THIS BLOG HAS MOVED

While this site will remain active, there will be no further posts here. I want to thank everyone who engaged with this blog over the course of its life, and invite them to join me at my new homestead:

https://citadelfoundations.wordpress.com

Thank you to all who have supported citadelfoundations over the years. 

Entropic Hysteria

Donald Trump is a fascist.

Let that sink in because it is, for all intents and purposes, the truth today. We could pick through the policies of Mussolini's Italy and compare them to the platform of Donald Trump's presidency, but this would be a waste of time. The sort of thing National Review ought to waste time on. In terms of the kind of reaction he receives, genuinely held and not simply a tactic for de-legitimizing his reign, he is a Fascist. America is at present a Fascist dictatorship in the mind of the left, and we must remember that in the Moden World, we are all forced to live within the mind of the left, so their delusions actually form the asylum walls. You might protest and say that they are now irrelevant precisely because of Trump's victory, but you'd be wrong, since the Cathedral is still very much intact, all be it with an annoying thorn now jabbing its side. The hysterics in the media who see fit to lie about busts being moved around and to compare speeches by a clumsy real estate mogul to those of Adolf Hitler, they feature the same hysteria seen during the so-called Women's March, and it is genuine.

Entropy is an issue we touch on somewhat regularly here, and I must point feverishly to the essay 'The Fatalism of Empires' by Bryce Laliberte, which I preserved here. He details the condensed theory of national decline espoused by Sir John Glubb, one of these being the rapid increase in societal polarization that often lies at the periphery of some catacalysm.

We can, with confidence now add yet another data point to our model of entropy in the West, and that is the descent of the left's perceptions to the point of hysteria. Some will say that the left has always been hysterical, after all were there really not blue-haired feminists decrying systemic oppression ten years ago? Of course there were. What is different today is the open embrace of what amount to low level civil war conditions. I say 'low level', because as of now there have been no serious attempts on anyone's life in the West. I stress that this change is not merely centered around Donald Trump's perculiar character, but is in fact manifest all across the Western world. Dennis Prager for aforementioned National Review dresses up his own analysis in Conservative garb, but beneath is the same sentiment that political factions have entered into a state of irreconcilability.

It did not start with the punch to the face received by Richard Spencer. No, it started in earnest on December 20th. I should state beforehand, violence has long been a feature of the left, moreso than it has been a feature of the right in the post-WWII era. The smattering of red-laced skinheads were more than compensated for by Weather Underground Marxists, Swedish red brigades, etc. We are not claiming that left wing violence is a new phenomenon. What we are claiming is that explicit endorsement of violence is now a gleefully embraced part of the Cathedral narrative. So, to return to December 20th. The day before, Andrei Karlov, the Russian ambassador to Turkey, was shot in the back by an Islamic terrorist while giving a talk at an art exhibition. The New York Daily News, which most would consider something of a mainstream outlet, saw fit to publish an article entitled "Assassination of Russian Ambassador Andrei Karlov was not terrorism, but retribution for Vladimir Putin’s war crimes". A mainstream US news outlet was applauding and encouraging political assassination.

probably one of the most disgusting articles I have ever read

Kuntzman (who is Jewish, we should get that out of the way) made the case that "justice had been served" upon the ambassador, who left behind a bereaved wife and son, by comparing the assassination to that of Ernst vom Rath, a Nazi era diplomat to France, by a Jewish student who gunned him down in cold blood in 1938. It is worth noting that at this time, Jews suffered very low levels of persecution in Germany, such as being deported to Poland. There were no mass killings to speak of whatsoever. Kristallnacht erupted in response to this murder (something that seems lost on Kuntzman).

Now, we can all probably say with absolute certainly that Gersh Kuntzman is subhuman garbage and most of us can probably think up exactly what kind of penalty he ought to receive for essentially working as an IS cheerleader. But what is important is that he made the case for political assassinations "when the victim works for Putin or Hitler". Perhaps you see where this is going.

The left considers its enemies to be Fascists, and by Kuntzman's logic, if violent action is justified against 'fascists' like Hitler or Putin, then it is most certainly justified against the left's contemporary enemies within the West itself. You want the connection? I'll let b-list actress Ashley Judd do the talking:

“I am not as nasty as a swastika painted on a Pride flag and I didn’t know devils could be resurrected, but I feel Hitler in these streets. A mustache traded for a toupee. Nazis renamed the cabinet, electric conversion therapy the new gas chamber, shaming the gay out of America, turning rainbows into suicide notes.”

it really does have to be heard to be believed

It follows logically does it not? If politically motivated violence is not only excusable but in fact noble when directed towards Fascists, and we are all of us (NRx, AltRight, AltLite, Donald Trump, Nigel Farage, whoever) Fascists... then politically motivated violence is noble if used against us.

Before, this was not a leap that anyone making up the face of the 'respectable' left would take. Bill Ayers? Sure. Major newspapers and television personalities? No. Though I'm sure most are aware of the killing of anti-fascist rapper Pavlos Fyssas in Greece back in 2013, you have probably never heard the two names; Manolis Kapelonis and Giorgos Fountoulis. Two men in their 20s, gunned down in a drive by shooting by The Fighting People's Revolutionary because they were members of Golden Dawn. For as much as Golden Dawn is hated by the media, you will struggle to find articles praising the attack. In fact, you will struggle to find articles on the attack, period. The Cathedral swept left wing violence by fringe groups under the rug before. Now the game is changing.

In the wake of Richard Spencer being sucker punched by a member of the still quite pathetic American equivalent of Antifa in DC, this assault was met with numerous articles making light of the incident, comparing it to scenes from movies where villains are knocked out cold, remixes of the video etc. 

for the few retards still denying that this is happening

We have on this blog already discussed in brief the malevolent glee with which British tabloids encouraged violence, tacitly, against Millennial Woes after he was doxxed, so we need not go into that again. Hopefully by now the overview of my analysis is clear.

Hysteria has been turned up to the Nth degree precisely because of velocity increase in leftward drift, as per societal entropy. By the same method that Conservatism was rendered defunct and is no longer really a factor at the level of ideological politics, violence is now seen by the left as the only recourse against real or perceived losses, and we should note once again that the Limbaugh Theorem writ large dominates the entire left and not just any single figure. They constantly undermine themselves like Chesterton's New Rebel because they perceive themselves as never having been in power. It makes sense when one considers that Liberalism's mutagenic properties mean that its victories are constantly being turned into defeats post-facto by the next generation, or today, the next person to figure out how to further maximize their own holiness. The Overton Penumbra cast out by Liberalism, which will provide cover for 'dissenters' like George Will is now virtually impossible to keep up with. It was impossible for the present array of forces on the supposed 'right' to be seen as anything other than jackbooted Nazis, and for every tiny crossroad in history which failed to conform to the Liberal preference not to be regarded as another Guernica.

This is where we are today. Welcome to the left wing virtual reality simulator where you play Hitler and they play a revisionist re-imagining of a genderqueer Stauffenberg. What is the required response to this jolting slip down the greased slope of Kali? We'll leave that for another time.

(I must link to Millennial Woes' first official set of videos post-doxx, which capture a newfound energy, and a refreshing return to a more pensive and analytical Woes. He covers the disappearance of the political center and where polarization will lead: 1, 2, 3. I also joined P.T. Carlo for another Thermidor Podcast where we did some back and forth on the topic of catastrophe, passivism, and acceleration. It was a real pleasure)

(For some reason, the comment function here didn't work, but I have turned off comment moderation, so it should be fine now. Apologies.)

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Another episode of the Plebian Podcast, covering religious conversions in particular

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GKW8gq3_NA&t=15s

And an appearance on Reactionary Ian's Christian hangout once again. Strangely UK-Centric this time around which was fun.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LD1dOnTh_Ns

Julius Evola - The Decline of Heroism (Video)

It is something of a surprise the regularity with which I'm actually able to produce these. It was not planned that this latest video would coincide with my Social Matter article on the archetype of the warrior, but a pleasant coincidence is always welcome.

Taken from his book The Metaphysics of War, this chapter details a general overview of how Julius Evola saw the unfolding Cold War. In it, he casts doubt on the degenerated warrior ethos in the West and its unreadiness to handle the threat of Bolshevism from the fortress of bourgeois pseudo-ideals. Evola perhaps underestimated the rate of decay which took hold behind the Iron Curtain, but his words can perhaps be even more usefully applied to the War on Terror which the West is undoubtedly losing, ceding its own home base with every border crossing. Being a warrior type himself, Evola was uniquely positioned to pass scathing judgment upon what today passes for 'heroism' in the West.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijrYNTaTnC8

I also participated in another Plebian Podcast, where we refresh the formula somewhat.  We discuss Ted Kaczynski and technology, as well as a little bit on identity formulation. This was a clean break from a formula that had gotten a little too comfortable and a return to good form I think.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajO-gmKEyYA

Understanding The Warrior Archetype

It's been too long since my last article at Social Matter, and thus I hope my latest is of interest to all. It comes off the back of a conversation I was having with various other contributors concerning where the warrior type is situated in a given society. Before this question can even be unpacked, it struck me that we really needed to understand what internal disposition defines the warrior, and how this relates to those of other castes.

Coincidentally this occured just as I came across an electrifying set of translated works on Gornahoor by Guido de Giorgio, covering among other topics this very question. It is an honor to bring you an analysis of Giorgio's thought on the subject, and be assured it won't be the last you'll hear about him. 

http://www.socialmatter.net/2017/01/23/understanding-warrior-archetype/

In addition to this, I attended a Plebian Podcast with Adam Wallace and co recently, closing the book on Donald Trump rather nicely. My hope is that now we can tackle perhaps more interesting subjects, since we're all feeling that Trump fatigue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYHARx6Amog

Be sure to stay tuned for Wednesday where if all goes according to plan, I will be releasing by fourth video!

Max Scheler's 'Ressentiment'

A recommendation from fellow Social Matter regular, Thomas Barghest, I had never heard of Scheler before. He was a German-born author who made huge contributions to the study of phenomenology, and to a lesser extent ethics, who won the praise of Martin Heidegger. Born to  Lutheran father and a Jewish mother, he would come to embrace Roman Catholicism and wrote passionately in its defense. Later, he would move away from Christianity to practice a kind of pantheism. Even in light of this, his earlier works are typically the ones deemed to be of interest.

This book among others was famous for having been on the Nazi government's 'burn list', largely because of its intention to counter many of the philosophical influences of Adolf Hitler. It did not help of course that Scheler had Jewish blood. And yet while I wrote a rather elaborate defense of 'book-burning', I think there was a gem among the various monstrous titles that went up in flames on all those nights in Berlin and Cologne. It is one that is most certainly worth reading if one wants a well-formulated Christian response to the first wave of atheism.

Ressentiment was titled after a concept that was used heavily by Nietzsche in order to criticize Christianity. It is defined as follows:

"Ressentiment is a self-poisoning of the mind which has quite definite causes and consequences. It is a lasting mental attitude, caused by the systematic repression of certain emotions and affects which, as such are normal components of human nature. Their repression leads to the constant tendency to indulge in certain kinds of value delusions and corresponding value judgments. The emotions and affects primarily concerned are revenge, hatred, malice, envy, the impulse to detract, and spite." 

Fun fact: Scheler was a voracious supporter

of the German cause in WWI, though he could not

fight due to an eye condition

Surprisingly, Scheler affirms that this degenerative tendency is very much applicable in contemporary Judaism, but disputes its presence in true Christianity, positing that Neitzsche had confused the slave morality of his day with a historical precedent which was entirely imaginary. In Scheler's view, Christian morality was far from an example of a stoop from weakness in light of oppression and powerlessness, but in fact a stoop from strength. He illustrates this in terms of duty and Godly imitation. As God stoops to man (an infinitely weaker and infirm entity), when we stoop out of love we imitate God, and thus strengthen ourselves. When we teach a child, we become stronger for it. What's more, only those who overflow with an inner calm can minister to the weaker, the poorer, the sinner, in the purest form (these are the saints). 

"We  have  an  urge  to  sacrifice before  we  ever  know  why,  for  what,  and  for  whom!  Jesus‟  view  of nature and life, which sometimes shines through his speeches and parables  in  fragments  and  hidden  allusions,  shows  quite  clearly that  he  understood  this fact.  When  he  tells us not  to  worry  about eating and drinking, it is not because he is indifferent to life and its preservation,  but  because  he  sees  also  a  vital  weakness  in  all “worrying”  about  the  next  day,  in  all  concentra tion  on  one‟s  own physical  well-being.  The  ravens with neither  storehouse nor  barn, the lilies which do not toil and spin and which God still arrays more gloriously than Solomon ( Luke 12:24 and 27)—they are symbols of that  profound  total  impression  he  has  of  life:  all  voluntary concentration on one‟s own bodily wellbeing, all worry and anxiety, hampers rather than furthers the creative force which instinctively and  beneficently  governs  all  life."

Scheler contrasts this perfectly with what he thought Nietzsche was in fact describing: 'altruism'

"But there is a completely different way of stooping to the small, the  lowly,  and  the  common, even  though  it  may  seem  almost  the same. Here love does not spring from an abundance of vital power, from firmness and security. Here it is only a euphemism for  escape, for the inability to “remain at home” with oneself (chez soi). Turning toward others is but the secondary consequence of this urge to flee from oneself. One cannot love anybody without turning away from oneself. However, the crucial question is whether this movement is prompted by the desire to turn toward a positive value, or whether the intention is  a radical escape from oneself. “Love” of the second variety is inspired by self-hatred, by hatred of one‟s own weakness and misery. The mind is always on the point of departing for distant places. Afraid of seeing itself and its inferiority, it is driven  to give itself to the other—not because of his worth, but merely for the sake of  his  “otherness.”  Modern  philosophical  jargon  has  found  a revealing  term  for  this  phenomenon,  one  of  the  many  modern substitutes  for  love:  “altruism.”"

I have in few places read this analysis written so well, as it perfectly links in with Bonald's excellent reflections on the reflexive Liberal 'Love of the Other'. There is more intricacy to Scheler's critique, but they are better left to the book itself.

my privilege seems to have knocked you over

allow me to help you up

Another astonishing aspect of this book is the Reactionary subtext. Scheler identifies ressentiment as the root emotional cause of the French Revolution, capturing a psychological facet of the Enlightenment that may have been overlooked by other writers. He makes the observation that those who know their place to do experience ressentiment when negative things happen to them, but rather see these as a natural result of their station. 

"The medieval peasant prior  to  the  13th  century  does  not  compare  himself  to  the  feudal 

lord,  nor  does  the  artisan  compare  himself  to  the  knight.  The peasant  may  make  comparisons  with  respect  to  the  richer  more respected peasant, and in the same way everyone confines himself to  his  own  sphere.  Each  group  had  its  exclusive  task  in  life,  its objective unity of purpose [...] A slave who has a slavish nature and accepts his status does not desire revenge when he  is injured by his master;  nor  does  a  servile  servant  who  is  reprimanded  or  a  child that  is  slapped.  Conversely,  feelings  of  revenge  are  favored  by strong  pretensions  which  remain  concealed,  or  by  great  pride coupled  with  an  inadequate  social  position.  There  follows  the important  sociological  law  that  this  psychological  dynamite  will spread with the discrepancy between the political, constitutional, or traditional  status  of  a  group  and  its  factual  power.  It  is  the difference  between  these  two  factors  which  is  decisive,  not  one  of them alone.  Social  ressentiment,  at  least,  would  be  slight  in  a democracy  which  is  not  only  political,  but  also  social  and  tends toward equality of property. But the same would be the case—and was the case—in a caste society such as that of India, or in a society with  sharply  divided  classes."

Thus Scheler correctly asserts that while wealth redistribution can minimize ressentiment, hierarchy does the job as well. The problem is the middle ground in which people believe redistribution is just, and yet redistribution does not occur. With hindsight on the equality experiment of Communism, we can probably now close the book on the first strategy against ressentiment, as it seems to be mythological. The latter however has a logn track record, and what's more, is in keeping with the natural divisions among a people, between higher and lower.

didn't really work

The copy of Ressentiment that I had was a library copy that was either sold or stolen before being sold to me. Regardless, it is a book with no visible flaws in the translation, and contains an introduction to Scheler by Lewis A. Coser and William W. Holdheim who clear up some issues regarding the translation itself. Footnotes are scattered throughout, though having to constantly turn to the informative  Notes section has reinforced my appreciation for Evolian footnote practices. It is far better to have additional optional information on the same page in my opinion.

All in all, I am glad that Barghest recommended this to me, and I in turn recommend you give it a look. It's only 174 pages, and I read the entire thing on a bus journey with minimal re-reading. Scheler's structure is very straightforward, even if some further chapter divisions might have worked in the book's favor. I will definitely be mining this one for years to come.

(Joined Adam Wallace and co for another Plebeian Podcast where we discussed a lot of stuff pertaining to the personal vs. the ideological. Also was invited as the first guest on a brand new podcast by P.T. Carlo as a companion to his new website 'Thermidor Mag' which you can find a link to on the right. We talked Trump and Geopolitics in the year of the fire monkey. Apologies that it starts somewhat abruptly. Carlo was getting to grips with the tech)

Urgency Vs. Centrality

It's not as if the question of where HBD and racial issues factor into Reactionary thought had only just arisen in the last couple of months, but certainly in the wake of Trump's victory and the subsequent events within the AltRight and outside of it, there is something of a compelling case to be made that we should shine a light on any areas of vagueness.

The argument I want to put across is that many on the radical right have unintentionally hampered their own success by treating the racial question in a way that is inappropriate  due to a confusion between urgency and centrality. They have correctly adopted the assumption that the speed of demographic change in most Occidental countries, especially when weighted to take into account aging populations, makes it the most pressing issue of our time. It is not merely statistics that tell this tale, but also the daily news. The torture suffered by a mentally handicapped white teen at the hands of a band of savage animals in Chicago is just the latest escalation of affairs in America for example. However, the response to this urgency often falls into the short-sighted, shallow view of 'Alt-Leftism', something sadly promoted by even a few supposedly trusted outlets.  This view typically boils all problems down to the point of urgency. If a problem does not seem, on the surface, to be urgent, then it is dismissed as not worth addressing with any formal political critique. Thus, when used in the racial paradigm, all problems facing society are placed squarely on the shoulder of the racial question and the solution is simply 'A Nice White Country'. If we were all 'white', then what other niggling problems we had could be worked through in a peacable manner. Necessarily attached to this view is that problems have their root in mass migration, which begins around the middle of the last century for most places (part of the reason Paleoconservatism falls into this trap).

A percular expression of this view can be found in the desire to alter the overton window so that all political actors are 'racially consciouss', regardless of party affiliation. If they are at least able to fill this criteria, then the conditions for a positive state of affairs are present.

I agree these scumbags should get death

but they are animals in a cage that was designed by others

Now, imagine for a moment that your daughter begins to take narcotics, and becomes addicted to routinely poisoning herself to the detriment of all those around her. And let us also suppose that this sudden change in your daughter had been brought on by her hanging around with a new group of friends; shifty, dirty types. The urgency in this scenario is represented by the drug addiction, while the centrality is located in the group of degenerate peers. The peers aren't killing your daughter, the drugs are, and yet the line of causality is clear, and one should safely assume that even if you did manage to solve the drug problem, the nightmare would likely recur until the root cause was removed from the equation. Notice here that I am proposing no order by which the problems be addressed. That would depend on your discretion, and the resources you had at your disposal. Anyone can see that it would be ill-advised to think that just getting your daughter to a rehab clinic would ultimately fix the situation.

you knew this crew was trouble

A one thing leads to another implication can of course be taken too far, which is why one has to provide strong evidence as to how a set of principles being completely overturned (typically with violent implications) can correlate precisely with the rise of some negative phenomena. I do not believe this can be done with the era of mass migration. Not only is there lacking a positive case for revolutionary change during this period (either in the spheres of religion or core political dogma), but there is an abundance of ties between a general trend of Enlightenment emancipation. While Feudal structures in Europe had begun to decay in the 1500s particularly for economic reasons, its remnant was formally abolished in England in 1574 and Russia in 1861. There had been 'peasant revolts' throughout history, but during this period their gains were made permanent, and were not hemmed in by the next effective ruler. It is in this period that we judge the faultline between Modernity and Tradition to fall (though this is disputed, even among the leading scholars). It matters not of course, since the abolition of serfdom rarely took such ideologically-driven forms as later emancipations. Democracy, the granting of franchise to non-landed gentlemen, the informal abolition of Patriarchy, and the abolition of not just chattel slavery but all forms of slavery; these can be seen as precursors to a world in which the situational value and place of man transcends race entirely. It is a natural outworking, as is its younger brother, the emancipation of deviants.

If these streams feed into one another, then it is not enough to say that you declare one iteration of this general principle to be evil, and the others preceding it to be virtuous. The latter cry for the former! (and before anyone says it, no, this is not an argument for chattel slavery). All of these emancipations from restriction, including the restrictions placed upon us by national borders and inborn kin preference, derive from the same underlying belief in egalitarianism and a leveling of positive and negative aspects of man. If one man is retarded and the other a genius, who is to say who would better lead? If one class is black and the other white, who is to say which will more capably solve a complex math problem? If one man is a man, and the other is in fact a woman, who is to say which will make a superior father?

you'll make a terrific.... ummm... what are you again?

This slippery bastardization of belief in a salvific grace offered to all is precisely the heresy of our time. And not unexpectedly, it is not just Christianity which it has managed to bastardize for its own purposes, for there are members of all religions who will justify the 'mother religion' of Liberalism using holy texts if it so suits them. Feminist pagans, gay Buddhists, etc. are not hard to find, however these religious practices are a minority in the West.

Call it the 'EQ' (Enlightenment Question), or the 'MQ' (Modernity Question), but whatever its name, this is the central question posed by the Crisis of the Modern World, and from these questions all others that we find ourselves intently focused on are emenating forth at varying speeds, rippling out from a crack in time.

Not only is making this the central question a logically sound move, but also from a tactical standpoint it makes sense. In no way do I advocate hiding our views on race, but when these views are ensconced within a broader outlook they tend not to trigger the most overtly hostile reaction from the enemy who has been conditioned to respond to racial dissent with greater ferocity than all other forms of dissent. I think this was partly responsible for the gut-punching trial that my friend Millennial Woes has been going through due to the despicable antics of antifa faggots and failed journalists. Woes has a particular style of discourse, and I believe this was the reason that his channel became arguably the second largest AltRight outlet on Youtube, even though his meteoric rise certainly coincided with a turn towards a laser-focus on questions of race. The frankness with which he is willing to treat subjects as diverse as monarchy, culture, sex relations, and perhaps my favorite, the various types of Liberal one encounters, make him incredibly easy to listen to. But even if one were to approach from a leftist background, I don't think his earlier videos (which weren't shy about the racial question either) appear as incendiary as later ones, where the specter of some of the long-standing problems of the AltRight looms large (some of these Woes acknowledged I, II, III).

There is an argument that we shouldn't care how we are perceived, and it is certainly one that some have embraced. Although I would say that the tragic situation of Millennial Woes stands as a warning not to be too comfortable with such a stance, acknowledging of course that there was a host of other factors which led up to the present condition. It is good that we have particularists who focus on one issue and become very familiar with it. Steve Sailer is much celebrated for his work on HBD, but because of its very scientific nature, it is less of an ideological consideration and more of a tool offered up by Sailer for our usage within our broader theory. It is to bolster our already existing arguments, the groundwork of which I laid out above.

While race is an urgent question, and one whose potential for 'redpilling' normies who can see its terrible truth with their own eyes somewhat justifies a pole position, it cannot be central to our worldview, any more than a very coherent argument as to why men with 'no skin in the game' ought not be allowed to vote can be. The solution to putting a permanent end to the racial anarchy we live in is to be found through a purer, older understanding of the world and man's relationship to it. While this might not factor in when drawing up a recruitment list for your deportation force, it is what you need to ensure that such activities are grounded in intelligible and moral premises rather than simple emotion, understandable as it may be in light of what is going on around us.

(I formally encourage all of my viewers to help Woes in whatever ways their means allow, and I endorse any and all measures taken to bring his attackers to justice. Adam Wallace had some thoughts on the incident here, and BlackPigeonSpeaks also did a very good summary)

The World is Reborn in Bethlehem

I certainly have been neglectful this past year, especially in the latter few months, being unable to keep up with all the goings-on in the sphere. Unfortunate amounts of work have prevented me from being as engaged as I otherwise would have liked to be, and for that I apologize. When the current period of unrest is over, things will hopefully return to normal.

This said, it is with great hope for the new year, there could not be a better way to ring it in than with some thinking on Christ's birth, which is celebrated as per the Julian Calender tomorrow. Being a rather bad Orthodox Christian, and certainly no theologian, I feel somewhat out of my depth delving into such a topic, but then perhaps this can be excused if one approaches the writing of an essay with the innocent curiosity of a child, rather than the scruples of a master. This is at least, what the holy day has come to mean for me. Thanks to Kristor at The Orthosphere for making space for it:

https://orthosphere.wordpress.com/2017/01/06/the-world-is-reborn-in-bethlehem/

What's more, another treat is my rather short-notice appearance on Descending the Tower, where I joined Nick B. Steves, Anthony DeMarco, E. Antony Gray, Harold Lee, Jean-Luc Deaux, One Irradiated Watson, and William Scott for a jam-packed year in review. Well done to the DeMarco in particular for his well-constructed round-up of events. 

http://www.socialmatter.net/2017/01/05/descending-tower-11/