View source for Church in Decline

'''[[Widespread Turmoil]]'''
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Surveying the scene, the Vatican is  troubled by what it sees. In his book &ldquo;<em>Without Roots: The West, Relativism,  Christianity, Islam</em>,&rdquo; Pope Benedict—then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger—described Europe  as having denied its religious and moral foundation. He lamented a continent  overtaken by secularism and materialism, a Europe  that had slipped into immorality, cultural confusion and irreligiousness. He  saw a Europe in danger of being overrun by  outside forces.<br>
  
This pope has also lamented the  weakening of European churches, telling a gathering of Italian priests, &ldquo;There  is no longer any evidence of the need for God, let alone Christ…the so-called  &lsquo;great&rsquo; churches seem to be dying.&rdquo; Indeed, according to the Center for the  Study of Global Christianity, every major religion in Western   Europe is declining—<em>except Islam</em>!<br>
  
The Roman  leader is well aware of the dramatic and increasingly growing EU demographic  shifts. Consider an article excerpt from a major British newspaper: &ldquo;Britain  and the rest of the European Union are ignoring a demographic time bomb: a  recent rush into the EU by migrants, including millions of Muslims, will change  the continent beyond recognition over the next two decades, and almost no  policy-makers are talking about it.<br>
  
&ldquo;The numbers are startling. Only 3.2  per cent of Spain&rsquo;s  population was foreign-born in 1998.   In 2007 it was 13.4 per cent. Europe&rsquo;s  Muslim population has more than doubled in the past 30 years and will have  doubled again by 2015. In  Brussels, the top seven baby boys&rsquo; names recently were Mohamed, Adam, Rayan,  Ayoub, Mehdi, Amine and Hamza&rdquo; (<em>The Telegraph</em>).<br>
  
What instability will such dramatic  demographic changes cause in the years ahead? The article continues: &ldquo;The study  for the US Air Force…found that there were at least 15 million Muslims in the  EU, and possibly as many as 23 million. They are not uniformly distributed, of  course. According to the US&rsquo;s  Migration Policy Institute, residents of Muslim faith will account for more  than 20 per cent of the EU population by 2050 but already do so in a number of  cities. Whites will be in a minority in Birmingham  by 2026, says Christopher   Caldwell, an American journalist,  and even sooner in Leicester.  Another forecast holds that Muslims could outnumber non-Muslims in France  and perhaps in all of western Europe by mid-century. Austria was 90 per cent Catholic in  the 20th century but Islam could be the majority religion among Austrians aged  under 15 by 2050, says Mr   Caldwell.&rdquo;<br>
  
Think about the previous sentence! Will  the Catholic church—with an extremely conservative pope in Rome—tolerate such a dramatic shift?<br>
  
In 1900, almost every European  professed Christianity. More recently, only three out of four even &ldquo;identify&rdquo;  with Christianity. The number who consider themselves &ldquo;non-religious&rdquo; shot up  from less than 1 percent to 15 percent. In 12 major European cities, 38 percent  say they&nbsp;<em>never</em>&nbsp;or&nbsp;<em>rarely</em>attend church. France  at 60 percent as a nation is the worst. But in areas of France, Sweden  and the Netherlands,  non-attendance is over 90 percent.<br>
  
Such statistics threaten the church&rsquo;s  very existence.<br>

<strong>In Search of a Government</strong><br>
The Vatican sees a world of secular  humanism—of no absolute morals—and devoid of strong leadership.<br>
  
A recent article about Benedict&rsquo;s thinking opened this way. It ought to  sober you like few things you have heard (emphasis mine): &ldquo;In the past 30  years, the Vatican has moved strongly to reassert the authority of a  traditional, even orthodox Roman Catholicism—to bring the notion of a &lsquo;one true  church&rsquo; to Europe&nbsp;<em>and then the larger world</em>&rdquo; (<em>Reuters</em>).<br>
  
The intent of this thinking is  obvious—one church on Earth under the Vatican!<br>
  
Next are the words of a church official  from the same article regarding the connection this pope draws between the  church at Rome—and  its relationship to the world. The goal in the pontiff&rsquo;s thinking could not be  clearer, and it adds to what we just read (emphasis also mine): &ldquo;The world is  evil and the church is pure…This is serious for Benedict.  He doesn&rsquo;t want the church to be a joke. He&rsquo;s suspicious of chaos and avoidance  of discipline and order, and of human efforts to adopt popular culture and  create church out of the world, instead of a church that&nbsp;<em>transforms the  world</em>. This deeply upsets him. He sees&nbsp;<em>all salvation taking place  inside the Catholic Church</em>. He believes that.&rdquo;<br>
  
But understand! While Benedict&rsquo;s efforts are undeniably&nbsp;<em>intensifying</em>,  his beliefs are not new to him. The seeds of his vision were rooted in the  thinking of decades ago. An account of this man in a late 1970s informal  setting is telling. Here is a description from one who spent an evening with  him during that period: &ldquo;…the whole time he spoke about&nbsp;<em>restoring the  old Europe</em>…where the&nbsp;<em>church takes  precedence over the state</em>&rdquo; (ibid.).<br>
  
Now realize that Benedict  was once the Archbishop of Munich (Germany). His daily place of work  was Frauenkirche (&ldquo;Cathedral of Our Dear Lady&rdquo;). This is home to the tomb of  the long-time German Holy Roman emperor, Louis IV  (AD 1314-1347). The church-state connection was not missed by the Archbishop  during the years he spent there—from 1977 until coming to high office in the Vatican in  1981.<br>
  
In a dramatic move, Benedict released a formal statement permitting  practicing Anglicans to join the Catholic Church. On the 10th anniversary of a  mutual declaration between the World Lutheran Federation and the Catholic  Church, the pope stated, &ldquo;I sincerely hope that this important anniversary will  help bring forward the path towards the&nbsp;<em>full visible unity of all the  disciples of Christ</em>.&rdquo; This is a&nbsp;<em>stunning</em>&nbsp;development in Rome&rsquo;s call for—get  this!—every professing Christian to  align with Catholicism! In addition, Polish Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz  referred to the pope in 2009 as one who &ldquo;speaks like a&nbsp;<em>prophet</em>,&rdquo;  when referring to the pope&rsquo;s call for European unity. Can the point be missed?<br>
  
If any still doubt the seriousness of  the Vatican,  consider the following longer statement in June 2009 from Benedict.  It removes all questions about&nbsp;<em>exactly</em>&nbsp;where he wishes to take  Europe. His desired destination should be no  surprise. Stunning on its face, and sweeping in scope, the words are from his  encyclical titled &ldquo;Charity in Truth&rdquo; (emphasis mine):<br>
  
&ldquo;In the face of the unrelenting growth  of global interdependence, there is a strongly felt need…for a reform of the  United Nations Organization, and likewise of economic institutions and  international finance, so that the concept of the&nbsp;<em>family of nations</em>&nbsp;can  acquire&nbsp;<em>real teeth</em>...To manage the global economy; to revive  economies hit by the crisis; to avoid any deterioration of the present crisis  and the greater imbalances that would result; to bring about integral and  timely disarmament, food security and peace; to guarantee the protection of the  environment and to regulate migration: for all this, there is urgent need of  a&nbsp;<em>true world political authority</em>, as…John XXIII indicated some  years ago.<br>
  
&ldquo;Such an authority would need to be  regulated&nbsp;<em>by law</em>, to observe consistently the principles of <em>subsidiarity</em>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<em>solidarity</em>,  to seek to establish the&nbsp;<em>common good</em>&nbsp;[but ask: by whose  definition?], and to make a commitment to securing authentic integral human  development inspired by the values of charity&nbsp;<em>in truth</em>&nbsp;[also  ask: would he have in mind other than Catholic doctrine for&nbsp;<em>truth</em>?].  Furthermore, such an authority would need to be&nbsp;<em>universally recognized</em>&nbsp;[Catholic  means&nbsp;<em>universal</em>] and to be vested with the effective power to  ensure security for all, regard for justice, and respect for <em>rights</em>&nbsp;[again  ask: defined by whom?].<br>
  
&ldquo;Obviously it would have to have the  authority to&nbsp;<em>ensure compliance</em>&nbsp;with its decisions from&nbsp;<em>all  parties</em>, and also with the coordinated measures adopted in various  international forums…They also require the construction of a&nbsp;<em>social  order</em>&nbsp;that at last&nbsp;<em>conforms</em>&nbsp;to the&nbsp;<em>moral  order</em>&nbsp;[I repeat:&nbsp;<em>defined by whom</em>?], to the interconnection  between moral and social spheres…&rdquo;<br>
  
By&nbsp;<em>every definition</em>, this  vision describes a&nbsp;<em>world government</em>—based in Europe—endorsed by,  and in partnership with, the Vatican.<br>
  
Therefore, to achieve such an alliance,  Rome&nbsp;<em>must</em>&nbsp;find  a powerful civil leader.<br>
  
History is the guide.<br>
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'''[[Widespread Turmoil]]'''
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