Good morning.
The Lord tells the crowd they can read the sky. Then he asks why they cannot read what is right.
Friday of the Twenty-ninth Week in Ordinary Time
Gospel: "And he said also to the multitudes: When you see a cloud rising from the west, presently you say: A shower is coming: and so it happeneth: And when ye see the south wind blow, you say: There will be heat: and it cometh to pass. You hypocrites, you know how to discern the face of the heaven and of the earth: but how is it that you do not discern this time? And why even of yourselves, do you not judge that which is just? And when thou goest with thy adversary to the prince, whilst thou art in the way, endeavour to be delivered from him: lest perhaps he draw thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the exacter, and the exacter cast thee into prison. I say to thee, thou shalt not go out thence, until thou pay the very last mite." — Luke 12:54-59
The Latin of the question is Quid autem et a vobis ipsis non judicatis quod justum est?
In the Catena Aurea, Origen says what the question assumes: "But had it not been implanted in our nature to judge what is right, our Lord would never have said this." Bede says it needs no learning: "although unlearned they might still by their natural ability discern Him." Basil allows the weather-watching, within a limit: "conjectures concerning the stars are necessary to the life of man, as long as we do not push our searches into their signs beyond due limits." And Cyril names the sign they missed: "It became them also not to be ignorant of the time of salvation, that is, the coming of the Savior."
The full readings are on USCCB.org.
bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/102326.cfm →
Summa Theologiae, Part I-II, question 91, article 2
Aquinas asks whether there is a natural law in us, and lists the objections first. One is that man is free, and the freer a man is, the less he is under law. He answers from Scripture first, with a gloss on Romans 2:14: "Although they have no written law, yet they have the natural law, whereby each one knows, and is conscious of, what is good and what is evil."
Then he gives the reason. Everything is ruled by the eternal law, and a rational creature shares in it by knowing it. For this he cites the Psalm: "The light of Thy countenance, O Lord, is signed upon us." His reading: "the light of natural reason, whereby we discern what is good and what is evil, which is the function of the natural law, is nothing else than an imprint on us of the Divine light."
And the conclusion: "It is therefore evident that the natural law is nothing else than the rational creature's participation of the eternal law."
It is Origen's point in Scholastic form. The Lord can ask why we do not judge what is just because the means to judge it were given to us.
Thursday's close: SPY $764.03, −1.2% · Nasdaq 100 −2.9% · Russell 2000 +0.1% · tape BULL, regime correction · new longs still paused by the two-loss warning
Thursday opened lower and stayed there. The S&P 500 fund gapped down 0.9% to $766.33, reached a low of $761.17 and a high of $767.66, and closed at $764.03, down 1.2%. That is 1.9% below the six-month closing high of $779.10 set October 6. The Nasdaq 100 fund gapped down 1.6% at the open and closed at $704.56, down 2.9%. The Russell 2000 fund rose 0.1% and the equal-weight S&P 500 fund 0.8%, so the fall was concentrated in the largest names. Six of the eleven sector funds rose: consumer staples led at +3.3% and utilities followed at +2.0%. Technology was the weakest at −3.3%, and communication services fell 1.4%.
The two-loss warning is still on: the system takes no new long until SPY closes above $779.37, and Thursday's close was $15.34 short of it, 2.0% below. The tape turns, and the system sells every long, only on a SPY close below $629.29. By our own count, 6 of the last 25 sessions are distribution days for the S&P 500 fund and 8 for the Nasdaq 100 fund. The scanner's list holds twenty-six names at or near their 52-week pivots, and none triggered.
The house account holds no stock positions today, and no orders were placed Thursday. The seven puts cost $18,426 and were worth $25,070 on Alpaca's marks, up 36.1%, which is what they are for. The account closed at $993,334, up from $987,691 on Wednesday, on a day the S&P 500 fund fell 1.2%. The idle-cash sleeve is in commodities (DBC) and short-term Treasuries (SHY).
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The week ahead, per the USCCB daily readings calendar for the United States:
Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us.
In Christ,
Jonathan Simmons
Enoch Capital LLC
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