On October 12, 2001 Zenit.org reported that according to Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, the Vatican’s permanent observer at the U.N. headquarters in Geneva, "The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to the United Nations and its secretary-general, Kofi Annan, is an important omen for the future of the institution."

       And why is that? Because, says Archbishop Martin, "in contributing to peace there have also been dark moments in the history of the United Nations"---you don't say! ---"but it is necessary to recall that it is a multilateral and intergovernmental organization, and its policies are linked to the policies of the states and great powers."

       Yes, and so what? What actual good has the United Nations done for the cause of true world peace? Even its response to the terrorist attacks of September 11 was tepid at best. Perhaps that is because the United Nations itself is little more than a collection of terrorist regimes ruled by tin-pot dictators, communists and "ex-communists." And how could the Archbishop fail to notice that the entire world is a terrorist regime which commits genocide against the unborn and busily undermines what is left of the moral order with every new piece of godless legislation?

       It was not so long ago that Pope Pius XI, in his encyclical Ubi Arcano Dei, warned Catholics not to look to any sort of humanistic "league of nations" to bring peace to the world, but rather to the only institution capable of producing true peace among men: the Holy Catholic Church. As Pius XI declared in that encyclical:

       No merely human institution of today can be as successful in devising a set of international laws which will be in harmony with world conditions as the Middle Ages were in the possession of that true League of Nations, Christianity. There exists an institution able to safeguard the sanctity of the law of nations. This institution is a part of every nation; at the same time it is above all nations. She enjoys, too, the highest authority, the fullness of the teaching power of the Apostles. Such an institution is the Church of Christ. She alone is adapted to do this great work, for she is not only divinely commissioned to lead mankind, but moreover, because of her very make-up and the constitution which she possesses, by reason of her age-old traditions and her great prestige, which has not been lessened but has been greatly increased since the close of the War, cannot but succeed in such a venture where others assuredly will fail.

       But those who carry out the Vatican's current diplomatic policies continue to praise the United Nations and to lend their support to the creation of a godless International Criminal Court under U.N. auspices. They just don't get it. The current world crisis cannot be solved by institutions composed of the same men who have caused the crisis. The crisis can be ended, and civilization saved, only by men of faith, acting through the instrumentality of the one true Church.

       In our time we have been given a heavenly reminder of this simple truth: "In the end My Immaculate Heart will triumph. The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to Me, which will be converted and a period of peace will be granted to the world." Those simple words have infinitely more worth than any Nobel Prize. They are, in fact, the key to true peace in our time. If only the men who dictate Vatican policy today would remember this.