Mortal Sins of the Vatican

by Joyce Arthur

"We do not need population control, and any effort at safe sex is totally, utterly immoral from top to bottom." ---Rev. James Reuter, Office of Mass Media, Catholic Church of the Philippines

Is the Vatican willing to sacrifice humanity in its attempt to protect its own power base in the world? This article examines the role of the Catholic Church in bringing an overpopulated world to the brink of disaster because of its influential and far-reaching agenda against family planning, contraception, and abortion.

The Unsung Death of U.S. Population Control Policies

In 1974, an American government report called NSSM 200: Implications of Worldwide Population Growth for U.S. Security and Overseas Interests, was presented to President Gerald Ford. The NSSM 200 study had been commissioned by former President Richard Nixon, and was undertaken by the National Security Council, the CIA, the Agency for International Development, and the Departments of Defense, Agriculture, and State.

The NSSM 200 study detailed how and why continued rapid world population growth gravely threatened U.S. and global security. It also provided a blueprint for American response to the problem. The report concluded that: "World population growth is widely recognized within the Government as a current danger of the highest magnitude calling for urgent measures ... There is a major risk of severe damage [from continued rapid population growth] to world economic, political, and ecological systems and, as these systems begin to fail, to our humanitarian values."

The NSSM 200 report recommended that the United States provide world leadership in population growth control, implement a (non-coercive) one-child policy in the U.S., and stabilize the U.S. population by the year 2000. Another major recommendation was to make family planning information, education, and contraception available to everyone in the developing world by 1980, and to achieve a two-child family in developing countries by 2000. The report also recognized the problem of illegal abortion, and stated that "No country has reduced its population growth without resorting to abortion."

Stephen Mumford, a population control expert, and president of the Center for Research on Population and Security in North Carolina, has documented the Vatican's almost single-handed role in destroying American political will to implement the NSSM 200 recommendations. Mumford's 1996 book, The Life and Death of NSSM 200: How the Destruction of Political Will Doomed a U.S. Population Policy, is a meticulously documented exposi of the Vatican's manipulation of the American government, and its tireless work to negate U.S. population policy.

Ironically, the NSSM 200 report itself specifically noted that the only institutional opposition to population growth control comes from the Vatican. Since 1975, the Vatican has been so successful in this opposition that not a single one of the NSSM 200 report's recommendations was ever implemented, and the report itself was buried, not reaching the public eye until 1989.

The rest of this article summarizes some of the main points from Mumford's book.

World Population: 1974 and Today

"[The Pope's] teachings and policies on birth control can no longer be seen merely as the business of Catholics ... [they] could now instead lead to the death of us all." --- Georgie Anne Geyer, columnist, Dallas Morning News, August 10, 1993.

In 1974, when the NSSM 200 report was written, world population was 3.9 billion. Without intensive population control measures, the report predicted that human population would grow to between 6 and 8 billion by 2000, and stabilize at 10 to 13 billion by 2050. These figures extrapolated an existing natural decline in fertility rates, and also assumed rapidly rising death rates due to famine, war, and environmental collapse.

This year, 1999, will see the sixth billionth person added to the world. Current global population projections by the United Nations are: 7 billion people by 2010, and 9 to 11 billion by 2050. We are not far off from the dire predictions of the NSSM 200 study. The last 25 years have seen a significant increase in local famines and wars, as well as ecological devastation on an unprecedented scale. The effects of global warming are now clearly evident in the rise of extreme weather events around the world. The 1990's is the warmest decade on record and arctic ice is now breaking apart and melting. Much of the African continent is experiencing a scourge of premature death from AIDS, starvation, ethnic wars, and abject poverty. Mumford predicts that more than half of Africans alive today will die prematurely, and a substantial majority of African children born in this decade will be dead by 2010, with many dead already (pg. 561). All of these horrors are the direct or indirect result of overpopulation pressures. The Vatican denial of birth control to the people of the world means that "death control" is taking over by default.

Even if drastic population control efforts are taken now, we are 25 years behind. Almost half the world's current population are beginning to bear children now or will be entering their child-bearing years over the next 20 years. Even with a one-child policy, the world faces huge demands on its resources due to this burgeoning population.

Since 1974, some countries have adopted population control measures, most notably China. But without strong leadership and financial support from the United States -- by far the most powerful nation in the world -- most countries simply lack the resources and the will to implement effective population control. Many developing countries are only just beginning to realize the need for such measures. That's because the problem and its solutions have been swept under the carpet for 25 years by the machinations of the Pope and the Vatican.

Even the World Health Organization is influenced by the Vatican. According to Milton Siegel, Assistant General Director of WHO from 1946 to 1970, the Vatican successfully blocked WHO from adopting and promoting the concept that overpopulation was a grave human health threat (Mumford, pgs. 561-567).

How did the Vatican manage to prevent global action against population control measures? And why?

Curse of the Infallibility Dogma

"The only way to solve the problem of contraception is to solve the problem of infallibility." --- Hans K|ng, liberal Catholic Theologian, 1979

The availability of contraception and safe, legal abortion is critical to successful world population control. Pope John Paul II's immutability on these two issues can be traced back to 1870, and the Vatican Council I. Two new dogmas were proclaimed at Vatican Council I by Pope Pius IX, a man considered by many to be mentally ill (Mumford, pgs. 191-193). The first was the dogma of papal infallibility, which means that the pope is incapable of error when he makes decisions on matters of faith and morals. The second was the dogma of papal primacy, which gave the pope universal jurisdiction over the entire church, reducing bishops to lackeys of the Pope.

The foundation of today's Catholic Church rests on the infallibility doctrine. In 1980, in a letter to the German Bishops' Conference, Pope John Paul II wrote: "I am convinced that the doctrine of infallibility is in a certain sense the key to the certainty with which the faith is confessed and proclaimed, as well as to the life and conduct of the faithful. For once the essential foundation is shaken or destroyed, the most basic truths of our faith likewise begin to break down."

The Church has put its infallibility and authority on the line with contraception and abortion, both of which are immoral and evil, according to official Church teachings. The 1930 Church encyclical On Christian Marriage pronounced all abortion to be murder, and contraception a "crime against nature."

By the 1960's, it was becoming obvious to many in the world that overpopulation was a real global threat. This awareness, combined with a growing recognition of women's rights, the development of effective means of artificial contraception, and the public health disaster of illegal abortion, contributed to a widespread trend to liberalize laws against contraception and abortion.

The Catholic Church was not immune to the moral power of these social movements. In 1964, Pope Paul VI (possibly the most socially progressive pope of this century) authorized a Commission on Population and Birth Control to see if he could find a way to change the Church's position on birth control without destroying papal authority. The commission consisted of 64 lay experts and 15 cardinals and bishops. After two years of studying the dilemma, the laymen voted 60 to 4 and the clerics 9 to 6 to change the Church's teaching on birth control because it was the right thing to do, even though it would mean a loss of papal authority. The minority faction also submitted a report to the Pope. The co-author of the minority report was none other than the Archbishop of Cracow, Karol Wojtyla, now Pope John Paul II. In his minority report, our future pope stated (or sanctioned) these words:

"If it should be declared that contraception is not evil in itself, then we should have to concede frankly that ... for half a century the [Holy] Spirit failed to protect Pius XI, Pius XII, and a large part of the Catholic hierarchy from a very serious error. This would mean that the leaders of the Church, acting with extreme imprudence, had condemned thousands of innocent human acts, forbidding, under pain of eternal damnation, a practice which would now be sanctioned. The fact can neither be denied nor ignored that these same acts would now be declared licit on the grounds of principles cited by the Protestants, which popes and bishops have either condemned or at least not approved."

Because of the grave threat to papal infallibility and authority posed by the majority's recommendation to change Church teachings on birth control, Pope Paul VI rejected the majority report, and adopted the minority report instead. In 1968, he issued his infamous encyclical, Humanae Vitae, in which he condemned almost every form of birth control as morally reprehensible.

Thus, contraception became the first serious threat to the principle of infallibility. The only way for the Church to backtrack on the issue of contraception would be to admit error, thereby destroying its divinely sanctioned infallibility, and losing much of its authority and power. The Vatican believes, probably correctly, that if solutions to the population problem were to be applied, Vatican power would soon wither and perhaps die completely. Obviously, then, the Vatican's battle against contraception and abortion rests not on moral grounds, but solely on its drive to survive as an influential political institution. And the cornerstone of the Vatican's quest for power is based, not on concern for the fate of humanity, but on its war against abortion.

Abortion -- Bedrock of the Papal Agenda

"No circumstance, no purpose, no law whatsoever can ever make licit an act which is intrinsically illicit, since it is contrary to the law of God which is written in every human heart, knowable by reason itself, and proclaimed by the church." --- Pope Paul VI on abortion, Humanae Vitae encyclical (1968)

In western Europe, the Pope has decisively lost his battle against legal abortion, including in the Vatican's home country, Italy. But his reactionary views still have far-reaching effects in developing countries, and in the United States. The Vatican chose the United States to wage an all-out war against abortion, because America is its last chance to assert its will on the world. If influential U.S. policy on population control can be made to match papal policy, many other countries will have little choice but to follow suit.

In 1975, American Catholic bishops issued their Pastoral Plan for Pro-Life Activities, a response not only to the NSSM 200 study, but to the legalization of abortion in the U.S. only two years before. This comprehensive blueprint laid out numerous objectives, such as:

passing a Human Life Amendment to the Constitution, giving full human rights to fetuses lobbying for appointment of anti-abortion judges to the Supreme Court to overturn Roe vs. Wade, or at least restrict abortion legally as much as possible lobbying all types of leadership (business, government, professions, academic, labour) and the media to promote public policies against abortion working with non-Catholic churches to advocate the anti-abortion view using the Catholic press and Catholic schools and churches to disseminate political and educational information against abortion With the exception of the passing of a Human Life Amendment, the bishops' pastoral plan has been largely implemented and successful.

The importance of the issue of abortion to the Catholic hierarchy cannot be underestimated. According to Timothy Byrnes, author of the 1991 book Catholic Bishops in American Politics, abortion occupies a unique position on the Catholic hierarchy's public policy agenda. Byrnes says: "Abortion is not one issue among many for the bishops. It is rather the bedrock, non-negotiable starting point from which the rest of their agenda has developed. The bishops' positions on other issues have led to political action and political controversy, but abortion ... has been a consistently central feature of the Catholic hierarchy's participation in American politics." (pg. 143)

How did the bishops accomplish their agenda, not only against abortion, but against world population control?

Hidden Power of The Catholic Hierarchy

"The Church has the power of employing force and [of exercising] direct and indirect temporal power." --- Vatican encyclical Quata Cura, Pope Pius IX, 1864

The Vatican agenda against U.S. population control policy does not reflect the position of 93% of American Catholics. Almost all of these liberal Catholics, including large numbers of priests and nuns, do not support the Pope's stance against birth control, abortion, women's ordination, and many other progressive issues. Unfortunately, liberal Catholics have very little political power and influence.

But the Vatican in Rome has vast resources, wealth, and minions at its disposal, and it uses these to continually inject the papal viewpoint into American politics, education, the media, and the private sphere. Within the United States resides a powerful and conservative Catholic hierarchy of cardinals and bishops who answer only to Rome. In addition, many key players in the American government have been devout Roman Catholics, including former CIA chief William Casey, former Secretary of State Alexander Haig, Reagan's National Security Advisors Richard Allen and William Clark, and many, many others.

Mumford documents the instrumental role that Catholic bishops played in the 1976 presidential election, and subsequent elections (pgs. 98-103; 163-165; 355-357). Both Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford actively courted the Catholic vote, and worked to establish a supportive relationship with the bishops. One of the deals Carter made with 15 Catholic leaders was to de-emphasize federal support for family planning in exchange for Catholic support for his Presidential race. Once elected, Carter put the two federal agencies with family planning programs under Catholic control, effectively rendering them useless.

Similarly, the bishops succeeded in their efforts to elect conservative Republican Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush. In both of these administrations, U.S. population policy reflected Vatican policy. In 1982, Reagan struck a deal with Pope John Paul II to cut off funding to U.S. foreign aid programs that promoted population control, in exchange for Vatican funding of the Polish Solidarity movement (Blanchard, 1994). Both Reagan and Bush made numerous appointments from the ranks of the Religious Right, who then waged a campaign of bureaucratic harassment and obstruction against the family planning establishment. Bishops were allowed to infiltrate every U.S. government office that had anything to do with population control. Reagan and Bush also appointed five Supreme Court Justices and 70% of all sitting judges in the federal court system, all of them anti-abortion (Mumford, pg. 165).

Although the Catholic hierarchy suffered a setback with the election of pro-choice President Bill Clinton in 1992, they and the rest of the Religious Right began a concerted campaign of undermining his credibility. From the moment he took office, Clinton has been hounded by charges intended to embarrass him and to weaken his ability to govern effectively. Mumford characterizes the attacks on Clinton as "ugly, bitter, brutal, and vicious" and as coming from everywhere -- the House, the Senate, radio and television talk shows, newspapers and magazines, and Rush Limbaugh (and most recently, Kenneth Starr). The conservative Catholic press has led the charge and have been the most aggressive (pg. 318).

Vatican Abuse of Ecumenism

"The Church has the power to define dogmatically the religion of the Catholic Church to be the only true religion." / "No man is free to embrace and profess that religion which he believes to be true, guided by the light of reason." --- Vatican encyclical Quata Cura, Pope Pius IX, 1864

As part of the Pastoral Plan for Pro-life Activities, the Vatican fostered an ecumenical movement with evangelical Protestants. Not only would this give its cause considerably more strength and numbers, but, according to Mumford, it served to "give the appearance that Protestants were the instigators" of the anti-abortion, anti-contraception movement (pg. 308). Indeed, most Americans identify the Protestant Religious Right as the main enemy of abortion rights. This is mainly because the Vatican's campaign against population control relies on stealth and censorship. For example, the Vatican has taken the "protest" out of Protestants. Until the pastoral plan was implemented, Protestant denominations freely protested or criticized the Catholic Church. By forging alliances with them, the bishops silenced them.

The Catholic hierarchy was instrumental in promoting and directing the Religious Right. In the late 1980's, it made an alliance with the powerful and very conservative Southern Baptist Convention. But even earlier, the Catholic hierarchy was basically responsible for creating both the Moral Majority, and later, the Christian Coalition. Catholic extremist Paul Weyrich recruited both Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson to lead the groups. Mumford shows that the leadership of the Christian Coalition is largely controlled by Catholics, and a large proportion of their staff is Catholic. Mumford states: "It is likely that much of the work of the Coalition, even in targeting Protestants, is accomplished by thousands of paid employees of the Catholic Church." (pg. 179).

The Christian Coalition is a powerful political organization that plays a large role in shaping the outcome of American elections. Mumford documents the takeover of the Republican Party by the Christian Coalition. In 1991, Pat Robertson stated his dream for the Coalition: "We want ... as soon as possible to see a working majority of the Republican Party in the hands of pro-family Christians by 1996." By 1994, Mumford says, "the Christian Right exercised complete domination of Republican parties in 13 states and considerable control in 18 others." (pg. 308) In the 1994 election, the Republican party won control of both houses of Congress, for the first time in 40 years.

Silencing of the Press

"This pressure [of the Catholic Church on American journalism] is one of the most important forces in American life, and the only one about which secrecy is generally maintained, no newspaper being brave enough to discuss it, although all fear it and believe that the problem should be dragged into the open and made publicly known." --- George Seldes, journalist and media critic, Lords of the Press (1938)

The Vatican is against almost all the democratic principles we hold dear, including freedom of the press, freedom of association, and freedom of religion. The "infallible" Pope Pius IX branded freedom of the press as intrinsically evil, and denied it was a legitimate right. Freedom of the press, he said, "does not allow a man to print what is wrong, what is known to be false, or what is calculated to undermine and destroy the moral and religious fiber of individuals and the peace and harmony of nations." Of course, the Church has decided it is the supreme judge of what is wrong, false, and moral.

The Church hierarchy has been very successful at silencing criticism of the Catholic Church in the North American press. The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights is the main group fighting "anti-Catholicism" in the press, supported by the Catholic hierarchy. Methods include sending continuous barrages of press releases to get the conservative Catholic viewpoint across, and demanding equal time when opposing views are published. If something is printed in the mainstream press that is critical of Catholicism, the Catholic League demands retractions, organizes petitions, threatens boycotts, publicly humiliates dissenters, and tries to get the offending reporter fired. Mumford documents numerous examples of these activities (pg. 289-302). The 1994 and 1995 annual reports of the Catholic League list 350 of its attacks on media, activist groups, businesses, schools, and governments.

Vatican Interference at the United Nations

"Does the Vatican rule the world? The world is not here to be dictated to. And let me tell you, the delegates here represent more than five billion people in the world, and not only 190 at the Vatican." --- Maher Mahran, Egypt's minister of population, U.N. International Conference on Population and Development, Cairo, 1994

This decade has seen the United Nations become more and more involved in helping countries implement population control measures, and in promoting the education and empowerment of women in developing countries as a means to achieve these goals. The Vatican has consistently fought against these advances at United Nations conferences, denying that an overpopulation problem even exists. It also lobbies strongly against solutions to global warming, because to admit this as a serious threat would be to admit the overpopulation problem that led to it.

The Vatican stands virtually alone on the world stage in defending its position. It has managed to ally itself with only a few Muslim and other reactionary countries, some with records of serious human rights abuses. Nevertheless, the Vatican has enjoyed considerable success at hampering the progress of the United Nations on population and environmental issues, because of its special status as a Non-member State Permanent Observer, a status shared by no other religion.

The Vatican is in a privileged position to directly influence U.N. policy by negotiating and voting on recommendations just like any national government. It uses its strong voice to block consensus at international conferences.

But at recent United Nations conferences, a new and more negative image of the Vatican has materialized. Because of its isolation and its extremist views, it has lost a great deal of international credibility. Furthermore, the Vatican's reputation as a moral authority lies in tatters. Its views are largely ignored by the masses, including most Catholics, who have become cynical and disillusioned by their Church's lost grip on reality. Non-Catholics generally consider the antics of the Vatican to be nothing more than a bad joke.

So relentless is the Vatican in its drive to push its agenda onto everyone else, so determined is it to retain its power and influence regardless of the cost in human suffering, that it has probably inflicted irreparable harm on the institution of the papacy. The Vatican's stance against population control measures is a desperate, last-ditch attempt to save itself from the blind alley it embarked upon in 1870, with the dogma of papal infallibility.

The Vatican is on a path to self-destruction. The question is: can we stop the Vatican before it drags the rest of the world with it?

References and Further Reading

Blanchard, Dallas A. The Anti-Abortion Movement and the Rise of the Religious Right. Twayne Publishers, New York. 1994.

Blanshard, Paul. American Freedom and Catholic Power. The Beacon Press, Boston. 1949.

Byrnes, Timothy. Catholic Bishops in American Politics. Princeton University Press, New Jersey. 1991.

Manning, Joanna. Is the Pope Catholic? A Woman Confronts Her Church. Malcolm Lester Books, Toronto. 1999.

Mumford, Stephen D. The Life and Death of NSSM 200: How the Destruction of Political Will Doomed a U.S. Population Policy. Center for Research on Population and Security, North Carolina. 1996.

Seldes, George. Lords of the Press. Julian Messner Inc., New York. 1938.

United Nations, Population Division, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 1998 Revision of the World Population Estimates and Projections. http://www.popin.org/pop1998/

(Mortal Sins of the Vatican, copyright ) 1999, Joyce Arthur.)

-- Deceit Exposer (expose@thedeceit.com), August 08, 2000

Answers

Fascinating. I suspect that you are giving the Church a bit more power than it really has: it can persaude, it can no longer threaten. The Southern Baptists and protestants were going in that direction anyway, the alliance made sense to all the allies, or they would abandon it. The Church did mess up at least one population control confurances.

It is carrying out its own agenda, and is true to that agenda.

The type of extreme pop control outlined in your document is where I support the church. I would be done not as a properganda move, but as a do-it-or-die move. Very nasty. I hope that America never stoops so low.

The US is below the replacement level for births, I have been told.

I sympathise with your population concerns, and regret both the Church's position's and the results of that position, but I would only support the most gentle of options. So I am for the volentary conception control, but not anything stronger. Forced sterialization and forced anything is really too much. Why not just give out the pill, and run a tight properganda campaign? Should work most places. Sean

-- Sean Cleary (sean_cleary@bigfoot.com), August 10, 2000.

Hey, anonymous anti-Catholic (formerly "Deceit Exposer," but now posing as one "Frederick Sharpe"), you really crack me up!!!

First, you copied an asinine article here on August 8. Notice that everyone (properly) ignored it for two days. You must have been thrilled when, on August 10, someone who is not a practicing Catholic took an interest in it enough to make a comment -- though even he criticized it strongly. Then four more days passed with everyone (properly) ignoring the article again.

That was just too much for you, wasn't it? You crave attention and are spoiling for a fight, so you had to come back and pretend to be someone who had just read the article and agreed with it. Thanks for giving me a good laugh with your play-acting! I won't satisfy you by debating the article's contents, though. I wouldn't bother to waste my time on such diabolical diarrhea.

Please come back, "Mr./Mrs. Sharpe," when you have guts enough to approach Catholics maturely, with charity, and with a real name and e-mail address.

John

-- J. F. Gecik (jgecik@desc.dla.mil), August 15, 2000.

"I won't satisfy you by debating the article's contents, though. I wouldn't bother to waste my time on such diabolical diarrhea."

That's good for a laugh! You won't debate it because you can't. I was trying to keep the argument alive, and I will continue to keep the argument alive. You cannot debate this essay because it's too true, and too irrefutable.

Go at it, Geoduck. We're all waiting. Have a go at it -- show us your version of reality. Defend your faith, but do it well.

-- Frederick Sharpe (x@x.com), August 18, 2000.

Dear Frederick Dull,
You have met your match. No, it's not me, but the patron saint of my parish, St. Michael the Archangel, who thrusts satan and his minions into hell.
Your crud at the top of this thread is, I say again, demonic dung, and I will not fall for your Tartarean temptations.
Begone.
John

-- J. F. Gecik (jgecik@desc.dla.mil), August 18, 2000.

John,

You call this perfectly reasonable, well-researched, factual argument "diarrhea" and "crud," yet you do not deign to actually dig in and defend your position. Why not tell us exactly what is untrue about this essay instead of engaging in ad hominem attacks? What exactly is it about this essay that is indefensible?

If you can answer this, you will inspire more confidence in your readers. Please be specific -- point to facts, show alternative reasoning, or simply present your arguments.

Looking forward to reading your defense,

-- Frederick Sharpe (x@x.com), August 20, 2000.

Jmj

Until now, sir, you can see that I have assumed you to have been coming here in "bad faith" -- as a sort of satanist or atheist who wanted nothing but to stir up trouble.

Let me take a different tack now and assume, just for a moment, that you are not a satanist or atheist, but rather a Jack Chick disciple or an extremely naive teenager. Now if I make this new assumption, I must still totally reject the thought of wasting time refuting this article. Why? Because the article is written in language that is so ridiculous and insulting that no one can take it seriously on a religious message board.

Please read the two notes just posted by the board's "moderator," one addressed specifically to you, if you think that I am overreacting.

The following bombastic expressions, just a few of those that I could have taken from the article you copied, are hate-filled and intolerable, making the whole article unworthy of response:
-- "Vatican willing to sacrifice humanity"
-- "its own power base"
-- "Vatican's manipulation of the American government"
-- "[The Pope's] teachings ... could ... lead to the death of us all."
-- "Vatican denial of birth control to the people of the world"
-- "the problem and its solutions have been swept under the carpet for 25 years by the machinations of the Pope and the Vatican.
-- "the Vatican successfully blocked WHO"
-- "Pope Pius IX, a man considered by many to be mentally ill"
-- "the cornerstone of the Vatican's quest for power"
-- "Vatican in Rome has vast resources, wealth, and minions at its disposal"

From Catholics here, sir, you could have obtained reasoned responses to some of the doctrinal and/or population-related contentions in the article, if those contentions had been expressed in a respectful (not anti-Catholic) way, one at a time, in your own words.

God bless you.
John
PS: I will not return to this thread, so please do not reply to me here.

-- J. F. Gecik (jgecik@desc.dla.mil), August 21, 2000.

John's characterization of me as a non-practicing Catholic is accurate. The dates from your article were useful. Sean

-- Sean Cleary (sean_cleary@bigfoot.com), August 28, 2000.

Let us consider the beginning.

Imagine endless empty space that goes on into infinity non-existence no awareness EVIL.

If we consider the old saying life finds away. GOD came into being by his own will to be, the awareness. Born out of the non-existence the EVIL.

Imagine an awareness hovering in endless space or Darkness as HE would see it.

After a time his thoughts become collective and he begins to think. He is aware of himself and begins to wonder if there were another. After searching for countless billions of years, the loneliness consumes him into obsession with finding another. But there is no other but him. He splits into two separate entities (schizoid only for real) that are equal and opposite in nature. Light - that which creates (Life - the future). Darkness(SHE : Spirit that inhabits the Darkness- The past) - Destroys makes desolate. Each has the same goal to end the loneliness only they have diametrically opposite positions on how to go about it. Chaos vs. Order, Light vs. Darkness, Life vs. Death, Existence vs. non-existence or Good vs. Evil. GOD is the awareness of being before the Darkness. We stand between the Darkness and the Light. Our true purpose is to Be. For that is the will of GOD - to be because HE is. Ja'El they said. When GOD comes again if he comes into Darkness the Earth will be cleansed with the fire of GOD (His true form). If GOD comes into the Light he will make the Earth a new with the Tree and the River of Life. All things are possible if we believe. The power of the Holy Spirit is promised to us by Jesus Christ.

That is why no one has seen GOD because he became separate from himself. The two have to be united into their new form. They want to come and live us,their children and the Angles of Light and Darkness. We are the key to setting them Free from the loneliness forever. Revelation chap 17 Behold the Beast that was (EVIL or non-existence reined in the beginning there was no awareness) and is not (Evil- the tendency towards non-existence cannot exist in pure form) and yet is (If we lose our sense of awareness the EVIL will return and nothing will exist)

The River of Life is man's final salvation. The fruit of Tree of Life is for the Fallen Angles Consummation, Turn from Darkness back to the awareness of GOD. The Leaves are for the Healing of the Nations. The sword of Power blocks our way to it and blinds us from The one who was (The True GOD, the past) The one who is (Man the children of GOD, the present) The one who will be (Christ - the son of man, the future). We will become like the others and they will become like us. The evolution.

The way is through Awareness - GOD's will to be. Understanding is Knowing the Truth Understanding is Accepting the Truth The Truth leads to Understanding which leads to Awareness which strengthens our will to Be.

The Truth is put before us but, they do everything they can to keep us from Understanding it.

We have to show them that we are not children anymore. That we have learned to Understand the Truth. And the Truth shall set us all Free. They are counting on us and we can't let them down. But it is ultimately up to them to change - Free will.

Mystery? Who are you? Man who stands between the Darkness and the Light. What do you want? Freedom Why are you here? To bring order to chaos. Where are you going? The Future

The End of Time - The New Beginning

-- Darian Borne (shadows@vmbc.net), December 01, 2000.

Friends,

If you wish to converse with Mr. Borne, please go to the thread he started (and to which I responded). It is called, "I'm looking for intelligent opinions not blind lashings Thank you."
He posted the same message to start that thread.
Please do not respond to him here.

SN

-- Slave Nolonger (free@long.last), December 02, 2000.

The Catholic church is not rich, they take in the least amount of money percent wise then any other church. Abortion is murder. I don't see anything wrong with contraception and the pope is not infalible. Obviously the church has made mistakes in the past (the selling of indulgences, the Holy War) so I seriously doubt that anyone, including the pope, actualy believes that the pope is infalible. Maybe we're wrong about contraception, but that still doesn't change the fact that abortion is murder. Takeing a life is not the same as preventing.

-- Chris Fox (martinaj@sprynet.com), December 14, 2000.

*The only way to solve the problem of contraception is to solve the problem of infallibility.* Hans Kung /

Maybe let us add, to solve the problem of infallibility (the Pope's) is to solve *the problem of the Holy Spirit* --Who is given to the Catholic Church by the Eternal Father and the Son. If Hans Kung, or the Dallas news columnists had it their way, we might disregard any notion of the Holy Spirit protecting the Vicar of Christ on earth from speaking in error on matters of faith and morals ex cathedra. We can hardly blame a putatively agnostic Dallas journalist for belittling the Pope. But to worry about a renegade priest, stripped of his Catholic teaching authority by the Pope himself-- or his grave reservations about Papal infallibility, is counter-productive.

Natural contraception of a moral type is not denied by the infallible teachings of the Pope. It is the artificial type, used to entitle a Catholic to ''The Joy of Sex'' with no responsibility attached; sex without consequences-- that remains forbidden. To these ''experts'' that argue about a population explosion, the Pope should say: ''IT'S THE MORALITY, STUPID !''

-- eugene c. chavez (chavezec@pacbell.net), December 16, 2000.

"Fascinating. I suspect that you are giving the Church a bit more power than it really has: it can persaude, it can no longer threaten."

Depends on who you ask....from www.fatima.org-

The following is an English translation of an Open Letter published in Italian in the July 12th, 1995 issue of Il Messaggero, Italy's largest daily newspaper.

AN OPEN LETTER TO POPE JOHN PAUL II AND TO ALL CATHOLICS AND PEACELOVING MEN

MOST HOLY FATHER . . . One year ago, planning began for a great Conference of Catholic bishops to be held in November 1994 in Mexico City, Mexico. The purpose of this Conference was to privately bring together our Church leaders to discuss the Message of Our Lady of Fatima and its unique Heaven-ordained role in the search for peace in our troubled world. As Our Lady said at Fatima, If My requests are granted many souls will be saved and there will be peace.

As organizers of this Conference, we were guided first and foremost by the teachings of our Holy Mother, the Church, especially those contained in documents of the Second Vatican Council pertaining to the rights and obligations of the laity. As Your Holiness knows, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church enjoins the Faithful to disclose their needs and desires to their pastors and states that by reason of the knowledge, competence or pre-eminence which they have, the laity are empowered indeed sometimes obliged to manifest their opinion on those things which pertain to the good of the Church. (Lumen Gentium IV.37; See also the New Code of Canon Law 212.)

Your Own Advice, Holy Father Moreover, in all our planning, Holiness, we were constantly mindful of the advice you yourself had offered in the presence of Cardinal Wyszynski in 1980 that those seeking the fulfillment of Our Lady s Fatima requests (especially the Consecration of Russia as a condition of world peace) should go to the bishops first and seek their support and assistance. From 1983 to 1993 we have written all the Catholic bishops numerous times about this matter, as well we called and met with a number of bishops, particularly at our first Bishops Conference at Fatima in 1992.

As a result of all these efforts we have obtained the support of 700 Catholic bishops from every part of the world for the consecration of specifically Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. But still it seemed we had not done enough. And so, in the spring and early summer of 1994, in a pious and humble spirit, we wrote again to all the bishops of the world and invited them to come together in a private setting near the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico to openly and freely discuss the Message of Fatima. Through the generosity of many thousands of Faithful souls committed to the goals of this Conference, we were also able to offer the bishops the full financial assistance they needed to travel and stay in Mexico.

Your Holiness should know that, prior to sending this invitation, we had consulted in person with His Excellency, Bishop Ramon Godinez- Flores, Secretary-General of the Mexican Conference of Bishops, and informed him of our intentions. In May 1994, Bishop Flores gave his enthusiastic approval to the Conference and went so far as to offer us the rental of the Mexican Bishops own official headquarters as a site for the Conference. We gladly accepted and provided His Excellency with an immediate deposit for the facility.

The Bishops Respond Enthusiastically! Over the course of the next few months, we received many cordial replies from bishops around the world, indicating their intention to attend the Conference and warmly commending the notion of such an event. It is clear that the bishops have both an obligation and a right to know (as completely as possible) the full Message of Fatima, and they rejoiced at the opportunity. From the early and enthusiastic responses we received, we estimated that as many as 300 bishops would attend the Conference, representing close to 10 percent of the entire Catholic Episcopate worldwide! A tremendous accomplishment considering the private nature of the gathering and the logistical and travel difficulties involved.

It was at this time, Holy Father, that we began to receive disturbing reports of letters and phone calls being made by some few bureaucrats of the Holy See to various bishops and nuncios in a direct effort to discourage and even forbid participation in our Conference. At first, we could hardly believe these reports, not understanding why Vatican bureaucrats would or could object to a private gathering of Catholic bishops and priests whose only purpose was to freely discuss the plan for peace that God s Mother gave the world at Fatima!

A Campaign of Deception and Lies Sadly, upon further investigation and with the assistance of sympathetic bishops, we discovered that indeed such letters had been sent from a few Vatican bureaucrats to chancelleries around the world. Incredibly, at a time when you yourself were forcefully speaking out publicly on the need for peace, these letters from your own subordinates suggested that our Conference was somehow inappropriate or out-of-order. To make matters worse, these letters contained outright lies and egregious libels concerning the prime organizer of the gathering, Father Nicholas Gruner. With no regard for the truth, Father Gruner s status as a priest-in-good-standing was called into serious question as well as his proven loyalty and dedication to Your Holiness person and high office.

These unfounded charges and outrageous accusations were especially painful in the face of Father Gruner s long and tireless efforts (even at the expense of his own health) on behalf of Our Lady and Her Fatima Message. In the last 18 years, despite constant opposition from radical modernists and anti-Marian forces within the Church, he has succeeded in creating one of the largest lay Apostolates in the world, bringing together nearly 500,000 individuals in a community of prayer and sacrifice dedicated to promoting the full and complete Message of Fatima. Through magazines, radio and television programs and in public appearances in many countries, Father Gruner has brought the Mother of God s Fatima words to tens of millions of souls around the world ... and all in perfect accordance with the teaching and traditions of the Holy Magisterium. Father Nicholas Gruner s current status as priest-in-good-standing is unquestionable and dramatically verified by the testimonial you yourself issued on February 1, 1993 honoring his 16 years of priestly service and personally congratulating him on his work for Our Lady of Fatima.

No Word of Warning or Protest Your Holiness, it is an understatement to say that we were dumbfounded when we first read the outrageous statement contained in these official letters. The Conference had been public news for many months, yet in all that time not a single Church official had even once contacted us with objections. More than 4,000 formal invitations had been sent to bishops, including yourself, and not a single word of protest had been received from any ecclesiastical authority. Now, only weeks before the Conference was due to commence, we found ourselves fighting against unseen enemies spreading false information and outright lies.

Despite our best efforts to counter this campaign of deception and lies by providing the true facts of the case, many bishops felt obliged to withdraw their support of the Conference out of fear and simple confusion. It soon became plainly obvious to us that spreading just this kind of dissention and confusion amongst the bishops was the underlying intention of this campaign in the first place! Adding insult to injury, not long before the event, we received a letter from Bishop Flores canceling our agreement for accommodation and withdrawing his official sanction. His Excellency cited comments made by an official of the Secretariat of State as being responsible for his decision. Holy Father, we are sure you will understand that we were deeply discouraged and disheartened by these events.

We debated long and hard whether we should move, postpone or cancel the Conference outright. In the end, we turned to Our Lord and Our Lady in prayer and, confident of Their guidance and protection, chose to continue our plans as originally announced. Even though time was critically short, by God s Grace, we were successful in obtaining (albeit at considerable financial cost) new meeting facilities and sleeping accommodations for the bishops. Through His Mercy, we were also able to overcome the last-minute legal and political impediments that Bishop Flores had engineered through the Mexican government (in clear violation of both God s law and Civil law) to prevent the issuance of travel visas to bishops who wished to attend our Conference. Blessed be God. Blessed be His Holy Name!

The Conference is Held! On November 8, 1994, the Conference on World Peace and the Immaculate Heart of Mary was formally convened in Mexico City in the presence of bishops from every continent in the world as well as honored guests and members of the Catholic and secular press. Over the next week, in a series of plenary sessions that were extraordinary for their seriousness and piety, the participants freely and openly discussed Our Lady s Fatima Message and its special role in the Church s effort to bring peace to our nations, to our families and to the world.

Your Holiness, while the number of bishops in attendance was far short of our original expectations, we were nevertheless deeply gratified that those who did attend represented so diverse and honored a cross-section of the Episcopacy. In prelates like Archbishop Accogli, Archbishop Capucci and Archbishop Milingo, we truly witnessed men who were worthy and noble successors to the Apostles themselves! We will forever be thankful for the courage and dedication that they and their colleagues showed in attending our Conference.

In the end, despite the sinister machinations of Our Lady s enemies, the assembled delegates came together to produce an historic document that we believe represents a new treasure for the Church. Consisting of 14 Resolutions, this document re-affirms Our Lady of Fatima s crucial role in the process towards true peace and in the mystery of our salvation itself.

Archbishop Milingo Accuses the Bureaucrats! Holy Father, it was left to a member of your own sacred Curia to deliver the most dramatic address of the Conference. Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo, formerly Ordinary of Lusaka and now Special Delegate of the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerants, rose and delivered an electrifying condemnation of those who had attempted to prevent this gathering of bishops from occurring. Speaking to his fellow bishops and to the entire Catholic world, His Excellency deplored the efforts of a few Vatican bureaucrats to suspend the lawful authority of the Episcopacy and prevent the bishops from carrying out their duties and fulfilling their responsibilities. Holding a copy of the letter that had been sent to the bishops of Nigeria, Archbishop Milingo stated:

What a pity! It is a humiliation to a human being, who is an apostle, a humiliation intended to prevent him from fulfilling his duties according to his own personality and character ... It is sad. It is humiliating. It lowers the dignity of a human being to have a letter like this going around that actually prevents someone from coming to a conference for Our Lady. ... If this letter represents their way to control us, it means that they don t trust the people to whom they have given authority. Archbishop Milingo concluded his address by forcefully encouraging all those who truly believe in peace to persevere in our efforts to bring the full Fatima Message to the Faithful and to the world. As His Excellency said, I think we can go very, very far if we can make each and every one of our Catholics concerned with the whole welfare of the world. And, indeed, it is just in that spirit of Christian charity and with utmost respect and humility that we are publishing this Open Letter.

Holy Father, World Peace is in Your Hands! The Blessed Mother of God came to Fatima to give the world the way to achieve true and lasting peace. She entrusted the means to this end to the Church, through you, the Vicar of Christ, in union with the bishops of the world. It has now been 78 years since Our Lady first appeared at Fatima. In that time, we have witnessed millions of lives destroyed through violence and war. Today, we continue to watch as millions of children are murdered in their own mothers wombs and tens of thousands of more lives are lost each year in bloody conflicts around the globe. The Queen of Peace has offered us an end to this tragic cycle of death and misery if we will but obey Her requests for prayer, reparation and consecration.

Your Holiness, we intend to continue to do our part to encourage all Catholics and others of good will to place their trust in the Sacred and Immaculate Hearts of Jesus and Mary. With all respect and love, we also intend to continue our efforts to bring Our Lady s full Fatima Message to the Church, particularly to you and your fellow bishops. Our campaign for the Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart (as commanded at Fatima) will continue unimpeded. We and the other 5,000,000 souls who have signed petitions to you asking for this act to be accomplished (and the millions more who await it) shall not be frightened or intimidated into silence by mere bureaucrats in pursuit of a private agenda.

The history of our Holy Church and the lives of our holy saints teaches us that we must resist evil from wherever it arises. Our hearts remain indissolubly united with yours, Holy Father, but we fear that you are being deceived and misled by those in whom you have placed your trust. The facts we have presented in this Open Letter combined with private information from Episcopal sources lead us inevitably to the conclusion that a small handful of Vatican bureaucrats are deliberately and maliciously withholding information from you and acting without proper authority in your august name. We respectfully urge you to take this opportunity to investigate the actions of those officials who in clear violation of Canon Law and the Constitution of the Church attempted to sabotage our recent Conference and blacken the name of a pious and humble priest who has sacrificed so greatly for the sake of Our Lady and the glory of Holy Mother Church.

We Appeal to You, Holy Father! Your Holiness, at the time of our first Bishops Conference in Fatima in 1992, we were appalled by the manifestly unjust statements made by certain Vatican bureaucrats who opposed the gathering. Nevertheless, we held our tongues, hoping and praying for Christian charity to prevail. We fully expected that, following the event, the magnitude of their error would be so obvious that these officials would publish an immediate retraction. At worst, we assumed that these illegal and unjust efforts to prevent us from promoting the Fatima Message would stop.

Now, following the events described in this Open Letter, it is manifestly clear that our patience and silence was taken by these individuals as a license for even more bold and unjust action against our attempts to bring Our Lady s Message to the bishops and to the world. After the bitter experiences of the last two Conferences, it now seems undeniable that there exists a small group of Vatican officials who have become so confident of their unbridled power that they will use any means (including lies, slander and libel) to silence anyone promoting the full Fatima Message. Thus, Holy Father, we are obliged to appeal to you directly in this public letter, trusting as always in your probity and fairness.

A New Conference is Announced! At the Mexico City Conference in November, we were encouraged by the bishops and others in attendance to undertake yet another meeting of bishops to discuss the Message of Fatima and its role in the peace of the world. Several bishops specifically urged us to hold this next conference in Rome under your protection and guidance. After the manifestly unjust statements and lies, published by Vatican bureaucrats against the first Fatima Bishops Peace Conference we at first waited for Christian charity to prevail. We expected that they would see their mistake and publish a retraction as justice demands. At the very least, we expected these bureaucrats to cease and desist any further illegal, unjust and immoral interventions against our publishing the full Fatima Message. But now after holding our Second Fatima Peace Conference for Bishops it is clear that our patience and our silence was taken by these bureaucrats as a license to be more bold and more unjust than ever and continue their campaign of lies against our informing the Catholic bishops of the world the truth.

Thus it is clear, judging from our awful experiences in the last two Conferences, that these few Vatican bureaucrats are so confident that they can, without any opposition, lie against, slander and libel any one who promotes the full Fatima Message, that we are forced to get around their maneuvers by appealing to Your Holiness in this public letter. Lest we be accused of planning in secret or not seeking proper authorization, we here and now in this public forum announce that we shall yet for a 3RD time invite every bishop in the world (whether friend or foe of Fatima) to join together in Rome for a Conference on Peace and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, dates and times to be announced by formal letter and publication.

Holy Father, we pray that you will bestow your Papal Blessing on this meeting and, if possible, attend one or more of its sessions. No Pope has ever spoken as movingly as you have of the urgent need for peace nor given so much respect to the Message of Fatima. We believe it is therefore most fitting and proper that your name come first in the list of those in support of this historic event.

Submitted in all respect and love to Your Holiness and in the names of Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ and His Blessed Mother, Mary.

Archbishop Benedict To Varpin Bishop A. S. Sanusi Father Paul Leonard Father Marcel Nault Father Paul Trinchard Coralie Graham John Vennari James Demers Mary Sedore Mairead Clarke

-- jackiea (jackiea@hotmail.com), December 17, 2000.

Dear Jackie,

Please straighten me out here. A 1995 open letter comes up now in answer to posts about Papal infallibility. All relating to the population control controversy. What IS the context of your message?

-- eugene c. chavez (chavezec@pacbell.net), December 18, 2000.

Simply responding to the comment that Sean made.

-- jackiea (jackiea@hotmail.com), December 18, 2000.

what ever u say or think censorship is wrong becouse it is the government lieing to the people which is a terrible thing 2 do just becouse the cowardly politisions want 2 protect them selves

-- leo (leo_bu@yahoo.co.uk), March 11, 2002.

Catholic apologist Dr. Scott Hahn or Fr.Frank Pavone of Priests For Life could refute this essay with one hand tied behind their backs! I wonder if the originator would DARE try sending it to them???

-- (echeeseman@webtv.net), March 07, 2003.