Letter #135, 2021, Tuesday, October 19: Viganò defends the dockworkers of Trieste, Italy

    Above, an Italian policeman hugs a protester on the docks of the port city of Trieste, Italy, and one of the protesting dockworkers prays (link) 

    You are demonstrating not only against a cowardly blackmail, with which you have to choose between a salary or the use of a pass; but against an entire ideology, against a faceless tyrannical power that seeks to impose itself definitively, which enjoys the unconditional support of the media and politics.” —Italian Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, 80, in an open letter to the striking dockworkers of Trieste, Italy, written yesterday, October 18, 2021, the Feast of St. Luke the Evangelist, and published today, October 19, 2021 (full text of the letter below, and here in the Italian original)

    Resistance to an authority that abuses its power against the purpose for which it was established is not only legitimate, but obligatory; how necessary was the struggle against totalitarianism and against all forms of dictatorship. And remember that you are all Christians, that your fathers and mothers have transmitted to you a Faith and values ​​that have allowed our beloved homeland [that is, Italy] to be a beacon of civilization, culture, art, business.—Viganò, in the same open letter to the striking dockworkers of Trieste, published today

    A “conservative” bishop who is defending the working man

    After Italian police over the weekend attacked Italian dock workers with water canons, tear gas and batons as the workers protested against very strict new vaccine mandates in the port city of Trieste, Italy, “conservative” Italian Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò issued a powerful open letter defending the workers’ right to strike (full text below)… a position that would have been considered “progressive” or “leftist” or at least “on the side of the working man” a few short years ago.

    So Viganò, who has been characterized as a “conservative,” “traditionalist,” “right-leaning” figure in the Catholic Church, is in these days turning out to be one of the few voices in the post-conciliar Church — the Church since the Vatican Council of 1962-1965 — willing to publicly, powerfully defend the rights of the working man not to be laid off from a job when the worker’s conscience has led the worker not to agree to comply with business or government imposed mandates which the worker believes are immoral or potentially physically harmful.

    In this sense, Viganò in these recent days, though still quite isolated, is becoming an unexpectedly “progressive” prophetic moral voice in the Church, and in the world.

    These Trieste port workers are in danger of losing their jobs if they hesitate to be vaccinated.

    Without their jobs, they will be unable to feed their families (how is that for a positive health measure?).

    But who in the Church is reaching out to these marginalized working men and women?

    Only Viganò.

    Who in the Church is publicly defending the “little people” of Italy — and of the world?

    Who in the Church is in true solidarity with the working men and women of Italy, and of many other countries, who fear the loss of their jobs, their livelihoods, their professions, and the hardships that will ensue for their families, but are nevertheless persuaded in conscious that they cannot and must not accept corporate and government health dictates that they regard as morally wrong and scientifically doubtful?

    Only Viganò, almost alone.

    Only Viganò is speaking out for these workers.

    And as Viganò does so, it is against the background of a world episcopate — thousands of Catholic bishops around the world — who remain silent, week after week, month after month.

    Viganò takes seriously the moral position of these workers, and he takes seriously the heavy cost these workers now face — loss of their salaries — as they try to abide by the dictates of conscience.

    So we have a peculiar picture coming increasingly into focus:

    —on the one hand, hundreds of “progressive” Church leaders, actually thousands of such “progressive” leaders, who have seemingly in fact lost touch with the working class, who are unwilling to defend the rights and the consciences of thousands and tens of thousands of workers who are being crushed by the dictates of huge corporations and governments… and

    —on the other hand, one solitary bishop, standing almost alone, dismissed by the majority as a “traditionalist” Catholic bishop “out of touch” with the workers men and women of today, yet in fact the sole Catholic bishop in Italy willing to speak out on behalf of the Trieste workers, even as they are pitilessly crushed by established power. —RM

    The British journalist Julian Gomes who writes from Rome for Church Militant has just published an account of the dockworkers’ strike and the accompanying crackdown of the local authorities here.

    Here are a few lines from this striking story:

    Cops Attack ‘No Vax’ Dockers Praying Rosary (link)

    Pope, Italian bishops mum as Viganò addresses protests against tyranny

    TRIESTE, Italy (ChurchMilitant.com) – Italian police attacked dock workers with water cannons, tear gas and batons as the workers prayed the Rosary and protested draconian vaccine mandates in the port city of Trieste Monday.

    Italians at the protest slammed the indifference of bishops to the suppression of workers’ rights while Vatican whistleblower Abp. Carlo Maria Viganò provided a lone voice demonstrating solidarity with dockers in a rousing address to peaceful protestors.

    Archbishop Viganò calls for prayer

    Viganò’s address condemning the government’s attempt to “enslave citizens under the pretext of a psycho-pandemic” by “coercion and blackmail” was read to hundreds of dockers who gathered in Piazza Unità d’Italia after police violently evacuated them from the port.

    (…)

    Begging the crowd to refrain from violence, Viganò exhorted: “Your weapon, a terrible and very powerful weapon, must be the Holy Rosary. Invoke the Blessed Virgin, pray to her together with your loved ones, your children, and your brothers … and she will inexorably defeat our adversary.”

    Catholic Hierarchy: ‘Boot Lickers’

    Pope Francis and the Italian bishops not only are silent; they are accomplices of the medical tyranny,” Roberto Dal Bosco, editor of Renovatio21 told Church Militant.

    The founder of the Renovatio21 group continued: “The Roman hierarchy is now the boot licker of the New World Order: Every Italian concerned with what is going on is realizing it. The Church is supporting — even, enforcing — tyranny. You live with the cognitive dissonance that the parish priest — who is telling us to get the abortion-tainted jab and obey totalitarian rules — could be your enemy.”

    Dockers’ Resistance

    Meanwhile, footage of dockers weeping; a pregnant woman beaten by police; tear gas rounds fired at women and children, a lower secondary school and into a baby’s carriage; and demonstrators holding hands in the air to signify nonviolence, went viral across Italy.

    “I am here for my three children. Sabrina, Antonio, Sofia — daddy is here for you! I am fighting for you and all the children of this planet. I will fight for you and only for you until the end. Fight, never give up,” said head of the dockers’ protest Stefano Puzzer, bursting into tears.

    Dockers sang and danced in closed circles with locked arms facing water cannons later in the cold night. A moving scene showed a docker facing the cannon and begging the police not to fire on workers as “we are all brothers” (“fratelli tutti“) and “we are in this together.”

    Speaking to Church Militant, a fire brigade source said police drove water cannon trucks into the fire stations and, on government orders, commandeered the stations’ water reserved for fighting fires to fire on peaceful demonstrators.

    Faithful Catholic and mother of four Fabiana Serra, who joined dockers in solidarity and handed out Rosaries for them to pray, told Church Militant several police in riot gear downed their helmets to de-escalate the situation and show solidarity with dockers.

    “A particularly moving moment was when a policeman hugged a female protestor outside Gate 4 showing the humanity of some of the cops who comforted the demonstrators. Many firefighters and police have also joined the protests,” Serra said.

    “A lone Polish priest was seen leading protestors in praying the Rosary,” she noted. A source from Rome said the cleric was later reprimanded by his superiors.

    Trieste Archbishop’s Weak Words

    Mainstream media and politicians attempted to smear the protestors as “fascist” and “violent.” A senior civil servant told Church Militantthe Draghi government was planning to send in the army to quash the dockers’ revolt.

    In a press statement, archbishop of Trieste Giampaolo Crepaldiexpressed “growing concern” over the “evolving situation” late Monday, calling for “dialogue,” “mutual listening” and a “noble and disinterested discernment.”

    But Roberto Dal Bosco told Church Militant “the only Catholic voice that is heard now by faithful Catholics and people of goodwill is that of Abp. Viganò.”

    “When the protest leader who read Viganò’s message mentioned Viganò’s name, the whole crowd cheered: Everyone knows Viganò, and that he speaks the truth. He alone dares to tell it all, and he isn’t afraid to say that it is a spiritual, Catholic fight,” Dal Bosco added.

    (…)

    The crowd cheered, shouting “Bravo!” and applauded the archbishop both at the beginning and end of his address.

    Green Pass Lights the Fuse

    Nearly 95% of the 950 dockers went on strike after the Italian government enforced its Green Pass — proof of vaccination, recovery or a negative test — on workers across the country Friday.

    As truck drivers drove slowly to block traffic, dockers in the ports of Ancona, Genoa and Trieste went on strike, and thousands of protestors in dozens of cities and towns marched against the mandate. The demonstrators include those who have been fully vaccinated but are against coercion.

    (…)

    Abp. Viganò earlier addressed demonstrations against medical tyranny in Rome’s Piazza del Popolo on October 9 and in Turin on October 15.

    Massive crowds gathered in Trieste City Centre as protests continue unabated on Tuesday despite heavy police presence in full riot gear.

    Here is the text of Archbishop Viganò’s letter to the dockworkers of Trieste    

    Letter by Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò to the striking dockworkers of Trieste, Italy

    By Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò

    October 18, 2021

    Dearest friends,

    I am following the peaceful protest that the dockers of Trieste have been calling for a few days, against the illegitimate rule that obliges all workers to obtain a health pass, obtainable by undergoing the inoculation of the experimental gene serum, or by subjecting themselves to a swab every forty-eight hours.

    You have now understood, dear friends, that the so-called vaccine is still in the experimental phase; that the long-term effects are unknown; for weeks there have been more and more adverse reactions to deaths, which the Health Authority – with the complicity of the media – tries to hide by categorizing them as sudden illness.

    We are all guinea pigs, the subject of mass experimentation imposed by pharmaceutical companies on their servants in institutions.

    You also know that the vaccine does not guarantee any immunity, does not protect against infecting either from being infected.

    And you know that swabs also have minimal reliability, because they were not designed to be used for diagnostic purposes.

    Yet, an employee cannot work, cannot receive a salary, nor have sick leave and maternity leave, if he does not agree to undergo this vile blackmail, with which you are forced to vaccinate or prove that you have not been infected from a virus that no laboratory – I repeat: none – he still isolated, but only sequenced.

    And I challenge anyone to prove otherwise.

    The violation of natural freedoms, civil and constitutional rights, the right to freedom of speech and peaceful demonstration has become an instrument of coercion and blackmail by a civil authority that no longer protects the health and well-being of citizens, but with the pretext of the psycho pandemic wants to enslave them. Slaves to control, to supervise, of which to trace every movement, every purchase, every transaction, every activity.

    And don’t be surprised: everything they are doing in these months – and what they will do in the next few months if no one stops them – was clearly stated.

    From the use of the pandemic emergency to impose new forms of control, to the use of the ecological emergency to prevent us from using the car, buying certain products, using electricity or gas. In their projects, they want to destroy our world, our culture, our religion, our way of life, of working, of relating to each other.

    We must become [Translator’s note: in their hope] automatons without critical judgment, customers of their multinationals, underpaid slaves of their companies, without rights, without protection, without social security and without freedom. Some of you – especially among those who joined this protest only lately – they will think that what I tell you are conspiracy theorems.

    Some naively think that this pandemic – whose deaths were caused almost entirely by the prohibition of following effective protocols – has only been mismanaged, by incompetent or inexperienced people.

    But it is not so.

    Anyone who talks about the decline in infected people and the absence of green passes in the countries of Northern Europe is unaware that, in a few months, in Denmark the digital ID with which every citizen will be registered with the identity card, passport, tax code will be mandatory, health card, vaccination status and bank account.

    And if there was no lockdown and curfew; if masks have not been made mandatory, it is only because those countries are already perfectly fine globalized, indoctrinated in the Great Reset ideology, ready to have the subcutaneous microchip inserted.

    In Sweden the microchip is already active on a voluntary basis, and used to open the front door or start the car. In the Northern countries, online purchases, the use of riders, electronic payments have already been a reality for some time.

    But here with us, no: until February last year, those who wanted a pizza ordered near the house, without the need to use an app.

    This is why in Italy, Spain, Portugal and in general in all the countries of Catholic tradition – the countries that some consider backward – the pandemic emergency had to be used: it had to serve to force us to cancel our way of life – a human way of life, made up of interpersonal relationships, greetings, hugs, conversations and exchanges of ideas – replacing it with the use of technology, the internet of things, to the impersonal application that records what we buy, when, where, at what price and with what type of payment.

    They want to know what we write on social media, what we say at home with Alexa and Google, what we like to read on Kindle, what movies we watch on Netflix and what music we listen to with Spotify.

    They know where we are going because the car, the cell phone, the watch, the iPad and even the bag and clothes have a connection to the network.

    They want to know your heart rate, your blood pressure, your blood sugar level, and of course how many and what vaccinations you have had or need to have.

    They also want to control your reproductive cycles, deciding if and when you can be fertile.

    They know how much you earn, how much you spend, how you spend it, who you meet with, which vehicles you travel on. In Italy this is happening more slowly than elsewhere.

    Thank God, there are people like you and like many other citizens who have understood that vaccination is a pretext to put you on a permanent leash, forcing you to do what you don’t want just because otherwise you can’t work, travel, eat.

    They don’t care about breaking the law. They are not interested in breaking the Constitution with impunity, let alone the law of God. They fear no one but their masters.

    The political class – the entire current political class, from the majority to the opposition – is completely subservient to a tyrannical power that commands governments, finance, health care, the media, large companies, the forces of law and order, the judiciary.

    And the ecclesiastical hierarchy is no exception, also subservient to the New World Order.

    This protest of yours, dear friends, is much more important than it may appear.

    Because you are demonstrating not only against a cowardly blackmail, with which you have to choose between a salary or the use of a pass; but against an entire ideology, against a faceless tyrannical power that seeks to impose itself definitively, which enjoys the unconditional support of the media and politics.

    A power that no one has ever elected, and which for this very reason does not consider necessary either the democratic vote or the role of the people’s representatives, since it has already bought them and blackmails them.

    This morning you were removed from the port entrances with fire hydrants, tear gas and batons. Means by which violent criminals, non-peaceful families and honest workers who see their wages and their freedom in danger are dispersed. You have been charged by policemen and carabinieri who are the first to experience the absurdity of the green pass, since some of them do not have one.

    I hope your peaceful and composed response leads them to think about what they are doing, about the betrayal of the Constitution on which they have sworn, about the tyrants they obey.

    He [Translator’s note: Jesus Christ] arose not to give in to violence, but equally not to be intimidated by rulers appointed by banks and pharmaceutical companies, because their power lasts as long as there are those who let themselves be frightened, those who obey, those who bow their heads and endure in silence.

    If each of you, firmly and peacefully, will be able to resist this intolerable oppression, this grotesque farce will collapse. inexorably, and with it the extras and extras who support it.

    Resistance to an authority that abuses its power against the purpose for which it was established is not only legitimate, but obligatory; how necessary was the struggle against totalitarianism and against all forms of dictatorship.

    And remember that you are all Christians, that your fathers and mothers have transmitted to you a Faith and values ​​that have allowed our beloved homeland to be a beacon of civilization, culture, art, business.

    Those who fought by giving their lives for Italy, to defend its sovereignty and independence, look down on you from heaven and expect equal pride, equal courage, equal honor.

    Remember of your Bishop Mons. Antonio Santin, who stood up to the Fascists, the Nazis and the Communists.

    We defend our identity, our religion, our values, our children, our loved ones, our work, our home.

    And I beg you: do not give in to the provocations of those who seek only the pretext to transform this nation into a regime subservient to Freemasonry, the Bilderberg Group, the Club of Rome, the Trilateral, the World Economic Forum, the WHO and all these conspirators, nameless and faceless.

    Your weapon, a terrible and very powerful weapon, must be the Holy Rosary. Invoke the Blessed Virgin, pray to her together with your loved ones, your children and your brothers; take up the blessed Crown!

    Together we ask Mary Mother and Queen of Monte Grisa and the Madonna della Salute venerated in Santa Maria Maggiore, to help our Italy, to protect it, to free it. Pray with faith, and she will inexorably defeat and defeat our adversary.

    I bless you all, assuring you of my prayer and asking you, begging you to place all your hopes in the Blessed Virgin, our Lady, our Mother, Help of Christians. Long live Maria! Long live Christ the King!

    + Carlo Maria Viganò, Archbishop

    October 18, 2021Saint Luke the Evangelist

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