Pope Francis’
affinity for global governance was evident during his recent trip to the United
States, with his remarks on his arrival at the
White House echoing
his embrace of the global-warming agenda in his first encyclical, “Laudato Si,”
and his historic speech to the United Nations
endorsing the U.N.’s new Agenda 2030.
Behind the pope’s
proclamations is a powerful Vatican adviser who is highly regarded among global
governance advocates, Peter
Sutherland, pictured above, a non-executive chairman of Wall Street investment
banking powerhouse Goldman Sachs who served as chairman of oil giant BP through
2009.
Sutherland’s globalist credentials are
exceptional.
Born in Ireland, where he also served as
attorney general, he was appointed to the European Commission in 1985 and
headed the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, which has evolved today into
the World Trade Organization.
Later, he was appointed to the steering
committee of the Bilderberg
Group and served as the honorary chairman of the Trilateral Commission.
In addition to his global governance
credentials, Sutherland is
one of an estimated 100 elite Papal Knights within the Roman Catholic lay
religious society Knights of Malta and a member of Opus Dei.
In his 1999 book, “Their Kingdom
Come,” Canadian financial journalist Robert Hutchinson characterized Opus Dei
as a secret society of
international bankers, financiers and businessman whose goal critics have characterized
as using the influence of the Catholic Church and its largely tax-exempt
worldwide network to advance the aims of global government.
On Sept. 22, when
flying to the United States for the first time, Pope Francis assured journalists he
is not a socialist, insisting his teachings “on economic
imperialism” are “the social doctrine of the church.”
Similarly, in
defending his 2013 apostolic exhortation, “Evangelii Gaudium” (“The Joy of the Gospel”), a treatise
radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh attacked as “pure
Marxism,” Pope Francis
castigated the “new idolatry of money.”
He told the Italian newspaper La Stampa the “ideology of Marxism is wrong,”
though he acknowledged he had met many Marxists in his life “who are good people.”
Yet, when it came
time to reform the Vatican Bank, Francis appointed Sutherland as his adviser to Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See,
the Vatican’s new name for the Vatican Bank.
Sutherland’s influence on the pope’s thinking
is probably nowhere more clear than on the issue of refugees and international
immigration.
In February, the Vatican approved Sutherland’s
election as president of the International Catholic Migration Commission,
a position he holds while serving as the U.N. special
representative of the secretary-general for international migration.
On Oct. 5, Sutherland ruffled feathers with an
interview published by the United Nations in which he claimed the refugees
currently flooding Europe from Syria and the Middle East are the responsibility
of the world under the United
Nation’s 1951 Refugee Convention.
“They’re the responsibility of the United
States, of Canada, of Latin America and of Asia, as well as Europe. Proximity
doesn’t define responsibility,” Sutherland said. “The world has to get its act
together with regard to what is happening in North Africa.”
Sutherland’s
ideas on migration trace back to an interview he gave the BBC in June 2010 in which he said the European Union should “do
its best to undermine” the “homogeneity of its member states, arguing that the
future prosperity of many EU states depended upon them becoming multicultural.”
Sutherland told a House of Lords committee that
migration was a “crucial dynamic for economic growth” in some EU nations,
“however difficult it might be to explain this to the citizens of those
states.”
Sutherland gave a lecture to the London School
of Economics, where he is also chairman, arguing there was a “shift from states
selecting migrants to migrants selecting states” and the EU’s ability to
compete at a “global level” was at risk.
He added that the EU states should stop
targeting “highly skilled” migrants, insisting that “at the most basic level
individuals should have a freedom of choice” about whether to come and study or
work in another country.
In addressing a joint session of
Congress, Francis’s remarks on refugees and migration mirrored
comments made by Sutherland.
“Our world is facing a refugee crisis of a
magnitude not seen since the Second World War,” the pope said, referring to
refugees from Syria and the Middle East. “This presents us with great
challenges and many hard decisions.
“On this continent, too, thousands of persons
are led to travel north in search of a better life for themselves and for their
loved ones, in search of greater opportunities,” he continued, referring to
Hispanic immigration to the United States.
“Is this not what we want for our own children?”
he asked. “We must not be taken aback by their numbers, but rather view them as
persons, seeing their faces and listening to their stories, trying to respond
as best we can to their situation.”
Concluding the thought, Francis quoted from
Matthew 7:12, evoking the Golden Rule.
“To respond in a way which is always humane,
just and fraternal,” he said. “We need to avoid a common temptation nowadays:
to discard whatever proves troublesome. Let us remember the Golden Rule: ‘Do
unto others as you would have them do unto you.’”
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