Reports from the news media, which have been promoting the rise and influence of the so-called Tea Party, much beyond what its numbers, members and influence would warrant, have almost completely written off the Democratic members of the House and the Senate, predicting a "tsunami" that will return power, possibly in both houses of Congress, to the Republican Party. If we really believed what they say, why should we even bother to vote and that is perhaps one reason why they are protesting too much. There's just a bit too much of this announcing the news before it even happens and/or telling us what it is, IMO. The infamous headline "Dewey Defeats Truman" springs to mind. (Truman did defeat Dewey, after all.) I'm getting very tired of US news media figures telling me what and how to believe when my own eyes and brain tell me differently.
Given the track record of the Republican Party from 2000-2008, if there is indeed a "tsunami," we will all definitely be in for a couple "Years of the Zombies" and those bode well for no one. So, we'll just have to see what news Wednesday brings. Whatever the results, for better or for worse, we will just have to live with them.
In the meantime, today's Guardian has a slideshow of photos showing how All Saints' Day is celebrated around the world. HWMBO and I are secular in our own practices. But we are always interested in what others are doing. So it was with some interest that I read in the local free newspaper that is distributed by the Swiss Romande Reformed Church (a Protestant denomination) that the Feast of the Reformation is traditionally celebrated on 31 October or on the first Sunday in November, at least in Switzerland, and thus more or less coincides with le Toussaint. The Feast of the Reformation commemorates Martin Luther's posting of his 95 Theses on the door of the church in Wittemberg in Germany on 31 October 1517.
The same paper also had a story that was also featured in today's Tribune de Genève. The story described the arrival in Geneva last Saturday, 30 October, of four French hikers who are trekking along the historical route followed by Huguenots when they were forced out of France during and after the French religious wars of the 16th and 17th centuries.
Although there are differing theories for the origin of the name "Huguenot," it generally refers to those French Protestants who were followers of Jean Calvin. As with most Protestants, Huguenots faced persecution from Catholics. But in France, during the early years of the reign of the Renaissance King François Ier , they were protected by the King from the worst excesses. This changed, however, after anti-Catholic posters were posted at various points in French cities, including one in the King's own bedchamber at Amboise castle. The shocking breach of security (l'affaire des Placards) caused the King to withdraw his earlier protection. The French Wars of Religion consisted of eight very bloody civil wars occurring between 1562 and 1598 and involved three main warring parties: the House of Valois (led first by King Charles IX, then by his younger brother King Henri III, who often played one faction against another in order to maintain himself in power); the House of Guise (the Catholic faction, led by Henri de Guise) and the House of Navarre (the Protestant faction, led by Henri de Navarre). For obvious reasons, the last phase of these wars is also referred to as la Guerre des Trois Henris (the War of the Three Henrys).
Ultimately, King Henri III brokered a deal with Henri de Navarre that would allow him to assume the French throne as King Henri IV upon Henri III's death, provided that Henri de Navarre convert to Catholicism. Ultimately, Henri de Navarre did convert and is supposed to have famously uttered, "Paris vaut bien une Messe." ("Paris is well worth a Mass.") Henri IV is a favorite historical personnage of mine, the ultimate pragmatist and a good man generally. Among one of his more historically significant acts, he issued the Edict of Nantes in 1598. The Edict granted full equality and rights to practice their religion to French Protestants. Unfortunately, Henri IV was assassinated by a fanatical monk in 1610. After his death, the Edict of Nantes was not well enforced. It was ultimately revoked altogether by Henri's grandson, Louis XIV, in 1685. That revocation provoked the flight of all French Protestants. Some fled to Switzerland; even more fled to Germany via Switzerland. Others fled to other spots in Europe and around the globe, including the Americas and even South Africa. In fact, South Africa's contemporary wine industry owes a lot to the French Huguenots who ultimately settled there.
Per the newspaper story, two of the four French hikers began their trek 400 kilometers away in la Drôme, and were later joined by the other two. Their arrival here represented the first limit of security that the fleeing Huguenots had historically found. There is currently a project to create a path leading from southern France all the way to Hesse in northern Germany, which is where most of the fleeing Huguenots finally found sanctuary. The full path is intended to be 1,400 kilometers long, but so far only the first part - that traversed by these hikers - is actually complete.
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