Election Night

It’s a holy day of sorts for many people. I have many liberal friends who are hanging out together, watching the returns, having a nice drink; all of this is a celebration of liberal democracy, of our country’s performing the liturgical rites of its religion. I, at times, look at it all wistfully, not because Im a liberal or participate in liberal democracy – I absolutely do not. But the ability to ritualize the important moments of my fatherland, my patria, is something I miss very much.

8 thoughts on “Election Night”

  1. I am reading Mark Twains biography of Joan of Arc right now and his description of the coronation Mass got my blood punping with pattiotism for France, and im not even french. Its that kind of liturgy that makes me envious of the british. Only downside of being british is, well, everything else.

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  2. I comment a lot of times from my phone rather than my computer, which is why my blog posts might seem like refined essays compared to my comments which might look like lazy Texts from Gen Z. Please forgive me!

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  3. Ha Scoot that’s funny I’m usually typing out my on my phone at the pub or train so I completely agree ha. Have you liked the Joan of Arc bio? I’ve heard a lot of great things about it; I think Ignatius Press had an edition at one time?

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  4. I have the ignatius press edition! It is spectacular. Mark Twain tells the story in narrative fashion, and if his claim is true, that he didnt put a word in her mouth which she didnt say, then her life is more fascinating than i ever understood before. It has certainly increased my devotion to St Joan, and i confess this is the first book ive read by Mark Twain and I am thoroughly impressed.

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  5. That’s really interesting. I’m going to pick up a copy! Having recently read Shakespeare’s King Henry VI I was fascinated how St Joan had such a “controversial” presence – she’s basically a promiscuous witch. I’ve wanted to have a devotion to her.

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  7. @Scoot
    I’ve never quite known what to do with the fascinating scene near the beginning of Twain’s book where the child St. Joan pleads with her parish priest to go easy on the fairy beings she encounters in the woods. She talks about them as if they are potential candidates for redemption and salvation, as if they are human, though I’m pretty sure they’re not. But they don’t seem angelic (or demonic) either. Who are they?

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  8. @buckyinky
    I spent a good deal of time puzzling over that scene. I consider it harmless: Kristor talks an awful lot about angelology and my first response was that it surely represents some angelic manifestation. I cannot consider myself a writer in anything but an aspirational sense, so I have a vague familiarity with the forms and structures, and so thought about the construction of the book and what purpose it served in the opening scene. It certainly symbolizes their youthful innocence, and when the fairy tree is destroyed her campaign for the salvation of France begins.

    I believe the fairy tree was a real thing and not merely symbolic, insofar as Twain quotes Joan talking about it; this lends it credibility if he really did use her own words every time she has dialog in the book. So in that sense it could be a construction of their youthful imaginations.

    I agree with you that it’s not entirely clear and I’m not 100% certain what to make of them. As far as their redemption and salvation is concerned, it’s a proper attitude when encountering other “beings”. When Europeans discovered the natives of the Americas, they considered them candidates for redemption and salvation too–they were new creatures with foreign ways, but even they needed to hear the Gospels. If we encountered intelligent fairy beings, then they would be properly creations of God, and so worthy subjects of evangelism, right?

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