Piggy-backing on the New Orleans elites’ purge of monuments dedicated to Southern heroes, some ne’er-do-wells have decided that the slaughter of the shrines wasn’t continuing at a fast enough pace and decided to begin defacing and destroying the property themselves. One such monument to gain their ire was that of Father Abram Joseph Ryan, Poet-Priest of the South. Father Ryan’s works, though noted in love for his home of Dixie, were not confined to that topic, the majority of his poems being religious in nature, reflecting upon spiritual mysteries. These “cultural cleansers,” comprised of self proclaimed “anti-fascists,” defaced a New Orleans monument to Father Ryan, spraying a red anarchist emblem over the front. A hammer and chisel (a hammer and sickle would have been more appropriate) was laid before the monument, with a note to the public. The note furthered their infantile views, inviting all to “Take a few whacks! Carve your name! Chisel a penis! Mind the wet paint and have fun!”

For the pleasure of the viewer, and in contrast to the inane, self-destructive Marxist drivel presented by the vandals, Father Ryan’s own words are forwarded in his poem, “A Land Without Ruins.”

 YES, give me the land where the ruins are spread,
And the living tread light on the hearts of the dead;
Yes, give me a land that is blest by the dust
And bright with the deeds of the down-trodden just.
Yes, give me the land where the battle’s red blast
Has flashed to the future the fame of the past;
Yes, give me the land that hath legends and lays
That tell of the memories of long vanished days;
Yes, give me a land that hath story and song,
Enshrine the strife of the right with the wrong;
Yes, give me a land with a grave in each spot
And names in the graves that shall not be forgot;
Yes, give me the land of the wreck and the tomb–
There is grandeur in graves–there is glory in gloom;
For out of the gloom future brightness is born
As after the night comes the sunrise of morn;
And the graves of the dead with the grass overgrown
May yet form the footstool of liberty’s throne,
And each single wreck in the war-path of might,
Shall yet be a rock in the temple of right.

Could a greater contrast be considered? These delinquents and cultural degenerates only make the man shine all the more.

Father Ryan, ora pro nobis.