[continued from previous message]   
      
   Priests have always tried to command abject obedience by instilling fear in   
   their followers. The manner in which the clergy have threatened, and still do   
   threaten their congregations with fire and brimstone is a subject known to all   
   and sundry. However,    
   it should be understood, and clearly, that this technique was not a later   
   development of the Church. It has been a fundamental tool right from the very   
   beginning. (See also Revelation 20:7-21:8, 22:18-19.)   
      
   [415] Probably no branch of Christianity more closely resembles Marxism than   
   the Eastern Orthodox Church, which upholds a fundamentally Catholic   
   philosophy, while simultaneously rejecting the authority of the Pope. In the   
   Eastern Orthodox Church, priests    
   may marry, but bishops are selected only from the celibate. The supreme leader   
   of the Eastern Orthodox Church is the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople,   
   who is regarded simply as the “first among equals”, and whose direct authority   
   remains confined    
   to the affairs of his own church. This concept faintly resembles Marx's   
   classless and stateless society, and so it is little wonder that Marxist   
   ideals took root first, and deepest, in Eastern Orthodox Russia rather than in   
   Protestant England.   
      
   On the other hand, in China, despite Mao Tse Tung's gargantuan efforts to   
   impose more or less Marxist materialism upon the society, already it is just   
   about impossible to find any trace of Marxism in the pronouncements of the   
   second generation communist    
   leadership there. The Chinese society has long been immersed in the   
   non-Judaeo-Christian traditions of Confucianism and Buddhism, which emphasize   
   a cyclic rather than a linear evolutionary pattern as well as a greater degree   
   of practical spirituality in    
   day-to-day life. It was reported recently that China's ruling Communist Party   
   is planning to launch a campaign of moral revitalization in order to establish   
   a “socialist spiritual civilization guided by communist ideology”. Quite   
   obviously, there can be    
   no spiritual society guided by communist ideology, because communism is   
   founded on a materialistic philosophy. In fact, the philosophy of materialism   
   is so analytical in nature, so divisive in nature, that its main effect is to   
   fragment society. Hence,    
   one may say that not only can there be no spiritual society guided by a   
   materialist philosophy but ultimately there can be no society at all guided by   
   such a philosophy. Clearly this self-contradictory language on the part of   
   China's current    
   administration is nothing but a camouflage for what is really taking place,   
   that is, the total abandonment of Marxist materialism in favor of a revival of   
   some form of the old religions, no doubt to be maintained under strict   
   government supervision.   
      
   [416] In Scandinavian countries, one is officially registered with the   
   Lutheran Church at the time of birth. Thus, the Church goes on increasing its   
   membership – on paper – and, at the same time, performs the necessary civic   
   function of controlling the    
   records of birth (and death). In return, the Church is granted an automatic   
   percentage of the people's taxes, just as if it were some special kind of   
   government department. But, though the official number of Protestants remains   
   quite high, very few of    
   these so-called Christians attend Church with regularity.   
      
   It must be mentioned that this vacuum in the realm of spirituality, directly   
   or indirectly resulting from the Protestant monopoly on religion, is quite   
   unhealthy for both the individual and the society. That is the main reason why   
   one finds in those    
   countries such a high degree of anomie, along with all of its associated   
   problems.   
      
   [417] Perhaps, most notable in the past twenty years, have been the tremendous   
   efforts at reconciliation between the Vatican and the Patriarch of   
   Constantinople, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Lutheran Church.   
      
   [418] Each year sees an increasing decline in the number of men coming forward   
   to be ordained as Catholic priests. Twenty years ago, the Catholic Church in   
   the United States had 48,000 Seminarians; today, there are less than 12,000 –   
   and it is estimated    
   that only about 7,000 of them will take their final vows. Today, the average   
   age of a Catholic priest in the U.S.A. is 56 but, by the turn of the century,   
   statisticians are predicting that it will be 73, one year greater than the   
   average life expectancy.    
   At the same time, the total Catholic population, even in the U.S., has   
   continued to expand, resulting in an increasing number of parishes without   
   priests.   
      
   All over the world, many Churches and monasteries have had to close their   
   doors, and much Church property sits idle most of the year. In response to   
   this problem, the newest Code of Canon Law, which is to take effect on 27   
   November 1983, and which will    
   theoretically govern the religious practices of 796 million Roman Catholics   
   around the world, has had to allow a greater degree of lay participation in   
   what were formerly only priestly functions. Even women have been, reluctantly,   
   permitted greater    
   responsibility, although women still may not be ordained as priests and they   
   are prohibited from being permanent lay readers and servers at Mass.   
      
   [419] There has been at least one assassination attempt against Pope John Paul   
   II that seems to have been commissioned from Moscow. Recently, Mehmet Ali   
   Agca, who was arrested in 1981 for shooting the Pope, publicly announced to   
   the press that the KGB    
   organized everything. True or false, the Bulgarian connection appears to be   
   almost beyond doubt; and, behind Bulgaria, one can generally detect the   
   not-so-subtle influence of Russia.   
      
   [420] Just a few days after these lines were written, the news broke in the   
   New York Times about a formerly top secret U.S. State Department report, dated   
   1947, which identified the Vatican as the “largest single organization   
   involved in the illegal    
   movement of emigrants” including Nazis. According to the State Department   
   report, “It is the Vatican's desire to assist any person, regardless of   
   nationality or political beliefs, as long as that person can prove himself to   
   be a Catholic. This of course    
   from the practical point of view is a dangerous practice. The Vatican further   
   justifies its participation by its desire to infiltrate, not only European   
   countries, but Latin American countries as well, with people of all political   
   beliefs as long as they    
   are anti-communist and pro-Catholic Church.” The report further declares, “In   
   countries where the Church is a controlling or dominating factor, the Vatican   
   has brought pressure to bear which has resulted in the foreign missions of   
   those Latin American    
   countries taking an attitude almost favoring the entry into their country of   
   former Nazis and former Fascists or other political groups, so long as they   
   are anti-communist.”   
      
   While the above-mentioned U.S. State Department report was being highlighted   
   in the news, the same newspaper articles also brought out the statement made   
   before the Supreme Court of Chile, in 1962, by Walter Rauff (a former S.S.   
   colonel wanted for the    
   mass murder of Jews in mobile death vans). According to Rauff, he was aided in   
   all respects by the Catholic Church, even to the point of his being given   
   refuge in Vatican City convents for 18 months soon after the war.   
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)