The greatest threat facing mankind is...

The greatest threat facing mankind is NOT anthropogenic "climate change."

Nor is it anthropogenic environmental damage.

It most certainly is not "overpopulation." Neither is it "peak oil." Nor is it food shortages.

The greatest threat facing mankind is, however, "anthropogenic."


Because the greatest threat facing mankind is the general failure of mankind to reproduce:

Look around you and think for a minute: Is America too crowded?

For years, we have been warned about the looming danger of overpopulation: people jostling for space on a planet that’s busting at the seams and running out of oil and food and land and everything else.

It’s all bunk. The “population bomb” never exploded. Instead, statistics from around the world make clear that since the 1970s, we’ve been facing exactly the opposite problem: people are having too few babies. Population growth has been slowing for two generations. The world’s population will peak, and then begin shrinking, within the next fifty years. In some countries, it’s already started. Japan, for instance, will be half its current size by the end of the century. In Italy, there are already more deaths than births every year. China’s One-Child Policy has left that country without enough women to marry its men, not enough young people to support the country’s elderly, and an impending population contraction that has the ruling class terrified.

And all of this is coming to America, too. In fact, it’s already here. Middle-class Americans have their own, informal one-child policy these days. And an alarming number of upscale professionals don’t even go that far—they have dogs, not kids. In fact, if it weren’t for the wave of immigration we experienced over the last thirty years, the United States would be on the verge of shrinking, too.

What happened? Everything about modern life—from Bugaboo strollers to insane college tuition to government regulations—has pushed Americans in a single direction, making it harder to have children. And making the people who do still want to have children feel like second-class citizens.

What to Expect When No One’s Expecting explains why the population implosion happened and how it is remaking culture, the economy, and politics both at home and around the world.

Because if America wants to continue to lead the world, we need to have more babies.

Fewer tells a monumental human story, largely ignored, but which promises to starkly change the human condition in the years to come. Never before have birth and fertility rates fallen so far, so fast, so low, for so long, in so many places, so surprisingly. In Fewer, Ben Wattenberg shows how and why this has occurred, and explains what it means for the future. The demographic plunge, he notes, is starkly apparent in the developed nations of Europe and Japan, which will lose about 150 million people in the next half century. Starting from higher levels, but moving with geometric speed, the demographic decline is also apparent in the less developed nations of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Only the United States (so far) has been exempt from the birth dearth, leaving America as more than "the sole super-power." Perhaps it should be called the global "omni-power." These stark demographic changes will affect commerce, the environment, public financing, and geo-politics. Here Wattenberg lists likely winners and losers. In Wattenberg's world of "The New Demography" readers get a look at a topic often chattered about, but rarely understood.

You’ve heard about the Death of the West. But the Muslim world is on the brink of an even greater collapse. WILL WE GO DOWN IN THE IMPLOSION? Thanks to collapsing birthrates, much of Europe is on a path of willed self-extinction. The untold story is that birthrates in Muslim nations are declining faster than anywhere else—at a rate never before documented. Europe, even in its decline, may have the resources to support an aging population, if at a terrible economic and cultural cost. But in the impoverished Islamic world, an aging population means a civilization on the brink of total collapse— something Islamic terrorists know and fear. Muslim decline poses new threats to America, challenges we cannot even understand, much less face effectively, without a wholly new kind of political analysis that explains how desperate peoples and nations behave. In How Civilizations Die, David P. Goldman—author of the celebrated “Spengler” column read by intelligence organizations worldwide—reveals how, almost unnoticed, massive shifts in global power are remaking our future.

Remarkably, most conventional wisdom about the shifting balance of world power virtually ignores one of the most fundamental components of power: population. The studies that do consider international security and demographic trends almost unanimously focus on population growth as a liability. In contrast, the distinguished contributors to this volume—security experts from the Naval War College, the American Enterprise Institute, and other think tanks—contend that demographic decline in key world powers now poses a profound challenge to global stability. The countries at greatest risk are in the developed world, where birthrates are falling and populations are aging. Many have already lost significant human capital, capital that would have helped them innovate and fuel their economy, man their armed forces, and secure a place at the table of world power. By examining the effects of diverging population trends between the United States and Europe and the effects of rapid population aging in Japan, India, and China, this book uncovers increasing tensions within the transatlantic alliance and destabilizing trends in Asian security. Thus, it argues, relative demographic decline may well make the world less, and not more, secure.

Overpopulation has long been a global concern. But between modern medicine and reduced fertility, world population may in fact be shrinking--and is almost certain to do so by the time today's children retire. The troubling implications for our economy and culture include:* The possibility of a fundamentalist revival due to the decline of secular fertility* The threat to the free market as the supply of workers and consumers declines* The eventual collapse of the American health care system as inordinate expenses are incurred by an aging populationPhillip Longman's uncompromisingly sensible solutions fly in the face of traditional ideas. State intervention is necessary, he argues, to combat the effects of an aging population. We must provide incentives for young families, and we cannot close our eyes and hope for the best as an entire generation approaches retirement age.The Empty Cradle changes the terms of one of the most important environmental, economic, and social debates of our day.

The world's population is still growing, thanks to rising longevity. But fertility rates - the average number of children born per woman - are falling nearly everywhere. More and more adults are deciding to have fewer and fewer children. Worldwide, reports the UN, there are 6 million fewer babies and young children today than there were in 1990. By 2015, according to one calculation, there will be 83 million fewer. By 2025, 127 million fewer. By 2050, the world's supply of the youngest children may have plunged by a quarter of a billion, and will amount to less than 5 percent of the human family. The reasons for this birth dearth are many. Among them: As the number of women in the workforce has soared, many have delayed marriage and childbearing, or decided against them altogether. The Sexual Revolution, by making sex readily available without marriage, removed what for many men had been a powerful motive to marry. Skyrocketing rates of divorce have made women less likely to have as many children as in generations past. Years of indoctrination about the perils of "overpopulation" have led many couples to embrace childlessness as a virtue. Result: a dramatic and inexorable aging of society. In the years ahead, the ranks of the elderly are going to swell to unprecedented levels, while the number of young people continues to dwindle. The working-age population will shrink, first in relation to the population of retirees, then in absolute terms. A world without children will be a poorer world - grayer, lonelier, less creative, less confident. Children are a great blessing, but it may take their disappearance for the world to remember why.

Demographic Winter: Decline of the Human Family (DVD/ Documentary)

by Rick Stout

Product Overview

One of the most ominous events of modern history is quietly unfolding. Social scientists and economists agree - we are headed toward a demographic winter which threatens to have catastrophic social and economic consequences. The effects will be severe and long lasting and are already becoming manifest in much of Europe.

A groundbreaking film, Demographic Winter: Decline of the Human Family, reveals in chilling soberness how societies with diminished family influence are now grimly seen as being in social and economic jeopardy.

Demographic Winter draws upon experts from all around the world - demographers, economists, sociologists, psychologists, civic and religious leaders, parliamentarians and diplomats. Together, they reveal the dangers facing society and the world’s economies, dangers far more imminent than global warming and at least as severe. These experts will discuss how:

The “population bomb” not only did not have the predicted consequences, but almost all of the developed countries of the world are now experiencing fertility rates far below replacement levels. Birthrates have fallen so low that even immigration cannot replace declining populations, and this migration is sapping strength from developing countries, the fertility rates for many of which are now falling at a faster pace than did those of the developed countries.

The economies of the world will continue to contract as the “human capital” spoken of by Nobel Prize winning economist Gary Becker, diminishes. The engines of commerce will be strained as the workers of today fail to replace themselves and are burdened by the responsibility to support an aging population.

Government programs will slow-bleed by the decrease in tax dollars received from an ever shrinking work force. The skyrocketing ratio of the old retirees to the young workers will render current-day social security systems completely unable to support the aging population.

Our attempts to modernize through social engineering policies and programs have left children growing up in broken homes, with absentee parents and little exposure to extended family, disconnected from the generations, and these children are experiencing severe psychological, sociological and economic consequences. The intact family’s immeasurable role in the development and prosperity of human societies is crumbling.

The influence of social and economic problems on ever shrinking, increasingly disconnected generations will compound and accelerate the deterioration. Our children and our children’s children will bear the economic and social burden of regenerating the “human capital” that accounts for 80% of wealth in the economy, and they will be ill-equipped to do so.

Is there a “tipping point”, after which the accelerating consequences will make recovery impossible without complete social and economic collapse? Even the experts can’t tell us how far we can go down this road, oblivious to the outcomes, until we reach a point where sliding into the void becomes unpreventable.

Only if the political incorrectness of talking about the natural family within policy circles is overcome will solutions begin to be found. These solutions will necessarily result in policy changes, changes that will support and promote the natural, intact family.

Just as it took the cumulative involvement of activist organizations, policy makers, the business world and the media to create the unintended consequences we are beginning to experience, so it will take the holistic contribution of all of these entities, together with civic and religious organizations, to change the hearts and minds of all of society to bring about a reversal.

It may be too late to avoid some very severe consequences, but with effort we may be able to preclude calamity. Demographic Winter lays out a forthright province of discussion. The warning voices in this film need to be heard before a silent, portentous fall turns into a long, hard winter.

Demography is destiny. But not always in the way we imagine, begins Pearce (When the Rivers Run Dry) in his fascinating analysis of how global population trends have shaped, and been shaped by, political and cultural shifts. He starts with Robert Malthus, whose concept of overpopulation—explicitly of the uneducated and poor classes—and depleted resources influenced two centuries of population and environmental theory, from early eugenicists (including Margaret Sanger) to the British colonial administrators presiding over India and Ireland. Pearce examines the roots of the incipient crash in global population in decades of mass sterilizations and such government interventions as Mao's one child program. Many nations are breeding at less then replacement numbers (including not only the well-publicized crises in Western Europe and Japan, but also Iran, Australia, South Africa, and possibly soon China and India). Highly readable and marked by first-class reportage, Pearce's book also highlights those at the helm of these vastly influential decisions—the families themselves, from working-class English families of the industrial revolution to the young women currently working in the factories of Bangladesh.

What is the impact of demographics on the prospective production of military power and the causes of war? This monograph analyzes this issue by projecting working-age populations through 2050; assessing the influence of demographics on manpower, national income and expenditures, and human capital; and examining how changes in these factors may affect the ability of states to carry out military missions. It also looks at some implications of these changes for other aspects of international security. The authors find that the United States, alone of all the large affluent nations, will continue to see (modest) increases in its working-age population thanks to replacement-level fertility rates and a likely return to vigorous levels of immigration. Meanwhile, the working-age populations of Europe and Japan are slated to fall by as much as 10 to 15 percent by 2030 and as much as 30 to 40 percent by 2050. The United States will thus account for a larger percentage of the population of its Atlantic and Pacific alliances; in other words, the capacity of traditional alliances to multiply U.S. demographic power is likely to decline, perhaps sharply, through 2050. India's working-age population is likely to overtake China's by 2030. The United States, which has 4.7 percent of the world's working-age population, will still have 4.3 percent by 2050, and the current share of global gross domestic product accounted for by the U.S. economy is likely to stay quite high.

And the primary means by which mankind has stopped reproducing are abortifacient hormonal contraceptives and abortion itself.

Martin Luther called the "Sin of Onan" marital sodomy. In the Judeo-Christian and Natural Law tradition, any sex act made deliberately infecund is no better than sodomy.

So in considering the greatest threats facing mankind, one must also consider this:

Crying to Heaven for Vengeance

by Dr. Jeff Mirus, September 7, 2004

From Our Store: Misinterpreting Catholicism (eBook)

The Bible mentions only four sins which cry out to God for vengeance. Considering the source and the emphasis, we have little choice but to examine our consciences on these points. A cursory examination will not do; we must cast off our cultural preconceptions to see beyond the obvious.

Homicide

And the Lord said, “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground.” (Gn 4:10) It is hardly suprising that Cain’s murder of Abel provides the first instance of one of these sins that cries out for Divine vengeance. While all sins disrupt the natural order in some way, those enumerated as crying out to God appear to be chosen because they strike at nature’s root.

It is easy to see how murder fits into this category. The unjust termination of the life of another is a profound violation of “how things should be” precisely because our very nature compels us to regard our own lives as precious. To take a person's life is to terminate in another what we instinctively regard as our own highest good.

Sadly, the ease with which we understand the foulness of murder may be conditioned more by our culture than by Divine Revelation. We must take care that we do not find it abhorrent only insofar as we are creatures of society, rather than creatures of God.

Abortion is a case in point.

Sodomy

Then the Lord said, “Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great and their sin is very grave, I will go down to see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry which has come to me.” (Gn 18:20-21) The inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah were guilty of homosexual activity. So far gone were they in this vice that the men of the town would not even accept heterosexual license with Lot’s daughters, both virgins, as a means of sating their lust (see 19:8-9).

Here we have another case in point for cultural conditioning. It is far more difficult for our contraceptive culture to see how contrary to nature homosexuality is. Those of us who instinctively feel its deep unnaturalness rightly react to homosexual activity with disgust, but logical arguments are unlikely to produce the same reaction in those whose instincts are damaged, blunted or rationalized away.

It is precisely in such situations that Divine Revelation is so very useful, for we cannot trust our feelings when they run counter to reality. We require a better guide. Sodomy strikes at the root of human nature because of its perversion of the procreative impulse, without which the race must die. But in case we don’t see it, God does.

Oppression of Widows and Orphans

“You shall not afflict any widow or orphan. If you do afflict them, and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry.” (Ex 21-23) There is a deep truth in this passage about the relationships of husbands to wives, and of parents to children, and about how vulnerable wives and children become when their natural protection is removed.

Very probably all of us can see that it would be gravely sinful to take advantage of the weakness and vulnerability of either a widow or an orphan, and we can readily imagine the financial burdens and solicitation of “favors” with which either can be afflicted. It is much easier in every way to abuse a boy or girl who has no father and to intimidate a woman who has no husband.

Once again, however, we must remove our social blinders to see the great evil in our culture which turns so many into widows and orphans in the first place. The grave sin of divorce, by which natural protection is ripped away from women and children, surely tops the list of horrors under this heading.

Cheating Laborers of Their Due

“You shall not oppress a hired servant who is poor and needy, whether he is one of your brethren or one of the sojourners who are in your land within your towns; you shall give him his hire on the day he earns it, before the sun goes down (for he is poor, and sets his heart upon it); lest he cry against you to the Lord, and it be a sin in you.” (Dt 24:14-15) Here we come to a principle of sound social order: those in positions of authority and wealth have serious obligations to those who depend on their decisions for their well-being. Fortunately, we live in a very wealthy society.

But does our very wealth cause this sin to appear irrelevant? Free enterprise is an excellent system, but too often it carries the completely unnecessary baggage of a callous attitude toward employees, regarding them as commodities. The social teachings of the Church have attempted to address this concern (without pointing at all toward socialism) for over a century.

Yet the latest trend, at least in the United States, is constant mergers and buyouts which throw hundreds of thousands out of work while enriching an elite few. Even temporary unemployment is both a bank-breaker and a heart-breaker. Working under an abusive or negligent boss can be a living nightmare. And most of us are well-shielded from adults who must work for a minimal wage. The Israelites were urged to remember their days in Egypt, and treat others accordingly.

Together and In Order

All of these sins cry out to God, but the four are not equal. The sequence in the text suggests a hierarchy of value, and it is a tightly linked hierarchy. One sin leads to another, from the gravest to the least, as we make objects out of persons and treat them accordingly, subverting all our natural relationships. For this reason, we cannot assuage our consciences by attending to the fourth sin while ignoring the first, or by claiming virtue on the third and closing our eyes to the second. If these sins cry out to God for vengeance and we still commit them or do nothing to restrict them in others, we mock God to His face. Of course, when we’re wearing our usual cultural blinders, it often appears to us that we can mock God with impunity. But isn’t this something else we know from Revelation—in case we cannot see it for ourselves?

The Obama administration would do well to recall these foundational principles before trying to force the only Church in the world still fighting for the future of humanity, and against this greatest threat to it, to cave in and pay for contraception and abortifacients:

Obama administration is taking a wrong-headed line with the church 

Forcing contraception insurance coverage goes too far

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Sunday, January 22 2012, 4:10 AM

Louis Lanzano/AP

Archbishop Timothy Dolan has lambasted the Obama administration for putting health policy ahead of moral teachings.

Excerpt:

President Obama’s health chief decreed Friday that the Catholic Church must provide its employees with health insurance coverage for contraception, its moral stance against birth control be damned.
Wrong, wrong, high-handedly, obtusely wrong.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius took Obamacare’s philosophy of equal insurance for all to a level of zealotry that reduced a deeply held matter of conscience to a bothersome trifle.
Presumably, the President was fully briefed on a decision of this magnitude. If so, he made a fundamental error that will only add to a sense among many faith-based communities that the White House has a thing against religion.
It was less than two weeks ago that the Supreme Court unanimously and thunderingly scolded the administration for trying to tell churches and church-based organization that the government knew best as to who they could hire and fire.
Because of the church’s size and reach, Sebelius’ ruling will apply most broadly to Catholic organizations, but they apply to affiliates of other religions that bar contraception and sterilization.

Bishops warned: Obama will seize assets, only proper response is "Courageous Defiance"

Cardinal O'Connor's response to Clinton admin abortion mandate:

 "Jail me!"

In a recent Sunday column in Catholic New World, Cardinal Francis George wrote that only three options will exist for Catholic institutions to avoid shutting down under the Obama administration’s HHS mandate: 1) secularize itself, breaking its connection to the church, her moral and social teachings and the oversight of its ministry by the local bishop, 2) pay exorbitant annual fees to avoid paying for birth control-inclusive insurance policies or 3) “sell the institution to a non-Catholic group or to a local government.” 

“The state is making itself into a church,” the Cardinal wrote. (March 6th 2012 Huff Post Chicago, The internet Newspaper: News blogs video Community)


Speaking at the STAND UP FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM RALLY in Goshen, NY on March 23, 2012, Tim Chichester, founder of the Catholic Family Association of America, pointed out that a fourth option, the most important and appropriate one, has not been mentioned. 

And he had a dire warning for the USCCB.


In his talk, Chichester laid out the real threat to our Catholic institutions  in stark terms:

"The strategy behind the abortion / sterilization mandate is to make those institutions indistinguishable from their secular counterparts while loosening the grip of the Constitution. But, you say, what of the threats to close down the hospitals and other vital services? After all, Catholic hospitals make up 13 percent of hospitals and 16 percent of all admissions in the U.S. - won't closure work?

The answer is a strong maybe not. It worked for Cardinal O'Connor in 1994, why not now? The answer is simple. We are dealing with a president who acts like a hard core Marxist ideologue, one for whom lying and deceit are resume enhancers. This is a man who has been recorded advocating for infanticide. A man whose advisers hold that the state owns the rights to body parts of people who are dead or in certain hopeless conditions.

He and his fellow travelers lied through their teeth to the Bart Stupaks as well as to the American public. What makes him trustworthy now? ... "

"...Let's walk through a possible scenario. Obama strings along the phony negotiations through the election cycle, the purpose being to provide the delusion of possible compromise for those too weak-minded to accept the reality of what he is. He wins the election. The phony 'negotiations' fail. The bishops fall back to the worst case scenario of “I will go to jail and shut down the hospitals” Obama calls their bluff. A slew of hospitals and many of the 400 other health centers and 1,500 specialized homes that the Catholic Church operates, start to close.

The crisis grows, the wailing begins, and, in a few weeks, Obama steps into the breach with previously prepared eminent domain filings, based upon the infamous Kelo decision, and transfers the assets representing over 200 years of Christian ministry to various private and commercial, as well as federal state and local political entities.

To Obama and all Marxists this is right and just. Let me illustrate why. In 1965 a thirty something year old woman in Odessa, in the USSR, gave help to a WW II widow who was all but starving on her miniscule war widows pension. The young lady was reported and brought to the militia station, the local police, and warned not to help the old woman. She protested. They said “We don't care – just don't help her.” A short time later she was hauled into the station house and warned again. The third time she was arrested and charged with a felony crime – slander against the state – and sentenced to 18 months of what was euphemistically called “strict regime”, the hardest of the hard labor camps.

The connection I am making here is two-fold. One is that most people have never understood the reasoning behind the Obama's effort to do away with tax deductions for charitable giving. The ideological component is the same as that used against the woman. The State is the father of us all – how dare you presume so much. The tax change is part of a web of rules and actions designed to make religious charity impossible, and thereby weaken the only real ideological opposition to Marxism.

The other connection is the recognition of the rabid anti-religious nature of these people. Simply put, you cannot negotiate with them because they simply cannot be trusted. Again, keep the name Stupak in your head...."

And then, Chichester revealed the only possible response of the leaders of the Church Militant in the face of this unconstitutional attack on our consciences and religious freedoms:

"Defiance

How can we act to make the most of this situation. A glance at the city of Nowa Huta, Poland provides insight. Nowa Huta was described by Brian Whitmore of THE BOSTON GLOBE, as the place “...where George Orwell's dark vision of a perfect industrial metropolis was executed with stunning precision. Until, that is, the workers rose up and overthrew Big Brother"

In this grimy steel town the workers wanted a church. The communists said no. The Archbishop of Kraków, Karol Wojtyla, persisted and defiantly held Mass on the site for years. Workers replaced every cross removed or destroyed by the State. Eventually the State caved.

What is needed now is for our bishops and other religious administrators to publicly defy the mandate and keep the institutions open without compliance. We must not give these Marxists the opportunity to seize the assets of religious and charitable institutions.

Our duty, yours and mine, is to assist them, to encourage them by letters and prayers. But our duty extends far beyond this rally in effort and time. We must make ourselves loud enough to be heard. We must be vigorous and persistent in creating prayerful and lively sit-ins in our politicians offices. We need to wheedle , encourage, beg , plead - what-ever it takes - to get our bishops, rabbis, ministers and priests to get motivated to the point of action. We must help them understand that a single pastoral letter to the flock is worthless without the personal courage to lead from the front. We long ago passed from the diplomatic maneuverings of 1938 to the brutal fighting of Stalingrad.

What is needed is direct, forceful, definitive and ongoing actions by courageous and defiant religious and lay leaders.

We need to tell them we will be standing next to them, saying“I will go to jail with you!”

And above all we must pray daily, unceasingly, for the conversion and confounding of those whose word and deed threaten us and our nation with such malice. We have a right and duty to pray for our deliverance from evil."

The following is the text of Chichester's entire presentation.You can also view his presentation on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9pktpXKB-U

Courageous Defiance

Timothy A. Chichester

STAND UP FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM RALLY

Delivered 23 March, 2012, Goshen, NY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9pktpXKB-U

CourageousDefiance

Some 3400 years ago a man stood before a king and said the most astonishing of things. He said that the king's authority was limited by God, not the mere will of the king. In Moses we see that courageous defiance to illegitimate authority that grows within the Jewish tradition.

Some1200 years later a man rode into battle under shields and banners marked with the Greek letters Chi and Rho, the monogram for Christ. And with this came the long, painful change in the way men saw each other. With the freedom of religion granted by Constantine, the idea that man derived his dignity from his Creator, an idea carried to us from the bosom of Abraham, is unleashed upon a brutal pagan world, a world mired in the unjust economics of slavery.

Through the centuries the hope of The Prince of Peace flowed over the debauched Roman empire and raised a new civilization, a civilization that saw, with increasing clarity, that it was true, that the dignity of each man was not granted by the State, but was a boon, a boon bestowed without price, a boon innate, a boon granted by an unspeakably loving God. The slow progress of Christian humanism,sometimes even glacial, often beset by the selfish nature of fallen man, ran arrow true, and resulted in the rise of what we know to be, Christianity, currently called Western Civilization, the most creative, peaceful, prosperous and free civilization ever.

That arrow passed through the blood of many courageous men who suffered and died to

shape a future that ensured that the State reflect the God-given dignity of man. That arrow passed through a room 236 years ago, through the hearts of men steeped in Christian culture and humanism. Then that arrow sped outward with it a flaming banner emblazoned with words that reflect natural law and the true, innate, dignity of man as bestowed by Almighty God: 

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights."

...Rights guaranteed by a miraculous political document that began with the words

"We the People"

and closed with the words

"...in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and Eighty seven"

It was a constitution that former slave Fredrick Douglass described as "a glorious liberty document." We were blessed with a Declaration of Independence that acknowledged the spiritual natur eand rights of man and a Constitution to enshroud and enable them. Not unlike the melding of a body and soul.

Following the initial signing of the US Constitution, France 's Declaration of the Rights of Man and of Citizens, emerged with generalities enabling an atheistic view quite opposed to Christian culture. In what I believe to be the most calamitous moment in the history of man, a nation declared that God did not exist. The pagans got it right. Even the murderous Aztec's, demonic in their human sacrifice,understood the reality of a transcendent deity. No one had ever thought so small as these enlightened ones who were the proto-marxists. France descended into a bloodbath that preshadowed the atheistic socialist regimes to come. The war on religion itself had become overt.

Within two generations the spiritual sewerage spawned from that atheistic ideology was recognizable enough as such a profound danger to civilization that the Vatican condemned Communism by name in 1846,two years before Karl Marx and Friedric Engles were commissioned by the German Communist League to write The Communist Manifesto.

In1891, twenty-seven years before the Bolshevik revolution, the war between the Church and the socialists for the heart of the workingman resulted in the detailed analysis and condemnation of socialism in the encyclical on capital and labor titled Rerum Novarum (which means New Things). In 1917 the war again turned bloody. Lenin asked who would be the communists Saint-Just, referring to the Frenchman behind the Reign of Terror, and found him in Felix Dzerzhinsky, and the Terror began.

The history of the20^th century is that of torrents of blood shed by the various stripes of Marxists, shed always with the harmonics of miasmic rage about man and his opiate, his religion.

The Present

I have sketched the history that has led us to this time. To a time when a self-avowed Marxist with a sworn animosity toward our Constitution, has become so emboldened as to dismiss the First Amendment and crush the Orthodox Jews and Christians who now are almost the only ones left who understand the peril, and have the spiritual resources to resist. The British, those sorry lab rats for a new world order, having voluntarily reached a level of pragmatic atheism exceeding that of the old Soviet Union, no longer have the power to resist the totalitarian State now descending upon them.

Others have talked and will talk about the Health Care Mandate and the need to overturnit. I am now going to talk to you about the duty we have to actively resist.
Since Marxist Socialist ideology holds that "Truth is what serves the State today," and that man is simply an economic unit, any behavior was,and is justified. This is a very, very, important distinction between Judeo-Christian morality and that of the Marxist Socialist. 

It goes to the heart of why so many Jews and Christians alike have been seduced wholesale away from the foundations that held them fast for centuries. It goes to the heart of why the Catholic bishops,charged with transmitting the Deposit of Faith from generation to generation, were 'surprised' by a White House lecture on how they needed to listen to the enlightened ones, the pragmatic Catholic apostates like Pelosi and Durbin, who are so willing to serve our pragmatic atheist and Marxist, Barak Hussein Obama.

The issue is much greater than the apparent First Amendment abuse. It is about making irrelevant those Christian institutions that constitute the main line of resistance to Marxist dominance over the US political sphere. 

The strategy behind the abortion / sterilization mandate is to make those institutions indistinguishable from their secular counterparts while loosening the grip of the Constitution. But, you say, what of the threats to close down the hospitals and other vital services? After all, Catholic hospitals make up 13 percent of hospitals and 16 percent of all admissions in the U.S. - won't closure work?

The answer is a strong maybe not. It worked for Cardinal O'Connor in 1994,why not now? The answer is simple. We are dealing with a president who acts like a hard core Marxist ideologue, one for whom lying and deceit are resume enhancers. This is a man who has been recorded advocating for infanticide. A man whose advisers hold that the state owns the rights to body parts of people who are dead or in certain hopeless conditions.

He and his fellow travelers lied through their teeth to the Bart Stupaks as well as to the American public. What makes him trustworthy now?

The Kelo Scenario Eminent Domain SeizureLet's walk through a possible scenario. Obama strings along the phony negotiations through the election cycle, the purpose being to provide the delusion of possible compromise for those too weak-minded to accept the reality of what he is. He wins the election. The phony 'negotiations' fail. The bishops fall back to the worst case scenario of "I will go to jail and shut down the hospitals." Obama calls their bluff. A slew of hospitals and many of the 400 other health centers and 1,500 specialized homes that the Catholic Church operates, start to close.
The crisis grows, the wailing begins, and, in a few weeks, Obama steps into the breach with previously prepared eminent domain filings, based upon the infamous Kelo decision, and transfers the assets representing over 200 years of Christian ministry to various private and commercial, as well as federal state and local political entities.


To Obama and all Marxists this is right and just. Let me illustrate why. In 1965 a thirty something year old woman in Odessa, in the USSR, gave help t oa WW II widow who was all but starving on her miniscule war widows pension. The young lady was reported and brought to the militia station, the local police, and warned not to help the old woman. Sheprotested. They said "We don't care . Just don't help her." A short time later she was hauled into the station house and warned again. The third time she was arrested and charged with a felony crime "slander against the state" and sentenced to 18 months of what was euphemistically called "strict regime," the hardest of the hard labor camps.

The connection I am making here is two-fold. One is that most people have never understood the reasoning behind the Obama's effort to do away with tax deductions for charitable giving. The ideological component is the same as that used against the woman. 
The State is the father of us all - how dare you presume so much. The tax change is part of a web of rules and actions designed to make religious charity impossible, and thereby weaken the only real ideological opposition to Marxism.

The other connection is the recognition of the rabid anti-religious nature of these people. Simply put, you cannot negotiate with them because they simply cannot be trusted. Again, keep the name Stupak in your head.

Defiance

How can we act to make the most of this situation. A glance at the city of Nowa Huta, Poland provides insight. Nowa Huta was described by Brian Whitmore of THE BOSTON GLOBE, as the place "...where George Orwell's dark vision of a perfect industrial metropolis was executed with stunning precision. Until, that is, the workers rose up and overthrew Big Brother."

In this grimy steel town the workers wanted a church. The communists said no. The Archbishop of Krakow, Karol Wojtyla, persisted and defiantly held Mass on the site for years. Workers replaced every cross removed or destroyed by the State. Eventually the State caved.

What is needed now is for our bishops and other religious administrators to publicly defy the mandate and keep the institutions open without compliance. We must not give these Marxists the opportunity to seize the assets of religious and charitable institutions.

Our duty, yours and mine, is to assist them, to encourage them by letters and prayers. But our duty extends far beyond this rally in effort and time. We must make ourselves loud enough to be heard. We must be vigorous and persistent in creating prayerful and lively sit-ins in our politicians offices. We need to wheedle , encourage, beg ,plead - what-ever it takes- to get our bishops, rabbis, ministers and priests to get motivated to the point of action. We must help them understand that a single pastoral letter to the flock is worthless without the personal courage to lead from the front. We long ago passed from the diplomatic maneuverings of 1938 to the brutal fighting of Stalingrad.

What is needed is direct, forceful, definitive and ongoing actions by courageous and defiant religious and lay leaders.

We need to tell them we will be standing next to them, saying "I will go to jail with you!"

And above all we must pray daily, unceasingly, for the conversion and confounding of those whose word and deed threaten us and our nation with such malice. 

We have a right and duty to pray for our deliverance from evil.

---

Introductory Remarks by STANDUP FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM RALLY Coordinator

March,23, 2012, Goshen, NY

Tim is an entrepreneur whose background in Fortune 500 engineering,planning, financial analysis, , and econometric modeling led to the successful launch a company providing Computer Assisted Design and Engineering systems. He is now retired from the family owned business.

Well versed in economics and history, Tim has used this broad life experience in the Culture Wars to advance Christian morality in the public square through conservative activism. In 2001 he started the Catholic Family Association of America in order to fight in the anti-Christian bigotry in the public arena. As president of CFAA and a religious leader, he is a proud signer of the Manhattan Declaration: A Call of Christian Conscience as well as the Mount Vernon Statement.Tim has always been guided by a love of what has been bequeathed to us, by the Grace of God, through our Founding Fathers. This led him to belatedly enter the US Senate race against Gillibrand in the spring of 2010.

Tim will be addressing what the duty of all freemen is in the face of religious oppression.

The apocalyptic prophecies of Hildegard of Bingen, the next Doctor of the Church

Earlier this fall, Pope Benedict XVI beatified Venerable Elena Aiello, bringing to light her little known prophecies, which have strong parallels to those of both Our Lady of Akita as well as statements Pope JPII and Cardinal Ratzinger made in the past regarding the Third Secret of Fatima. (See this earlier blog post for a summary of the parallels: For fourth anniversary of Summorum Pontificum, Pope draws attention to little known prophecies of Venerable Elena Aiello)

Now, Pope Benedict XVI is drawing attention to St. Hildegard of Bingen, by declaring her a Doctor of the Church.

In addition to her many accomplishments, St. Hildegard is also known for a number of apocalyptic prophecies:

THE MINOR CHASTISEMENT



"The time is coming when princes and peoples will reject the authority of the Pope. Some countries will prefer their own Church rulers to the Pope. The German Empire will be divided.  Church property will be secularised. Priests will be persecuted. After the birth of Antichrist heretics will preach their false doctrines undisturbed, resulting in Christians having doubts about their holy Catholic faith."



At that period when antichrist shall be born, there will be many wars and right order shall be destroyed on earth. Heresy will be rampant and the heretics will preach their errors openly without restraint. Even among Christians doubt and scepticism will be entertained concerning the beliefs of Catholicism



"Toward the end of the world, mankind will be purified through sufferings. This will be true especially of the clergy, who will be robbed of all property. When the clergy has adopted a simple manner of living, conditions will improve.



At this time as a punishment for their sins Christians especially will attempt armed resistance to those who at that time are persecuting them, sensing no concern for the death of their bodies.



"A powerful wind will rise in the North carrying heavy fog and the densest dust by divine command and it will fill their throats and eyes so they will cease their savagery and be stricken with great fear.



Then within the Christian people the Holy Godhead will accomplish signs and wonders as if accomplished them at the time of Moses with the pillar of cloud and as Michael the archangel did when he fought the heathen for the sake of the Christians. Because of Michael's help Gods faithful children will march under his protection. They will decimate their foes and achieve victory through Gods power As a result of this a large number of heathens will join Christians in true faith and they will  say   The God of the Christians is true God because such wondrous works have been accomplished among the Christians .



After that there will be so few men left that seven women will fight for one man, that they will say to the man: "Marry me to take the disgrace from me." For in those days it will be a disgrace for a woman to be without child, as it was by the Jews in the Old Testament.



"Before the Comet comes, many nations, the good excepted, will be scoured with want and famine. The great nation in the ocean that is inhabited by people of different tribes and descent by an earthquake, storm and tidal waves will be devastated.  It will be divided, and in great part submerged. That nation will also have many misfortunes at sea, and lose its colonies in the east through a Tiger and a Lion.



 The Comet by its tremendous pressure, will force much out of the ocean and flood many countries, causing much want and many plagues. [After the] great Comet, the great nation will be devastated by earthquakes, storms, and great waves of water, causing much want and plagues. The ocean will also flood many other countries, so that all coastal cities will live in fear, with many destroyed. All sea coast cities will be fearful and many of them will be destroyed by tidal waves, and most living creatures will be killed and even those who escape will die from a horrible disease.



For in none of these cities does a person live according to the laws of God. "Peace will return to Europe when the white flower again takes possession of the throne of France.



(See http://www.unitypublishing.com/aug24_98.html  for the White Flower)     



During this time of peace the people will be forbidden to carry weapons and iron will be used solely for making agricultural implements and tools. Also during this period the soil will be very productive and many Jews, heathens and heretics will join the Church.



"Peace will return when the Lily ascends the Throne again.  The land will be very productive . During this time weapons will be forbidden. Iron will only be used for agricultural tools. In this period the land will be very productive. Jews, heathen and heretics will join the church.



The throne of the last catholic Empire will crumble and the sceptre will fall out of the hand of him who sits on the throne. The Great Monarch by this time will be a very old man. All justice will cease and will be trodden under foot. The latter times will be more evil and corrupt in the eyes of God. Children of God will be persecuted by the most hateful means in the eyes of God. Almost immediately after the death of the Monarch comes antichrist        



 (Note: This in my opinion is the peace promised by Fatima - Richard Salbato)



ANTICHRIST



When the great ruler (the Great Monarch who is to rule Europe after the collapse of Communism) exterminates the Turks almost entirely, one of the remaining Mohammadans will be converted, become a priest bishop and cardinal, and when the new pope is elected (immediately before Antichrist) this cardinal will kill the pope before he is crowned, through jealousy, wishing to be pope himself; then when the other cardinals elect the next pope, 



(Note by Richard Salbato - this will be the last pope on earth - Peter the Second)



this cardinal will proclaim himself Anti-pope, and two-thirds of the Christians will go with him.  He, as well as Anti-christ, are descendants of the tribe of Dan.



An unchaste woman will conceive an unchaste son. The wicked serpent who deceived Adam will influence this child in such as way that nothing good or virtuous will enter him; nor under the circumstances will it even be possible for any good to be in him



The mark (of Antichrist) will be a hellish symbol of Baptism, because thereby a person will be stamped as an adherent of Antichrist and also of the Devil in that he thereby gives himself over to the influence of Satan.  Whoever will not have this mark of Antichrist can neither buy nor sell anything and will be beheaded.



He will win over to himself the rulers, the mighty and the wealthy, will bring about the destruction of those who do not accept his faith and, finally, will subjugate the entire earth.



The streets of Jerusalem, will then shine in the brightest gold with the blood of Christians which will flow like water.  Simultaneously Antichrist will try to increase his wonders.  His executioners will work such miracles when they torment the Christians that the people will think Antichrist is the true God.  The executioners will not permit the Christians to win the martyrs' crown easily for they will endeavour to prolong their pain until they renounce their faith.  Yet some will receive a special grace from God to die during the torments.



Antichrist will make the earth move, level mountains, dry up rivers, produce thunder and lightning and hail, remove the leaves from the trees and return them again to the trees, make men sick and cure them, exorcise devils, raise the dead to life.  He will appear to be crucified and rise from the dead.  All in all,  Christians will be astounded and in grievous doubts while the followers of Antichrist will be confirmed in their false faith.



Finally, when he shall have converted all his plans into action, he will gather his   worshippers about him and tell them that he will presently ascend toward Heaven.  However, at the moment of the ascension a bolt of lightning will overwhelm and annihilate him.  The planned ascent into heaven will have been prepared by the artful employment of ingenious devices, and the moment at which the event was to have taken place, leading to his destruction, will produce a cloud that will spread an unbearable odour.  Through this many people will again come to their senses and to understanding.



Then the people should prepare for the last judgment, the day of which is indeed veiled in secrecy and obscurity, but not far distant."



Henoch and Elias are being instructed by God in a mysterious manner in paradise.



(This is the same thing that Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich says of paradise and Henoch and Elias)



God shows them the works of men as though they could see these with natural eyes.  The two men are therefore, much wiser than all wise men put together.  The same force which removed Henoch and Elias from the earth will bring them back in a storm wind at the time when the Antichrist will spread his false doctrine.  As long as they will dwell amongst men they will always be refreshed after 40 days.  They have the mission from God to resist the Antichrist and lead the erring back to the road of salvation.  Both men, distinguished by age and stature, will speak to men: `This accursed one is sent by the devil in order to lead men into error.  We have been preserved by God at a secreted place, where we did not experience the suffering of men.  We are now sent by God in order to oppose. the heresy of this destroyer.  Look, if we resemble you in stature and age.'  And because the testimony of both shall agree they will be believed.  All will follow these two aged men and renounce heresy.  They will visit all cities and towns where previously the Antichrist had sown his heresy, and through the power of the Holy Ghost will work genuine miracles.  All the people will be greatly astonished at them.  Henoch and Elias will. confuse the followers of Satan with thunder strokes, and destroy. them and fortify the Christians in faith.  Therefore, the. Christians will hurry to martyrdom, which the son of evil will. prepare for them like to a banquet, so that the murderers will. grow tired of counting the dead on account of their great. numbers; for their blood will run like rivers. Henoch and Elias have been taught much wisdom and knowledge. in Paradise while awaiting their return to earth.  God will. instruct them every forty days while they are on earth.  They. will receive exceptional graces and powers from God to use. against Antichrist. / Enoch and Elias will be instructed by God in a most secret manner in paradise. God reveals to them the actions and condition of men that they may regard them with the eyes of compassion. Because of this special preparation, these two holy men are more wise than all the wise men on the earth  taken together. God will give them the task of opposing antichrist and of bringing back those who have strayed from the way of salvation. Both of these men will say to people:   This accursed one has been sent by the devil to lead men astray and into error; we have been preserved by God in a hidden place where we did not experience the sorrows of men but God has now sent us to combat the heresy of this son of perdition. They will go into all cities and villages where previously antichrist had broadcasted his heresies and by the power of the Holy Spirit will perform wonderful miracles so that all nations will greatly marvel at them. This as to a wedding feast, Christians will hasten to death by martyrdom which the son of perdition will have prepared for them in such numbers that those murderers will be unable even to count the slain, then the blood of these martyrs will fill the rivers



When the fear of God has been disregarded everywhere, violent and furious wars will take place.  A multitude of people will be slaughtered and many cities will be transformed into heaps of rubbish.



The Son of Corruption and Ruin will appear and reign for. only a short time, towards the end of the days of the world's duration; the period which corresponds to the moment when the sun has disappeared beyond the horizon; that is to say he shall come at the last days of the world.  He will not be Satan himself, but a human being equalling and resembling him in atrocious hideousness.  His mother, a depraved woman possessed by the. devil, will live as a prostitute in the desert.  She will declare that she is ignorant as to the identity of his father, and will. maintain that her son was presented to her by God in a. supernatural manner, as was the Child of the Blessed Virgin.  She will then be venerated as a saint by deceived people.



Antichrist will come from a land that lies between two seas, and will practise his tyranny in the East.  After his birth false teachers and doctrines will appear, followed by wars, famines, and pestilence. His mother will seldom let any one see him, and yet by magic. art, she will manage to gain the love of the people for him.



He will be raised at different secret places and will be kept in seclusion until full grown.  When he has grown to full manhood he will publicly announce a hostile doctrine on religion.  He will lure and attract the people to himself by granting them complete exemption from the observance of all divine and ecclesiastical. commandments, by forgiving them their sins and requiring of them only their belief in his divinity.  He will spurn and reject baptism and the gospel.  He will open his mouth to preach contradiction.  He will say, `Jesus of Nazareth is not the son of. God, only a deceiver who gave himself out as God; and the Church instituted by him is only superstition'.  The true Christ has come in his person.  He will say, `I am the Saviour of the. world'.  Especially will he try to convince the Jews that he is the Messiah sent by God, and the Jews will accept him as such.  His doctrine of faith will be taken from the Jewish religion and seemingly will not differ much from the fundamental doctrine of Christianity for he will teach that there is one God who created the world, who is omniscient and knows the thoughts of man and is just, who rewards the obeyers of his commands and the trespassers he chastises, who raises all from the dead in due time.  This God has spoken through Moses and the Prophets, therefore the precepts of the Mosaic laws are to be kept, especially circumcision and keeping the Sabbath, yet by his moral laws he will try to reverse all order on earth.  Therefore he is called in Holy Writ the `Lawless One'.  He will think that he can change time and laws. He will discard all laws, morals and religious principles, to draw the world to himself.  He will grant entire freedom from the commandments of God and the Church and permit everyone to live as his passions dictate.  By doing so he hopes to be acknowledged by the people as deliverer from the yoke, and as the cause of prosperity in the world.  Religion he will endeavour to make convenient.  He will say that you need not fast and embitter your life by renunciation, as the people of former times did when they had no sense of God's goodness.  It will suffice to love God.  He. will let the people feast to their heart's content so that they will pity the unfortunate people of former centuries.  He will preach free love and tear asunder family ties.  He will scorn everything holy, and he will ridicule all graces of the Church with devilish mockery.  He will condemn humility and foster proud and gruesome dogmas.  He will tear down that which God has taught in the Old and New Testament and maintain sin and vice are not sin and vice.  Briefly he will declare the road to Hell is the way to Heaven.



"After having passed a licentious youth among very perverted men and in a desert, she being conducted by a demon disguised as an angel of light, the mother of the son of perdition will conceive and give birth without knowing the father.  In another land, she will make men believe that her birth was some miraculous thing, seeing that she had not appointed a spouse, and she will ignore that, she will say, how the infant she had brought into the world had been formed in her womb, and the people will regard it as a saint and qualified to the title.



"The son of perdition is this very wicked beast who will put to death those who refuse to believe in him; who will associate with kings, priests, the great and the rich; who will mistake the humility and will esteem pride; who will finally subjugate the entire universe by his diabolic means.



"He will gain over many people and tell them: "You are allowed to do all that you please; renounce the fasts; it suffices that you love me; I who am your God."



"He will show them treasures and riches, and he will permit them to riot in all sorts of festivities, as they please. He will oblige them to practice circumcision and other Judaic observances, and he will tell them: "Those who believe in me will receive pardon of their sins and will live with me eternally."



"He will reject baptism and evangelism, and he will reject in derision all the precepts the Spirit has given to men of my part.



"Then he will say to his partisans, "Strike me with a sword, and place my corpse in a proper shroud until the day of my resurrection." They will believe him to have really given over to death, and from his mortal wound he will make a striking semblance of resuscitation.



"After which, he will compose himself a certain cipher, which he will say is to be a pledge of salute; he will give it to all his servitors like the sign of our faith in heaven, and he will command them to adore it. Concerning those who, for the love of my name, will refuse to render this sacrilegious adoration to the son of perdition, he will put them to death amidst the cruellest torments.



"But I will defend my two Witnesses, Enoch and Elias, whom I have reserved for those times. Their mission will be to combat the man of evil and reprimand him in the sight of the faithful whom he has seduced. They will have the virtue of operating the most brilliant miracles, in all the places where the son of perdition has spread his evil doctrines. In the meanwhile, I will permit this evildoer to put them to death; but I will give them in heaven the recompense of their travails.



"Later, however, after the coming of Enoch and Elias, the Antichrist will be destroyed, and the Church will sing forth with unprecedented glory, and the victims of the great error will throng to return to the fold."



"The Man of Sin will be born of an ungodly woman who, from her infancy, will have been initiated into occult sciences and the wiles of the demon. She will live in the desert with perverse men, and abandon herself to crime with so much the greater ardor, as she will think she is authorized thereby to by the revelations of an angel. And thus, in the fire of burning concupiscence she will conceive the Son of Perdition, without knowing by what father. Then she will teach that fornication is permitted, declaring herself holy and honoured as a saint.



"But Lucifer, the old and cunning serpent, will find the fruit of her womb with his infernal spirit and entirely possess the fruit of sin.



"Now when he shall have attained the age of manhood, he will set himself up as a new master and teach perverse doctrine. Soon he will revolt against the saints; and he will acquire such great power that in the madness of his pride he would raise himself above the clouds; and as in the beginning Satan said: "I will be like unto the most high", and fell; so in those days, he will fall when he will say in the person of his son, "I am the Saviour of the World!"



"He will ally himself with the kings, the princes and the powerful ones of the earth; he will condemn humility and will extol all the doctrines of pride. His magic art will feign the most astonishing prodigies; he will disturb the atmosphere, command thunder and tempest, produce hail and horrible lightning. He will move mountains, dry up streams, reanimate the withered verdure of forests. His arts will be practiced upon the elements, but chiefly upon man will he exhaust his infernal power. He will seem to take away health and restore it. How so? By sending some possessed soul into a dead body, to move it for a time. But these resurrections will be of short duration.



"At the sight of these things, many will be terrified and will believe in him; and some, preserving their primitive faith, will nevertheless court the favour of the Man of Sin or fear his displeasure. And so many will be led astray among those who, shutting the interior eye of their soul, will live habitually in exterior things...



"After the Antichrist has ascended a high mountain and been destroyed by Christ, many erring souls will return to truth, and men will make rapid progress in the ways of holiness."



"Nothing good will enter into him nor be able to be in him. For he will be nourished in diverse and secret places, lest he should be known by men, and he will be imbued with all diabolical arts, and he will be hidden until he is of full age, nor will he show the perversities which will be in him, until he knows himself to be full and superabundant in all iniquities.



"He will appear to agitate the air, to make fire descend from heaven, to produce rainbows, lightning, thunder and hail, to tumble mountains, dry up streams, to strip the verdure of trees, of forests, and to restore them again. He will also appear to be able to make men sick or well at will, to chase out demons, and at times even to resuscitate the dead, making a cadaver move like it was alive. But this kind of resurrection will never endure beyond a little time, for the glory of God will not suffer it.



"Ostensibly he will be murdered, spill his blood and die. With bewilderment and consternation, mankind will learn that he is not dead, but has awakened from his death-sleep.



"From the beginning of his course many battles and many things contrary to the lawful dispensation will arise, and charity will be extinguished in men. In them also will arise bitterness and harshness and there will be so many heresies that heretics will preach their errors openly and certainly; and there shall be so much doubt and incertitude in the Catholic faith of Christians that men shall be in doubt of what God they invoke, and many signs shall appear in the sun and moon, and in the stars and in the waters, and in other elements and creatures, so that, as it were in a picture, future events shall be foretold in their portents.



"Then so much sadness shall occupy men at that time, that they shall be led to die as if for nothing. But those who are perfect in the Catholic faith will await in great contrition what God wills to ordain. And these great tribulations shall proceed in this way, while the Son of Perdition shall open his mouth in the words of falsehood and his deceptions, heaven and earth shall tremble together. But after the fall of the Antichrist the glory of the Son of God shall be increased.



"As soon as he is born, he will have teeth and pronounce blasphemies; in short, he will be a born devil. He will emit fearful cries, work miracles, and wallow in luxury and vice. He will have brothers who are also demons incarnate, and at the age of twelve, they will distinguish themselves in brilliant achievements. They will command an armed force, which will be supported by the infernal legions.



"After the Son of Perdition has accomplished all of his evil designs, he will call together all of his believers and tell them that he wishes to ascend into heaven.



"At the moment of his ascension, a thunderbolt will strike him to the ground, and he will die.



"The mountain where he was established for the operation of his ascension, in an instant will be covered with a thick cloud which emits an unbearable odor of truly infernal corruption... At the sight of his body, the eyes of great number of persons will open and they will be made to see their miserable error.



"After the sorrowful defeat of the Son of Perdition, the spouse of my Son, who is the Church, will shine with a glory without equal, and the victims of the error will be impressed to re-enter the sheepfold.



"As to the day, after the fall of Antichrist, when the world will end, man must not seek to know, for he can never learn it. That secret the Father has reserved for Himself."



After Enoch and Elias suffer physical death the spirit of life will reawaken them raise them up into the clouds and the rejoicing of that man s followers (antichrist) will change into fear, sorrow and dismay. Then the son of corruption will gather together a large group of people in order that his glory can be openly shown forth. He will attempt to walk through the heavens so that any remnant of the catholic faith that might remain throughout the world might completely disappear. In the sight of crowds standing around and listening he will order the high strata of the sky to lift him up during his ascension into heaven and the words of my loyal servant Paul will be fulfilled and these are the words which Paul who is full of the spirit of truth says  and the lord Jesus will slay him with the breath of his mouth and will destroy him with his glorious appearance at his coming     when the son of corruption ascends on high through diabolical trickery he will be thrust down again by divine power. The fumes of sulphur and pitch will consume him such that the crowds standing nearby will flee into the mountains for protection. Such abject fear will seize all who see and hear these things that they will reject the devil and his spiritual son antichrist and be converted to the true faith by baptism.



The son of perdition will come when the day declines and the sun sinks, that is when the time arrives and the world loses its stability."

 
St. Hildegard's prophecies play a central role in the attachment of a certain segment of traditionalist Catholics to the idea of a return of Monarchy.


It is certainly possible to read too much into our Holy Father's recent actions, but one can't help but wonder if he's trying to tell us something.

ADDENDUM:

It is worth comparing part of St. Hildegard's prophecy,

The Comet by its tremendous pressure, will force much out of the ocean and flood many countries, causing much want and many plagues. [After the] great Comet, the great nation will be devastated by earthquakes, storms, and great waves of water, causing much want and plagues. The ocean will also flood many other countries, so that all coastal cities will live in fear, with many destroyed. All sea coast cities will be fearful and many of them will be destroyed by tidal waves

With the words of Pope John Paul II regarding Fatima (from a file at EWTN):

When people at Fulda,
Germany asked John Paul II in 1980 if the Third Secret of Fatima contained
a threat from God, the Pope responded:

     "If there is a message in which it is said that the oceans will
     flood entire sections of the earth; that, from one moment to the
     other, millions of people will perish . . . there is no longer
     any point in really wanting to publish this secret message.

     Many want to know merely out of curiosity, or because of their
     taste for sensationalism, but they forget that "to know" implies
     for them a responsibility. It is dangerous to want to satisfy
     one's curiosity only, if one is convinced that we can do nothing
     against a catastrophe that has been predicted....

     (At this point the Holy Father took hold of his Rosary and
     said:) Here is the remedy against all evil! Pray, pray and ask
     for nothing else.  Put everything in the hands of the Mother of
     God!"[9]

     John Paul II's reply seemed to imply that a threat of flood is part
of the Third Secret of Fatima.

     Later, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger admitted in an interview with
journalist, Vittorio Messori, that he had read the Third Secret of Fatima.
Messori then tells how he questioned the Cardinal about the "secret":

     "Undenied versions are circulating in the world, I continue,
     which describe the contents of that "secret" as disquieting,
     apocalyptic, as warning of terrible sufferings. John Paul II
     himself, in his personal visit to Germany, seemed to confirm
     (albeit with prudent circumlocutions, privately, to a select
     group) the undeniably disconcerting contents of that text.
     Before him, Paul VI, during his pilgrimage to Fatima, also seems
     to have alluded to the "apocalyptic" themes of the "secret." Why
     was it never decided to make it public, if only to counter rash
     speculations?"[10]

     Cardinal Ratzinger's response, that revealing the Third Secret would
add nothing necessary for the Christian to know and that it "would mean
exposing the Church to the danger of sensationalism, exploitation of the
content," also seemed to "confirm (albeit with prudent circumlocutions)"
that the contents of the Third Secret of Fatima did contain those
"disconcerting" messages.[11]