When 'Green' isn't 'Green'

Yesterday Josephus wrote quite a piece on the mirage of "free" energy and the pitfalls of covering the landscape with the noisy eyesores of wind 'turbines.' All of this is being pushed forward by WWF, Greenpeace, other "Green" NGOs and all the rest of the "Climate Change/Global Doom Warming organisations. As he mentioned, the proponents determinedly ignore all evidence of environmental damage being done in this pointless pursuit of this golden dream of a "fossil fuel free future."

The vision set out in the report Josephus cited is a grand one, but takes no account at all of the environmental, economic, political and resources impact of attempting to generate electricity in desert areas and then distribute it to countries not just thousands of miles away, but on different continents and even on different sides of an ocean ... Nor does it attempt to address the thorny question of how it will all be paid for or who will pay for it. Josephus raised a second thorny issue. The report proposes placing all these wonderful generating systems in some of the least stable, politically, areas of the world, under the control of governments who have something of a track record of behaving in a somewhat petulant manner in international relations. One can easily imagine a scenario where someone in one of these countries, no doubt "provoked" by some supposed "slight" to his faith, country or culture, could pull the plug on Europe.

Today a report published in the geologists journal, suggests that geological evidence suggests that the 2*C warming the AGW/IPCC pundits want to prevent is not preventable. Indeed, they go further, they say it is inevitable and that sea levels could rise by well over 20 metres as a result. But that, as they are quick to point out (but which will no doubt be omitted from any popular press reports of this) will require the melting of all the West Antarctic ice shelf, all the Greenland ice and most of the sea ice shelf in East Antarctica - which would take thousands of years.

I can see many reasons for finding cleaner energy supplies, but the most important, in my opinion, is to break away from our dependence on oil supplied by countries whose regimes are unstable, untrustworthy and interested only in destroying Western culture and economies. We cannot do entirely without oil, but we can use it more efficiently, we can ensure there is less wastage and we can certainly make better use of our own resources such as coal. But none of these is likely to even be looked at until we can break away from this fetish for "free energy," which, as Josephus has pointed out, is neither "free" nor clean and green.

Patrick - The Man Behind the Legend

Today there will be celebrations in many parts of the world in honour of St Patrick. The day is a public holiday in Ireland and in some other countries where there is a strong Irish Roman Catholic presence. There will, no doubt, be flags, parades and green beer among other things, including folk dressed as Leprechauns, Irish dancers and Scottish bagpipe bands. (The "Irish" or Uillieann Pipes (From the Irish and literally meaning "Pipes of the Elbow) are played seated with the drones across the legs. The bellows are operated by the players elbow to keep the 'bag' filled with air.) Many of those taking part will know a bit about the legendary figure they are celebrating - like his supposed driving the snakes out of Ireland - but not much more.

This is surprising in many respects since we actually know more about St Patrick than any other person of similar standing in Britain in his period. The reason is that we have two authentic documents, copies of originals written by him, still in existence. From their contents we are able to reconstruct much of his life and the society in which he worked. In recent years re-interpreters have been busy rearranging some of these facts to suit whatever their agendas may be. This seems to be an attempt to downplay and even discredit him and his life's work. 

It is a fate now befalling many other historic figures. The classic example is Dan Brown's abuse of history and fact in his Da Vinci Code. The "Priory of Sion" was the invention of a M. Pierre Plantard in 1956. It was not a remnant of the "Templars" or any other ancient crusading order. Nor was Leonardo da Vinci ever in any way connected to it or that other now infamous group, the Illuminati. A short-lived and rather predatory Masonic Order that was suppressed in 1756 and existed for a total of 56 years. It had nothing whatever to do with the Bilderberger Group. All of that is the figment of Mr Brown's imagination. But conspiracy theorists love it.

I recently came across a statement that St Patrick had been convicted in a British Court of "impersonating" a Bishop and that he was not in fact consecrated as one. This is apparently based on his "Confessio" - translated by his detractors as "Confession" when it actually means "Declaration" - which is biographical and was almost certainly an answer to his detractors in Britain. We know nothing whatever about what these "charges" were, since neither the names of his detractors, any record of their activities or ministry, nor of any "court proceedings" survived the Saxon, Pict and Danish invasions. What we do know is that the British Church was, at this time, under interdict from the rest of the Church for its adherence and practice of "Pelagianism." 

The charge about his "masquerading" as a Bishop is a spurious one, based on the mis translation and possibly misunderstanding of the statement in the opening paragraph of his "Letter to the Soldiers of Coroticus" following a raid by the Welsh-Pict "King" - himself a noted Pelagian - in which he excommunicated the King and all his followers and supporters. The relevant salutation states - 

PATRICIUS PECCATOR INDOCTUS SCILICET HIBERIONE CONSTITUTUS EPISCOPUM ME ESSE FATEOR. 

This translates as -

I am Patrick, yes a sinner and indeed untaught; yet I am established here in Ireland where I profess myself bishop. 

It is that final part of the sentence which some have seized on to claim he was a "self declared" Bishop and therefore an impostor. Two things must be remembered here, first that Cromwell probably destroyed the original copy of this letter when he burned what is known as the "Ogham Library" in his campaigns against Catholicism (And some would add Christianity itself) in Ireland. Patrick would have written his original on thin wooden "leaves" which were more durable than the Papyrus used in the Mediterranean. Vellum would have been too difficult to obtain and hugely expensive, so was reserved for things such as copies of the Gospels and other books of the Bible. Secondly, unfortunately, the copyists weren't perfect, and his handwriting probably wasn't that good either. He is likely to have been almost crippled by arthritis as a result of poor diet and abuse as a slave. In fact one story attested within a generation of his death, is that a Bishop named Cartan or Macartan carried him everywhere in the last years of his life. This speaks loudly of a man crippled by an arthritic condition.

As the late Archbishop George Otto Sims has written, Patrick's salutation to the Soldiers of Coroticus is a standard phraseology used in almost every document written by a bishop of that period. What stands out as unique is his use of the term, in reference to himself, as an "untaught sinner." It occurs again in the "Declaration." The letter predates the Declaration, which leads scholars to believe that the excommunication of Coroticus and his supporters led to an attempt to discredit Patrick. It failed, not least because his bishopric was not only valid, but successful. Archbishop Sims (Anglican) and Msgr Liam de Paor (Roman Catholic), describe him as "the first missionary bishop of the church since St Paul." They also point to the fact that, far from being "unlearned" Patrick knows his scriptures intimately and his writing is riddled with quotations from the pre-Vulgate texts in use in the 5th Century.

We know he was the son of a Romano-British official, his father probably a Decurion in Roman parlance, and his grandfather a priest. His full names were Magnus Sucatus Patricius, the first being his actual "nomen," the second the Family name and the third his "cognomen" or nickname. (Julius Caesar is actually Gaius Julius - Caesar means "Hairy" and was probably a derogatory nickname since he was notoriously hairless.) The Decurion class were landowning, usually held public service offices such as being magistrates, running towns and so on. 

Patrick's parents were obviously of this class, having both a "town" residence and a villa somewhere near the shore. Most recent examination of both the clues in his texts and of the history of the period, suggest his most probable "home" to have been along the southern shore of Wales near the mouth of the Severn Estuary or on the north shore of Somerset and South Gloucestershire. It is generally agreed that the copyists got the name of the town wrong - probably because they couldn't read his original - sionce there is nowhere in Roman Britain named "Bannavem Taburnia." There are, however, a number of "Bannaventas" which meant "Market of ..." and several such towns are known in the area I mentioned, several with names easily corrupted by bad handwriting to "Taburnia."

His birth was probably in 385 or 386 AD and he appears, from his own account, to have been a victim of a major raid on the Severn Estuary, South Wales, Somerset and Devon in 401 AD. It is also important to realise that the Irish tribes lived to a law different from the rest of Europe. Rome enforced a system of "manumission" which allowed a slave to be freed or to buy his or her freedom. The Irish did not. Under the law of the Brehon, a slave was a slave, was a slave. Male slaves had a lower value than females and ranked somewhere below the beasts of burden or the owner's hunting hounds. A slave was bought naked and lived that way unless his owner clothed him, and if he was sold, he was sold naked and without any tools, no matter if he had made any to help in his work.

Patrick tells us it took two days sailing to reach Ireland following the raid, with a pause while other raiders assembled at a resting place probably near St David's in West Wales. This is an important clue to his home, since the Irish raiders used light fast craft with an extremely efficient rig. A raid on the coast anywhere further north, say in Cheshire, Lancashire or Scotland, would not have required a two day passage to reach Ireland. He also tells us that he had committed some heinous "sin" which had resulted in his being "rusticated" to the family villa, presumably while his father dealt with the fallout. Since sexual license was fairly widespread the "sin" is unlikely to have been sexual, although that may have been the incentive which some scholars speculate involved a death. Whatever it was, it haunted Patrick for the rest of his life. He saw his period as a slave as a just punishment for his crime, though it took him a while to come to this conclusion. After his escape he tells us he returned home and he then "vanishes" for some 20 years. Again, later monastics tried to claim he'd become a monk during this time, but if this was true, he would certainly have mentioned it and he doesn't. 

Another favourite argument I have seen concerning his bishopric is that his name does not appear in the lists of those consecrated by the Bishops of Rome at this period. This ignores the fact that Rome was not the only "authority" at that time, almost all the Diocesan Bishops were consecrating other bishops, appointing and ordaining priests and sending them on various missions. Monasticism was in its infancy, Lerins, near NIce, being the earliest established and recognised community living to a "Rule."

Historically another man, Palladius Patricius was sent by Rome to Ireland, probably to the area now called Leinster and we also know, from other sources, that he took Magnus Sucatus with him. At some point Palladius and Patrick parted company, the latter returning to Gaul shortly before Palladius unexpectedly died. The Gaulish bishops, then busy dealing with the Pelagian heretics in Britannia didn't waste any time and sent the former slave straight back. The evidence suggests that Germanus, Bishop of Auxerre, Lupus of Troyes and the bishop of Paris all had a hand in it. Germanus was the appointed leader of the anti-Pelagian mission, a well documented event.

What makes Patrick unique is that he never made any exaggerated claims and he never forgot his "sin." His humility and the effort he put into his ministry shine like a light in the darkness to those who look for it. He took his life in his hands returning to his former master's tribal lands. The Law of the Brehon prescribed that an escaped slave must be either returned to his master or killed. So how did Patrick escape that fate?

Quite simply, he described himself as "The Slave of Christ" and when challenged always told the challenger that he "served his Master, his God." There were several attempts on his life and on his person. He survived them all and he was always released when taken into slavery again. 

Rather than trying to "re-interpret" documents and evidence we should look more closely at the life and the man. Here was a man who foreswore everything, life, birthright, comfort and home, to serve God. In his latter years, according to a medical professional who has studied the accounts of his "assistants", he should have been bedridden by his late 50's, yet continued working into his late 70s even though he was probably crippled. Among the things he will have suffered from as a result of his years as a slave, are malnutrition (critical in later life if suffered as a teenager), probably deformity of his legs as a result of being used as a beast of burden and malnutrition, damage to his joints as a result of labour and poor diet in his late puberty, possible infertility, and disease associated with parasites in the bowel. There may well have been other injuries due to abuse, punishment and even sexual abuse. That he survived to a possible age of 76 years is almost miraculous. That he remained steadfast in his faith is indisputable.

I will mark his feast day properly, with an act of worship to God and thanks for the life and example of Magnus Sucatus Patricius, Saint, Bishop, Missionary and exemplary Christian.  

Scapegoats ...

Some years ago, in a book by John Winton, I came across a definition of a "Scape Goat" that has stayed with me. Yesterday's post by Josephus touched on it again in one part. The definition is a little crude, but being from the Navy, I suspect it may be excused, especially as it does hit the nail exactly as far as the issue Josephus raised is concerned. Winton has one of the characters in his story say -

"A scape goat is a chap picked at random after any cock-up so everyone can pour sh*t and derision on his head, then go happily on their way rejoicing, safe in the knowledge some other poor b*st*rd will take all the blame."


Josephus reminded me of this when he mentioned the way in which, on what appears to be a regular cycle a particular group or groups is picked out to become the "enemy of civilised society" until sufficient hatred has been stirred up in the minds of the "masses" to lead to that group being "cast into outer darkness." This is really the skill of the propagandist. You can still find people who firmly believe that all Germans were jackbooted, goose-stepping, baby eating Nazis. Someone in the first World War coined the name "Huns" to describe them and it is still being bandied about. (The real "Huns" are actually further East - the Hungarians!) Look at some of the anti-EU blogs and you soon discover that all the old arguments about the Germans cherishing ambitions of "world domination" or "world empire" and being "naturally militaristic" are still in circulation. Erskine Childers' book "The Riddle of the Sands" was a great anti-German propaganda piece at a time when Britain was engaged in an arms race and the populace needed to be whipped up to support the massive expenditures involved.

Josephus mentions the regular assaults on Free Masonry (The Monk is not a member, but has no problem with people who are!), the Jews (goes back to pre-Roman times that does!), and currently, among a small section of the supposedly "Christian" community, those who use the "pill" or, for whatever reason, seek to have an abortion. As he mentions, the law as it is written in Arizona has far reaching consequences - potentially invasive and a rather crude and, I would suggest, unconstitutional attempt to impose a set of personal opinions and prejudices on all the citizens of the State.

He also mentions that being "anti-semitic" is today a seriously taboo issue, yet it has morphed into "anti-Israel." A carefully orchestrated disguise for the much older and more honest version. As I have now seen several times, those who promote this new form of anti-semitism are eager to tell anyone gullible enough to believe them, that they don't "hate Jews" but think that Israel has no right to exist. They then go on to trot out all the old arguments that "the Jews stole the land in 1947," that the Jordanian authorities had "promised" to treat them fairly, and that there were "no Jews" in the Holy Land until after 1916. Now one regularly hears that "Israel is an Apartheid State" and "must be forced" to "return the land stolen from the Palestinians." Again, this ignores the real facts. Among other things it ignores the fact that Israel is unique in Arab lands in being democratic - women are not discriminated against as they are in almost all the neighbour states. There are non-Jews in the Knesset, but there are no non-Muslims in the government of any neighbour!

It also ignores the fact that the "Palestinian" people are actually Jordanian. Balfour's "Two State" proposal was reneged on by successive British governments to pander to Muslim feelings and "don't upset the oil sheiks." The result of attempts to prevent Jewish migration and then to prevent their purchase of land, was the "Stern Gang" - in any other country a "Freedom Fighter Movement" -  and Hagganah. Plus the mess we now face in the Middle East. Ironically, the "Two State" proposal was achieved by default - the Kingdom of Jordan and Israel.

As it is said in the old English expression, "Give a dog and bad name - and hang him." The Jews as represented by the State of Israel, Free Masons, Christians and now those who seek abortions for probably sound enough reasons, have all become our favourite "Scape Goats." We can happily throw ordure at them all and go on our way rejoicing in the belief that we can't smell the muck on our own hands.

I have only this to say to those who vilify the women who need to undergo this deeply upsetting and emotional experience of abortion. It applies to all those, Christian or not, who seek to impose their ideology on others by force, by vilification or any other means. It is the same thing Our Lord said to those who confronted Him with the "woman taken in adultery."

"Let he, who is without sin, cast the first stone."

Madam is unwell ...

Madam Paddy Cat is unwell. It is very likely age related, so there is not a lot anyone can do except make her reasonably comfortable and pander to her little foibles - like insisting on breakfast at 04.15 in the mornings ...

Still, at her age, she's doing remarkably well, a surprise really since she didn't start out that well and probably used up 8 of her supposed 9 lives by the time we moved to the flat I bought in Tewkesbury.

We had a visit to the vet today, not our favourite occupation, and now we are feeling very unhappy and want some personal love and attention.

Who wants to be a President?

Especially in our so-called democracies! Germany is in the process of finding a new President at present, the previous one, Christian Wulff, has been hounded out of office by the usual collection of politicians with an axe to grind, the media (we made you so we can destroy you) and the usual "rent-a-mob" against anyone who manages to achieve anything they haven't. The reason? It seems he had a few friends and enjoyed taking holidays with them, one of them even helped out with a loan when he was looking for a new house. That was enough to get his political opponents onto their high horses. Then he had some bad PR advice and everything went downhill from there.

Sadly, the very politicians now crowing about having brought him down, are no better themselves. One even admitted, as near as a politician will ever get to admitting something, "there but for the grace of God ..." At least in Germany, the President is a figurehead. He or she is elected by a special college of 1240 representatives drawn from the Bundestag and the Landestags with 620 "electors" from the Bundestag and another 620 from the Landes.

With the Presidential campaigns in the US heating up now I was fascinated to see that the whole question of Barak Obama's citizenship is still being hotly debated. There are now claims that his birth certificate has been forged or "doctored" and another document is as well. It seems that Mr Obama may have had the same bad PR advice as Mr Wulff. Had he been open and up front and produced all these documents right at the outset he wouldn't have given the conspiracy theorists the opportunity to make a start. Now he's got no less than Sheriff Arpiao investigating possible forgery and intent to defraud.

I had to look this up, but it appears that the US Constitution does have some clause about the President having to be born in the US of A and not merely be a Citizen of the US. This is, apparently, why a number of other people those of us living in other bits of the globe thought might be President of the US one day, have never been candidates. Arnold Schwarzeneger being one! Now there's a thought ... "Iran! I'll be baaaack!"

What would be the result, I wondered, of Sheriff Arpiao proving his case? If Mr Obama's birth certificate is forged, and one does have to ask why he waited almost 3 years in the face of numerous challenges to produce it, does this mean that his entire Presidency is invalidated? What would be the legal implications of having had an illegal President? I'm sure there are lawyers out there rubbing their hands in glee at the thought of all the laws which, having been signed into law by him, are now seriously open to challenge.

I expect there will be a lot of ramifications in International Affairs as well. Are treaties signed by an invalid President legal and binding? Are any of the appointments made in his name and representing his administration valid?

What does strike me as strange is that everything I've read on this has tried to play it down. Obviously some have no desire to explore this and others don't feel anything is served by it, but what is curious, to me at any rate, is that many of the papers and news media playing it all down would have been running with this ball if the name in the frame had been George W Bush ... That there is a distinct bias is obvious, but it doesn't prove a conspiracy either. What it demonstrates to me is that there are almost no blows too low for the media or in politics - unless it affects your own situation.

As I said earlier, IF Arpiao proves his case, and I rather doubt it will be, what affect does it have? Mr Obama won't be able to run in November for a second Term, plus there will be a lot of fairly tricky legal questions to answer. Will it change much more? Probably not.

But it does raise the question: Why would anyone want to subject themselves, their families and their friends to this sort of baying pack of blood thirsty cannibalism? I think it requires a degree of masochism most of us simply don't have.

A thought for the day ...

"Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere."

Albert Einstein.

Coming from one of the most influential Physicists of our age, this says a lot more than a cursory reading will reveal. Think about it, the master of logic, the man who thought in mathematical figures and formulas, is saying that you need to employ the imagination to explore new concepts, ideas and possibly even the improbable if you want to advance knowledge.

Now that is profound.

Say that again?

Sometimes you have to wonder about what you have just heard or read. A case in point is the US Army officer who told reporters that a village in Vietnam had been bombed out of existence in order to save it ...

The New Scientist reports a similar statement has recently been made by a wildlife conservation journal, "Game Changer" to the effect that we have to be prepared to kill some endangered animals in order to "save" them. In short it is being suggested that "culling" elephants, rhinoceros  and other large endangered animals provides the only way to control their activities and prevent, for instance, a herd of elephants destroying forests and crops - or lions killing cattle herds.

Reading this debate reinforces, for me at least, the complexity of the whole ecology. Tweak one part and something else unravels. This runs right through the entire environmental argument. A lot of the time well-meaning individuals and organisations grab hold of one tiny piece of the jigsaw, insist that this is the "key" to everything and then run with it. Until it all goes wrong. Then, of course, its someone else's fault.

The excuse is always, "we have to start somewhere ..."

One thing I learned a long time ago, is that it is often better not to start something until you know exactly which dominoes are going to fall - and what they will trigger in their turn. At least then, you have some idea of how to contain the damage.