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reetings from Australia. 

Welcome to this Red-Letter Day. Below you will find today's global celebrations, birthdays and events.

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Carpe diem! (Seize the day!)

Pip Wilson

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Carpe diem! 29 Yesterday | Tomorrow | Search Open links in a New Window

Today is

As for the future, your task is not to foresee it, but to enable it.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry; The Wisdom of the Sands  

A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry; Flight to Arras

La perfection est atteinte non quand il ne reste rien à ajouter, mais quand il ne reste rien à enlever.
(You know you've achieved perfection in design, not when you have nothing more to add, but when you have nothing more to take away.)
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward together in the same direction. 
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Voici mon secret. Il est très simple : on ne voit bien qu'avec le coeur. L'essentiel est invisible pour les yeux.
(It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; What is essential is invisible to the eye.)
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry; The Little Prince  

What makes the desert beautiful is that somewhere it hides a well.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Transport of the mails, transport of the human voice, transport of flickering pictures – in this century, as in others, our highest accomplishments still have the single aim of bringing men together.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry; Wind, Sand, and Stars

Pure logic is the ruin of the spirit. 
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

The machine does not isolate us from the great problems of nature but plunges us more deeply into them.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

There is no hope of joy except in human relations.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry  

I do not respect reviewers. They are almost always failed writers, consequently envious and jealous of those who write. I find their profession kind of despicable, because it is so unfair and stupid to snap judgments in a little article after the work of years. I think that the real reviewers are the readers. I care very much for the letters of my readers. I receive them from all over the world, and they always say much more intelligent things than those written by the 'reviewers'.
Oriana Fallaci, Italian interviewer, writer and journalist, born on June 29, 1930

Listening to someone talk isn't at all like listening to their words played over on a machine. What you hear when you have a face before you is never what you hear when you have before you a winding tape.
Oriana Fallaci; The Egotists, Foreword, 1963

With our progress we have destroyed our only weapon against tedium: that rare weakness we call imagination.
Oriana Fallaci; in Words of Women Quotations for Success, Power Dynamics Publishing, 1997

I always introduce myself as an encyclopaedia of defects which I do not deny. Why should I? It took me a whole life to build myself as I am.
Oriana Fallaci
 
To have realized your dream makes you feel lost.
Oriana Fallaci; Letter to a Child Never Born, 1975
                             
The clash between us and them is not a military one. It's a cultural one, a religious one, and the worst is still to come.
Oriana Fallaci

I leave shreds of my soul on every experience.
Oriana Fallaci

... who is the pioneer of modern journalism? Not Hemingway who wrote of his experiences in the trenches, not Orwell who spent a year of his life with the Parisian poor, not Egon Erwin Kisch the expert on Prague prostitutes, but Oriana Fallaci who in the years 1969 to 1972 published a series of interviews with the most famous politicians of the time. Those interviews were more than mere conversations; they were duels. Before the powerful politicians realized that they were fighting under unequal conditions – for she was allowed to ask questions but they were not – they were already on the floor of the ring, KO'ed.
Milan Kundera, Immortality; on Oriana Fallaci

... we all ate our mushrooms facing the wall where the small altar table stood. We ate them in silence, except for Cayetano's father, don Emilio, who was consulting the mushrooms about his infected left forearm. He would jerk his head violently with each mushroom that he swallowed, and utter a smacking noise, as though in acknowledgment of their divine potency. I was seated in the corner of the room on the left of the altar. The señora asked me to move because the word would come down there…
  I joined Allan immediately behind the señora, we took about a half hour to eat our six pairs of mushrooms. By eleven o'clock we had finished our respective portions, the señora crossing herself with the last swallow. … At about 11:20 Allan leaned from his chair and whispered to me that he was having a chill. We wrapped him in a blanket. A little later he leaned over again and said, `Gordon, I am beginning to see things,' to which I gave him the comforting reply that I was too.
  The patterns grew into architectural structures, with colonnades and architraves, patios of regal splendor, the stonework all in brilliant colors – gold and onyx and ebony – all harmoniously and ingeniously contrived, in richest magnificence extending beyond the reach of sight. These architectural visions seemed oriental, though at every stage I pointed out to myself that they could not be identified with any specific oriental country...
  At one point in the faint moonlight the bouquet on the table assumed the dimensions and shape of an imperial conveyance, a triumphal car, drawn by zoological creatures conceivable only in an imaginary mythology, bearing a woman clothed in regal splendor. The visions came in endless succession, each growing out of the preceding ones. We had the sensation that the walls of our humble house had vanished, that our untrammeled souls were floating in the empyrean, stroked by divine breeze, possessed of a divine mobility that would transport anywhere on the wings of a thought. Only when by an act of conscious effort I touched the wall of Cayetano's house would I be brought back to the confines of the room where we all were, and this touch with reality seemed to be what precipitated nausea in me.
R Gordon Wasson, American mycologist, describing his first psychedelic mushroom experience with Maria Sabina on June 29, 1955   Source

A specialist is a man who knows more and more about less and less.
William Mayo

June 29 is the 180^th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (181^st in leap years), with 185 days remaining.
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Feast day of St Peter the Apostle and St Paul the Apostle (Book of Common Prayer January 25)

(Yellow rattle, Rhinanthus galli, is today's plant, dedicated to St Peter.)

The joint feast of Saints Peter and Paul seems always to have been kept at Rome on June 29, and might go back at least to the time of Constantine (b. 274). In 9^th Century England, the Christian feasts were confined to Christmas, Epiphany, three days of Easter, Assumption, Saints Peter and Paul, St Gregory, and All Saints.

From the days of the early Christian Church, these two were considered the chief of the male saints; in the mosaics of the Roman basilicas, dating from the 4^th Century to the 9^th, Christ appears as the central figure, with Saints Peter and Paul on his right and left.

Today is a religious and national holiday in Colombia, Costa Rica, Peru, San Marino, State of the Vatican City, and Venezuela, also a local holiday in Rome, of which Peter and Paul are patron saints.

Peter

Saint Peter (d. c. 67) was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus Christ in the New Testament. His birth name was Simon (Hebrew שמעון Šim'ôn, Shim'on 'Hearkening; listening'), he was a fisherman, and was given the nickname of 'Peter', which means 'rock' in Greek (Petros). St Paul generally called him Cephas or Kephas, which is the Aramaic equivalent of the nickname. He was the brother of Saint Andrew the Apostle who led him to Christ. Roman Catholics believe him to be the first Pope and to their church he is known as 'Prince of the Apostles'.

According to the early Christian writers Tertullian and Origen, Peter was crucified upside-down; according to some, this had been prophesied by Jesus (John 21.18: "when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and take you where you do not want to go"). St Clement of Rome, c. 95, placed his death in the time of Nero. In later tradition, Peter is considered the first bishop of Antioch and later bishop of Rome. The New Testament includes two letters ascribed to Peter: the First Epistle of Peter and the Second Epistle of Peter. Based on the quality of the Greek, many scholars doubt that the apostle Peter actually penned those letters, but he might have had an amanuensis.

Peter's symbols in art include a bunch of keys, because Christ gave him "the keys of the kingdom of heaven". Another is  a rooster, because he went out and wept bitterly when he heard the cock crow, having denied Christ as He said he would (Matt. xxvi.75), and a double-barred cross.

He is often portrayed as a nearly bald man, often with a fringe of hair on the sides and a tuft on top.

Peter's churches

In England alone, Peter has 830 churches dedicated in his sole honour, and 30 jointly with St Paul, and 10 in connection with some other saint.

St Peter's day at the Vatican

Peter's Pence

"Annual tribute of one penny, paid at the feast of St Peter to the see of Rome, collected at first from every family, but afterwards restricted to those 'who had the value of thirty pence in quick or live-stock'. This tax was collected in England from the late 8th century until its abolition by Henry VIII in 1534. It was also called Rome-Scot, Rome fardynges, or Peter's farthings. Much of it never got as far as Rome. Peter's Pence now consists of voluntary offerings made to the Holy See by Roman Catholics."   
Ivor H Evans, Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, Cassell, London, 1988

"On 29 June, or the Sunday closest to it, a voluntary collection is taken called 'Peterspence' (also written as 'Peter's Pence'). Peterspence, along with investments, once constituted the Vatican's sole source of income aside from the gifts of benefactors and voluntary alms (nowadays, the Vatican is entangled with 'Big Banking' and God knows what else). Traditional Catholics might decide to give their 'pence' to traditional Catholic organizations instead.

"Originally, Peterspence was a medieval tax of one penny placed by English Kings on householders who had a certain amount of land. The practice spread throughout Christendom, but didn't survive the 'Reformation.' When Pope Pius IX, though, was driven from Rome and exiled after the Papal States were stolen by agents of the Masonic 'Risorgimento,' the practice was brought back, so that now Catholics voluntarily give in order to support the works of the Church."  Source

To find stolen property 

Shears are stuck in the wood of a sieve and two maidens hold up the sieve by the shears' handle. Then they say "By St Peter and St Paul, so and so has stolen such a thing".  Others say "By St Peter and St Paul, he has not stolen it." The sieve will turn when the thief is named.
John Aubrey, Remains of Gentilism, 1688 (Charles Kightly, The Perpetual Almanack of Folklore, Thames and Hudson, London, 1987, June13 page)

No two Pope Peters

Peter and lingam
"The rock on which the church was founded had roots in the pagan Roman myths of the city God Petra, the Mithraic father of fathers. Petra's symbol, a phallic stone like the Siva lingam of the Hindus, was planted on the middle of the Vatican right up to the late Middle Ages."   Source

Commemorations of St Peter
June 29 (feast of Peter and Paul)
February 22 (feast of the Chair of Peter, emblematic of the world unity of the Church)
November 28 (feast of the dedication of the Basilicas of Peter and Paul)

St Paul

St Paul of Tarsus or St Paul, the Apostle (b. c. 3 - beheaded at Rome, Italy c. 66) was born Saul of Tarsus in Tarsus of Cilicia and described himself as an Israelite of the tribe of Benjamin and a Pharisee (Rom. 11:1, Phil. 3:5). He studied religion "at the feet of Gamaliel" (Acts 22:3) in Jerusalem, and also pursued the occupation of tent maker (hence is the patron saint of that craft). As a youth, he was present and approving at the stoning of Christianity's first martyr, St Stephen. His conversion, however, led him to become one of the Christian Church's primary leaders, and he died a martyr himself. 

Paul himself openly admitted that he at first persecuted Christians (Phil. 3:5). He was converted to Christianity when a bright light blinded him on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:1-9). In Paul's vision, Jesus Christ rebuked him and told him he was destined to take the Gospel to the Gentiles. This event is commemorated on what is more generally thought of as his feast day, the Feast of Paul's Conversion (January 25).

After his resounding conversion, St Paul made missionary journeys all over the Middle East. Enduring imprisonment, hardship of all kinds and even shipwreck, he was a very resolute spreader of the Christian faith, profoundly affecting the very heart of Western civilisation. Many today see his texts as having had a singularly negative effect on male-female relations and tolerance for divergence of thought and behaviour.

Talmudic scholar Hyam Maccoby, in his book The Mythmaker: Paul and the Invention of Christianity, theorises that St Paul was raised among mystery religions which featured dying and resurrected saviours, then later converted to Judaism, with the hope of becoming a Pharisee.

Paul and the sword

One of the symbols of St Paul is a sword (others include springs of water, and a book), because he was decapitated in about 66 CE, traditionally at Tre Fontaine in Rome. It is said Paul was martyred after converting one of Nero's favourite concubines, and that milk instead of blood flowed from his wounds. The Convent of La Lisla in Spain even claims to have the very sword.

"As soone as the heed was from the body" his head said "Jesus Christus fyfty tymes", according to an ancient writer. Others said his head ran milk instead of blood; the head gave three leaps and at each one a fountain sprung up where it fell, and they remain today.

Paul's patronage also includes against snakes, authors, evangelists, hailstorms, hospital public relations, journalists, musicians, newspaper editorial staff, poisonous snakes, public relations personnel, publishers, rope makers, saddlemakers, snake bites, and writers.

Commemorations of St Paul
January 25 (celebration of his conversion)
June 29 (celebration of Saints Peter and Paul, co-founders of the Church)
November 18 (feast of the dedication of the Basilicas of Peter and Paul)

St Paul's Grotto, Malta
There is a legend that states that St Paul's cave on the Mediterranean island of Malta (where he was shipwrecked) remains the same size regardless of how many pieces of rock are removed from the cave as souvenirs.   Source

Cure for dancing mania
"The terms tarantism and dancing mania are often used interchangeably as they share overlapping features. Tarantism was mainly confined to southern Italy. Gloyne (1950, 29) describes it as the 'mass hysterical reaction' to perceived bites of the tarantula spider. The first recorded episodes appeared during the thirteenth century and persisted on a widespread scale in southern Europe for 400 years, reaching a peak in the seventeenth century, after which it virtually disappeared. Small annual episodes have persisted in southern Italy well into the twentieth century. Hans Schadewaldt (1971) investigated an outbreak in Wardo during 1957. Italian religious history professor Ernesto de Martino (1966) identifies thirty-five cases of tarantism near Galatina in 1959. De Martino conducted his survey between June 28 and 30, as June 29 is the festival day of St. Peter and St. Paul. On that day it is customary for the 'victims' to travel from regional villages to the chapel of St. Paul to obtain a cure for various ailments. More recently, it has been observed near Sardinia, Italy (Gallini 1988)."   Source

Watching march
"The guard of civilians enrolled in mediaeval London to keep order in the streets on the Vigils of St Peter and St John the Baptist during the festivities; used also of the festivities themselves."
Evans, Ivor H, Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, Cassell, London, 1988

Harvest herbs
An old East Anglian custom has it that today is propitious for harvesting herbs. 

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