www.byzcath.org Forums News & Events Church News British Warrant for the Pope's arrest?!

I am speechless....

click here to read this pathetic absurdity [aolnews.com]

Lord have protect your servant, Pope Benedict and have mercy on this world.

Two words: Sovereign Immunity.

... from the article:

The Vatican has previously claimed that, as a head of state, the pope is immune from prosecution. However, the two atheists' lawyers have advised them that the pontiff is not the head of a state with full United Nations membership, meaning he could be arrested on British soil.

"I'm convinced we can get over the threshold of immunity," the pair's solicitor, Mark Stephens, told The Guardian. "The Vatican is not recognized as a state in international law. ... It was a construct of Mussolini, and when the Vatican first applied to become a member of the U.N., the U.S. said no. So as a sop they were given the status of permanent observers rather than full members."

Full United Nations membership is not a criterion for sovereign immunity and never has been. This is just another example of activist lawyers attempting to demolish the nation-state system that has governed international relations since the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648.

Mr. Stephens' historical synopsis of the history of the Vatican City is, shall we say, somewhere between disingenuous and outright duplicitous. Among other things, he ignores the existence of the Papal States down to 1871, and the establishment of diplomatic relations between their successor, the Vatican City (world's smallest sovereign state, as any player of Trivial Pursuit or Jeopardy knows) from the last quarter of the 19th century onward puts lie to the claim the Vatican was 'invented" by Mussolini. As to why the United States turned down Vatican membership in the UN, the reason was rooted in domestic U.S. politics, and not in some inherent defect in the status of the Vatican City.

Just why does anyone care what the Guardian has to say, anyhow? I'd go to Pravda for accurate information, if I had to make a choice.

Any attempted indictment will be quashed because none of the governments involved want to go there. After all, once sovereign immunity is dismantled, each and every head of state or head of government everywhere

All that you are saying is true, but what is pathetic is how literally 'hell bent' these gentlemen are...

BTW...I didn't read it on the Guardian, (a rag, I am aware), but out of curiousity when it popped up on AOL news in front of my eyes while trying to log into my email account. Anything that grabs attention on the pages of email providers that need to be filled daily is fit to print these days, I suppose.

It is heart-wrenching to see how vicious and hateful the attacks of a most holy and humble man are. Sickening. Let us all continue to pray for the Pontiff.

Alexis

I most certainly agree, Alexis...

May our Lord protect the Pontiff from all the attacks of the evil one through the hardened and hateful hearts of some men and women.

Such people truly are hell-bent, to such an extent that they can't wait to get to the real thing, but create their own simulacrum right here on earth.

Indeed!!

Do we have one of the 'puck' faces any place. I guess it is a good thing we don't. It would most likely be getting used overtime right now.

Lord have mercy on us!

Sorry y'all for my rudeness. It is just sicking to think of such, I don't know what to call it. I just wonder what her Majesty, the Queen thinks of all of this. Oh, well! God have mercy!

The real issue gentlemen and ladies is the laying of groundwork for open persecution as has never been seen since the time of the Emperor's. It's comming just watch and see.
Stephanos I

Unfortunately, from outside, it appears the Queen is pretty much irrelevant these days to British jurisprudence and law.

This will never fly in the international community. There would be such a wave of protest from countries with large Catholic populations that such a move would come to naught.

I recall that when the U.S. went ater Noriega, he fled to the Vatican Embassy. The commander of the U.S forces was interviewed and he commented that if it were any other embassy, they would have simply stormed in and pulled out Noriega. "But you don't do that with the Vatican," he stated.

Blessings

Actually, I doubt whether U.S. forces would storm any embassy of a country with which we are not at war. Embassies are sovereign territory and like foreign heads of state, enjoy sovereign immunity. The headaches of violating diplomatic immunity greatly exceed the satisfaction of nailing a two-bit thug like Noriega. The U.S. would do what it did in the case of the Vatican Embassy: place it under blockade and wait for Noriega (or whoever) to wear out his welcome.