Rudyard Kipling"
“When you're left wounded on Afganistan's plains and
the women come out to cut up what remains, Just roll to your rifle
and blow out your brains,
And go to your God like a soldier”
General Douglas MacArthur"
“We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.”
“It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.” “Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.
“The soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.”
“May God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .” “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
“Nobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
“It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
The Soldier stood and faced God
Which must always come to pass
He hoped his shoes were shining
Just as bright as his brass
"Step forward you Soldier,
How shall I deal with you?
Have you always turned the other cheek?
To My Church have you been true?"
"No, Lord, I guess I ain't
Because those of us who carry guns
Can't always be a saint."
I've had to work on Sundays
And at times my talk was tough,
And sometimes I've been violent,
Because the world is awfully rough.
But, I never took a penny
That wasn't mine to keep.
Though I worked a lot of overtime
When the bills got just too steep,
The Soldier squared his shoulders and said
And I never passed a cry for help
Though at times I shook with fear,
And sometimes, God forgive me,
I've wept unmanly tears.
I know I don't deserve a place
Among the people here.
They never wanted me around
Except to calm their fears.
If you've a place for me here,
Lord, It needn't be so grand,
I never expected or had too much,
But if you don't, I'll understand."
There was silence all around the throne
Where the saints had often trod
As the Soldier waited quietly,
For the judgment of his God.
"Step forward now, you Soldier,
You've borne your burden well.
Walk peacefully on Heaven's streets,
You've done your time in Hell."
Is there really any evidence to the contrary?
“Has the Pope Abandoned Europe to Islam?,” by Giulio Meotti, Gatestone Institute, May 26, 2016:
To scroll the list of Pope Francis’s apostolic trips —
Brazil, South Korea, Albania, Turkey, Sri Lanka, Ecuador, Cuba, United
States, Mexico, Kenya, Uganda, Philippines — one could say that Europe
is not exactly at the top of his agenda.
The two previous pontiffs both fought for the cradle of Christendom.
Pope John Paul II took on Communism by toppling the Berlin Wall and the
Iron Curtain. Benedict XVI took on “the dictatorship of relativism”
(the belief that truth is in the eye of the beholder) and bet
everything on re-evangelizing the continent by traveling through it (he
visited Spain three times) and in speeches such as the magnificent ones
at Regensburg, where he spoke bluntly about the threat of Islam, and the
German Bundestag, where he warned the gathered politicians against declining religiosity and “sacrificing their own ideals for the sake of power.”
Pope Francis, on the contrary, simply ignores Europe, as if he
already considers it lost. This former Argentinian Cardinal, a
representative of the “global South” Christianity, made spectacular
trips to the migrants’ islands of Lampedusa (Italy) and Lesbos (Greece), but never to the heart of the old continent. Pope Francis has also made it difficult for Anglicans to enter into the Catholic Church, by downplaying the dialogue with them.
