Remembering Cardinal Thomas Wolsey

one of the only pictures there is of Cardinal Thomas Wolsey

Here is Actor Sam Neill played Cardinal Thomas Wolsey in the Peace Arch Entertainment production for Showtime, The Tudors.



King Henry VIII and Cardinal Thomas Wolsey

Thomas Wolsey: Sir, you will be remembered as an English statesman and a cardinal of the Catholic Church. precedence over even the Archbishop of Canterbury, remembering you after 480 years, may you rest in peace!

Thomas Wolsey:
Lord Chancellor
In office
1515–1529
Preceded by William Warham
Succeeded by Sir Thomas More


Archbishop of York
In office
1514–1530


Thomas Wolsey (c. 1471 or 1475? – 29 November 1530; sometimes spelled Woolsey) was an English political figure and cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. When Henry VIII became king of England in 1509, Wolsey became the King's almoner.[2] Wolsey's affairs prospered and by 1514 he had become the controlling figure in virtually all matters of state and was extremely powerful within the Church. The highest political position he attained was Lord Chancellor, the King's chief advisor, enjoying great freedom and often depicted as an alter rex (other king). Within the Church he became Archbishop of York, the second most important seat in England, and then was made a cardinal in 1515, giving him precedence over even the Archbishop of Canterbury. His main legacy is from his interest in architecture, in particular his old home of Hampton Court Palace, which stands today.


Downfall
Despite his many enemies, Cardinal Wolsey held Henry VIII's confidence until Henry decided to seek an annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, so that he could marry Anne Boleyn. Wolsey's failure to secure the annulment is widely perceived to have directly caused his downfall and arrest.

Henry's marriage to Catherine had produced no sons who survived infancy; the Wars of the Roses were still within living memory, leading to the fear of a power struggle after Henry's death. His daughter Mary was not considered capable of holding the country together and continuing the Tudor dynasty because England, until then, had not accepted a queen regnant (with the exception, perhaps, of Empress Matilda, who fought and lost a long civil war in an attempt to keep her throne).

Henry expressed the belief that Catherine's inability to produce a viable male heir was due to her being the widow of his elder brother, Arthur, Prince of Wales, which, he became convinced, violated Biblical proscription and cursed his marriage as incestuous. He also believed that the papal dispensation for his marriage to Catherine was invalid because it was based upon the claim that Catherine was still a virgin after her first husband's death.

Henry argued that Catherine's claim was not credible, and thus, the original papal dispensation must be withdrawn and their marriage annulled. Henry's motivation has been attributed to his determination to have a son and heir, and to his desire for Anne Boleyn, one of his wife's maids-of-honour. Catherine had no further pregnancies after 1519; Henry began annulment proceedings in 1527.

Catherine, however, maintained that she had been a virgin when she married King Henry. Because Catherine was opposed to the annulment and a return to her previous status as Dowager Princess of Wales, the annulment request became a matter of international diplomacy, with Catherine's nephew, Charles V, pressuring the Pope to not annul his aunt's marriage.

Pope Clement VII was presented with a problem: he could either anger Charles or else anger Henry. He delayed announcing a decision for as long as possible; this infuriated Henry and Anne Boleyn, who began to doubt the papal legate Wolsey's loyalty to the State over the Church.

Wolsey's appeal to the Pope for a divorce came on three fronts. Firstly, he tried to convince the Pope that the original papal dispensation was void as the marriage clearly went against words in the Bible, in the book of Leviticus. Secondly, Wolsey objected to the original dispensation on technical grounds, and claimed it was incorrectly worded (however shortly afterwards a correctly worded version was found in Spain). Thirdly, Wolsey wanted the Pope to allow the final decision to be made in England, which of course, as papal legate, would be supervised by him. In 1528, the Pope decided to allow two papal legates to decide the outcome in England: Wolsey and Cardinal Campeggio.

Wolsey was confident of the decision. However, Campeggio took a long time to arrive, and when he finally did arrive he delayed proceedings so much, the case had to be suspended in July 1528, effectively sealing Wolsey's fate. Anne Boleyn and her faction convinced Henry that Wolsey was deliberately slowing proceedings, and as a result, he was arrested in 1529, and the Pope decided the official decision should be made in Rome anyway.

In 1529, Wolsey was stripped of his government office and property, including his magnificently expanded residence of York Place, which Henry chose to replace the Palace of Westminster as his own main London residence. However, Wolsey was permitted to remain Archbishop of York. He travelled to Yorkshire for the first time in his career, but at Cawood in North Yorkshire, he was accused of treason and ordered to London by Henry Percy, 6th Earl of Northumberland.

In great distress, he set out for the capital with his personal chaplain, Edmund Bonner. Wolsey fell ill and died on the way, at Leicester on 29 November 1530, around the age of sixty. "If I had served my God", the Cardinal said remorsefully, "as diligently as I did my king, He would not have given me over in my grey hairs."

In keeping with his practice of erecting magnificent buildings, Wolsey had designed a grand tomb for himself, but he was buried in Leicester Abbey (now Abbey Park) without a monument. Henry VIII considered using the impressive black sarcophagus for himself, but Lord Nelson now lies in it, within the crypt of St. Paul's Cathedral.



Fictional portrayals
Wolsey plays a major role in the early stages of the Autobiography of Henry VIII by Margaret George.
Wolsey is the primary antagonist of William Shakespeare's Henry VIII, which depicts him as an arrogant power-grabber. Henry Irving, Walter Hampden and John Gielgud were well-known for their stage performances of the role, and Timothy West played him in the 1979 BBC Television Shakespeare production of that play.
Wolsey is a minor but important character in Robert Bolt's play A Man for All Seasons; he was played in the two film versions of the play by Orson Welles (1966) and John Gielgud (1988), respectively.
Wolsey was portrayed somewhat more sympathetically in the film Anne of the Thousand Days (1969)—a performance which earned Anthony Quayle an Academy Award nomination.
Wolsey was played by John Baskcomb in The Six Wives of Henry VIII (1970) and by John Bryans when this series was made into the film Henry VIII and His Six Wives (1972).
David Suchet plays him in Henry VIII with Ray Winstone.
Terry Scott portrayed a rather comical performance of Wolsey in Carry On Henry (1970).
William Griffis played Wolsey in the Broadway musical Rex which starred Nicol Williamson as King Henry. (1976)
In the Showtime series The Tudors (2007), he is portrayed by Sam Neill. The TV production interprets his death as suicide by cutthroat covered up by the King and Thomas Cromwell.
He is one of the main characters in Hilary Mantel's novel Wolf Hall (2009).






This account of Thomas Wolsey's fall from royal favor was written by the Tudor chronicler Edward Hall.
Wolsey was born c1473 and eventually held the titles Cardinal-Archbishop of York and Lord Chancellor. He was famous at Oxford University for taking his degree at the age of fifteen; he was intelligent, hard-working, and also very fond of pomp and ceremony.

He became King Henry VII's chaplain during the last two years of his life. Henry VIII appointed him to a minor office upon his accession, but Wolsey's only became involved in government affairs in 1512. He urged Henry to wage war against the French on behalf of Pope Julius II. The war was successful and Henry generously rewarded its main proponent and organizer. Wolsey subsequently became the king's chief minister from 1515 to 1529.

His powerful office and close friendship with Henry earned him many enemies, particularly aristocrats who resented his usurpation of their traditional influence. They also resented his great wealth. Over the years, Wolsey amassed a vast fortune, though he did so largely through his church offices. He spent lavishly, but he was also charitable and personally financed many diplomatic missions. It should be noted that most gentlemen entered government service for financial reward; Wolsey was no different. And as the king's chief minister, he was expected to entertain foreign dignitaries and maintain a suitably impressive lifestyle. His increasingly ostentatious displays of wealth did, however, damage both his personal reputation and that of the church.

Wolsey lacked the genius for administration of his protégé and successor, Thomas Cromwell. But he was efficient and capable; when he found he could not control Parliament (it met only once during his years as chancellor), he simply refused to summon it. He was also blamed for the high taxation necessary to support Henry VIII's ambitious foreign policy.

He maintained the king's favor until he failed to secure an annulment of Henry's first marriage. From 1527-1529, as Anne Boleyn's influence rose, Wolsey's waned. She disliked the Cardinal because of his interference in her earlier engagement to Henry Percy. And both she and the king were increasingly impatient with the pope's endless prevarication. Torn between his secular and spiritual masters, Wolsey chose Henry's side - but it did not matter. On 9 October 1529, he was indicted for praemunire; he later confessed his guilt. Parliament was summoned to indict him on forty-four charges. The king kept him from prison but stripped him of many offices and all of his power. Wolsey was ordered to retire to his archbishopric of York. Indiscreet letters to Rome led to his arrest on 4 November. He died on the 24th, while returning to London and, most likely, execution at the Tower.

Hall implies that Wolsey committed suicide. He did not. He did, however, avoid execution at the Tower which was the fate Henry VIII intended for him.

It should be noted that Cromwell defended Wolsey in parliament.
You have heard under the last year how the cardinal of York [Wolsey] was attainted in praemunire, and despite that the king had given him the bishoprics of York and Winchester, with great possessions, and had licensed him to live in his diocese of York. Being thus in his diocese, grudging his fall and not remembering the kindness the King showed to him, he wrote to the court of Rome and to several other princes letters reproaching the king, and as much as he was able stirred them to revenge his case against the King and his realm; so much so that various opprobrious words about the king were spoken to Dr Edward Kern, the king's orator at Rome, and it was said to him that for the cardinal's sake the king's matrimonial suit would have the worse speed. The cardinal would also speak fair to the people to win their hearts, and always declared that he was unjustly and untruly commanded, which fair speaking made many men believe that he spoke the truth. And to be held in higher repute by the people he determined to be installed or enthroned at York with all possible pomp, and caused a throne to be erected in the Cathedral Church of such a height and design as was never seen before; and he sent to all the lords, abbots, priors, knights, esquires and gentlemen of his diocese to be at his manor of Cawood on 6 November, and so to bring him to York with all pomp and solemnity.

The King, who knew of his doings and secret communications, all this year pretended to ignore them to see what he would eventually do, until he saw his proud heart so highly exalted that he intended to be so triumphantly installed without informing the king, even as if in disdain of the king. Then the king thought it was not fitting or convenient to let him any longer continue in his malicious and proud purposes and attempts. Therefore he sent letters to Henry, the sixth earl of Northumberland, willing him with all diligence to arrest the cardinal, and to deliver him to the earl of Shrewsbury, great steward of the king's household. When the earl had seen the letter, with a suitable number of men he came to the manor of Cawood on 4 November, and when he was brought to the cardinal in his chamber he said to him: "My Lord, I pray you have patience, for here I arrest you." "Arrest me," said the cardinal; "Yes," said the earl, "I have orders to do so." "You have no such power," said the cardinal, "for I am both a cardinal and a peer of the College of Rome, and ought not to be arrested by any temporal power, for I am not subject to that power, therefore if you arrest me I will withstand it." "Well," said the Earl, "here is the king's commission, and therefore I charge you to obey." The Cardinal somewhat remembered himself, and said, "Well, my lord, I am content to obey, but although by negligence I fell under punishment of the praemunire and lost by law all my lands and goods, yet my person was in the king's protection and I was pardoned that offence. Therefore I wonder why I now should be arrested, especially considering that I am a member of the apostolic See, on whom no temporal man should lay violent hands. Well, I see the King lacks good counsel." "Well," said the earl, "when I was sworn warden of the marches you yourself told me that I might with my staff arrest all men under the degree of king, and now I am stronger for I have a commission for what I do as you have seen." The cardinal at length obeyed, and was kept in his private chamber, and his goods seized and his officers discharged, and his physician, Dr Augustine, was also arrested, and brought to the Tower by Sir Walter Welshe, one of the king's chamber. On 6 November the cardinal was conveyed from Cawood to Sheffield Castle, and there delivered into the keeping of the earl of Shrewsbury until the king's pleasure was known. About this arrest there was much talk among the common people, and many were glad, for surely he was not in favour with the commons.

When the cardinal was thus arrested the king sent Sir William Kingston Knight, captain of the guard and constable of the Tower of London with some of the yeomen of the guard to Sheffield, to fetch the cardinal to the Tower. When the cardinal saw the captain of the guard he was much astonished and shortly became ill, for he foresaw some great trouble, and for that reason men said he willingly took so much strong purgative that his constitution could not bear it. But Sir William Kingston comforted him, and by easy journeys he brought him to the Abbey of Leicester on 27 November, where through weakness caused by purgatives and vomiting he died the second night following, and is buried in the same Abbey.

Remembering Servant of God Dorothy Day after 30 years

In March of 2000,

John Cardinal O’Connor announced the approval of the Holy See for the Archdiocese of New York to open the Cause for the Beatification and Canonization of Dorothy Day. With this approval, Dorothy Day was given the title of Servant of God. Edward Cardinal Egan is continuing the efforts for her canonization.


The next step toward sainthood is beatification. Beatification allows a person to be honored by a particular
group or region. In order to beatify a candidate, it must be shown that the person is responsible for a
posthumous miracle. To be considered a saint, there must be proof of a second posthumous miracle.


Prayer for the Intercession of Servant of God Dorothy Day

God our Creator,
your servant Dorothy Day exemplified the
Catholic faith by her conversion,
life of prayer and voluntary poverty,
works of mercy, and
witness to the justice and peace
of the Gospel.

May her life inspire people
to turn to Christ as their Savior and guide,
to see his face in the world’s poor and
to raise their voices for the justice
of God’s kingdom.

We pray that you grant the favors we ask
through her intercession so that her goodness
and holiness my be more widely recognized
and one day the Church may
proclaim her Saint.

We ask this through Christ our Lord.

Amen.




Prayer Petitions

Submit the petition for which you desires prayers through the intercession of Dorothy Day to our website DorothyDayGuild.org (Coming Soon!) Please be sure to include your name, address, and telephone number.

The Guild for Dorothy Day
Archdiocese of New York
1011 First Avenue 12th Floor
New York, NY 10022




Dorothy Day:I am pleased to hear that you were announced by the Vatican that you were Elevated to status of "Servant of God", and you are declared a Saint someday. I hope people will read about your life and see that you are an example with your inspiration towards your faith. Also thanks to be part of Staten Island's own history too! remembering you 30 years ago today, may you rest in peace!


Dorothy Day (November 8, 1897 – November 29, 1980) was an American journalist, social activist and devout Catholic convert; she advocated the Catholic economic theory of Distributism. She was also considered to be an Christian anarchist,and did not hesitate to use the term. In the 1930s, Day worked closely with fellow activist Peter Maurin to establish the Catholic Worker movement, a nonviolent, pacifist movement that continues to combine direct aid for the poor and homeless with nonviolent direct action on their behalf.

Day's cause for canonization is open in the Catholic Church.

By the 1960s, Day was embraced by a significant number of Catholics, while at the same time, she earned the praise of counterculture leaders such as Abbie Hoffman, who characterized her as the first hippie,[9] a description of which Day approved.

Yet, although Day had written passionately about women’s rights, free love and birth control in the 1910s, she opposed the sexual revolution of the 1960s, saying she had seen the ill-effects of a similar sexual revolution in the 1920s. Day had a progressive attitude toward social and economic rights, alloyed with a very orthodox and traditional sense of Catholic morality and piety.

Her devotion to her church was neither conventional nor unquestioning, however. She alienated many U.S. Catholics (including some clerical leaders) with her condemnation of Falangist leader Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War; and, possibly in response to her criticism of Cardinal Francis Spellman, she came under pressure by the Archdiocese of New York in 1951 to change the name of her newspaper, "ostensibly because the word Catholic implies an official church connection when such was not the case". The newspaper's name was not changed.

In 1971, Day was awarded the Pacem in Terris Award. It was named after a 1963 encyclical letter by Pope John XXIII that calls upon all people of good will to secure peace among all nations. Pacem in Terris is Latin for 'Peace on Earth.' Day was accorded many other honors in her last decade, including the Laetare Medal from the University of Notre Dame, in 1972.

She died on November 29, 1980, in New York City.

Day was buried in Cemetery of the Resurrection on Staten Island, just a few blocks from the location of the beachside cottage where she first became interested in Catholicism. She was proposed for sainthood by the Claretian Missionaries in 1983. Pope John Paul II granted the Archdiocese of New York permission to open Day's "cause" for sainthood in March 2000, thereby officially making her a "Servant of God" in the eyes of the Catholic Church

Legacy:
Her autobiography, The Long Loneliness, was published in 1952. Day's account of the Catholic Worker movement, Loaves and Fishes, was published in 1963. A popular movie called Entertaining Angels: The Dorothy Day Story was produced in 1996. Day was portrayed by Moira Kelly and Peter Maurin was portrayed by Martin Sheen, actors later known for their roles on The West Wing television series in the United States. Fool for Christ: The Story of Dorothy Day, a one woman play performed by Sarah Melici, premiered in 1998. A DVD of the play has been produced and Melici continues to do live performances in the United States and Canada.

The first full-length documentary about Day, Dorothy Day: Don't Call Me a Saint, by filmmaker Claudia Larson, premiered on November 29, 2005 at Marquette University, where Day's papers are housed. The documentary was also shown at the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival and is now available on DVD. Day's diaries, The Duty of Delight: The Diaries of Dorothy Day, edited by Robert Ellsberg, were published by the Marquette University Press in 2008. A companion volume, All the Way to Heaven: The Selected Letters of Dorothy Day, also edited by Ellsberg, was published by the Marquette University Press in 2010.

Day has been the recipient of numerous posthumous honors and awards. Among them: in 1992, she received the Courage of Conscience Award from the Peace Abbey,and in 2001, she was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in Seneca Falls, New York.

Memorialization
Day's accomplishments have been memorialized in many ways. Dormitories at Lewis University in Romeoville, Illinois, University of Scranton in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Loyola College in Maryland are named in her honor. A named professorship at St. John's University School of Law is currently held by labor law scholar David L. Gregory.

At Marquette University, a floor bearing Day's name has been reserved for those drawn to social justice issues. Broadway Housing Communities, a supportive housing project in New York City, opened the Dorothy Day Apartment Building in 2003. Several Catholic Worker communities are named after Day.

Remembering a great actor after 24 years

Cary Grant: You are truly one of my favorite old time actors in the classical films, I wonder what if you choice the role of James Bond in 1962,I will always like your films like To Catch A Thief, Charade, and North by Northwest, remembering you 24 years today, may you rest in peace!


Archibald Alexander Leach:(January 18, 1904 – November 29, 1986), better known by his stage name Cary Grant, was an English-American actor. With his distinctive yet not quite placeable Mid-Atlantic accent, he was noted as perhaps the foremost exemplar of the debonair leading man: handsome, virile, charismatic, and charming.

He was named the second Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film Institute. His popular classic films include The Awful Truth (1937), Bringing Up Baby (1938), Gunga Din (1939), Only Angels Have Wings (1939), His Girl Friday (1940), The Philadelphia Story (1940), Suspicion (1941), Arsenic and Old Lace (1944), Notorious (1946), To Catch A Thief (1955), An Affair to Remember (1957), North by Northwest (1959), and Charade (1963).

At the 42nd Academy Awards the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences honored him with an Honorary Award "for his unique mastery of the art of screen acting with the respect and affection of his colleagues".


Retirement and death

Statue of Cary Grant in Millennium Square, Bristol, EnglandAlthough Grant had retired from the screen, he remained active in other areas. In the late 1960s, he accepted a position on the board of directors at Fabergé. By all accounts this position was not honorary, as some had assumed, Grant regularly attended meetings and his mere appearance at a product launch would almost certainly guarantee its success. The position also permitted use of a private plane, which Grant could use to fly to see his daughter wherever her mother, Dyan Cannon, was working. He later joined the boards of Hollywood Park, Western Airlines (now Delta Air Lines), and MGM.

In the last few years of his life, Grant undertook tours of the United States in a one-man show. It was called "A Conversation with Cary Grant", in which he would show clips from his films and answer audience questions. Grant was preparing for a performance at the Adler Theater in Davenport, Iowa on the afternoon of 29 November 1986 when he sustained a cerebral hemorrhage. He had previously suffered a stroke in October 1984. He died at 11:22 pm in St. Luke's Hospital.

In 2001 a statue of Grant was erected in Millennium Square, a regenerated area next to the harbour in his city of birth, Bristol, England.

In November 2004, Grant was named "The Greatest Movie Star of All Time" by Premiere Magazine. Richard Schickel, the film critic, said about Grant: "He's the best star actor there ever was in the movies."

The world lost one of the Beatles today after 9 years

George Harrison: You were my favorite of the Fab 4 or the Beatles, I admire your spiritual on life and the greatness of the environment, may you have eternal and peace, remembering you 9 years later, may you rest in peace!

George Harrison

(25 February 1943 – 29 November 2001) was an English rock guitarist, singer-songwriter, actor and film producer who achieved international fame as lead guitarist of The Beatles.

Often referred to as "the quiet Beatle",[3] Harrison embraced Indian mysticism, and helped broaden the horizons of the other Beatles, as well as those of their Western audience.[5] Following the band's break-up, he had a successful career as a solo artist and later as part of the Traveling Wilburys, and also as a film and record producer. Harrison is listed at number 21 in Rolling Stone magazine's list of "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".

Although most of The Beatles' songs were written by Lennon and McCartney, Harrison, also a songwriter, generally contributed 1-2 songs per record from the With The Beatles onwards. His later compositions with The Beatles include "Here Comes the Sun", "Something" and "While My Guitar Gently Weeps". By the time of the band's break-up, Harrison had accumulated a backlog of material, which he then released as the acclaimed and successful triple album All Things Must Pass in 1970, from which came two singles: a double A-side single, "My Sweet Lord" backed with "Isn't It a Pity", and "What Is Life". In addition to his solo work, Harrison co-wrote two hits for Ringo Starr, another former Beatle, as well as songs for the Traveling Wilburys—the supergroup he formed in 1988 with Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Jeff Lynne, and Roy Orbison.

Harrison embraced Indian culture and Hinduism in the mid 1960s, and helped expand Western awareness of sitar music and of the Hare Krishna movement. With Ravi Shankar he organised a major charity concert with the 1971 Concert for Bangladesh.

Besides being a musician, he was also a record producer and co-founder of the production company HandMade Films. In his work as a film producer, he collaborated with people as diverse as the members of Monty Python and Madonna.[8] He was married twice, to the model Pattie Boyd in 1966, and to the record company secretary Olivia Trinidad Arias in 1978, with whom he had one son, Dhani Harrison. He was a close friend of Eric Clapton. He is the only Beatle to have published an autobiography, with I Me Mine in 1980. Harrison died of lung cancer in 2001.


Death
Cancer diagnosis
Harrison developed throat cancer, which was discovered in 1997 after a lump on his neck was analysed. He attributed it to his smoking in the 1960s. He was successfully treated with radiotherapy. Early in May 2001, it was revealed that he had undergone an operation at the Mayo Clinic to remove a cancerous growth from one of his lungs. In July of that year, it was reported that Harrison was receiving radiotherapy for a brain tumour at a clinic in Switzerland.

Decline and death
Despite the treatments and operations, Harrison died on 29 November 2001 at a Hollywood Hills mansion that was once leased by McCartney and was previously owned by Courtney Love.

The cause of death was listed on his Los Angeles County death certificate as "metastatic non-small cell lung cancer". He was cremated at Hollywood Forever Cemetery and his ashes were scattered in the Ganges River by his close family in a private ceremony according to Hindu tradition. He left almost £100 million in his will.

In 2002, on the first anniversary of Harrison's death, the Concert for George was held at the Royal Albert Hall; it was organised by Eric Clapton and included performances by many of Harrison's musical friends, including Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr. The profits from the concert went to Harrison's charity, the Material World Charitable Foundation.

Honours
Harrison's first official honour was when The Beatles were appointed Members of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in 1965, and received their insignia from the Queen at an investiture at Buckingham Palace on 26 October. Another award with The Beatles came in 1970 when they won an Academy Award for the best Original Song Score for Let It Be.

A significant music award as a solo artist was in December 1992, when he became the first recipient of the Billboard Century Award - presented to music artists for significant bodies of work. The minor planet 4149, discovered on 9 March 1984 by B. A. Skiff at the Anderson Mesa Station of the Lowell Observatory, was named after Harrison. Harrison is listed at number 21 in Rolling Stone magazine's list of "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".

Harrison was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a solo artist on 15 March 2004 by his Traveling Wilburys friends Lynne and Petty. He was inducted into the Madison Square Garden Walk of Fame on 1 August 2006 for the Concert for Bangladesh.

Harrison featured twice on the cover of Time magazine, initially with The Beatles in 1967,then on his own, shortly after his death in 2001.

In June 2007, portraits of Harrison and John Lennon were unveiled at The Mirage Hotel on the Las Vegas Strip, where they will be on permanent display. In September 2007, Variety announced that Martin Scorsese would make a film about Harrison's life.

On 14 April 2009, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce awarded Harrison a star on the Walk of Fame in front of the Capitol Records Building. (The Beatles also have a group star on the Walk of Fame.) Musicians Tom Petty, Jeff Lynne and Paul McCartney were among those in attendance when the star was unveiled. Harrison's widow Olivia, actor Tom Hanks and comedian Eric Idle made speeches at the ceremony; Harrison's son Dhani uttered the Hare Krishna mantra.

After the ceremony, Capitol/EMI Records announced that a new career-spanning CD entitled Let It Roll: Songs by George Harrison would be released in mid-June 2009.

American film director Martin Scorsese has announced that he is making a George Harrison documentary titled Living in the Material World: George Harrison.

40 years ago: the world lost a great General

Benjamin O. Davis: I dont know much about you general, I just read that you are the first African to be general in the United States Army. Thank you sir for serving in the military!remembering you after 40 years, may you rest in peace!






Brigadier General Benjamin Oliver Davis, Sr.


By William Fischer, Jr., November 14, 2008

1. Brigadier General Benjamin Oliver Davis, Sr. Marker (side A)

Inscription.
Benjamin Oliver Davis, Sr. (July 1, 1877 - November 26, 1970), the nation's first African American general in the Regular Army, was born in Washington, D.C. Davis first served as a temporary first lieutenant of the 8th U.S. Volunteer Infantry during the Spanish-American War. Following that conflict, he enlisted as a private in the 9th U.S. Cavalry, serving in the Philippine Insurrection where he began to rise in rank. Davis was promoted to first lieutenant in 1905, captain in 1915, lieutenant colonel in 1920, colonel in 1930, and brigadier general in 1941. His military career took him around the world. In 1909, he was detailed as Military Attache to Monrovia, Liberia. During World War I, Davis was stationed in the Philippines. In 1938, he took command of the New York's African American 396th National Guard Infantry, later known as the 369th Coast Artillery (Antiaircraft) Regiment.

[Marker Reverse]:
During World War II, Benjamin Oliver Davis, Sr. was assigned to the European Theater of Operations in September 1942 on special duty as advisor on race relations. He retired from military service on July 14, 1948 after fifty years of service. His decorations and honors include: the Distinguished Service Medal and Bronze Star Medal, the Croix de Guerre with Palm from France, and the Grade of

By William Fischer, Jr., November 14, 2008

2. Brigadier General Benjamin Oliver Davis, Sr. Marker (side B)

Commander of the Star of Africa from Liberia. Throughout his illustrious military career, his connection to Wilberforce University was strong, serving as Professor of Military Science and Tactics on four different occasions: 1905-1909, 1915-1917, 1929-1930, and 1937-1938. Brigadier General Davis is buried in Section 2 of Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia.

Erected 2003 by Ohio Bicentennial Commission, Cinergy Foundation, and The Ohio Historical Society. (Marker Number 18-29.)

Location. 39° 42.923′ N, 83° 52.767′ W. Marker is in Wilberforce, Ohio, in Greene County. Click for map. Marker is on the Central State University campus, 50 feet southwest of the Paul Robeson Performing Arts Center, and 200 feet north of the intersection of Brush Row Road and Wesley Avenue. Marker is in this post office area: Wilberforce OH 45384, United States of America.


Gen Benjamin Oliver Davis, Sr
Brigadier General Benjamin Oliver Davis, Sr. (July 1, 1877 – November 26, 1970) was an American general and the father of Benjamin O. Davis Jr. He was the first African-American general in the United States Army.

Benjamin O. Davis, Sr., was born in Washington, D.C., on July 1, 1877. His biographer Marvin Fletcher (author of America's First Black General, Benjamin O. Davis, Sr., 1880-1970) has presented evidence of his birth records indicating that he was born in May 1880 and later lied about his age so that he could enlist in the Army without the permission of his parents. It is the earlier date that appears on his grave at Arlington National Cemetery, however. He was a student at Howard University when—as a result of the start of the War with Spain—he entered the military service on July 13, 1898 as a temporary first lieutenant of the 8th United States Volunteer Infantry. He was mustered out on March 6, 1899, and on June 18, 1899, he enlisted as a private in Troop I, U.S. 9th Cavalry Regiment (one of the original Buffalo Soldier regiments), of the Regular Army. He then served as corporal and squadron sergeant major, and on February 2, 1901, he was commissioned a second lieutenant of Cavalry in the Regular Army.


Military service
Benjamin Oliver Davis, Sr. was born in Washington, D.C. on July 1, 1877 to Louis P. H. and Henrietta Davis. He attended M Street High School in Washington where he participated in the school’s cadet program. During the Spanish-American War, Davis briefly served in Company D, 1st Separate Battalion of the Washington D.C. National Guard. On 10 July 1898, Davis joined the 8th U.S. Volunteer Infantry Regiment as a first lieutenant of Company G. The 8th United States Volunteer Infantry was stationed at Chickamauga Park, Georgia, from October 1898 until the unit was disbanded in March 1899.

On 14 June 1899, Davis enlisted in the Regular Army. He was assigned to Troop I, 3rd Squadron, 9th Cavalry at Ft. Duchesne, Utah, first as the troop’s clerk and then as squadron sergeant major. In the spring of 1901, Troop I was assigned to the Philippines. In August 1901, he was assigned to Troop F, 10th Cavalry, where Davis assumed the duties of a second lieutenant after passing an officers' qualification test. Troop F returned to the United States in August 1902. Davis was then stationed at Fort Washakie, Wyoming, where he also served for several months with Troop M. In September 1905, he was assigned to Wilberforce University in Ohio as Professor of Military Science and Tactics, a post that he filled for four years.

In November 1909, shortly after being ordered to Regimental Headquarters, 9th Cavalry, Davis was reassigned for duty to Liberia. He left the United States for Liberia in April 1910, and served as a military attaché reporting on Liberia's military forces until October 1911. He returned to the United States in November 1911. In January 1912, Davis was assigned to Troop I, 9th Cavalry, stationed at Fort D. A. Russell, Wyoming. In 1913, the 9th Cavalry was assigned to patrol the Mexican-United States border.

In February 1915, Davis was again assigned to Wilberforce University as Professor of Military Science and Tactics. From 1917 to 1920, Davis was assigned to the 9th Cavalry at Camp Stotsenburg, Philippine Islands, as supply officer, commander of 3rd Squadron, and then of 1st Squadron. He reached the temporary rank of lieutenant colonel, but returned to the United States in March 1920 with the rank of captain.

Davis was assigned to the Tuskegee University, Alabama, as the Professor of Military Science and Tactics from 1920 to 1924. He then served for five years as an instructor with 2nd Battalion, 372nd Regiment, Ohio National Guard, in Cleveland, Ohio. In September 1929, Davis returned to Wilberforce University as Professor of Military Science and Tactics. He was assigned to the Tuskegee Institute in the early part of 1931, and remained there for six years as Professor of Military Science and Tactics. During the summer months of 1930 to 1933, Davis escorted pilgrimages of World War I Gold Star Mothers and Widows to the burial places of their loved ones in Europe.

In August 1937, Davis returned to Wilberforce University as Professor of Military Science and Tactics. Davis was assigned to the 369th Regiment, New York National Guard, during the summer of 1938, and took command of the regiment a short time later. Davis was promoted to Brigadier General on 25 October 1940, becoming the first African-American general in the United States Army.

Davis became Commanding General of 4th Brigade, 2nd Cavalry Division at Fort Riley, Kansas, in January 1941. About six months later, he was assigned to Washington, D.C. as an assistant in the Office of the Inspector General. While serving in the Office of the Inspector General, Davis also served on the Advisory Committee on Negro Troop Problems. From 1941 to 1944, Davis conducted inspection tours of African-American soldiers in the United States Army. From September to November 1942 and again from July to November 1944, Davis made inspection tours of African-American soldiers stationed in Europe.

On 10 November 1944, Davis was reassigned to work under Lieutenant General John C. H. Lee as Special Assistant to the Commanding General, Communications Zone, European Theater of Operations. He served with the General Inspectorate Section, European Theater of Operation (later the Office of the Inspector General on Europe) from January through May 1945. While serving in the European Theater of Operations, Davis was influential in the proposed policy of integration using replacement units.

After serving in the European Theater of Operations for more than a year, Davis returned to Washington, D.C. as Assistant to the Inspector General. In 1947 he was assigned as a Special Assistant to the Secretary of the Army. In this capacity, he was sent to Liberia in July 1947 as a representative of the United States for the African country’s centennial celebration. On 20 July 1948, after fifty years of military service, Davis retired in a public ceremony with President Harry S. Truman presiding.

From July 1953 through June 1961, he served as a member of the American Battle Monuments Commission. Davis died on 26 November 1970 at Great Lakes Naval Hospital in Chicago, Illinois, and was buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

[edit] Promotions
He was promoted to first lieutenant on March 30, 1905; to captain on December 24, 1915; to major (temporary) on August 5, 1917; and to lieutenant colonel (temporary) on May 1, 1918. He reverted to his permanent rank of captain on October 14, 1919, and was promoted to lieutenant colonel on July 1, 1920; to colonel on February 18, 1930; to brigadier general (temporary) on October 25, 1940. He was retired on July 31, 1941, and recalled to active duty with the rank of brigadier general the following day.

[edit] Decorations and honors
General Davis' U.S. military decorations included the Distinguished Service Medal (DSM) and Bronze Star. His DSM medal, awarded by General Order 10, dated February 22, 1945, stated that Benjamin O. Davis was awarded the DSM "for exceptionally meritorious service to the Government in a duty of great responsibility from June 1941 to November 1944." The War Department release issued about General Davis' DSM on February 11, 1945, included the following citation:

For exceptionally meritorious service to the Government in a duty of great responsibility from June, 1941, to November, 1944, as an Inspector of troop units in the field, and as special War Department consultant on matters pertaining to Negro troops. The initiative, intelligence and sympathetic understanding displayed by him in conducting countless investigations concerning individual soldiers, troop units, and components of the War Department brought about a fair and equitable solution to many important problems which have since become the basis of far-reaching War Department policy. His wise advice and counsel have made a direct contribution to the maintenance of soldier morale and troop discipline and has been of material assistance to the War Department and to responsible commanders in the field of understanding personnel matters as they pertain to the individual soldier.
Additionally, Davis was awarded an Honorary Degree of LL.D. from Atlanta University, Atlanta, Georgia. His foreign awards and honors include of the Croix de Guerre with Palm from France and the Grade of Commander of the Order of the Star of Africa from Liberia.

Benjamin Oliver Davis Sr. was born in Washington D.C. on July 1, 1877. Benjamin attended the M Street High School and enrolled at Howard University in 1897. In 1898 during the Spanish-American War, he left school and volunteered as a First Lieutenant in the 8th U.S. Volunteer Infantry. He enlisted in the 9th U.S. Calvary, regular army at Fort Duchesne, Utah on June 18, 1899. He rose rapidly through the ranks and received a commission as a Second Lieutenant in 1901. Benjamin was promoted to First Lieutenant in 1905 and Captain in 1915.

He was the military attaché to Monrovia, Liberia from 1909 to 1912 and then assigned garrison duty and border patrol in the western U.S. He stood another tour of duty in the Philippines from 1917 to 1920 during which time he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel. Benjamin was assigned as a professor of military tactics at the Tuskegee Institute from 1920 to 1924.

Benjamin received his first independent command, the 369th National Guard Infantry Regiment in 1938 and on October 25, 1940 he became the first African American general in U.S. history. He was appointed to the Committee on Negro Troop Policies in 1942 where he helped to solve racial incidents.

General Davis was instrumental in changing the military's policies on segregation and instituted a proposal to retrain African American service troops as combat soldiers. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal for his efforts in changing the Army's policy regarding segregation.

General Davis retired on July 14, 1948 after 50 years of distinguished service. During his army career he received the French Crois de Guerre with Palm, Commander of the Order of the Star of Africa and the Bronze Star medal.

General Benjamin O. Davis, Sr. died on November 26, 1970 and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

General Davis' son, Benjamin O. Davis Jr. also excelled in his military career and later became the first African American general in the United States Air Force. He was the commander of the illustrious Tuskegee Airmen and received the 4th star of a full general in 1998.

Happy Feast day of Blessed Miguel Pro

Blessed Padre Miguel A. Pro you were a simple man who was protecting by the Almighty in your life, i hope you become a saint, rest in peace! Remembering you 83 years later Father Pro! Remembering you on your feast day!

Blessed Miguel Agustín Pro Juárez (January 13, 1891 – November 23, 1927), also known as Blessed Miguel Pro, was a Mexican Jesuit priest, executed during the persecution of the Catholic Church under the presidency of Plutarco Elías Calles after trumped up charges of involvement in an assassination attempt against former President Álvaro Obregón. Fr. Pro was beatified by John Paul II as a martyr on September 25, 1988.


Arrest and execution
An assassination attempt by bombing against Álvaro Obregón (which only wounded the ex-president) in November 1927 provided the state with a pretext to capture Pro and his brothers Humberto and Roberto. A young engineer who was involved and confessed his part in the assassination testified the Pro brothers were not involved. Miguel and his brothers were taken to the Detective Inspector's Office in Mexico City.

On November 13, 1927, President Calles gave orders to have Pro executed under the pretext of the assassination, but in reality for defying the virtual outlawing of Catholicism. Calles had the execution meticulously photographed, and the newspapers throughout the country carried them on the front page the following day. Presumably, Calles thought that the sight of the pictures would frighten the Cristero rebels who were fighting against his troops, particularly in the state of Jalisco. However, they had the opposite effect.


When the initial shots of the firing squad failed to kill him, a soldier shot him point blankFr. Pro and his brothers were visited by Generals Roberto Cruz and Palomera Lopez around 11 p.m. on November 22, 1927.

The next day, as Fr. Pro walked from his cell to the courtyard and the firing squad, he blessed the soldiers, knelt and briefly prayed quietly. Declining a blindfold, he faced his executioners with a crucifix in one hand and a rosary in the other and held his arms out in imitation of the crucified Christ and shouted out, "May God have mercy on you! May God bless you! Lord, Thou knowest that I am innocent! With all my heart I forgive my enemies!" Before the firing squad were ordered to shoot, Pro raised his arms in imitation of Christ and shouted the defiant cry of the Cristeros, "Viva Cristo Rey!" -"Long live Christ the King!" .When the initial shots of the firing squad failed to kill him, a soldier shot him point blank.

The Cristeros became more animated and fought with renewed enthusiasm, many of them carrying the newspaper photo of Pro before the firing squad.

Beatification
Fifty-two years after Pro's execution, the Pope visited Mexico, was welcomed by the President, and celebrated open-air Masses before thousands of people (an act which would have been a crime during Pro's life and was still technically illegal at the time of the pope's visit, though unenforced). At his beatification on September 25, 1988, Pope John Paul II honored Fr. Pro with these words:

Neither suffering nor serious illness, neither the exhausting ministerial activity, frequently carried out in difficult and dangerous circumstances, could stifle the radiating and contagious joy which he brought to his life for Christ and which nothing could take away. Indeed, the deepest root of self-sacrificing surrender for the lowly was his passionate love for Jesus Christ and his ardent desire to be conformed to him, even unto death.

Blessed Miguel Pro - "Viva Cristo Rey"

There is a law in Mexico, which states that no religious ceremony may be held outside of a church. The same law exists in many communist countries, or at least did exist, until the revolutions in 1989. Mexico and perhaps a few other hard line countries still maintain that law.

There are only two times in the last twelve years that an exception to that law has been allowed, and that was when His Holiness, Pope John Paul II, came to Mexico in 1979 and 1990. At those times, Masses were celebrated openly in large outdoor areas. But with those exceptions, the law is very clear and very strict.

However, on September 25, 1988, a fairly large group of Mexicans, led by a priest, walked to the National Lottery building, located on a busy thoroughfare in Mexico City, and celebrated Mass there. The crowd was large enough to attract the attention of the police, and we're sure the police did notice. But the faithful were not stopped, or hindered in any way. We were very surprised to hear of this, until we were told of a little bronze plaque on the wall of that building. It reads very simply, "This is the spot where Padre Miguel Pro was executed on November 23, 1927." And the day the Mass was celebrated was the day Miguel Pro was beatified by Pope John Paul II, at St. Peter's Basilica in Rome.

Mexico is such a contradiction. How can a country which is 97% Catholic, and 99% Guadalupean, be ruled by Anti-Catholic governments since 1825? Or better yet, how has the Catholic Church been able to survive, under the heel of such domination? We, in the United States, find it almost impossible to believe that only 75 years ago, there was such wholesale persecution and slaughter of Catholics, just south of the border, down Mexico way.

The situation between the State and the Church had been going downhill for many years. To make matters worse, the Constitution of 1917 took away the Church's official standing in Mexico. Priests were not allowed to wear clerical garb. Previously, all church property had been confiscated by the State. Now, the church was forbidden to accumulate any new private property. The priesthood was classified as a profession, like a doctor or lawyer. Priests had to have licenses to practice their profession. If they had no license, they could not preach. If they did have their license, the government had its finger on them at all times. Foreign missionaries were banned in Mexico; and native Mexicans were forbidden to train in the Mexican seminaries. So the faithful were not allowed to have Mexican priests, and not allowed to have foreign priests come in. The idea was to kill off Catholicism in Mexico, by eliminating the priesthood. When none of this seemed to work, the president, Plutarco Elias Calles, issued an order that all clergy were to leave their duties and report to Mexico City. None of them left their parishes, which made them outlaws in the eyes of the State. God only knows what Calles would have done with them, if they had all come to Mexico City.

Most of the world knew very little, or nothing, of what was going on in Mexico. Those Catholic priests, nuns and lay people who had been murdered, might have remained unknown statistics of man's inhumanity to man, and Satan's hate for God, had President Calles not made a move that backfired on him, and all of Mexico. The execution of Miguel Pro, and the publicizing of that execution, was a huge mistake on the part of the Mexican government in 1927, which they have never been able to live down, or sweep under the carpet. It highlighted the persecution of the Church by the government. Padre Pro just refused to go away, and based on his recent beatification, he never will.

Who is Padre Miguel Pro?

Miguel Agust¡n Pro was God's clown. He was born on January 13, 1891. His early days remind us very much of St. Francis of Assisi. Miguel came from a well-to-do family, which was a feat in itself, at the turn of the century, in Mexico. His father was an executive in a small mining village in the state of Zacatecas. Miguel grew up, embracing all the beauty of his surroundings. He was of the upper class, but he never thought of himself that way. His greatest love, as a child, was to wander down into the mines, to be with the workers. To Miguel, this was the best way to spend his life. It gave him a chance to meet and become close to those unfortunates who had to be in the mines, working long hours, under terrible conditions. But when Miguel was there, he cheered everyone up. All was fun.

He was a natural comic, which would be of great help to him in his unorthodox priestly ministry. He was a very happy boy in school, the leader of the crowd. We would call Miguel a very normal boy; yet there was a sensitivity in him that his mother noticed from his earliest age.

He went to work for his father in the office of the mine, before he had finished school. That was fine with Miguel. He would rather be around the mines than at school, anyway. He adapted beautifully to the office. His natural talents emerged. He picked up all the office procedures, especially details, and mastered them. He was great on the typewriter; he could type 100 words per minute. But whenever he could, he would sneak down into the mines. He became friendly with the miners. He picked up their colloquial language, which was different from what his parents spoke in the house.

One talent Miguel acquired early in life, which would be extremely important to him later on, was as a caricaturist. He was able to capture, in exaggerated form, the peculiarities in people's faces. At first, he sketched them on paper; they were hysterical. He would embellish noses, thick bushy eyebrows, long chins, funny eyes, buck teeth. He had an aptitude for these things. But he grew from drawing them, to disguising himself in the same theatrical masks. This ability to disguise himself was to prove crucial in later years.

His focus was not on spirituality, at all. He was having too much of a good time. He learned to play the guitar and mandolin, as was required of a young man of his station. His two sisters decided to join the convent. Miguel became furious! Things were changing. He didn't want that. He was enjoying his family. Miguel became very angry. He blamed it on the Jesuits. They had been the girls' spiritual directors. He developed a great animosity toward the Jesuits. He really didn't believe his sisters would go through with this insanity; he thought for sure he could count on his mother and father to step in and stop them. But they didn't!

On the day, his sisters left for their new life in Christ, an irate Miguel bolted out into the woods. He was gone for days. His mother was really worried about him. Anything could happen in the woods. He was not experienced in hiking or camping. She went out looking for him. When she found him, as she knew she would, she spoke very gently to her son. She was concerned about the way, he had reacted to his sisters' entering religious life. Miguel couldn't understand either, why he had reacted so angrily. He just knew it bothered him terribly.

His mother made a suggestion that she knew would not go over well with Miguel. She asked him to go on a religious retreat, just for a few days, to try to come to terms with what was bothering him. She was right; he was not happy with the idea. But, praise God, he went anyway. No one knows for sure what happened on that retreat. The best comparison we can make is Paul's conversion on the road to Damascus. It was about as complete a turnaround as Paul made. This young man, a hothead like Paul, impetuous like Paul, came back from this retreat, converted like Paul, his vocation to the priesthood, sealed. And most unbelievable of all, he was going to be a Jesuit!

The parallels with Paul are so clear. We have to believe that Miguel Pro was given some insight on that retreat, some vision, whether physical or spiritual, which lifted him to the heights of Heaven. On August 11, 1911, he left his home and family, and entered the Jesuit seminary in El Llano, in the state of Michoac n. He was twenty years old.

The Church and the State

The relationship between the Church and the State had plunged to its lowest depths. The conflict had begun about a hundred years before Miguel Pro entered the seminary. Ironically, the actions of a well-meaning priest, Miguel Hidalgo, brought about revolution. He had only wanted some equity for the Indians, who had been mistreated at the hands of the Spanish from the days following Cortez' conquest. The priest was about social justice; what he accomplished was social uprising, against the wealthy landowners, and (not part of his plan) against the Church. The leaders of the Church have always been associated with the establishment. It was that way during the French Revolution; it was the same during the Mexican Revolution.

Farmers and peasants, without weapons other than pitchforks, knives and the like, rallied round Hidalgo, and marched on the towns and villages of Mexico. The force swelled to over a hundred thousand, at which point, Hidalgo lost control of his followers completely; it became a bloodbath. Hidalgo was not a military man; he became the dupe for ambitious men, who would use him for their own ends. Finally, he was killed, a year after his ill-begun revolution. He has been called the "Father of the Revolution" in Mexico. And from that poor beginning, revolution upon revolution has continued. The Spanish regained control of the towns after Hidalgo was killed, but they never quite controlled the country again.

After a period of ten years, many guerrilla attacks and much back-stabbing, a shrewd upstart took control of the country, and proclaimed himself its Emperor. His empire lasted less than two years, but accomplished two things. Spain was banished from Mexico, including its soldiers and governors, but also its money. The Emperor bled the country of what remained of its treasury, setting the stage for many to continue doing, down through the years. The bloodsuckers remained; only now they were home-grown Mexican opportunists, rather than the Spanish Overlords. In a period of fifty five years, from 1821 to 1876, Mexico was ruled by forty presidents, two emperors, and a few provisional governments. Everyone took their best shot at raping the people. It was also during this time that Mexico lost a good deal of her territory to the United States in the Mexican War of 1846: Texas, California, Nevada and Utah, in addition to parts of New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and Wyoming.

The country had been looted of all its treasury systematically by Santa Anna, who had been in some degree of power for almost twenty five years. While he was exiled from the country three times, he was also asked to come back twice. Each time he returned, he wiped out the treasury again. Finally, in 1854, the people had had enough of him, and he was exiled his third and last time.

The country had been ruled for so many years by military men, who kept increasing and increasing their own personal fortunes, the people looked with hope to a strong non-military man, a full-blooded Indian, Benito Juarez. He was the only one who seemed to care about the people. During his eighteen years in power, he brought his country to financial ruin; not because he was crooked, he just didn't know how to run a country. Juarez, who has been called the "Thomas Jefferson" of Mexico, because of his reforms, was also most instrumental in persecuting the Church in Mexico. This seems strange for a man who was taken off the streets as a young boy and given his education through the generosity of a priest.

As soon as Juarez had attained even a small degree of power in the Mexican government, he passed a bill, forbidding the Church to buy property. He followed this with another law, called the Reform Laws, which confiscated all church property, broke up monastic orders, dismantled convents, and prohibited seminaries. Religious were not allowed to wear clerical vestments on the streets. The Reform laws of Benito Juarez, and his attitude, that of crushing the Church in Mexico, have existed in one form or another until this day. Once begun, the persecution never ended. Sadly enough, this man would not have remained in power, if it were not for the support he received from the United States. Into this setting, the Lord places Miguel Pro, a Powerful Man in our Church

47 Years ago today, the world lost 2 great figures

John Fitzgerald Kennedy: today was truly a day in the history books. You will be missed, remembering you after 47 years,You will always be considered a great leader. You will be truly missed. Thanks for creating the stepping stone for all Catholics to reach high standards!



Professor Lewis:I respect you both as a theologain and a writer. Your 'Chronicles Of Narnia' series is my favorite of all of your writings, thanks, remembering you after 47 years today, may you rest in peace!


On this day, the world lost 2 unique individuals on the same day. They were an inspiring author to use theology in great books and an young charming United States President who wanted to lead the nation to the New Frontier to met his end by an assassin' bullet in Dallas, Texas. Remembering President JFK and author C.S. Lewis after 47 years ago today!


John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963.

After military service as commander of the Motor Torpedo Boat PT-109 and Motor Torpedo Boat PT-59 during World War II in the South Pacific, Kennedy represented Massachusetts's 11th congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1947 to 1953 as a Democrat. Thereafter, he served in the U.S. Senate from 1953 until 1960. Kennedy defeated then Vice President and Republican candidate Richard Nixon in the 1960 U.S. presidential election, one of the closest in American history. He was the second-youngest President (after Theodore Roosevelt), the first President born in the 20th century, and the youngest elected to the office, at the age of 43.

Kennedy is the only Catholic, and the first Irish American, president, and is the only president to have won a Pulitzer Prize.[5] Events during his presidency included the Bay of Pigs Invasion, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the building of the Berlin Wall, the Space Race, the African American Civil Rights Movement and early stages of the Vietnam War.

Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas. Lee Harvey Oswald was charged with the crime but was shot and killed two days later by Jack Ruby before any trial. The FBI, the Warren Commission, and the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) concluded that Oswald was the assassin, with the HSCA allowing for the probability of conspiracy based on disputed acoustic evidence. Today, Kennedy continues to rank highly in public opinion ratings of former U.S. presidents.


Clive Staples Lewis (29 November 1898 – 22 November 1963), commonly referred to as C. S. Lewis and known to his friends and family as "Jack", was an Irish-born British novelist, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian and Christian apologist. He is also known for his fiction, especially The Screwtape Letters, The Chronicles of Narnia and The Space Trilogy.

Lewis was a close friend of J. R. R. Tolkien, and both authors were leading figures in the English faculty at Oxford University and in the informal Oxford literary group known as the "Inklings".

According to his memoir Surprised by Joy, Lewis had been baptised in the Church of Ireland at birth, but fell away from his faith during his adolescence. Owing to the influence of Tolkien and other friends, at the age of 32 Lewis returned to Christianity, becoming "a very ordinary layman of the Church of England". His conversion had a profound effect on his work, and his wartime radio broadcasts on the subject of Christianity brought him wide acclaim.

In 1956, he married the American writer Joy Gresham, 17 years his junior, who died four years later of cancer at the age of 45.

Lewis died three years after his wife, as the result of renal failure. His death came one week before his 65th birthday. Media coverage of his death was minimal, as he died on 22 November 1963 – the same day that U.S. President John F. Kennedy was assassinated.

Illness and death

In early June 1961, Lewis began experiencing medical problems and was diagnosed with inflammation of the kidneys which resulted in blood poisoning. His illness caused him to miss the autumn term at Cambridge, though his health gradually began improving in 1962 and he returned that April. Lewis's health continued to improve, and according to his friend George Sayer, Lewis was fully himself by the spring of 1963. However, on 15 July 1963 he fell ill and was admitted to hospital. The next day at 5:00 pm, Lewis suffered a heart attack and lapsed into a coma, unexpectedly awaking the following day at 2:00 pm.

After he was discharged from the hospital, Lewis returned to the Kilns, though he was too ill to return to work. As a result, he resigned from his post at Cambridge in August. Lewis's condition continued to decline, and in mid-November he was diagnosed with end stage renal failure. On 22 November 1963 Lewis collapsed in his bedroom at 5:30 pm and died a few minutes later, exactly one week before his 65th birthday. He is buried in the churchyard of Holy Trinity Church, Headington, Oxford (Friends of Holy Trinity Church). Almost 10 years later, his brother Warren Hamilton "Warnie" Lewis, who died on 9 April 1973, was buried next to him.

Media coverage of his death was almost completely overshadowed by news of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, which occurred on the same day, as did the death of Aldous Huxley, author of Brave New World. This coincidence was the inspiration for Peter Kreeft's book Between Heaven and Hell: A Dialog Somewhere.

C. S. Lewis is commemorated on 22 November in the church calendar of the Episcopal Church

Remembering Leo Tolstoy after 100 years

Leo Tolstoy: thank you for writing the classics, "Anna Karenina," "War and Peace," "The Cossacks," "The Death of Ivan Ilyich," "Master and Man," "The Kreutzer Sonata," and "Resurrection." remembering you after 100 years, may you rest in peace!




Leo Tolstoy, or Count Lyev Nikolayevich Tolstoy; September 9 [O.S. August 28] 1828 – November 20 [O.S. November 7] 1910), was a Russian writer whom many consider to be the world's greatest novelist. His masterpieces War and Peace and Anna Karenina represent, in their scope, breadth and vivid depiction of 19th-century Russian life and attitudes, the peak of realist fiction.

Tolstoy's further talents as essayist, dramatist, and educational reformer made him the most influential member of the aristocratic Tolstoy family. His literal interpretation of the ethical teachings of Jesus, centering on the Sermon on the Mount, caused him in later life to become a fervent Christian anarchist and anarcho-pacifist. His ideas on nonviolent resistance, expressed in such works as The Kingdom of God Is Within You, were to have a profound impact on such pivotal twentieth-century figures as Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.

Death

Tolstoy died of pneumonia at Astapovo station in 1910 after leaving home in the middle of winter at the age of 82. His death came only days after gathering the nerve to abandon his family and wealth and take up the path of a wandering ascetic, a path that he had agonized over pursuing for decades. He had not been at the peace off health before leaving home; his wife and daughters were all actively engaged in caring for him daily.

He had been speaking and writing of his own death in the days preceding his departure from home, but fell ill at the train station not far from home. The station master took Tolstoy to his apartment, where his personal doctors were called to the scene. He was given injections of morphine and camphor. The police tried to limit access to his funeral procession, but thousands of peasants lined the streets at his funeral. Still, some peasants were heard to say that, other than knowing that "some nobleman had died," they knew little else about Tolstoy. There is some speculation that Tolstoy was murdered with poison by his wife Sonya

Today is the 85th Birthday of Robert Francis Kennedy!

"Uncle" Robert Francis Kennedy: you were truly a unqiue individual in the Kennedy family, You were a great Attorney General and Speaker on Civil Rights in 1960s, Remembering you today, happy 85th birthday!

Robert Francis Kennedy with New York Yankee Legend Mickey Mantle!

Rev. Martin Luther King Jr and Robert Francis Kennedy

"First is the danger of futility; the belief there is nothing one man or one woman can do against the enormous array of the world's ills — against misery and ignorance, injustice and violence. Yet many of the world's great movements, of thought and action, have flowed from the work of a single man. A young monk began the Protestant reformation, a young general extended an empire from Macedonia to the borders of the earth, and a young woman reclaimed the territory of France. It was a young Italian explorer who discovered the New World, and 32-year-old Thomas Jefferson who proclaimed that all men are created equal. "Give me a place to stand," said Archimedes, "and I will move the world." These men moved the world, and so can we all".

Robert Francis "Bobby" Kennedy (November 20, 1925 – June 6, 1968), also referred to by his initials RFK, was an American politician, a Democratic Senator from New York, and a noted civil rights activist. An icon of modern American liberalism and member of the Kennedy family, he was a younger brother of President John F. Kennedy and acted as one of his advisers during his presidency. From 1961 to 1964, he was the U.S. Attorney General.

Following his brother John's assassination on November 22, 1963, Kennedy continued to serve as Attorney General under President Lyndon B. Johnson for nine months. In September 1964, Kennedy resigned to seek the U.S. Senate seat from New York, which he won in November. Within a few years, he publicly split with Johnson over the Vietnam War.

In March 1968, Kennedy began a campaign for the presidency and was a front-running candidate of the Democratic Party. In the California presidential primary on June 4, Kennedy defeated Eugene McCarthy, a fellow U.S. Senator from Minnesota. Following a brief victory speech delivered just past midnight on June 5 at The Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, Kennedy was assassinated by Sirhan Sirhan. Mortally wounded and unconscious, he survived for nearly 26 hours, dying early in the morning of June 6.



Born November 20, 1925(1925-11-20)
Brookline, Massachusetts
Died June 6, 1968(1968-06-06) (aged 42)
Los Angeles, California
Resting place Arlington National Cemetery
Arlington, Virginia
Nationality American
Political party Democratic
Spouse(s) Ethel (née Skakel)
Children Kathleen H. (b.1951)
Joseph P. II (b.1952)
Robert F., Jr. (b.1954)
David A. (1955–84)
M. Courtney (b.1956)
Michael L. (1958–97)
M. Kerry (b.1959)
Christopher G. (b.1963)
M. Maxwell T. (b.1965)
Douglas H. (b.1967)
Rory E.K. (b.1968)
Alma mater Harvard College (A.B.)
University of Virginia School of Law (LL.B.)
Religion Roman Catholic
Signature
Military service
Service/branch United States Navy Reserve
Years of service 1944-1946
Rank Seaman Apprentice
Unit USS Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr.
Battles/wars World War II




Honors


Justice Department building being renamed in honor of Robert Kennedy


D.C. Stadium in Washington, D.C. was renamed Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium in 1969. In 1978, the United States Congress posthumously awarded Kennedy its Gold Medal of Honor. In 1998, the United States Mint released a special dollar coin that featured Kennedy on the obverse and the emblems of the United States Department of Justice and the United States Senate on the reverse.

In Washington, D.C. on November 20, 2001, US President George W. Bush and Attorney General John Ashcroft dedicated the Department of Justice headquarters building as the Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice Building, honoring Robert F. Kennedy on what would have been his 76th birthday. They both spoke during the ceremony, as did Kennedy's eldest son, Joseph II.




Numerous roads, public schools and other facilities across the United States were named in memory of Robert F. Kennedy in the months and years after his death. The Robert F. Kennedy Memorial organization<sup>[50] was founded in 1968, with an international award program to recognize human rights activists. It is now known as the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights. In a further effort to not just remember the late Senator, but continue his work helping disadvantaged, a small group of private citizens launched the Robert F. Kennedy Children's Action Corps in 1969, which today helps more than 800 abused and neglected children each year. A bust of Kennedy resides in the library of the University of Virginia School of Law, from where he obtained his law degree.

On June 4, 2008, on the eve of the 40th anniversary of the assassination of Kennedy, the New York State Assembly voted to rename the Triborough Bridge in New York City the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Bridge in honor of the former New York Senator. New York State Governor David Paterson signed the legislation into law on Friday, August 8, 2008.

Quotes by Robert Francis Kennedy:

A revolution is coming — a revolution which will be peaceful if we are wise enough; compassionate if we care enough; successful if we are fortunate enough — But a revolution which is coming whether we will it or not. We can affect its character; we cannot alter its inevitability.
Speech in the US Senate (9 May 1966)


If we would lead outside our borders, if we would help those who need our assistance, if we would meet our responsibilities to mankind, we must first, all of us, demolish the borders which history has erected between men within our own nations — barriers of race and religion, social class and ignorance.
Our answer is the world's hope; it is to rely on youth. The cruelties and the obstacles of this swiftly changing planet will not yield to obsolete dogmas and outworn slogans. It cannot be moved by those who cling to a present which is already dying, who prefer the illusion of security to the excitement and danger which comes with even the most peaceful progress. This world demands the qualities of youth: not a time of life but a state of mind, a temper of the will, a quality of the imagination, a predominance of courage over timidity, of the appetite for adventure over the love of ease.</sup>

Today is the 147th Anniversary of the Gettysburg Address

this is one of the only known photograph of President Abraham Lincoln about to address this memorable speech!


Abraham Lincoln
The Gettysburg Address
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met here on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of it as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But in a larger sense we can not dedicate - we can not consecrate - we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled, here, have consecrated it far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but can never forget what they did here.

It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they have, thus far, so nobly carried on. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us - that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion - that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain; that this nation shall have a new birth of freedom; and that this government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.


The Gettysburg Address is a speech by U.S. President Abraham Lincoln and is one of the best-known speeches in United States history. It was delivered by Lincoln during the American Civil War, on the afternoon of Thursday, November 19, 1863, at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, four and a half months after the Union armies defeated those of the Confederacy at the decisive Battle of Gettysburg.

Abraham Lincoln's carefully crafted address, secondary to other presentations that day, came to be regarded as one of the greatest speeches in American history. In just over two minutes, Lincoln invoked the principles of human equality espoused by the Declaration of Independence and redefined the Civil War as a struggle not merely for the Union, but as "a new birth of freedom" that would bring true equality to all of its citizens, and that would also create a unified nation in which states' rights were no longer dominant.

Beginning with the now-iconic phrase "Four score and seven years ago," referring to the American Revolution of 1776, Lincoln examined the founding principles of the United States in the context of the Civil War, and used the ceremony at Gettysburg as an opportunity not only to consecrate the grounds of a cemetery, but also to exhort the listeners to ensure the survival of America's representative democracy, that the "government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

Despite the speech's prominent place in the history and popular culture of the United States, the exact wording of the speech is disputed. The five known manuscripts of the Gettysburg Address differ in a number of details and also differ from contemporary newspaper reprints of the speech.

Happy 160th birthday to Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson I truly admired your works of literature like the Strange Case of Dr. Jeykll and Mr. Hyde and Treasure Island, happy 160th birthday!





Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson (13 November 1850 – 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer. His best-known books include Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and the Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.

A literary celebrity during his lifetime, Stevenson now ranks among the 30 most translated authors in the world, just below Charles Dickens.[1] He has been greatly admired by many authors, including Jorge Luis Borges, Ernest Hemingway, Rudyard Kipling, Marcel Schwob, Vladimir Nabokov, J. M. Barrie, and G. K. Chesterton, who said of him that he "seemed to pick the right word up on the point of his pen, like a man playing spillikins.



Novels
Treasure Island (1883) His first major success, a tale of piracy, buried treasure, and adventure, has been filmed frequently. He originally entitled it The Sea Cook but an editor changed it.
The Black Arrow: A Tale of the Two Roses (1883) An historical adventure novel and romance set during the Wars of the Roses.
Prince Otto (1885) Stevenson’s third full-length narrative, an action romance set in the imaginary Germanic state of Grünewald.
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886), a novella about a dual personality much depicted in plays and films, also influential in the growth of understanding of the subconscious mind through its treatment of a kind and intelligent physician who turns into a psychopathic monster after imbibing a drug intended to separate good from evil in a personality.
Kidnapped (1886) is a historical novel that tells of the boy David Balfour's pursuit of his inheritance and his alliance with Alan Breck in the intrigues of Jacobite troubles in Scotland.
The Master of Ballantrae (1889), a masterful tale of revenge, set in Scotland, America, and India.
The Wrong Box (1889); co-written with Lloyd Osbourne. A comic novel of a tontine, also filmed (1966).
The Wrecker (1892); co-written with Lloyd Osbourne.
Catriona (1893), also known as David Balfour, is a sequel to Kidnapped, telling of Balfour's further adventures.
The Ebb-Tide (1894); co-written with Lloyd Osbourne.
Weir of Hermiston (1896). Unfinished at the time of Stevenson's death, considered to have promised great artistic growth.
St. Ives: being the Adventures of a French Prisoner in England (1897). Unfinished at the time of Stevenson's death, the novel was completed by Arthur Quiller-Couch