The Antichrist will be "a pacifist, ecologist and ecumenist"

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Pope is warned of a green Antichrist

The Times
March 02, 2007

An arch-conservative cardinal chosen by the Pope to deliver this year's Lenten meditations to the Vatican hierarchy has caused consternation by giving warning of an Antichrist who is "a pacifist, ecologist and ecumenist".

Cardinal Giacomo Biffi, 78, who retired as Archbishop of Bologna three years ago, quoted Vladimir Solovyov (1853-1900), the Russian philosopher and mystic, as predicting that the Antichrist "will convoke an ecumenical council and seek the consensus of all the Christian confessions".

The "masses" would follow the Antichrist, "with the exception of small groups of Catholics, Orthodox and Protestants" who would fight to prevent the watering down and ultimate destruction of the faith, he said.

The Pope traditionally withdraws from public view during the first week of Lent, conducting "spiritual exercises" in retreat with close advisers.

The choice of Cardinal Biffi raised eyebrows in the Vatican, given his sometimes eccentric views. The cardinal gave a warning of the coming of the Antichrist during his two decades as the Archbishop of Bologna, and said that an "invasion" of Muslim immigrants was undermining Europe's Christian values.

Cardinal Biffi said that the Antichrist was not necessarily a person but "the reduction of Christianity to an ideology . . . The teaching that the great Russian philosopher left us is that Christianity cannot be reduced to a set of values. At the heart of being a Christian is the personal encounter with Jesus Christ." But he quoted with approval from Solovyov's Three Dialogues on War, Progress and the End of History, which suggests that the Antichrist is a real figure.

Cardinal Biffi said that Christianity stood for "absolute values, such as goodness, truth, beauty". If "relative values" such as "solidarity, love of peace and respect for nature" became absolute, they would encourage "idolatry" and "put obstacles in the way of salvation".

When he was still Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Pope Benedict sternly defended core Roman Catholic doctrines and opposed calls for an ecumenical Third Vatican Council advanced by Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, the liberal former Archbishop of Milan.

The choice of Lenten speaker has in the past given a clue to Vatican policy, although one source said that Cardinal Biffi had perhaps been chosen because his "verbal fireworks" would keep listeners awake.

Beastly beliefs

-The doctrine of the Antichrist appears in the New Testament, and could denote someone setting himself up as a Christlike saviour. The Book of Revelation refers to the "Number of the Beast", 666

-Martin Luther and other reformers saw the Pope as the Antichrist

-In 1888 the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche denounced Christianity in The Antichrist

-When the Pope addressed the European Parliament in 1988 the Rev Ian Paisley interrupted him, shouting, "I renounce you as the Antichrist!"

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I know luminist but I have a couple of other words to look up before I answer the poll...

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<gasp>

Al Gore is the Antichrist!!

Good thing he didn't become president! Whew.

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Ah... much as I thought...

Well, at one point I thought of Ratzinger as the anti-christ.

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So the anti-christ isn't Dick Cheney OR Paul Wolfowitz? That's hard to believe.

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I keep thinking that any individual that comes along and who truly possesses the capacity to make a difference will neccesarily have some ideas that are in conflict with christianity. Thus he may easily be proclaimed the anti-christ by the fanatics in the vatican. Then he would likely be hunted by zealots.

I mean, if Gandhi were proclaimed the anti-christ in his time, he would probably have been shot long before he actually was, and what a loss that would be.

Heck, if Christ came back today he'd probably be in conflict with the church.

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Do most of us agree that both extremes merge, and as such it's almost impossible to predict which extreme the Antichrist would be on, simply that he would be from one such extreme? I mean, if someone were to knowingly or unknowingly work for the devil and come to great power through philosophies which will prove to dismantle the fundamental economic balances of earth culture, he could presumably be from any one of the demographics and parties which now fight Christianity. So which Anti-Christian movements are the most powerful and most likely to be able to put a man in that level of power? Yes, sociopathic corporations and libertarians. But also, yes, staunch environmentalists and eco-terrorists. And yes, terrorist Islam. And yes, fundamentalist Christians. It's going to be someone who either believes in everything or believes in nothing, but really not in between.

Someone discuss a reason to believe any of the above more than any other one.

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I had to come back when I saw The Secret was the #1 DVD on Amazon. Law of attraction stuff--meaning faith is believing in things which are not true, but physically become true because you believe hard enough. Amazon says The Secret has been #1 for two-ish months now. Even after being from the hippie capitol called Marin County (right between San Francisco, Berkeley, Napa, and Sonoma), having met multiple people in that video, and after 20 years of the martial arts (with meditation classes, chi classes, etc)--that law of attraction stuff still creeps me out. And, to me, that's totally the kind of movement that could groom the kind of person who could rise to power and start a cultural or political chain of events that could start WWIII.

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If you believe there's an Anti christ, then it follows you must believe there's a Christ.

If you believe in the Christ then you believe he will return and establish His kingdom on earth.

You must also believe that the anti christs short reign on earth will be the event that brings Christ back because that is the Christs actual word on the subject.

Therefore the Anti Christ is working towards,, as all things do the fullfillment of the prophecy of the Christ.

therefore he's not an anti christ at all.

That's that. Bring me a glass of red please.

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You left out 'none of the above' and seem to have ignored the fact that the antichrist might acutally be a group.

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For all we know, the pope is the antichrist... It would explain a lot...

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So much to reply to--we'll see if I can do it intelligibly...

1) I'd like to see a discussion on which Christian churches, and which churches at all, believe in The Antichrist. For that matter, which churches believe in antichrists in general apart from The.

2) The former question would answer whether "the antichrist can be a group." I think most people would believe that the USSR or Nazi-ism were both antichrist with a lower-case A. But can the big guy that ends the world be a group, philosophy, concept, etc. or even a female for that matter?

3) "You must also believe that the anti christs short reign on earth will be the event that brings Christ back because that is the Christs actual word on the subject."
If it were that clear, I don't think there'd be a discussion. Again, I'd bet that a decent percentage of christian churches don't believe in The Antichrist at all... that of a man who will perform miracles and will appear to die for three days and then reappear, attracting a whole group of followers to overtly evil ideas. I'm not sure if an unprejudiced reading of Revelations would convince anyone of that future. (Not to say that I don't believe it.)

4) Do we have ny reason to argue which group he will belong to? I personally believe the extremes merge and that apostasy generally comes from fundamentalism more than relativism. I assume the AntiChrist will come from a group that fights my church and others, whether that's mounted itself from a capitalistic/competing church in the name of Christianity or mounted by a non-Christian group. Personally I don't believe AntiChrists of any force come from agnostic parents... AntiChrists in the past have always been former Christians.

5) And the million dollar one, how anti-Christ does he have to be? Can he just be non-theistic but not atheistic (like a Buddhist); can he just think something different than mainstream Christianity but still believe that Jesus was sent by God (like a Muslim.) Can they be Christian in every sense of the word, just not dues-paying members to the televangelists union (like a Mormon.) If a Catholic becomes President, do you fear he's the Antichrist? It still scares me that so many people in polls say they'd more quickly vote for a Muslim for President than a Mormon; partially because no one who responds that way in polls has any real reason to polarize to that extent.

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The Antichrist will be "a pacifist, ecologist and ecumenist"

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