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Mysticism and Controversy
Posted by Brother André Marie, M.I.C.M. in Spiritual Theology
This article was originally published on the Spero News site.
It is a wonderful sign that the study of serious mystical theology is gaining momentum in Catholic circles. We have much cause for joy in the revival of the deep, fortifying works of spiritual masters such as St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila, Abbot Columba Marmion, and many other mystical writers whose life work was "to do and to teach" (Acts 1:1) in the realm of orthodox and fruitful Catholic spirituality.
One subject that all of the sound authors in this area touch upon — and something generally accepted today — is what is called the "universal call to holiness." This is the doctrine which asserts that all of Christ's faithful, by virtue of their common baptism, are called not merely to escape hell, but to achieve the heights of sanctity, to become saints, even to possess on earth that state properly known as the mystical life. Sanctity, many authors continually and rightly remind us, is not something reserved for a special caste in the Church — not the religious, not the priest, not the bishop — although these contract, by vow or orders, certain additional obligations in regard to sanctity. No one group in the Mystical Body was meant to have a monopoly on the precious pearl of the interior life lived to an excellent degree.
While many authors are reminding us of this truth, I think it not unwarranted to make my own humble contribution to the effort, with some specific points of emphasis — and a correction. Summarily, I would like to focus upon a common doctrine of Catholic mystical writers, which is that the spiritual life known as the "three ways" is something accessible to all. The correction is of a common error many modern writers and popular preachers fall into when they assert that, in the days before Vatican II, sanctity was generally considered the vocation of an elite, not the common call of Christians. This is a disservice and an injustice to our Catholic forefathers. If the reader has never heard claims of this kind, he should read this article, which makes some uncommonly hubristic assertions. (St. Thomas, whom the author of this piece seems to have read only superficially, deserves a heartfelt apology!) True, there were always bad thinkers among clergy and faithful; there was always clericalism among some clergy; and there has always existed a tendency to mediocrity and a half-measured living of the Gospel among many of the faithful; but these particular effects of original sin do not justify impugning the generality of our ancestors for adhering to a two-track system in which the lay person was regarded as second class, while the true spiritual adepts — the pros, as it were — dwelt in convents, monasteries, or rectories.
I propose to kill two birds with one stone, that is, to summarize the authentic doctrine while showing that it was not an innovation of Vatican II. The "stone" I will use consists of references to pre-Vatican II authors who elucidated the "universal call" — and generally, I might add, far better than most contemporary writers on the subject.
Beginning with the End
Many scriptural commentators take notice of the fact that the Sermon on the Mount, wherein Our Lord introduces the Gospel, presents a description of the apex of sanctity. This is accomplished in the eight beatitudes, which St. Thomas Aquinas explains to be the most perfect acts of the theological virtues operating under the influence of the gifts of the Holy Ghost. The beatitudes pertain not only to the life of Heaven (our final end), but to the life of perfection here on earth (our proximate preparation for that end). Here are St. Thomas' simple and consoling words on the matter: "[T]hose things which are set down as merits in the beatitudes, are a kind of preparation for, or disposition to happiness, either perfect or inchoate: while those that are assigned as rewards, may be either perfect happiness, so as to refer to the future life, or some beginning of happiness, such as is found in those who have attained perfection, in which case they refer to the present life. Because when a man begins to make progress in the acts of the virtues and gifts, it is to be hoped that he will arrive at perfection, both as a wayfarer, and as a citizen of the heavenly kingdom."
At the beginning of His public life, Our Lord showed us the goal, just as the builder sets to work with a blueprint of what the edifice is supposed to look like when completed. God directs us, as He did Moses concerning the Tabernacle: "Look and make it according to the pattern, that was shewn thee in the mount" (Ex. 25:40). The Mount of Beatitudes, where Christ gave the New Law, rises higher than Mount Sinai, whence came the law of types and figures.
If the blessings of the beatitudes apply also to this life as a prelude to the life of Heaven, then those who have them now ("those who have attained perfection") are ready for their final end. For these all-too-rare souls, death will be little more than the opening of the veils separating them from the Beatific Vision. For the rest of us who die in the state of grace, there is Purgatory — God's summer school for the ill prepared.
Father Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange
The Dominican Father Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. (1877-1964), masterfully explained the theology of the spiritual life in his two-volume The Three Ages of the Interior Life. He is most insistent that the perfection required for this immediate entry into Heaven is the full plenitude of the theological virtue of Charity, elevated in its operation by the highest of the gifts of the Holy Ghost: Wisdom. Here, the learned Dominican was loyally following St. Thomas. But the Angelic Doctor was not breaking new ground; it was St. Paul who called Charity the "bond of perfection" (Col. 3:14).
Father Garrigou-Lagrange follows the three-fold distinction of spiritual progress that is common to most Catholic schools of spirituality: the purgative way, the illuminative way, and the unitive way. He challenges his readers with the abundantly proven doctrine that the unitive way is in the "normal way of sanctity," that is, far from being an extraordinary phenomenon like speaking in tongues, prophecy, and suchlike, mysticism properly so-called is the normal flowering of the life of grace in the fervent Christian. (It is important to note here that "normal" does not mean "common." Many abnormalities are common.) Beginning with St. Thomas' teaching that "grace is nothing else than a beginning of glory in us," he illustrates how this seed of divine life is to grow in our souls to full bloom.
After citing St. Thomas, St. John of the Cross, and St. Francis de Sales in support of his assertions, he concludes: "We have thus found a confirmation of what we believe to be the truth about the infused contemplation of the mysteries of faith, which seems to us more and more to be in the normal way of sanctity and to be morally necessary to the full perfection of Christian life. … In this sense, we maintain and we explain what seems to us the traditional teaching, which is more and more accepted today: namely, that the normal prelude of the vision of heaven, the infused contemplation of the mysteries of faith, is, by docility to the Holy Ghost, prayer, and the cross, accessible to all fervent interior souls."
Far from merely postulating a general call to holiness, Father Garrigou-Lagrange explains holiness as close union with God, a union whose normal development leads to the mystical state, i.e., the state of contemplation, or the unitive way.
This Dominican theologian was an arch-anti-modernist, a doctrinaire son of St. Dominic if ever there was one. His "Where is the New Theology Leading Us?" was a critique of authors like Hans Urs von Balthasar and Henri de Lubac, who, in the name of resourcement, were jeopardizing the sacred deposit. I mention this not merely to excoriate these authors (who rightly deserve it), but also to make it plain that it was Garrigou-Lagrange's dedication to tradition and orthodoxy that guided his approach to the mystical life. All the more reason to hold in contempt the idea that the universal call to sanctity is a forty-year-old phenomenon.
Dom Prosper Guéranger
We have cited the authority of a Dominican who worked in the twentieth century. Let us go back earlier, to a man who died about two years before Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange was born: Abbot Guéranger, O.S.B. He was a product — nay, an inspiration — of that "reactionary," anti-revolutionary, nineteenth-century movement known as ultramontanism (see his robust Papal Monarchy, which has only recently been Englished). A powerfully motivating force behind Blessed Pio Nono's two infallible definitions, he also revived Gregorian Chant (the "Solesmes Method" goes back to him), Benedictine monasticism, and the Roman liturgy in France, where it had been replaced by the inferior neo-Gallican rites. In his magisterial fifteen-volume work, The Liturgical Year, we find a relevant passage among his meditations for the Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost. The abbot is commenting on the Epistle (Ephesians 3:13-21), whose central passage has St. Paul praying, "That Christ may dwell by faith in your hearts; that being rooted and founded in charity, you may be able to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth, and length, and height, and depth: to know also the charity of Christ, which surpasseth all knowledge, that you may be filled unto all the fulness of God." The commentary ought to be savored, not merely read:
"But, if holiness is requisite in order to obtain the full development of the divine life spoken of by the apostle, let us also take notice how the desire and the prayer of St. Paul are for all men; and how, therefore, no one is excluded from that divine vocation. Indeed, as St. John Chrysostom observes, the Christians, to whom he sends his Epistle, are people living in the world, married, having children and servants, for he gives them rules of conduct with regard to each point. The saints of Ephesus, as of all other places, are no others than the faithful of Christ Jesus, that is to say, they are those who faithfully follow the divine precepts, in the condition of life proper to each. Now, it depends on us to follow God's grace; nothing else but our own resistance prevents the Holy Ghost from making saints of us. Those sublime heights, to which the progressive movement of the sacred liturgy has, since Pentecost, been leading the Church, are open to all of us. If the new order of ideas introduced by this movement strike us, at times, as being beyond our practical attainment, the probable reason of such cowardice is — and a short examination of conscience will bear witness against us — that we have neglected, ever since Advent and Christmas, to profit, as we should have done, by the teachings and graces of every kind, which were given us as means for advancing in light and in Christian virtue." (The Liturgical Year, Vol. 11, p. 359-360.)
In order to make sense out of Dom Guéranger's last two sentences, we must be aware that, like many other authors (e.g., Blessed Abbot Marmion, O.S.B, and Father Gabriel of Saint Mary Magdalen, O.C.D.), the good Abbot of Solesmes sees the cycle of the Church's liturgical year divided into three parts corresponding to the purgative, illuminative, and unitive ways.
It may seem that this monastic author proposes something out of the norm, a standard beyond reach of most of the laity (and most clergy and religious, for that matter). On the contrary, what the master of Solesmes proposed is nothing more than the common, traditional teaching. Writing in the July/August 1997 Envoy Magazine, Norbertine Father Hugh Barbour, O. Praem., speaks of an error that crept up in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries concerning the "ordinary way" that laity were to follow as distinguished from the way of great sanctity to be pursued by religious. Father Barbour shows that this error was not left unanswered:
"Right away, though, the saints themselves began to react to this error. St. Alphonsus taught his missionary preachers how to teach the faithful to make a meditation. St. Francis de Sales' teaching [that] encouraged holiness through contemplation among the laity was promoted. Finally, in this and the last century, the Church encouraged a revival of the study of St. Thomas Aquinas. The Dominicans and Carmelites, who had always followed St. Thomas very closely, started proving from his writings, from Scripture and from the Fathers, that the mystical life of prayer in its full development was the normal, organic result of the life of grace for all the members of the Mystical Body of Christ. St. Teresa's Interior Castle is for everyone, not just nuns. The mystical 'dark nights' can be undergone by any Christian, if he does not give up the battle for spiritual progress in union with God. The great teachers in these things were the Dominicans Arintero and Garrigou-Lagrange, the Carmelite Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalene, the Benedictine Abbot Marmion and the Trappist Dom Chautard."
He concludes by pointing out the availability of the works of these men, even in English.
So it is not a case of "pre-Vatican II" and "post-Vatican II" thinking about sanctity for the laity. It is, rather, a question of what constitutes authentic Catholic tradition going back to that most exacting command of the Man-God: "Be ye therefore perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Mt. 5:48). The contemporary Norbertine writer we have just cited names some of the most beloved and widely read spiritual writers of the "pre-Vatican II" Church; yet many of these are among the same authors experiencing a wonderful revival in our day, thanks, in large measure, to the zealous efforts of their religious orders, as well as lay-run, traditionalist publishing houses.
Beginner, Proficient, Perfect
Those who tread the three ways we call beginners (purgative way), proficients (illuminative way), and perfect (unitive way). Abbot Guéranger, whose focus in The Liturgical Year is to draw all his doctrine and devotion from the Church's liturgy, explains the annual cycle in terms of the three ways:
"We have shown elsewhere how the time of Advent belongs to that period of the spiritual life which is called, in Mystic Theology, the Purgative Life, during which the soul cleanses herself from sin and the occasions of sin, by the fear of God's judgements, and by combating against every evil concupiscence. We are taking it for granted that every faithful soul has journeyed through these rugged paths, which must be gone through before she could be admitted to the Feast to which the Church invites all mankind, saying to them, on the Saturday of the Second Week of Advent, these words of the Prophet Isaias: Lo! This is our God: we have waited for him, and he will save us. We have patiently waited for him, and we shall rejoice and be joyful in his Salvation! (Isa. XXV 9) As in the house of our heavenly Father there are many mansions, so likewise, on the grand Solemnity of Christmas, when those words of Isaias are realized, the Church sees, amongst the countless throng who receive the Bread of Life, a great variety of sentiments and dispositions. Some were dead, and the graces given during the holy Season of Advent have restored them to life: others, whose spiritual life had long been healthy, have so spent their Advent that its holy exercises have redoubled their love of their Lord, and their entrance into Bethlehem has been to them a renewal of their soul's life.
"Now every soul that has been admitted to Bethlehem, that is to say, into the House of Bread, and has been united with him who is the Light of the World — that soul no longer walks in darkness. The mystery of Christmas is one of Illumination; and the grace it produces in the soul that corresponds with it, places her in the Illuminative Life. Henceforward, then, we need no longer weary ourselves watching for our Savior's arrival; he has come, he has shone upon us, and we are resolved to keep up the light, nay, to cherish its growth within us, in proportion as the Liturgical Year unfolds its successive seasons of mysteries and graces. God grant that we may reflect in our souls the Church's progressive development of this divine Light; and be led by its brightness to that Union which crowns both the year of the Church and the faithful soul which has spent the year under the Church's guidance." (The Liturgical Year, Vol. 2, p. 20-21.)
Pentecost, as explained elsewhere in the abbot's magnum opus, is the season of the unitive way. The season dedicated to the Holy Ghost in the liturgical year corresponds to that highest plane of the interior life, wherein the gifts of the Holy Ghost are most operative and their effects most sustained.
The Church's Doctor of Mystical Theology, St. John of the Cross, tells us that what distinguishes these three phases are the so-called "passive purifications." The passive purification of the senses brings the soul from the purgative to the illuminative way. The passive purification of the spirit is the difficult bridge from the illuminative to the unitive way. The old Catholic Encyclopedia summarizes the Spanish Carmelite succinctly in the matter of purifications:
"What mystical writers describe as the active and passive purifications of the spiritual life may be brought under, and arranged according to, their three states of perfection, though not confined to any one of them. The active purification consists of all the holy efforts, mortifications, labors, and sufferings by which the soul, aided by the grace of God, endeavors to reform the mind, heart, and the sensitive appetite. This is the characteristic work of the purgative way. The passive purifications are the means which God employs to purify the soul from its stains and vices, and to prepare it for the exceptional graces of the supernatural life. In the works of St. John of the Cross these purifications are called nights, and he divides them into two classes, the night of the senses and the night of the spirit."
Father Garrigou-Lagrange follows St. Thomas in likening the three ways to the ages of corporeal life: childhood, adolescence, and maturity. He goes further than the Angelic Doctor: By synthesizing this spiritual analogy with the doctrine of St. John of the Cross, the French Thomist compares the passive purifications to certain crises of physical growth and maturation. Thus, the crisis of puberty corresponds to the dark night of the senses. As the former brings the child into adolescence, the latter brings the beginner to illumination. The passive purification of the spirit, more harrowing and arduous, is like the often perilous age of liberty that bridges adolescence and adulthood.
The author of The Three Ages of the Spiritual Life is careful to note that while St. John of the Cross addresses contemplative religious in his works (he was writing for his own), the active life of both the non-monastic religious, and the lay person in the world are compatible with these purifications. It is true that active souls will experience the passive purifications quite differently than contemplatives, but the purifications are necessary for progress, as much for the Carthusian as for the saintly auto mechanic or housewife.
(A very useful chart of the three ways, showing the place of prayer, the gifts, the virtues, and the purifications, is online here.)
Ascetical and Mystical
Those who have read a modicum of spiritual theology have doubtless run into the terms "ascetical" and "mystical." While the terms are used differently by authors, for the Dominican and Carmelite writers, ascetical (coming from the same Greek word giving us "athlete") corresponds to the purgative way, while mystical corresponds to the two higher ways. Very important for the theology of Father Garrigou-Lagrange is the fact that the ascetical life is ordered to the mystical life.
What does it mean to say that asceticism is ordained to mysticism? A brief explanation should help: Asceticism consists in "the active purification of the external and internal senses, of the passions, of the intellect and the will, by mortification, meditation, and prayer" (Father Garrigou-Lagrange) — all under the influence of actual grace. The soul's powers are very active, while the gifts of the Holy Ghost are more or less latent. The mystical life involves the more frequent, intense, and direct activity of the Holy Ghost. Because the ascetical life is a necessary foundation for the mystical life — and the latter is the natural development of the former — we say that the asceticism is ordered to mysticism.
An Eighteenth-Century Innovation
The question ought to be asked: Is there anything to justify the claim that the "bad old days" before Vatican II were dominated by this downplaying of the vocation of all Christians to the life of perfection? For the sake of complete disclosure, I should say that there is a basis, although the position was by no means the common teaching. A Jesuit by the name of John Baptist Scaramelli (1687-1752) made too sharp a distinction between ascetical and mystical theology. The way of asceticism, he proposed, was the way of the normal Christian. The mystical life was reserved for a precious few, and by mystical he meant not only what we have called mysticism but also extraordinary phenomena (charismatic graces). This latter error mistakes the essential for the accidental, for extraordinary graces like prophesy, tongues, and such are not for the sanctification of the one who has them, but for the sanctification of others.
This two-fold division is not merely a different way to approach the subject matter. It is an essential difference in spiritual doctrine inasmuch as the ascetical life, for Scaramelli, is not ordained to the mystical life. As Father Barbour explains this erroneous system, "The 'ordinary' holiness [of asceticism] would consist of vocal prayer and reception of the sacraments, with instruction in the faith and the practice of the virtues needed for one's state in life. The 'extraordinary' degree [of mysticism] would be for those who dedicate their lives more or less exclusively to the things of God (religious and contemplatives), who would then practice mental prayer and the ways of contemplation."
Against Scaramelli's artificial bifurcation of asceticism and mysticism rose up a host of spiritual writers, including his brother Jesuits, who insisted on both the traditional three-fold distinction and its application to all the faithful. (Father Garrigou-Lagrange gives many names from this host.) Scaramelli's ideas were never censured by the Church, but they did not gain the ascendancy among theologians.
Ending with the End
A great deal more can be said on our subject. Thankfully, this has been done by the great masters I have named, and many others besides. I pray that the giants upon whose shoulders I am feebly attempting to stand will become further appreciated and their rich works more deeply savored. More than that, I hope that the fuller life of grace will be lived in great abundance in the Church of our day, for Our Lord did say, "I am come that they may have life and may have it more abundantly" (John 10:10). As Dom Chautard establishes with rigorous argumentation in The Soul of the Apostolate, a fruitful apostolic life is not possible without a deep spiritual life. More than that, there is something of a tragedy in missing out on the highest sanctity that can be ours. It is the stuff of sad songs: unrequited love.
Besides works and authors named in this article, I would like to recommend the following:
Additional works of Father Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, especially The Three Conversions in the Spiritual Life, which is a summary of the much larger work I have cited throughout. (Many works of Pere Garrigou-Lagrange are on line, including The Three Ages of the Interior Life.)
All of the works of Blessed Columba Marmion, especially Christ the Life of the Soul and Christ in His Mysteries.
Divine Intimacy by Father Gabriel of Saint Mary Magdalen, O.C.D. (the English version has a 1964 Imprimatur, but the author died in 1953). The whole schema of this book, which was by no means intended exclusively for religious or priests — is, like Dom Guéranger and Dom Marmion, a treatment of the Church's liturgical year as a growth from the first to the third spiritual age: from beginner to proficient to perfect (corresponding to purgative, illuminative, and unitive ways).
M. Eugene Boylan, O. Cist. R., This Tremendous Lover, The Newman Press, Westminster, MD, 1957; and Problems in Mental Prayer, which originally appeared in 1943.
The Interior Life: Simplified and Reduced to Its Fundamental Principle by a Carthusian monk, edited by Father Joseph Tissot (one-time Superior General of the Salesians). The first English translation was published in 1913. I have a Newman Press edition from 1949. The book was reprinted in 1988 by Roman Catholic Books, a traditionalist publishing house.
The writings of Father Jordan Aumann, O.P.

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Meet the Cast: Sonny! "I was pretty much making out with the Plant at the end"
July 04, 2014 / Nicole Connell
….and now Sonny, played by Frazer Woodhams.
Name: Frazer Woodhams
Character Name: Dominic "Sonny" LaTierri
Tell us a bit about Sonny: One of the T-birds, considers himself as kind of a big deal. Thinks he's a real ladies man, obviously that's the main reason I got the part… but actually he's very misguided and the only attention he gets from the opposite sex is when he's being told off my Miss Lynch.
What's your Favourite song in the show and Why?: Obviously it has to be the iconic "Greased Lightning", its just great fun to sing and who doesn't love the dance moves.
What other shows have you done: Footloose, Little Shop of Horrors, Into The Woods, Fame, West Side Story, Beauty and the Beast, Guys and Dolls, Oliver, the Wiz, Billy Elliot and Grease (twice)
Best and worst moment on stage: Worst moment was when I was playing Riff in West Side Story, 5 of the jets forgot to come on stage for the rumble, so myself and two others faced off against 8 sharks. Best moment was playing the mad scientist in little shop of horrors, and pretty much making out with the plant at the end.
Interesting Grease Fact #11: The original stage play of "Grease" has more sexual references than the censors would allow in the film. One of these was the use of clingfilm as a condom. The censors made the filmmakers take this out during production of the movie, but John Travolta found a sneaky way to put it back in. During the song "Greased Lightning" you can see Danny rubbing plastic wrap on his crotch during the dance number.
July 04, 2014 / Nicole Connell/
Grease Rehersal Shots
Meet the Cast: Roger! "Enjoys ...


14 Jan - 8 min - Uploaded by PengPengJohn The best version ever! *Still In Love With You* I think i'll fall to pieces If i don't find something. "Still in Love with You" is a song originally recorded by Thin Lizzy, first released on their album Nightlife, and later released on the live albums Live and Thin Lizzy versions - Bobby Tench version - Sade version. I think I'll fall to pieces. If I don't find something else to do. This sadness never ceases. I'm still in love with you. My head it keeps on reeling. It's got me in a crazy .
Lyrics to "Still In Love With You" song by Thin Lizzy: Think I'll just fall to pieces If I don't find something else to do This sadness never ceases I'm st. 29 May - 6 min Thin Lizzy-Still In Love With You (Original Version). 3 years ago views. Knucklesconcern. 16 Jul - 8 min Thin Lizzy Still in love with you. Playing next. Thin Lizzy: The Boys Are Back In Town.
Watch the video for Still in Love With You from Thin Lizzy's Wild One - The Very Best of Thin Lizzy for free, and see the artwork, lyrics and similar artists. Lyrics to 'Still in Love With You' by Thin Lizzy. Think I'll just fall to pieces / If I don't find something else to do / This sadness never ceases / I'm still.


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Q: Pseudo-classe CSS :nth-of-type() Veja só..

div .p:nth-of-type(2) {
  font-weight: bold;
}
DIV 1

p1

p2

p3

p4

DIV 2

p1

p2

p3

p4

No exemplo acima, eu quero selecionar o segundo elemento da classe P(.p) filha de um pai(div), e não é o que resulta..
se eu fizer o uso de nth-of-type(1) ele funciona, que para mim traduzido seria, selecionar o primeiro elemento do tipo paragrafo filho de um pai(div). Mas porquê nth-of-type(2) não vai lá para o quarto parágrafo de ambas as divs, dando o efeito negrito..

A: Tem como fazer usando combinadores:

/*Seleciona a segunda ocorrência do elemento com a classe .p dentro de uma div */
div > .p ~ .p {
   font-weight: bold;
   color: blue;
}

/*Seleciona a terceira ocorrência do elemento com a classe .p dentro de uma div */
div > .p ~ .p ~ .p {
   font-weight: bold;
   color: green;
}
DIV1

p1

p2

p3

p4

DIV 2

p1

p2

p3

p4

p5

Cada repetição da classe separada pelo combinador ~ significa um nível na classe que quer escolher.
Seletores nível 3:
http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-selectors/
EDIT:
Como citei no comentário enquanto ainda não temos seletores de nível 4 a saída seria usar JQuery: http://jsfiddle.net/xL9qw5od/

A: Se você quer selecionar "filhos" basta usar "+":
Exemplo

div p:first-child + p {
  font-weight: bold;
}
DIV 1

p1

p2

p3

p4

DIV 2

p1

p2

p3

p4

Veja que uso o :first-child para referenciar ao primeiro  e '+ p' para referenciar o próximo, sempre que quiser um próximo, acrescente '+ p'.
Não posso dizer que esta é a melhor maneira, mas se entendi bem, isso funciona.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
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Starting something new
By Rachel FixsenSeptember 2013 (Magazine)
Real estate debt is a new investment class for European institutions. Rachel Fixsen talks to six investors and advisers about their experiences so far
Roland Mangelmans
APG Asset Management
*Invests in junior and mezzanine debt, but no plans for senior
*Debt provides access to assets unavailable to equity investors
Having been one of the first big European investors to allocate to real estate debt, Dutch pensions provider and asset manager APG now invests in various debt strategies, focused on assets in core European countries.
"APG has committed over €1bn into these strategies and has further – yet selective – interest to expand its exposure to this sector," says Roland Mangelmans, senior portfolio manager for real estate at APG Asset Management.
However, APG has not invested in senior debt or in non-performing loan opportunities and has, Mangelmans says, no intention of doing so at the moment.
Investing in real estate debt has the advantage for APG of providing access to certain assets and portfolios that are simply not investable from an equity perspective.
Added to this, from a risk-adjusted perspective, debt investments can offer an attractive return compared to equity, Mangelmans says.
"A generally shorter duration comparison to equity can in certain cases be considered as an advantage," he says. "At the same time, being a long-term investor, this can be a drawback."
Mangelmans sees real estate debt as a growing opportunity, because, over time, the proportion of non-banking lenders will increase.
"There is a large number of funds for which equity is currently being raised with numerous strategies," he says. "However we believe only a limited number of managers will be able to successfully and sufficiently deploy capital in terms of execution of strategy.
"We consider the size and composition of the management team, track record and experience in sourcing and structuring attractive transactions with quality sponsors on quality assets as the key components in the successful execution of a debt strategy."
When underwriting a real estate debt opportunity, the main factor for APG is the quality of the underlying real estate asset in terms of its location, tenancy, operational business plan and so on, Mangelmans explains.
Partners Group
*Invested significant amounts in debt since mid-2008
*Looks for equity participation feature where there is potential upside
Partners Group has been an active investor in real estate debt since the middle of 2008
when the firm made an investment in a portfolio of non-performing loans.
"Since then we have invested significant amounts in real estate debt," says Eliza Bailey, senior vice-president in the private real estate team at Partners Group.
The company invests in mezzanine, participating mezzanine, preferred equity made through new loan originations, recapitalisations, and secondary purchases of loan portfolios.
While property debt has the benefits of being defensive and having a high cash yield, there are downsides to watch out for as well. The upside of real estate debt can be capped, Bailey notes.
"Unless the debt includes an equity participation feature, it is unlikely to benefit from any upside achieved at the property," she says. "This is why we look to include an equity participation feature in our debt investments if we believe in the upside potential of an investment."
Also, some debt investments are made through intricate structures that might make it difficult to take control of the property if it underperforms, or may limit your rights compared to other positions in the capital stack. "It is important that you know what type of structure you are investing in and you have a structure that allows for a clear path to foreclosure or recourse," she says.
Assessing this requires specialist legal and tax knowledge, she adds.
As real estate practitioners, Partners Group's first consideration when investing in property debt is the fundamentals of the underlying property.
"If we like the real estate fundamentals and the business plan for the property and feel they compare favourably to the local market, then we review the business plan in close co-operation with the operating team," Bailey says.
"If we get comfortable with the qualifications and experience of the operating team, then we determine where we think the best risk-adjusted return can be obtained within the capital stack and how best to structure our investment."
Kate Mijakowska
*Tighter spreads and fewer opportunities in securitised products prompted interest in direct loans
*Manager numbers now high enough to run large segregated mandates
Consultancy Redington sees a significant number of pension funds and insurance companies seeking to make an allocation in the real estate debt market.
"Until recently, the main route into real estate debt investments for pension funds was through securitised products," for example, commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS), says Kate Mijakowska, associate within manager research at Redington.
But spread-tightening and a decreasing number of opportunities in this area have led investors to explore other ways of accessing property debt. "Recently, we have observed particular interest in direct, commercial property loans," she says. "Due to the retreat of banks from the space and an increased need for refinancing, the risk-return profile of these loans has increased considerably."
Direct investment in commercial real estate loans is a relatively new opportunity for non-bank investors, and there have been many new entrants in the market in the last year or two.
"We believe there is a sufficient number of asset managers at the moment to run large segregated mandates," Mijakowska says, but pooled funds are scarce.
The choice of asset manager is crucial. When investing in property debt directly, pension funds should consider factors including previous experience in originating and structuring such loans, network of contacts with borrowers and work-out experience, Mijakowska says.
"We currently advise our clients, who consider direct property debt investment, to focus on the senior and stretch-senior, UK, and to a lesser extent the core European," she says.
"Stretch-senior debt can [offer] spreads of up to Libor plus 7.5% while still retaining a significant buffer in the form of equity and mezzanine debt, especially now that loan-to-value levels on senior debt have contracted significantly.
"Choice of geography is driven not only by the stability of the economy but also by the UK's transparent and relatively straightforward legal system, which enables to foreclose quickly if we have to," Mijakowska says.
Marcus Palmer
Hermes Real Estate Investment Management
*Expects the UK RE debt market to become less dominated by banks
*Loans of £50m-plus (€58.4bn) seen as particular investment opportunity
Opportunities for investors in real estate debt are emerging rapidly, according to Marcus Palmer, head of real estate debt at Hermes Real Estate Investment Management.
The Basel III capital-adequacy regulations and new rules governing how UK banks assess the risks of loans – known as slotting – have significantly reduced their appetite and ability to finance commercial real estate. "Lenders are now highly selective to whom, to what and how they will provide finance," Palmer says.
But despite the structural deleveraging in the banking sector, it is still banks that dominate the landscape with a 90% market share, he points out, with the commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) market remaining practically closed.
In the UK, £46bn of deal estate debt will mature in 2013, creating a need for refinancing, while between 2013 and 2016, £143bn will mature, Palmer notes.
"In comparison, banks have 57% market share in the US, with 22% taken by CMBS and 21% by alternative providers," he says.
"We don't expect the UK market to evolve this way, but certainly expect the landscape to be less dominated by banks in the long term."
Healthy returns are on offer, with premium spreads for senior real estate debt currently 125-175bps above similarly rated corporate bonds.
"Capital structures in the property market have become more conservative, which is illustrated by falling loan-to-valuation ratios," he says. "Using less leverage reduces risk, and lower LTVs mitigate the danger of large and unforeseen falls in property valuations."
Given new regulations, few banks now have the appetite or capacity to lend more than £35m as a single loan to anyone outside their core clients, he says.
"Transactions above £50m now typically rely on club or syndicated lending structures and we therefore see loans of £50m-plus as a sweet-spot opportunity. This presents opportunities to providers of capital who can write large loans and have the skills to originate and execute," he says. "We can originate on a bilateral basis as well as participate in club and syndicated structures."
Claire Ballantyne
Hymans Robertson
*Client exposure to debt growing as familiarity with associated risks increases
*Limited secondary market and out-of-the-market risk are main drawbacks
Consultancy Hymans Robertson has a number of clients considering private debt opportunities, including real estate debt, according to Claire Ballantyne, research analyst at the firm.
"Real estate debt is a relatively new investment for UK pension funds to consider, as pre-financial crisis lending was dominated by the banks," she says.
"We would expect client exposure to this market to grow as they become more familiar with the risks associated with investing in this market, including default, recovery and liquidity risk."
Investors in real estate debt need to take a medium- to long-term investment view, as typically access is through a closed-ended fund with terms of 10 years or longer, she says.
But she cautions that the private nature of the market means there is a limited secondary market.
Another consideration is out-of-the-market risk, because managers of real estate debt can take time – often two to three years – to get capital raised and then invested, Ballantyne warns.
"That said, real estate debt can be an attractive investment for those pension funds who can withstand a level of illiquidity in return for a satisfactory excess return premium," she says.
"An investment in private real estate debt could form part of a liability cash-flow matching solution for pension schemes."
Conservative estimates suggest that €1trn of European real estate debt will need to be refinanced over the next three to five years, Ballantyne says.
At the moment, Hymans Robertson thinks there are only a handful of managers – mostly specialist ones – that can offer products to UK pension funds giving access to real estate debt as an investment.
"The lack of products is a function of barriers-to-entry for more traditional fixed income managers. There is a need for expertise in debt origination, workout in the event of default and a specialist understanding of property markets," Ballantyne says.
"We expect manager offerings to increase as more traditional fixed income managers develop expertise in these areas, through hiring in or forming partnerships across specialist firms."
Johannes Edgren
Valtion Eläkerahasto (VER) Finnish State Pension Fund
*Still looking at debt opportunities, but has yet to invest
*Focuses on manager track record, experience and alignment of interest
Finland's State Pension Fund, Valtion Eläkerahasto (VER), has been busy looking at a number of real estate debt funds, but has yet to make any investment in the asset class.
"We are still looking at opportunities in this space," says Johannes Edgren, portfolio manager at VER. "Real estate debt provides a stable and – depending on the strategy – high-income return," he says.
The €15.8bn pension fund has the added security of being in a more favourable position in the capital stack compared to equity. "If you compare the income return on core real estate and the income return on a mezzanine loan on the same property, the income return on the mezzanine is likely to be higher even though it is in a more secure position," says Edgren.
On the other hand, in many cases, the potential upside of the debt investment is capped.
"As banks have reduced their lending to real estate, there is a need for other parties to fill in the lending gap," he says. "The opportunity seems to still be there and we have definitively seen more managers coming to the market and raising funds."
He adds: "It seems that good managers do not have trouble raising capital as evidenced in the recent closings of some debt funds at their target levels."
As with all its investments, VER focuses on the track record and experience of the manager when choosing a real estate debt investment, as well as the fund terms and alignment of interest. "We prefer managers with an existing track record," Edgren says.
"But, as this is more of an emerging opportunity, the number of such managers are still limited.
He adds: "We also prefer countries within Europe where the legal framework is clear and supportive of this type of investment."
So far in its real estate debt search, VER has looked mostly at the junior and mezzanine debt, as well as whole loans. "The returns for these strategies look attractive compared to the risks," Edgren says. "Although the senior spreads can be attractive, the absolute return level can be quite low."
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Today I window-shopped a little for a new copy of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbi t . I don't yet know which edition I'm going to buy, but I know I'm not going to buy it at Barnes & Noble. Let me explain why.
First, I should observe that the net flow of books is still primarily out of my house. My goal in life right now is to simplify, simplify, simplify, and I simply don't need all of these big heavy paper things sitting in my space proclaiming my hipness. This is what libraries are for. Beyond a few works of rarity or artistic significance (I'll never get rid of my Codex Seraphinianus), I'm happy to not have the physical objects in my house.
This doesn't mean I don't read, mind you - I have jumped into e-books in a big way, and I find them preferable in almost every way to their paper compatriots. But specifically for reading aloud to others, there's something communal about a book, and The Hobbit is a book that rewards reading aloud.
So I want to buy a physical copy of The Hobbit. While window-shopping at Amazon, I went looking for a particular edition at Barnes & Noble, and visiting their web site reminded me why I hate them. It has to do with the divide between their online store and their brick and mortar store.
In my mind, the existence of the brick and mortar stores is, quite possibly, the only reason I would use Barnes & Noble over Amazon: if I want it today, then maybe I would want to swing by a store and buy it. Let's use this edition of The Hobbit as an example. I didn't actually buy this book today, but this is how it worked for a different book the last time I bought one (Haroun and the Sea of Stories , if you must know). Here's how the shopping experience works if you want to buy a book at B&N; and pick it up at their store.
First, you go to the page for the book you want. It has an "online price" (in this example, $25). You give your zip code in the "Pick Me Up" dialog box, and it checks local inventory, and tells you what nearby stores have the book. So far, so good. If you want to get it at one of the stores, you press the bright happy "Pick Me Up" button, and go to the corresponding store in about an hour.
Now, to give Barnes & Nobles their due, they do have some language, in 8 point text at the bottom of the page, quietly mentioning "Store and online prices may vary." But on the other hand, if the e-commerce site for your book- retailing company with 5 billion dollars a year in revenue cannot manage to tell me what I'm going to pay at the time I actually click to reserve the book, they can go jump in a very deep, very cold, and very filthy lake.
Let me be perfectly clear: I do not begrudge them their price difference. I do not begrudge them charging more in brick and mortar stores. All I want is for them to tell me how much they expect me to pay before I click the button that, emotionally, commits me to getting in my car and driving to their storefront. That little bit of deception by sleight-of-hand, that little bit of screw-the- customer attitude, is all I need to convince me that if I'm going to give money to someone for a physical book, that someone is never going to be Barnes & Noble.
I hope they enjoyed the extra $7 they got out of me for Haroun and the Sea of Stories, because it's the last $7 they'll ever see from me.


text:
Dan Davidson
Dan began his career as a marketing graduate at Sainsbury's. He then went on to further his banking career at Barclays for a period of 10 years which culminated in his role of Corporate Director in Business Services. In 2007, Dan said goodbye to a career in banking and founded Build Team, a home extension specialist that offers a Design & Build service to homeowners across London.
Dan lives in Dulwich with his wife and two sons and enjoys cycling, tennis and skiing. He is a trustee to the Board of Groundwork London, a charity established in 1982, which aims to support local economies to promote environmental sustainability, and to provide young people with support and employment opportunities to further their careers.
Dan began his career as a marketing graduate at Sainsbury's. He then went on to further his banking career at Barclays for a period of 10 years which culminated in his role of Corporate Director in Business Services. In 2007, Dan said goodbye to a career in banking and founded Build Team, a home extension specialist that offers a Design & Build service to homeowners across London.
Design Team Build Team
David Abimbola
The High Court, Chandigarh
Favourite Building
David graduated in Architecture from Kingston University in London. He oversees the Architectural Design Team and ensures the smooth running of the Design Process. He loves travelling the world to see how different cultures interpret design. His favourite city (so far) is Chandigarh in India, and he is a keen admirer of Le Corbusier, a French-Swiss Architect.
Steven grew up in Wales and moved to Scotland when he was 11. He completed his studies and obtained a MA in Architecture from the University of Edinburgh. He moved to London shortly after and joined Build Team. Steven enjoys football and rugby, and particularly enjoys cycling to client meetings and site visits.
Arya Sunny
Arya is originally from India where she studied at Calicut University. She moved to London several years ago and has experience in working in a small residential architectural practice before joining Build Team. She admires simplicity and using true materials in architecture.
Reem Arafat
Reem is originally from Syria where she studied Architecture at Al-Baath University. Reem moved to Manchester in 2014 and worked in a small architectural practice before moving to London and joining Build Team. Reem has always been curious in new design concepts which prioritise space over objects and emphasises on people, culture and environment. Reem's role model in architecture is Zaha Hadid an Iraqi-British architect.
Kyriakos Pappas MIET MFPWS
Health and Safety Advisor
Notre Dame du Haut
Kyriakos is a qualified (chartered) engineer, with a Master in Electrical Engineering. He is a member of the IET and the Faculty of PWS, and CITB SMSTS qualified regarding health and safety. He has 20 years of experience within project and site management. Kyrs is our SHE/CDM Advisor and PW Expert ensuring compliance with the current legislation for both areas. He enjoys reading, music, theatre, psychology and poetry writing.
Katerina Archontaki
Katerina is a creative architect with passion for good design and professional experience on a range of projects including residential development, public refurbishments and commercial design. She graduated from University of Patras, Greece before focusing on Interior design with a Master from Scuola Poilitecnica di Design, Milan. Living and working in Milan was a great impact for her career and aesthetics. However London seems to be the city she prefers; as it gives the opportunity of attending great exhibitions.
Tess Ingle
Design Assistant
Tess grew up in Sheffield before moving to Newcastle to study Interior Architecture at Northumbria University. After graduating Tess went travelling getting the chance to explore different cultures and architecture from around the world. She settled in Australia for two years before recently returning back to the UK to pursue her passion for architecture and design. Tess is excited by her recent move to London and enjoys visiting all the different neighbourhoods of London in her spare time.
Callum Buckland
Callum has had an interest in architecture since he was young and visited National Trust properties with family. He studied Architecture at Plymouth University before moving back to his hometown of Portsmouth where he worked in a luxury independent hotel as both an Events Assistant and Duty Manager. With a move to London Callum decided to mix his passion for architecture with the customer service skills he learnt in hospitality and joined the practice in early spring 2019.
Melissa Castillo
Melissa is a Graphic Designer. Since graduating from Middlesex University she has been involved in taking part on several re-branding projects, for small independent companies as a freelancer, until joining Build Team. She enjoys going to museums in London, traveling and learning new languages.
Build Team Design Team
Mark Eden
Construction Director
As one of the two founders of Build Team, Mark oversees the Project Management Team and ensures the smooth running of the business. Mark completed his academic studies in 2002 and qualified as a PRINCE2 practitioner. With experience in both residential and commercial project management, he ensures our builds are quality focused and completed on time.
Kyrs is our SHE/CDM Advisor and PW Expert ensuring compliance with the current legislation for both areas. Kyrs sits within our contract/project management team, ensuring successful delivery of our construction schemes. He enjoys reading, music, theatre, psychology and poetry writing.
Juliana Maia
Juliana is a qualified architect from Brazil. She worked as an architect for 7 years and moved to London in 2017. In mid-2019 she obtained a MSc in Project Management at Northumbria University and shortly after joined Build Team. She has strong passion for project management and construction. She loves travelling, music and learning about new cultures.
Gustavo Cilumbriello
Gustavo from Brazil has specialised in Civil Engineering, he started his qualifications in Brazil in 2008 as a Civil Technician and in 2013 he started his Civil Engineer Degree. He moved to London in 2018 and fell in love with the beautiful city. He is passionate about project management, building methods and site experiences. He enjoys cooking, travelling and listening to music.
Natasha Angelova
Natasha is originally Macedonian, and after she studied Master's Degree in Translation and Interpreting in Italy, she moved to London pursuing her love and passion for English language. She is hoping to specialise her linguistic knowledge and administrative skills in the administration of construction projects. She loves modern art and good music and in the free time she enjoys watching and translating TV Series.
Amy Khan
Amy has 6 years' experience as an Environmental Consultant, and enjoyed project managing whilst working all over the UK. She decided to pursue a career change, follow her interests in property builds and explore her local city, by joining Build Team in September 2019 as an Assistant Project Manager. Amy is very keen to expand her knowledge of residential developments within the construction industry. Outside of work, she enjoys cooking, travelling, creating films and attending live music events.
Tamrryn Booth


So many exciting things are in the simmering musical pot of life at the moment. I've just come out of some recording sessions at the brand new 301 studios with Jenny Eriksson and the Marais Project. Keep your eyes out for their 20th anniversary album which will feature my arrangements of a Marais suite for gamba and accordion, as well as some beautiful Argentinian songs.
I'll be heading up to Brisbane for the Oz Manouche festival Nov 29 – Dec 2 with my new jazz duo Blue and Sentimental featuring Luke Chapman on guitar and myself on accordion and vocals.
Keep your ears out early 2019 for the new sounds of my group Chaika – as we are about to head into the studio to record our third album. All our fans will finally be able to take home or download our latest sounds they have been loving on the live stage. An album tour will definitely follow.
Another very big project I am working on is the launch of my new jazz quintet in 2019. Put January 20th in your diaries, as that's when we will be doing our first performance at the Camelot Lounge, Marrickville. Tickets will go on sale mid Dec!
I am also planning a short time again in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in May. I'll be spending time with my dear friend Owen Salome working on our repertoire for Tangalo 9 piece album plus working with the great guitarist Adrian Ramirez on a duo project I hope to tour in Australia late 2019.
In the new year I will also be setting up a Patreon account. It is an opportunity for fans of the music I create to get more involved with small scale artist patronage! It helps give life to all these beautiful musical projects and collaborations, plus my Patreon fans will have some extra special treatment when it comes to musical tid-bits and recordings I share.
Next PostNext Article Chaika's third album on its way!


In the wake of Glee's brutal "Break Up" episode, it's no surprise that the show's return from a baseball-induced hiatus proved to be a lighter, low-stakes affair. I mean, it's not like anybody was going to end up dissolving into a puddle of tears and Ben & Jerry's Chocolate-Chip Cookie Dough just from finding out which of the McKinley High kids would score the choice roles of Sandy and Danny in the school production of Grease.
* Artie enlisted his creatively adrift pal Finn to help co-direct the school production of Grease, but Coach Sue blew a gasket at the idea of casting transgender teen Unique as Rizzo. The writers tried to paint Sue as less of a bigot and more as a woman concerned that a vulnerable kid might be put in danger on the altar of open-mindedness, but she used a lot of ugly rhetoric to get to her point.
* Speaking of ugly rhetoric, Finn accidentally used the word "retarded" to describe Sue's baby. Even as a slip of the tongue, the gaffe seemed wildly out of character.
* Marley, Kitty, Jake and new recruit Ryder Lynn (The Glee Project champ Blake Jenner) went out for the Sandy and Danny roles, with Marley and Ryder triumphing after an intense callbacks rendition of "Born to Hand Jive." Okay, maybe not intense, but energetic?
* Tina freaked out when Mike Chang returned to McKinley (along with Mercedes) to assist Finn and Artie with the school play, while Blaine continued to reel from his split with Kurt.
What was your favorite musical number from "The Role You Were Born to Play"? How did you feel about this week's main story arcs? Did Sue's behavior or Finn's slip-up seem out of character to you? Take our poll below, then hit the comments with your thoughts!


Cite as Paterson, A., "Final Judgment revisited", European Journal of Current Legal Issues (2015) 21(1).
Not many authors have the good fortune to have their work examined by their peers in a special issue of a journal to which they themselves are permitted to contribute. I have been doubly fortunate in the calibre of the commentators and the strength of their contributions. By the time I had completed Final Judgment it was already clear that decision-making in the Supreme Court had departed significantly from the practice in the House of Lords. Teamwork had arrived - evidenced by more meetings before and especially, after, the hearings, and many more exchanges between the Justices. These changes brought unintended consequences: a loss of transparency in the Court, an exacerbation of power differentials between the Justices and ambiguities over the utility of the power to dissent. In this short piece I explore these developments and what has happened in the two years since the manuscript was completed.
When I finished the manuscript of Final Judgment in the summer of 2013 it was already clear that decision-making in the Supreme Court had departed significantly from what it was in the final years of Lord Bingham's House of Lords.  First and foremost was the commitment to Teamwork. This was evidenced by a series of changes - meetings before the hearings; tighter discipline on counsel's arguments; a greater willingness to engage with arguments not put forward by counsel; a much greater commitment to single judgments; a collective disinclination to write concurring judgments; much more engagement by email with the judgment writer(s) and more second and third conferences after the hearings. It was also clear that there were unintended consequences from these developments: a loss of transparency in the Court, an exacerbation of power differentials between the Justices and ambiguities over the utility of the power to dissent.
However, in one crucial area the court is less transparent than its predecessor. We know less than we did as to what the members of the court think in each case. Under Bingham only 20 per cent of cases resulted in a single judgment. In the other cases, several judges indicated their view on the appeal, enabling interested parties to distinguish the moral concerns of Lord Browne-Wilkinson or Lord Steyn from the pragmatism of Lord Hoffmann.
By 2013 single judgments were running at 55 per cent of cases (see Figure 1 below).
Partly the dramatic rise in single judgments was down to the ever-rising workload of the court and partly it was due to a desire to offer greater guidance to hard-pressed judges in the lower courts. When the Supreme Court opened its doors in 2009, some of the Justices openly favoured a substantial rise in the number of single judgments - others, notably the two Scots and Lord Brown, did not. However, Lord Justice Carnwath in a celebrated cri de coeur in Doherty  called on the final court to use single judgments for the sake of the lower courts, the profession, and the paying clients and it soon became clear that Lord Clarke MR and many of his colleagues on the Court of Appeal, agreed with him. Gradually as more and more of them (including Lord Carnwath) were promoted to the Supreme Court, those favouring single judgments gained the ascendancy.
The third reason for the rise of the single judgment was new Court's deliberate commitment to greater teamwork. It is not that the Law Lords under Bingham did not get on - they did - they just did not see themselves as members of a team. The Justices, their first two Presidents included, were of a different outlook. They began to meet more often, at least once a term to discuss the running of the Court, and also before and after hearings - in the hope of reducing disagreements. Technology in the guise of email and word-processed draft judgments also facilitated team-working through permitting far greater circulation of judgments and multiple revisions than in the House, where not all the Law Lords were computer literate.
Although the Justices are publicly portrayed as equals - some are more equal than others. We know from Lord Wilberforce that some Law Lords were more successful than others in having their views prevail in the outcome adopted by the majority of the Court. Some, in short, were more willing to embrace - and some were more adept at embracing - the range of opportunities to influence their colleagues which presented themselves even in a Court of individuals.  Team-working on the Supreme Court has enhanced these opportunities. Thus, some Justices are more successful in getting appeals accepted for a hearing on the Court as we can see from Figure 2.
Again, as I indicated in Final Judgment,  some Justices in "close call" cases  are significantly more likely to appear on the majority as opposed to the minority side, and this has not changed in the two years since its publication (see Table 1 below). This is not always an indication of greater influence or task-leadership (it may indicate social leadership)  although we know that Justices such as Lords Dyson and Reed (and, one suspects, Lord Sumption) have been particularly adept in winning some of their brethren round to their perspective.  However, perhaps the most problematic power imbalance was the discrepancies which Final Judgment threw up in relation to propensity to write the lead judgment in the court. In part, the relative likelihood that a Justice would write the lead judgment reflected their success in winning others to their position in "close call" cases.
However, as we can see from Figure 3, between 2009 and 2013, some Justices - notably those who tended to preside in the cases - were more than twice as likely to write the lead judgment in the Court as some of their colleagues. This imbalance was considerably reinforced by the fact that in 55% of cases there was only a single judgment. This is one area where there has been a change since 2013.
Figure 3. Lead or single judgments in the UK Supreme Court as a percentage of cases sat in 2009-13.
Following the publication of Final Judgment deliberate attempts have been made to equalise the load in terms of lead and single judgment writing, (as is the case in the US Supreme Court), with some effect, as can be seen from Figure 4.
Whether it was the Court's commitment to greater team-working, its growing caseload or Lord Neuberger's unexpected suggestion in 2012  that there might be merit in fewer dissents, the dissent rate of the Court, (which had risen in 2011 to well above the prevailing norm of 24%, perhaps as result of the internal tensions at that time) began to fall thereafter, assisted by the arrival of a more clubbable President (see Figure 5). Indeed in one startling and possibly unprecedented period of eight months from late June 2013 to mid February 2014 there was a run of 47 straight cases in the Court without a dissent.
When the decline in dissents was revealed,  it did not gel with some internal perceptions in the Court - which was aware of dissents in the pipeline but still to be published and of dissents in the Privy Council. Even when dissents resumed in 2014 it was clear, as Figure 6 indicates, that dissenting is primarily an activity that the Justices seem happiest to indulge in with one or more companions. Thus, some Justices have never dissented on their own and almost all of those who have, do so much less often than in company with others. Possibly they consider that there is little point in a solo dissent in terms of influencing the future direction of the law. Maybe, again, greater opportunities for participation in the judgment-crafting process is bringing with it a disinclination to break ranks unless the issue is really a big question of principle. There is no indication, however, that dissenting is perceived by the Justices as an uncollegial act. At any rate, whether as a reaction to the eight month de facto moratorium on dissents, or not, the Court's willingness to dissent began to increase in the latter part of 2014 and in early 2015, accelerating the dissent rate to an astonishing 50%. It is not that the 2011 tensions have re-emerged in the Court - it remains as collegial under Lord Neuberger as it has ever been, helped by the rare luxury on the Court of a sustained period when there is no turnover in the Justices. Nor has team-working declined. However, perhaps because the Justices are now more familiar with each other's thinking, the additional meetings associated with team-working are no longer being as fruitful as once they were.
Cases are taking longer, much longer, from hearing to judgment than was the case when Lord Neuberger first took over, especially in "close call" cases. Nicklinson, which took six months to publish (three times the norm) was always going to attract multiple judgments because of its topicality , but a late splintering of the majority over the issue of how best to engage in dialogue with Parliament, produced a decision without a majority ratio, despite efforts in several conferences to narrow the differences on the Court.R (on the application of SG) v. the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (the benefits cap case)  took 318 days to be published, reflecting a plethora of conferences , a multiplicity of emails, some swithering by the swing voter and ultimately a decision for which there is no majority ratio. R (on the application of Evans) v. Attorney General  (the Prince of Wales's letters case) took four months to emerge (twice the norm) but here again the repeated conferences still could not produce a majority ratio. With such a level of disagreement perhaps inevitably the percentage of cases resulting in a single judgment has plummeted in the last six months. It has dropped by half to 25%, although this is perhaps a slightly misleading figure since there were eight joint lead judgments in 2014,  a device that has the advantages of a single judgment and fewer of its disadvantages.
Even in the 20 months since the manuscript for Final Judgment was completed, a lot has changed on the Court. The frequency of single judgments rose and then fell back, dissents fell and then rose sharply and efforts have been made to equalise the load in terms of the allocation of lead judgments. Curiously, as Lord Neuberger's Court has had longer to work together it has grown less settled. Team-working has not declined but it is not proving as spectacularly successful in producing single judgments with a clear ratio as was the case when Lord Neuberger arrived. Lord Neuberger favours multiple conferences if they lead to clearer and more coherent judgments, but is also aware that sometimes repeated meetings only serve to entrench opinions. In the past year "close call" cases have risen significantly, they are taking substantially longer to conclude and do not always yield a majority ratio. However, if dissents are rising, so too, are the numbers of joint judgments. This is a further sign of collegial working because they have the benefit of not so obviously threatening the individualism of the Justices (since they tend to reflect an internal division of labour rather than a jointly crafted judgment)  whilst enabling workloads to be shared without some of the drawbacks of multiple judgments.
The issue of panel size continues to trouble the Court. Lord Phillips favoured larger panels to decide important or particularly difficult cases. Lord Neuberger was initially less convinced of the effectiveness or utility of the frequent use of larger panels, but is now showing signs that on this his mind may be changing. One situation where he will re-convene with a larger panel is when a smaller panel in a tricky case is fiercely divided - here the question as in Prest and Waya is to ensure that the enlarged panel is as balanced in specialist interest and outlook as can be achieved. Re-convened panels can also occur when the Justices wish to decide an appeal on a point that has occurred to them after the hearing and which was not argued by counsel. Even then it is far more common for them to merely ask for additional submissions in writing (see Darbyshire in this issue). In practice it does not seem to matter whether the counsel accede to these requests or not,  the Justices have almost always stuck to the argument which they have raised from their own researches. The frequency with which this has occurred in the last two years must be disconcerting to counsel and to those tholed to more traditional advocacy in the Court - in truth it is further evidence that decision-making in our final appellate court continues to evolve and reminds commentators that they are describing a moving target.
 Of course the actual final year of the House of Lords was presided over by Lord Phillips.
 The ability to view the oral hearings for up to a year and to instantly verify claims such as occurred in the Assange case, that the Court had decided the case on a point which counsel had not been invited to address - which it had - are matters for which the Court deserves great credit. It is also in marked contrast with the US Supreme Court which allows tapes of oral arguments to be released but has repeatedly refused to allow its proceedings to be televised.
 That said, it would be fair to say that the average press release summarising a decision of the Court is not readily comprehensible to the non-lawyer. The Justices' own words when delivering the oral judgment for YouTube are generally more user friendly - although they are still not watched by many. Thus the Nicklinson judgment on YouTube has been watched by less than 5,000 viewers since it was handed down in June 2014.
  EWCA Civ 1739 at para 63.
 Lord Rodger, 'Humour and the Law' 2009 SLT (News) 202.
 See e.g. Healthcare at Home Limited (Appellant) v The Common Services Agency (Respondent) (Scotland)  UKSC 49 per Lord Reed at para 1.
 See Final Judgment (Hart Publishing, 2013) ch 4. Lord Bingham was one of those who did not take all the opportunities that he might have done to influence his colleagues.
 See Final Judgment (Hart Publishing, 2013) ch 4.
 Defined as 'cases in which two or more judges in the final court dissent from the majority outcome'. Definition derived from B. Dickson, 'Close Calls in the House of Lords' ch 13 of J Lee (ed), From House of Lords to Supreme Court (Hart Publishing,2011).
 On task and social leadership see Final Judgment (Hart Publishing, 2013) ch 4.
 See Final Judgment ch 5.
 A. Paterson, 'A Scarcity of Dissents?' http://ukscblog.com/scarcity-dissent/.
 More than twice the figure in the last few years.
 Joint judgments have long had a provenance in the Court of Appeal and are therefore not a novelty for the Justices promoted from that court.
 In several of the recent cases where this has occurred counsel declined to run the argument.


text:
A central bank cryptocurrency to democratise money – Project Syndicate & Jordan Times
Democratise the Euro! Digital Economies/Money English Op-ed Postcapitalism Project Syndicate Technofeudalism
02/08/2021 by Yanis Varoufakis
The history of money has been the history of the struggles to control the payment system and the money tree. Today, with control over both resting in the hands of bankers, central banks' efforts to boost business end up amplifying inequality while failing to address either economic stagnation or the looming climate disaster. The time for ending this scandalous cartel is now; the way to do it is by creating a central-bank cryptocurrency.
Whether you are charging a cup of coffee to your debit card or wiring money, the transaction passes through a digital system fully owned by bankers. What should be a public utility, like roads or sewers, is a lucrative cartel. Similarly, every time bankers lend, they mark up the balance of the borrower's account, thus creating new money. Dollars, pounds, euros, yen and so on are conjured mostly by private bankers out of thin air.
Defenders of the status quo will protest that bankers' access to the money tree is constrained by the central bank. By imposing on bankers a minimum ratio of safe debts (such as US government bonds or real estate collateral) for every loan they make, the central bank limits the production of new money. But while that may be true in theory, during a crisis, debts turn bad en masse, forcing the central bank to choose between letting banks fail and accepting increasingly worthless collateral.
Society's reliance on banks for its payments system has meant that since 2008 — and more so during the pandemic — central-bank money has been showered, via private bankers, on the ultra-rich, while everyone else suffers stagnation and austerity. Once caught in this trap, it became impossible for central banks to revive the economy while keeping financiers on a leash. To escape, it is necessary, though insufficient, to end bankers' dual monopoly of the payment system and the money tree. But how?
Bitcoin-like, non-state cryptocurrencies do threaten the bankers' monopoly over the payment system, domestic as well as international. But they are a terrible alternative in every other respect. Of their many defects, the one that stands out is that the crypto money supply cannot be adjusted to reflect economic activity.
If such currencies had prevailed before the pandemic, governments would not be able to support locked down workers and firms. As for developing countries that do not borrow in their own currencies, turning a bitcoin-like cryptocurrency into legal tender, as El Salvador did recently, promises to cause even worse problems than those caused by dollarisation.
The aim ought to be termination of bankers' monopoly of payments and money creation, albeit without passing their exorbitant power to the central bank's bureaucrats. Central bank digital currencies based on bitcoin-like transparency-enhancing technologies are a promising way to achieve three objectives: Liberating the payments' system from rentiers, guaranteeing unprecedented transparency regarding how much money is plucked from the money tree, and democratising access to the tree's fruit.
Interestingly, the idea of central bank digital currencies is gaining support from the financial establishment such as the Bank for International Settlements, known as the central bank of central banks. These financial gatekeepers are embracing central bank digital currencies because they can see that, if they do not, someone else will, whether it is the People's Bank of China, whose own digital currency is at an advanced stage of development, or, more ominously, Big Tech. Their objective is to usher in digital currencies that preserve the current oligarchy's monopoly over money. The objective of progressives must be to wrest control away from them in order to promote shared prosperity with monetary stability.
The first step is to separate payments from the bankers' money tree. This can be achieved easily if the central bank automatically granted every resident (but also selected non-residents trading with residents) a digital account, a PIN, and a web/phone application that enables free, immediate money transfers.
In addition to the lure of free payments, a tax discount of, say, 5 per cent on funds transferred to one's central bank account and used to extinguish taxes a year later would attract idle savings from commercial banks and give the government access to prepaid taxes. Bankers will have to offer customers genuine services to keep their business.
As for concerns about privacy, it is possible to anonymise central-bank accounts with digital tags that only an independent ombudsman, a post created in the spirit of a new separation of powers, can trace to physical persons. After all, lest we forget, our current payments system (with the strict "Know Your Customer" rules imposed on bankers) offers next to no privacy.
The second step will be to end socialism for the ultra-rich, also known as quantitative easing. Instead of the central bank financing banks that lend to corporates, which then use the money to buy back their own shares, thus boosting their wealth without a cent of actual investment, the central bank would automatically credit a monthly sum to every resident's account — with the government taxing, at year's end, the receipts of well-to-do folk. As economic conditions change, this direct dividend would fluctuate accordingly.
This system should be built on a Bitcoin-like transparency-enhancing distributed ledger for two reasons: Resilience and trust. Any central-bank digital currency would be extremely vulnerable. But a distributed ledger architecture would be impervious to hacking or physical damage. And since the quantity of money would be set by the central bank, there would be no need for Bitcoin-like mining which requires planet-endangering electricity consumption. Furthermore, it would give us common knowledge of the quantity of money in the system, thereby preventing the central bank from covertly inflating the economy while preserving anonymity.
Central-bank digital money will happen sooner or later. The great struggle over who will control the payment system and the money tree will continue. But we have a chance to use new technology to democratise money, to reclaim control over the money supply, to offer savers a decent interest rate without precipitating a new depression, and to lay the groundwork for a universal basic dividend — in short, to press the money tree into the service of people and the planet.
Who controls transactions, interest rates and money creation controls politics. That's why the powers-that-be will fight this proposal tooth and nail.
Yanis Varoufakis, a former finance minister of Greece, is leader of the MeRA25 Party and professor of Economics at the University of Athens. Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2021.
What political lessons can we learn from football? A lively chat with Brian Eno, Ken Loach & Roger Waters (plus a short text on the politics of football)
What is money, really? And why Bitcoin is not the answer (even if blockchain is brilliant & potentially helpful in democratising money)
English Project Syndicate
My prediction on what 2023 will bring – Project Syndicate
English European Crisis Interviews Talks Technofeudalism Ukraine
Europe, the War in Ukraine, Technofeudalism & the challenges ahead – at the 2022 Global Investment Forum
Debate Digital Economies/Money English Politics and Economics Theatre Video
Summing up my take on crypto, followed by a live debate
Digital Economies/Money English Op-ed Project Syndicate Technofeudalism
The Techno-Feudal Method to Musk's Twitter Madness – Project Syndicate op-ed
Box0_TOP_ENG English Iran Op-ed PROGRESSIVE INTERNATIONAL
The New Iranian Revolution as an opportunity for the Internationalist Left – Project Syndicate
AUSTERITY - Vintage minis Box0_TOP_ENG DiEM25 UK English Op-ed The New Statesman
Rishi Sunak's 'grown-up' austerity is designed to keep zombie capitalism alive
English Interviews Talks Technofeudalism Theatre
Discussing Technofeudalism, Ukraine & Britain with David McWilliams in Kilkenny – audio
Debate DiEM25 DiEM25 UK English Interviews Politics and Economics Project Syndicate
Should electricity markets be reformed or disbanded? My debate with Michael Liebreich on Cleaning Up
English Iran Middle East mέta - Centre for Postcapitalist Civilisation Op-ed PROGRESSIVE INTERNATIONAL
Iran's Revolutionary Moment as the Internationalist Left's Great Challenge – by Shoja Azari
Debate English mέta - Centre for Postcapitalist Civilisation Postcapitalism PROGRESSIVE INTERNATIONAL
Our Task? To Inspire the Rebellion against the Legalised Robbery of People & Earth, even if it is too late – Reply to Chomsky, Fuentes & McPherson
Banking Crisis Box0_TOP_ENG Digital Economies/Money English Op-ed Project Syndicate The Global Minotaur: A theory of the Global Crisis
How the West poisoned its money – Project Syndicate op-ed
Box0_TOP_ENG English Essays North America Op-ed PROGRESSIVE INTERNATIONAL The Atlantic
Is This the End of 'Socialism for the Rich'? – The Atlantic
Box1_ENG DiEM25 UK English Op-ed The Guardian
Trickle-down Truss is carrying on the dirty work of Thatcher, Blair and Osborne – THE GUARDIAN
Box0_TOP_ENG DiEM25 UK English Op-ed Politics and Economics The New Statesman
Zombie capitalism is unravelling – THE NEW STATESMAN
DiEM25 Ελλάδας English Greece Op-ed Unherd
The Greek Watergate – UNHERD
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This pebble fit in the palm of his hand: it was flat and smooth and had been worn down over many years to a smoothness that was pleasing to the touch. Albert was blind; there wasn't much he hadn't seen in his 95 years, but there was still something comforting in that pebble. Although his face wasn't smooth, his heart was. What was wrong with the Rock of Gibraltar, I asked him. "It's dark and craggy, ugly." I realized later that the Rock of Gibraltar was the last stopping point before Mr. LaFleur went into the thick of World War One. The Rock of Gibraltar was a metaphor for another time in life, a time when the polishing didn't happen gently, when the rocks of war clashed with one another, when men were left broken rather than polished.
We don't think of water as "hard" (unless you're that guy who installs water filters) but we do think of rocks as hard. Yet water against rock over time equals polish. Colors pop: reds and greens, subtler hues of gray and black. The rock, by itself, doesn't become polished. Nor is it polished by something hard. In fact, if you take a hard rock and smack it against another hard rock, one is going to break, or at least bruise. Water in motion, on the other hand, when coming in waves as the moon circles the earth, can softly polish the rock.
In the Void it's very easy for our hearts to feel like rocks. They sit inside our chests and, at least spiritually and psychologically speaking, they don't even feel like they're beating. Cold, solid, un-moving and unmoved. To experience a fusion in the void, we need water in motion. In fact, we need a tidal bore.
The Bay of Fundy creates a unique tide pattern daily. Most tides go up and down with a normal amount of highs and lows. The unique shape of the Bay of Fundy creates a phenomenon a bit like the sloshing of water back and forth in a long, narrow bathtub. That is to say, when the tides come in at the end of that bathtub, they come in really high, even pushing water upriver into the tributary. When the tide goes out in Truro, Nova Scotia, you can ride the river down as though it was whitewater. The rest of the day, the river is just a normal lazy river flowing into the Bay, but when the tide comes in or goes out, you get a quarter-hour or so of excitement.
So, if we are like rocks during the Void experience, it seems that a polishing is happening TO us, and this isn't something we can strive for. It will just happen over time as though we were a boulder situated on the beach at the eastern end of the Bay of Fundy. The polishing is not something we can really see or feel happening, but God is there like the tide, in and out, water in motion. God pushes us, then pulls, then pushes again. In the Void, our rocky hearts fuse with the water God bathes us in. One day you will see, even if you are blind like old Mr. LaFleur — I invite you to have hope in this — that this rock from Nova Scotia you've become is more pleasing than the Rock of Gibraltar. It's happening. Even — especially when it isn't noticeable.
If you want to read a fictitious rendering of the life of Albert LaFleur, pick up my novel, White Buffalo Gold.