Rorate Caeli

The Passion of Europe in Holy Week - Pray for Brussels

Rogier van der Weyden
Crucifixion Triptych (in the background, Brussels in the 15th cent.)
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

They have got what they wanted -- "they" being the Socialist politicians in Belgium who, for decades, in many cases making clear they were trying to influence demography for political reasons, allowed Islam to grow, become native, and grow once more, and radicalize, while at the same time alienating the Catholic culture that was the only thing which had made Belgium (that is, the unity of Dutch-speaking and French-speaking Catholics of the Low Countries) possible.

The Passion of Europe now goes on before our eyes, day after day. Let us pray for the dead today in the Brussels airport and in the Brussels subway system. But let us remember that war has come, and that it has not yet been won by Islam, as strong as it may seem today.

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Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine,
et lux perpetua luceat eis.

(Personal recess for several weeks)