys."

See Charles Coulombe's article The Monarchy in Australia for a Catholic perspective more traditional than Cardinal Pell's.

Great article; thanks for posting it. Gerald Warner is one of my favorite commentators. I particularly loved this line: the "liberal" coterie of fantasists that equates the Catholic Church with Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory

If you haven't seen his earlier pieces on the Catholic Church, I highly recommend them:
Is the Pope a Catholic? (December 14, 2002)
Gibson's Passion forced to find sanctuary (February 29, 2004)
Struggle to return to Christian values (April 11, 2004)

From Revisiting Some Old Questions by Thomas Woods:

One could cite a great many popes on the use of the Latin language, but I shall confine myself to two. First, Pius XI: "For the Church, precisely because it embraces all nations and is destined to endure to the end of time...of its very nature requires a language which is universal, immutable, and non-vernacular." Pope John XXIII quoted this passage in his own Apostolic Letter on Latin, Veterum Sapientia. He himself wrote: "Finally, the Catholic Church has a dignity far surpassing that of every merely human society, for it was founded by Christ the Lord. It is altogether fitting, therefore, that the language it uses should be noble, majestic, and non-vernacular."

Think about that. The Catholic Church has a dignity far surpassing that of every merely human society, and therefore, as befitting this dignity, should possess a language that is the unique possession of no single group of people. Now the Church has never condemned harmless regional variations, which are bound to exist: devotional practices more popular in one place than another, particular saints enjoying greater devotion in some places than in others, and so on. But when we step into our churches, it is good for us to leave outside much of what differentiates us as Americans, Canadians, Frenchmen, or Koreans, so that we might better appreciate what we share in common as Catholics. Shame on us if we turn our backs on this beautiful expression of the universality of the Church in order that we might enjoy the familiarity of our own language.

By preserving Latin as the liturgical language of the Roman Rite, not only do we erect a barrier against improvisation and heresy (in the form of questionable translations) but we also give expression to our identity as Catholics. We may not speak any Latin ourselves - though it is highly desirable for Catholics to learn that sacred language - and rely entirely on our missals to navigate the Mass. But a liturgical language common to us all reminds us that we belong to an institution greater than any nation, and one through which we are bound to faithful all over the world. The world is our mission territory, and it is entirely fitting that we missionaries, bound together as members of the Mystical Body of Christ, should worship in a common language.

Here's the other one, for your ping list.