by
Thomas A. Droleskey
Although I have noted very frequently the low numbers of those who access this site's home page and the individual articles, having no way to know, given the limited technological tools available to me, if a particular article has been viewed for a given length of time (which would indicate whether someone glanced at an article or took the time to read it), the Alexa ranking service places this site currently at 177,187 in the United States of American and at 634,294 on a worldwide basis over the course of three months. There has been some considerable amount of slippage recently as the site has fallen in a one month sample of viewership to 804,123 worldwide, althought is rebounded to a "robust" 620,434 worldwide on a three month sample of viewership and a 795,322 on a one month sampling worldwide (pulling up to a ranking 174,500 in the United Sttes as of June 7, 2010. There are approximately one hundred million sites in the world.
The highest United States-based ranking of this site occurred some seven months ago now (gee, I wonder what was going on then?--something that I hope I never have to write about again) when one ranking placed it at around 69,000 or so of visited sites by American users of the internet.
As readers of this site know, my articles are written for the honor and glory of the Most Blessed Trinity as I attempt to make reparation for my many sins and mistakes to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary. No "search engine boosters" have ever been employed to "direct" internet "traffic" to this site. It is been my belief from the beginning in February of 2004, when this site replaced the printed Christ or Chaos journal, which was published between September of 1996 and August of 2003, as we have trusted that Our Lady would send us whoever needed to be sent to this site.
Oh, yes, sure, there are times when the lack of response to the appeals for just a bit of help from those who read this site gets discouraging in human terms. Everything that happens, of course, is in the Providence of God. It is not His Holy Will for us to be supported by large numbers of those who read this site, and this is something that I must accept with equanimity as we remain very grateful to those who do support us, mostly by means of truly sacrificial giving that we can repay only with our prayers.
Why am I writing about this?
Well, it's sort of like this: the empirical statistics demonstrating the relatively low numbers of people who read this site are pretty comparable to those of a few other sites (the statistics for worldwide rankings are taken from the three month average provided on the Alexa site; there are variations in some instances between that three month average and the one month figures).
This site has a higher Alexa ranking, believe it or not, than the Traditio site, which ranks at 360,670 in the United States and at 938,110 on a worldwide basis.
The online portion of the newspaper with which I was associated for about three and one-half years, The Remnant, has moved ahead of this site worldwide, ranking at
787,736 worldwide, while just slightly behind it here in the United States, where it ranks at 274,961, having a very strong showing the United Kingdom (96,333).
The Daily Catholic site, which editor-publisher Michael Cain has been producing for many years now (having beaten me to the punch concerning the truth that those who defect from the Faith cannot hold ecclesiastical office legitimately), ranks at
1,281,426 in the United States and
2,380,339 worldwide.
The Novus Ordo Watch site, which has no American ranking listed, ranks at 3,188,447 worldwide.
The Tradition in Action site has a ranking of
124,599 in the United States and
360,880 worldwide.
The website of the Congregation of Mary Immaculate Queen ranks at
697,627 in the United States and
1,322,900 worldwide.
The website of the Society of Saint Pius V has a website ranking of 7,927,437 (there is no ranking for the website of radio station WFTS).
The Traditional Mass.org website has a worldwide ranking of
2,946,195 worldwide and
471,021 in the United States. Saint Gertrude the Great Church has worldwide ranking of 3,775,056 and has no ranking in the United States of America.
The Latin Mass magazine's website has a worldwide rating of
3,112,597 and ranking of 529,089 in the United States. Its related website, Keep the Faith.org, has a worldwide ranking of
6,034,072 for the past three months (and a ranking of 3,994,571 in the past month).
The Saint Albert the Great.org website has worldwide ranking of 14,429,968, presumably mostly from the United States.
The CathInfo.com forum has a worldwide ranking of 2,164,508 and is ranks at
851,027 in the United States of America.
Today's Catholic World has a worldwide ranking of 1,775,678 and
498,067 in the United States of America.
The Four Marks newspaper ranks at
9,886,795 and has no ranking in the United States of America.
The Traditional Catholic Sermons website has a worldwide ranking of 2,505,866 and is not ranked in the United States.
The American website Society of Saint Pius X website is ranked at
1,247,110 worldwide and
451,848 in the United States of America. The official website of the Society's general house in Switzerland has a worldwide ranking of
3,032,482. The Society's British website comes in with a ranking of
6,318,991.
The Catholic Family News website, which does not feature daily updates as far as I can tell, ranks at 2,191,417 in the world (no ranking listed for this country).
Father Nicholas Gruner's Fatima.org website has a worldwide ranking of
501,451 and stands at
468,097 in the United States.
The highest ranking of all traditionally-minded websites is (and it would be intellectually dishonest not to report this fact as it is what it is) the Most Holy Family Monastery, which ranks at
78,275 in the United States and
218,506 in the world.
A site that is hostile to sedevacantism and to the Society of Saint Pius X almost in equal parts, Catholic Apologetics International, has a worldwide ranking of 1,270,041 and an American ranking of 442,390.
The website of the "unreconciled" Saint Benedict Center group founded by the late Father Leonard Feeney ranks at
469,893 in the world and
141,889 in the United States of America.
Even the newspaper for which I wrote for eight years, The Wanderer, which is available via subscription, has a relatively small audience, coming in at
3,252,501 worldwide and
762,732 in the United States.
This could go on and on.
By contrast, sites fully in tune with conciliarism have a far wider audience.
The charismatic-friendly "Spirit Daily" website ranks at 71, 324 worldwide and 19, 444 in the United States.
The "mainstream" conciliar website, Catholic Culture, org, ranks at 100,716 worldwide and
22,689 in the United States.
The "conservative" "What does the Prayer Really Say?" website has a ranking of 134,658 worldwide and of 35,652 in the United States.
Another conciliar site, Catholic.org, ranks at 25,394 worldwide and
8,979 in the United States.
The Eternally Wishful Television Network (EWTN) has a worldwide ranking of 20,373 and of
6,703 in the United States.
The official propaganda arm of the conciliar "bishops" in the United States of America, Catholic News Service, has a worldwide ranking of 181,990 and of 56,629 here at home.
A "conservative" conciliar website, Catholic News Agency, ranks at 58,741 in the world and 22,830 in the United States.
The New Advent website, which has become a "news portal" for the "conservative" brand of conciliarism in addition to hosting the 1910 Catholic Encyclopedia, ranks at 26,429 in the world and 8,217 in the United States.
The Zenit spin doctoring machine ranks at 42,028 worldwide and 27,187 in the United States.
The conciliar Vatican's website stands at 7,823 worldwide and
9,398 in the United States of America.
Even the American Life League's website doesn't fare a whole lot better than most traditionally-minded or even "conservative" or full-throated conciliar sites, ranking at 585,595 in the world and
224,682 in the United States. Human Life International? 825,440 in the world and
298,694 in the United States. The partly pro-abortion and "neutral-on-contraception" National Right to Life Committee does only slightly better with all of the fund-raising that its officials do:
279,463 in the world and
127,482 in the United States.
Even those numbers, although some are much better than traditionally-minded sites, are pretty measly in comparison to what's "out there" in cyberspace on the internet.
The point of this recitation, however, is to note that, no matter the differences that divide Catholics across the vast expanse of the ecclesiastical divide during this time of apostasy and betrayal, we are essentially yelling and screaming, figuratively speaking, at each other and the very small audiences that our work attracts relative to the volume of traffic on the internet.
Yes, some of the webmasters of the sites above would argue that their numbers are higher, that the Alexa service does not measure traffic accurately. Fine. Let them boast all they want. Perhaps their own figures are better than those found on the Alexa site.
My point remains, however, the same: more people in the world are concerned about such things as umpire Jim Joyce's blown call that ruined Detroit Tigers' pitcher Armando Galarraga's bid for a perfect game with two outs in the ninth inning or about the out-of-control former Duchess of York, Sarah Ferguson, to sell access to her former husband, Prince Andrew, the Duke of York, without knowing that she was dealing with a sting operation conducted by reporters for a London newspaper, News of the World. Very few people, relatively speaking, pay any attention to all to supernatural verities, no less the state of the Catholic Church in this time of one world peril after another unleashed in the world by the forces of Modernity and aided and abetted by the forces of conciliarism that have been their "reconciliation" to the principles of the "new era inaugurated in 1789."
Indeed, it is very sad to note that after Google, which is the highest ranking site in the world and in the United States of America, the second position in the worldwide and American Alexa rankings is a "Facebook" entry for same man named Bill Farmer. I don't know who Bill Farmer is or why his "facebook" entry is rated so high. Over 777,000 sites link into Bill Farmer's "facebook" entry! That's a higher number than this site's world wide web ranking! I don't even want to know who Bill Farmer is, thank you very much. All right, all right. I found out. He's the current voice of the cartoon character Goofy, of all things. The man who does the voice of Goofy is ranked number two of all of the websites in the world. Doesn't that say it all, my friends and regrettable foes? The man who does the voice of Goofy has a Facebook listing that places his page number two of all websites in the world.
Do you have any doubts that we are living in the midst of madness. Goofy?
Then again, why not. A world gone crazy as a result of the errors of Modernity and Modernism might as well turn to the voice of Goofy. (Hey, I used to do a pretty mean impression of Goofy in my younger days, sort of a variation of my Bullwinkle the Moose voice, which is a variation of my Crazy Guggenheim voice from Jackie Gleason's American Scene Magazine. All of this useless talent. Nowhere to use it. No classroom to just amuse myself with students who are young enough to be my grandchildren looking on as though I have nine heads. Ah, the penances. No other path to Heaven.)
Let's face it, my friends and regrettable foes amongst my former colleagues out there in cyberspace, we are really, really small potatoes whose universes consist of a very limited number of people interested in anything we have to write about any subject, no matter the Holy Faith.
Obviously, this is not to minimize the importance of making the effort to provide information to souls who are searching of it. I hear every once in a while from people I have never met who have found a particular article helpful to him. These are little consolations sent by Our Lady so that the hand can be kept on the plough as we keep working without looking back--and without looking for results!
We should, however, be aware that very few people are paying any attention to us, never tempted to exaggerate our own self-importance, which is nonexistent in the eyes of the world. Indeed, I have just shaken my head in disbelief when people, usually critics, exaggerate the "influence" of the work of this site as I am keenly aware that even most Catholics in the world are more concerned with bread and circuses than anything to do with the Holy Faith.
There is somewhat of a silver lining in all of this, however, at least as I see things. Very few people, relatively speaking, are paying any attention to L'Osservatore Romano or the Vatican Information Service or even Zenit, for that matter. Very few people, relatively speaking, even know that Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI is in Cyprus at the present moment, still on the prowl to promote conciliarism and thus deceive souls even though he thinks he is promoting "unity," babbling the same old conciliar shibboleths about seeking to
"strengthen our common bonds and to reiterate the need to build up mutual trust and lasting friendship between all those who worship the one God" (Welcoming Ceremony at the International Airport of Paphos, June 4, 2010) and seeking "unity" with the Orthodox, who constitute a majority of the Cypriot population, and the Protestants, although very few in number on Cyprus, without exhorting anyone within his hearing to convert unconditionally to the Catholic Church Ecumenical Celebration in the archeological area of the church of Agia Kiriaki Chrysopolitissa,Paphos, 4 June 2010.)
Thus it is that I will wait until Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI returns to Rome on Sunday to write an article about the latest offenses given to the honor and glory and majesty of the Most Blessed Trinity by one who is enabled in the commission of outrageous blasphemies and sacrileges by so many apologists, including those who know that it is offensive to God to personally esteem the symbols of false religions and to call their places of "worship" as sacred or to speak of the Catholic Church in terms of "communion" with those who must abjure their errors publicly and categorically in order to be members of the true Church. You wanna read more about the conciliarists and "unity" and false ecumenism, go read Anti-Apostles All and Forever Prowling the World Seeking the Ruin of Souls, part 1 and Forever Prowling the World Seeking The Ruin of Souls, part 2.
It is enough for now to point out that one of the saddest commentaries on our times is that so few people care to read anything at all. They simply want to be entertained as God is blasphemed by the lords of Modernity and Modernism alike, contributing to a pollution of souls the likes of which the massive oil spill in the Gulf Mexico, which will examined on this site next week, pales into insignificance, and this is to take nothing at all away from the great harm being done to the beaches on the shores of the Gulf and to the livelihood of those who depend upon commercial fishing and of the very quality and safety of our water supply.
Nothing that any of us write in cyberspace is "essential" for others to read. It is essential for us to quit our sins and to be sorry for them as we make reparation to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus through the Immaculate Heart of Mary for them, praying as many Rosaries each day as our states-in-life permit.
It is essential for us to pray and to work and to make sacrifices for more and more vocations to the priesthood and the consecrated religious life so that the faithful in the Catholic catacombs can continue to receive the true Sacraments and good Catholic instruction in the Faith as our priest and religious help to sanctify the world by means of their own many sacrifices and personal mortifications, especially as our true bishops and priests offer the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, thereby depriving many Catholics of the graces they need to sanctify and to save their souls, which is why the devil has sought to eradicate true offerings of the Mass so as to reduce the influence of grace in the world.
It is essential for us to forgive others the harm that they do to us or others, recognizing that it may be necessary to seek justice in particular situations but to do so by being truthful and without a trace of self-pity, appeals to emotionalism, character assassination and for the sake only of remedying the wound to justice that has been done as we are forgiven much in the Sacred Tribunal of Penance and must forgive others freely as we are given at the hands of a true priest.
It is essential for us to rely more tenderly upon Our Lady's motherly intervention and to seek her guidance to make good use as Catholics of our time rather than wasting it on the nattering nabobs of naturalism (a twist of the phrase "nattering nabobs of negativism" that was coined by White House speechwriter William Safire for then Vice President of the United States of America Spiro T. Agnew on September 11, 1970, at the California State Republican Convention in San Diego, California).
It is essential for us to seek to withdraw more and more from worldly ways and strive more earnestly and more fervently for the things of Heaven, indeed for the possession of the glory of the Beatific Vision of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost for all eternity.
It is not essential for any of our websites to exist. It is not important how many or few people read them. What matters is that we are trying, despite our own sins and failings, to please God and to help souls as best as we are able within our limitations of intellect.
Don't worry, in the event that you were worried, that is. I'll do a little summary of the "papal" visit to Cyprus for posting on Monday, possibly along with another article.
For now, pray a Rosary and spend more time in prayer before Our Lord's Real Presence in the Most Blessed Sacrament if you are privileged enough to live near Him as He awaits our acts of love in the tabernacle.
Viva Cristo Rey! Vivat Christus Rex!
Our Lady of Fatima, 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 Balthasar, pray for us.
Saint Boniface, pray for us.
See also: A Litany of Saints
Isn't it time to pray a Rosary now?
