by
Thomas A. Droleskey
Although he has, I suppose, made quite a career for himself as a director and a producer, much like his writer-producer-actor-comic father Carl, Robert Reiner will always be remembered as the fictional character he portrayed on All In The Family for seven years, Michael Stivic, dubbed by his fictional father-in-law, Archie Bunker, as "The Meathead." Rob Reiner supports one evil after another. Much like his father, however, Rob Reiner does have a very good self-effacing sense of humor. He said at one point,
"I could win the Nobel Prize and they'd write 'Meathead wins the Nobel Prize'."
One of the great tragedies of the accommodations made to the "realities" of pluralism by the Americanist Catholic bishops of the past is that they rarely sought to evangelize the likes of the Reiners. This is even truer today as the lords of the counterfeit church of conciliarism actually reaffirm adherents of false religions in their false beliefs without ever seeking to convert them. The accommodations made to the "realities" of pluralism by the Americanist Catholic bishops of the past--and by their successors in the counterfeit church of conciliarism--have contributed greatly to the proliferation of various evils under cover of the civil law and in every aspect of what passes for popular culture today.
Conciliarism has taken these past accommodations to the point where even most ordinary Catholics have lost their horror of the sense of personal sense (see Having No Regard for the Horror of Personal Sin) as they spend their lives steeped in an ethos of sentimentality that is the logical result of the false premises of the Protestant Revolt and of naturalism that have been advanced by the lodges of Judeo-Masonry.
How many Catholics understand that each of the problems in their own lives and in the world is caused by Original Sin and by our own Actual Sins?
How many Catholics understand that there is no political, governmental, legal, constitutional, programmatic, naturalistic, religiously indifferentist, secular, nondenominational, interdenominational, materialistic or philosophical means to resolve a single social evil, that the reform of the world is premised upon the reform of individual lives in cooperation with the Sanctifying Graces that have been won for us by the shedding of every single drop of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ's Most Precious Blood on the wood of the Holy Cross and that flow into our hearts and souls through the loving hands of Our Lady, she who is the Mediatrix of All Graces?
How many Catholics understand or accept the simple truths expressed by the late Silvio Cardinal Antoniano in the Sixteenth Century and by Pope Saint Pius X in Notre Charge Apostolique ninety-nine years ago now?
The more closely the temporal power of a nation aligns itself with the spiritual, and the more it fosters and promotes the latter, by so much the more it contributes to the conservation of the commonwealth. For it is the aim of the ecclesiastical authority by the use of spiritual means, to form good Christians in accordance with its own particular end and object; and in doing this it helps at the same time to form good citizens, and prepares them to meet their obligations as members of a civil society. This follows of necessity because in the City of God, the Holy Roman Catholic Church, a good citizen and an upright man are absolutely one and the same thing. How grave therefore is the error of those who separate things so closely united, and who think that they can produce good citizens by ways and methods other than those which make for the formation of good Christians. For, let human prudence say what it likes and reason as it pleases, it is impossible to produce true temporal peace and tranquillity by things repugnant or opposed to the peace and happiness of eternity. (Silvio Cardinal Antoniano, quoted by Pope Pius XI in Divini Illius Magistri, December 31, 1929.)
Here we have, founded by Catholics, an inter-denominational association that is to work for the reform of civilization, an undertaking which is above all religious in character; for there is no true civilization without a moral civilization, and no true moral civilization without the true religion: it is a proven truth, a historical fact. (Pope Saint Pius X, Notre Charge Apostolique, August 15, 1910.)
Most Catholics do not understand or accept these truths as they are not taught by the counterfeit church of conciliarism. Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, for example, does not believe that Catholicism is the one and only foundation of personal and social order. Most Catholics are lost in a fog of the apostasies of conciliarism and in the morass of naturalism's swampy waters, so full of the quicksand of false philosophies and rank sentimentality.
It is no wonder, therefore, that non-Catholics, who do not even have a suggestion of Catholicism to guide their lives, are submerged in every error imaginable. Rob Reiner, who is, evidently, as likable, humanly speaking, as his father, who played the role of Alan Brady so well on the program that he, Carl Reiner, created, The Dick Van Dyke Show, is submerged in every error imaginable, spending a good deal of the fortune that he has made from his work in the motion picture industry on promoting such nonsense as the fascistic anti-smoking agenda. As one who is has never smoked in his life (no, not anything, including substances that were, most tragically, popularized in my high school years (1965-1969), I can nevertheless recognize the fascism represented by anti-smoking crusaders, who are almost always people who are simultaneously obsessed with bodily health while at the same time possessed of a belief that they must promote one objective moral evil after another in the name, as they see it, of one false slogan after another ("human rights," "dignity," "compassion," "equality," "love"). Rob Reiner does not recognize that the very moral evils he is promoting make it "impossible to produce true temporal peace and tranquility" as these evils are "repugnant" and "opposed to the peace and happiness of eternity.
Steeped in the sentimentality of naturalism, Mr. Reiner is committed to overturning Proposition 8, the morally flawed (see Do You Hear The People Sing?) voter referendum, upheld on May 26, 2009, by the Supreme Court of the State of California in the case of Strauss v. Horton, that banned "marriage" between persons of the same gender while at the same time affirming the "right" of such persons to be accorded "civil union" or "domestic partnership" status that conferred the "equivalent" of the "rights" of marriages between men and women without the word "marriage" being used. To this end, Rob Reiner has hired Theodore D. Olson, the former Solicitor General of the United States of America in the administration of former President George Walker Bush, to represent a coalition of groups in an effort to overturn the California State Supreme Court's decision.
A recent article in The New York Times described the alliance between Rob Reiner and Theodore Olson, each of whom is naturalist who are agreed on the basic premises of Modernity (that is, that it is not necessary for men or their nations to subordinate everything in their lives to the Deposit of Faith that Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ has entrusted exclusively to His Catholic Church for Its eternal safekeeping and infallible explication), to seek the overturn of the California State Supreme Court decision in the case of Strauss v. Horton:
But in a war room down the hall, where Mr. Olson is preparing for what he believes could be the most important case of his career, the binders stuffed with briefs, case law and notes offer a different take on a man many liberals love to hate. They are filled with arguments Mr. Olson hopes will lead to a Supreme Court decision with the potential to reshape the legal and social landscape along the lines of cases like Brown v. Board of Education and Roe v. Wade: the legalization of same-sex marriage nationwide.
Given the traditional battle lines on the issue, Mr. Olson’s decision to file a lawsuit challenging California’s recent ban on same-sex marriage has stirred up stereotype-rattled suspicion on both sides.
“For conservatives who don’t like what I’m doing, it’s, ‘If he just had someone in his family we’d forgive him,’ ” Mr. Olson said. “For liberals it’s such a freakish thing that it’s, ‘He must have someone in his family, otherwise a conservative couldn’t possibly have these views.’ It’s frustrating that people won’t take it on face value.”
While Mr. Olson came to the case by a serendipitous route that began late last year with Rob Reiner, a Hollywood director widely known for his Democratic activism, he said his support of same-sex marriage stemmed from longstanding personal and legal conviction. He sees nothing inconsistent with that stance and his devotion to conservative legal causes: The same antipathy toward government discrimination, he said, inspired him to take up another cause that many on the right applauded — a lengthy campaign to dismantle affirmative action programs.
A hearing in the marriage case, filed on behalf of two gay couples, is scheduled for Wednesday in federal court in San Francisco. Practicing his opening argument recently, Mr. Olson declared that California’s ban is “utterly without justification” and stigmatizes gay men and lesbians as “second-class and unworthy.”
“This case,” he said afterward, “could involve the rights and happiness and equal treatment of millions of people.”
Chuck Cooper, who is representing proponents of California’s ban, argues that such a “radical redefinition of the ancient institution of marriage” would require the court to find a right that does not exist in the Constitution — the very type of judicial activism Mr. Olson has long decried. “I never expected him to take this case, or at least not this side of it,” said Mr. Cooper, a friend of Mr. Olson from the Reagan Justice Department.
The lawsuit comes as societal views on same-sex marriage are rapidly evolving. Six states have now authorized gay couples to marry, and the politics of the issue increasingly defy convention. President Obama, for example, has said he opposes same-sex marriage, while former Vice President Dick Cheney, whose daughter is a lesbian, supports it.
Even so, Mr. Olson’s involvement stands out. As one of the leading Supreme Court advocates of his generation, he commands wide respect in the legal community, and his views carry considerable weight with the justices, according to Steven G. Calabresi, a law professor at Northwestern University and a leader with Mr. Olson in the Federalist Society, a hothouse for conservative legal theory.
“While some will think that this is an unpardonable error and rethink their views on Ted,” Mr. Calabresi said, “I think it will cause others to take a second look at the argument he is making.” (Theodore Olson's Road to Championing Same-Sex Marriage - NYTimes.com)
The alliance between Rob Reiner and Theodore Olson is not as unlikely as one might think.
As I have tried to explain on this site in article after article (yes, over and over again), there is more that unites the false opposites of the naturalist "left" and the naturalist "right" than divides them. While Reiner and Olson may disagree on many issues, each, as noted just above, is absolute agreement with the rejection of the primacy of the Social Reign of Christ the King as the foundation of personal and social order. Once you reject the Social Reign of Christ the King, my friends, the only real disagreements that those in public life have revolve around the nature and the extent of the power that will be exercised by civil governments. Once you reject the true Faith as the only foundation of personal and social order, you see, the currents of naturalism, especially sentimentality and illogic, must overflow the banks of the rivers of human minds and hearts, flooding out all rational discourse as meatheads meet meatheads to find "common ground" to promote various social issues despite their disagreements on other matters.
There is no consistent or logical way to retard the floodwaters of sentimentality if the Divinely-instituted authority of the Catholic Church is not recognized by a civil state as having the right to intervene as a last resort--following the exhausting of her Indirect Power of teaching and preaching and exhortation--when the good of souls demands her maternal intervention with civil authorities to prevent or to stop that which is harmful to souls and thus harmful to all social order. A naturalistic system that is steeped in the falsehoods of the egalitarianism of both Protestantism and Judeo-Masonry winds up with human beings screaming at each other as follows, "Who are you to tell me that I am wrong about this issue?"
Each brand of Protestantism, no matter the differences that exist among those over 33,000 different brands, is founded upon a rejection of the belief that Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ founded His Church as a visible society headed by the Successor of Saint Peter and the bishops who are in full communion with him. Each individual believe is, at least theoretically, "equal" to other believers, although the lack of a visible hierarchy makes it necessary for such sects as the Baptists and various nondenominational evangelicals and fundamentalists to "elect" various leaders as their adherents look to various "experts" for guidance about how to interpret the Protestant's distorted version of Sacred Scripture that is not the Word of God as it contains mistranslations and omissions of books that render their "bibles" as works of the devil and not of God the Holy Ghost.
The proliferation of Protestant sects founded in a rejection of the hierarchy of the Catholic Church leads inexorably to a rejection of the historicity of Scriptures. If there is no one to say with certain authority that a given passage of Scripture is to be interpreted one way, you see, then, it is only a matter of time before those who wish to "demythologize" Scripture of things that no "rational" man could possibly believe had happened (God creating the earth as recounted in The Book of Genesis, Noah and the Flood, Moses parting the Red Sea, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, the Sacred Divinity of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, His miracles, including the Miracle of His Bodily Resurrection, etc.) begin to deconstruct the plain words of Sacred Scripture into meaning the exact opposite of what they do as they attempt to separate the "historical context" in which the words in Scripture were written from their "meaning" for us today. The forces let loose by Protestantism are what have given us a world where the lowest common denominator is unbelief, where men argue with each other about moral truths that exist in the nature of things and have been entrusted by God Himself to the authority of the Catholic Church for their infallible explication until the end of time.
Pope Leo XIII, writing in Immortale Dei, November 1, 1885, noted this all very succinctly:
To hold, therefore, that there is no difference in matters of religion between forms that are unlike each other, and even contrary to each other, most clearly leads in the end to the rejection of all religion in both theory and practice. And this is the same thing as atheism, however it may differ from it in name. Men who really believe in the existence of God must, in order to be consistent with themselves and to avoid absurd conclusions, understand that differing modes of divine worship involving dissimilarity and conflict even on most important points cannot all be equally probable, equally good, and equally acceptable to God. (Pope Leo XIII, Immortale Dei, November 1, 1885.)
Judeo-Masonry exploited the religious indifferentism wrought by the Protestant Revolution's logical consequences by emphasizing that men could "agree to disagree" about matters of religion as they sought to work together as "brothers" for the common good. Pope Leo XIII explained this, once again quite succinctly, in Humanum Genus, April 20, 1884:
But the naturalists go much further; for, having, in the highest things, entered upon a wholly erroneous course, they are carried headlong to extremes, either by reason of the weakness of human nature, or because God inflicts upon them the just punishment of their pride. Hence it happens that they no longer consider as certain and permanent those things which are fully understood by the natural light of reason, such as certainly are -- the existence of God, the immaterial nature of the human soul, and its immortality. The sect of the Freemasons, by a similar course of error, is exposed to these same dangers; for, although in a general way they may profess the existence of God, they themselves are witnesses that they do not all maintain this truth with the full assent of the mind or with a firm conviction. Neither do they conceal that this question about God is the greatest source and cause of discords among them; in fact, it is certain that a considerable contention about this same subject has existed among them very lately. But, indeed, the sect allows great liberty to its votaries, so that to each side is given the right to defend its own opinion, either that there is a God, or that there is none; and those who obstinately contend that there is no God are as easily initiated as those who contend that God exists, though, like the pantheists, they have false notions concerning Him: all which is nothing else than taking away the reality, while retaining some absurd representation of the divine nature.
When this greatest fundamental truth has been overturned or weakened, it follows that those truths, also, which are known by the teaching of nature must begin to fall -- namely, that all things were made by the free will of God the Creator; that the world is governed by Providence; that souls do not die; that to this life of men upon the earth there will succeed another and an everlasting life.
When these truths are done away with, which are as the principles of nature and important for knowledge and for practical use, it is easy to see what will become of both public and private morality. We say nothing of those more heavenly virtues, which no one can exercise or even acquire without a special gift and grace of God; of which necessarily no trace can be found in those who reject as unknown the redemption of mankind, the grace of God, the sacraments, and the happiness to be obtained in heaven. We speak now of the duties which have their origin in natural probity. That God is the Creator of the world and its provident Ruler; that the eternal law commands the natural order to be maintained, and forbids that it be disturbed; that the last end of men is a destiny far above human things and beyond this sojourning upon the earth: these are the sources and these the principles of all justice and morality.
If these be taken away, as the naturalists and Freemasons desire, there will immediately be no knowledge as to what constitutes justice and injustice, or upon what principle morality is founded. And, in truth, the teaching of morality which alone finds favor with the sect of Freemasons, and in which they contend that youth should be instructed, is that which they call "civil," and "independent," and "free," namely, that which does not contain any religious belief. But, how insufficient such teaching is, how wanting in soundness, and how easily moved by every impulse of passion, is sufficiently proved by its sad fruits, which have already begun to appear. For, wherever, by removing Christian education, this teaching has begun more completely to rule, there goodness and integrity of morals have begun quickly to perish, monstrous and shameful opinions have grown up, and the audacity of evil deeds has risen to a high degree. All this is commonly complained of and deplored; and not a few of those who by no means wish to do so are compelled by abundant evidence to give not infrequently the same testimony.
Whether or not Rob Reiner and/or Theodore Olson understand it, this passage from Pope Leo XIII's Humanum Genus explains why they are as one in promoting "marriage" between persons who are steeped in unrepentant sins of perversity against the Sixth and Ninth Commandments. Men who, whether consciously or not, reject the authority of the Catholic Church will indeed have no true and consistent "knowledge as to what constitutes justice and injustice, or upon what principle morality is found." Do you see how this is so?
There is no need in this article to repeat the entirety of the contents of
Ron Paul, Meet Saint Paul, an article that attempted to explain the the libertarian Dr. Ron Paul, who prescribed the birth control pill, which is an abortifacient, in his medical practice in the belief, contrary to all scientific evidence, that the pill does not kill preborn babies (see
the pill kills babies) is wrong in his libertarian assertion that moral issues such as abortion and "marriage rights" for those engaged in unrepentant sins against the Sixth and Ninth Commandments are to be "determined" according to "the will of people" in the states, either by means of ballot initiatives or in state legislatures. Dr. Paul is most wrong about this. No human being, whether acting on his own or with others in the institutions of civil governance, has any authority from God to dispense with the binding precepts of the Divine Positive Law and the Natural Law. It is
God's Rights, not States Rights, my friends.
Pope Leo XIII noted in Immortale Dei that the state is acting against its own interests whenever it permits the license of opinion or action to receive the protection of the civil law:
So, too, the liberty of thinking, and of publishing, whatsoever each one likes, without any hindrance, is not in itself an advantage over which society can wisely rejoice. On the contrary, it is the fountain-head and origin of many evils. Liberty is a power perfecting man, and hence should have truth and goodness for its object. But the character of goodness and truth cannot be changed at option. These remain ever one and the same, and are no less unchangeable than nature itself. If the mind assents to false opinions, and the will chooses and follows after what is wrong, neither can attain its native fullness, but both must fall from their native dignity into an abyss of corruption. Whatever, therefore, is opposed to virtue and truth may not rightly be brought temptingly before the eye of man, much less sanctioned by the favor and protection of the law. A well-spent life is the only way to heaven, whither all are bound, and on this account the State is acting against the laws and dictates of nature whenever it permits the license of opinion and of action to lead minds astray from truth and souls away from the practice of virtue. To exclude the Church, founded by God Himself, from the business of life, from the making of laws, from the education of youth, from domestic society is a grave and fatal error. A State from which religion is banished can never be well regulated; and already perhaps more than is desirable is known of the nature and tendency of the so-called civil philosophy of life and morals. The Church of Christ is the true and sole teacher of virtue and guardian of morals. She it is who preserves in their purity the principles from which duties flow, and, by setting forth most urgent reasons for virtuous life, bids us not only to turn away from wicked deeds, but even to curb all movements of the mind that are opposed to reason, even though they be not carried out in action. (Pope Leo XIII, Immortale Dei, November 1, 1900.)
Dr. Paul is correct about many things, including the necessity of limited government. He does not understand or accept the fact, however, that the statism of the present time is the direct and inexorable result of the revolution against the Divine Plan that Our Lord Himself instituted to effect man's return to Him through His Catholic Church. It is not the "will of the people" by which we are governed when it comes to First and Last Things. It is the law of God.
A word awash in the sentimentality of naturalism, however, produces endless streams of confusion. Rob Reiner and Theodore Olson believe that there is an absolute "right" for people steeped in perversity to "marry." Ron Paul and many other libertarians believe that such a matter is up to the "people" to decide. Some of those who adhere to the various stripes of the naturalist flavor known as "conservatism" assert that we must be governed by "traditional values." Each of these naturalists, however, is really a "meathead" as he rejects the simple truth, binding upon the consciences of all men in all places until the end of time, that the Catholic Church alone is the repository that has been given us by God Himself to teach us and to sanctify us so that we can conform our own lives with the truths contained in the Deposit of Faith by cooperating with Sanctifying Grace to aspire to the heights of personal sanctity, thereby contributing to the true temporal welfare of our nations.
A person formed according to the truths of the Catholic Faith understands, for example, that these words of Pope Pius XI, although they applied to illicit unions between men and women, are just as relevant to the promotion of "marriage" or "civil unions" between persons who base their very human identities upon an immersion in that which caused Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ to suffer in His Sacred Humanity during His Passion and Death and that caused His Most Blessed Mother's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart to be pierced through and through with those Seven Swords of Sorrow: sin. Unrepentant sin the foundation of personal and social disorder, not order.
How grievously all these err and how shamelessly they leave the ways of honesty is already evident from what we have set forth here regarding the origin and nature of wedlock, its purposes and the good inherent in it. The evil of this teaching is plainly seen from the consequences which its advocates deduce from it, namely, that the laws, institutions and customs by which wedlock is governed, since they take their origin solely from the will of man, are subject entirely to him, hence can and must be founded, changed and abrogated according to human caprice and the shifting circumstances of human affairs; that the generative power which is grounded in nature itself is more sacred and has wider range than matrimony -- hence it may be exercised both outside as well as within the confines of wedlock, and though the purpose of matrimony be set aside, as though to suggest that the license of a base fornicating woman should enjoy the same rights as the chaste motherhood of a lawfully wedded wife.
Armed with these principles, some men go so far as to concoct new species of unions, suited, as they say, to the present temper of men and the times, which various new forms of matrimony they presume to label "temporary," "experimental," and "companionate." These offer all the indulgence of matrimony and its rights without, however, the indissoluble bond, and without offspring, unless later the parties alter their cohabitation into a matrimony in the full sense of the law.
Indeed there are some who desire and insist that these practices be legitimatized by the law or, at least, excused by their general acceptance among the people. They do not seem even to suspect that these proposals partake of nothing of the modern "culture" in which they glory so much, but are simply hateful abominations which beyond all question reduce our truly cultured nations to the barbarous standards of savage peoples. (Pope Pius XI stated the matter very clearly in Casti Connubii, December 31, 1930.)
Hateful abominations can never be sanctioned by the civil law. Anyone who believes otherwise is in league, whether wittingly or unwittingly, with the devil, not with Christ the King as He has revealed Himself through the Catholic Church.
A believing Catholic understand that is to take these words of Saint Paul rather seriously when the Apostle to the Gentiles taught us that one of the clearest paths to ruin for a people is to endorse or to be indifferent about perversity:
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and injustice of those men that detain the truth of God in injustice: Because that which is known of God is manifest in them. For God hath manifested it unto them. For the invisible things of him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made; his eternal power also, and divinity: so that they are inexcusable.
Because that, when they knew God, they have not glorified him as God, or given thanks; but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened. For professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of the image of a corruptible man, and of birds, and of fourfooted beasts, and of creeping things. Wherefore God gave them up to the desires of their heart, unto uncleanness, to dishonour their own bodies among themselves. Who changed the truth of God into a lie; and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
For this cause God delivered them up to shameful affections. For their women have changed the natural use into that use which is against nature. And, in like manner, the men also, leaving the natural use of the women, have burned in their lusts one towards another, men with men working that which is filthy, and receiving in themselves the recompense which was due to their error. And as they liked not to have God in their knowledge, God delivered them up to a reprobate sense, to do those things which are not convenient; Being filled with all iniquity, malice, fornication, avarice, wickedness, full of envy, murder, contention, deceit, malignity, whisperers, Detractors, hateful to God, contumelious, proud, haughty, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
foolish, dissolute, without affection, without fidelity, without mercy. Who, having known the justice of God, did not understand that they who do such things, are worthy of death; and not only they that do them, but they also that consent to them that do them. (Romans 1: 18-32.)
God's love for us is an act of His Divine Will, the ultimate expression of which is the salvation of our immortal souls as members of the Catholic Church, outside of which there is no salvation and without which there can be no true social order. We do not truly love ourselves if we persist in unrepentant Mortal Sins as we are engaged in acts of spiritual suicide by doing so. We do not truly love others, that is, to will their good, both in this life and for all eternity, if we do or say anything, whether by omission or commission, that reaffirms them in lives of unrepentant Mortal Sins. Authentic love wills the good. It is not an expression of empty sentimentality or a quest for "happiness" by the pursuit of illicit "pleasures" that are destructive of both body and soul and are, ultimately, destructive of all social order and even rational social discourse.
Theodore Olson and his new buddy Rob Reiner understand none of this as they seek to bestow a "civil right" upon those engaged in unrepentant sins against the Sixth and Ninth Commandments. And although Theodore B. Olson is a darling of those in The Federalist Society, is no darling of God. Acting as the Solicitor General of the United States of America, Olson argued in a brief submitted on December 4, 2002, to the Supreme Court of the United States of America in the case of Joseph Scheidler v. National Organization for Women that the work of Joseph Scheidler, the then seventy-five year-old founder of the Pro Life Action League, to save babies from execution outside of abortuaries was analogous to the sort of "racketeering" prohibited under the Hobbs Act of 1946, claiming that Scheidler was depriving legitimate business, abortuaries, of their income. And this from the "pro-life" George Walker Bush administration (applause for Bush, anyone?):
"It is irrelevant under the Hobbs Act whether the defendant is motivated by an economic purpose, as the lower courts that have addressed the issue have correctly recognized. The text of the Hobbs Act contains no requirement of an economic motive. As explained, when a person uses force or threats to compel a business to cede control over what goods or services the business will offer, the defendant obtains the victim's property by acquiring the power to decide how the business will be conducted. That conclusion holds true whether or not the defendant has a profit-making objective.
"A contrary conclusion would allow a defendant to hijack legitimate businesses by wrongful acts of violence, threats, or fear simply because the defendant had a non-economic objective. That result would defeat the government's strong interest in protecting interstate commerce under the Hobbs Act by prosecuting extortionists who are motivated by causes other than financial gain. For instance, an economic motive requirement would immunize a defendant from prosecution under the Hobbs Act even though the defendant threatened acts of murder against a bank that loaned money to foreign nations whose policies the defendant opposed, against a retail store that sold products to which the defendant objected, or against any other business that used its land or other valuable property for a purpose that the defendant found unpalatable.
"Those acts have deleterious effects on interstate commerce, whether or not the defendant directs the use of such property for his own financial gain. To exempt such conduct from the Hobbs Act would retreat from the Act's purpose to 'protect the right of citizens of this country to market their products without any interference from lawless bandits.' In sum, when the defendant uses wrongful force or threats to wrest control over the victim's business decisions, the defendant obtains that property interest." (Brief of United States Solicitor General Theodore B. Olson in the case of Joseph Scheidler v. National Organization for Women, December 4, 2002.)
Yes, the "pro-life" George Walker Bush administration authorized its Solicitor General to argue before the Supreme Court of the United States of America that abortuaries are legitimate businesses whose economic well-being was "threatened" by the sidewalk counseling activities of Joe Scheidler. Do you see how the Protestant and Judeo-Masonic system of government is a farce from beginning to end? And even though the Supreme Court of the United States of America rendered the correct decision in the case of Joseph Scheidler v. National Organization for Women on February 26, 2003 (see
Justice for a True Pro-Life Hero), the ever-mercurial nature of American jurisprudence guarantees nothing about the future as such jurisprudence, both for "strict constructionists" and "liberal judicial activists" is founded in an interpretation of the words of men in written documents without making any reference at all to the binding precepts of the Divine Positive Law and the Natural Law as these have been entrusted exclusively to the infallible teaching authority of the Catholic Church.
Our Lady, she who made possible our salvation by her perfect fiat to the Will of God the Father at the Annunciation, condemned naturalism in the strongest possible terms when speaking to the Venerable Mary of Agreda:
My daughter, the inestimable treasure of the virtue of divine faith is hidden to those mortals who have only carnal and earthly eyes; for they do not know how to appreciate and esteem a gift and blessing of such incomparable value. Consider, my dearest, what the world was without faith and what it would be today if my Son and Lord would not preserve faith. How many men whom the world have celebrated as great, powerful and wise have precipitated themselves, on account of the want of light of faith, from the darkness of their unbelief into most abominable sins, and thence into the eternal darkness of hell! How many kingdoms and provinces, being blind themselves, follow these still more blind leaders until they together fall into the abyss of eternal pains! And they are followed by the bad Christians, who having received the grace and blessing of faith, live as if they had it not in their hearts.
Do not forget, my dear friend, to be thankful for this precious jewel, which the Lord has given thee as a dower and wedding gift of they espousal with Him, in order to draw thee to the bridal chamber of his holy Church and afterwards to have intercourse with Him in the eternal beatitude. Continually exercise this virtue of faith, for it places thee near to thy last end, after which thou striveset, and brings thee near to the object they desires and thy love. Faith teaches the sure way of eternal salvation, faith is the light that shines in the darkness of this mortal life and pilgrimage; it leads men securely to the possession of the fatherland to which they are wayfaring, if they do not allow it to die out by infidelity and sinfulness. Faith enlivens the other virtues and serves as a nourishment of the just man and a support in his labors. Faith confounds and fills with fear the infidels and the lax Christians in their negligence; for it convinces them in this world of their sin and threatens punishment in the life to come. Faith is powerful to do all things, for nothing is impossible to the believer; faith makes all things attainable and possible. Faith illumine and ennobles the understanding of man, since it directs him in the darkness of his natural ignorance, not stray from the way, and it elevates him above himself so that he sees and understands with infallible certainty what is far above his powers and assures him of it no less than if he saw it clearly before him. He is thus freed from the gross and vile narrow-mindedness of those who will believe only what they can experience by their own limited natural powers, not considering that the soul, as long as it lives in the prison of this corruptible body, is very much circumscribed and limited in its sphere of action by the knowledge drawn from the coarse activity of the senses. Appreciate, therefore, my daughter, this priceless treasure of the Catholic faith, given thee by God, watch over it and practice it in great esteem and reverence. (The Venerable Mary of Agreda, A Popular Abridgement of The Mystical City of God, pp. 142-144.)
Any questions out there in cyberspace? Oh, I didn't think so. This is pretty clear, wouldn't you say? Catholicism is essential to personal and social order. Do you think we can abandon any and all attachment to naturalism and its false "philosophies," my friends, that give us such alliances as the one that has been entered to by Rob Reiner and Theodore Olson? We need the likes of Saint Louis IX governing our nation, not a convention of meatheads.
Let us make sure to use the weapon that was given to Saint Dominic de Guzman, Our Lady's Most Holy Rosary, as we seek to eradicate sin from all our own lives, making use of the Sacred Tribunal of Penance on a weekly basis and spending time before Our Lady's Divine Son in His Real Presence in the Most Blessed Sacrament as we offer up our daily acts of penance to His Most Sacred Heart through her own Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart as her consecrated slaves. We must never doubt the fact that Our Lady's Immaculate Heart will triumph, We must pray as many Rosaries each day as our states-in-life permit to help plant a few seeds for this wonderful triumph.
Let us use the spiritual weapons that Our Lord has given us through His Most Blessed Mother, understanding these words that Saint Paul wrote in his Epistle to the Ephesians apply to us right now in our current ecclesiastical and civil circumstances:
Not serving to the eye, as it were pleasing men, but, as the servants of Christ doing the will of God from the heart, With a good will serving, as to the Lord, and not to men. Knowing that whatsoever good thing any man shall do, the same shall he receive from the Lord, whether he be bond, or free. And you, masters, do the same things to them, forbearing threatenings, knowing that the Lord both of them and you is in heaven; and there is no respect of persons with him. Finally, brethren, be strengthened in the Lord, and in the might of his power.
Put you on the armour of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armour of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace:
In all things taking the shield of faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit (which is the word of God). By all prayer and supplication praying at all times in the spirit; and in the same watching with all instance and supplication for all the saints: (Ephesians 6: 6-18.)
Omnia instaurare in Christo.
Our Lady of Sorrows, pray for us!
Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us now and at the hour of our deaths.
All to thee, Blessed Mother. All to thy Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, we love you. Save souls!
Viva Cristo Rey! Vivat Christus Rex!
Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us.
