Some in the media are calling
it just a statement about "economic justice." But Pope Benedict XVI's
"Charity
in Truth" statement, also known as an encyclical, is a radical
document that puts the Roman Catholic Church firmly on the side of an emerging
world government.
In explicit and direct language, the Pope calls for a "true
world political authority" to manage the affairs of the world. At the same
time, however, the Pope also warns that such an international order could
"produce a dangerous universal power of a tyrannical nature" and must
be guarded against somehow.
The New York Times got it
right this time, noting
the Pope's call for a world political authority amounted to endorsement of a
New World Economic Order, a long-time goal of the old Soviet-sponsored international
communist movement. Bloomberg.com highlighted the Pope's call for a new world
order with "teeth."
The Pope's shocking endorsement of a "World Political
Authority," which has prophetic implications for some Christians who fear
that a global dictatorship will take power in the "last days" of
man's reign on earth, comes shortly after the United Nations Conference on the
World Financial and Economic Crisis issued a call for global taxes and more
powerful global institutions. U.N. General Assembly President, Miguel D'Escoto, a Communist
Catholic Priest, gave a
speech at the event calling on the nations of the world to revere
"Mother Earth" but concluded with words
from the Pope blessing the conference participants.
The controversial Papal
statement comes just before a meeting of the G-8 nations and a scheduled
meeting between the Pope and President Obama at the
Sounding like Obama himself,
Pope Benedict says this new international order can be accomplished through
"reform of the United
Nations Organization, and likewise of economic institutions and international
finance, so that the concept of the family of nations can acquire real
teeth."
The "teeth" may come
in adopting the global environmental agenda, which the Pope warmly embraces.
Sounding like Al Gore, the
Pope said that one pressing need is "a worldwide redistribution of energy
resources, so that countries lacking those resources can have access to
them." He adds that "This responsibility is a global one, for it is
concerned not just with energy but with the whole of creation, which must not
be bequeathed to future generations depleted of its resources."
"The Church has a
responsibility towards creation and she must assert this responsibility in the
public sphere," he explains.
In a statement that sounds
like an endorsement of a new global warming treaty, which will be negotiated at
a U.N. conference in December, the Pope says, "The international community
has an urgent duty to find institutional means of regulating the exploitation
of non-renewable resources, involving poor countries in the process, in order
to plan together for the future."
"The technologically
advanced societies can and must lower their domestic energy consumption, either
through an evolution in manufacturing methods or through greater ecological
sensitivity among their citizens." he declares.
In terms of how this new
"world political authority" should look, the Pope says that it, too,
should have "teeth" in the form of "the authority to ensure
compliance with its decisions from all parties, and also with the coordinated
measures adopted in various international forums." Pope Benedict declares
that "such an authority would need to be universally recognized and to be
vested with the effective power to ensure security for all, regard for justice,
and respect for rights."
But the document, which is
more than 30,000 words long, is contradictory in that it pretends that a world
government can co-exist with freedom and democracy. For example, the statement
calls for "a greater degree of international ordering, marked by
subsidiarity, for the management of globalization." The term
"subsidiarity" is usually defined as having matters handled by local
authorities, not international bureaucrats.
In another example of
double-speak, the Pope declares that "Globalization certainly requires
authority, insofar as it poses the problem of a global common good that needs
to be pursued. This authority, however, must be organized in a subsidiary and
stratified way, if it is not to infringe upon freedom and if it is to yield
effective results in practice."
He doesn't explain how it will
be possible for citizens to influence or control this "world political
authority" when they are under its bureaucratic control.
In the statement about how the
New World Order could turn into a tyranny, the Pope is also contradictory,
declaring that "...the principle of subsidiarity is particularly
well-suited to managing globalization and directing it towards authentic human
development. In order not to produce a dangerous universal power of a
tyrannical nature, the
governance of globalization must be marked by subsidiarity, articulated into
several layers and involving different levels that can work together."
Against, he doesn't explain
how people on the local or even national levels will be able to resist this
tyranny.
In a strong endorsement of
foreign aid, the Pope says that "In the search for solutions to the
current economic crisis, development
aid for poor countries must be considered a valid means of creating wealth for
all."
But there must be more. He
says that "...more economically developed nations should do all they can
to allocate larger portions of their gross domestic product to development aid,
thus respecting the obligations that the international community has undertaken
in this regard."
This statement seems to be an
urgent call for fulfilment of the U.N.'s Millennium Development Goals, which
involve an estimated $845 billion from the
The Pope goes on to say that
the social order should conform to the moral order, but the fact is that on
moral issues such as abortion and homosexuality, the agenda of the United
Nations is opposed to that of the Catholic Church. Even on capital punishment,
there is disagreement. The U.N. opposes it while traditional church teaching
(Section 2267 of the Catholic Catechism) allows it in certain cases.
In his statement, the Pope
declares that "Some non-governmental Organizations work actively to spread
abortion, at times promoting the practice of sterilization in poor countries,
in some cases not even informing the women concerned. Moreover, there is reason
to suspect that development aid is sometimes linked to specific health-care
policies which de facto involve
the imposition of strong birth control measures. Further grounds for concern
are laws permitting euthanasia as well as pressure from lobby groups,
nationally and internationally, in favour of its juridical recognition."
What he doesn't mention is
that some of these groups operate through and with the support of the United
Nations.