On July 5, 2002, the Catholic pro-life organization Life Site National (LSN) reported that "Pro-lifers around the globe were dismayed Monday at the Vatican’s welcoming of the establishment of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Archbishop Renato Martino, the Vatican's representative at the United Nations issued a release in support of the ICC and noted that the Vatican had contributed a symbolic donation of $3,000 to the ICC trust fund set up by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan."

        LSN notes that pro-life activists who followed the creation of the ICC during U.N. conferences "have warned from its inception about the dangers of the ICC. Gwen Landolt, a lawyer with REAL Women Canada … warned that the ICC is far from ideal. While the Vatican's worldview would be one based on Christian morality, the ICC, warns Landolt, is based on radical feminist ideology. Integrated all through the ICC document is feminist ideology."

        Landolt noted the very real prospect that "the Pope could be called before the ICC." LSN says that "Landolt’s comments echo those of Dr. Richard G. Wilkins, Professor of Law at Brigham Young University. Wilkins, a leading authority on the ICC who regularly acts as legal counsel for pro-family NGOs (non-governmental organizations) at the United Nations, told LifeSite that the ICC could eventually be used to try ‘the Pope or other religious leaders’ since issues such as abortion and homosexuality would inevitably fall within the ICC's jurisdiction."

        LSN observes that "The possibility that the ICC could try the Pope is hardly far fetched. Pro-abortion groups have long planned to use the ICC to force abortion on countries and individuals unwilling to bend to other pressures. At the UN Beijing +5 Prepcom in 2000, at a panel discussion, Rhonda Copelon of the International Women’s Human Rights Law Clinic, who served as the chief ICC legal strategist for the powerful UN Women’s Caucus for Gender Justice, said the court was a ‘tool’ that will serve as a ‘model’ that she said ‘can be used to change domestic laws’ to conform with feminist goals."

        Think it can’t happen? Think again. The ICC, notes Wilkins, is without checks and balances and "has the most powerful prosecutor ever with the vaguest criminal statute passed anywhere. The ICC leaves open to total discretion of the prosecutor and the court the determining of what the ‘crimes’ mean." Indeed, it is already becoming apparent that the ICC will be used as the international enforcement arm of Big Abortion. According to LSN, in June of 2000 International Planned Parenthood "accus[ed] the Pope and the Catholic Church of war crimes." A letter by Planned Parenthood declared that "The opinion and actions of the Holy See in regard to sexual and reproductive health and rights are seen by many as a kind of war, a war that contributes to the suffering and deaths of millions of innocent people, a war not conducted with guns and fire but with condemnation and psychological terror." (See http://www.lifesite.Net/ldn/2000/jun/00063005.html)

        Furthermore, "in March 2002 a German artist launched a suit against the pope for the Church’s stand against using condoms. Karl-Friedrich Lentze filed a case at the International Court in The Hague arguing that the Pope ‘should be made responsible for the deaths of countless people’ since, according to Lentze, the Pope’s stand against condoms shows ‘significant contempt and arrogance towards human life’". (See http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2002/mar/02030504.html)

        Yet the Vatican apparatus, led by Cardinal Sodano as Secretary of State, pushes ahead with its promotion of the structures of the New World Order in what it evidently believes is a post-Fatima Church. Of course, Sodano’s attempt to bury Fatima will sooner or later be trumped by the divine designs of Heaven - just as the attempt of the Pharisees to bury Christ was trumped by the Resurrection. Meanwhile, however, that tinkling sound you hear is 3,000 pieces of silver being deposited by Cardinal Sodano’s minions into the coffers of what already promises to be one of the biggest persecutors of the Body of Christ in the Third Millennium.