America’s tanking economy saturated the news this past weekend. But one of the most alarming statements in the New York Times had nothing to do with the economy.

“This pope is looking to reconquer Europe,” wrote Rachel Donadio, “if not in numbers, then at the political table” (September 19, emphasis mine throughout).

That makes my heart flutter. The Catholic Church has been Europe’s single greatest and bloodiest constant for nearly 2,000 years. History books overflow with examples of the Vatican exploiting church-state relationships as vehicles for fulfilling dark papal ambitions. They also prove that European leaders seeking military and political dominance always seek sanction and support from the pope. Have we forgotten Justinian’s imperialistic restoration or Charlemagne’s astounding but bloodstained accomplishments? Can we ever forget the Crusades, Napoleon and Hitler’s Third Reich?

Each of these bloody events was sponsored and participated in by the Catholic Church!

Now Pope Benedict xvi is resurrecting those memories by, as the Times put it, trying to “reconquer Europe” and lock down church-state relationships across the Continent.

History is screaming at us. Can you not hear it? It’s saying we ought to be alarmed when a pope goes on a personal crusade to conquer Europe!

Donadio began by asking, “Is the Catholic Church a beleaguered underdog, fighting for a voice in secular Europe, or a still-mighty power, wielding its influence on European law through friendly center-right governments?” That question, she wrote, “has been building momentum throughout Pope Benedict xvi’s three-year-old papacy ….”

Donadio recognizes, as many in the mainstream now do, that Pope Benedict xvi is on a personal crusade to restore Catholicism to the heart of European politics. But while many recognize the ambitions of Pope Benedict xvi, few, including Donadio, are concerned. We ought to be: It would be foolish to underestimate the power and craft of a 2,000-year-old religion that has more than 1 billion adherents and a long, blood-stained legacy of empowering tyrants, slaughtering enemies and dominating Europe.

History tells us that the harder the Vatican works to establish Catholicism at the heart of Europe, the closer it ought to be watched and evaluated—and the more alarmed we should all grow!

With this in mind, let’s parse the pope’s jaunt to France a week and a half ago. That trip—made at a tumultuous and transitional period in European history—was a significant event for France, and for the entire European continent.

When Benedict landed at the airport on Friday, September 12, he was greeted by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who rejected the tradition of greeting leaders at Élysée Palace and actually welcomed the pope at the airport. Sarkozy then escorted Benedict to Élysée Palace, where, within hours, the two wasted no time in laying groundwork for what could be the biggest change in France since the French Revolution.

The dominant theme of Benedict’s trip, established in his first public address, was that France needs to rethink and redraw its church-state relations!

Speaking first at Élysée, the Catholic president added to remarks he had made to the pope during a visit to the Vatican in December 2007, where he advocated a “positive secularism” that allows for greater mingling between religion and government, and allows for religion to improve society. Speaking before fellow politicians and a delighted Benedict, Sarkozy said blatantly that it would be “madness” for France, which “accepts its Christian roots,” to “deprive ourselves” of religion.

If a French president made that statement a few decades ago—in front of the world’s most recognized religious leader, no less—he would likely have sparked riots across France!

France is a deeply secular state. In France, secularism, as Henri Astier observed, “is the closest thing the French have to a state religion.” In France, the law of laïcité, or secularism, strictly separates church and religion, and has been the backbone of French political thought since the French Revolution and the foundation of the current political and legal system established in 1905. Religion in France is strictly a private matter. It is kept completely out of public life, is not taught at all in schools, and the government is forbidden to subsidize any religion.

For 200 years, the principle of secularism has been the untouchable. It is the one uncompromisable issue in French politics.

Or it was. Before Nicolas Sarkozy and Pope Benedict xvi came along.

Here’s how the pope responded to Sarkozy’s blandishments:

At this moment in history when cultures continue to cross paths more frequently, I am firmly convinced that a new reflection on the true meaning and importance of laïcitéis now necessary. In fact, it is fundamental … to become more aware of the irreplaceable role of religion for the formation of consciences and the contribution which it can bring to—among other things—the creation of a basic ethical consensus within society.

France, redefine laïcité now! Strip away the subtlety and Orwellian doublespeak, and that’s essentially what Benedict was espousing. It was a subtle yet audacious speech, in which Pope Benedict xvi basically told France to rethink arguably its most culturally definitive law! He made other similar statements on Saturday and Sunday. Together, the pope and the French president waged a spectacular assault on the political and legal underpinnings of the French state. In fact, this visit may well represent France’s first steps away from secularism.

The intrigue doesn’t end there. Agnès Poirier, writing in the New Statesmanlast week, revealed the high level of strategic cooperation Benedict has extracted from the president of France. Sarkozy’s notion of “positive secularism,” said Poirier, is a carefully concocted “Trojan horse,” designed to result in the eventual redefinition of French politics and France itself. Now here’s where the story gets especially gripping: “The term ‘positive secularism’ was actually coined in 2005 by the then Cardinal Ratzinger, whose views have inspired two of President Sarkozy’s close aides and speechwriters, the practicing Catholic, Emmanuelle Mignon, and the Dominican friar, Philippe Verdin.”

Imagine that! Sarkozy’s notion, even his phrasing, of “positive secularism” was originally concocted by the wily Joseph Ratzinger, former head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and the man he now affords unprecedented state honors and key compromises: Pope Benedict xvi.

“So what we have witnessed,” continued Poirier, “is Nicolas Sarkozy pretending to have an idea that originated at the Vatican, while the pope, its delighted author, sits back and waits for the president to implement ‘his’ idea.” That’s impressive foresight on Benedict’s behalf. It appears he’s been making plans to undermine the secular French government and society for at least three years. “A few days ago,” concluded Poirier, “in an interview with the Catholic French daily La Croix, Benedict’s private secretary clearly stated that the holy father expected the president of France to diligently transform this idea into acts.”

If Sarkozy comes through, we could very well see a Catholic revival in France!

Peter O’Neil, European correspondent for the Canwest News Service, agrees: “Analysts say French Catholics, with the lowest church attendance rate in Europe, feel threatened by the growing number of Muslim immigrants and might therefore be more open to greater recognition of the Catholic Church’s role in French culture and history.”

We should also realize that the pope designed this church-state campaign in France for a wider audience. Like everything this pope does, his push for improved church-state relations in France was intended to resonate in the minds and hearts of political leaders and citizens across Europe.

Pope Benedict xvi is concerned about a “progressive secularization of European institutions,”said John Allen Jr., a columnist for the National Catholic Reporter. Benedict is deeply concerned about and in the process of addressing the secularism rooted in multiple societies throughout Europe. The reason he went after secularism in France is that he believes the rest of Europe, as Allen wrote, is being “heavily influenced by the French model.” Benedict knows that if he can stem the rising tide of secularism in France, the bastion of European secularism, he can stem its rise across Europe.

And be assured, if the pope is prepared to confront secularism in France, he’s more than prepared to tackle it elsewhere on the Continent!

“Let’s not make mistakes, there are laws in Europe that the Vatican would like to change,” said Allen. The pope’s remarks to France were “not an apolitical reflection,” he said. Benedict makes no pretense of being above or clean from political matters. Allen is absolutely right: Benedict’s remarks were a cannon shot across the bow of European national governments—and even the now-forming European supranational government!

“… Benedict’s insistence that religion and politics be ‘open’ to each other,” explained Rachel Donadio in her Times article, “coupled with his strong renewal while in Lourdes of the church’s opposition to same-sex couples, communion for the divorced and euthanasia—sends a direct message: The church doesn’t want European law to be at odds with church teaching, and he wants Roman Catholics to make some noise about it.”

Donadio is right: Pope Benedict xvi is on a crusade to “reconquer Europe”! That’s what his trip to France was all about. That’s what his remarks about the need for France to rethink its secular underpinnings were all about. He was warning France, and all of Europe—and, in effect, you—that he is on a quest to reestablish Catholicism as the spiritual heart of Europe.

If you haven’t studied much European history lately, now might be the time to dust off those history books and look into the Vatican’s historic relationship with Europe. Anyone who does this will see that it’s a truly frightening relationship.

Nothing is more alarming, more brutal, more devastating, than the Continent conquered and steered by Roman Catholicism!

How long will we ignore the terrifying ambitions and cunning actions of Pope Benedict xvi? How much longer can the pope get away with craftily attacking secular governments and encouraging Europe to return to its Catholic heritage before the world wakes up and realizes that he intends to resurrect theHoly Roman Empire?

Pope Benedict xvi is looking to reconquer Europe! This is the context in which we must analyze news as it unfolds on the Continent. The Trumpet can give you both historical and prophetic insight into Pope Benedict’s attempt to resurrect the Holy Roman Empire. For nearly 20 years now the Trumpet, under the stewardship of Gerald Flurry, has upheld and declared the words of Herbert W. Armstrong, the editor in chief of the Plain Truth, and a man who for 40 years, beginning in World War ii, declared the final resurrection of the Holy Roman Empire!

To learn more about the prophesied future of Europe, read Germany and the Holy Roman Empire.