THANK YOU for your kind comments about my intellectual honesty. I certainly try.
I won't trouble you or myself ATT with a paragraph by paragraph reply.
I will note . . . I have read, as you know, the encyclical before this one in its entirety. I think your points are consistent with that one, too.
I do plan to read this entire encyclical when I can manage it and comment paragraph by paragraph.
Yes, there are many lofty sentences and paragraphs far in abundance above the troubling ones--as far as I can tell from what's been said and you have written.
However, they do not, for me, mollify the troubling ones for the following reasons:
1. The NWO folks say most of those lofty things as well--as justification for their tyranny--of course while pretending they have nothing to do with tyranny. It's a bit like the Soviets claiming all their tyranny was necessary on the road to the idyllic utopia of "pure Communism."
In fact, even in your paragraphs about the lofty points, some of the wording was very disturbingly almost identical to the wording in some of the NWO documents . . . some such docs decades old. In fact, I can't, at the moment, think of one of your paragraphs about the lofty content that I have NOT read in essential form in some NWO document that I've read the last 45 years or so.
2. YES, the NWO folks also talk out of both sides of their fingers. I'm sorry to have to use that phrase with you but that's how I read both sorts of documents. It's a bit like a velvet covered brick or a rabbit fur glove over an iron fist. They even have their version of subsidiarity wherein they claim that local Nations, government entities will have the freedom to do as they wish as long as they don't trouble the common good etc. etc. etc.
However, with their control of individuals down to implanted ID/locator chips . . . and police empowered & charged to be prosecutors, judge, jury and executioners on the spot . . . I'm still not impressed with such a notion of subsidiarity.
3. Some of the Pope's lofty phrases seem identical to me with the ones of the NWO folks rationalizing and justifying reducing the population to 200 million; insuring a global currency; managing international trade very wholesale and integratedly; dividing the world into 10 governmental regions (interestingly--consistent with Biblical prophecy about the global government);
Sure, evidently, many of the Pope's lofty statements would be in contradiction to many of the ruthless tyrannical goals and schemes--and certainly methods--of the NWO. BUT THE SAME IS TRUE OF THEIR OWN DOCS.
4. It boils down to . . . essentially . . . smoke screens and white-wash . . . distracting from the ruthless tyranny with visions of more utopian wonders--always "in love" and "in truth" and "for the children" and for "the survival of humanity" and for the "survival of the planet."
5. EVEN IN THE HIGHLY UNLIKELY EVENT that the NWO folks would come out with a document tomorrow applauding this one of the Pope and agreeing carte blanche with every sentence the Pope signed-on to . . . a somewhat plausible event . . . it would be a cruel farce. It wouldn't be that much of a stretch because their own documents have said so many of the identically same things.
6. YET, ANYONE TRUSTING SUCH A DOCUMENT would be akin to those trusting Chamberlain about Hitler and Hitler's early statements about Hitler's own plans and goals. It would be lofty words with the gestapo waiting in the wings for a wholesale different kind of enforcement awaiting close at hand.
7. SO, I'M SORRY. I remain keenly and highly sobered and aghast at the encyclical. To me, still, all the talk about the lofty sentences and paragraphs is akin to talk about how beautiful the fabric is on the deck chairs of the Titanic.
You really don’t know what you are writing about. Markomalley’s generous exposition is quite accurate—subsidiarity is for real and the encyclical is not a brief for your NWO. Sorry, it’s just not. We face a greater threat to our freedoms from the bureaucratic tyranny of our own US government. And that tyranny will oppress Catholics who, bolstered by love of Life as taught in this encyclical, will refuse to knuckle under. You might think about the coming day when you might appreciate Catholic brothers-in-arms (figuratively—I do not advocate armed resistance).
To the degree that a Culture of Death comes to dominate the world, as it will, I think you’ll find that the most courageous opponent of it will be the bishop of Rome.
Take care that you, in you twisted fear of the Bishop of Rome, don’t wake up some day allied with the actually existing NWO against its leading opponent. The NWO will take forms that you probably won’t even recognize because you are blinded by your own fervid search for it.
Mark O’Malley’s find is very interesting and reveals a lot about the machinations of Vatican politics. I wish you had addressed your comments to that and not diverted this thread with another bout of “the Pope is the Anti-Christ pawn of the New World Order.”
The problem is that there are many warring forces in the Vatican, some of which probably are pawns of the New World Order who would be perfectly happy to announce that Obama is their new Pope. Heck, Kathleen Kennedy is already raving that he’s “more Catholic” than the Pope, why not?
On the whole, the encyclical has some positive points; much of the rest of it is just the bureaucratic vaporing of the Peace and Justice committee that wrote it. In fact, in the original Italian, even this paragraph 67 was the usual vague nonsense. It’s only the English version, so far, that seems to have this disturbing phrase in it.
Thank you for sharing your insights and concerns, dear brother in Christ!
The very sad thing, IMO, is that politics is read into everything that comes from the Vatican when this is more anti-political than not.
However, they do not, for me, mollify the troubling ones …
Once you've had a chance to read the whole document, then we can talk about it. The trouble is that you may stress upon the couple of "troubling statements" out of their overall context (just as we saw with your review of Populorum Progressio -- not that your concerns were completely resolved, but a lot of them, in fact, were after dealing with the actual document).
Having said that, let me repeat one thing I said back on 1 July, before the release of the document, Please withhold judgment until you have a chance to read the document for yourselves (after all, how often does the MSM get anything right about the Church?)