George Mitchell was the United States Senator from Maine who served as the Majority Leader when President Clinton was in office. However, his finest hour was not as a Senator.

I’ll wager that most of you do not know who he is.

Mitchell’s accomplishments included being tasked by Major League Baseball in 2007 to investigate the steroid scandals. His investigation resulted in a 409-page report which documented 89 retired and active players involved, many of whom were well known. He served on many corporate boards, including Disney. In Maine, scholarships and schools are named after him.

President Clinton offered him a nomination to the Supreme Court which he declined. He would’ve been a slam dunk for confirmation given the respect and admiration of his fellow Senators. He left the Senate and was then appointed as a Special Envoy to Northern Ireland with a direction to seek resolution of the ongoing battles known (only the Irish could so name them) as “The Troubles.”

“The Troubles” were a lot more than a little trouble.

They were all out war between the IRA and Protestant para-military groups. Every few days brought a bombing, an assassination, and what amounted to a civil war between the two factions. Countless civilians were caught and died in the crossfire. This went on for 30 years with ebbs and flows, marches, protests, bombings in Northern Ireland and in England including an attempted assassination of the British Prime Minister. British troops patrolled cities in Northern Ireland and became identified as being on the side of the Protestant paramilitaries. They too were targeted by the IRA.

If you wanna know all the necessary details about “The Troubles” just Google it and be prepared for a long read. The gist of this 30-year war was the desire of the IRA to have the six counties of Northern Ireland united with the 26 counties of the Republic of Ireland and the countervailing desire of the six counties in the North to stay aligned with Great Britain. For all practical purposes, Northern Ireland was “Protestant” to the extent that Catholics were actively discriminated against and had no political power there.

So, Mitchell stepped into this mess and a few years later produced what is known as the “Good Friday Agreement” which effectively ended “The Troubles.” The Agreement was reached 28 years ago in 1998. The Good Friday Agreement was the outgrowth of something called the Mitchell Principles first announced in 1986, and which guided discussions leading to the final agreement. The Good Friday Agreement was voted on by the Irish people and passed overwhelmingly in both the Republic of Ireland and in Northern Ireland. 

Pulling this off was the equivalent of solving the Rubik’s cube while bombs were going off and you were being continuously shot at by while simultaneously dealing with all the political parties and gadflies involved in the process, including the British government, controlling authorities in Northern Ireland (6 counties) as well as the Republic of Ireland (26 counties). Mitchell provided the equivalent of a master class in negotiation, compromise, and resolution. The signing of the Good Friday Agreement included a picture of Mitchell standing in the center between Prime Minister Ahern of Ireland and Prime Minister Tony Blair of Great Britain.

For his efforts, he was a demigod in Ireland which was not bad for a Lebanese boy from Maine. Queen’s University in Belfast displayed a bronze bust of his likeness and named one of its programs, The Mitchell Research Institute. He was made Chancellor of that University from 1999 to 2009.

Other honors followed. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1999 and the Liberty Medal in 1998. The US–Ireland Alliance created a prestigious exchange scholarship in his name.

And even before his efforts in Ireland, there were scholarships named after him in Maine as well as the local public elementary school. After Ireland, he went as a Special Envoy to the Mid-East to broker an Israeli/Palestinian peace process which was doomed by the unwillingness of the various parties to compromise.

Mitchell is now 92 years old and in poor health. When he was 61, he married his second wife who was then 35 and they have two children, a boy and a girl who was named Claire after an Irish girl who had been blinded by a bomb. His wife was, by all accounts, extremely accomplished (professional tennis management) and very attractive. They were married in December 1994 just before he left the Senate, turned down the Supreme Court and went off to Ireland.

A life well lived but then turned upside down because of Jeffrey Epstein. Because of his relationship with Epstein, the bronze bust in Belfast is gone, and his name no longer appears on the Institute at Queen’s University. His name will be stripped from the exchange scholarship awarded by the US–Ireland Alliance. There is a move afoot to take his name off of an elementary school in Maine. His portrait has been removed from the Maine State House. The Maine scholarships named after him will undergo a name change.

There is no documented suggestion that Mitchell was privy to Epstein‘s crimes. Mitchell has adamantly denied any wrongdoing.

There are three undisputed things about Epstein. First, he was fabulously wealthy with a townhouse in Manhattan, an apartment in Paris, a ranch in New Mexico with a 30,000 square-foot house, a private jet and a private island in the Caribbean. Second, he was a sex addict so much so that his age-appropriate companion, Ghislaine Maxwell, couldn’t keep up and had to enlist other women or girls to service him. Third, he was a “collector” of famous people, all of whom have now been disgraced.

For example, for a post Yom Kippur dinner in 2010, Epstein suggested that Mitchell be invited and that Mitchell‘s presence should be noted in order to induce other invitees to attend, including Larry Summers, the President of Harvard, and Ehud Barak, the former Prime Minister of Israel. Mitchell declined the invitation as he declined many other invitations. It appears that Epstein thought Mitchell’s presence would make various of his dinners and parties more desirable for others to attend and, hence, used Mitchell as “bait.”

All of those taking Mitchell’s name off of this scholarship or that building indicate that they are not suggesting that Mitchell is culpable, but only that his name is currently not appropriate. They have the backbone of a slug.

What a cancel culture we have created! It’s probably too late to rename the Washington Monument or the Jefferson Memorial but, if we are following the current mania for calling out perceived and real sins, certainly the fact that they owned slaves would qualify and what would be the problem with taking their names off of all public elementary and high schools?

So, let’s make this personal. Have you ever done something that you would be embarrassed for your mother or father to know? If you are honest, I’m sure there is more than one thing that you wouldn’t want known. I stopped counting at 20. The point is that we all have bad moments, but that doesn’t mean the good things in our lives don’t have value.

So, if George Mitchell fell off the wagon once or twice (and I don’t think he did), should that nullify all the good that he accomplished? The groups and those who want to dishonor him in his old age have not contributed any good that would dwarf the good that he provided.

It seems to be that before someone limbers up their fingers to type on Twitter or to post a social media message, it would be good if they considered their own shortcomings.  Maybe they will remember the 2000-year-old admonition delivered by Jesus when the scribes and Pharisees wanted to know if they should follow the Mosaic law and stone an adulteress to death.

“Let you who is without sin cast the first stone at her.” John 8:7.

Once Alex Pretti was dead, the explanations began.

Kristi Noem, the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, said that Pretti was “brandishing a gun” and trying to kill Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE) federal agents. Both Noem and Stephen Miller, the White House Deputy Chief of Staff who is responsible for the conduct of immigration policy, described Pretti as a “domestic terrorist.” The Department of Homeland Security issued a statement stating that Pretti “wanted to do maximum damage and massacre law enforcement.”

But then the cell phone video emerged and was dissected minutely by the New York Times and CNN. It reminded me of the song with the following line: “Are you going to believe me or your lying eyes.” Our eyes won because Pretti was being held face down on the street by four ICE agents and was obviously not a threat to anyone when he was shot in the back “at least” 10 times. The “lying” had been done by Noem and Miller, no great surprise to anyone who has observed them over the last year.

The federal government has sent 3,000 immigration agents to Minneapolis, 2,000 of whom are ICE employees and 1,000 of whom are employed by the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agency. The difference is that CBP employees typically are snaring desperate people trying to cross the Rio Grande. Those people are certainly not blowing whistles, using their cell phones to record the interactions or calling the CBP agents fascists or other derogatory names. Indeed, it turns out that the two shooters were CBP employees from South Texas. These were the wrong fellows to entrust with a gun in an urban protest environment. Even to the ordinary observer there was absolutely no threat whatsoever as other the agents were holding Pretti on the ground.

According to the Poynter Institute, ICE has hired an additional 12,000 agents in the last year (2025) and the “training” time for new agents has been cut in half. To place this in perspective, at the beginning of 2025 ICE employed 20,000 agents so the increase has been more than 50%. So too, the CBP has ramped up its hiring, and both agencies are paying bonuses to attract and keep employees. It is not a reach to predict that both agencies will double their pre-2025 employment in the very near future.

Pretti was a pain in the butt to the immigration agents. I suspect they knew his name but they surely knew who he was since he was on the street often with his camera and his whistle. As it turns out, he had an altercation with a different group of ICE employees about 10 days before he was murdered. The video of that interaction shows him spitting on the window of a ICE vehicle and then kicking the back of the vehicle twice so as to dislodge one of the rear tail lights .The ICE agent who was the target of the spitting, got out of the car and tussled with Pretti and then gave up, got back in the car and left. For my money, Pretti should’ve been arrested then and there for damage to government property.

The characterization of Pretti as a caring and helpful ICU nurse is probably true but it doesn’t jive with carrying a gun even though it was “legal.” The fact remains that he was murdered and posed no threat to anyone.

Pretti’s death appears to be the beginning of a sustained national reaction against ICE. The White House reaction was telling. The commander of the Minneapolis surge was demoted and sent to California. Stephen Miller is the Darth Vader of the Trump immigration policy. He immediately called Pretti a “domestic terrorist” but, after the video had been widely viewed, went to the friendly confines of Fox News to opine that the agents may not have followed the “protocol” established by the White House (meaning him). In fact, those agents had followed his original protocol and, when it went sideways, Miller had to invent a new protocol.

This is all you have to know about Alex Pretti‘s death. A man was being held face down on the street and then this happened.

Bang/bang/bang/bang/bang/bang/bang/bang/bang/bang.

And then he was dead with at least 10 shots in his back.

Streets of Minneapolis (by Bruce Springsteen)

Since 2001 ESPN has aired a half hour television program entitled “Pardon The Interruption.” The cohosts are Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon. The two of them are friendly and play back-and-forth on all things sports. Kornheiser always ends the program waving a small Canadian flag and saying: “We are out of time. We will try to do better next time.” At that point, Wilbon says: “Same time tomorrow, knuckleheads.” The show is watched by 1 million people each evening.

But there are pardons, and then there are pardons. When you bump into somebody in a crowded store, you may say “sorry, pardon me.” But besides these well-mannered “pardon me’s,” there are real “pardons” which have nothing to do with good manners.

Which brings us to Juan Orlando Hernandez. I did not know who this person was until he was recently pardoned by President Trump. It turns out that he was the former president of Honduras, who was convicted of overseeing a massive cocaine smuggling operation into the United States while he was president of Honduras. At the time of his pardon, he was serving a 45-year sentence at the federal penitentiary in Hazleton, West Virginia.

Apparently, this pardon was given in order to affect the election in Honduras so that Hernandez’s right-wing party would be the winner.

Neither did I know Changping Zhao, a crypto billionaire, until he was also pardoned by President Trump. He had pled guilty to money laundering and served four months in prison and paid a fine of $4 billion and had to resign from his CEO position at Binance which is the leading exchange for crypto trading in the world. One of the Trump family crypto ventures has just helped organize a $2 billion investment in Binance.

I don’t think it is too cynical to imagine that this pardon had to do with money since the Trump family is “all in” with the crypto world.

However, I did know or, more appropriately, was well aware of the 2,000 individuals who rampaged the United States Capitol January 6, 2021 and were pardoned by President Trump on his first day in office. Of course, Trump had encouraged those individuals to march to the Capitol and actually said that he would join them which he didn’t. This was as close to a coup d’etat as has ever been seen in this country.

The January 6 desecration of the US Capitol resulted in millions of dollars of damage and numerous injuries to police officers. According to Trump, criminal charges against these rioters and vandals was improper as they were “political hostages” even though thousands of these “political hostages” had pled guilty and were serving jail time and many more were about to be tried. 

Once the Capitol was breached, the chants began to “Hang Pence.” Vice President Pence had refused Trump’s demand that he recognize the votes of “fake electors” in certain swing states which would’ve changed the outcome. Rather, he was determined to perform his constitutional duty and count the proper electoral votes which clearly demonstrated that Trump had lost the election. According to the sworn testimony of Mark Meadows, his Chief of Staff, Trump said that afternoon that maybe Pence should be hanged, an account that was corroborated by another witness.

Pence and his family were taken to a secure room in the Capitol but his security detail wanted him to leave the complex. He refused apparently because he was determined to continue the vote. After the Capitol was cleared of rioters, the vote did recommence and was finalized at 3 AM the next morning.

In April 2025, Pence was awarded the “John F. Kennedy Profile In Courage” award by the JFK Library in Boston for his actions on January 6, 2021 despite the damage he may have caused to his political career and in spite of the threat to his personal safety and that of his family. The late president’s daughter, Caroline Kennedy, said: “At the time I thought Vice President Pence was just doing his job. Only later, did I realize that his act of courage saved our government…”.

On January 20, Trump did not attend the inauguration of President Biden and continued to maintain that the election had been stolen from him. That day, when he left Washington for Florida, he was a complete political pariah because of January 6. Indeed, it is remarkable that he made a comeback helped, no doubt, by President Biden’s abject failure to secure the southern border, a job that should’ve been pretty easy to accomplish. He thus served up to Trump a winning issue.

The business of presidential pardons has always been grist for the political mill. For example, President Clinton pardoned Marc Rich who had fled the United States and was responsible for over $48 million in unpaid taxes and numerous related crimes. The quid pro quo for the pardon was rumored to be that his ex-wife had made substantial contributions to the Clinton presidential library and to Hillary Clinton’s campaign for the United States Senate. President Jimmy Carter said the pardon was “disgraceful.”

While the rioters in the Capitol were the enlisted foot soldiers in the coup d’etat, the commanding officers were working in a different sphere. They included the “fake electors” whose job was to rewrite the results in the swing states. And then there were people like Sydney Powell and Rudy Giuliani who brought multiple lawsuits in any number of states alleging problems with the voting machines and other issues. These lawsuits were, without exception, rejected. They too received pardons which did not save them from civil lawsuits or from criminal actions brought by the states.

The civil lawsuits were substantial. Giuliani was in ordered to pay $148 million to two women who were slandered into saying that they had fixed the vote in Georgia. The case was recently settled for an undisclosed amount so that Guliani’s homes in New York and South Florida along with his Yankee member memorabilia would not be auctioned to satisfy the judgment. It appears that Giuliani was bailed out by a third party. Who knows but maybe the third-party was a Saudi prince who was cozying up to the White House or had been called by the White House.

Giuliani lost his law licenses in New York and in the District of Columbia because of his legal efforts to overturn the election without any colorable proof.

Fox News, the media outlet for the coup d’etat, settled a case from Dominion Voting Systems for $787.5 million for its role in slandering that company in various of its newscasts.

Sydney Powell avoided the loss of her law license in Texas but pled guilty to 6 violations of the Georgia law relating to her efforts to undo the Georgia election result. She too is on the wrong end of slander suits.

The Commander-In-Chief of the coup d’etat got off scot-free. He was indicted for criminal conspiracy to overturn the results of a proper election. However, the case could not proceed once he was reelected President under long-standing Justice Department policy that a sitting president may not be the defendant in a criminal case.

Recently, Jack Smith, the prosecutor in the Trump case, outlined the case to a closed meeting of certain members of the House Judiciary Committee. Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland was at that meeting and commented thereafter that the Chair of the Committee (Republican Jim Jordan of Ohio) was very smart in insisting upon a closed meeting because Smith’s testimony would’ve been devastating if it had been heard by the public.

Memory is sometimes unreliable. We might remember an event from years ago but have added details which are not correct. It is important to get the details right. Let’s get the details of January 6 right.

We know Amber as a piece of jewelry but it starts off as sticky tree resin and then hardens into the stone. In the process of hardening it might catch an insect which ends up being fossilized. If the amber were conscious, it might say to the insect: “Gotcha.”

We need the equivalent of Amber for the purpose of preserving our memory of the January 6 riots, the protagonists and the pardons. These events should be recorded in our school history books to remind us that the pardons, in Jimmy Carter’s words, were “unforgivable” and to teach future generations about the first attempted coup d’etat in American History.

The sticky resin of our January 6 amber will catch all the protagonists including the Commander-in-Chief of the coup d’etat and, as it hardens, his face will be seen through the amber glass.

Gotcha.

A few weeks ago, while at Sunday Mass, I heard the hymn “The Lord Hears the Cry of the Poor.” It repeats a line from Psalm 34 which is a part of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh). With very minor variations, the Hebrew Bible is what Christians call the Old Testament.

It is a haunting hymn and you need to listen to it (click the title) The Lord Hears the Cry of the Poor. So, after listening to the hymn, a number of thoughts occurred in no particular order. First, the Lord hears the cries of the poor because there are so many of them. Second, wouldn’t it be better to reduce the number of the poor and cut down on the crying. Third, what have I done about it?

The shareholders of Tesla did not hear “the cries of the poor” but did hear the cries of the world’s richest man and just approved a $1 trillion pay package for Elon Musk. Not bad; maybe he can distribute some of that bounty to people at traffic lights asking for money.

As an aside, imagine it is you at the traffic light and you have a $20 bill, a $10 bill, a $5 dollar bill and two $1 dollar bills. Do you stare straight ahead or do you make a contribution and, if so, what is the contribution? Now imagine that the person holding the sign is you. What do you do?

Zohran Mandami just ran away with the election for Mayor of New York City. His campaign promised free childcare, free bus rides, a freeze on rent controlled apartments and a pilot program to establish 5 city owned grocery stores, one in each borough. He was not responding to the “cries of the poor” but rather to New York City citizens who were having a hard time making ends meet.

How to pay for it all? Tax the rich and the corporations to the tune of not less than $9 billion a year. His voters would not be taxed but would get all the benefits. He takes pride in being a “democratic socialist” and, in person, appears very engaging with a good sense of humor. But it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that the “rich” will be making plans to set up legal residence elsewhere like, say, Connecticut, New Jersey or South Florida.

Margaret Thatcher had a withering quote about socialism. “The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.”

But what about the cries of the poor? Most organized religions endorse two related principles: take care of the poor and welcome the stranger.

For example, one of the five Pillars of Islam is called Zakat which requires observant Muslims to share their wealth with the poor in their community.

The Torah, which is the part of the Hebrew Bible that contains God’s explicit instructions, requires that “strangers” be treated with kindness and respect. “The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as one of your citizens; you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.” (Leviticus 19:33 to 34). The Hebrew word for stranger (ger) appears no less than 36 times in the Torah.

So how are we greeting “strangers” today. Too often, they are being greeted by armed ICE agents in tactical gear and masks who have the right to basically stop anyone if there is a “reasonable suspicion” that the person is not a citizen. What is “reasonable suspicion”? Like many things, it is very subjective and since most of the undocumented people in the United States came from South America, it may be “reasonable suspicion” if two people are on the street speaking in Spanish.

Why don’t we hold ICE agents to the same standards as we do the police. They should wear name tags, ditch the masks and have body cameras with audio features so that a judge could determine if there was “reasonable suspicion” for the arrest in the first place.

The original explanation for increased ICE enforcement was to get the violent criminals out of the country and to find the law breakers and give them the heave-ho. But consider the case of this “violent” law breaker.

Melissa Tran is the mother of four children and with her husband runs a nail salon in Hagerstown, Maryland. In deep blue Maryland, Hagerstown is a deep red place. Melissa has been a fixture in the Hagerstown community for over 20 years. She is the mom who attends all the swim meets, recitals and sports bumper stickers celebrating her children’s performance in school. She is a fixture in the Hagerstown community and red Hagerstown turned out in force when ICE came calling.

In 2001 she pled guilty to a felony relating to the stealing of $30,000 from her employer. She served four months in prison, paid back the money and began her second life starting with obtaining a college degree. The immigration judge had ordered her to be deported to Vietnam from whence she came at age 11. But Vietnam would not take her and that remained the same for 25 years. However, recently Vietnam has indicated that they would take her. So, in a few days, off she goes, leaving behind her husband, her four children and a prosperous business.

ICE held her in detention for 151 days at three different far away locations until a judge ordered that she be returned to her family because ICE had not made any provisions for her deportation. That has now changed.

Melissa Tran is a “stranger.” “The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as one of your citizens; you shall love (the stranger) as yourself, for you were once strangers in the land of Egypt.”

There are many thousands like Melissa Tran living here. In fact, there are 51 million immigrants who are not citizens, but are in the country by virtue of a green card, a similar exemption or illegally. The best estimate is that approximately 18 million of the 51 million are here illegally. But all of them are at risk as evidenced in the New York Times story of November 21, 2025 (“How Non Citizens, Anxious Under Trump, Are Altering Their Lives”)

Isn’t Melissa Tan a person who deserves a second chance? She has proven herself over the last 25 years and tearing her away from her family with children ranging from 4 to 20 is unnecessarily cruel. And while we are on the subject of cruelty, the Administration plans to send Kilmar Abrego Garcia who has been a pain in the Trump Administration’s ass since it wrongfully deported him to El Salvador when then set off a string of court cases, including the one in the Supreme Court, in which most of the judges have questioned the government’s bona fides. The latest plan is to send him to Africa, and not to a Spanish speaking country, presumably to show everybody who’s boss, especially someone who has given the boss judicial black eye after judicial black eye.

The United States Conference of Catholic bishops issue a “Special Message” on November 12, 2025, which was passed by a vote of 216 in favor, 5 against and 3 abstentions. President Trump was not mentioned but the message was clear and unmistakable.

We are disturbed when we see among our people, a climate of fear and anxiety about questions of profiling and immigration enforcement. We are saddened by… the vilification of immigrants.

We are troubled by threats against the sanctity of houses of worship and the special nature of hospitals and schools. We are grieved when we meet parents who fear being detained when taking their children to school and when we try to console family members who have already been separated from their loved ones.

The priority of the Lord … is for those who are most vulnerable: the widow, the orphan, the poor, and the stranger.

We oppose the indiscriminate mass deportation of people. We pray for an end to dehumanizing rhetoric and violence, whether directed at immigrants or at law enforcement.

I suspect that most non-believers may agree that we need to assist the poor and welcome the stranger. For believers, it is a religious obligation.

Assist the poor/welcome the stranger.

Boy have we screwed that up.

I obtain most of my information from reading newspapers, books, and articles on the Internet. While this is also true for my wife, she is partial to the evening news on NBC. A few years ago, the NBC Evening News began to close the broadcast with a final segment being a “feel good” piece. I suspect that that was in response to many people saying “Is there anything good happening in the world?”

So, last week I came upon the ultimate “feel good” story.

In 2018 there was a Special Olympics event in Seattle for mentally and physically challenged youngsters. One of the events was a sprint. Nine kids lined up to run the race. When the gun went off, eight started on their way but the ninth was a boy who stumbled and fell on the ground and began crying. The other eight then stopped. One girl with Downs Syndrome went back to the crying boy, gave him a kiss and said that that would make him feel better. All the “sprinters” then gathered around the boy and together they walked to the finish line to the thunderous applause of the spectators.

“Gilding The Lily” is a phrase which is really a misquote from one of Shakespeare’s once very popular, but now forgotten, plays, King John (“to gild refined gold, to paint the lily….is wasteful and ridiculous excess). However, the meaning is the same: there is no need to embellish things which are already beautiful in themselves.

Now, back to our story. Unfortunately, according to The Special Olympics Washington office (snopes.com) it is not accurate. There is a kernel of truth in it, but additional details have, as the phrase goes, gilded the lily.

The event did not occur in Seattle in 2018 but in Spokane, Washington in 1976.

The boy did stumble and two of the sprinters went back to help and together the three of them went to the finish line together. The other sprinters continued on their way, having trained to win the race.

There was no report of a “kiss” for the stumbled runner.

The Special Olympics oath is:  “Let me win. But if I cannot win, let me be brave in the attempt.” The Special Olympics is not a social gathering for disabled people but an actual sporting event where the contestants have trained for a long time to compete and to win.

So, is this “fake news?” Not really since something like this did happen even if it happened almost 50 years ago and not in 2018. In fact, the real story is as compelling as the one that made the rounds on the Internet. Two kids did help the fallen runner and those three did finish together while the others did what they were supposed to do: try to win the race.

Who knows whether the other runners even knew that the boy had fallen? Their goal was to win the race, and no runner would pull up because one of the other runners had to stop because of an injury. We don’t expect that in a normal Olympic race nor should we expect that in a Special Olympics race.

So, kudos to the “helpers” who showed great compassion and kudos as well to the sprinters who were just trying to win the race.

But let’s take a poll.  How many of you like the original story better than the actual story? Raise  your hands.  It appears that 9 out of 10 prefer the original story.  Why is that? To me, the answer is fairly simple.  With all the news of war, famine, murder and political chicanery, we really desire stories of compassion. We need to hold onto the notion that people are good and caring.  Not a bad notion, if you ask me.

Postscript to my latest blog entitled “Gone But Not Forgotten.”Readers of this blog know that I have absolute contempt for Trump. It didn’t start with his presidency.  It started long before that.

In the late 1980s he single-handedly blew up the United States Football League (Spring football). He convinced other USFL team owners to file a completely ill-advised antitrust lawsuit against the NFL arguing that it effectively monopolized Fall football where the money was. The jury ruled in favor of the USFL and awarded damages in the amount of $1. Damages in an antitrust case are trebled and, for many years, a copy of the check for $3 was proudly displayed in the lobby of the NFL offices even though it had “lost” the case. The USFL then folded.

And then came the Central Park Five where he took out full page ads in the New York papers, proposing the death penalty for the accused Black youngsters.  Ultimately, the real rapist and killer of the white jogger was found and the five were exonerated. Trump’s response: well, the prosecutor (his friend) thought they were guilty. Apparently, he did not think to check with the defense lawyers for the five.

Having said this, there is always a “but.”

As expected, Donald Trump did not win the Nobel Peace Prize. The White House reaction was to lambast the Norwegian committee. Bullying tactics may work with American corporations and universities, but I don’t think the Norwegians give a hot damn and will probably remember this in the future. 

But he still has a chance to win the Prize next year if he can pull off the successful resolution of the Israeli/Palestinian war in Gaza. That would be no mean feat. As Thomas Freidman of the New York Times has observed, bringing peace to the region is like trying to concentrate on solving a Rubik’s Cube while being shot at from all sides.

Indeed, this was the easy part since Hamas had to see the writing on the wall as Israel proceeded to level its stronghold Gaza City and Trump had made clear that if the hostages weren’t released, Israel had his full backing. So, Hamas played its last and only card:  you get the hostages, we get a cease fire and we get a lot of our people back.

But he has started the process.  He has now taken his well-deserved victory laps for securing the release of the hostages which was an excellent result but probably not enough to merit the Nobel prize. Finding a pathway for a reasonable solution for the Palestinians is the sticky wicket. Having Arab countries supervise Gaza, getting rid of Hamas, and reforming the Palestinian authority is the hard part. I don’t think Trump has the focus or the capacity to accomplish this.

But, if he comes close, give him the Prize.

I have been watching a show called Bosch on Prime Video. Two of the characters are long-time detective partners on the verge of retirement. They are a classic yin/yang duo and fond of each other. One is nicknamed Barrel, and the other is nicknamed Crate (apparently a reference to the retailer Crate and Barrel).

Crate is tall and thin while Barrel is short, somewhat squat, and resembles a barrel. They retire. Called back into action, Barrel says: “We are gone but not forgotten.” Crate laconically retorts “Actually, we are forgotten but not gone.”

Sooner or later, most of us will not only be gone but also forgotten.

Which brings us to the Nobel Prize for Peace. To the average person, the Peace Prize is the most prestigious of the Nobel prizes and that particular honor may best ensure that the prize winner will not be forgotten at least for a number of years. Certain winners like Martin Luther King, Jr. (1964) will be remembered for years but the most recent winner Nihon Hydankyo of Japan (2024) will probably have a relatively short shelf life.

There are five other Nobel prizes: chemistry, physics, physiology or medicine, literature and economics. 

Four presidents have won the Nobel prize for Peace. Teddy Roosevelt won it for his successful efforts to end the Russian Japanese war. Woodrow Wilson won it for his efforts to establish the League of Nations. Jimmy Carter won it for his role in the 1972 Camp David Accords and for his untiring efforts to bring peace after his presidency. Barack Obama won it after nine months in the presidency for basically doing nothing. A member of the Nobel Committee who awarded it to Obama said it was “aspirational” and that the aspirations were never achieved.

Even Obama in his acceptance speech recognized that the award was controversial. “And yet I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the considerable controversy your generous decision has generated.”

The Nobel prize is one that comes to the individual not one that the individual attempts to gain. President Trump is not one to honor tradition and so he is lobbying to be awarded the prize. Any number of world leaders are supporting his effort including Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel. Given the present war in Gaza, I’m not sure that I would want him to carry water for me. I am certain that our ambassador to Norway has only one job to complete. (The Peace prize is awarded by a Norwegian committee while the other Nobel prizes are awarded by a Swedish committee. Norway and Sweden were in a union at the time of Nobel’s death.)

According to Alfred Noble’s will, the prize will be awarded to a person “who has done the most or the best work to encourage fraternity between nations, to abolish or reduce standing armies and to encourage peace congresses.”

Given Trump’s current “America First” orientation, it would seem that he is not a candidate who satisfies Noble’s will. But to give the devil his due, his 2020 triumph in having several Arab nations recognize Israel (the Abraham Accords) was clearly deserving of the Nobel Peace Prize but his subsequent actions in Trump 2.0 may have negated that achievement.

Trump 2.0 seems to be the exact opposite of what Noble’s will dictated. He surely has not encouraged “fraternity between nations.” He obviously has no interest in restraining “standing armies” as he launches military strikes on Iran and boats off of Venezuela and is excessively proud of our military capability. As for “peace congresses,” he has withdrawn $1 billion in annual funding from the United Nations and plans the withdrawal another billion dollars annually. He has just renamed the Department of Defense to the Department of War.

While he said he would solve the Russia Ukraine war on “day one,” his efforts have been cosmetic and it appears that Putin is playing him for a chump. He has now withdrawn from his peace effort and said recently that it was up to Zelinsky to make peace. His efforts to secure peace in Gaza have been, first, to suggest that all the Palestinians be removed to other countries so the area could be redeveloped and now, second, there is no effort to restrain Israel. In fact, there is now full support of Netanyahu, and the slaughter continues.

Trump has an almost desperate need to be recognized. One funny story is how he posted a picture of himself on the front page of Time magazine at one of his golf clubs in Virginia. The problem was that he had never appeared, at that juncture, on the cover of Time and the picture at the golf club was a phony.

That being said, he surely is more deserving than Obama because of the Abraham Accords. His principal problem is that Trump being Trump and that the Norwegians being the Norwegians, I think the award is unlikely, particularly given Trump 2.0.

Which, without question, would be the correct result.

“A man was going down the road from Jerusalem to Jericho when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead.”

So begins St. Luke’s account of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:30), one of Jesus’ best-known parables in the New Testament.

The parable is well known to Christians, but probably not to others. The half dead man is passed by a Jewish cleric who goes to the other side of the road and keeps going. A second Jewish cleric does the same. But then comes the Samaritan who dresses the man’s wounds, takes him to a nearby inn, pays for his stay and tells the inn keeper to look after him and that he will pay him any additional money owed when he returns.

All 50 states of the United States and the District of Columbia have “Good Samaritan” laws. While the particulars may vary from state to state, the gist of the laws is to protect a stranger from providing assistance, even if the assistance goes wrong . I suspect that our current society is considerably more litigious than was the case in the first Century A.D.

There are two keys to the parable. First, the Jewish clerics who pass by even though you would expect a rabbi, a minister or a priest to stop and lend aid. Then there is the Samaritan.

In first Century A.D., when religion was a very serious matter, a Jewish person would have nothing to do with a Gentile but, God forbid, it was much more damming to deal with a Samaritan. The Samaritans lived on adjoining land and claimed Moses as a common ancestor but had mixed him up with pagan gods, intermarried and provided refuge to Jews who had been kicked out what is modern day Israel for perceived sin or crimes. They were the lowest of the low and, yet, it was a Samaritan who showed mercy to the half dead Jewish victim.

So, the point of the parable is that the most reviled person is capable of great mercy while those who should be particularly merciful are not. And remember the Jewish hatred of Samaritans was reciprocated so the Good Samaritan was not expected to be good toward a Jew.

So, fast-forward 21 centuries on the road to Jericho. Suppose the half dead person was Nancy Pelosi or Liz Cheney or Joe Biden or Adam Schiff. The person on the road was Donald Trump. Do you think he would stop or do you think he would say “what a bunch of losers” and then proceed on his way to Jericho?

But let’s reverse this and make Donald Trump the half dead person. Nancy Pelosi or Liz Cheney or Joe Biden or Adam Schiff is the person on the road. Would they give aid or go on to Jericho?

I did a non-scientific study of the answers to those questions. Of the seven people, two were extremely pro-Trump and five were anti-Trump although one of the five was more moderate than the rest.

The adamantly pro-Trump people were convinced that he would render aid or arrange for aid to be provided. They were equally convinced that Pelosi et al. would skedaddle onto Jericho.

The five anti-Trump people were more nuanced. Four of the five thought that Trump would ignore his half dead enemies. Two of those four thought that Pelosi would render aid. Two of those four thought that neither Trump nor Pelosi et al. would lend aid.

The most interesting response of the five was that of my daughter Megan. She thought that Trump would render aid but Pelosi et al. would not. But her reasoning was different. She is no admirer of Trump but thought he would render aid because he would want to take credit for it, maybe to burnish his Nobel prize nomination. When I asked whether he would do it if no one was looking, her answer was equally interesting. Yes because Pelosi would tell the truth and hence Trump‘s claim would be verified. 

It is a sad commentary that we have come to this where different political persuasions cannot believe that certain people will not do the right thing. Our politics have distorted our moral compasses and certain of our politicians have lost their moral compasses. That is not to say that all people are Good Samaritans, far from it. Remember, in the parable, two of the three went on to Jericho. 

Now, what is your answer to the Trump/Pelosi questions? If you care to post a reply, you must tap on the title of the blog and then a button will appear to allow you to reply.

 Equally important is what you would do.

Note to believers: Jesus is watching and can spot a liar a mile away. 

The origin of the phrase “Barbarians At The Gate” appears to refer to the unsuccessful attempt by Ottoman Turks to take Vienna in 1529 and again in 1689.

But what happens when the barbarians are not at the gate because they already live in the city?

If you have $50 million, you can become a major donor to charities, museums or nonprofit causes. You can endow a scholarship at a number of schools for the benefit of future students . You can underwrite research to cure cancer. You can provide sleeping nets to control malaria in mosquito environments. You could provide antiviral drugs to control AIDS. There is no shortage of needs in this world which $50 million could address.

If you are Jeff Bezos, you can also have a $50 million wedding in Venice and invite certain so-called” A Listers” to participate. Bezos tried to get Elton John and Lady Gaga to perform on the third day but was unwilling to meet John’s $6 million appearance fee and tried to negotiate. Sir Elton said “no” and appeared instead at a party in the Hamptons for his $6 million and he arrived with a red piano. Lady Gaga also did not make the Bezos affair.

Now it’s true that Bezos has given considerable funds to charities but compared to his former wife, McKenzie Scott, he’s a piker. McKenzie Scott has a whole lot of money ($36 billion) but Bezos has considerably more ($226 billion) and yet she laps him several times in charitable giving.

So why object to a $50 million wedding? I can think of two reasons. First, what is the need for such conspicuous consumption? Can’t you just have a tasteful ceremony and a great reception for, say, $1 million? Second, why did these so called “A Listers” attend this extravaganza? Of course, the Kardashians were there since such garish displays are right down their alley and they must keep up the brand (Kris Jenner apparently called to get ALL her girls in). But, why in God’s name, did Oprah attend?

Bezos is one of the richest men in the world and, along with his first wife, started Amazon from their garage in Seattle selling books over the Internet. He was the first to understand that the Internet could be harnessed for the sale of retail items. Amazon is a truly remarkable company which has completely disrupted retail sales and now is the “go to” place to order virtually anything and have it delivered to your door in a matter of hours or days.

Some of his later ventures are less worthy of praise. He purchased the Washington Post. Bezos was on Donald Trump‘s naughty list and so he has used the Post to get back in Trump‘s good graces. He vetoed the Post’s endorsement of Kamala Harris and has neutered its editorial policy to please the Trump administration. The net result was that any number of staffers resigned and the Post is no longer the newspaper that it once was.

I know little about Bezos’ wife, Lauren Sanchez, except that she wears undergarments that make her waist go in/in/in and her breasts go out/out/out. Days after the wedding, she was an unsuccessful bidder for Jane Birkin’s original Hermes bag (1984) which just auctioned in Paris for $10.1 million. I suspect she knows a number of plastic surgeons. 

The Birkin bag is, in itself, a story. Who would pay over $10 million for a 40-year-old used satchel? Someone with $10 million and very little sense. Not to be a scold but surely there was a better destination for that $10 million.

There is Internet speculation that Kim Kardashian was the anonymous bidder for the Birkin bag. That clearly is not true for several reasons. First, if she was a successful bidder, her PR machine would be blasting it all over the world. Second, it is more likely that her PR people put that out in the first place since apparently Kim has figured out that her days as the “it” girl are over as the younger crowd at the Venice affair has forced her out.

And then there is the Met Gala, a fashion event held in May of each year. If you can get an invitation, it would cost you $75,000 to go. Bad Bunny stole the show in 2023 in a suit with a 26-foot floral train. Seeing is believing: Bad Bunny.

For all practical purposes, the gatekeeper at the Met Gala is Anna Wintour who just completed her 37-year run as editor-in-chief of Vogue magazine and has been in charge of the Met Gala for 30 years. The Gala is considered the premier fashion event of the year and invites attendees to display the most unusual dresses and the like. Proceeds benefit the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

And if you think Bad Bunny had an unusual costume, take a gander at some from this year:

So what does all of this have to do with “Barbarians At The Gate?”

Do you really think that they are outside the gate?

Almost 30 years ago there was a comedy/drama movie called Jerry Maguire. Jerry (Tom Cruise) was a sports agent with a single client (Rod Tidwell played by Cuba Gooding Jr. who would always say to Jerry “Show Me The Money.” Jerry’s love interest was Renée Zellweger.

Jerry had been let go by a large firm and ended up only with Rod Tidwell, who was a talented but discontented wide receiver for the Arizona Cardinals who could not get the contract he wanted. By the end, however, Rod made a catch that secured a playoff berth and then, on TV, thanked Jerry for being such a wonderful agent which meant Jerry would have more than one client going forward and that Jerry would get Rod the mega contract he wanted. Jerry then pursued and won the girl back as well (“shut up…you had me from hello”). Of course, that movie involved pro football where “Show Me The Money” is to be expected. Now, however, “Show Me The Money” has made its way to the college ranks.

Bryce Underwood is a high school senior from Belleville, Michigan who is a phenomenal football player. He is rated as the number one prospect in the country. At 6’3” and 205 pounds, he is not only a great passer but a great runner as well.

Until recently, he had committed to play football for LSU, which has a history of producing great quarterbacks, including a recent Heisman Trophy winner. But that commitment was verbal and then the University of Michigan came calling.

Tom Brady, often referred to as the GOAT (greatest of all time) quarterback, called Underwood to get him to attend Brady’s alma mater, Michigan. Then Larry Ellison, the Oracle billionaire who also attended Michigan, ponied up $12 million and that cinched the deal. So, Underwood will now be playing for Michigan and is likely to be the starting quarterback as a freshman.

So, you may ask: “how did this happen?” When I was going to college, the scholarship athletes received full room, board and tuition as well as specialized academic help in exchange for their participation on the football or basketball team. Somewhere along the way, an inventive lawyer decided that a scholarship athlete should be receiving money from the university which was profiting from their efforts. So, there was born the NIL concept (Name, Image and Likeness). So, if the university sold a jersey with a football player’s name on it, the player should receive some recompense.

That seemed reasonable, but, like all seemingly reasonable propositions, the devil was in the details. The Supreme Court decided in 2021 that the NCAA rules limiting compensation for scholarship athletes violated the Sherman Antitrust Act. The decision was unanimous, and eight of the nine justices attended Ivy League law schools, which never had football programs anywhere near that of LSU or the University of Michigan. All Ivy League schools had decided many years ago their football programs would not try to compete with the University of Michigans of the world. So, the Justices did not see the Pandora’s box that they had just opened. Only Justice Amy Coney Barrett had any notion of what big time football was about as she had been a student and professor in the Notre Dame law school, but she had only been on the Court for a few months.

There is a reason that the Harvard versus Yale football game is not televised. And there are reasons that Alabama versus Auburn, Notre Dame versus Southern Cal or Michigan versus Ohio State are televised. The reasons are simple. College football fans want to see the “big” games and couldn’t care less about the Ivy League games. It seems that eight of the nine justices were not college football fans and probably didn’t understand what would occur as a result of the decision.

I don’t pretend to be an antitrust expert, so it may well be that the decision was legally correct. However, it created a loophole that you could drive a Mack truck through. All of a sudden there were “NIL groups” in virtually every school where big-time football or basketball existed. These NIL groups were funded by the ever-present alumni boosters who then decided that paying the athlete for his name on jerseys was worth $12 million.

And it’s not only the big money sports but it even extends to women’s softball. NiJarre Canaday was an exceptional softball pitcher for Stanford. She was so good that the Texas Tech Matador Club (its NIL group) suggested that she come pitch for Texas Tech for an NIL amount in excess of $1 million. In spite of her presence and her superb pitching, Texas Tech just lost in the finals of the Women’s Softball National Championship to Texas. NiJarre will be back next year for another million dollar plus consideration. Not only that but the Matador Club has persuaded at least five nationally ranked softball players to transfer to Texas Tech and all of them will receive NIL money.

The Matador Club raises approximately $55 million in NIL money. Most of that is probably spent on football and basketball but a fair amount is being spent on women’s softball, and it will likely result in national championships. So, it actually seems like a pretty sensible investment and will likely increase attention to the sport. But since there is no professional softball league, NiJarre’s ability to make a considerable sum of money is conditioned on playing in college until her eligibility runs out.

Much of this would not be possible without what is called the “transfer portal.” Basically, an athlete can decide to go from one school to the other and the NIL money is a powerful lubricant as the recruitment of NiJarre proved.

Last year’s National Football Championship was won by Ohio State. The Ohio State football players received over $20 million in NIL money which was at least 5 times the amount received by players on the losing team.

So how long will this last? Theoretically, it will soon come to an end. The reason is that there has been a court case where there has been a settlement between the NCAA and various parties, including the large football and basketball conferences. The proposed solution is to allow each school to spend just over $20 million to its athletes (amount increases each year) and to limit NIL money unless there is a “valid business purpose.”

Think about this. Texas Tech’s Matador Club raised over $50 million and now Texas Tech will have to exist on $20 million. Ohio State football players made $20 million in NIL money and now ALL Ohio State athletes (basketball [men and women],softball, lacrosse ,etc.) will have to live on the same $20 million. This probably means that there will now be numerous  “valid business purposes” to justify NIL money.

I’m sure that there are car dealers and restaurants in Tuscaloosa, Ann Arbor, Columbus, South Bend, Los Angeles, Austin, Gainesville, and numerous other college towns that will be happy to have the endorsement of certain athletes. And of course, there is the NIL money to be provided by Nike, Adidas , Under Armour and the athletic gear companies. NIL money, once loosed, is not easily cabined.

Is this the end of the world? No. It reminds me of the change in the Olympics, which allowed professional athletes to compete and abandoned the rule that it only had to be amateurs. People remain mesmerized by the Olympics and the rule change may have made the competition more compelling. However, the rule change also insured that there will never be another “Miracle On Ice,” the 1980 hockey game where US college amateur players defeated the professional Russian hockey team.

One does have to question whether it’s a good idea to reward 18-year-olds with million-dollar bonuses simply for their athletic ability. Have we gone too far? For me, the answer is yes but I’m just an old guy remembering the “good old days” which were probably not as good as I remember.

The present state of affairs probably does mean that the phrase the old “college try” will not be used very much in the future.

Numbers can be both illuminating and deceiving. For example, the religion score on United States Presidents is Protestants 43 and Catholics 2. In America, Protestants have tended to do better than Catholics since, after all, they founded the place and established the most notable universities while most Catholics didn’t arrive until the middle of the 19th Century and were pretty much an unwashed and uneducated horde.

But there is one area where Catholics thump Protestants: they have more Saints (1,000 plus and more in the works). It’s true that Protestants don’t venerate Saints because, in their view, any person that lives faithfully is already a Saint. Catholics, on the other hand, like their Saints and often ask them to intercede with God on their behalf.

For a very partial list of certain saints see “The Saint Within Us” published on this blog on September 10, 2021.

Christianity is the religion which has the most believers in the world, 2.4 billion. That Christianity has prospered is almost hard to understand. After Jesus had left the world, the religion was left in the hands of 12 uneducated and illiterate Apostles who were instructed to spread the word. At first, the theory was that you had to be a Jew in order to become a Christian, but Saint Paul dismissed that notion in AD 40 and, boy, did Christianity then take off because it was now open to all the Gentiles. It “took off” only in a relative sense since Christians were openly persecuted, martyred, and had their property confiscated until Constantine became the Roman emperor in AD 313.

I suppose every religion has to have a story and the Christian story is a doozy. There is a virgin birth, which produces the God/man, Jesus. He becomes an itinerant preacher, gathers 12 Apostles, performs numerous miracles, including raising a young girl and Lazarus from the dead. He introduces a new way of thinking which is to love one another and turn the other cheek. He is a threat to the Jewish hierarchy because of his popularity with the people and his refusal to follow certain rules and customs. So, he is crucified, dies, is buried and comes back to life three days later.

Forty days later, he ascends into heaven after appearing numerous times. Fifty days after the Resurrection, the Holy Spirit visits the Apostles and tongues of fire appear above each one’s head and they speak to the crowd composed of many groups with different languages but each understands what the Apostle is saying. Saul, who is on his way to persecute Christians is struck blind and becomes Saint Paul, who then composes most of the early letters to the Christian communities which today are regularly read at Mass. Of course, there are regular visitors from heaven in the form of angels, with Gabriel being the first and probably the most significant when he appeared to Mary informing her of her pregnancy.

So why did this unlikely story become the most followed religion in the world? Some say that, unlikely as it seems, it is the truth. Non-believers say that it is a series of unbelievable propositions that no sane person would accept ranging from the Virgin birth to the Jesus’ resurrection and later ascension into heaven.

There are plenty of non-believers after Constantine but once Christianity became the dominant religion in the Roman Empire it did truly “takeoff” particularly in Western Europe as Islam became the competing religion in certain eastern portions of the Roman Empire. 

Things went fairly swimmingly until the Protestant Reformation when Martin Luther, John Calvin, and King Henry VIII’s libido resulted in the break from Rome. Who knows? If not for the Protestant Reformation, the Saints might still be well regarded.

And there is one person whom Catholics believe is far superior to any Saint: the Blessed Virgin Mary (Mary). Not only is Mary superior to any Saint since, after all, she is the Mother of God, but she is different in many other ways. For the last thousand years or so, believers have said the rosary in her honor (the rosary consists of 59 “beads”, each bead being a prayer as well as opening and closing prayers).

Mary is also decidedly different from Saints because of the claims that she has regularly visited the Earth. So, there is Our Lady of Guadalupe (Mexico 1531), Our Lady of Fatima (Portugal 1917), Our Lady of Lourdes (France 1858) and close to 40 other visits all over the world with a surprising number having been in the last 100 years. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Marian_apparitions) .In many cases, Mary appears to children or young adults and usually makes requests and sometimes gives predictions of things to come. Indeed, there is a cottage industry of commentary about what the three 1917 “predictions” of Our Lady of Fatima mean.

The most recently reported apparitions began in 1981 in the village of Medjugorje located in Bosnia Herzegovina. Those claiming to see Mary were then six children (ages 10 to 16) who continue, as adults, to make similar claims.

In 1981, the village was part of communist Yugoslavia and the communist authorities blocked pilgrims from reaching the site of the reported apparitions. Currently 1 million pilgrims a year visit Medjugorje and the reported apparitions continue on an almost daily basis as do reported miracles. The Vatican has now authorized pilgrimages but does not endorse the supernatural nature of the reported apparitions.

The overarching message delivered in the Marian apparitions is for the faithful to say the rosary and increase their religious activity for the benefit of the world or to help the poor. For some odd reason, Mary’s message reminds me of the Nat King Cole song, “Straighten Up and Fly Right.” Apparently, that song was inspired by a sermon given by his father.

About 35 years ago, my Aunt Mildred, who was a retired nun, became very excited about the Marian apparitions in Medjugorje. She wanted my opinion. I really knew nothing about it but was skeptical, an opinion I did not share with her. As a believer, Mildred was sure that all Marian apparitions were real.

We are in a time where religion has been declared obsolete, and the younger generation does not attend church or follow religion. It is said that the younger generation is less interested in the “good” than in obtaining “goods.”

So what to make or the Marian apparitions: It was really hard to dismiss them out of hand because of the physical events that are related to them. Our Lady of Guadalupe arranged flowers in Juan Diego’s cloak and told him to take it to the archbishop. When the cloak was opened, the flowers fell out and revealed the image of Mary on the cloak.

At Fatima during the last apparition, thousands watched while the sun appeared to descend to the earth, so much so that people in faraway Paris thought it was the Aurora Borealis.

At Lourdes the healing waters continue to heal.

Other apparitions had similar physical manifestations. Something very unusual has been going on for a very long period of time.

I think Aunt Mildred might have been right after all.