Lux Lucet

So far, so good.  But EFN doesn’t stop there.  It continues by asserting that the flight of Joseph and his family are “models and protectors of every migrant, alien and refugee of whatever kind”[6] who is “compelled by fear of persecution or by want” to leave his native land.  There are two principal problems here.  First, there’s the unchristian notion that dead saints, in this case Joseph and Mary, can serve as protectors of the living.  Second, Rome adds to the definition of refugee by including the category of those in want.  The definitions of “refugee” quoted above said nothing about those in want.  Neither the UN Convention nor US law recognizes economic refugees, but Rome does.  Joseph and his family were fleeing persecution, they were not fleeing want.  As a result, there is no basis in the passage about the flight from Egypt for Rome to argue that the family’s flight serves as an “archetype” and “model…of every migrant, alien, and refugee of whatever kind.”    

But this is not the extent of the problems with EFN.  In EFN, Pius XII continues Rome’s longstanding attacks on both private property and the nation-state, two Biblical ideas recovered as a result of the Protestant Reformation in the 16^th century. 

Deeply concerning to everyone who loves political and economic liberty is Pius XII’s reliance on Rerum Novarum, Pope Leo XIII’s 1891 encyclical, as the basis for his immigration argument in EFN.  Rerum Novarum is described in Ecclesiastical Megalomania as “One of the Roman Church-State’s most influential statements on economic matters.”[7] What makes Rerum Novarum so dangerous, and Rome’s immigration theory that is built on it, is, as Robbins noted, the encyclical’s aggressive Marxism.  Noted Robbins, “The encyclical’s Marxism is so blatant that one Roman Catholic writer declared that ‘much of the encyclical…appeared only to repeat in more orthodox language what Marx had said ten years before.” 

Writes Pius XII

Then,—according to the teaching of “Rerum Novarum,” —the right of the family to a living space is recognized. When this happens, migration attains its natural scope as experience often shows. We mean, the more favorable distribution of men on the earth’s surface suitable to colonies of agricultural workers; that surface which God created and prepared for the use of all.[8]

When Rome speaks about “the right of the family to a living space,” what they mean is that Western nations, including America, have an obligation to supply that living space.  This is the basis for Rome’s many statements about the supposed obligation of the United States and other nations to take in economic migrants. And that obligation is not merely to take them in, but to supply them with the wherewithal to furnish that living space.    

Pope Pius XII continues,

If the two parties, those who agree to leave their native land and those who agree to admit the newcomers, remain anxious to eliminate as far as possible all obstacles to the birth and growth of real confidence between the country of emigration and that of immigration, all those affected by such transference of people and places will profit by the transaction.[9]

And yet the people of the United States have not agreed to admit the millions of illegal aliens surging across our southwest border.[10]  The current administration, abandoning its obligation to uphold American law, including American immigration law, has instead decided on a stand-down policy of non-enforcement while at the same time encouraging foreigners to violate American immigration law with promises of free housing, free medical care, and other benefits all paid for by American citizens by government force, either through direct taxation or inflation.[11]   

The pope further asserts,

The families will receive a plot of ground which will be native for them in the true sense of the word; the thickly inhabited countries will be relieved and their people will acquire new friends in foreign countries; and the States which receive the emigrants will acquire industrious citizens. In this receive the migrants will acquire industrious citizens. In this way, the nations which give and those which receive will both contribute to the increased welfare of man and the progress of human culture.[12]

Yet far from being the economic boon Rome claims, the masses of illegal aliens flooding America are a crushing tax burden on the American people. According to one source, “Annually, the 11 to 22 million aliens living in the U.S. cost American taxpayers $163 billion.  That amount does not include any of the social and economic costs – such as higher housing prices, depleted wages, lost jobs, increased crime, and strained public resources at hospitals and schools.”[13] This is hardly an example of “contribut[ing] to the increased welfare of man and the progress of human culture” as the pope claims.  Rather, it represents the destruction of Protestant, western civilization by the papal Antichrist.

In EFN, Pius XII quotes an earlier letter written by him to the American bishops dated December 24, 1948.  In this letter, Pius attacks not only private property.  He wrote,

The natural law itself, no less than devotion to humanity, urges that ways of migration be opened to these people. For the Creator of the universe made all good things primarily for the good of all. Since land everywhere offers the possibility of supporting a large number of people, the sovereignty of the State, although it must be respected, cannot be exaggerated to the point that access to this land is, for inadequate or unjustified reasons, denied to needy and decent people from other nations, provided of course, that the public wealth, considered very carefully, does not forbid this.[14]

Note that Pius draws special attention to the fact that “natural law” is the basis for what he calls “migration.”  In Ecclesiastical Megalomania, John Robbins noted that in Thomistic, that is to say, Roman Catholic economic thought, “Private property is neither part of natural law, nor an absolute right, but an invention of human reason…Rather than private property being part of the natural law, the possession of all things in common is the natural law.”[15]  This natural law communism of the Roman Church-State is expressed by Pius in his words, “For the Creator of the universe made all good things primarily for the good of all.”  Thomas called this original communism “the community of goods.” 

Neither Thomas nor Pius XII would argue that natural law forbids the private ownership of goods.  But they would argue that private property, not being part of natural law, but rather an invention of human reason, is rightfully subject to human regulation. 

According to Thomas, the moral imperative for the “community of goods” is need.  As Thomas put it,

The division and appropriation of things which are based on human law do not preclude the fact that man’s needs have to be remedied by means of these very things.  Hence, whatever certain people have in superabundance is due, by natural law, to the purpose of succoring the poor.[16]

How does this idea relate to the millions of illegal aliens pouring across America’s border?  Though he doesn’t say so directly, Pius XII believed that because individual illegal aliens have need, they have the right to take of the superabundance of the American people, and it is not a sin for them to do this.

In Roman Catholic social teaching, the notion that need is the only moral basis for ownership is called the universal destination of all goods. 

Writes Robbins,

The Thomistic notion of original communism – the denial that private property is part of the natural law, but that common property is both natural and divine – is foundational to all the Roman Catholic arguments for various forms of collectivism [including the sort of immigration socialism we seen enacted on America’s southwestern border on a daily basis], from medieval feudalism and guild socialism to twentieth century fascism and liberation theology.  The popes refer to this original communism as the ‘universal destination of all goods.”[17]    

As then Bishop, now Cardinal, Robert McElroy of San Diego put it in a 2017 speech,

This stance of the church’s teaching flows from teaching of the Book of Genesis, that creation is the gift of God to all of humanity. Thus in the most fundamental way, there is a universal destination for all of the material goods that exist in this world. Wealth is a common heritage, not at its core a right of lineage or of acquisition.[18]

Once you begin to see the communist concept of the universal destination of all goods in Rome’s arguments for mass, taxpayer-subsidized immigration schemes, as the saying goes, you cannot unsee it.  We shall revisit the universal destination of all goods when we look at Strangers No Longer: Together on the Journey of Hope.

Not satisfied with merely attacking private property, Pius XII continued by assault on liberty by going after the institution designed to protect private property, the nation-state, and by implication tied the Vatican’s immigration policy to world government.  As I noted in last year’s Reformation Day talk, Rome has always despised the idea of sovereign nation-states that are not subject to her control and constantly pushes for world government.[19]  As Pius XII put it,

Since land everywhere offers the possibility of supporting a large number of people, the sovereignty of the State, although it must be respected, cannot be exaggerated to the point that access to this land is, for inadequate or unjustified reasons, denied to needy and decent people from other nations, provided of course, that the public wealth, considered very carefully, does not forbid this.[20]

As is his father the Devil, the papal Antichrist is fond of speaking out of both sides of his mouth.  In this case, he conceals his hatred for the nation-state by pretending to defend it, by claiming that there are limits to how far illegal aliens can go with their invading and devouring nations.  They may do so, writes the pope, only as long as “the public wealth” (note, Pius does not say private wealth), is “considered very carefully.”  I hope that makes you feel better about having your land devoured in your presence.  We will be destroyed, but not past the point where Antichrist, after careful consideration, deems our “public wealth” to be at risk.  How merciful of him! But don’t relax too much.  One must “respect” “the sovereignty of the State,” but must not do so in an “exaggerated” manner.  But who decides whether respect for “the sovereignty of the State” is “exaggerated” or not?  Obviously, it must be a power superior to all nation-states, and that implies a world government.  And given the papacy’s extraordinary pretensions to power – according to the Church-State, the pope of Rome is the “father of kings, governor of the world, and vicar of Christ” – it is the pope himself who will head that world government and decide whether America, or any other nation, has an “exaggerated” view of its “sovereignty.” 

Put a bit differently, Rome will decide how many illegal aliens will invade America and how much wealth they will be allowed to steal from the American people.  In Rome’s eyes, the only people who have no say in the matter are ordinary American citizens and their duly elected representatives.           

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[1] John W. Robbins, Ecclesiastical Megalomania: The Economic and Political Thought of the Roman Catholic Church (The Trinity Foundation, 1999), 119.

[2] Because of his close ties to the Third Reich during WWII, author John Cornwell dubbed Pius XII “Hitler’s Pope” in his 1999 book of that title. 

[3]Exsul Familia Nazarethana, https://www.papalencyclicals.net/pius12/p12exsul.htm, accessed 10/8/2023.

[4] EFN, 1.

[5] Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, page 16,https://www.unhcr.org/us/media/convention-and-protocol-relating-status-refugees, accessed 10/8/2023.

[6] Note the plural “models and protectors.”  Rome’s superstitious and unbiblical assertion that dead saints can protect the living is on display here.  

[7] Ecclesiastical Megalomania, 43.

[8] EFN, 99.

[9] EFN, 100.

[10] According to the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), as of June 2023, there are an estimated 16.8 million illegal aliens residing in the United States, representing a 16 percent increase in the first 2 years of Joe Biden’s presidency.  “FAIR Research Report, June 2023”  https://www.fairus.org/issue/illegal-immigration/how-many-illegal-aliens-are-united-states-2023-update, accessed 10/8/2023.

[11] One could cite any number of outrageous examples of governments forcing Americans to subsidize illegal aliens.  To pick just one, consider this story, “Massachusetts Taxpayers to Subsidize College Tuition for Illegal Aliens” by John Binder, Breitbart, August 14, 2023. According to this article, the Massachusetts Governor has signed a state budget that “includes an initiative that opens in-state college tuition rates to illegal aliens who attended high school or got their GED in Massachusetts.”  https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2023/08/14/massachusetts-taxpayers-subsidize-college-tuition-illegal-aliens/, accessed 10/8/2023.    

[12] EFN, 100.

[13] “Open Borders Boondoggle: Biden’s DHS Sends Millions in Taxpayer Money to NGOs Facilitating Illegal Immigration,” by John Binder, Breitbart, September 28, 2023, https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2023/09/28/open-borders-boondoggle-bidens-dhs-sends-millions-in-taxpayer-money-to-ngos-facilitating-illegal-immigration/, accessed 10/8/2023.  Worth noting, this same article reports massive payments to NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations such as Catholic Charities, and Annunciation House, a Jesuit organization based in El Paso, TX.  These two organizations are openly working to subvert the United States of America by facilitating the flood of illegal aliens into the country.    

[14] EFN, 102.

[15] Ecclesiastical Megalomania, 31.

[16] Summa Theologiae, ii-ii, 7^th article.

[17] Ecclesiastical Megalomania, 38.

[18] “In powerful speech, San Diego bishop challenges organizers to disrupt, rebuild,” by Brian Roewe, National Catholic Reporter, February 19, 2017, https://www.ncronline.org/powerful-speech-san-diego-bishop-challenges-organizers-disrupt-rebuild, accessed 10/8/2023.  Robert McElroy was promoted to Cardinal by Pope Francis in 2022, “Cardinal Robert McElroy: Newest (and youngest) American ‘red hat’ a kindred spirit of Pope Francis,” by Kevin Jones and Carl Bunderson, Catholic New Agency, August 26, 2022, https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/252129/cardinal-robert-mcelroy-closely-aligned-with-pope-francis, accessed 10/8/2023.

[19] Rome is the premier globalist organization, and it is only the extraordinary spiritual blindness of our time that prevents people from seeing this.  To give just one recent example, Pope Francis openly called for a New World Order in a 2021 interview.  See “Pope Francis Calls for ‘New World Order’ After the Pandemic,” by Thomas D. Williams, Ph.D. Breitbart, March 15, 2021,  https://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2021/03/15/pope-francis-calls-for-new-world-order-after-the-pandemic/, accessed 10/8/2023.

[20] EFN, 102.

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