Pierre Marchildon, Full-time Pilgrim of St. Michael

Jan.-Feb.-March 2008
(continued from page 8)
Money is a licence
Money is nothing but a ticket, a licence that
costs nothing to produce but a decision and a
drop of ink. And in order to get this licence, the
population must get into debt for all that they
produce. Can one imagine worst economic tyranny?
The banker’s pen which consents or refuses
to give to individuals, to corporations, to
governments, the right to mobilize the skills of
professionals, the nation’s natural resources,
that pen commands; it grants or refuses; it sets
conditions on the financial permits that it gives;
it gets into debt those individuals or governments
to whom it grants permits. The banker’s
pen has the power of a scepter in the hands of
a superpower — the monetary power.
From 1929 to 1939, we endured ten years
of economic paralysis. Not one government
thought it had the power to put an end to it.
A declaration of war came, and the financial
permits to produce, to draft, to destroy and to
kill, suddenly appeared overnight.
This fact, on its own, should have been an
eye-opener, and made everybody understand
by now that this 10-year Depression was nothing
but a 10-year refusal by the controllers of
money and credit of releasing licences (money).
It only required their decision to put an end to
the depression and money shortage. For example,
the decision came to instigate the war,
when the money-licences were issued by the
billions, to finance six years of the most expensive
war ever.
Yet, you may still hear backward scholars
deny that the volume of credit in circulation
depends upon the action of the banks. These
scholars, who resist the obvious, are an invaluable
support to the superpower through their
ignorance — if it is really ignorance on their
part, or perhaps through vested selfish interests
that bind them, or through their collusion with a
power which can bring them easy promotions.
Upper-class bankers on the other hand,
know very well that financial credit, which
makes up the bulk of modern money, is created
and cancelled in the ledgers of banks.
A distinguished British banker, the Right
Honourable Reginald McKenna, one-time British
Chancellor of the Exchequer (Minister of Finance)
and Chairman of the Midland Bank, one
of the Big Five (five largest banks of England),
addressed an annual general meeting of the
shareholders of the bank on January 25, 1924,
and said (as recorded in his book, Post-War
Banking):
“I am afraid the ordinary citizen will not
like to be told that the banks can, and do, create
and destroy money. The amount of finance
in existence varies only with the action of the
banks in increasing or decreasing deposits and
bank purchases. We know how this is effected.
Every loan, overdraft, or bank purchase creates
a deposit, and every repayment of a loan,
overdraft, or bank sale destroys a deposit.”
Having also been Minister of Finance, Mc-
Kenna knew very well where the bigger of the
two powers — the power of the banks and that
of the sovereign government of the country
— resided. And he was frank enough to state
the following, which is very uncommon among
bankers of his level:
“They (the banks) control the credit of the
nation, direct the policies of governments, and
keep in the palm of their hands the destinies of
the peoples.”
This is a statement which is in complete
agreement with what Pope Pius XI wrote in his
Encyclical Letter Quadragesimo Anno, in 1931,
about “those who, because they hold and control
money, are able also to govern credit and
determine its allotment, for that reason sup-
plying, so to speak, the lifeblood to the entire
economic body, and grasping, as it were,
in their hands the very soul of production, so
that no one dare breathe against their will.”
The solution
The solution is to replace this non-constitutional
superpower with a constitutional monetary
organism, similar to the judiciary system,
staffed with qualified accountants instead of
judges. These accountants would, like judges,
fulfill their duties independently of the powers
that be. They would base their operations —
additions, subtractions, or rules of three — on
statistics which do not depend upon them, but
on the statements of the production and consumption
of the country, resulting from the free
activities of free producers to respond to the orders
freely expressed by free consumers.
The Jan. 7, 2008 issue of the Italian newspaper
Il Messaggero reports:
“The issue of globalization, which has
been one of Pope Benedict XVI’s primary
concerns, will be at the center of his first social
encyclical. It has been leaked from the
Vatican that the encyclical will be made public
on March 19, feast of St. Joseph, patron of
laborers. (It will also be the Pope’s name day.)
Globalization has been a key point in many
Papal documents — from an appeal to the G8
during their June 2007 summit, with a letter
to German Chancellor Angela Merkel asking
her to urge her colleagues to help Africa more
and to forgive debts to poor countries, to his
homily during his pastoral visit to Velletri in
September, when he denounced globalization
carried out only for economic reasons.”
On Sunday, January 6, 2008, the solemnity
of the Epiphany, the Holy Father issued
strong words in his homily:
“Yet, what the prophet (Isaiah) said is
also true today in many senses: ‘thick darkness
covers the peoples’» and our history.
Indeed, it cannot be said that ‘globalization’
is synonymous with ‘world order’ - it
is quite the opposite. Conflicts for economic
supremacy and hoarding resources of energy,
water and raw materials hinder the
work of all who are striving at every level
This means that money and credit would
only be the faithful reflection, the expression in
figures, of economic realities.
If the pen of an usurped superpower can
create or refuse, according to the will of this tyrant,
the financial credit, based on the nation’s
real credit, the pen from a constitutional monetary
power would be as effective to issue the
financial credit, to the service of the population
and all the members of society. This end would
be specified in the law.
There would no longer be a purely financial
hindrance. Getting into debt to foreign bankers
for things that we can produce in our own country
— this idiocy would cease to exist. Prices
that keep going up, when production becomes
easier and more plentiful — such an inconsistency
would cease to exist in a monetary body
that is obligated by law to make the financial
aspects of the economy the exact reflection of
reality.
The seeking of new job creations while the
machine, instead of human labour, supplies
products — such a ridiculous policy would be
relegated to a past history of subjection to a
monster. The astronomical waste, due to the
production of things that are useless to the
normal needs of people, with the sole end of
creating jobs, would be banned as a lack of responsibility
to the generations that must succeed
us.
And thousands of other things as well will
ensue with this establishment of a monetary
power of service, and when this unbearable rule
that links income solely to employment is done
away with, when the first effect of progress
should be a free man. Thhis would allow him to
devote himself freely to activities which are less
materialistic, and to tend towards the blossoming
out of his personality and freedom.
Louis Even
Pope: globalization is synonymous
with world disorder
New social encyclical due by March 19th
to build a just and supportive world. There
is a need for greater hope, which will make
it possible to prefer the common good of
all to the luxury of the few and the poverty
of the many. ‘This great hope can only be
God... not any god, but the God who has a
human face’ (Spe Salvi, n. 31): the God who
showed himself in the Child of Bethlehem
and the Crucified and Risen One.
If there is great hope, it is possible to
persevere in sobriety. If true hope is lacking,
happiness is sought in drunkenness, in the
superfluous, in excesses, and we ruin ourselves
and the world. It is then that moderation
is not only an ascetic rule but also a
path of salvation for humanity. It is already
obvious that only by adopting a sober lifestyle,
accompanied by a serious effort for
a fair distribution of riches, will it be possible
to establish an order of just and sustainable
development. For this reason we
need people who nourish great hope and
thus have great courage: the courage of the
Magi, who made a long journey following a
star and were able to kneel before a Child
and offer him their precious gifts. We all
need this courage, anchored to firm hope.
May Mary obtain it for us, accompanying us
on our earthly pilgrimage with her maternal
protection. Amen!
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