Tag Archives: Holy Roman Empire

A Note on Sovereignty and the Knights of St. John

26 Thursday Jan 2017

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This post is in part a response to a very recent article by the Modern Medievalist, whom I respect highly (and yet nonetheless disagree with in this case), and partly as a general response to the distortion of the concept of Sovereignty in Modern times. This has been brought to the forefront by the investigation of Holy See into the Religious Military Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem of Rhodes and of Malta. As the investigation is still on-going, it would be unwise to comment on specific situation of the Order today, so this post is mainly confined to the general principles involved.

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Catholic, Western, and Supranational

26 Thursday Jan 2017

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Austria has always been a stronghold of Catholicism: the former head of the supranational Holy Roman Empire, the secular arm of Christendom, has always been a luminous antithesis to all forms of provincialism. This is not primarily because Austria was the head of a great empire with many inhabitants, but rather because it was Catholic, Western, and supranational…

-Dietrich von Hildebrand, Der Genius Österreichs und der Provinzialismus

Austria, the true heir and embodiment of the Holy Roman Empire, has always reflected in its forms and institutions the true Catholic ideal of the supranational country. Ever since the Roman Empire was transformed into a truly foederatial system in the fifth century Heroic Age has Christendom striven for this ideal. However, in few institutions has this ideal ever been as wholly achieved or pursued as in the Kaiserlich und Königlich Gemeinsame Armee, the Imperial and Royal Common Army, of which the Hapsburg Restoration Movement is in part a spiritual successor and continuation. Therefore, it might be asked, what are the qualities that allowed the K.u.K. Armee to act as a unifying element of the Empire? 

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Was there ever a “Medieval Nationalism”?

11 Wednesday Jan 2017

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The first truly concrete, “systematized” identitarian revolution in Europe is Taboritism, the radical form of Hussitism… This furious explosion of a synthetic mixture of nationalism, socialism, and radical democracy with communist innuendos not only had devastated large parts of Bohemia, Moravia, and Upper Hungary, but also had deeply shaken the social and spiritual fabric of Europe. In their perennial ramifications the shadows of this profound revolution are still with us and will continue to be for some time.

-Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn, Leftism

Recently I came across an article attempting to claim that Nationalism was not only a political-philosophy that originated in the “Medieval Period,” but that it was the political norm. Referring to the Holy Roman Empire with the absurd (never officially recognized) addition “of the German Nation“ the article goes on to claim that the Crownlands of Empire in the Sacred Ages “included all people of the German nationality,” a falsehood which completely ignores not only the Transylvanian Saxons, but also the Danube Swabians, the Carpathian Germans (Zipsers), the Walddeutsche, the Teutonic Livonians, the Saxons of Schleswig, and the Vosges Germans. Still the questions remain, was there a form of Nationalism present in the Sacred Ages, and was it the prevalent understanding of the political order?

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The Lost Count

25 Sunday Dec 2016

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Deep in the snow-laden forests surrounding the river Aare in small cave a young lad stirred from a painful sleep. Fiery embers still glowed warmly just outside the low entrance of the cavern as dawn illumined the east, far from the shadow of the western mountains. He lifted his golden haired head from under the great wolf pelt which had covered him the last night, still half asleep but dimly conscious of a large shadow moving in and for a moment concealing the sunlight beyond. As the boy tried to recollect what exactly it was he had seen, he suddenly realized that he could not even remember his own name.

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G.K. Chesterton on the Legend of Emperor Charlemagne

17 Saturday Dec 2016

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It is when a fact is thus too big for history that it overflows the surrounding facts and expresses itself in fable. Nay, it is when the fact is in a sense too solid that its very solidity breaks the framework of ordinary things; and it can only be recorded through extraordinary things like fairy-tales and romances of chivalry. Everybody felt that merely saying that one Carolus or Carl had lived and died at a certain date, and had a palace at Aix, and fought such and such campaigns against Saxons or Saracens, was wholly inadequate to explain what had happened.

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A Restorationist in the Age of Racialism

07 Wednesday Dec 2016

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The first of these pernicious errors, widespread today, is the forgetfulness of that law of human solidarity and charity which is dictated and imposed by our common origin and by the equality of rational nature in all men, to whatever people they belong, and by the redeeming Sacrifice offered by Jesus Christ on the Altar of the Cross to His Heavenly Father on behalf of sinful mankind.

– Pius XII, Summi Pontificatus

Encouraged by certain “victories”, the world is triumphantly entering a New Age of Nationalism… or so we are told in shouts of jubilation or despair. The sad truth is that the world has never left the downward spiral that is Nationalism; it has merely entered beginning the last phase, Racial Nationalism. That the world has fallen to such lowness is not surprising; such was always the Fate of the Fallen world, and yet we are not bound by that fate, but by Divine Providence alone. With God’s grace we can fight against this marring of the world.

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The Emperor is Dead! Long Live the Emperor!

21 Monday Nov 2016

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franz-josef-in-prayerOn this day (November 21) one hundred years ago (in 1916), His Majesty Franz Josef, Emperor of Austria, King of Bohemia, Apostolic King of Hungary, King of Jerusalem (etc.), and heir of the Holy Roman Emperors, entered Eternal Life after a reign of sixty-eight years. He came to the throne amidst the fires of revolution, and died amidst the ashes of the Great War, and yet for the long years of his reign, his peoples were at peace and contented. So long as he ruled it, this last remnant of Christendom in Europe seemed as though it would last into the far distant future. And yet his own life was fraught with tragedy that might have brought lesser men to despair, the murder of his brother, of his only son, of his wife, and finally of his heir, and through it all he held firm to his God-given duties to his peoples.

However, the death of the old Emperor was not only a time of mourning, for it was also on this day that Archduke Karl ascended to the throne of the war-torn Empire; Emperor as was foretold by St. Pius X, and though most of his reign would be spent in exile, he was certainly a worthy successor of his great-uncle Franz Josef, blessed with same courage and devotion.

Pie Jesu Domine,
Dona eis requiem sempiternam

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The Vision of Roland

10 Thursday Nov 2016

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Far, far across the hills echoed the song of the Olifant of the Palatines. In the vanguard of his army Carolus Goldencrowned heard it beyond the Pass of Runcievalles, summoning the riders of the King of the West. Now swiftly they rode, their own horns giving answer, swiftly to brandish bright swords against the enemies of the free realms. Alas! too late had come the summons and what aid now could save those valiant knights of Christendom?

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Blessed Karl , the Hope of Austria

21 Friday Oct 2016

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I bless Archduke Charles, who will be the future Emperor of Austria and will help lead his countries and peoples to great honor and many blessings — but this will not become obvious until after his death.

-St. Pius X, Audience with Empress (then Princess) Zita of Bourbon-Parma

“In exile far from the lands, you sojourn, Hope of Austria…” These words, written for His Imperial and Royal Majesty Otto while he was still an exile in Spain, might very well apply to his father the last reigning Emperor-King, Karl of Austria. His body still sojourns on the isle of Madeira, the final shores of his exile. It might seem strange to connect Hope with his long suffering, his earthly failure as the powers in the world dethroned him, his young death after an excruciating illness. And yet his suffering was not in vain, rather, it was the beginning of something greater, something we now may not see the end of in our earthly lives.

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Novena for the Canonization of Bl. Karl of Austria

13 Thursday Oct 2016

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Prayer for the Canonization of Blessed Emperor Karl of Austria:

[To be prayed at the beginning of each day of the novena.]

Heavenly Father, through Blessed Emperor Karl You have given Your Church and the people of God an example of how we can live a discerning and spiritual life in a convincing and courageous way.

His public actions as emperor and king, and his personal acts as a family man, were firmly based in the teachings of the Catholic Faith. His love for his Eucharistic Lord grew in times of trial, and helped him to unite himself to Christ’s sacrifice through his own life’s sacrifice for his peoples. Emperor Karl honored the Mother of God, and loved to pray the rosary throughout his life.

Strengthen us by his intercession when discouragement, faintheartedness, loneliness, bitterness and depression trouble us. Let us follow the example of Your faithful servant, and unselfishly serve our brothers and sisters according to Your will.

Hear my petitions and grant my request [mention your intention here].

Grant that Blessed Karl of Austria be deemed worthy of canonization, for the glory of Your Name, the praise of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and for blessings upon the Church.

Amen.

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