Chapter 19
The Religious Right
It is not
alone in the United States that the Papacy exerts its power. In another
predominantly Protestant nation, Australia, the political power of the
Roman Catholic Church is immense. The Sydney Morning Herald, July
31, 1999, one of Australia’s most prestigious newspapers, in a feature
article entitled "The Mandate of Heaven," reported that,
In secular Australia the [Roman Catholic] church
remains the best connected, best funded, most-respected lobby in the
nation. . . .
Under [Prime Minister John] Howard, Andrew Robb,
the Federal Director of the Liberal Party—and a Catholic—had set out
to "remove the barriers we [the government] erected for ourselves in
1993." Robb established links with both the committees and the bishops
through the coalition of Catholic MPs [Members of Parliament].
The power of Roman Catholicism in Australia is
evidenced by the fact that—
Both [the] Labor [Party] and the [Liberal
Party-National Party] Coalition take for granted these days that they
can’t win government if the Catholic vote is solidly against them. . .
. And the [Roman Catholic] church has never abandoned its claim to
appeal directly to the Catholic vote. (Ibid.)
The article noted that—
Catholics are now secure inside the strongholds of
power—not just the Labor Party but of the Coalition, too. The Jesuits
educated four of [Prime Minister John] Howard’s Cabinet. Tim Fischer
[leader of the National Party, the junior party in the coalition] was
another Jesuit boy. This strength of representation around a
conservative cabinet table would have been unimaginable even 20 years
ago.
By way of explanation, the Liberal Party in
Australia, John Howard’s party, defying its name, is, in policy, a
conservative party.
It is the Protestants in most nations who are giving
rise to this Roman Catholic dominance. In the United States the churches
of the Reformation and even the Baptist Churches are conceding truth for
accord with Rome. The International Herald-Tribune (a paper
produced for overseas readers by the New York Times and the
Washington Post) of June 27, 1998, reported that—
In a decision intended to resolve an issue that
split the western Christian world nearly 500 years ago, the Vatican
has said that it will sign a declaration with most of the world’s
Lutherans affirming that Roman Catholics and Lutherans share a basic
understanding of how human beings receive God’s forgiveness and
salvation.
Since Rome had not altered its unscriptural
positions, it is obvious that the concessions had come from the World
Lutheran Federation. As we, ourselves, possess a strong Lutheran
heritage from our paternal ancestors, we are astounded at this Lutheran
compromise.
It was not only the Lutherans who sought agreement
with Rome. Four years earlier The Columbus [Ohio] Dispatch, June
17, 1994, commenced an article concerning the thirteen years of Roman
Catholic-Southern Baptist dialogue with the sentence,
Southern Baptists and Roman Catholics can be more
than political soul mates, the nation’s largest Protestant
denomination declared yesterday! The Southern Baptist Convention
overwhelmingly voted to support the dialogue between the two
denominations.
But a wider issue was at stake, as the newspaper
article explained. By 1994, the Religious Right, a loose union of
evangelical Protestants and conservative Roman Catholics, had been
launched providing a perilous mix which they felt presented a united
front which could benefit the achievement of a strong political
opposition to social degradation such as abortion and pornography.
Protestants had forgotten the old adage that Satan always provides good
reasons to do wrong.
What brought the discussion into the forefront this
year was a widely publicized appeal for closer relations signed by
conservative Catholic leaders and prominent evangelicals, including
Pat Robertson, Charles Colson and the heads of both the Home Mission
Board and the Christian Life Commission of the Southern Baptist
Convention.
"As evangelicals and Catholics, we dare not by
needless and loveless conflict between ourselves give aid and comfort
to the enemies of Christ," said the declaration.
It urged the groups to increase efforts against
abortion and pornography and no longer hold each other at theological
arm’s lengths.
The section that caused the greatest furor among
some Baptists was an appeal to stop proselytizing each other’s flocks,
saying such efforts were neither theologically legitimate nor a
prudent use of resources. (Ibid.)
While the Baptist-Catholic accord did not include a
consensus that each would cease proselytizing amongst adherents of the
other’s faith, the Religious Right was adopting the faulted concept that
the various denominations should only seek converts amongst the
unchurched. Such a view well served Rome’s designs. By its conversations
with Roman Catholicism, the Southern Baptists were gulled into a state
of unwariness which has continued to erode their former understanding of
the peril to souls entrapped in the Roman Catholic Church. This is well
confirmed by The Columbus Dispatch (op. cit.) report.
Southern Baptists have historically been reluctant
to enter the ecumenical movement long embraced by mainline Protestants
for fear of compromising their faith.
But Baptist leaders said yesterday that the
experience of working with Catholics on certain issues, such as
abortion, helped bring the denomination to the point of seeking closer
relations in other areas.
"We have found ourselves in the same foxhole," said
Tommy Lea, chairman of the convention’s Resolutions Committee.
In First Things, May, 1994, the Religious
Right in the United States in a paper significantly entitled,
"Evangelicals and Catholics Together: The Christian Missions in the
Third Millennium," commenced,
We are Evangelical Protestants and Roman Catholics
who have been led through prayer, study, and discussion to common
convictions about Christian faith and mission.
They speak of—
Evangelicals and Catholics to be Christians
together in a way that helps prepare the world for the coming of him
to whom belongs the kingdom, the power and the glory, forever, Amen.
This eight page statement was prepared by fifteen
Roman Catholic and Evangelical participants. Two participants were
Jesuit priests, Juan Diaz-Villar, of Catholic Hispanic Ministries, and
Avery Dulles. Dulles is the son of President Eisenhower’s Secretary of
State, John Foster Dulles, and was created a Cardinal by John Paul II in
January, 2001. He was a Professor of Theology at Fordham University.
Cardinal Dulles’ elevation to that ecclesiastical rank is very strong
evidence of the Papacy’s approval of this coalition with the
Evangelicals. Many notable American Roman Catholics, including the late
archbishop of New York, Cardinal John O’Connor, endorsed the paper. One
would have thought the Evangelicals, surely well aware of the care with
which the Papacy makes endorsements, would set aside some time to
reflect upon the reasons that the Papacy saw a benefit to its agenda in
this coalition. To the student of prophecy, the answer is evident.
Many believe that Rome is now a proponent of
religious liberty, for John Paul II called for religious liberty in
India. But let it never be forgotten that Rome always has advocated
religious liberty where their members are in the minority, as they most
assuredly are in India, or where they are persecuted. She talks and acts
very differently when she is dominant.
Writing in the Sydney Morning Herald, Oct. 26,
2000, Padraic P. McGuinness, spoke plainly about the denial of religious
liberty by the Pope. As his Irish name suggests, McGuinness was raised a
Roman Catholic but later accepted atheism. In part McGuinness wrote,
once again warning us of the absence of religious liberty in
Catholicism:
The great problem facing those who have never
belonged to the Catholic Church or have severed their connections with
it, is its continuing claim to interfere in their lives. Liberty of
conscience is that which the church still finds it difficult to come
to terms with. That is fair enough for those who consider themselves
Catholics, but it is totally unacceptable when this church (or indeed,
any other) claims the right to govern the consciences of those who do
not accept membership in it.
This week, a biographer of Pope John Paul II,
George Weigel, delivered an important lecture on behalf of the Centre
of Independent Studies on "The Moral Foundations of Freedom."
Unfortunately he fell into the classic Catholic confusion of asserting
that the only true freedom is the freedom to believe what the
church believes to be morally right. And he made the truly astonishing
claim that his church is "the world’s premier institutional
defender of human rights."
But those of us who are not members of the Catholic
Church should beware of the dangers implicit in the line promoted by
the Pope (whose social teachings are a kind of soft fascism) and by
Weigel—with a bit of wordplay they try to deny the reality of
individual human liberty and freedom of choice. They can only do this
by pretending that any choice that does not fit their morality is not
a truly free choice. This is the first step on the road to theocratic
government.
The ecumenical movement is blinding Protestants to
the dangers of Roman Catholic practice and doctrine. Protestantism today
with few exceptions has total amnesia of the history of the medieval
Papacy. One example of this blindness is seen in the words of Paul
Crouch, who has totally abrogated his Protestant heritage. On his
televised program, "Praise the Lord," on October 17, 1989 he said,
I have come to the conviction that Martin Luther
made a mistake. He should never have left the Roman Catholic Church. I
am eradicating the word Protestant out of my vocabulary. I am not
protesting anything. It is time for Catholics and non-Catholics to
come together as one in the Spirit and one in the Lord.
|
