Let the Old Cash Register, Not the Freedom that Comes from the Holy Cross, Ring

Proving that there has been a return to old Richard Milhous Nixon-Henry Alfred Kissinger policy of realpolitik (i.e., Machiavellianism), President Donald John Trump, ever the dealmaker who is unguided by any understanding of the precepts of the Divine and Natural Laws, seems to be content to work with Nicolas Maduro’s vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, a hardened socialist who is now the acting president of Venezuela, to get Venezuelan oil flowing again into the United States of America while one of Maduro’s top lieutenants, Minister of Interior, Justice, and Peace, Diosdado Cabellom uses his colectivos to terrorize Venezuelans who might have information on their cell phones revealing to be critics of Nicolas Maduro and/or supporters of President Donald John Trump:

In the aftermath of Nicolás Maduro’s capture by United States forces, paramilitary groups tied to the Venezuelan leader’s regime have initiated an aggressive campaign to maintain control over the country.

Mobs of motorcycle-riding civilians often armed with assault rifles, known as colectivos, have been conducting intrusive searches and establishing checkpoints to identify and punish anyone showing support for Maduro’s removal from power, Reuters reported.

The National Union of Press Workers of Venezuela reported that armed forces briefly detained fourteen journalists during Monday's induction of Vice President Delcy Rodríguez as the country’s interim leader. Residents have also reported that some Venezuelans have been afraid to leave their homes, fearing that armed forces would seize and scour their phones for signs of dissent, The Telegraph said.

"The future is uncertain, the Colectivos have weapons, the Colombian guerrilla is already here in Venezuela, so we don’t know what’s going to happen, time will tell," Oswaldo, a 69-year-old Venezuelan shop owner, told The Telegraph.

The colectivos are largely controlled by Nicolás Maduro’s close ally, Diosdado Cabello, who has a $25 million bounty from the U.S. State Department largely for his role in corruption and drug trafficking.

Cabello, who serves as the state's Minister of Interior, Justice and Peace, is widely known for suppressing political dissent in Venezuela. The presence of colectivos, who often serve as an unofficial arm of state repression, suggests that Maduro loyalists are desperately trying to maintain their grip on the country.

The reported crackdown began with a government directive to root out dissent against the Venezuelan regime. According to Reuters, a state of emergency decree published on Monday ordered police to "immediately begin the national search and capture of everyone involved in the promotion or support of the armed attack by the United States."

As someone who conducts state-run domestic espionage through widespread coordination of surveillance and counterintelligence agencies, Cabello remains a major unpredictable and dangerous figure in the wake of Maduro’s capture, Reuters reported.
"The focus is now on Diosdado Cabello," Venezuelan military strategist Jose Garcia told the outlet. "Because he is the most ideological, violent and unpredictable element of the Venezuelan regime."

Reuters reported that the former military officer was also recently spotted patrolling Venezuelan streets with security forces.

In a social media post by the Venezuelan government, footage reportedly showed Cabello posing with a crowd of armed militia as they shouted, "Always loyal, never traitors."

Reuters added that in recent weeks, Cabello was also seen on television ordering Venezuela’s military counterintelligence agency to "go and get the terrorists" and warning "whoever strays, we will know."

He reportedly repeated the same rhetoric in a state television appearance Saturday, wearing a flak jacket and helmet and surrounded by heavily armed guards.

Despite the removal of Maduro, the loyalist crackdown on dissent and the media suggests that the ruling party has no intention of relinquishing its grip on power. (Paramilitary groups on motorcycles move to enforce crackdown in Venezuela.)

President Trump, at least publicly, is not saying a word about Caballo’s retention in office nor about the latter’s terrorizing of Venezuelans as acting president Delcy Rodriguez has decided to “play ball” with the government of the United States of America on what matters most to Mr. Trump, oil and the money that will flow therefrom:

President Trump announced Tuesday that Venezuela will sell up to 50 million barrels of oil to the US at “market price” — and that he will control what the South American nation can do with the proceeds from the sale.

“I am pleased to announce that the Interim Authorities in Venezuela will be turning over between 30 and 50 MILLION Barrels of High Quality, Sanctioned Oil, to the United States of America,” Trump posted on Truth Social.

“This Oil will be sold at its Market Price, and that money will be controlled by me, as President of the United States of America, to ensure it is used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the United States!” he continued.

“I have asked Energy Secretary Chris Wright to execute this plan, immediately.”

Trump said the oil will be “brought directly” to the US docks via storage ships.

Following the Jan. 3 military operation to depose and capture dictator Nicolas Maduro, the president has said he hopes to see more US oil companies enter Venezuela and expand production in the oil-rich nation.

Trump suggested Monday that the US government could reimburse American oil companies for resuscitating Venezuela’s energy industry.

The president told NBC News that he thinks American firms could get Venezuela’s oil fields “up and running” within 18 months.

“I think we can do it in less time than that, but it’ll be a lot of money,” Trump said. 

“A tremendous amount of money will have to be spent, and the oil companies will spend it, and then they’ll get reimbursed by us or through revenue,” he added. 

Chevron is the only major US oil company currently operating in Venezuela. 

ConocoPhillips and Exxon Mobil both left Venezuela nearly 20 years ago when Maduro’s socialist predecessor, Hugo Chávez, nationalized their assets. 

In 2019, Trump blocked US companies from doing business with Venezuela’s state-owned oil enterprise in an effort to pressure Maduro to step aside.   

In mid-December, Trump implemented a blockade preventing oil tankers from leaving Venezuela, while threatening to seize ships attempting to evade the blockade. 

Energy Secretary Chris Wright is slated to meet with executives from Exxon and ConocoPhillips later this week to talk Venezuelan oil, according to Bloomberg News.

Wright has been tasked with leading the Trump administration’s efforts to rebuild Venezuela’s oil infrastructure, NBC News reported, citing a White House official. (Venezuela selling up to 50 million barrels of oil to US, Trump reveals. For an explanation as why Donald John Trump trusts Delcy Rodriguez, please see How Delcy Rodríguez courted Donald Trump and rose to power in Venezuela.)

Yes, the let the cash register, not freedom that comes from the Cross of the Divine Redeemer, ring:

President Donald Trump is leaving Delcy Rodriguez alone in the effort, we are told, to provide “stability” in Venezuela even though voters overwhelming elected an ally of Maria Machado to the Venezuelan presidency in 2024 rather than to call for open elections that would undoubtedly result in Machado’s own election because administration officials said that she, the winner 2025 Nobel Prize for Peace Trump, believe should have been his, would not be able to stabilize Venezuela without the presence of American military forces on the ground in large enough numbers keep the Maduro forces in check:

Even before the lightning-quick U.S. raid on Venezuela’s capital, President Trump had made a crucial decision about what would happen once the country’s leader, Nicolás Maduro, was out of the picture.

Mr. Trump would not be throwing his support behind María Corina Machado, the opposition leader who led a successful election campaign against Mr. Maduro in 2024 and had the greatest popular legitimacy to lead the nation.

Behind the scenes, Mr. Trump came to his conclusion based on several crucial factors, including U.S. intelligence that suggested the opposition would have trouble leading the government, and a souring relationship between Ms. Machado and top Trump officials, according to five people with knowledge of his decision-making.

“I think it would be very tough for her to be the leader,” Mr. Trump said over the weekend, after the mission ended with Mr. Maduro in U.S. custody. “She doesn’t have the support within, or the respect within, the country. She’s a very nice woman, but she doesn’t have the respect.”

The president had been persuaded by arguments from senior officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who said that if the United States tried to back the opposition, it could further destabilize the country and require a more robust military presence inside the country. A classified C.I.A. intelligence analysis reflected that view, as well, according to a person familiar with the document.

For Mr. Trump, the focus in Venezuela is oil, not promoting democracy.

And even though Ms. Machado has gone out of her way to please Mr. Trump, in reality her relationship with the White House had been fraying for months. Senior U.S. officials had grown frustrated with her assessments of Mr. Maduro’s strength, feeling that she provided inaccurate reports that he was weak and on the verge of collapse. They also grew skeptical of her ability to seize power in Venezuela.

Representatives for Ms. Machado did not respond to requests for comment.

In fact, she had been a source of friction inside the Trump administration since soon after the president returned to office last January.

Shortly before a visit to the capital, Caracas, in January, Richard Grenell, Mr. Trump’s envoy, met with Ms. Machado’s representatives in the Waldorf Astoria hotel in Washington. Mr. Grenell asked them to arrange an in-person meeting with Ms. Machado in Caracas and for a list of political prisoners they wanted liberated.

But the in-person meeting never happened. Ms. Machado, despite promises from the American delegation that she would be protected, refused to meet with Mr. Grenell. Instead, a phone call was arranged during his visit, according to multiple people briefed on the call.

The phone call was cordial. But over time the relationship deteriorated, according to people briefed on the interactions. Ms. Machado and her team ignored the request for a list of political prisoners, out of apparent desire to avoid accusations of favoritism, or of intimating that her movement is taking part in the negotiations.

Mr. Grenell repeatedly pressed Ms. Machado to outline her plan for putting her surrogate candidate, Edmundo González, into office after she was barred from running. He grew frustrated when she expressed no concrete ideas of how to put the democratically elected government into power, according to people briefed on the conversations.

For her part, Ms. Machado was also upset that Mr. Grenell, unlike Mr. Rubio, did not forcefully denounce Mr. Maduro as illegitimate. Mr. Grenell told colleagues that such a statement, while true, would undercut his diplomatic outreach.

Mr. Grenell declined to comment.

For now, Mr. Trump and Mr. Rubio have said they are focused on working with the interim president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodríguez, a vice president under Mr. Maduro.

“We are dealing with the immediate reality,” Mr. Rubio said on Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “The immediate reality is that, unfortunately and sadly, but unfortunately the vast majority of the opposition is no longer present inside of Venezuela. We have short-term things that have to be addressed right away.”

Freddy Guevara, a former Venezuelan congressman living in exile in New York and a member of Ms. Machado’s coalition, said that he did not know why the White House had chosen to move forward with Ms. Rodríguez, but his best guess was that it was the easiest path for now.

“I think the Americans are not betting on revolution, but on reforms,” he said.

He and fellow opposition members are now focused on pushing first for the release of political prisoners in Venezuela, and then for the ability to return to Venezuela and compete in open elections.

Mr. Grenell declined to comment.

For now, Mr. Trump and Mr. Rubio have said they are focused on working with the interim president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodríguez, a vice president under Mr. Maduro.

“We are dealing with the immediate reality,” Mr. Rubio said on Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “The immediate reality is that, unfortunately and sadly, but unfortunately the vast majority of the opposition is no longer present inside of Venezuela. We have short-term things that have to be addressed right away.”

Freddy Guevara, a former Venezuelan congressman living in exile in New York and a member of Ms. Machado’s coalition, said that he did not know why the White House had chosen to move forward with Ms. Rodríguez, but his best guess was that it was the easiest path for now.

“I think the Americans are not betting on revolution, but on reforms,” he said.

He and fellow opposition members are now focused on pushing first for the release of political prisoners in Venezuela, and then for the ability to return to Venezuela and compete in open elections. Mr. Trump’s embrace of Ms. Rodríguez is also forcing some Republicans, who have been staunch supporters of Ms. Machado, into difficult positions. Miami’s three Republican members of Congress faced repeated questions in a news conference on Saturday night about why Mr. Trump had dismissed Ms. Machado.

One of the lawmakers, Representative Mario Diaz-Balart, took offense at any suggestion that he or his colleagues no longer backed Ms. Machado. They reiterated their strong support for her but did not venture any explanations for Mr. Trump’s words.

“I’m convinced that when there are elections, whether there are new elections or there’s a decision to take the old elections, the last elections, that the next democratically elected president of Venezuela is going to be María Corina Machado,” Mr. Diaz-Balart said.

Ms. Machado, a scion of a conservative magnate, had built strong connections in the Republican Party over the decades spent in Venezuelan politics, but she appeared little prepared for the transformation of the party into a transactional, ideologically agnostic political machine under Mr. Trump.

Categorical rejection of any talks or contact with Mr. Maduro’s government has been a bedrock of Ms. Machado’s political strategy, a strategy that has earned her the respect and support of a majority of Venezuelan people, but it has crippled her ability to build a broader coalition capable of enabling her bid for power.

Ms. Machado’s unequivocal support of sanctions has destroyed her relations with Venezuela’s business elite, which had built a modus vivendi with Mr. Maduro to continue working in the country after a quarter-century of his government’s rule.

Ms. Machado’s economic advisers have argued that every dollar going into Venezuela was a dollar for Mr. Maduro, a radical stance that had alienated many members of Venezuela’s civil society working to improve living conditions in the country. Her message had increasingly begun to mirror the views of the diaspora and deviated from the realities of people who remained in Venezuela.

As Mr. Trump tightened his economic sanctions over Venezuela in recent months, Ms Machado remained largely silent, reducing her statements to the praise of Mr. Trump and publicizing the suffering of the hundreds of Venezuelan political prisoners.

She has not issued a comment on the cancellation of most flights into Venezuela, the deportation of tens of thousands of Venezuelan migrants from the United States, the skyrocketing inflation in the country or the collapse of oil revenues, which finance the import of basic goods into the country.

Instead, members of Ms. Machado’s team and allies in exile took to social media to attack and discredit public figures whose work deviated from their views.

These actions cost Ms. Machado the support of members of the Democratic Party and many businesspeople, American and Venezuelan, who had interests in Venezuela and influence in Mr. Trump’s orbit.

Orlando J. Pérez, a professor of political science at the University of North Texas at Dallas, said Mr. Trump’s comment on Saturday about Ms. Machado shocked him.

“The statement that she is not respected inside, I think is, is not true on the face of it,” he said. “She clearly is the most popular opposition leader. She clearly has the legitimacy that the Nobel Peace Prize gives her.”

But Mr. Pérez said Mr. Trump’s comment reflected the infeasibility of Ms. Machado’s taking power without a significant American military presence.

“They don’t have the levers of power,” he said of Ms. Machado and Mr. González. “They don’t have the institutions, and without us over assistance, they’re not going to get back into power in Venezuela.”

Mr. Trump’s comments were also widely noticed among Venezuelans in South Florida, who tend to feel deep affection for Ms. Machado.

“We were a little surprised by what he said about María Corina,” said Nelson Jiménez, 55, who left Venezuela in 2020.

Mr. Jiménez said Mr. Trump might be “ill informed” about how much support Ms. Machado has in Venezuela. “I think he’s wrong,” he said. (www.christorchaos.com/%3Ca%20href=">http://www.christorchaos.com/%3Ca%20href=" https:="" style="text-decoration-line: underline; color: rgb(181, 44, 44);">Why Trump Refused to Back Venezuela's Machado: Fear of Chaos, and Fraying Ties.)

There are some very valid points in this article about the current political situation in Venezuela. However, Mrs. Maria Corina Machado is very popular and highly regarded in Venezuela, meaning that President Donald John Trump’s comment about the lack of such support and respect is probably viscerally rather factually based:

Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado has spent months trying to gain Donald Trump’s favor - but the U.S. president looks set to leave her in the lurch.

Machado, who led a successful election campaign against deposed Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro in 2024 despite being barred from holding public office, has often been touted as the leader with the greatest popular legitimacy to lead the South American country.

But Trump, who was beaten by Machado to the Nobel Peace Prize in December, has openly opposed the 58-year-old from Caracas taking the reigns in Venezuela. Machado has remained in Norway since being awarded the prize in October, but has said she wants to return following Maduro’s removal.

“I think it would be very tough for her to be the leader,” Trump said on Saturday, hours after Maduro had been seized by U.S. forces in an overnight raid. “She doesn’t have the support within, or the respect within, the country. She’s a very nice woman, but she doesn’t have the respect.”

Two White House sources told The Washington Post that the President had lost interest in supporting Machado after her decision to accept the Nobel Peace Prize. Machado dedicated the award to Trump after her win, but by accepting it in the first place she was guilty of the “ultimate sin”, one said.

“If she had turned it down and said, ‘I can’t accept it because it’s Donald Trump’s,’ she’d be the president of Venezuela today,” they added.

Machado has, however, said she would share the prize with Trump, despite not offering to give him the prize outright.

“It hasn’t happened yet,” she told Fox News, “but I certainly would love to be able to personally tell him that we believe, the Venezuelan people, because this is a prize of the Venezuelan people, certainly want to give it to him, and share it with him.”

Trump’s remarks prompted surprise among Machado’s camp, a person close to the team told the Post. One opposition figure told the outlet that the comments were difficult to hear, but “in every transition, you have to swallow some bitter pills.”

But even before Maduro was removed from power, all had not been well between Machado and the White House, reports suggest.

According to The New York Times, Secretary of State Marco Rubio had argued against backing the Venezuelan opposition, arguing it would further destabilise the country and mean a larger military presence would be necessary in the country. This view was supported by classified C.I.A. intelligence, a person familiar with the document told the outlet.

The Wall Street Journal also revealed that a C.I.A. intelligence assessment had determined that Maduro’s key allies, including Delcy Rodriguez, who was sworn in as president on Monday, would be the best positioned to lead a temporary government in Caracas and maintain short-term stability.

The analysis reportedly influenced Trump’s decision to back Rodriguez instead of Machado, who it is believed would not command the support of the country’s armed forces and other elites.

Machado and Edmundo González, her stand-in candidate who won more than two-thirds of the vote in the 2024 election, would struggle to gain legitimacy and would face significant resistance from pro-regime security services, drug-trafficking groups and political opponents, the report argued.

Senior U.S. officials are also said to have grown increasingly frustrated with Machado over the past year, finding her recent claims that the Maduro regime was weakened and nearing collapse to be inaccurate, and becoming increasingly sceptical about her ability to overthrow the government. (www.christorchaos.com/%3Ca%20href=">http://www.christorchaos.com/%3Ca%20href=" https:="" style="text-decoration-line: underline; color: rgb(181, 44, 44);">Why Trump Snubbed Venezuela Opposition Leader Machado after she beat him to the Nobel Peace Prize.)

There is probably a great deal of truth to Donald John Trump’s resentment Mrs. Machado’s acceptance of the Nobel Prize for Peace and to the intelligence assessment of the current difficulties in Venezuela, but for Trump is disparage Mrs. Machado as he did is just another example of his characteristic pettiness and narcissism, which is so pronounced that he seems obsessed to have his name emblazoned on as many edifices as possible without realizing that there will be someone of the false opposite of the naturalist “left” who will one day, whether in 2029 or 2033, remove the Trump name from all those edifices.

Indeed, it is probably a blessing from Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ Himself that Mrs. Machado is not in power in her home country now as she would most certainly be assassinated in the manner that Filipino opposition leader Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino was gunned done by Filipino military offices allied with then Filipino President Ferdinand Marcos as soon as he stepped off a plane in Manilla, The Philippines, on August 21, 1983. Once again, though, Donald John Trump always lives down to expectations when he believes that something that belongs to him is given to someone else.

As has been noted time and again on this website, the bottom line for Donald John Trump has always been the bottom line financially, and “Operation Absolute Resolve” was less about bringing a narco-terrorist to justice than making it possible for the government of the United States of America to gain access to Venezuela’s oil reserves and to starve the apparently faltering Islamic Republic of Iran and Communist Cuba into submission as well:

Drugs are the building blocks of empires. This was true for the British, French, and Dutch empires when they were pushing opium into China, even fighting two wars with the Chinese in order to keep the drug legal; the French had further used the sale of opium and opium products like heroin to fund their colonial war in Indochina during the 1950s. This allowed the military and security services secretive funds to continue fighting the war and funding new special programs even if their publicly allocated funds from the parliaments and congresses dry up. America is no exception to these activities and has been actively involved in the drug trade for decades, most famously the “French Connection,” where opium cut by the Chinese nationalists and supported by the OSS was sent to be synthesized in Sicilian drug labs and later by the Corsican mob in the Southern French town of Marseille. All of this was then sent to Cuban labs run by the mob and later sent to America for distribution, and then the funds later distributed in CIA operations against the Communist parties in Western Europe. Later, of course, these operations would expand into South America, most famously the Contras pushing cocaine in order to fund its fight against the Sandinistas. This is important because one of the main accusations and reasons given by the Trump administration for the military operation was that Maduro was a narcoterrorist running a large cartel.

The American government claims that Maduro and other senior military and political officials run a drug trafficking network and gang called the “Cartel of the Suns.” This cartel is not even close to being the biggest cocaine trafficking country to the USA; a France24 report stated that Panama, Ecuador, and Columbia were the biggest exporters of cocaine by boat to the United States, with Columbia responsible for two-thirds of coca leaf cultivation. Even fentanyl, the leading cause of overdose in America, comes from Mexico and China. While the rhetoric of narcoterrorism could be seen as simple propaganda and an excuse to conduct a military operation, the control of Venezuela’s drug trade could be a very important reality. It was in Venezuela that the first American federal official directly accused the CIA of trafficking cocaine into the United States with the help of the Venezuelan National Guard.

But that was before Hugo Chavez took power, the socialist leader who, according to FEE, had commenced a runoff nationalization program, stripping private property rights; this is similar to how Castro had expelled the Italian-American gangsters like Santo Traficante and Meyer Lansky along with their drug labs and casinos. Unlike in Mexico or Colombia, where private cartels compete with one another over territory and trafficking routes and use private property as a means to protect their assets from the public and government searches, the Venezuelan government has monopolized the drug trade in their own country. Mises had explained, a government-run industry does not run on profit and loss; its axpayers support it, and its military and police protect it, power other cartels elsewhere pay lucratively to obtain. Going back to John Perkins book, he claimed that the Chinese have made bold economic moves in Latin America as part of their Belt and Road Initiative, but the Chinese projects have been met with repeated failures, shoddy construction, ecological disasters, and debt entrapment. Perkins explains (p.27):

“China was rapidly engulfing one country after another, in Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Europe, as well as Latin America. I had to wonder why these countries so enthusiastically accepted China, despite the mistakes it made developing projects in Ecuador and a dozen other countries. It seemed to me that the hydroelectric dams and power systems US companies built in my day had been well engineered and were still producing electricity. By comparison, Chinese engineering was abysmal.”

So as America seeks to secure the Western Hemisphere as Marco Rubio claimed, it’s odd that the major cartels in Mexico and Columbia have been left untouched. Perhaps the cartels in Latin America and the American security state have a vested interest against the shoddy Chinese infrastructure and socialist dictators stripping private property rights.

Wag the Dog

Finally, there is the propaganda effect the military operation has had on the American population. From Ben Shapiro to Nick Fuentes, young conservatives and the Latin American diasporas looked on in awe as the American military bombed Caracas and special forces kidnapped the dictator. Jokes circulated online about how Russia just saw what a real special operation looks like; it’s supposed to take an hour, not three years. Of course, America had just gotten out of a twenty-year conflict in Afghanistan and a shorter but bloodier one in Iraq. The rhetoric that surrounds this operation is a tactic to try and beat the “Vietnam syndrome.” After the Vietnam War, America had conducted small but successful wars around the world, such as in Grenada and Panama, until finally, America had swept Iraq in a resounding victory against the Iraqis in 1991, ending what Bush called “the Vietnam syndrome.” The Trump Administration is conducting theater in order to restore faith in the competency in the American military.

Tying up Loose Ends

JD Vance had stated that the attack on Venezuela was in response to its narcoterrorism and the theft of American property; he asked if we should “just let Communists steal our stuff?” With him adding that “Great powers don’t act like that.” The United States is retreating back into its hemisphere; it is losing Europe to the war in Ukraine. Every time America seems to teeter towards a peace agreement with Putin that isn’t unconditional surrender, European leaders threaten to“gain independence” from America. Now Trump has threatened to take Greenland from Denmark, a land that he claims is a vital point in national security; after all, Russia and China are increasing their military and economic presence in the area. As the relationship between Europe and America continues to sour over the war, and the Middle East becomes more unstable due to the Israelis, America is finding itself securing its north and south, securing one of the most resource-rich countries in the world. This strategy includes Cuba as well, a Chinese and Russian ally and a country that the Cuban Rubio would no doubt take interest in.

The United States doesn’t just seek to run Venezuela; it seeks to run the Western Hemisphere. The State is tying up its loose ends in order to secure itself. It won’t be Trump running this new operation either; it will be his backers, the www.christorchaos.com/%3Ca%20href=">http://www.christorchaos.com/%3Ca%20href=" https:="" style="text-decoration-line: underline; color: rgb(181, 44, 44);">..">men who sat behind him at his inauguration, the men who have been in positions of power before Trump and will be there after Trump is gone. They’re just using Trump to further their goals in a now multipolar world. The bombing of Iran and the kidnapping of Maduro all violate international law and give other countries an excuse to do the same, but international law never mattered, and the United States no longer cares. (www.christorchaos.com/%3Ca%20href=">http://www.christorchaos.com/%3Ca%20href=" https:="" style="text-decoration-line: underline; color: rgb(181, 44, 44);">Oil, Drugs, and Security: How Trump Plans to Run Venezuela.)

The situation in Venezuela is now a fait’accompli and has occurred within the Providence of God, meaning that we must pray for the people of Venezuela to remain steadfast in their devotion to Our Lady of Coromoto, the Patroness of Venezuela, and to cling to her Most Holy Rosary as yet another imperialistic mineral grab takes while their Communist persecutors continue to run the country’s infrastructure and seek to continue the Hugo Chavez/Nicolas Maduro policies of repression.

Sadly, the United States of America has a long history of letting the cash register ring to the detriment of the peoples from which its government and corporate leaders exploit their natural resources for their own enrichment all while eschewing the one and only true standard of human liberty, the Holy Cross of the Divine Redeeemer, Christ the King, Who was made manifest to the Gentiles during these very days.

We must remember that God permits the events of the world to unfold as they do for His greater honor and glory while keeping us on our knees in fervent prayer to Him as the consecrated slaves of His Divine Son, Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, she who is the Queen of Heaven and Earth. We must rest in the peace of the Prince of Peace, the Newborn Babe, Christ the King, Who must always reign in our hearts just as He is absent from the princes of this world in whom there is no hope of salvation but who believe that they can scheme and plot their ways to some kind of “peace” to their liking even though a “peace” to the liking of worldlings is not His peace but the illusions of the adversary himself.

On this day within the Octave of the Epiphany, therefore, let us remember that the events of this passing world are distractions meant to detract from true realities of the Holy Faith on which we must be focused at all times, especially now as we meditate upon the great mystery of Our Lord’s manifestation to the Gentiles and thus to the whole world as King of Kings:

It is thou, O Divine Infant! that bringest us all these graces and receivest all this devoted homage of thy creatures. The time will soon come, dear Jesus! when thou wilt break the silence thou hast imposed on thyself in order that thou mightest teach us humility—thou wilt speak to us as our Master. Cæsar Augustus has long ruled over Pagan Rome, and she thinks herself the kingdom that is to have no end; but she and her Rulers must yield to the Eternal King and his eternal City: the throne of earthly power must now give place for the Throne of Christian charity, and a new Rome is to spring up, grander than the first. The Gentiles are looking for thee, their King; but the day will come when they will have no need to seek thee, but thou, in thy mercy, wilt go in search of them, by sending them apostles and missioners, who will preach thy Gospel to them. Show thyself to them, as He to whom all power has been given in heaven and on earth; and show them also Her whom thou hast made to be Queen of the universe. May this august Mother of thine be raised up from the poor Stable of Bethlehem, and from the humble dwelling of Nazareth, and be taken on the wings of Angels to that throne of mercy which thou hast made for her, and from which she will bless all peoples and generations with her loving protection. (Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., The Liturgical Year, Third Day in the Octave of the Epiphany.)

Donald John Trump may think that the “kingdom” of American dominance will have no end, but there will come a time when, like Rome of the Republic and Rome of the Empire, it will be no more as the only One Whose Kingdom lasts forever is the Kingdom of Christ the King, Who teaches us always that the one and only true standard of human liberty is His Holy Cross upon which He shed every single drop of His Most Precious Blood to redeem us and thus liberate from enslavement to sin and worldliness.

May every Rosary we pray help to plant the needs for those who exercise civil power to have a true epiphany that sees them bend the knee to Christ the King and to obey His Holy Church in all that pertains to the good of souls, both temporally and eternally.

Our Lady of the Rosary, pray for us.

Saint Joseph, pray for us.

Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.

Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.

Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saints Joachim and Anne, pray for us.

Saints Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar, pray for us.

Appendix

Dom Prosper Gueranger on the Third Day within the Octave of the Epiphany

The great Mystery of the Alliance of the Son of God with the universal Church, and which is represented in the Epiphany by the Magi, was looked forward to by the world in every age previous to the coming of our Emmanuel. The Patriarchs and Prophets had propagated the tradition; and the Gentile world gave frequent proofs that the tradition prevailed even with them.

When Adam, in Eden, first beheld her whom God had formed from one of his ribs, and whom he called Eve, because she was the Mother of all the living (Genesis 3:20) —he exclaimed, “This is the bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh. Man shall leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall be two in one flesh.” (Genesis 2:23-24) In uttering these words, the soul of our first Parent was enlightened by the Holy Spirit and, as we are told by the most profound interpreters of the Sacred Scriptures (such as Tertullian, St. Augustine, St. Jerome, etc.), he foretold the Alliance of the Son of God with his Church, which issued from his Side when opened by the spear on the Cross; for the love of which Spouse, he left the right hand of his Father, and the heavenly Jerusalem, his mother, that he might dwell with us, in this our earthly abode.

The second father of the human race, Noah—after he had seen the Rainbow in the heavens, announcing that now God’s anger was appeased—prophesied to his three Sons their own respective future and, in theirs, that of the world. Cham had drawn upon himself his father’s curse; Sem seemed to be the favored son—for from his race, there should come the Savior of the world; but the Patriarch immediately adds: “May God enlarge Japheth, and may he dwell in the tents of Sem.” (Genesis 9:27) In the course of time, the ancient alliance that had been made between God and the people of Israel was broken; the Semitic race fluctuated in its religion, and finally fell into infidelity; and at length, God adopts the family of Japheth, that is, the Gentiles of the west, as his own people; for ages, they had been without God, and now the very Seat of religion is established in their midst, and they are put at the head of the whole human race.

Later on, it is the great God himself that speaks to Abraham, promising him that he shall be the father of a countless family. “I will bless thee,” says the Lord, “and I will multiply thy seed as the stars of heaven.” (Genesis 22:17) As the Apostle tells us, more numerous was to be the family of Abraham according to the faith than that which should be born to him of Sara. All they that have received the faith of a Mediator to come, and all they that, being warned by the Star, have come to Jesus as their God—all are the children of Abraham.

The Mystery is again expressed in Rebecca, the wife of Isaac. She feels that there are two children struggling within her womb; and this is the answer she receives from God when she consulted him: “Two nations are in thy womb, (Genesis 25:22) and two peoples shall be divided out of thy womb; and one people shall overcome the other, and the elder shall serve the younger.” (Genesis 25:23) Now, who is this “younger” child that overcomes the elder but the Gentiles, who struggle with Juda for the light and who, though but the child of the promise, supplants him who was son according to the flesh? Such is the teaching of St. Leo and St. Augustine.

Next, it is Jacob who, when dying, calls his twelve sons, the fathers of the twelve tribes of Israel, around his bed, and prophetically assigns to each of them the career they were to run. Juda is put before the rest; he is to be the King of his brethren, and from his royal race shall come the Messias. But the prophecy concludes with the prediction of Israel’s humiliation, which humiliation is to be the glory of the rest of the human race. “The scepter shall not be taken away from Juda, nor a Ruler from his thigh, till He come that is to be sent, and he shall be the Expectation of the Nations.”  (Genesis 49:10)

When Israel had gone out of Egypt and was in possession of the Promised Land, Balaam cried out, setting his face towards the desert, where Israel was encamped: “I shall see him, but not now; I shall behold him, but not near. A Star shall rise out of Jacob, and a scepter shall spring up from Israel … Who shall live when God shall do these things? They shall come in galleys from Italy; they shall overcome the Assyrians, and shall waste the Hebrews, and at the last, they themselves also shall perish.” (Numbers 24:17, 23-24) And what kingdom shall succeed this? The kingdom of Christ, who is the Star, and the King that shall rule forever.

David has this great day continually before his mind. He is forever celebrating in his Psalms the Kingship of his Son according to the flesh: he shows him to us bearing the Scepter, girt with the Sword, anointed by God his Father, and extending his kingdom from sea to sea: he tells us how the Kings of Tharsis and the Islands, the Kings of the Arabians and of Saba, and the Princes of Ethiopia shall prostrate at his feet and adore him: he mentions their gifts of gold. (Psalm 71)

In his mysterious Canticle of Canticles, Solomon describes the joy of the spiritual union between the divine Spouse and his Church, and that Church is not the Synagogue. Christ invites her, in words of tenderest love, to come and be crowned; and she, to whom he addresses these words, is dwelling beyond the confines of the land where lives the people of God. “Come from Libanus, my Spouse, come from Libanus, come! Thou shalt be crowned from the top of Amana, from the top of Sanir and Hermon, from the dens of the lions, from the mountains of the leopards.” (Song of Solomon 4:8) This daughter of Pharaoh confesses her unworthiness: I am black, she says; but she immediately adds that she has been made beautiful by the grace of her Spouse. (Song of Solomon 1:4)

The Prophet Osee follows with his inspired prediction: “And it shall be in that day, saith the Lord, that she shall call me, My Husband, and she shall call me no more Baali. And I will take away the names of Baalim out of her mouth and she shall no more remember their name … And I will espouse thee to me forever … And I will sow her unto me in the earth, and I will have mercy on her that was without mercy. And I will say to that which was not my people: Thou art my people; and they shall say: Thou art my God. (Hosea 2:16-17)

The elder Tobias, while captive in Babylon, prophesies the same alliance. The Jerusalem which was to receive the Jews after their deliverance by Cyrus, is not the City of which he speaks in such glowing terms; it is a new and richer and lovelier Jerusalem. “Jerusalem! City of God! bless the God eternal, that he may rebuild his tabernacle in thee, and may call back all the captives to thee. Thou shalt shine with a glorious light. Nations from afar shall come to thee, and shall bring gifts, and shall esteem thy land as holy. For they shall call upon the great Name in thee … All that fear God shall return thither. And the Gentiles shall leave their idols, and shall come into Jerusalem, and shall dwell in it. And all the kings of the earth shall rejoice in it, adoring the King of Israel.” (Tobias 13, 14)

It is true, the Gentiles shall be severely chastised by God, on account of their crimes; but that justice is for no other end than to prepare those very Gentiles for an eternal alliance with the great Jehovah. He thus speaks, by his Prophet Sophonias: “My judgment is to assemble the Gentiles, and to gather the kingdoms: and to pour upon them my indignation, all my fierce anger: for with the fire of my jealousy shall all the earth be devoured. Because then I will restore to the people a chosen lip, that all may call upon the name of the Lord, and may serve him with one shoulder. From beyond the rivers of Ethiopia shall my suppliants, the children of my dispersed people, bring me an offering.” (Zephaniah 3:8-10)

He promises the same mercy by his Prophet Ezechiel: “One King shall be over all, and they shall no more be two nations, neither shall they be divided any more into two kingdoms. Nor shall they be defiled any more with their idols: and I will save them out of all the places in which they have sinned. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God. And they shall have One Shepherd. And I will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant with them: and I will establish them, and will multiply them, and will set my Sanctuary in the midst of them forever.” (Ezekiel 37:22)

After the Prophet Daniel has described the three great Kingdoms, which were successively to pass away, he says there shall be a Kingdom “which is an everlasting Kingdom, and all kings shall serve him (the King), and shall obey him.” He had previously said: “The power” (that was to be given to the Son of man) “is an everlasting power that shall not be taken away; and his Kingdom shall not be destroyed.” (Daniel 7:27)

Aggeus thus foretells the great events (Haggai 2:7-8) which were to happen before the coming of the One Shepherd, and the establishment of that everlasting Sanctuary, which was to be set up in the very midst of the Gentiles: “Yet one little while, and I will move the heaven, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land. And I will move all Nations, and the Desired of all nations shall come.”

But we should have to cite all the Prophets in order to describe, in all its grandeur, the glorious spectacle promised by God to the world when, being mindful of the Gentiles, he should lead them to the feet of Jesus. The Church has quoted the Prophet Isaias in the Epistle of the Feast, and no Prophet is so explicit and so sublime as this son of Amos.

The expression of the same universal expectation and desire is found also among the Gentiles. The Sibyls kept up the hope in the heart of the people; and in Rome itself, we find the Poet Virgil repeating, in one of his poems, the oracles they had pronounced. “The last age,” says he, “foretold by the Cumean Sibyl, is at hand; a new and glorious era is coming: a new race is being sent down to earth from heaven. At the birth of this Child, the iron age will cease, and one of gold will rise upon the whole world … No remnants of our crimes will be left, and their removal will free the earth from its never-ending fear.” (Virgil, Eclog. IV)

If we are unwilling to accept, as did St. Augustine and so many other holy Fathers, these Sibylline oracles as the expression of the ancient traditions—we have pagan philosophers and historians, such as Cicero, Tacitus, and Suetonius, testifying that, in their times, the world was in expectation of a Deliverer; that this Deliverer would come not only from the East, but from Judea; and that a Kingdom was on the point of being established which would include the entire world.

O Jesus, our Emmanuel! this universal expectation was that of the holy Magi, to whom thou didst send the Star. No sooner do they receive the signal of thy having come than they set out in search of thee, asking—where is He born that is King of the Jews? The oracles of thy Prophets were verified in them; but if they received the first-fruits of the great promise, we possess it in all its fullness. The Alliance is made; and our souls, for love of which thou didst come down from heaven, are thine. The Church is come forth from thy divine side, with the Blood and Water; and all that thou dost for this thy chosen Spouse, thou accomplishest in each of her faithful children. We are the sons of Japheth, and we have supplanted the race of Sem, which refused us the entrance of its tents; the birthright, which belonged to Juda, has been transferred to us. Each age, do our numbers increase, for we are to become numerous as the stars of heaven. We are no longer in the anxious period of expectation; the Star has risen, and the Kingdom it predicted will now forever protect and bless us. The Kings of Tharsis and the Islands, the Kings of Arabia and Saba, the Princes of Ethiopia, are come, bringing their gifts with them; all generations have followed them. The Spouse has received all her honors, and has long since forgotten Amana, and Sanir, and Hermon, where she once dwelt in the midst of wild beasts; she is not black, she is beautiful, with neither spot nor wrinkle upon her, but in every way is worthy of her divine Lord. Baal is forgotten forever, and she lovingly speaks the language given her by her God. The One Shepherd feeds the one flock. The last Kingdom, the Kingdom which is to continue forever, is faithfully fulfilling its glorious destiny.

It is thou, O Divine Infant! that bringest us all these graces and receivest all this devoted homage of thy creatures. The time will soon come, dear Jesus! when thou wilt break the silence thou hast imposed on thyself in order that thou mightest teach us humility—thou wilt speak to us as our Master. Cæsar Augustus has long ruled over Pagan Rome, and she thinks herself the kingdom that is to have no end; but she and her Rulers must yield to the Eternal King and his eternal City: the throne of earthly power must now give place for the Throne of Christian charity, and a new Rome is to spring up, grander than the first. The Gentiles are looking for thee, their King; but the day will come when they will have no need to seek thee, but thou, in thy mercy, wilt go in search of them, by sending them apostles and missioners, who will preach thy Gospel to them. Show thyself to them, as He to whom all power has been given in heaven and on earth; and show them also Her whom thou hast made to be Queen of the universe. May this august Mother of thine be raised up from the poor Stable of Bethlehem, and from the humble dwelling of Nazareth, and be taken on the wings of Angels to that throne of mercy which thou hast made for her, and from which she will bless all peoples and generations with her loving protection. (Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., The Liturgical Year, Third Day in the Octave of the Epiphany.)