Penance and Sin…Sack clothe and Ashes…What it means to a Jewish Rabbi.
Who are the Great Deceivers in the “end times”

Tzibbur al HaTzarah: Call to a Communal Fast to Avert Calamity
Fasting for Peace and Justice
Lee Moore and Rabbi Arthur Waskow 10/30/2002
October 30, 2002 25 Mar-Cheshvan 5763

Long ago, Jews chose when they were facing the calamities of drought, or plague, or famine, or war, to call the community to fast.
By the time of the framing of the Mishnah (around 200 CE), this tradition had been shaped into a liturgy for calling such a Fast. What follows below is a liturgy or service that draws upon this special service as it is described in Mishnah Ta’anit (Chapters 1-3). The service can be used on the actual day of fasting, or can be used to proclaim a later day of fasting.
For Jewish communities that need time to prepare for such a fast, we especially urge consideration of a Call to fast on the 10th of Tevet, December 15, a traditional fast day in memory of the beginning of a disastrous war — that is, the beginning of the siege of Jerusalem by Babylonian troops 2500 years ago.
We welcome other religious and spiritual communities, especially those stirred by the Multi-religious Call to a Fast for Peace, to use whatever parts of this liturgy appeal to them.
There are further comments about communal fasting and about the Fast of the 10th of Tevet, after the liturgy below. See also many essays and articles on the question of war with Iraq on From: the Shalom Center Website (www.shalomctr.org).
With blessings of shalom,
Lee Moore, Program Coordinator
Rabbi Arthur Waskow, Director
The Shalom Center

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Ta’anit Tzibbur al HaTzarah:
Call to a Communal Fast to Avert Calamity

Finding ourselves pressed down by the possibility of war, we gather to support each other and to strengthen our courage. Regardless of our political views, we know that wars cause the death of innocents — mothers and children, fathers and grandparents. We know that the world is an interconnected whole, and that what we do to one part of it will in turn affect us, too.
The Rambam teaches that all fasts assist in the holy process of T’shuvah — turning ourselves toward the One. By turning away from filling our bellies, we more easily open our hearts to compassion, our minds to wisdom, and our hands to acts of peace. Today, we ask the question — what tshuvah, what turning, is it that we want to turn to, in light of this potential calamity of war? Near the end of the service, each person in the circle will be asked to share what they intend to turn to.

Bringing Out the Ark

Since ancient times, the Call to a Communal Fast has begun by bringing out the Ark into an open space and strewing wood-ashes on the Ark, on the foreheads of the secular and religious leaders of the community, and then everyone else. [Pause to do this, skipping anyone who prefers not to have the ashes. If the community has not brought an Ark outdoors, ashes may be strewn on the Torah cover or on a cloth surrounding it.]

The eldest member of the group speaks:

Today, as the Prophet Joel (2:13) teaches, “Karu l’vavchem v’al bigdeichem” — we gather to rend our hearts, not our garments as we do upon a death. We have not experienced a death, but in the darkened air there hovers the possibility of many deaths. By rending our hearts — tearing them more open — we hope to prevent the needless killing that could happen during war. Let us rend our hearts now, so that we will not need to rend our garments later. May our hearts and the hearts of our leaders soften so that we make life-affirming choices in these difficult times. As we learn (Jonah 3: 8-10), when Nineveh repented from the violence of their fists, God saw not their sackcloth and ashes — but instead “God saw their deeds, that they turned from their evil path.”

We call ourselves to alarm by blowing the shofar in the sound of alarm; we call ourselves to compassion by blowing the shofar in its wailing and its sobs.

Zichronot/Remembrances

We remember the Power of the One to re-member us, to make us whole again.
“God remembered Noah and every living creature, and all the life-forms, all the animals that were with him in the ark; God brought a rushing-wind across the earth, and the waters abated.” May we, living in a world beflooded by an overflow of violence, remember now our covenant for life.
Just as God heard our groaning under slavery in the Narrow Place, re-membering the covenant of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Sarah, Rivka, Rachel and Leah, so may we re-member our own part in that covenant.
Blessed are You, YHWH our God, Ruler [Breathing-spirit] of the world, who has made us holy through connectedness, and has connected us through the hearing of the shofar. Baruch attah YHWH elohenu melech [ruach] ha’olam asher kidshanu b’mitzvot vitzivanu lishmoa kol shofar.
First blowing of the shofar — Tekiah, Shevarim, Teruah, Tekiah.
Blessed are You, YHWH our God, Who re-members the covenant.
Shoferot/Shofar-Transformations Today, we blow the shofar to awaken ourselves and our leaders to the transformative possibilities of peace. For as we are taught, “All you who dwell upon the planet and live throughout the earth shall see when the banner is lifted on the mountain, shall hear the Shofar when it is sounded forth.” (Isaiah 18:3).
Second blowing of the shofar — Tekiah, Shevarim, Teruah, Tekiah Gedolah
For You hear the sound of the shofar and You heed its call. There is none like You. Blessed are You, YHWH, who in compassion hears the shofar sounding of Your people.
Acrostic Prayer for Yom Kippur Katan
(the “little Yom Kippur” before the New Moon or on any communal fast)
(by Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi)
You my God, my Helper
Ordering my life is not easy
My struggles are before You
Keep at my side as I strive
I am not as good as I wish to be
Put forth Your light and lead me
Please guide my steps on Your path
Up to the level I can live on
Raise my actions to my value
Kindness plant in my heart
Attention to the ways I am relating
To others who cross my path
And help me to live in balance
Neither in haste nor in sloth
And give me joy in Your service
Making bright the lives of my loved one
Embracing the lot You give me —
Night and morning in Your service.
How may I come to You / If I did not heed Your word?
What You have made pure / I have polluted
What You have loved / I despised
What You have ordered / I have disrupted
What you have intended / I have opposed
Take my ways and turn them
So that I might make pure/ What I have polluted
That I may love / What You love
That I may order / What I have disrupted
That I might intend / What You intend
May I be renewed like the moon.
May I reflect Your light ever waxing.

Recitation of Psalms

from Psalm 120:

In my distress, I called to YHWH and I was answered.
God, rescue my soul/ breath from lips that lie, from a tongue that deceives…
Too long has my soul/ breath dwelt with those who hate peace.
I am peace, but when I speak, they are for war.

from Psalm 121:

Song: Esai Einai
I lift up my eyes unto the mountain
From where, from where will my help come?
I lift up my eyes unto the mountain
From where, from where will my help come?
My help will come-come from the One,
Maker of the heavens and the earth.
My help will come-come from the One,
Maker of the heavens and the earth.
Esai Einai, el ha-harim
Mei-ai’yin, mei-ai’yin yavo ezri?
Esai Einai, el ha-harim
Mei-ai’yin, mei-ai’yin yavo ezri?
Ezri me-im Hashem oseh shamaiim v’aretz (x2).

from Psalm 130:

From the depths have I called You, O Eternal.
YHWH, hear my voice.
May your ears attend to the sound of my pleas.
For if you were to keep track of all misdeeds,
Oh God, who could breathe?
Yet with You comes forgiveness
That fills us with awe.
In You I place my hope,
With every breath I place my hope in You,
And for Your word I yearn.
My every breath awaits You,
More than watchmen wait for the dawn —
Yes, more than watchmen yearn for dawn.
You who wrestle God, take hope in YHWH!
For with the Source of Life is loving-kindness
And many forms of freedom —
For the Breath of Life will free us from all our unjust acts.

from Psalm 102:

You Who Hear prayers, hear my prayer now,
Let my outcry reach to You.
Do not hide your face from me on this day of distress.
Lend me Your ear.
On the very day I call out, answer me.

Reading from the Prophets —
Yeshayahu, Isaiah 56

What is the fast that I demand of you? —
What is a day that truly presses down your ego?
Is it bending down your head like a bulrush?
Sitting on sack-cloth and ashes?
No!
This is the fast that I have chosen:
Break the handcuffs put on by wicked power;
Undo the yoke of heavy burden;
Let the oppressed go free.
Share your bread with the hungry;
Bring the homeless to your own house.
When you see the naked, clothe them;
Don’t hide yourself; they are your flesh and blood!

And from a child of the Prophets, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, writing in 1943:

Emblazoned over the gates of the world in which we live is the escutcheon of the demons. The mark of Cain in the face of man has come to overshadow the likeness of God. Ashamed and dismayed, we ask: Who is responsible?

All may be guided by the words of the Baal Shem: If a man has beheld evil, he may know that it was shown to him in order that he learn his own guilt and repent; for what is shown to him is also within him.
Indeed, where were we when men learned to hate in the days of starvation? When raving madmen were sowing wrath in the hearts of the unemployed?

Let Fascism not serve as an alibi for our conscience. We have failed to fight for right, for justice, for goodness; as a result we must fight against wrong, against injustice, against evil. We have failed to offer sacrifices on the altar of peace; now we must offer sacrifices on the altar of war.

When greed, envy, and the reckless will to power, the serpents that were cherished in the bosom of our civilization, came to maturity, they broke out of their dens to fall upon the helpless nations.

The conscience of the world was destroyed by those who were wont to blame others rather than themselves.

T’shuvah

What acts of ours will respond wholeheartedly to Isaiah’s voicing of God’s desire? What acts of ours will respond to Heschel’s call that we become responsible?
Let each of us now look into the hearts we have torn open, and bring forth one action that we intend as an act of turning toward the One. — Each of us is welcome now to say what deed we intend to do in order to lessen violence, seek peace, and prevent war.
[Wait for words of commitment from members of the community.]
We call upon our community to undertake a communal fast and thoughtful action in the hope of averting the calamity of war, focused on the hours from dawn to dusk on _________ [insert date according to the Jewish and Western calendars].

Closing song (by Debbie Friedman; Zechariah 4: 6, read on Shabbat Hanukkah)

Not by might, and not by power,
but by Spirit alone
Shall we all live in peace.
The children sing, the children sing —
And their tears may fall
But we’ll hear them call
And another song will rise (x3).
Not by might, and not by power,
but by Spirit alone
Shall we all live in peace.

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The liturgy above and the comments below were shaped by Lee Moore, Program Coordinator for The Shalom Center, and Rabbi Arthur Waskow, its director.
As our nation and the world face the serious possibility of war, The Shalom Center encourages communities — whether Jewish or Multi-religious — to gather to fast, to reflect, to pray, and to act. We encourage you to use the service above, and to modify it as befits your situation.
We also encourage you to read the Multi-religious Call to a Fast for Peace (which you have already received), as part of this liturgy. It, and a set of suggestions for action and study called “What is the Fast that We Propose?” are on the Shalom Center Website at (www.shalomctr.org) along with a great deal of other information about Iraq.
It is a mitzvah to call out to God any time danger looms. In ancient times, the rabbis would call for a fast to engage the whole community in changing its behavior. In so doing, the people hoped to re-establish right relationship with the Divine and avert an impending calamity. The liturgy above is based on this traditional practice of calling for a fast in times of calamity.
The call is timely this year. In ancient times, if the rains did not come by the first of the month of Kislev, the entire community would be called to fast for three days from dawn to dusk. This year, we need inward rains of healing — our own tears of contrition and compassion — and so we inaugurate a season of conscious fasting.
The first fast could be held on Yom Kippur Katan — the daylight just before Rosh Chodesh begins, the new moon of Kislev. This corresponds to November 4. But, God forbid, that we still find ourselves with a threat of imminent war in one month’s time, we may need to fast again, from dawn to dusk, on the next Yom Kippur Katan, just before the new moon of Tevet.
If we STILL are hearing words of war by the tenth of Tevet, December 15, it would be appropriate for us to fast then, as well. Some Jews do this every year, to remember the beginnings of the siege on Jerusalem in Babylonian times.
To understand the memorializing of this date is to realize how deep ran the scars of disastrous war in Jewish consciousness — a war that some within the People Israel actually welcomed because they were so sure that God would not allow the Babylonians to triumph.
It was Jeremiah who warned that only internal transformation could save the people, and he was ignored and ultimately imprisoned by the king.
So proclaiming a Fast for the daylight hours of the 10th of Tevet, Sunday December 15, may be especially appropriate this year.
On that day, Jews might gather, pray by using the service above, share with each other the fears they hold, study together in a teach-in that draws on Jewish wisdom about peace and war and on contemporary knowledge about Iraq, oil, power, and the world community, undertake some action to advance the possibility of peace, and after sundown break the fast together in communal celebration.
Ta’anit Tzibbur is not intended for private, individual reflection. It aims at communal recognition of the impending calamity, and communal transformation. The root of the word “ta’anit” relates to the notion of being pressed, afflicted, like the bread of affliction during Passover. It’s crucial that we come together in this time in groups of three or more to acknowledge that we feel pressed by the threat of war. And then, as a community we can break the fast together, with hopes of a brighter immediate future.
The Rambam (Hilkhot Ta’anit 1:1-2) highlights a fast day as one of teshuvah, or turning/ returning. Constraints on eating focus attention upon our behavior and the resulting crisis.
Mincha-time, late afternoon, is a critical moment for teshuvah during a ta’anit. Ezra (9:5) writes, “During the Mincha time I arose from my ta’anit, tore my clothing, fell upon my knees, and spread my hands upward to YHWH my God.”
This liturgy is perhaps best used, then, by a community of fasters who assemble if possible during the day to study and reflect and act. Then in the late afternoon or early evening, the might pray together for a shifting of the winds away from destruction and possible further destruction, and finally in celebration of community together break their fast.
With blessings of shalom,
Lee Moore and Rabbi Arthur Waskow
The Shalom Center (www.shalomctr.org)
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Bulletin 216
Medjugorje, November 26, 2005

“Dear children! Also today I call you to pray, pray, pray until prayer becomes life for you. Little children, at this time, in a special way, I pray before God to give you the gift of faith. Only in faith will you discover the joy of the gift of life that God has given you. Your heart will be joyful thinking of eternity. I am with you and love you with a tender love. Thank you for having responded to my call.” November 25, 2005

A great theological and psycho sociological question is why the Christians flee a public demonstration of their faith? Why do they think that they will have less success if they hide their fidelity to Christ? It goes so far that some of them eliminate Christian symbols from their offices, from their cars, from their neck. Although it is said to us, and repeated high and strong, that faith is a private business, it is also a public affair of universal range. To suppress something, which characterizes us in an essential way, means to disavow the One in whom we believe, and into whose hands, especially in distress and pain, we place our trust.

Jesus says clearly that he will disavow, in front of his Father and in the Kingdom of heaven towards which we aspire, those who disavow Him on earth. Therefore, the message printed on the calling card reminds us that it is necessary to express publicly and confess discreetly our faith, and to invite others to conversion. In fundamental questions, we should not step back. Jesus did not step back in front of those who wanted Him to deny that He was to One who was supposed to come. He remained coherent at the price of the cross and of death.

Fr. Mario Knezovic
________________________________________

POST-SYNODAL
APOSTOLIC EXHORTATION
RECONCILIATION AND PENANCE
OF JOHN PAUL II
TO THE BISHOPS
CLERGY AND FAITHFUL
ON RECONCILIATION AND PENANCE
IN THE MISSION OF THE CHURCH TODAY

PART TWO
THE LOVE THAT IS GREATER THAN SIN
The Tragedy of Man

13. In the words of St. John the apostle, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive our sins.”(56) Written at the very dawn of the church, these inspired words introduce better than any other human expression the theme of sin, which is intimately connected with that of reconciliation. These words present the question of sin in its human dimension: sin as an integral part of the truth about man. But they immediately relate the human dimension to its divine dimension, where sin is countered by the truth of divine love, which is just, generous and faithful, and which reveals itself above all in forgiveness and redemption. Thus St. John also writes a little further on that “whatever accusations (our conscience) may raise against us, God is greater than our conscience.”(57)
To acknowledge one’s sin, indeed-penetrating still more deeply into the consideration of one’s own personhood-to recognize oneself as being a sinner, capable of sin and inclined to commit sin, is the essential first step in returning to God. For example, this is the experience of David, who “having done what is evil in the eyes of the Lord” and having been rebuked by the prophet Nathan,(58) exclaims: “For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you alone, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight.”(59) Similarly, Jesus himself puts the following significant words on the lips and in the heart of the prodigal son: “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you.”(60)

In effect, to become reconciled with God presupposes and includes detaching oneself consciously and with determination from the sin into which one has fallen. It presupposes and includes, therefore, doing penance in the fullest sense of the term: repenting, showing this repentance, adopting a real attitude of repentance- which is the attitude of the person who starts out on the road of return to the Father. This is a general law and one which each individual must follow in his or her particular situation. For it is not possible to deal with sin and conversion only in abstract terms.

In the concrete circumstances of sinful humanity, in which there can be no conversion without the acknowledgment of one’s own sin, the church’s ministry of reconciliation intervenes in each individual case with a precise penitential purpose. That is, the church’s ministry intervenes in order to bring the person to the “knowledge of self”-in the words of St. Catherine of Siena(61)-to the rejection of evil, to the re-establishment of friendship with God, to a new interior ordering, to a fresh ecclesial conversion. Indeed, even beyond the boundaries of the church and the community of believers, the message and ministry of penance are addressed to all men and women, because all need conversion and reconciliation.(62)

In order to carry out this penitential ministry adequately, we shall have to evaluate the consequences of sin with “eyes enlightened”(63) by faith. These consequences of sin are the reasons for division and rupture not only within each person, but also within the various circles of a person’s life: in relation to the family, to the professional and social environment, as can often be seen from experience; it is confirmed by the passage in the Bible about the city of Babel and its tower.(64) Intent on building what was to be at once a symbol and a source of unity, those people found themselves more scattered than before, divided in speech, divided among themselves, incapable of consensus and agreement.

Why did the ambitious project fail? Why did “the builders labor in vain?”(65) They failed because they had set up as a sign and guarantee of the unity they desired a work of their own hands alone and had forgotten the action of the Lord. They had attended only to the horizontal dimension of work and social life, forgetting the vertical dimension by which they would have been rooted in God, their creator and Lord, and would have been directed toward him as the ultimate goal of their progress.

Now it can be said that the tragedy of humanity today, as indeed of every period in history, consists precisely in its similarity to the experience of Babel.

The Tower of Babel Deserted: Gerrit Greeve

CHAPTER ONE
THE MYSTERY OF SIN

14 If we read the passage in the Bible on the city and tower of Babel in the new light offered by the Gospel and if we compare it with the other passage on the fall of our first parents, we can draw from it valuable elements for an understanding of the mystery of sin. This expression, which echoes what St. Paul writes concerning the mystery of evil,(66) helps us to grasp the obscure and intangible element hidden in sin. Clearly sin is a product of man’s freedom. But deep within its human reality there are factors at work which place it beyond the merely human, in the border area where man’s conscience, will and sensitivity are in contact with the dark forces which, according to St. Paul, are active in the world almost to the point of ruling it. (67)

Disobedience to God

A first point which helps us to understand sin emerges from the biblical narrative on the building of the tower of Babel: The people sought to build a city, organize themselves into a society and to be strong and powerful without God, if not precisely against God.(68) In this sense the story of the first sin in Eden and the story of Babel, in spite of notable differences in content and form, have one thing in common: In both there is an exclusion of God through direct opposition to one of his commandments, through an act of rivalry, through the mistaken pretension of being “like him.”(69) In the story of Babel the exclusion of God is presented not so much under the aspect of opposition to him as of forgetfulness and indifference toward him, as if God were of no relevance in the sphere of man’s joint projects. But in both cases the relationship to God is severed with violence. In the case of Eden there appears in all its seriousness and tragic reality that which constitutes the ultimate essence and darkness of sin: disobedience to God, to His law, to the mural norm that he has given man, inscribing it in his heart and confirming and perfecting it through revelation.

Exclusion of God, rupture with God, disobedience to God: Throughout the history of mankind this has been and is, in various forms, sin. It can go as far as a very denial of God and his existence: This is the phenomenon called atheism.

Adela Maria, BSP: Are we going to sit idly by and let a minority of ONE rob this country of its Heritage…to be with God, for God and in God?
It is the disobedience of a person who, by a free act, does not acknowledge God’s sovereignty over his or her life, at least at that particular moment in which he or she transgresses God’s law.

Division Between Brothers

15. In the biblical narratives mentioned above, man’s rupture with God leads tragically to divisions between brothers.

In the description of the “first sin,” the rupture with Yahweh simultaneously breaks the bond of friendship that had united the human family. Thus the subsequent pages of Genesis show us the man and the woman as it were pointing an accusing finger at each other.(70) Later we have the brother hating his brother and finally taking his life.(71)

According to the Babel story, the result of sin is the shattering of the human family, already begun with the first sin and now reaching its most extreme form on the social level.

No one wishing to investigate the mystery of sin can ignore this link between cause and effect. As a rupture with God, sin is an act of disobedience by a creature who rejects, at least implicitly, the very one from whom he came and who sustains him in life. It is therefore a suicidal act. Since by sinning man refuses to submit to God, his internal balance is also destroyed and it is precisely within himself that contradictions and conflicts arise. Wounded in this way, man almost inevitably causes damage to the fabric of his relationship with others and with the created world. This is an objective law and an objective reality, verified in so many ways in the human psyche and in the spiritual life as well as in society, where it is easy to see the signs and effects of internal disorder.

The mystery of sin is composed of this twofold wound which the sinner opens in himself and in his relationship with his neighbor. Therefore one can speak of personal and social sin: From one point of view, every sin is personal; from another point of view, every sin is social insofar as and because it also has social repercussions.

Personal Sin and Social Sin

16. Sin, in the proper sense, is always a personal act, since it is an act of freedom on the part of an individual person and not properly of a group or community. This individual may be conditioned, incited and influenced by numerous and powerful external factors. He may also be subjected to tendencies, defects and habits linked with his personal condition. In not a few cases such external and internal factors may attenuate, to a greater or lesser degree, the person’s freedom and therefore his responsibility and guilt. But it is a truth of faith, also confirmed by our experience and reason, that the human person is free. This truth cannot be disregarded in order to place the blame for individuals’ sins on external factors such as structures, systems or other people. Above all, this would be to deny the person’s dignity and freedom, which are manifested-even though in a negative and disastrous way-also in this responsibility for sin committed. Hence, there is nothing so personal and un-transferable in each individual as merit for virtue or responsibility for sin.

As a personal act, sin has its first and most important consequences in the sinner himself: that is, in his relationship with God, who is the very foundation of human life; and also in his spirit, weakening his will and clouding his intellect.

At this point we must ask what was being referred to by those who during the preparation of the synod and in the course of its actual work frequently spoke of social sin.

The expression and the underlying concept in fact have various meanings.

To speak of social sin means in the first place to recognize that, by virtue of human solidarity which is as mysterious and intangible as it is real and concrete, each individual’s sin in some way affects others. This is the other aspect of that solidarity which on the religious level is developed in the profound and magnificent mystery of the communion of saints, thanks to which it has been possible to say that “every soul that rises above itself, raises up the world.” To this law of ascent there unfortunately corresponds the law of descent. Consequently one can speak of a communion of sin, whereby a soul that lowers itself through sin drags down with itself the church and, in some way, the whole world. In other words, there is no sin, not even the most intimate and secret one, the most strictly individual one, that exclusively concerns the person committing it. With greater or lesser violence, with greater or lesser harm, every sin has repercussions on the entire ecclesial body and the whole human family. According to this first meaning of the term, every sin can undoubtedly be considered as social sin.

Adela Maria, BSP: Such as homosexuality and lesbianism marriages.

Some sins, however, by their very matter constitute a direct attack on one’s neighbor and more exactly, in the language of the Gospel, against one’s brother or sister. They are an offense against God because they are offenses against one’s neighbor. These sins are usually called social sins, and this is the second meaning of the term. In this sense social sin is sin against love of neighbor, and in the law of Christ it is all the more serious in that it involves the Second Commandment, which is “like unto the first.”(72) Likewise, the term social applies to every sin against justice in interpersonal relationships, committed either by the individual against the community or by the community against the individual. Also social is every sin against the rights of the human person, beginning with the right to end including the life of the unborn or against a person’s physical integrity. Likewise social is every sin against others’ freedom, especially against the supreme freedom to believe in God and adore him; social is every sin against the dignity and honor of one’s neighbor. Also social is every sin against the common good and its exigencies in relation to the whole broad spectrum of the rights and duties of citizens. The term social can be applied to sins of commission or omission-on the part of political, economic or trade union leaders, who though in a position to do so, do not work diligently and wisely for the improvement and transformation of society according to the requirements and potential of the given historic moment; as also on the part of workers who through absenteeism or non-cooperation fail to ensure that their industries can continue to advance the well-being of the workers themselves, of their families and of the whole of society.

The third meaning of social sin refers to the relationships between the various human communities. These relationships are not always in accordance with the plan of God, who intends that there be justice in the world and freedom and peace between individuals, groups and peoples. Thus the class struggle, whoever the person who leads it or on occasion seeks to give it a theoretical justification, is a social evil. Likewise obstinate confrontation between blocs of nations, between one nation and another, between different groups within the same nation all this too is a social evil. In both cases one may ask whether moral responsibility for these evils, and therefore sin, can be attributed to any person in particular. Now it has to be admitted that realities and situations such as those described, when they become generalized and reach vast proportions as social phenomena, almost always become anonymous, just as their causes are complex and not always identifiable. Hence if one speaks of social sin here, the expression obviously has an analogical meaning. However, to speak even analogically of social sins must not cause us to underestimate the responsibility of the individuals involved. It is meant to be an appeal to the consciences of all, so that each may shoulder his or her responsibility seriously and courageously in order to change those disastrous conditions and intolerable situations.

Having said this in the clearest and most unequivocal way, one must add at once that there is one meaning sometimes given to social sin that is not legitimate or acceptable even though it is very common in certain quarters today.(74) This usage contrasts social sin and personal sin, not without ambiguity, in a way that leads more or less unconsciously to the watering down and almost the abolition of personal sin, with the recognition only of social gilt and responsibilities. According to this usage, which can readily be seen to derive from non-Christian ideologies and systems-which have possibly been discarded today by the very people who formerly officially upheld them-practically every sin is a social sin, in the sense that blame for it is to be placed not so much on the moral conscience of an individual, but rather on some vague entity or anonymous collectivity such as the situation, the system, society, structures or institutions.

Whenever the church speaks of situations of sin or when the condemns as social sins certain situations or the collective behavior of certain social groups, big or small, or even of whole nations and blocs of nations, she knows and she proclaims that such cases of social sin are the result of the accumulation and concentration of many personal sins. It is a case of the very personal sins of those who cause or support evil or who exploit it; of those who are in a position to avoid, eliminate or at least limit certain social evils but who fail to do so out of laziness, fear or the conspiracy of silence, through secret complicity or indifference; of those who take refuge in the supposed impossibility of changing the world and also of those who sidestep the effort and sacrifice required, producing specious reasons of higher order. The real responsibility, then, lies with individuals.

A situation-or likewise an institution, a structure, society itself-is not in itself the subject of moral acts. Hence a situation cannot in itself be good or bad.

At the heart of every situation of sin are always to be found sinful people. So true is this that even when such a situation can be changed in its structural and institutional aspects by the force of law or-as unfortunately more often happens by the law of force, the change in fact proves to be incomplete, of short duration and ultimately vain and ineffective-not to say counterproductive if the people directly or indirectly responsible for that situation are not converted.

Mortal and Venial

17. But here we come to a further dimension in the mystery of sin, one on which the human mind has never ceased to ponder: the question of its gravity. It is a question which cannot be overlooked and one which the Christian conscience has never refused to answer. Why and to what degree is sin a serious matter in the offense it commits against God and in its effects on man? The church has a teaching on this matter which she reaffirms in its essential elements, while recognizing that it is not always easy in concrete situations to define clear and exact limits.

Already in the Old Testament, individuals guilty of several kinds of sins - sins committed deliberately,(75) the various forms of impurity,(76) idolatry,(77) the worship of false gods (78) - were ordered to be “taken away from the people,” which could also mean to be condemned to death.(79) Contrasted with these were other sins especially sins committed through ignorance, that were forgiven by means of a sacrificial offering.(80)
In reference also to these texts, the church has for centuries spoken of mortal sin and venial sin. But it is above all the New Testament that sheds light on this distinction and these terms. Here there are many passages which enumerate and strongly reprove sins that are particularly deserving of condemnation.(81) There is also the confirmation of the Decalogue by Jesus himself.(82) Here I wish to give special attention to two passages that are significant and impressive.

In a text of his First Letter, St. John speaks of a sin which leads to death (pros thanaton), as opposed to a sin which does not lead to death (me pros thanaton).(83) Obviously, the concept of death here is a spiritual death. It is a question of the loss of the true life or “eternal life,” which for John is knowledge of the Father and the Son,(84) and communion and intimacy with them. In that passage the sin that leads to death seems to be the denial of the Son(85) or the worship of false gods.(86) At any rate, by this distinction of concepts John seems to wish to emphasize the incalculable seriousness of what constitutes the very essence of sin, namely the rejection of God. This is manifested above all in apostasy and idolatry: repudiating faith in revealed truth and making certain created realities equal to God, raising them to the status of idols or false gods.(87) But in this passage the apostle’s intention is also to underline the certainty that comes to the Christian from the fact of having been “born of God” through the coming of the Son: The Christian possesses a power that preserves him from falling into sin; God protects him, and “the evil one does not touch him.” If he should sin through weakness or ignorance, he has confidence in being forgiven, also because he is supported by the joint prayer of the community.

In another passage of the New Testament, namely in St. Matthew’s Gospel,(88)Jesus himself speaks of a “blasphemy against the Holy Spirit” that ” will not be forgiven” by reason of the fact that in its manifestation, it is an obstinate refusal to be converted to the love of the Father of mercies.

Here of course it is a question of external radical manifestations: rejection of God, rejection of his grace and therefore opposition to the very source of salvation(89)-these are manifestations whereby a person seems to exclude himself voluntarily from the path of forgiveness. It is to be hoped that very few persist to the end in this attitude of rebellion or even defiance of God. Moreover, God in his merciful love is greater than our hearts, as St. John further teaches us,(90) and can overcome all our psychological and spiritual resistance. So that, as St. Thomas writes, “considering the omnipotence and mercy of God, no one should despair of the salvation of anyone in this life.”(91)

But when we ponder the problem of a rebellious will meeting the infinitely just God, we cannot but experience feelings of salutary “fear and trembling,” as St. Paul suggests.(92) Moreover, Jesus’ warning about the sin “that will not be forgiven” confirms the existence of sins which can bring down on the sinner the punishment of “eternal death.”

In the light of these and other passages of sacred Scripture, doctors and theologians, spiritual teachers and pastors have divided sins into mortal and venial. St. Augustine, among others, speaks of letalia or mortifera crimina, contrasting them with venialia, levia or quotidiana.(93) The meaning which he gives to these adjectives was to influence the successive magisterium of the church. After him, it was St. Thomas who was to formulate in the clearest possible terms the doctrine which became a constant in the church.

In defining and distinguishing between mortal and venial sins, St. Thomas and the theology of sin that has its source in him could not be unaware of the biblical reference and therefore of the concept of spiritual death. According to St. Thomas, in order to live spiritually man must remain in communion with the supreme principle of life, which is God, since God is the ultimate end of man’ s being and acting. Now sin is a disorder perpetrated by the human being against this life-principle. And when through sin, the soul commits a disorder that reaches the point of turning away from its ultimate end God to which it is bound by charity, then the sin is mortal; on the other hand, whenever the disorder does not reach the point of a turning away from God, the sin is venial.”(94) For this reason venial sin does not deprive the sinner of sanctifying grace, friendship with God, charity and therefore eternal happiness, whereas just such a deprivation is precisely the consequence of mortal sin.

Furthermore, when sin is considered from the point of view of the punishment it merits, for St. Thomas and other doctors’ mortal sin is the sin which, if un-forgiven, leads to eternal punishment; whereas venial sin is the sin that merits merely temporal punishment (that is, a partial punishment which can be expiated on earth or in purgatory).

Considering sin from the point of view of its matter, the ideas of death, of radical rupture with God, the supreme good, of deviation from the path that leads to God or interruption of the journey toward him (which are all ways of defining mortal sin) are linked with the idea of the gravity of sin’s objective content. Hence, in the church’s doctrine and pastoral action, grave sin is in practice identified with mortal sin.

Here we have the core of the church’s traditional teaching, which was reiterated frequently and vigorously during the recent synod. The synod in fact not only reaffirmed the teaching of the Council of Trent concerning the existence and nature of mortal and venial sins,(95) but it also recalled that mortal sin is sin whose object is grave matter and which is also committed with full knowledge and deliberate consent. It must be added-as was likewise done at the synod-that some sins are intrinsically grave and mortal by reason of their matter. That is, there exist acts which, per se and in themselves, independently of circumstances, are always seriously wrong by reason of their object. These acts, if carried out with sufficient awareness and freedom, are always gravely sinful.(96)

This doctrine, based on the Deccalogue and on the preaching of the Old Testament, and assimilated into the kerygma of the apostles and belonging to the earliest teaching of the church, and constantly reaffirmed by her to this day, is exactly verified in the experience of the men and women of all times. Man knows well by experience that along the road of faith and justice which leads to the knowledge and love of God in this life and toward perfect union with him in eternity, he can cease to go forward or can go astray without abandoning the way of God; and in this case there occurs venial sin. This however must never be underestimated, as though it were automatically something that can be ignored or regarded as “a sin of little importance.”

For man also knows, through painful experience, that by a conscious and free act of his will he can change course and go in a direction opposed to God’s will, separating himself from God (aversio a Deo), rejecting loving communion with him, detaching himself from the life principle which God is and consequently choosing death.

With the whole tradition of the church, we call mortal sin the act by which man freely and consciously rejects God, his law, the covenant of love that God offers, preferring to turn in on himself or to some created and finite reality, something contrary to the divine will (conversio ad creaturam). This can occur in a direct and formal way in the sins of idolatry, apostasy and atheism; or in an equivalent way as in every act of disobedience to God’s commandments in a grave matter. Man perceives that this disobedience to God destroys the bond that unites him with his life principle: It is a mortal sin, that is, an act which gravely offends God and ends in turning against man himself with a dark and powerful force of destruction.

During the synod assembly some fathers proposed a threefold distinction of sins, classifying them as venial, grave and mortal. This threefold distinction might illustrate the fact that there is a scale of seriousness among grave sins. But it still remains true that the essential and decisive distinction is between sin which destroys charity and sin which does not kill the supernatural life: There is no middle way between life and death.
Likewise, care will have to be taken not to reduce mortal sin to an act of ” fundamental option”-as is commonly said today-against God, intending thereby an explicit and formal contempt for God or neighbor. For mortal sin exists also when a person knowingly and willingly, for whatever reason, chooses something gravely disordered. In fact, such a choice already includes contempt for the divine law, a rejection of God’s love for humanity and the whole of creation; the person turns away from God and loses charity. Thus the fundamental orientation can be radically changed by individual acts. Clearly there can occur situations which are very complex and obscure from a psychological viewpoint and which have an influence on the sinner’s subjective culpability. But from a consideration of the psychological sphere one cannot proceed to the construction of a theological category, which is what the “fundamental option” precisely is, understanding it in such a way that it objectively changes or casts doubt upon the traditional concept of mortal sin.

While every sincere and prudent attempt to clarify the psychological and theological mystery of sin is to be valued, the church nevertheless has a duty to remind all scholars in this field of the need to be faithful to the word of God that teaches us also about sin. She likewise has to remind them of the risk of contributing to a further weakening of the sense of sin in the modern world.

The Loss of the Sense of Sin

18. Over the course of generations, the Christian mind has gained from the Gospel as it is read in the ecclesial community a fine sensitivity and an acute perception of the seeds of death contained in sin, as well as a sensitivity and an acuteness of perception for identifying them in the thousand guises under which sin shows itself. This is what is commonly called the sense of sin.

This sense is rooted in man’s moral conscience and is as it were its thermometer. It is linked to the sense of God, since it derives from man’s conscious relationship with God as his Creator, Lord and Father. Hence, just as it is impossible to eradicate completely the sense of God or to silence the conscience completely; so the sense of sin is never completely eliminated.

Nevertheless, it happens not infrequently in history, for more or less lengthy periods and under the influence of many different factors, that the moral conscience of many people becomes seriously clouded. “Have we the right idea of conscience?”-I asked two years ago in an address to the faithful” Is it not true that modern man is threatened by an eclipse of conscience? By a deformation of conscience; by a numbness or ‘deadening’ of conscience,”(97); too many signs indicate that such an eclipse exists in our time. This is all the more disturbing in that conscience, defined by the council as “the most secret core and sanctuary of a man,”(98) is “strictly related to human freedom…. For this reason conscience, to a great extent, constitutes the basis of man’s interior dignity and, at the same time, of his relationship to God.”(99) It is inevitable therefore that in this situation there is an obscuring also of the sense of sin, which is closely connected with the moral conscience, the search for truth and the desire to make a responsible use of freedom. When the conscience is weakened the sense of God is also obscured, and as a result, with the loss of this decisive inner point of reference, the sense of sin is lost. This explains why my predecessor Pius XI, one day declared, in words that have almost become proverbial, that “the sin of the century is the loss of the sense of sin.”(100)

Why has this happened in our time? A glance at certain aspects of contemporary culture can help us to understand the progressive weakening of the sense of sin, precisely because of the crisis of conscience and crisis of the sense of God already mentioned.

“Secularism” is by nature and definition a movement of ideas and behavior which advocates a humanism totally without God, completely centered upon the cult of action and production and caught up in the heady enthusiasm of consumerism and pleasure seeking, unconcerned with the danger of “losing one’s soul.” This secularism cannot but undermine the sense of sin. At the very most, sin will be reduced to what offends man. But it is precisely here that we are faced with the bitter experience which I already alluded to in my first encyclical namely, that man can build a world without God, but this world will end by turning against him.”(101) In fact, God is the origin and the supreme end of man, and man carries in himself a divine seed.(102) Hence it is the reality of God that reveals and illustrates the mystery of man. It is therefore vain to hope that there will take root a sense of sin against man and against human values, if there is no sense of offense against God, namely the true sense of sin.

Another reason for the disappearance of the sense of sin in contemporary society is to be found in the errors made in evaluating certain findings of the human sciences. Thus on the basis of certain affirmations of psychology, concern to avoid creating feelings of guilt or to place limits on freedom leads to a refusal ever to admit any shortcoming. Through an undue extrapolation of the criteria of the science of sociology, it finally happens-as I have already said-that all failings are blamed upon society, and the individual is declared innocent of them. Again, a certain cultural anthropology so emphasizes the undeniable environmental and historical conditioning and influences which act upon man, that it reduces his responsibility to the point of not acknowledging his ability to perform truly human acts and therefore his ability to sin.

The sense of sin also easily declines as a result of a system of ethics deriving from a certain historical relativism. This may take the form of an ethical system which relativises the moral norm, denying its absolute and unconditional value, and as a consequence denying that there can be intrinsically illicit acts independent of the circumstances in which they are performed by the subject. Herein lies a real “overthrowing and downfall of moral values,” and “the problem is not so much one of ignorance of Christian ethics,” but ignorance “rather of the meaning, foundations and criteria of the moral attitude.”(103) Another effect of this ethical turning upside down is always such an attenuation of the notion of sin as almost to reach the point of saying that sin does exist, but no one knows who commits it.

Finally the sense of sin disappears when-as can happen in the education of youth, in the mass media and even in education within the family-it is wrongly identified with a morbid feeling of guilt or with the mere transgression of legal norms and precepts.

The loss of the sense of sin is thus a form or consequence of the denial of God: not only in the form of atheism but also in the form of secularism. If sin is the breaking, off of one’s filial relationship to God in order to situate one’s life outside of obedience to him, then to sin is not merely to deny God. To sin is also to live as if he did not exist, to eliminate him from one’s daily life. A model of society which is mutilated or distorted in one sense or another, as is often encouraged by the mass media, greatly favors the gradual loss of the sense of sin. In such a situation the obscuring or weakening of the sense of sin comes from several sources: from a rejection of any reference to the transcendent in the name of the individual’s aspiration to personal independence; from acceptance of ethical models imposed by general consensus and behavior, even when condemned by the individual conscience; from the tragic social and economic conditions that oppress a great part of humanity, causing a tendency to see errors and faults only in the context of society; finally and especially, from the obscuring of the notion of God’s fatherhood and dominion over man’s life.

Even in the field of the thought and life of the church certain trends inevitably favor the decline of the sense of sin. For example, some are inclined to replace exaggerated attitudes of the past with other exaggerations: From seeing sin everywhere they pass to not recognizing it anywhere; from too much emphasis on the fear of eternal punishment they pass to preaching a love of God that excludes any punishment deserved by sin; from severity in trying to correct erroneous consciences they pass to a kind of respect for conscience which excludes the duty of telling the truth. And should it not be added that the confusion caused in the consciences of many of the faithful by differences of opinions and teachings in theology, preaching, catechesis and spiritual direction on serious and delicate questions of Christian morals ends by diminishing the true sense of sin almost to the point of eliminating it altogether? Nor can certain deficiencies in the practice of sacramental penance be overlooked. These include the tendency to obscure the ecclesial significance of sin and of conversion and to reduce them to merely personal matters; or vice versa, the tendency to nullify the personal value of good and evil and to consider only their community dimension. There also exists the danger, never totally eliminated, of routine ritualism that deprives the sacrament of its full significance and formative effectiveness.

The restoration of a proper sense of sin is the first way of facing the grave spiritual crisis looming over man today. But the sense of sin can only be restored through a clear reminder of the unchangeable principles of reason and faith which the moral teaching of the church has always upheld.

There are good grounds for hoping that a healthy sense of sin will once again flourish, especially in the Christian world and in the church. This will be aided by sound catechetics, illuminated by the biblical theology of the covenant, by an attentive listening and trustful openness to the magisterium of the church, which; never ceases to enlighten consciences, and by an ever more careful practice of the sacrament of penance.

If anything, this newsletter is a forewarning
UN WATCH!
“Helping YOU to Connect the Global to the Local” The Women’s International Media Group, Inc.
P. O. Box 77 Middletown, MD 21769-0077
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Vol. 3, Issue 4 July-August, 2001
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THE PROTESTORS, AGE OF AQUARIUS AND
THE GROUP OF 8 MEETING IN GENOA ITALY
By Joan M. Veon, Executive Director

INTRODUCTION

September 1 marks the 8th year in which I have been covering United Nations and UN related meetings. I began with the United Nations Conference on Population and Development in Cairo in September 1994 and have just returned from my 43rd meeting in Genoa, Italy. With each, I have seen a little bit more of the total global agenda for world control. This time, I was able to understand how the Group of Seven/Group of Eight fit in with regard to a global parliamentary structure.

I have found that as the final stages of world government become apparent, a diversion is needed and necessary in order to continue to keep (primarily) Americans in their present state of slumber and complacency. What the media continues to report on is the protestors. Ever since the Seattle World Trade Organization in November 1999 where violence became the name of the game, it was only used to keep the more visible and final pieces of the global structure hidden.

For those of us who believe that the sovereignty of the United States is being handed over to a global entity called the United Nations and that they constitute the cornerstone of “world government”, what I have to report with regard to the 26th meeting of the Group of Seven/Group of Eight will not surprise you. In fact, it will make a lot of sense and provide you with the final pieces. This report may even be controversial because there are dates and times which I cannot ignore any longer for they constitute an astrological pattern known as the Age of Aquarius.

BACKGROUND

Beginning in 1992 with the UN Conference on the Environment and Development, held in Rio de Janeiro, the environment, which reduces man to the equivalent of a plant or animal, became the new global philosophy by which the world and all of its rules and regulations would come into adherence. Part of this perverted philosophy is a concept known as “sustainable development” which all of the countries of the world are implementing, including the United States. In the last nine years, sustainable development has been making its way into all UN and UN related conferences and meetings. Sustainable development has become the standard by which all treaties, agreements, and global documents in the future are to be governed. In effect, the pagan environmental agenda will become part and parcel of all political and non-political activities.
In 1994, a very important building block was added, the World Trade Organization-WTO. The WTO is the final loss of economic sovereignty as trade is now being managed from an international level and not from a national level. All trade borders, with the exception of the last vestiges like farming subsidies and intellectual property rights, have been eliminated. The few remaining will be discussed at the upcoming WTO in November in Qatar.

Beginning in 1996, the Group of Seven (Russia became “Eight” in 1998) started to restructure the global economic infrastructure with very vast and broad changes which required the assistance of a number of global organizations such as the Bank for International Settlements, the IMF/World Bank, the United Nations, the International Organization of Security Commissions and the International Association of Insurance Commissioners. By harmonizing the global economic level, in the future, all national banks will have to come into compliance with a very large set of rules and regulations which will govern where and how they do business. The fact remains that the banking system of all countries will in effect be “taken over” by rules and regulations which come from the international level. This means that national banks will no longer be national but will end up under the control of the Bank for International Settlements. This restructuring shifts more power to the international level from the national.

It should also be mentioned in 1996 that the United Nations held a follow-up meeting to their 1976 meeting on “Habitat”. Called “Habitat II”, this meeting unveiled the concept of “public-private partnership” which basically is a for-profit business arrangement between multinational corporations and governments. Public-private partnerships are being set up all over the United States and all over the world and constitute a change in the STRUCTURE OF GOVERNMENT. For the United States, it represents a loss of representative government since the partnership structure shifts telephone systems, water works, utilities and waste water treatment plants, etc. into a new business arrangement which is controlled by those who have the most moneythe corporation. In Genoa, two of the large initiatives which were unveiled international are public-private partnerships, involving the UN, individual nation-states and multinational corporations. Public-private partnerships constitute the “privatization” of government or the buyout of government by business.
In 1998 the International Criminal Court was birthed. For the first time since the Roman Empire, an international power now has the ability to transcend national borders in order to arrest someone who has been charged with an international crime. I have been told by Sen. Hatch that the U.S. will not sign it.
Lastly, in September 2000, the United Nations was given very vast and deep empowerments to its existing structure as it was given the power to add its own “rapid deployment force” and a “People’s Parliament” or “House of International Representatives.”

However, it is at Genoa that the full Global Parliamentary structure of world government became visible to those who heard the demands of the protestors which was not reported in the mainstream newspapers and television networks. In order to get the historic flavor of this meeting, a brief history of Genoa is provided.

HISTORY OF GENOA

Only Genoa has retained a position of dominance out of Italy’s four ancient maritime republics (Venice, Amalfi and Pisa). It has been a trading seaport since the beginning of time as it is at the crossroads between north and south, east and west. Many civilizations have met and mingled here from all the shores. Genoa is Italy’s largest and most important port and is second only to Marseille in the Mediterranean.

It became a great sea-faring colonial power, creating a network of economic, cultural and social relations that covered the whole of the Mediterranean. Genoa is called “La Superba” or the Superb City which describes its beautiful gardens, palaces and artbuilt mostly with the Spanish gold which came from America. By the 11th Century, Genoa was one of the leading maritime powers in the Mediterrean.

The Kingdom of Sicily was ruled by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II from 1211 to 1250. Frederick was the grandson of Frederick Barbarossa. Frederick II opened Sicily up to free trade, built castles throughout the island and launched the Sixth Crusade in 1227. When Pope Gregory died in 1241, Frederick was hoping the new pope would be friendly. However, Innocent IV, was from Sicily’s mortal enemy and determined competitor for economic dominance, Genoa. As a result of years of fighting with Innocent IV, after his death, Frederick’s son-in-law was reduced to pawning the Sicilian throne to Genoese businessmen in return for gold.
The Genoese had long nursed dreams of adding Sicily to their domains and considered Frederick II and the Sicilians their arch enemies. Benefitting from the election of Pope Innocent IV, it was the Pope who claimed the Kingdom of Sicily for the Holy See. By 1250 Genoa had a prosperous textile industry, huge shipyards which produced most of the 1800 ships that sailed for St. Louis’s crusade in 1248 under the command of Genoese admirals and commercial enterprises of all kinds. Far surpassing these endeavors was their sophistication in banking. The Genoese had lent large sums to both Saint Louis and Innocent IV and had been bankers to just about every important crusader. As a result of the Genoese gold standard, their economy grew in power and prestige.

In 1284, Genoa soundly defeated rival Venice. By this time, Genoa had merchant colonies stretching from the coast of North Africa to Syria, along the Black Sea and in Spain where the Genoese captains became the first to sail to the Canaries and the Azores. It’s Golden Age was marred when it was divided into factionsnobles against each other, nobles against the mercantile classes, the merchants against the artisanswhile the ruling families each dominated their own quarter, forming “alberghi” or brotherhoods.

When the city sank deep into debt during its prolonged war with Venice for the eastern Mediterranean, its creditorsGenoa’s oligarchsformed a syndicate, the Banco di San Giorgio, to guarantee their increasingly precarious loans. This the bank did by gradually assuming control of the city’s overseas territories, castles, towns and treasury. From then on, Genoa was run as a business proposition. [Similar to the public- private partnership which is a corporate buyout of government.] Genoa remained Europe’s leading economic power. (The above is directly from two sources: Peter L. Bernstein, The Power of GOLD, the History of an Obsession, New York: John Wiley & Sons Inc., 2000 and Dana Facaros and Michael Pauls, Italy, Cadogan Guides, London, 2000).

THE HISTORY OF THE GROUP OF EIGHT

As a result of severing any relationship the U.S. dollar had to gold in 1971 and the subsequent global currency crises which occurred in 1973, President Nixon called together the presidents and prime ministers of four other countries to meet along with their treasury secretaries in the library of the White House to discuss the world economic system. Two years later, the President of France formalized the meeting of these same countries when they met in Rambouillet, France. By 1977, the number of countries had grown to seven: the United States, Canada, Germany, Japan, France and Great Britain. By 1998, Russia was admitted as a political partner making it the Group of Eight in every area but finances and economics where it remains the Group of Seven.

Over the last twenty-six years, the format and agenda of the G7/G8 has grown immensely. At the end of the meeting, a “Communique” is issued by all of the presidents and prime ministers. Sometimes it can be accompanied by the “Presidents” Report. For the first ten years, the Communique’s were up to five pages long, during the next ten years, they grew to between twelve and twenty pages and from 1996 they have been about thirty to forty pages with 2000 being an exception at 110 pages!

Although their initial concern was economic, they started in 1979 to make one line statements regarding pollution, carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, food supplies, population growth and relations with developing countries. By 1981, they added East-West relations and in 1984 started to discuss environmental pollution of the water, ground and air.

To show the expansion of their purview, the 1999 G8 Communique discussed globalization, employment, life-long learning, social safeguards, debt-reduction for highly indebted poor countries, sustainable development, climate change, non- proliferation, arms control and disarmament, AIDS, nuclear safety, the Year 2000 computer problem, Kosovo, the Middle East Peace Process, global financial stability, improving crisis prevention and management and involving the private sector, the Financial Stability Forum, the restructuring of the IMF/World Bank system, capital flows, human rights, terrorism, human security, rule of law and good governance. They also signed and agreed on a major “Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe” which states in part, “We will strive to achieve the objective of lasting peace, prosperity and stability for South Eastern Europe. We will reach this objective through a comprehensive and coherent approach to the region involving the EU, the OSCE, the Council of Europe, the UN, NATO, the OECD, the WEU, the IFIs [the World Bank and IMF], and the regional initiatives” (emphasis added). You can see the interconnectedness of agencies, countries and international organizations.

INTERVIEWS

Before we take a look at the unfolding power structure of the G7/G8, I would like to share with you two of the interviews that I conducted in Genoa. As a result of my research, I had concluded that the G8 was in effect an “International Executive Branch” of government while the UN constitutes an “International Congress.” The first is with Sir Nicholas Bayne now retired who served as Britain’s Ambassador to Zaire, the Congo, Rwanda and Burundi. He was Sous-Sherpa at the first Group of Five meeting and has been a career member of the British Diplomatic Service. In that capacity he also served as the UK Permanent Representative to the OECD. He is a member of the Royal Institute for International Affairs and in 1992 was made Knight Commander of St. Michael and St. George which is the Order of diplomacy given to those who serve as ambassadors overseas or in the foreign, Commonwealth or Colonial services.

Veon: In Birmingham, Tony Blair changed the G8 structure to make it two-tier. Do we have two different systems here that are operating even though they use the same global governance institutions: the BIS, IOSCO, the IMF/World bank? What are we seeing?

Sir N: I think the same sort of trends are emerging in the G8 as you see in the UN. You said they are acting like a cabinet. It’s a bit like that way in the UK. The Prime Ministers tries to ensure some compatibility about what his other ministers are doing. It’s what we call ‘joined up government.’

Veon: There are two structures then. The UN which has a governmental type of structure with the Secretary General, the General Assembly, the Security Council and we have the G8 structure with a G8 cabinet which appears to be forming. Where are these two structures going?

Sir N: The G8 is trying to be more open and accessible to other people. In Japan last year, they brought in NGOs. The meetings of finance and foreign and other ministers are bringing in other people to take part. The Finance Ministers had the heads of the World Bank and the regional development banks come in and take part in their meeting, so that’s the way they are bringing other people in.
I interviewed Sir Nicholas first in 1998 in Birmingham and since then at every G8 meeting. At that time I asked him what the role of the multinational corporations was. He replied,
“What the multinational corporations can do is that they can bring investment capital, new technology and management skills to developing countries that need it. It took developing countries quite a long time to understand that they should be going out and attracting private investment rather than worrying about foreign firms buying up their countries. Now all the more successful developing countries realize that multi-national companies bring them in very precious resources, both in terms of cash, technology and in the ways of doing business.” This is very important in light of the rise in public-private partnerships and the role of the Prince of Wales Business Leaders Forum which has been examined in my book, Prince Charles the Sustainable Prince.

The next interview I conducted was with Dr. John Kirton who heads up the unofficial G7/G8 secretariat at the University of Toronto. He is one of the leading experts on the G7/G8 system along with Sir Nicholas who now participates very actively in their activities and reporting at the G8 meetings. I have interviewed John ever since 1996 with the exception of 2000 when I did not cover the G8.

Veon: Based on your capacity and observations, what kind of structural changes are we seeing and have seen in the G8?

Kirton: A major one I think, is a move to engage civil society reaching downwards and other non- G8 countries and international organizations reaching outwards in a full set of things which the summit process does, not only in having greater inputs into the policy making process leading into the decisions later made, but in also the actual delivery of some of the innovative new actions that are being taken (emphasis added). We began to see this process last year in Okinawa. There and in the lead-up to the summit, a much broader range of civil society groups were brought together by the Japanese to gather ideas for what the summit should focus on.

Veon: When did civil society get involved in the G8?

Kirton: Civil society engagement really goes back to the early 1980s in the Summit. In a sense, from the beginning of time you have the long established organized groups. The federation of employers or the federations of labor unions or the federation of agricultural producers come together before the summit and have a meeting, send a letter with demands to their governments who would consult with them. In 1984, it was the beginning of the creation of the other economic summits and a broader range of voices which came together and put on [parallel] conferences in the margins of the summit.
Birmingham marked an important step forward because a large number of the major development-oriented NGO’s produced a broad coalition of stakeholders, the church groups, the community groups, from average individuals around a central campaign and cause: debt relief for the poorest countries in the world (emphasis added). They pioneered some innovative techniques, moving toward the security perimeters necessary for every summit, joining arms, linking with one another and surrounding the summit peacefully. And it worked. (JV Note: I have been a recipient of these new innovative techniques in Seattle and in Washington, D.C. When not used peacefully they can be very disruptive!)

Veon: In light of the violence now, the fact that civil society is being heard, their demands are getting broader and broader as they push the envelope, what does this really say about the structure of the G8 and the structure of the global governance system?

Kirton: It correctly recognizes that in our intensely interconnected world, many of the problems are also connected. That’s why you can’t rely on separate, segmented ministerial forums, around [which] the UN family is constructed to address these problems (emphasis added).

Veon: At the Millennium Summit, the UN was given great empowerments. (I showed him a chart I was working on, see next page) What do we have? Is there some overlap? Is this two tier? How should it look?
Kirton: I think the best way to look at it is to say that globalization has brought an increasing need for global governance in which countries come together to see how the world global community can be managed (emphasis added). There are two international institutional systems to provide that global governance. One is the UN family which was designed in 1945, a time well before our current problems existed or where known. Then there is the G7/G8 created in 1975. It’s a more modern instrument, but it’s a far more flexible interest because it is not imprisoned by a particular charter and by a massive bureaucracy of international civil servants who have grown rich doing things the old ways.
In some cases, the UN has a lot to contribute and the G7 quite properly tries to give direction to the UN system, even to reform the UN system to say, ‘get on with the job’ (emphasis added). And the G7 in its own work depends importantly on the broader support and legitimization that the UN can provide. In many areas when the UN was designed with this array of functional agencies in 1945, [today’s] problems weren’t known. There is no adequate machinery to solve the problems.

Veon: What does that make the UN? They will be adding a People’s Parliament, they have a rapid deployment force coming onboard, the position of Secretary General and the Security Council has been strengthened.

Kirton: Almost never does the UN meet at the level of leaders. Basically it’s delivered by international civil servants, by tax-free diplomats. It is also the prisoner of its own bureaucracy. Again, richly rewarded people who don’t pay taxes in its many big buildings littered around the world (emphasis added). Also because it is universal, has all the countries of the world essentially within it, it is dominated by dictators. So basic democratic principles we believe in human rights, we think genocide is wrong they don’t flourish because in institutions basically dominated by dictators you can’t get consensus on that or implement them (emphasis added). Of course at the heart of the system is the Security Council. So it is not a club that’s going to produce movement on the kind of shared values that a world which has massively embraced democracy since the end of the Cold War is very comfortable in relying on to move us ahead.

Veon: Is this what we see? Is this the two tier system?

Kirton: I think that’s right in the sense that the G8 is the effective center of global governance defacto, the cabinet (emphasis added). It’s where the real decisions are taking place, where the real political impetus comes from.

Veon: What does this make Kofi Annan?

Kirton: He would be the Secretary to the cabinet in parliamentary tradition. Perhaps at best, the chief of staff in the White House would be the equivalent (emphasis added).

Veon: Give me a parallel to parliamentary government with what we are seeing here.

Kirton: In parliamentary systems such as Canada’s or Britain’s, even though you have a deputy minister, who is the Chief Civil Servant in each individual department, you also have a Chief Civil Servant for the government as a whole. Secretary to the Cabinet is the term. The Chief Civil Servant amongst all the civil servants; someone responsible for making sure that the decisions taken by the democratically elected leaders are actually executed by the hired help. It’s the Chief Civil Servant that has to make sure that responsibilities get shared, that one department can’t blame inaction on another, that they actually work together to get the job done (emphasis added). Kofi Annan is in a good position to do some of that job as the head Civil Servant of the UN system, which has an impressive array of specialized agencies [ranging] from food to agriculture to nuclear energy to civil aviation. But Kofi Annan has uncertain authority over many of the elements of the UN system at large.

In 1998, I interview Dr. Kirton and asked him about the new format which Tony Blair had set in place. His reply was,
“The G8 is emerging as the center of global governance in the new era. What we are seeing are so many subjects that were dealt with domestically like crime, employment, now at the center internationally with the G8 being the club that looks at them in a way that the UN can’t or won’t. Not only looking at them, but making decision that will count in the lives of individual citizens that will make it easier for all our peoples to get better jobs and to go to bed feeling more safe at night knowing that 7 or 8 powerful governments are actively cooperating to stem the flow of drugs into the US, to make sure that it is harder to get illegally smuggled firearms, the make sure for law abiding Americans that action is being taken to prevent the illegal smuggling of people from Asia and elsewhere into the U.S. We are at a world wherein most of the members of the President Clinton’s cabinet are actively engaged in the work of the G7right across the agenda infectious disease, climate change, nuclear safety and trade (emphasis added). You see the G7 acting in ways that will determine the lives of average Americans over the next year and beyond.” Note: It was in Birmingham that Tony Blair announced that all of the G7-G8 countries had so many similar domestic problems that they needed to work together!

Summary of the Interviews

1. We are seeing “joined up government” in the inter-relationship between the G8 and the United Nations. The present parliamentary structure really started to come into being when Tony Blair changed the meeting times of the foreign and finance ministers so that they would meet separate from the Summit heads. Note how this small change becomes terribly significant! Kirton said, “the G7 properly tries to give direction to the UN system, even to reform it and to say, ‘get the job done’.”

2. The rise of a border-less world has moved us into “globalization” which has, in the words of Dr. Kirton, “Brought an increasing need for global governance in which countries come together to see how the world global community can be managed. [T]he G8 is the effective center of global governance defacto.”

3. Civil society has become very visible at the G7/G8 meetings when they staged their first non-violent protest in 1998 in Birmingham. According to Kirton, “A move to engage civil society reaching downwards and the other non-G8 countries and international organizations, reaching outwards in a full set of things which the summit process does, not only in having greater inputs into the policy making process leading into the decisions later made.”

4. Kofi Annan’s position is that he is a “Chief Civil Servant amongst all the civil servants.” According to Kirton, “Someone who is responsible for making sure that the decisions taken by the democratically elected leaders are actually executed.” In more real terms, he is a quarter-back, ensuring that all the plays get played. This function became very clear when Kofi Annan scolded the presidents and prime ministers for only being able to contribute $1.8B to a new global AIDS Trust Fund when the UN needs $10B a year. This action constitutes the very first. The Secretary-General is not a regular attendee at G8 meetings and furthermore, he was only there for one night and did not give any press conference.

PROTESTORS

A new phenomenon occurred in November 1999 at the Seattle World Trade Organization meeting. Violent protests were allowed to break out. I was on the ground in Seattle for about seven hours that day. I personally watched the protestors devolve into violence. Throughout the day I kept asking the police, who were positioned throughout the city area, when they were going to do something and they told me they had no orders. Basically my Constitutional rights were transferred to the protestors as I had no rights and no police protection as the police even refused to escort me into the Media Building. Several days later I asked someone who appeared to know high level matters where the order to restrain the police came from. He told me the Mayor’s Office.

So what did they protest? Globalization, endangered whales, worker rights in Mexico and debt relief. Since then, the protestors or the “professionally paid protestors” have traveled from one international conference to the next. They have protested at the IMF/World Bank meeting in the spring, 2000, the World Economic Forum in Davos in January 2000, the Summit of the Americas in April 2001, and in other countries. Now Genoa.

You heard all about the protestors but their demands went unreported. They demanded a global tax in order to pay for the AIDS Trust, the HIPC (Highly Indebted Poor Countries) debt relief, as well as a multitude of other welfare programs in the United Nations Millennium Summit document. These include: cutting the number of people living in poverty, who are hungry and who lack access to safe drinking water; achieving universal primary education for all; a reduction of 75% in maternal mortality; to halt and reverse the spread of AIDS and to provide special assistance to AIDS orphans and to improve the lives of 100 million slum dwellers.

To provide you with the kind of money this will require, the cost to reduce by half the people living in extreme poverty is estimated at $10 billion a year, the cost of universal primary education is $9 billion a year and the cost to upgrade the lives of slum dwellers is $500 per person or $50 billion. These are tall orders. Obviously in order to substantiate a global tax, you need problems and expenses just as big!

Personally, I find it quite interesting that the poor in Africa have been kept poor as a result of a continuous stream of brutal dictators like Idi Amin and others. I think of the aid raised for Ethiopia by popular singers and rock stars which rotted at the port because the government refused to transport it to those starving. Then there are all of the wars which are being fought in South Africa over gold, diamonds, water and dams. Africa is extremely rich in minerals, yet they are starving. The United Nations has needed to perpetuate poverty so that they could effect a major TRANSFER OF WEALTH program. Think about it, the countries which endorse socialism, Marxism and Communism have TRANSFER OF WEALTH at the center. America is the only country in the world in which TRANSFER OF WEALTH was not part of our political philosophy. Who has the most to lose? AMERICA.

GLOBAL TAX

I have been following a global tax since 1994 when I discovered while researching the United Nations that it was the “unofficial” agenda for the Social Summit which was held six months after the population reduction conference in Egypt. The UN chose to use that meeting to introduce on an unofficial basis the whole idea of a global tax to the Summit’s reporters.

Six months before the Summit, the United Nations Development Programme’s 1994 Human Development Report called for a “New World Social Charter where the world would redistribute wealth as it cannot survive 1/4 rich and 3/4’s poor and where the UN must become the principal custodian of global human security and help with basic education, healthcare, immunization and family planning” and a global tax to find sources of money for the UN so that it can fulfill its mandates, among other things.

In Copenhagen, I asked Dr. Inge Kaul, who wrote the 1994 Human Development Report, why the countries of the world should provide the UN with a global tax which would give them an income of $150B more than their 1993 budget. This absolutely cunning woman stuttered through seven minutes of reply which included, “I would hope that it would come to the UN, the money has somehow slipped away from us. I think it would be only logical that the money comes back to the UN.”

The Tobin Tax

Dr. James Tobin of Princeton suggested back in the 1970’s, a tax on international currency transactions as a way to protect the dollar from unwanted advances and changes in value as a result of Nixon severing gold from the dollar. In 1994, it was absolutely brilliant of Dr. Kaul to adopt the idea of the Tobin Tax for an international global tax as a way to fund UN projects. In 1994 she recommended a minuscule tax of .005 of 1% on the $1.5T dollars which moved around the world on a daily basis looking for the highest return. This would have provided the UN with $150B a year. Today more than $1.9T moves around the world and the protestors are demanding a full 1% (I sure this gives room to maneuver down to maybe « of 1%!).

Although the Tobin Tax made it to the G7 Finance Ministers Report, after all these years, they basically said they were against it. In the meantime, Canada, France, Belgium and Italy declared their support for it. The fact that it is in the G7 Report automatically gives it great attention. Lastly, in this regard, the UN is hosting a “Financing for Development” Conference in 2002 in which a number of global taxes are part of the agenda shows that a global tax is the final piece necessary for world government.

Financing for Development

In December 2000, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan appointed Dr. Ernesto Zedillo, former president of Mexico to head a panel that will advise him on ways to fulfill the financing needs of the world’s developing countries. Those serving on the panel include former U.S. Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin. In June 28 of this year, the Panel released their recommendations. A conference is scheduled for March 18-22, 2002 in Monterrey Mexico.

In order to meet the needs outlined above which are from the Millennium Declaration, their initial recommendations include:

1. A Global Council to be established at the highest political level to provide leadership on issues of global governance.
2. With regard to issues of labor and environmental standards, they should be consolidated into a single entity, the Global Environmental Organization which should have the equivalent standing of the World Trade Organization or the IMF and World Bank.
3. New sources of finance should be considered: a tax on currency (the Tobin Tax) which still needs “rigorous technical study and feasibility.” A carbon tax is a tax on the consumption of fossil fuels.
4. The establishment of an International Tax Organization (the panel will study the benefits).

Please note that while the Tobin would not be directly felt by you and I. The carbon tax would most certainly increase our cost of living dramatically!

BUSH

I met President Bush in Genoa by being in a place where I was not supposed to be. I ended up in the building where the Bush-Putin press briefing was being held only to be escorted out of the building since I did not have a White House press pass. I decided to wait since the President’s limousine was parked outside of the building. When Bush came out I was able to call out to him. I said, “Mr. President is the world at peace?” He came over to me and said, “My fellow American.” I said, “Yes sir! Is the world at peace?” He did not answer and started to move away. I said, “Mr. President you didn’t answer my question.” He said, “I did too.” (He did not know I was not White House press.) I asked again and he replied, “We are at peace.” I then said to him for he was now in the same position as when I first called out to him, “Is this the New World Order your father spoke about?” No answer.

THE AGE OF AQUARIUS

I think most of us remember a very popular song which was popular in the 1980’s, called “The Age of Aquarius.” Interestingly, there is more truth in the timing of songs and movies than we probably will ever know. I have been personally interested, since covering UN and UN-related meetings with regard to whether or not there is a full moon. I remember looking out my hotel window during the activities of the UN 50th Anniversary in San Francisco in June 1995 and seeing a full moon. Throughout the years, I have been fascinated by the number of full moons while covering these global meetings. In the occult, the New Moon/Full Moon are satanic feast days. In the 26 years, 19 of the past G7/G8 meetings have been new (6) or full (13) moon. In speaking with two different experts in the occult and witchcraft, I find that “there is more than meets the eye.” Let’s take a look at UN timing.

The “Age of Aquarius” began with the dawn of the third millennium on 12/31/99. What is significant about the Age of Aquarius is that it is 1000 years long and it marks the BEGINNING of the third 1000 year period on the earth. The move from one 1000 year period to another comprises a major stellar shift. The world is coming out of the Age of Pisces. The Age of Aquarius comes into full force on March 21, 2002, at its apex. The inner circle of the zodiac deal with 12 signs which are 30 days long.

If you will recall there was great hype about “Y2K”. Y2K or the Internet was the wiring of the world for world government. Nine months later the UN Millennium Summit was held. This meeting is extremely significant. The presidents, prime ministers, kings and princes of this world voted to expand and empower the United Nations by adding a rapid deployment force and a “People’s Parliament.” You could say, “The baby was birthed.” In July 2001, the UN Conference on the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons” was held. During the time of the conference Friday the 13th occurred. In July 2001, the G8 Summit was held in which Bush declared the world is as peace. I am told by experts that the time between July 2001 to November 2001 constitutes an “occult power bridge” which is a cross-over point. It symbolizes the time for fast movement. In November 2001, the World Food Summit will take place during the time of the first full moon of that month. More significantly, March 21 2002, is the MIDPOINT of the AGE OF AQUARIUS as the zodiac now moves to the sign of Aries. Interestingly enough, the Financing for Development Conference will be held March 18-22, during the midpoint of the Age of Aquarius. Is this baloney or is it the real thing? Is it a coincidence or was it planned? Does it have meaning or is it bunk?

(Note: “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore, take on the full armor of God that you may be able to withstand in the evil day.” Eph. 6:12, 13)

SUMMARY

In summary, let me end with my question to Tony Blair. My question was, “We are meeting in historic Genoa, Christopher Columbus and the new world. Are we indeed in a New World?”

Blair: Are we seeing a new world? I think there is this sense that out of the G8 Summit this year that the real threat that faces countries such as our own, the real threat is the threat of instability, chaos, disorder, fundamentalism, terrorism and if you like, the man made challenges like climate change. The interesting thing is of course that even though there will be divergent opinions around the table, some countries will want to go further on some issues and others may disagree on other issues the general sense is that there is a community of interest in providing stability and order both in terms of the economy and in terms of world security within which those differences can be resolved.

Bottom Line

We are in a global parliamentary form of government. We now have the presidents and prime ministers acting as one within a frame of reference which allows “consensus” which allows divergent opinions but the same agenda. What you and I will see as we go forward is the completion of this global parliamentary structure–the addition of the last key components which include: one or two forms of global taxation, an International Taxation Authority, an International Environmental Authority and a Global Commission on Global Governance.

I don’t believe that where these meetings are held is a mistake. Genoa, in my opinion, was chosen because it was the birthplace of Christopher Columbus, and because the Genoese banks ended up taking government over. When you consider the Bush-Putin press briefing in which Bush declared, “We’re basically saying the Cold War is forever over and the vestiges of the Cold War that locked us both into a hostile situation is over. We are exploring the opportunity to redefine that strategic framework for keeping [not] the peace that existed in the past, but a strategic framework as we go out in the 21st Century” (emphasis added). Couple this with the global tax demands of the protestors which is the last piece of world government and my answer to my own question to Bush is that, “Yes, we are in the NEW WORLD ORDER WHICH APPEARS TO BE THE AGE OF AQUARIUS.”

What this report is all about is the control of you and I and the resources of the earth. It is inconceivable in the minds of most people that this could happen, however, I have be an eye-witness over the last seven years to its power and structure. We have not felt its power but as the final pieces come into being, life will change dramatically.

I am reminded that the Christian church was birthed during world government. The early Christians understood Roman rule. They worked around it but did not participate. In the future, great discernment will be needed in order to live.
If anything, this newsletter is a forewarning