Anchor Team 251: Rumblings in Rome

Added: 2026-05-28

[00:00:01]Good evening everybody. Welcome once again to the Lepanto Institute Think Tank. I'm your host Michael Hichborn and with me this evening is Father Charles Murr. We've had him on the program before. He's a good friend of the program. He's a good friend of the Lepanto Institute and he's a good friend of mine.

[00:00:16]I am very happy to have Father Murr talk to us this evening about our recent report on the the the world meeting of popular movements and the greater expansion of Marxism within the church. How this is a a very serious problem and something that must be faced and what the broader implications are. Of course, before we begin any of that, we're going to begin as we always do with our prayer. And Father, if you'll lead us, please.

[00:00:44]So in nomine Patris et Fili et Spiritus Sancti, amen.

[00:00:50]Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum.

[00:00:54]Benedicta tu in mulieribus et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus. Sancta Maria, Amen.

[00:01:06]Our Lady, mediatrix of all grace, pray for us. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, amen. Amen.

[00:01:14]Thank you so much, Father. We start off in Latin and end up in English, but it's so wonderful that we have a God who understands. Yes. Yes.

[00:01:21]Yes. It's as I tell my kids when they when they're too soft in their prayers, how can you expect our Lord to hear you praying if I can't hear you.

[00:01:31]>> [laughter] >> There you go. There you go. There you go.

[00:01:35]Um So you you read the report that we put together on the world meeting of popular movements and you were gracious enough to reach out to me and and give me your reaction. If you would please just kind of give give everybody else here your reaction to what we discovered about the world meeting of popular movements and all of the Marxists that were gathered in Rome.

[00:02:01]Well, first of all, let me congratulate you on the report.

[00:02:05]Because a lot of work and a lot of effort went into it, obviously.

[00:02:08]Uh thank you for doing that. Uh the and and and believe me, uh the world, especially the Catholic world, needed to hear that.

[00:02:18]We and still needs to hear it. I don't think it's penetrated yet. I don't think it's I don't think it's really uh gotten [clears throat] gotten uh inside yet. But, we've been dealing with this problem of Marxism in the church uh for for decades, at least for at least for 60 years, if not 150 years. Right.

[00:02:40]Uh I I remember as a as a school child a school kid, the the sisters that we had who taught us were Lithuanian.

[00:02:49]And and they they gave us a fantastic education, the Sisters of Saint Casimir.

[00:02:54]A fantastic education, but they also instilled a healthy healthy fear of communism in all of us. Yeah. Uh we they they told us what had happened. They This was This was first hand and and letters from their from their family members back in Lithuania and in Poland living under communism.

[00:03:12]Uh and they described it a lot, not in not in horrible terms for for fifth and sixth and seventh graders, right? To to but, enough to make us understand that this was not only ungodly, it was unhuman.

[00:03:28]Inhuman, let me put it that way, the system.

[00:03:31]Uh so, I'm I'm coming from it that way.

[00:03:34]But, one of the things that I remember hearing many times when I was a boy, and this has ceased to be quoted or said, the communists, the Marxists, promised to enter into the Catholic Church and to help cause us to fall.

[00:04:00]This is one of their promises. This is they they they said it to gleefully.

[00:04:05]They're very proud of this. This is what they what we're about.

[00:04:09]Uh that they that they've done that should not be a real surprise. And let me say this to Michael. When I was reading your report, I cannot say that I was surprised by anything that I was reading.

[00:04:25]Yeah. It affirmed It affirmed what I And I'm sure you I I'm sure you understood that you understand what I'm saying because you had to have felt the same way.

[00:04:33]It It's what they said they were going to do and now you're reading that they did it.

[00:04:38]Right.

[00:04:39]>> it it uh it it didn't really come to me as a a shocking surprise.

[00:04:44]It came to me as as something as a fulfillment of of a threat made years ago.

[00:04:51]Uh a promise kept.

[00:04:54]Yeah, you know Mhm. Go ahead. And go go ahead. I'm sorry.

[00:04:59]I'm sorry. Go ahead.

[00:05:01]I've got I've just got to explain uh to you and to you to our audience two quick things. First of all, I'm in I'm way out in the country in in southern Spain. So the connection often with the with the with uh YouTuber with the with the uh Zoom and and the connection that we're making is not always so great, okay? I have to apologize for that. And secondly, I've I've been suffering with a little bit of uh bronchitis. Not a little bit, a lot of bronchitis. So if I put the mic off and start coughing, uh don't get excited. I'll come back. I'll be back. I I I just take moments of uh uh like like coughing jags. I'm sorry for that. But uh but anyway, now, what were going to say that's said, let's go on to something more important.

[00:05:50]Well, what I was going to I was going to reaffirm what you were talking about the communists making it fully aware to the to the people that they were intending to infiltrate Catholic Church. Um Shortly before testifying before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, Herb Philbrick, who wrote a book I Led Three Lives, he was a communist infiltrator on behalf of the FBI. He published an article in the Christian Herald, and the title was "The Communists Are After Your Church." Now, this was in the 1950s. So, before he testified in the 1950s.

[00:06:28]The article was introduced into the record during the Senate hearing committees on communist activities, and this is what the what he warned in the beginning of his article. He said, "Whether your church is a city cathedral or a village meeting house, the communists are out to get it. Not that they intend to put your church out of business just yet. They don't. They want to use it. They want to use you, a good church member, as they have used many others to front their own objective, which is nothing less than the ultimate and complete destruction of democracy and religious faith."

[00:07:01]You know, I've I've studied communism almost my entire life, and it was somewhat by accident, but also by happenstance and and by our Lord's direct providence, he gave me grandparents who were actively involved in helping to expose communist cell networks in Southern California back in the 1960s.

[00:07:24]And uh >> [clears throat] >> because of that, I had a rather unique education, and I learned how the communists think. I learned what they do. I learned where they operate and who they're targeting. Uh I learned how to recognize communists and communist activities and to understand what it is they're going to accomplish. And you know, I get I get a lot of um I don't want to say hate, but I get a lot of pushback on my use of the word communist when I talk about hard leftist organizations that are basically fellow travelers assisting the work of revolution, which is ultimately what communism is. It's revolution.

[00:08:06]Uh it's it's revolution against the established order for the for the sake of creating a new order that is counter to what the Catholic Church has always taught. It's its ultimate aim is to establish a humanist society based on a socialist economic principle for the purpose of creating automatons throughout the world that simply serve what they call the common good. That's communism and socialism in a nutshell, which is why it's completely and totally inimical to church teaching. It doesn't matter whether it's, you know, radical and hardcore communism or soft moderate socialism, they're all the same.

[00:08:50]But when I look at what we saw at the World Meeting of Popular Movements starting with Pope Francis back in 2014, he gathered all of these communists together culminating in what we saw in October of 2025. Pope Leo XIII I might forgive me, but that that's just incredible.

[00:09:10]That was that that part of the the report was just incredible. I had no idea that that's what he was attending when he was given that that if you will that crucifix.

[00:09:19]I had no idea that that's that's what that's what he was intending. And just like any like a fellow communist, it was incredible. I'm sorry for interrupting, but I just I just found that amazing.

[00:09:31]Well, you know, the funny thing is it it only came up when I was doing the research into the background of the World Meeting of Popular Movements cuz I was like, "Okay, well, first of all, who was there in the beginning? Who was working on it? Who put this whole thing together? Where was it held?" All that kind of stuff. I was looking into the entire background.

[00:09:49]And then I saw the dates of the second World Meeting of Popular Movements when Evo Morales was a participant and I went, "Wait a minute.

[00:09:58]That was 2015. [laughter] That was the same year that that um Evo Morales gave Pope Francis that communist hammer and sickle crucifix. So, I I I just kind of wondered, was it the same event?

[00:10:13]And I looked at it and it was the same event. I was shocked. And then I started looking through news accounts. I said, "Okay, maybe this was just kind of glossed over uh you know, the World Meeting of Popular Movements." And the thing is, every single news account that I saw regarding the hammer and sickle crucifix never once mentioned that Pope Francis was there for the World Meeting of Popular Movements, not once.

[00:10:37]Which tells me >> That's what I'm what I was saying. I I mean, I'm the the Vatican uh they did a a magnificent job hiding that. Yep. They really did. They were they were they In In things like that, they're very efficient. Yeah. Because that would have that would have upset people. That really would have upset people.

[00:10:56]Uh it really would It It It upsets me now, but it really would have upset people then. But no mention of that.

[00:11:04]Right.

[00:11:04]>> It's It's It's amazing. I don't know [clears throat] how they managed to do it.

[00:11:08]Well, You know, there was something There's something else too that you hit on. There There two points that I want to make.

[00:11:13]One was like Freemasonry, like Freemasonry, uh communist Marxists are not out to destroy the Catholic Church in this in this sense.

[00:11:30]They don't believe in any of its fundamentals and beliefs or or anything and they would love to destroy the belief system, but they want the structure.

[00:11:40]They want the structure to remain. This is what the the Masons were were were intent on getting rid of all of the beliefs that they if you will the Catholic superstitions as they say.

[00:11:52]But holding on to the network of the church all over the world because that network is precious and it's to be used. Communists are the same are the same way. The Marxists are the same way. They would like to use the church and they are are using the church. They're not They're not In the 50s and 60s even into the 70s, but certainly in the 50s and 60s 40s even before that communism was the enemy.

[00:12:21]There was no question who who the enemy of freedom of democracy was. It was communism. There was no question who the enemy of religion was of Catholicism. It was communism. That was That would That would be the first answer that everyone in the world would give.

[00:12:38]All of the sudden that's not the enemy.

[00:12:42]The enemy of the of the church are the poor who've been treated unjustly. The the this the that these marginal groups which are all controlled by the communists at least the propaganda for them.

[00:12:57]But But it's a What I'm trying to say is they would love to hold on to the structure that the church has that the church has and is the network that it is that is universal because actually there is no structure as efficient and as worldwide as the Catholic Church.

[00:13:17]Uh before the internet before cellular telephones the Vatican was number one in knowing exactly what was happening in any point of the world.

[00:13:31]Yeah.

[00:13:32]Yeah. The just the the the the parishioners would tell the parish priest, the parish priest would tell the bishop, the bishop would tell the nuncio, the nuncio was online with the Vatican. Boom. They knew This was This was phenomenal. Nobody had such a thing.

[00:13:48]And also, the Vatican had diplomatic relations with different with countries that that the United States, Canada, the West did not have diplomatic relations with.

[00:14:00]Uh it it just it just as a point just in the as an example, took I don't know when the Vatican finally finally recognized Israel, but it was under John Paul II.

[00:14:12]But, up until then, if they did not recognize Israel, so that they wouldn't jeopardize the relations they had with the Muslim nations. Right, it was 1993.

[00:14:23]93? Was that late? Right?

[00:14:25]But, I mean, this is this is And And the Freemasons knew this, too. They've been And they they Let me just say this, too. And this is the second point.

[00:14:37]When I read When I I actually sat down a few days it took me to go through Pius X's encyclical against modernism.

[00:14:49]It's not an easy read. It's not an easy read. But, I I made it through.

[00:14:55]And I just I The one thing that kept kept in my mind was it is the synthesis of all heresies.

[00:15:09]Yeah. Marxism is a heresy. Freemasonry is a heresy. Gnosticism is a heresy.

[00:15:16]All of these heresies are contained in modernism.

[00:15:20]And well, we're talking about one aspect of modernism right now, communism, Marxism, there are many others that join them. When you see a manifestation like the ones that they've had all over the world of of young communists, it's not just young communists.

[00:15:39]They've got people who don't who really don't care about communism, but they care about ecology.

[00:15:45]Right. They don't care or they care about this or they care about the treatment of animals. All all of the leftist causes converge. And this is what Pius X condemned and explained was modernism.

[00:15:59]It's the synthesis of all of this.

[00:16:02]Communism is a is a terrible threat.

[00:16:05]It's still a threat and is very much a threat.

[00:16:08]What what also concerns me very much as a as a priest and as a theologian is theology of liberation.

[00:16:18]Oh, yeah.

[00:16:19]This is This is This is pure Marxism.

[00:16:23]Let me just explain quickly uh for for those who are listening to us uh what this is all about.

[00:16:32]Excuse me.

[00:16:35]We had, for example, and everybody knows this, we had Thomas Aquinas built on Aristotle, some some Plato as a philosophical base to understanding theology.

[00:16:51]Our theology comes from revelation. And to understand the revelation and and and and make theological sense of a lot of things, you need a philosophical base to help you do that.

[00:17:05]Thomas Aquinas provided that base for centuries.

[00:17:09]The Marxists came along and they said, "Well, wait just a minute.

[00:17:13]If Thomas Aquinas was able to be the philosophical base for Catholic theology.

[00:17:22]That was yesterday.

[00:17:24]That's passé.

[00:17:26]Uh how many times have you heard this? The Second Vatican Council did away with that. All right. Yeah. You've heard that a thousand times, haven't you? Well, that now is it. Yes. So, what we need is a modern philosophy. Well, what would that modern philosophy be? Marxism. Mhm.

[00:17:44]Let's take away scholasticism and put in Marxism and use that as a philosophical base for Catholic theology. There will therefore will make Catholic theology relevant to the world of today.

[00:17:58]Well, now it's interesting. Uh Pope Leo has a new encyclical coming out on artificial intelligence.

[00:18:04]And uh accompanying him at the publication ceremony or the release ceremony, whatever it is, of this new encyclical, he has uh uh Cardinal Fernandez, who is is deeply problematic. But, also accompanying him You How very Christian of you? How very kind. Yeah, I'll I'll I'll I'll let his record speak for itself. Um but uh also accompanying him are these two university professors.

[00:18:34]Uh and they're professors of Catholic social thought.

[00:18:39]I went through their record just to see what it is they're talking about, and they make regular, and I mean almost everything they've published has regular references to Karl Marx.

[00:18:52]As if Karl Marx is properly Oh, yes.

[00:18:55]So, these two professors that are going to be accompanying Pope Leo are Marxists.

[00:19:00]Now, they may not be capital M Marx, you know, this is what drives me nuts about scholastics. They say, "Well, true Marxism is somebody who adheres to all of the principles of Karl Marx. And a neo-Marxist is somebody who takes some of his principles and then changes them. And it's like you you can't just sit there and say somebody's a Marxist.

[00:19:24]You know, it drives me crazy. They they want to split hairs. But the the bottom line is these women, these theologians, are Marxists.

[00:19:34]No, undoubtedly.

[00:19:36]And and Michael, there's also something to to be to be said for this.

[00:19:41]The when you're taking a philosophical basis as I was explaining, Marxism for for for a philosophical base. Your philosophical philosophical base now is Marxism.

[00:19:56]Just a minute.

[00:19:57]Just a minute.

[00:19:59]How do you take a philosophical a philosophy that is intrinsically atheistic? Right. It has to be atheistic.

[00:20:11]I keep telling this to people. You cannot admit the existence of God if you are a Marxist.

[00:20:17]Because then you would be putting you would be putting something or someone higher than the state.

[00:20:24]Yep.

[00:20:25]>> And the state is the maximum authority, even the maximum moral authority on everything. There can be nothing higher.

[00:20:32]How do you how do you square that? You can't.

[00:20:35]You can't. And this is what this is this is just to begin with.

[00:20:39]Just to begin with. Let me private property and everything else that comes along.

[00:20:44]It's impossible. But what what the Marxists did in the 1970s, maybe '68, around '68, they they went into theology and they proposed that Marxism be the base, the philosophical base for Catholic theology. Hence, thus the the the birth of theology of liberation.

[00:21:07]Yeah. So now the instead of salvation of souls we're we're we're trying to save the entire man, the whole man, they keep saying this. The whole man. Well, they don't care about the soul. The soul isn't even discussed. We want to save the whole man from poverty, from famine, from and all of these things are good.

[00:21:29]As a matter of fact the the Catholic Church has been trying to save man from all of those things for 2,000 years.

[00:21:36]We've got we've had the greatest missionaries and and doctors and everything, scores of people scores of people hundreds of thousands of people over 2,000 years who have dedicated their lives to alleviating all of this suffering. We've been working on that.

[00:21:52]But we're also and above all concerned about the salvation of man's soul.

[00:21:57]Right.

[00:21:57]>> This is what is downplayed tragically to almost non-existent. So this is something that really needs to be focused on with regard to what's happened in the church. Because when I started the Lepanto Institute I did so out of recognition that the nature of charity within the church has been transformed. They've changed charity from a true act of love caritas love they've changed it from my love for my neighbor out of love for God into an industry where people can get paid to do certain philanthropic works. So I the in the 1960s uh the in not the encyclical the Vatican II document and it's not talked about enough uh perfectae caritatis which is the document that transformed all of the religious institutes.

[00:22:53]One of the things that was central to it was this theme that even the cloisters needed to consider how to incorporate social justice into their regular lives and routines. Yes.

[00:23:06]disastrous because the the religious [clears throat] institutes, they all threw off the habits and they decided, "You know what? We don't have to do these direct services anymore where we're clothing the naked and feeding the hungry and sheltering the homeless. No, we need to go out there and picket. We need to carry signs. We need to advocate for these people and get the government to do what we had been doing."

[00:23:26]And and after that, what happened is charity was transformed into an industry. So now uh you don't have these these uh charitable works from the church that are going in and looking at the charitable works as a means to the end of salvation.

[00:23:44]They're looking at feeding the home or feeding the hungry as an end in itself.

[00:23:48]Clothing the naked as an end in itself.

[00:23:51]E- even when our Lord was in the desert, he was getting ready to preach to the multitude and he turned to his his uh followers and he said, "They're hungry."

[00:24:01]In other words, he can't preach to them when they're when they have an empty stomach. He has to fill their bellies in order for them to be in a in a place to listen.

[00:24:09]So this is the methodology that our Lord established for charity. Let's feed them so that we can preach.

[00:24:16]So that's what he did.

[00:24:18]But now they've they've done away with the preaching element, done away with the salvation element and I'll tell you, I spoke with the CEO of Catholic Relief Services gosh, probably 15 years ago.

[00:24:30]That must have been interesting. Oh, yeah.

[00:24:33]>> [laughter] >> Yeah. Well, one of the things one of the things that I brought to his attention, I said, "What what bothers me most about CRS is that not only do you not preach the gospel, but you're not allowed to because you're taking government money."

[00:24:49]And his response was, "Well, you know, we we we don't go out there and trying to convert anybody, but we do try to change people's minds as to how to treat one another.

[00:25:01]Well, that's not going to save anybody.

[00:25:04]I'm sorry, that's not going to That's not going to Doesn't Doesn't communism attempt to do that very same thing? Exactly, and that's where I'm going with Yes. Yeah.

[00:25:16]That's it.

[00:25:17]Charity has been transformed into a Marxist tool.

[00:25:20]Yes. Yes.

[00:25:22]Yes, exactly.

[00:25:24]And it's not only that, but but in the in the our system of free enterprise, I I hate using the word capitalistic Mhm. of capital capitalist society of free enterprise, there's money to be made in charity.

[00:25:40]Yeah. See, this wasn't the this wasn't the case before. Where I I just heard this for the for the first time maybe last week.

[00:25:49]That there are there are people in the United States, especially, who are being paid as caregivers for their own relatives.

[00:26:02]For example, if I take care of my ailing mother, uh stop in and take care of her, buy her groceries, and whatever, I I can be paid for that by the state as a as some sort of an extension of a social worker. Well, I mean, you've got to be kidding me that that I would be paid for doing what I'm supposed to be doing for my mother or for my father or for a for a friend who's ailing.

[00:26:27]The We We everything is a business, and and it's and we've done this, too. It's not just communism that's doing this. We do this also in materialistic and free enterprise. Yep. We've made everything into a business. Communism has taken over has taken over the whole thing because they want to take care of you They want to They want to take care of you from uh from womb to tomb, and not in the best way.

[00:26:50]Uh this is why euthanasia is is is uh is is also approved by most communist states uh because it's it's uh it's a weight on society on this. But but let me just remember say something before I forget what you were talking about I want to connect to that.

[00:27:07]Years ago when this began in the late 60s 1970s overtly overtly because it's always been there uh under under the blanket if you will or uh not so not so clearly but overtly in the 60s and 70s I remember hearing many times that the the most perfect form Let me put it this way. I remember Christian brother saying in high school I don't know what you're upset about or what you're scandalized by when we're talking about Marxism.

[00:27:38]The most perfect form of Marxism is to be found in monasteries and convents. Oh, yeah.

[00:27:46]>> [laughter] >> Yeah. You see Nobody Nobody All of those people were lacking a a sense of critical thinking. They didn't have it.

[00:27:58]And they were they were just buying anything that sounded fluffy and nice.

[00:28:02]Well, this this pleased the Marxists to no end.

[00:28:06]They could they could get more and more and more done.

[00:28:09]Uh your findings your findings uh what you found When would you begin When would you say this this this whole movement began of of progressive meetings that that were organized uh Marxist communist meetings that were being organized all over all over the world especially in Latin America.

[00:28:33]I I should say Hispanoamerica.

[00:28:35]Yeah. Yeah, so the the world meeting of popular movements under the guise of the Catholic Church officially began in 2014.

[00:28:43]Uh apparently Jorge Bergoglio when he was the uh when he was the Bishop of Buenos Aires had started this kind of thing while he was Bishop there. Uh but it's not clear whether there were regional meetings. I know that um organizations like MST, Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais, uh Sem Terra, um La Via Campesina, and various others, they had started organizing back in the early 2000s and I also know that the World Social Forum, which is an international communist uh activity group, where a bunch of these groups they get together and they have marches and they have these different colloquia to meet and to discuss their strategies and that kind of stuff.

[00:29:29]The World Social Forum, by the way, is the opposite of the World Economic Forum. The World Economic Forum is is a bunch of industrialists and bankers and and financiers. They get together and they try to talk about how to transform the world. They want the great reset.

[00:29:44]Well, the World Social Forum is the communist inverse of that. Working towards the same goal.

[00:29:50]So, they Yeah, the World Social Forum started in the early 2000s and Caritas Internationalis, which is the uh overarching umbrella organization run out of the Vatican, uh that of all the international aid and development groups for every diocese in the world, Caritas Internationalis is on the governing body of the World Social Forum.

[00:30:19]Unbelievable.

[00:30:21]Unbelievable.

[00:30:23]So, you know, it's been going on for a while.

[00:30:28]Yeah.

[00:30:29]Tragically, tragically. And this also explains to a great to a great degree why we are where we're where we are.

[00:30:37]Uh in in in in on the confusion in the church. Because you don't just you don't just pulse and pull the rug out from underneath a whole institution and and expect no fall or no no no no no terrible reaction. The reaction that [clears throat] that has been happening for the last uh over the over over the last 50 years. I I like to say 100 years because this has been brewing a long time before the Second Vatican Council. I don't want it to be confused completely with the Second Vatican Council. However, uh our listeners should know that one of the conditions for the ecumenical presence of of the Russian Orthodox Church and the Greek Orthodox Church and what have you in the Second Vatican Council was uh granted by the communist governments of Russia, of Greece, what have you.

[00:31:36]That and under the condition with the condition that no mention of communism be discussed, be be brought up during the council.

[00:31:44]Yeah. Now this is an incredible this is an incredible thing because when you're saying we're having a council to discuss where man is today and what we want to do is aggiornamenti, update update uh our our thoughts and our processes in different ways to accommodate the man of today, the modern man.

[00:32:10]Well, okay.

[00:32:13]One of the things one of one of the things the major problem that's facing modern man 50 and 60 years ago is the same one that's facing him today.

[00:32:23]It's called communism.

[00:32:25]>> [laughter] >> Right.

[00:32:26]Yeah. Now now I'll I'll I'll let these bishops attend your meeting, your ecumenical council, on the condition that you never talk about communism.

[00:32:37]And we agreed to this. We said, "Yeah, oh that okay. Okay, we'll do that."

[00:32:42]Well, we you know, oh well, all right.

[00:32:44]But, go ahead.

[00:32:46]Amazing. The number one The number one topic that should have been discussed during that council was Marxism, communism, and the infiltration throughout the world of it.

[00:32:58]The only thing that wasn't discussed was that.

[00:33:01]You know, when we were first opening this discussion this evening, the I I talked about what Herbert Philbrick had said in his article about how the communists intend to use the church. You actually mentioned how the communists they they don't want to destroy the church just yet, but they do want to use the church to spread communism. A lot of people turn to Karl Marx and they say, "Yeah, but he called, you know, religion the opium of the masses." As if that was some sort of dismissal of uh of religion. But, I want to read to you his full quote. Now, I want to get your reaction to it. Here's what he Sure.

[00:33:36]He said, "The foundation of irreligious criticism, man makes religion. Religion does not make man.

[00:33:43]Religion is indeed self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through himself or has already lost himself again.

[00:33:53]But, man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the Man is the world of man, state, society.

[00:34:03]This state and this social produce and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world because they are an inverted world. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopedia compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual pont d'honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn compliment, and its universal basis of consolation and justification.

[00:34:34]It is the fantastic realization of the human essence, since the human essence is not acquired has not acquired any true reality.

[00:34:44]The struggle against religion is therefore indirectly the struggle against the world whose spirit spiritual aroma is religion. And here's the key part.

[00:34:54]Religious suffering is at one in the same time the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering.

[00:35:05]Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of the heartless world, the soul of a soulless condition.

[00:35:13]It is the opium of the people.

[00:35:15]The abolition of of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness.

[00:35:23]To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions.

[00:35:30]The criticism of religion is therefore in embryo the criticism that veil of tears of which religion is the halo.

[00:35:41]All of this and and again, I want to get your reaction to it.

[00:35:46]But all of this is to say that religion is the illusion that we use to comfort ourselves because the real enemy is suffering. That's my paraphrase of what he wrote.

[00:35:59]And >> Because can you repeat that? Because the real enemy is suffering.

[00:36:05]Suffering.

[00:36:06]That suffering is the enemy. Suffering is the enemy of mankind. Therefore, man has to reject suffering and to wage a war against suffering.

[00:36:15]Which means that communism at its very basic root, Marxism at its core is the rejection of suffering. It's the rejection of the cross.

[00:36:24]And I think that in its essence, that's what we're fighting against.

[00:36:29]It It is a rejection of the cross.

[00:36:33]And you will remember how our Lord reacted to that.

[00:36:39]Mhm.

[00:36:40]When Peter and and the other apostles, I'm sure, but especially Peter said to him, "Lord, this shall not be.

[00:36:48]That you're going to be handed over to the priests and they're going to to execute you and and bring you to crucifixion and and cause you suffering and and death. This shall not be. I won't let it happen," says St. Peter.

[00:37:01]Right.

[00:37:01]>> And what does our Lord call him? Satan.

[00:37:04]Vade retro Satana. Get thee behind me, Satan.

[00:37:09]Mhm. Wow.

[00:37:11]Strong words. This is These are the words almost almost immediately after he he made him pope. That's [laughter] right.

[00:37:21]This has been revealed to you by by my heavenly father, not by not by flesh and blood, right? Thou art Peter and upon this rock I build my church. And within minutes, get thee behind me, Satan.

[00:37:36]What amazing because Peter was tempting Christ from his cross.

[00:37:42]Mhm. And what we know what we know as Catholics Catholic Christians, we know very well that the cross is our way to salvation.

[00:37:52]Everyone has one.

[00:37:54]By the way, those who are listening, if you don't have one yet, be patient.

[00:38:00]Be [laughter] patient.

[00:38:02]Yeah, exactly.

[00:38:03]>> It'll It'll You'll You'll It'll find you real soon. It'll find you real soon.

[00:38:07]This is This is how we get to salvation.

[00:38:10]This is how we are saved, through the cross, not by avoiding it, not by avoiding it, not by a utopia that doesn't that doesn't let us even see or think about that. It's just not It's just not It's not real. It's not real.

[00:38:25]Uh communism is a People keep forgetting communism is a lie.

[00:38:30]Mhm. It's It's basically a lie.

[00:38:32]Uh and and uh nothing of it nothing in it is really true. It's just really not.

[00:38:39]If people would be living Christianity really the way it's supposed to be lived there would be no need for even uh even the existence the beginning of communism or of many other forms of government.

[00:38:54]There just wouldn't be. The problem is that we're human and we're imperfect and we need governments. But we don't need a government that's based on an out lies and is here to like Jean-Jacques Rousseau who who ultimately uh began this whole this whole uh this whole revolution, right? By saying by saying human nature is is is is wonderful.

[00:39:19]Human nature is clean.

[00:39:21]It's pristine. It's marvelous. It's society.

[00:39:27]It's society that's ruined man.

[00:39:30]Mhm. He was born He was born perfectly fine. It's society Not only society, it's the church that's ruined man.

[00:39:40]Also that that perfect society the Catholic Church we've ruined man. Really really.

[00:39:47]We don't begin that way. We begin the other way.

[00:39:49]Mhm. Man has a fallen nature and it's through the church and through grace that he's restored and has the possibility of being saved and saving and participating in his own salvation.

[00:40:03]This is a a whole different direction.

[00:40:06]Unfortunately, Michael uh our church in the last several decades has taken the wrong direction and they've bought into that they bought into they bought into the to the lies. They bought into the lies.

[00:40:22]And so many of our I I remember seeing in Rome when I was studying there good really good priests would arrive every year to begin their studies at the Angelicum or at the Gregorian University or the Lateran, whatever they were studying.

[00:40:39]And within months uh they're singing they're singing the Communist Manifesto.

[00:40:46]It was just it was amazing. Amazing because this was being pushed. We had Gustavo Gutiérrez the father of theology of theology of liberation at our college to give uh to give a a talk and answer questions.

[00:41:02]And I asked the question. I asked the question because I knew it was a question. I'm I'm 21 22 years old.

[00:41:08]Kind of a a wise guy to even be asking anything. I said I said would you approve of violence for your revolution?

[00:41:20]I mean I believe in a revolution. I believe in a revolution. We want we want the world to to become Catholic. That's what I That's the revolution that I'm working for.

[00:41:29]We want the world to be Catholic.

[00:41:32]I really truly want that. That's what I want. That's the revolution I want.

[00:41:36]Would you approve of violence for your revolution? He said yes.

[00:41:42]Yep.

[00:41:42]>> Yes. He said I said that's that's enough. That's all I needed. Yep.

[00:41:47]>> [laughter] >> Yep. And this is this is Christianity?

[00:41:50]This is where the church is going?

[00:41:53]Something very wrong.

[00:41:54]Well, this is one of the lies of the world meeting of popular movements anyway. They all they all talk about non-violence and they don't they oppose violence but it's always the violence of the other side. It's never really their violence. They don't consider what they do to be violent.

[00:42:08]You know, they um Funny how that works.

[00:42:10]Funny how that works. Yeah, you know, MST uh is is well known for not only squatting on farms, but also attacking and killing people's cattle and their their livestock.

[00:42:23]They're known for burning crops. They're known for causing damage to to actual farm owners, people that run farms, because they're trying to steal the land and just use it for however they want to use it and and uh you know, it's it's that disruptive nature of revolution that comes from the left. There's another one, CUC, which I think stands for Comité de Campesina or Campesina.

[00:42:53]And what CUC does in their own history, they talk about how they got their beginnings by collaborating with guerrilla warfare and trying to establish revolution.

[00:43:06]It's amazing.

[00:43:09]And yet, they all talk about nonviolence, but it's always we oppose the violence of the capitalists. We oppose the violence of those who have that prevent us from having what we need or whatever. But it's it's always a denouncement of the other.

[00:43:25]Well, their their message, as their vocabulary is very selective. Mhm. What what I get a kick out of listening to Roam, our Roam, these are people who are supposedly on the same side of of every issue that we are.

[00:43:42]Saying uh we're with you.

[00:43:47]Mhm. Uh all together.

[00:43:50]Everyone welcome. No one denied.

[00:43:54]Except >> [laughter] >> except anyone who's not exactly marching to our orders over here. Right.

[00:44:05]>> Now, what it's amazing. It reminds me that that famous line in Animal Farm, remember?

[00:44:10]All animals are equal and then the sign was changed. All All animals are equal but some animal animals are are more equal than others. Yeah.

[00:44:19]It's This is what This is what we're doing and what we're playing with and it's all going in that Marxist direction.

[00:44:27]It It It really is. It really is.

[00:44:30]Less and less God mentioned and more and more man. Oh, man is the center of everything. Now, be careful.

[00:44:38]I want to bring this back to what we talked about at the very beginning, the church being used to foment Marxism throughout the church. This is what we found with regard to the 2025 meeting that Pope Leo spoke to.

[00:44:54]Uh the the coordinator for the World Meeting of Popular Movements, Don Matteo Ferrari, he said this at the press conference, "For the first time, popular movements will come to meet the Holy Father accompanied by the local churches."

[00:45:08]He He went on. He said, "The delegations of representatives of popular movements from around the world who will come to the to to the new meeting will be accompanied by delegations from local churches with official mandates.

[00:45:22]Thus, together they will also present themselves at the audience with Pope Leo the 14th. This is a sign of the synodal church that builds bridges and of the missionary church that reaches out to the peripheries.

[00:45:37]How can this be interpreted as anything except we are trying to plant the seeds of Marxism in local churches so that the fires of revolution will spread through the local churches and into those poor communities causing revolution against established authorities in the third world countries and around the world.

[00:45:57]How can we interpret it in any other way?

[00:46:00]You can't. You can't.

[00:46:03]It's being presented all of these meetings are being presented synodally is being presented as very organic.

[00:46:11]It's just these people are are are naturally coming into small groups in Cucamonga and Cucaracha and all of these small little places just and then they get into bigger groups and organically they come and now here we are in Rome all organic.

[00:46:30]That's nonsense. This is a con job.

[00:46:33]Right. This is a this is this is a con.

[00:46:36]It's It's not organic. All of this is being planned from day one from that tiny small group in in Cucamonga.

[00:46:45]From that group they were planned.

[00:46:48]Everything is planned all along the way.

[00:46:49]Nothing is left Nothing is left to the Holy Ghost to inspiration.

[00:46:55]Nothing. It's all planned out.

[00:46:58]Therefore, it is dishonest. It's dishonest. You see in all all of the I wish I had an I I had the example right here. There are many examples of this but people who vote the vote is uh seven to 10 10 to 10 to seven.

[00:47:18]10 in favor seven. Seven wins.

[00:47:21]Yeah.

[00:47:23]And uh five to three three wins.

[00:47:27]>> [laughter] >> This It's amazing. It's amazing and and they do this They rely on something else that's that's that's trickery.

[00:47:37]The The older I get the more evident this is.

[00:47:40]We have a memory as human beings.

[00:47:43]Maybe it's maybe it's just in the West but I know this. I'm about three days.

[00:47:51]I'm about three days.

[00:47:53]If somebody wants to perpetrate a fraud give it three days and people will they'll be on to something else. They'll they'll have forgotten about it.

[00:48:03]>> [laughter] >> And what you're what you're doing, Michael, and what I'm trying to to to second with you is no, no, no, don't forget.

[00:48:12]Keep memory of this. Keep memory of this because it's going to be coming up more and more and more. It is we are going to have a great confrontation with this and you better remember the facts. You better remember what's happening.

[00:48:25]You know, in 1952, uh Archbishop Fulton Sheen gave a speech to a congregation of American Catholics in Rome.

[00:48:33]And here's here's what he said. He said, "In 1936, the communist wolves went into the forces with uh which control public opinion.

[00:48:44]There was hardly a prominent newspaper commentator who did not have a communist secretary, although he or she did not know it.

[00:48:51]This was the beginning of the planting of forces of evil communism within the religious communities to destroy them from within.

[00:48:59]A call for volunteers to enter religious orders and make the great sacrifices of life of a seminarian was made at a secret red meeting in a large American city."

[00:49:12]Now, he doesn't ever name the city. Uh I suspect that it was Chicago because Chicago was very much a hub of communist activity. There was a lot of collaboration between Was?

[00:49:23]Well, well, >> [laughter] >> yeah.

[00:49:25]Yeah.

[00:49:27]But uh there there was a lot of um because Chicago was so close to the Canadian border, uh it it was very possible for there to be a kind of a transmission of the communists in Canada operating with the communists in in America and then spread through Chicago because Chicago was very much a a hub of commerce.

[00:49:46]But you know, you you start looking at the you You the dots and you say it's very clear that the communists have been infiltrating the church for the last at least 100 years, if not longer.

[00:49:59]And now we're seeing the culmination. You pointed this out. We're seeing the culmination of it in the church. We're seeing synodality talking about transforming the church in various ways.

[00:50:09]You know, last night I posted on X.

[00:50:12]I I said the the general philosophy of the Synod on Synodality is this.

[00:50:18]If the church ain't broke, fix it till it is.

[00:50:24]>> [laughter] >> And I I think that's where we are. I think I like that. It's good. It's good.

[00:50:30]And that's what they're doing. They're monkeying with everything. They're they're telling us nothing Nothing's changing, but we're going to keep fixing it until it gets changed.

[00:50:38]That is is effectively what we're being told.

[00:50:41]Well, you you can see this, can't you?

[00:50:43]For example, take women's ordination.

[00:50:46]Uh just as as a theme, right? They also gave gave whatever it is. Gave whatever. Gave everything.

[00:50:54]It's voted on quite clearly. These these up to here, no no no more than than this. That's voted on. It's agreed on.

[00:51:05]Uh we need another document and another vote and another study group.

[00:51:10]And we're going to keep studying this until it gives the results we want.

[00:51:15]Right. That's exactly what's happening.

[00:51:17]That's exactly what's happening.

[00:51:20]We've seen we've seen women's ordination turned down by Episcopal committees.

[00:51:25]This doesn't matter. We need it needs further study. It needs further study. This is unbelievable. This is unbelievable. And this is going on and it's going to continue going on until they get their way.

[00:51:37]Isn't that the definition of insanity?

[00:51:39]Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result?

[00:51:43]>> [laughter] >> Well, yeah, the only difference there, Michael, is that this kind of insanity does end up with a different result.

[00:51:49]Yeah. But because there are which is not which is not the true result we understand but it's their result. Yes. Well, because it's the what they're doing is they're trying to stack the they're trying to stack the courts.

[00:52:01]You know, the communists >> Absolutely. their kangaroo courts where they would they would try somebody for something and then when they didn't get the result in the trial that they wanted they'd fire the judge, bring in another judge, and then retry the person for the crime that they were originally charged with. And they would repeat this until they got the judge that they wanted who was going to give them the result they wanted. So, it's all about taking control of those key choke points within society, within the church, within the government, within you know, whatever institution so that they can control the end result. It They don't have to control the entire thing. They just have to be able to control the one entity that's going to change the result.

[00:52:42]That's That's all they have to do.

[00:52:44]That's how they operate.

[00:52:45]>> Yeah.

[00:52:46]Yes.

[00:52:47]And then that Yes, that's it. And that is what's been happening and what it is happening and what's going to continue happening.

[00:52:53]Uh the question here is First of all, what you've done I I started out saying this and I'm going to end saying this. What you've done with this study is a great contribution to to to helping the church understand the church of today. To help to help understand to help us understand how we got where we are.

[00:53:15]It's very important and I congratulate you for it. It should be read by more people. Unfortunately, our bishops are busy doing other things. We don't know what but they're very busy men these men.

[00:53:28]Uh and >> [laughter] >> it's unbelievable.

[00:53:32]Uh we [clears throat] we've got to get back to an understanding of what we're about.

[00:53:37]We really do.

[00:53:38]And and we what people should understand this this communism works in a particular way.

[00:53:46]It's always worked in a particular way.

[00:53:47]It's always toward its ends with no consideration for the truth of a matter.

[00:53:54]It's going to be how we want it. You were talking about the mock trials.

[00:53:59]Uh imagine just imagine a man like Cardinal Mindszenty.

[00:54:04]Dressed up as a clown. Dressed up as a clown and brought into a public courtroom and mocked openly.

[00:54:13]This this is incredible. This is this is the the extremes to which they'll go.

[00:54:20]Uh it it's horrible. Communism is horrible. And it is a lie. Anybody who can't see that I feel sorry for. I really do.

[00:54:28]I feel sorry for all of us because if we don't wake up to this, we're going to be we're going to be living in that sort of a system. This is already eating away at our church. It's eating away at our church.

[00:54:40]Uh that's why so many of the movements that are if you will traditional or conservative or what have you are gaining momentum. And the reason the reason they're gaining momentum is because people are waking up. Thank God.

[00:54:54]Thank God.

[00:54:55]And and but the and the problem is that Rome, for example, doesn't know how to deal with this. Those people were not supposed to wake up.

[00:55:04]Right. That wasn't part of the program.

[00:55:07]You see?

[00:55:08]And we're going to accept anything that we want.

[00:55:11]And every again, everybody welcome.

[00:55:14]Everybody except these.

[00:55:19]Yeah. What what kind of an everybody is that? What is that?

[00:55:24]That's that's very that's communism.

[00:55:25]Communism does that. They do it all the time. They lie to they lie universally.

[00:55:31]They make a universal statement. They lie and then they make it particular.

[00:55:35]Yep. Oh, we didn't mean that. We meant this.

[00:55:39]After after they got the the power. Uh I just wanted to thank you and I'm getting the opportunity now uh for the for that study.

[00:55:48]It I what what it it blew me away. It blew me away.

[00:55:52]I was just I was unaware that I knew that things were going wrong. And I knew that they were going wrong in a lot of ways, but I never knew concretely what.

[00:56:04]And you've you've hit You haven't hit everything because it's impossible to hit everything everything that's wrong in the direction, but this is a major contribution to understanding the problems that we're facing today in Catholicism and in democracy.

[00:56:21]>> [snorts] >> Well, I I I definitely really thank you sincerely for your for your kind words.

[00:56:26]The question now is what do we do?

[00:56:28]I mean, we we have a right >> I I didn't Mike, I didn't want to ask that question. [laughter] Because I don't have an answer. I wish I did. I don't know, but what I what I will tell you is this.

[00:56:42]>> [laughter] >> Knowing the problem is a major step in the right direction to solving the problem, okay? For the for the moment, I'm still in shock of over the problem the exposé of the problem. I But let that sink in a little bit and let and and a lot of people have read this and a lot of people are impressed very impressed with it. Uh let that sink in and sooner or later solutions are going to come forth.

[00:57:12]It's good that we know the problem. We we weren't quite aware of the problem.

[00:57:17]Now we are. We're being made aware. And for that we thank you.

[00:57:21]And maybe in the not too distant future we will have some solutions.

[00:57:26]I hope so.

[00:57:27]Please God. Please God we do. Um But thank you very much for your time this evening and for for kind of talking us through this and thing just >> Michael, it's always it's always a pleasure. It's it's it's always a pleasure speaking with a gentleman. I I I have so much to learn from gentleman.

[00:57:44]>> [laughter] >> When I find one, I'll let you know. It's a joy speaking with you and again, I'll I'll just end thanking you again for the the tremendous contribution you've made to Holy Mother Church.

[00:58:00]I mean that sincerely.

[00:58:02]Well, thank you very much, Father. Thank you if if you would please close us out with an Ave.

[00:58:07]Certainly.

[00:58:19]Santa Maria >> Santa Maria Thank you so much, Father. God bless you and I will see you all next not next week because my son is getting married and I'm not going to do a show next week. So, no show next week.

[00:58:46]See you all next time.