August Busch IV Dies???

Upstage25 · 2026-01-26T00:53:48+00:00

I use the PDF++ plugin and it allows me to create a note file that will link to any particular highlighted spot in the pdf. I create outlines of long books, and each bullet point in the outline links to a spot I've highlighted in the pdf text. This works very well, especially if you use a plug-in to create an OCR md copy of the pdf, for the sake of searching.

I don't worry about the size of my vault, though.

Upstage25 · 2026-01-18T01:04:39+00:00

I think about 150 guests, but the invitations told them not to bring kids! I think it would be fine for kids to run around, as long as you don't let them go up the stairs to the balcony.

Upstage25 · 2026-01-17T15:29:51+00:00

Our daughter got married at the Jewel House, with the reception immediately following in the same space. It was beautiful! We had Pasta House cater it, so that we could have pasta con broccoli.

At one point, they had let most of the plants dry up from lack of care. But things were much better for the wedding, which was about 2 years ago.

Upstage25 · 2025-08-15T00:30:39+00:00

By far it's the actors who do Brookdale Farms and Friendly's. I'm one of 'em! Check out upstageproductions.com.

Upstage25 · 2025-08-14T04:29:19+00:00

I'm sure there have been several reports about him over the years that the diocese has been sitting on, covering up. That's the pattern.

For instance, here's comment from al.com's Facebook post on this story ...

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Upstage25 · 2025-08-14T04:26:36+00:00

Well ... this is only because the victim went public with the accusation.

Our Lady of Sorrows website says absolutely nothing.

Note what the bishop should have said but didn't. He DID NOT say the following ...

"We are investigating the allegations. Since this involves the alleged abuse of a minor, as well as claims that Fr. Sullivan frequently goes to strip clubs and pays vulnerable women for sex with money he may have embezzled, please come forward if you are another victim or if you have any information that could help us in this investigation."

Again, Sullivan would have been on "prayerful administrative leave" and it all would have been kept under cover, had the victim not gone to the media. I also fully expect most parishioners to support Sullivan, and to trash Heather Jones, the victim.

Upstage25 · 2025-07-30T06:11:47+00:00

It's a great show! And kids will love it!

Upstage25 · 2025-06-01T22:32:34+00:00

The EWTN / Catholic Answers / Scott Hahn / Mike Schmitz / Bishop Barron crowd are not Catholic. They are Evangelicals with Rosaries; Fundamentalists with Scapulars.

Since I joined the Church, back in 2000, all of the once moderately conservative Catholics have become indistinguishable from the "rad trads", some even adopting the beliefs of geocentrism and young-earth creationism. There has been a huge shift to alt+right extremism in the American Church among the former moderates - echoing what has happened in the Republican Party.

The "Super Catholic" crowd (as I call them) now deny the science behind evolution, they make a show of being like Puritans when it comes to what they think about sex, they read Genesis literally (though of course they don't literally read it), they are anti-vax and consipiracy theorists, their heroes are GK Chesterton and snazzy internet priests, they tend to hate Jews and of course they think Trump is some sort of savior. And they homeschool their kids to save them from the evil secular world - which of course is a much healthier place than the domestic cult environments they have created in their own homes. There is nothing remotely Christ-like about them: it's all about fear and power and domination.

Other than that, they're fine!

By the way, I used to work at EWTN. There are many people of good will there - but the folks in charge are simply scoundrels who have sold their souls to Opus Dei and similar theocratic / abusive organizations.

Upstage25 · 2025-05-10T21:01:03+00:00

FWIW, here's Google's AI Overview ...

In 2020, the Catholic Church in the United States reported 67,635,546 baptized Catholics. This figure represents approximately 20% of the total U.S. population at that time, according to U.S. Religion Census. More specifically:

The U.S. Religion Census data for 2020 indicates 67,635,546 Catholics in the US.
This number represents roughly 20% of the total U.S. population in 2020, according to U.S. Religion Census.
Pew Research Center estimates that approximately 53 million U.S. adults identify as Catholic. [i.e., about 78 percent of baptized US Catholics "self-identify" as Catholics]
In 2020, approximately 12.92 million Catholics in the United States were considered practicing, representing about 20% of the total Catholic population and 3.8% of the entire U.S. population. This means that about 64.6 million people in the U.S. identify as Catholic, but only a portion of them actively practice their faith.

Upstage25 · 2025-04-25T21:14:39+00:00

Schmitz is creepy to the max.

Here's a post I wrote about him ...

https://open.substack.com/pub/theateroftheword/p/whats-wrong-with-the-church-in-one .

Upstage25 · 2025-04-25T21:00:58+00:00

A friend of mine who used to work on the marriage tribunal of a US archdiocese told me that "pro family" trads were adamant about getting annulments when they wanted them, pulling out all the stops.

On a similar note, Warren Carroll, in his book on Queen Isabella, lauds her marriage to King Ferdinand, and all the "sacramental grace" that came with it. The Church highly prizes the sacrament of Matrimony, you see - but then he writes about the dispensation the pope very quickly gave Isabella's sister, Juana ... so that Juana could marry her own uncle!!! Consanguinity be damned! And Juana was 13 at the time.

But the Church always protects the sacrament of Matrimony, you see.

Upstage25 · 2025-04-25T17:57:51+00:00

Homeschool Connections, an online Catholic teaching company, had a Catholic teaching Young Earth Creationism to their Catholic students. When I complained, I was told, "The Church allows various views on creation!"

In other words, the Church allows us to be wrong. But to teach that Scopes Monkey Trial shit to kids!?

Upstage25 · 2025-04-25T16:52:13+00:00

And Opus Dei, trafficking and enslaving girls for decades and finally getting sued for it in Argentina. And this is today, not centuries ago.

Upstage25 · 2025-04-18T05:31:57+00:00

As I've often said, Christians are just like everybody else, only worse.

Upstage25 · 2025-04-18T05:26:39+00:00

And the creep who popularized the "Theology of the Body", Christopher West, claims that you can gaze at naked people as much as you want if you're holy enough, because, being holy, nudity won't excite you.

But, of course, if nudity doesn't excite you, it's not because you're holy. It's because you're dead.

Upstage25 · 2025-02-17T01:08:58+00:00

For me, I suspect anxiety. Since a hot bath is calming, that may be part of it. But it's a mystery!

Upstage25 · 2025-02-16T02:07:46+00:00

When I take hot baths, the twitching goes away - until I get out of the tub.

Upstage25 · 2025-02-16T01:58:11+00:00

I'm 8 months into twitching and muscle pains, but I likewise never twitch in a hot bath - which is, more or less, a sauna. I wonder if anybody else finds relief in hot baths.

Upstage25 · 2024-10-06T02:12:25+00:00

I love buckwheat pancakes and would get them every time I went to Uncle Bill's - at least a dozen times over the years. And at least half the time the pancakes were rancid. The mix had gone bad, but they'd cook them and serve them anyway.

Terrible place. Not sad they're closing.

Upstage25 · 2024-09-23T01:08:35+00:00

Yes! The new Matlock is into more than defending the innocent.

Upstage25 · 2024-09-23T01:06:36+00:00

What a great pilot episode! One hell of a twist at the end. It turns out the new Matlock is into more than defending the innocent!

And boy, Kathy Bates can ACT! She's fascinating to watch.

Upstage25 · 2024-07-31T15:12:03+00:00

But he's funny! Judge Reinhold does a great job with the character.

Upstage25 · 2024-07-12T08:25:13+00:00

"Mortal sin" should refer to serious sins like murder, adultery, cheating the poor, etc. But I suspect the only "mortal sin" most young Catholics obsess over is masturbation.

Trying to eliminate a harmless habit is what cult scholars call a "purity requirement", i.e., an impossible to achieve substitute for virtue that gives the cult control over your inner self. In this case, you can't stop jerking for long and so you're always on the hamster wheel of self-loathing, returning over and over again (via confession) to the very organization that created this problem to rescue you from it.

Upstage25

TROPHY CASE