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Lighting a candle in toxic air.

December 18: Pius XII, Optatissima Pax (1947) and the Powerlessness of Prayer

It was on this date, December 18, 1947, that Pope Pius XII, in the ninth year of his papacy, promulgated the encyclical Optatissima Pax, On Prescribing Prayers for Peace. This was timed well, for World War Two had ended just two years earlier. And Pius was the same pope, born Eugenio Pacelli, whose tepid and infrequent condemnations of Hitler and the Nazis, while somewhat successful, only show that had he condemned the atrocities more forcefully and more frequently, millions of Jewish lives could have been saved.

To read more, go to THIS LINK.

Originally published December 2003 by Ronald Bruce Meyer.

Ronald Bruce Meyer

Our Fearless Leader.


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November 11: Kurt Vonnegut Jr + Joseph McCabe

Kurt Vonnegut Jr (1922) It was on this date, November 11, 1922, that science fiction and satire writer Kurt Vonnegut was born in Indianapolis, Indiana. Vonnegut enrolled at Cornell University as a biochemistry major, but left for the Air Force during World War Two. He was captured in May 1944 during the Battle of the […]



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