IT would take a whole book to collect, analyse and interpret the mass of documentation on this subject; I am inundated by it. And were it a thousand pages long, your Frossard and his like will always solve the problem, at least till the moment of your death or of your fall, by denying the facts themselves and finding their support in the numerous resources of general disinformation. They will contest the links of cause and effect that I will have established between your utopianism and the ruin of the world.

I would have liked to explain – just as St. Pius X explained of pre-war Sillonism – how and why you “ convey socialism with your eye fixed on a chimera ”, your humanist chimera, which leads straight to further Auschwitzes and Katyns, to one huge planetary concentration camp guarded by “ demons straight from hell ”, as Pius IX described the agitators of the Paris Commune in 1871.

I must, however, limit myself to the essential outline of the demonstration.

I. THE POPE OF HUMAN RIGHTS, THE POPE OF THE DISSIDENTS

Your action is rooted in your anthropocentric and solipsist philosophy. But you overlook the first two words of the Christian prayer: Pater Noster. God is first. He is anterior and superior to us; He is The Father. We are a plurality and we are brothers of one another; together, we are the adopted sons of our Father. For you, Man is a concrete-abstract, universal and absolute. “ It is not the faith that I primarily defend, but Man, ” you said at Cracow (Homily, May 1978, cf. CRC, December 1978). Disturbing.

In the beginning, there is Man. And you enter as Pope into the arena of world politics, not in the name of God, of Christ, or of the Church, nor, of course, in the name of the sovereign Vatican State, but in the name of Man, with your many elevated titles giving you an unparalleled moral authority. “ All political activity, whether national or international, proceeds ‘ from man ’, is exercised ‘ by man ’, and is ‘ on behalf of man ’. The raison d’être of all politics is the service of man. ” Such was the obsessive theme of the speech you addressed to UNO on October 2, 1979 (Documentation Catholique, October 21, cf. CRC, December 1979).

Faith in Man, the religion of man who makes himself God, and the cult of man all find expression in the service, the propaganda, and the struggle on behalf of Human Rights. And on every horizon over the last two centuries there has arisen a whole host of those defending the oppressed, among whose number you now rank yourself. All the exploited, all those whose human rights are not recognised, honoured or respected are entitled to your solicitude, as well as the solicitude of all those powers who, like you and with you, so generously work for the liberation of the oppressed. They work against those enslaving oppressors who are reigning still, still ! in various parts of the world, much more numerous than might be imagined.

In Argentina, for example, there has been much for the defenders of Human Rights to do over the last ten years since the methodical and relentless war against the Montenero Communists ended in victory. But you regularly echo the efforts of these Monteneros by speaking in favour of those who have “ disappeared ” and of their wives. It is a well-staged and exemplary propaganda struggle on behalf of Man. To the whole world, you proclaim your feelings:

“ We pray that the Lord may comfort those who have lost all hope of finding their loved ones. We fully share their pain and we will not lose hope that these distressing problems will be cleared up, for the good not only of the families concerned, but also for the peace and prosperity of those communities so dear to us. We ask that information be quickly made available, as promised, concerning the situation of those in prison and that, in all circumstances where one seeks to maintain respect for the law, there should be a rigorous commitment to respect the person both physically and morally, even if that person is guilty or is accused of having violated the law. ” (Angelus, October 28, 1979; DC, November 18)

Whether guilty or innocent, but especially if guilty, it is Man who is threatened and to whose aid and defence you come. What comfort you give to all the world’s criminals and terrorists ! What a valuable collaborator and encouragement you are for all those agitators and revolutionaries who, with pen or kalatchnikov in hand, work for Man’s freedom ! Ernesto Cardenale, for example, whom, to Malinski’s furious annoyance, you failed to meet ! And Sam Nujoma, the head of SWAPO, the terrible Soviet guerrilla movement waging a war of liberation against South Africa for the freedom of Namibia – but him you did meet, as I said earlier. And there was Yasser Arafat, the dedicated defender of the Palestinian people driven from their homeland by international decree and dispersed these last forty years. Him also you received, sending a shock throughout the world ! And there are many others...

You are the prestigious defender of Man, your brother. And in pursuit of this your vocation, you bear witness to man in all those international organisations recognised by you as effective, sovereign, and legitimate world authorities. They take precedence over States, perhaps even over Churches, human religions at any rate. These organisations are UNO, UNESCO, ILO, the member states of the Helsinki Agreement, etc. Well might you say: Everything, which is international, is ours.

“ It is to be noted that the Holy See – in keeping with its identity, and at different levels – has always striven to be a faithful collaborator of the United Nations in every initiative destined to promote this difficult but noble aim. The Holy See has always appreciated, praised and supported the efforts of the United Nations towards an ever more effective guarantee of a full and just protection for the fundamental rights and freedoms of the human person. ” (Message to the United Nations for the 30th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights; DC, January 7, 1979)

Thus, all the world’s great international organisms and all the world’s highest spiritual and moral authorities are today mobilised in defence of man... Against whom ? Against the dictators of the Right, against non-democratic, anti-parliamentarian and necessarily anticommunist regimes, which, for that reason, you call unchristian, even if their Constitutions openly and officially declare them to be Catholic, alas !

In her struggle for Human Rights the Church condemns “ National Security regimes ”, regimes, moreover, that are corrupt, plutocratic and intolerable, as portrayed for world opinion by the KGB disinformation services. The Shah of Iran, the anticommunist dictator Somoza in Nicaragua, General Romero in Salvador, President Marcos in the Philippines and, of course, General Pinochet, that animal who holds on to power in Chile despite the Archbishop of Santiago, Cardinal Silva Henriquez, whom you keep there for the hour of revenge. Many of the dictators whom you have denounced have already fallen. But patience ! The rest will also fall. All those who defy your spiritual power ! All those who defy Man !

Here is how you ban them from the nations of the world: “ There is no true freedom where internal security is erected as the only and supreme norm for relations between authority and citizens, as though this were the only and principal means of maintaining peace. In this context, one cannot ignore the problem of systematic or selective repression – accompanied by assassination, torture, disappearance and exile – to which many persons have fallen victim, including bishops, priests, religious, and Christian lay people committed to the service of their neighbour. ” That was your message for World Peace Day, January 1, 1983. (DC, January 4) Service of one’s neighbour, it has to be understood, is the revolution.

To President Marcos, who is the target for all the world’s defenders of Man, very important and powerful groups, as well as dangerous terrorist maffias, because not only is he anti-Communist but, as you may well know, he is also anti-capitalist – to President Marcos you addressed these severe and implacable principles of your new political moral code.

“ Even in exceptional circumstances, there can be no justification for the violation of the fundamental dignity of the human person or of the fundamental rights that safeguard this dignity. Every apparent conflict between the needs of security and the citizen’s fundamental rights must be resolved in accordance with the fundamental principle – always advocated by the Church – that the organisation only exists for the service of man and for the protection of his dignity, and that it cannot claim to be serving the common good when human rights are not safeguarded. ” (DC no.1804 p.258, March 15, 1981, Message of February 17 to the President and to the nation of the Philippines)

Look out, Marcos ! Look out, Imelda ! It is the suitcase or the coffin for you ! And there is no absolution. Let us be serious. Your principles render all government impossible. You only remind the anti-democratic states of these principles. Why not openly preach them to the plutocratic, secular, and masonic states as well ? Why not preach them to the Peoples’ Democracies ? Why not even remind your own power of these principles, for it has withheld from me the justice that is my due, just as did your Predecessor. And I need not mention the many others “ purged ” from your Conciliar Church. Might it not be that this struggle for human rights is the screen for another war ?

What should strike you, if you are sincere in this struggle, is the common element in all these poor, exploited, and oppressed wretches, to whose defence you so generously come. All these suppressed peoples are supported by an entire network of spiritual organisations working for the defence of the human person. They are all in agreement, and their names are suddenly known the entire world over. And another very curious thing ! They are all subsidised, commanded, and armed by Moscow’s KGB. So your helpers defending the poor “ peasants ” of Salvador and the Turkish Armenians are the six hundred thousand officers of the GRU and of the KGB ! Congratulations ! It looks as though the poor penniless little Vatican has become Moscow’s ideological offshoot !

What are we to conclude therefore ? That Moscow and Rome together form one great power for the defence of human rights wherever they are violated ? Nobody other than you and your Frossard would believe it. So, might Rome, through sheer idealism, dangerous daydreams and fantasies, have become the KGB’s best relay station and the Soviet Empire’s keenest fellow traveller ? I leave the answer to you.

First reflection. The Church of the centuries, no less an expert in humanity than was Paul VI and as you yourself claim to be, always obeyed the words of her Lord and Master and preferred, amidst all the injustices of this poor world, to call the unfortunate to submission and resignation, and whilst she neglected not to sermonise the rich and powerful, she never debated their power nor, under the pretext of defending Man or of bringing in an era of Justice, did she ever contest any authority, be it de iure or de facto, which assured the common good. And she always condemned anarchy formally.

Yes, always did she uphold authority and denounce dissidents ! It is not something that raises a great stir, but it does safeguard peace and order in the here-and-now, and it preserves the possibility of progress in the future. You, on the other hand, make a great deal of noise, you the “ Pope of the dissidents ”. Are you sure that you are not also doing enormous harm ?

Further reflection. Although your interventions in politics are “ always by way of witnessing to Christ and the Gospel ” – the Gospel of Human Rights and of Liberty, that is – I am nevertheless surprised that your preferential concern is to undermine those states that are the most favourable to you, regimes that are closest to the Catholic conception. On the other hand, you spare the Protestant, Orthodox, Muslim, Jewish, Masonic and Communist powers. I dread to think that this might be an illustration of the old French proverb: Oignez vilain, il vous poindra; poignez vilain, il vous oindra. (Soft-soap a villain, and he will sting you; but sting a villain, and he will soft-soap you.)

Yet another reflection. Why do you only defend causes that are assured of success, and never desperate causes ? Such as that of Rudolf Hess, “ the oldest prisoner in the world ”, on whose behalf an association of eminent jurists asked you to intervene, without success and without even a response on your part. There are two possible solutions. Either you are a demagogue concerned for your prestige and unwilling to risk it in matters where public opinion is indifferent... And then the whole thing is a sham ! Or else there are good and the bad victims, good and bad prisoners… In which case, the defence of human rights is one big deception designed to serve one camp against the other. And you, the Vicar of Jesus Christ, have sided with the powerful to crush the humble, the weak and the persecuted. That is what it is. I pity you.

II. THE POPE OF THE EAST, COMMUNISM’S WILLING DUPE

Firstly, you invent an impracticable, impossible moral policy, whereby the State has to tolerate anarchy ! For example, at the OAU on October 6, 1979, you said: “ If certain ideologies and certain interpretations of the legitimate concern for national security were to result in man with his rights and dignity being subjected to the yoke of the State, they would thereby cease to be human (!) and it would be impossible, without great deceitfulness, to regard them as having a Christian reference. ” (CRC December 1973)

Every State, therefore, that claims the obedience of “ the human person ” – Mr. Everyman with his rights, his dignity, his brief case and bank account, his democratic convictions and his fight against torture – will henceforth be convicted of violating human rights and will cease to be regarded as human, let alone Christian. In your eyes and in those of the Church such a State will be regarded as bestial and due for the rough justice of the “ pistoleros ”.

Your most effective supporter against the dictators is world communism, which, like you and even more than you, wants their downfall and is working for it with the aid of your most zealous sons and daughters, the Jesuits and the Maryknoll Sisters, and which is working to install the pluralist and personalist parliamentary democracy of your dreams. Just look at these fine Sandinistas of Nicaragua, who have even made four of your priests part of their government ! Having reached the moment of truth when the Revolution shows its true face – when it is taken over by brigands and sets about eliminating the liberals, killing, robbing, plundering, enlisting, and transforming itself into a pure marxist-leninist dictatorship modelled on Havana, Tripoli or Moscow – the Bishop of Managua, Ovando y Bravo, has woken up and has turned coat. At least he is honest. And you ?

You prefer to act blind and deaf so as not to see or hear the blood and the cries of the victims of your companions in the struggle for human rights. If it is not stupidity, what is it ? Who might know ? The person closest to you is convinced that communism “ is with the tide of history ”. That is how she talks, and so we must accommodate ourselves to it. But if that is how she thinks, it is because she has heard it from you, she having no thoughts of her own.

But you have been advancing in this communist collaboration for thirty years, without constraint or compulsion, but quite sure of going in the same radical direction as they are and, what is more, of using your superior strength to make them evolve in the right direction to which, consciously or unconsciously, they aspire. Thus, you engage in dialogue with them about human rights and over the Helsinki Agreement, etc., listening to all their speeches but ignoring all their deeds. Your hope is that the Communist Empire should display that same concern for human rights and dignity and be mobilised on behalf of the dissidents. But you prefer to ignore the Lubiankas, the “ road accidents ”, and the falls from Moscow hotel windows onto the pavement beneath the blind eyes of the passers-by. You charitably forget Ali Agca’s revolver shots. And so you live a perpetual and reinforced lie of omission in everything that relates to the difference of nature between the West which you are destroying, and the East which you are powerless to shake.

Concerning your respect towards the world communist powers – not to say servility and therefore co-operation, be it deliberate, coerced, or spontaneous, it matters little ! – Westerners are totally misled by your attitude over the Polish drama, which is something very particular, where world communism leaves you a generously wide margin for manoeuvre and propaganda. Because of this, you are thought to be anticommunist. But you are Polish and, as such, you are predisposed to outrage at any suggestion of Russian occupation and passionately against any invasion from Moscow. Especially since, like all Slav or Jewish socialists, you are more germanophile than panslavist; you opted for the “ Jagellon option ”: no Russians here ! Reconquest of the Western territories ! But as for communism in Poland and in the world at large, that is another question altogether !

When Walesa paid you a visit in Rome on January 15, 1981, at the time of the “ entente cordiale ” between Solidarnosc and the Polish Communist State, you said to him, and every Westerner thought it very astute, but it was not:

“ I rejoice... All have stressed the particular maturity shown by Polish society and by the workers in particular… In the context of the events of today’s world – events whose method of operation so often consists in violence and force, exploiting the terror that exists in numerous countries and not even sparing the lives of the innocent – this manner of action devoid of violence and force (emphasised in the text), which seeks solutions through the intermediary of mutual dialogue and which is motivated by a fundamental concern for the common good, is precisely that which honours the workers… no less than the representatives of the State authorities.

“ I welcomed with joy the news of the approbation of the free trade union, Solidarity. It shows that there is not – because there ought not to be – any contradiction between such an autonomous social initiative taken by working men and the structure of the system (sic) that appeals to work as a fundamental value (sic) of the life of society and of the State. ” (DC February 15; cf. CRC, April 1981, Polish Pope against American General)

You want the world to change, but, above all, not in the direction of any kind of fascism. That, for you, is beyond the bounds of horror and absolutely excluded. For the world to which you belong, it is the “ intrinsically evil ”. Nor do you want it to change in the direction of liberal capitalism, convinced as you have always been – though Poland, the Vatican, and yourself have profit considerably from it – that it is decadent and doomed because, as this person says, “ it is not with the tide of history ”. So what remains ? Let us see:

“ I have heard the cry go up from these lands ! ” you said at San José airport in Costa Rica, after having just kissed its soil (a ritual that seems unbecoming to me, from a pope who seems to reserve all his kisses for the earth and women). And you called the brave little nation of Costa Rica – which had never asked anything of you and who politely applauded you – to Revolution ! You called on them to make a radical change in their ideas, programmes and structures. (DC, April 17, 1983, p.385-386)

“ Yes ! these nations are capable of progressively reaching the objective of a much greater dignity for their sons ” – here indeed is the chimera denounced by St. Pius. – “ They will have to move towards it with an ever greater determination and in collaboration with various sectors of the population… ” – a mad appeal to all those fishing in troubled waters, the agitators, the resistance movement, and of course the guebists. Just as with all resistance movements ! Just as with Solidarnosc infiltrated by the KOR – “ without resorting to violent methods or collectivist systems… ” – Go, my daughter, to the ball and sin not, said the woman. Go, my daughter, to the fire and burn not, replied the Curé d’Ars as he threw a straw into the fireplace ! And you, my children, go and make omelettes without breaking eggs. Go with the devil, without falling into the Gulag ! – “ ...collectivist systems, which can prove to be no less oppressive for human dignity than a purely economist capitalism. ” – There are as many homicidal lies here as there are words. Can ? No, there is no doubt about it. Prove to be ? But it has been a known, scientifically established and verified fact since 1917. No less oppressive ? A thousand times more so; incomparably more so. For human dignity ? Yes, and for human life and for eternal salvation. Than a purely economist capitalism ? There has never been a capitalist society that is purely this or that. And the proof ? The fact that you are tolerated in it ! The task of converting people does not interest you; it is too laborious, too painful and too modest. The task of subverting people, however, – in a white robe with a gold cross and red cape against the backdrop of a blue sky – that is everything one could desire ! –

“ It is the path of man; it is the humanism proclaimed by the Church… ” – by the Church of Satan ! – “ … in her social teaching ” – a further deception, or else we shall have to throw overboard with you Leo XIII, Pius XI, and of course Paul VI – “ ... a humanism which will be able to overcome the lamentable situations that cry out for necessary reforms. ”

– But where has such a utopia ever been allowed to overcome, etc. ? In the Chile of Frei and Allende ? In Nicaragua ? Where ? Nowhere, except in the future, of course ! Tell us about the economic situation in Gierek’s Poland, which you so warmly congratulated on your first visit there ! I would far rather live in Costa Rica, the little Switzerland of Central America, than in any of the communist regimes of your bloodstained utopias !

Yes, you are dreaming of another form of communism. You explained it to us in your encyclical Laborem exercens of September 14, 1981 (DC, October 4). It was a milestone, which I did not comment on at the time in writing, but which I shall certainly comment on now to prove what I have to say to you.

The encyclical analyses everything through a marxist grid. It is, therefore, hostile to the reality of the facts, which it refuses to admit but which it cannot suppress. It is clearly hostile to theological truth and even to philosophical truth (no.8). It is at enmity with our corporative tradition and ignorant of our doctrines and the modern realisations of these doctrines achieved by social legitimist Catholics (no.11).

You permit an hegelian-marxist encounter between liberal materialist Capitalism and collectivist Marxism which is equally materialist (no.11). Equally ! You reject capitalism as the reign of objects, things, capital, and money. In that, you are already marxist (no.12). But you make the labour philosophy a religion for the worker and, therefore, for the subject, Man ! And so, you opt for a form of communism evolving not towards liberalism but towards personalism (no.14), and finally opening towards the spiritual world in a way that capitalism could never do (no.21).

You – or the author of the first encyclical, a Pole impregnated for nearly forty years with leninist marxism, who knows nothing except through this distorting lens – are entirely unaware, or pretend to be so, of: (1) The necessary conditions for the natural prosperity of nations, which capitalism understands, although it only partially respects them. (2) The primary political conditions for order and freedom, which consist of the independence of the Sovereign from any kind of bribery or violence, whether it originates from the bourgeoisie or from the popular masses, and his sacred legitimacy. Your thinking moves in the closed world of democratic disorder. (3) The conditions for that “ supplement of the soul ”, for that universal fraternity, etc., which you desire, which you dream about, but which demand – as their unique and proportionate cause – the truth of the religion preached by the true Church, and the State’s recognition of latter, allowing her perfect freedom in exercising her Christian mission.

Your illusion with regard to marxism is disconcerting. It accepts communism as being better than capitalism, and capitalism as being better in every way than any kind of dictatorship, be it the absolute monarchy of a king or the military dictatorship of a Catholic subject in all things to the law of the Church (the true one !).

Your inclination goes from the latter type of government to the former, and from thence to the worst. Your friend is right: it is the tide of history, the moral code of the dead dog floating with the tide. And there are two stages in this decline: the fall of Christendom, followed by the Gulag. (CRC, December 1977, Gulag or Christendom)

III. THE PERVERSE EFFECTS, WHITE, RED AND BLACK,
OF A PONTIFICATE TURNING INTO TRAGEDY

In the France of September 1939, we were going through what was known as the “ phoney war ”; there were theatrical performances for the troops, football on the parade ground, and festivities in the fortifications on the Maginot Line. In the meanwhile, Poland was undergoing its agony. And in the following Spring, we went through our agony: defeat, exodus and invasion. Thus it is that our frivolous democracies go from comedy to tragedy. Similarly, your pontificate, after a phoney council, is like that of Paul VI, “ a phoney pontificate ” for a Church whose warning lights are all now flashing. Every day another parish dies. Every month another monastery closes. Morale among the faithful is at a low ebb. Priests age with sadness knowing that, since no-one will replace them after they have died, it is no longer the time to sow, plant or lay foundations. It is all very sad. Public morale is not very optimistic either, neither in the East for sure, nor in the West, nor in the Third World. Capitalism has ceased to exert its charm, and Socialism has cruelly deceived those who fell for it. The world is growing dark.

The political men, the ministers, the deputies, the members of the Nomenklatura of every country, are more light-hearted. As for the heads of state, they are brimming with self-satisfaction, and are pleased with the world as it is. All, that is, except the sinister Andropov. That is a sign… And also those national security dictators who are troubled by the many threats weighing on their peoples. The bishops too all seem to be very happy, their laughing faces tell of their satisfaction. Now that there are fewer priests, dwindling congregations and no money in the Church’s coffers, there are even more bishops. And the Pope is even happier, happy with himself, with the Church, happy with everyone and even with the way the World is going.

All would be going splendidly, if only the courageous application of the Council, the new missionary pastoral approach, the liturgical renewal and, above all, the opening to the world, the service of man, all that is so “ positive ” and so “ promising ”, were not being thwarted by certain “ perverse effects ”, as the new economists call them, effects which are beyond our powers of control and exact detection. It is generally thought that things should have forged ahead even faster, to shake off these unfortunate accompaniments. But you impose your own style on all, which is one of a progress that is energetic and bold, but not over-hasty.

That way of seeing things is simply to cloak a reality one would rather not admit to oneself or to others, so tragic is it becoming day by day. These effects are not perverse, but expected. They are the consequence, Most Holy Father, of your “ secular anthropocentrism ”, of your philosophy of Man, and of the methodical practice that flows from it – the deterioration of religion, of the Church and of our still civilised and Christian society, already so singularly maltreated by the previous reformers and revolutionaries. For convenience I shall classify these effects as white, red and black.

EROS

I call this first pest white, remembering that it has always accompanied the political success of the White Party in Poland, that party of aristocratic and bourgeois liberals, freemasons for the most part, infatuated with Germanic and Jewish ideas, whose rise has always led to a sudden growth in the cult of the god Eros and a subsequent collapse of morality.

The call to happiness and success in life, to the self-realisation and self-development of everyone in perfect freedom, is always paid for by a celebration of sensuality – and today the party is explosive ! The time-honoured consequences of this are a falling birth rate, abortion, divorce, sexual aberration, licence on the beaches and in the theatre, co-education, declining religious practice, the falling away of priests, and religious abandoning their vocations. Following on from this, we have the feverish claim for ever higher salaries, social agitation, the abandonment of the countryside and the rush towards the city, increasing criminality, drug addiction, laziness among workers, inertia among the elite, and the rejection of all our traditions. It is Sodom and Gomorrah on the eve of their destruction. It is Babylon at the moment of its fall.

“ Liberty ”, you said at Philadelphia on October 3, 1979, “ is the supreme principle of all political and social order, in relations between governments and people, and in relations between persons themselves. ” (CRC, December 1973)

One would have thought that the supreme principle of life in society was something like obedience to God and the fraternal charity that ensues ! But liberty ! If only somewhere else you were to teach us the supreme principle of life with God, or the moral life. But no ! Nothing exists outside social life, and that is governed by liberty ! So what does Christ have to add ? Joy !

At Turin, you recounted on your return from a journey, you had had the following experience which you hastened to communicate urbi et orbi during the Angelus on April 21, 1980, as the “ fruits of this paschal pilgrimage and of this visit. ”

“ It is a new experience of faith in Christ, who constantly gives man the joy of being man. Yes, Christ gives man this joy. And that is the greatest of all gifts. It is the foundation of all that men can desire and of all that they can realise through any of their programmes or ideologies. ”

– Most Holy Father, it is the Spirit of blasphemy and infatuation which makes you speak thus ! Am I myself misled ? Every time I happen to re-read you – and here I am simply copying these words from the French edition of the Osservatore Romano for April 22 – I say to myself: But it is not possible ! It is not possible ! Did the whole world hear or read those words ? And could everyone accept them without so much as a murmur or a look of surprise ? –

“ Yes, this is at the basis of everything. Man must be reconciled with his own humanity. He cannot be deprived of this, whatever path he may take. He cannot be deprived of the acceptance of his own humanity. Man cannot be deprived of the simple and fundamental joy of being human. Christ gave man this peace. He gives him this joy. This, strictly speaking, is the Paschal Joy... ”

Here we have mankind burdened with two principles: one, belonging to the politico-social sphere, is liberty, and the other, belonging to the Christian faith, is the joy of being human. With principles like those, the Curé d’Ars would have said in his forthright language, the human race will end up worshipping the beasts !

Especially since you have not ceased, from the time of your arrival, knowingly and subtly to titillate the flesh “ in its masculinity and femininity ”, in its complementarity, its reciprocal attraction and its union one with the other. It is the Spirit of impurity that instructs you and pushes you to utter these daring words, like a dart which pierces hearts there to release its venom, whilst your discourse will continue with its idle appeals to dignity, grandeur and self-exaltation.

“ Young people of France ”, you wrote in the Message you addressed to them after that mad evening at the Parc des Princes, “ bodily union has always been the strongest language with which two beings can speak to each other. ” (Note, Centurion, p.182)

It is impious, it is antichrist, it is antimarian, and antireligious. Does the Holy Being of the Three Divine Persons experience bodily union ? Did the Blessed Virgin Mary have any experience of that which you talk about so precisely ? Did St. Joseph regret not experiencing it ? And all the saints ? Ah, how odious you are, how hateful in your corruptive teaching ! And how do you expect these young people, whom you have filled with enthusiasm for your Person, and whose imaginations you have excited with the pleasures of the flesh, to find any restraint for their carnal passions in your eulogies of human dignity and self mastery, which lead to the proud contemplation of their own beauty and grandeur ?

But you continue in this line, debauching the whole world, made giddy with your caresses, and you with its applause. Every time I denounce your “ erotic obsession ” (CRC, February 1982), I earn for myself, not you, the indignation of all…

POLEMOS

Red. The colour of the Polish Reds, brothers of the carbonari. You incite all to the Revolution: children, the little people, proletarians, half-castes, primitives, students and women. Gradually you incite everyone who could have more and who could be more. And at your call, they all vibrate, agitate and prepare to rise for a struggle, they know not which. But it is THE Revolution, whose prophet and legendary athlete you are. You are more the athlete of this insurrection than you are “ the athlete of God ”. Listen to yourself dreaming as you talk, and recognise the torrents of blood and tears that are being marked out by your tourist itinerary across the five continents of the world !

“ Full of hope, I pray that the entire Philippine people and their leaders cease not to respect a commitment to a development that is fully human and triumphant over situations and structures of inequality (ah !), of injustice and of poverty (oh !), in the name of the sacred character of humanity. I pray that all may work together generously and courageously, without hatred, class warfare or fratricidal strife, in resisting all the temptations of materialist or violent ideologies. The moral resources of the Philippines are strong enough to resist the external pressures being applied to make this nation adopt models that are alien to its culture and sensibility.

“ Recent praiseworthy initiatives (here the reference is to the lifting of the state of siege, at the Pope’s request) augur well for the future, for they testify to the people’s capacity to assume their legitimate share of responsibility in constructing a society aspiring to peace, justice and the protection of all human rights. ” (DC, March 15, p.258)

Wherever you go, you are like Lammenais lost in his dreams of liberty, equality and fraternity, and blind to the earth beneath him and to the crowds who hear him. In Africa, corrupt, decadent, disorganised and still suffering from the shock of the brutal and fatal decolonisation project programmed in New York and in Moscow, you sing of the joys of being free, stirring up racial wars that never end...

“ A few days ago, before setting out on this pastoral visitation, I expressed my joy at being able to visit the peoples of Africa in their own countries, in their own sovereign states, where they are ‘ the true proprietors of their own land and the helmsmen of their own destiny ’. In Africa, most nations in the past have experienced colonial administration. Without denying the various achievements of that administration, the world rejoices in the fact that that era has reached its end. The peoples of Africa, with a few painful exceptions, are in the process of assuming full political responsibility for their own destiny – and here I particularly salute the recent independence of Zimbabwe. ” (DC, June 1, 1980)

You were addressing the “ diplomatic corps ” of all those new African States, and you, the Pope, insulted the white colonisers. Since I have vowed to declare my mind fully, I must say, You sicken me ! You Insulter of all our sailors and missionaries, of all our soldiers and colonisers, doctors and planters, without whom there would have been no future for Africa. You spit on the graves of our forbears, of all our tortured, violated, impaled and eaten brothers, who met their end because emissaries from Moscow, New York… and from Rome had come to stir up the negroes against their benefactors. I must stop before I become ill tempered and sarcastic. As I wrote to Paul VI who stretched out his arms to the Red Guards of the Chinese Cultural Revolution: Henceforth there is a river of blood separating us, the blood of our martyrs shed by those dogs, by those demons at your call !

As you pass on, rebellions multiply in your wake. And with each rebellion, destiny wavers uncertainly between the brutal massacre and repression of the rebels by some minor king or pagan dictator, ex-Christian or Muslim, and the taking over of the country by the Soviets through their Cuban or, still more dangerous, East German mercenaries. But as the world Soviet Empire expands, so the area for your journeys shrinks. Soon there will be only Rome where you can preach revolt against the foreigner from the North !

THANATOS

Black is for death. The keystone of your optimism and of your humanism is pacifism. Just as the keystone of your “ faith ” is the negation of hell. No peril of damnation in the next world, and no peril of war in this. For us, it is prosperity, ease and joy ! I hope that your pacifism, your neutralism, and your leftist intellectual anti-militarism are no more than an immense frivolity on your part. Anything more would be crime – the crime of high treason.

You call for disarmament. Like your predecessor, Paul VI, you prefer the Coué method, so dear to him. By dint of bleating peace, the lions will turn into sheep:

“ But to take up the challenge imposed on all mankind by the hard quest for peace, more than words are needed [...]. The true spirit of peace needs to penetrate. At the minimum, there must be an agreement to stand by a few elementary but firm principles such as the following. Human affairs must be treated humanely and not with violence. Tensions and conflicts must be regulated by means of reasonable negotiation and not by force. Ideological opposition must be faced in a climate of dialogue and free discussion [...]. Imprescriptible human rights must be safeguarded in all circumstances. Killing is not to be permitted as a way of imposing a solution. ”

That is a “ highly remarked on ” passage from your Message to any international assembly devoted to disarmament. (Message of June 7, 1982; DC, no.1833, p.663)

On another occasion, you adopt a very solemn language, but for all its papal solemnity, the speech is none the less absurd. One would let pass this flood of idle literature, proceeding from another “ Peace Pilgrim ”, as Aristide Briand was once called, if it were not for the fact that these disarmament speeches are preparing for yet another Dantesque cataclysm, engulfing all mankind ! Here, therefore, is a passage from a certain speech of yours. I have called it absurd, because I am speaking here from a political and military standpoint. But if I am to speak as a priest, I ought also to call it impious and atheistic.

“ By virtue of my universal mission, I wish to make myself once more the spokesman of men’s right to justice and peace, and of the will of God that all men be saved. And I renew the appeal I made in Hiroshima on February 25 last: let us solemnly commit ourselves, here and now, never again to allow, still less to seek, war as a means of resolving conflicts. Let us promise the brothers of our humanity to work untiringly for disarmament and for the banning of all atomic weapons. Let us replace domination and hatred with mutual trust and solidarity. ” (Printed, without an eyebrow being raised, by the pious publication Homme Nouveau, November 15, 1981)

You abominate all integrism, all fanaticism, chauvinism, racism, nationalism and militarism. You weaken all that is on the side of God’s side, on the side of good, and on the side of civilisation, which, after all, is the true side of “ man ”. In the meantime, the forces of Evil are arming, in contempt of Your Holiness.

What is going to happen ? The fall of the world, which you will have ruined. It will be said that you had no hand in the matter, just as was said about of Leo XIII in the 1914 War and of Piux XI in the 1939 War. One can say what one likes, but you will well and truly have been the cause. I can hear in my mind’s ear the cries of all the French as they tramped the way of the Exodus in June 1940: We have been betrayed ! Down with the traitors ! Death to the traitors ! In Carter’s day, all the world’s disasters could be imputed to this peanut merchant, with whom you so greatly sympathised on the occasion of your visit to the White House. But now that Reagan is confronting Andropov, you are certainly not for Reagan. Would you be a supporter of the nice Mr. Andropov of the KGB ?

IT LOOKS TO ME LIKE A MADMAN’S DREAM

It is not I who say it, but your friend and confidant, André Frossard, in an interview he gave to Le Point. I quote the last question and its answer. And I shall close this file after having hung a notice on the walls of the Vatican. What is it ? Read on:

“ One last question concerning the Pope. A very different one, if you will excuse me. Why did he receive Arafat ? ”

– For him, the Church is on the side of the poor. And it is ever such. He is sensitive to the profound poverty suffered by the man without a homeland. And I believe there is more to it. He feels that in the Arab mentality there is both generosity and a touch of savagery, and that in the Jewish mentality there is both heartbreak and harshness. From the beginning of time, savagery has been face to face with harshness. He would like generosity to confront heartbreak.

“ To me it seems like the dream of a madman. But would he be Pope if he did not demand the impossible ? You see, I am not all that far from May 68: ‘ Be realists; demand the impossible ! ’ (Le Point, October 25, 1982) ”

Must there be a mad pope for a mad world, therefore ? That is one opinion. I maintain my freedom to think that a mad world needs a wise and prudent pope, a good Catholic pope.