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Ever heard of the term “Co-Intel-Pro”?
In 1956, the Federal Bureau of Intelligence (FBI) designed
“Co-Intel-Pro” (or “Counterintelligence Program”) to “increase
factionalism, cause disruption, and win defections” from subversives
and dissident groups operating within the borders of the United
States. The FBI began the program, in part, due to Supreme Court
rulings that had hamstrung the FBI in its efforts to infiltrate and
destroy subversives and dissident groups.
Co-Intel-Pro was successfully kept secret until 1971, when the
“Citizens’ Commission to Investigate the FBI” burglarized the FBI
field office down the street in Media, Pennsylvania. Members of the
group stole dossiers and exposed the program by turning the dossiers
over to the news media. Within one year, the FBI Director, J. Edgar
Hoover, declared Co-Intel-Pro dead.
In his book War at Home, attorney Brian Glick identified four
tactics the FBI used during the Co-Intel-Pro era:
1.
Infiltration:
FBI agents and their informers did not just spy on political
subversives and dissidents. Their main purpose was to discredit and
disrupt, their presence serving to undermine trust and to scare off
potential supporters. To exploit this fear, the FBI and local
police smeared genuine subversives and dissidents by identifying
them as FBI agents and infiltrators.
2.
Psychological warfare from the outside:
The FBI and local police planted false stories in the media and
published bogus leaflets and other publications using the names of
targeted groups. The FBI forged correspondence, sent anonymous
letters, and made anonymous telephone calls. The FBI also spread
disinformation about meetings and events, set up pseudo movement
groups headed by FBI agents, and manipulated or strong-armed
parents, employers, landlords, school officials, and others to cause
trouble for suspected subversives and dissidents.
3.
Harassment through the legal system:
The FBI and police used the legal system to harass subversives and
dissidents with the goal of making them appear to be criminals.
Sworn officers of the law gave perjured testimony and presented
fabricated evidence as a pretext for false arrests and wrongful
imprisonments. They discriminatorily enforced tax laws and other
government regulations and used conspicuous surveillance,
“investigative” interviews, and grand jury subpoenas in an effort to
intimidate subversives and dissidents as well as to silence their
supporters.
4.
Extralegal force and violence:
The FBI conspired with local police departments to threaten
subversives and dissidents, to conduct illegal break-ins in order to
search the homes of subversives and dissidents as well as to commit
vandalism, assaults, beatings, and some believe, assassinations.
The object was to frighten if not to eliminate subversives and
dissident groups and to disrupt their movements.
Why am I providing all of this detail about Co-Intel-Pro?
In today’s gospel, Jesus thanks his heavenly Father for hiding
divine truth from “the wise and the intelligent” and revealing it to
“the little ones.” Understanding God’s truth requires having a
simple, pure heart, one incapable of being deceived—even
by the intelligent—whose
goal oftentimes is to manipulate other people’s minds so that they
believe what is not God’s truth is God’s truth or to render
God completely irrelevant when considering what the truth may be.
A lot of people today don’t believe that evil exists as an objective
entity. For them, evil is the stuff of fanciful imagination, the
“Super Ego,” that the more wise and intelligent among us are capable
of deconstructing. Satan and Lucifer don’t exist; no, they are
inventions by which the ignorant keep themselves and others from
doing what they really want to do (all of that
“Id”
stuff),
living their lives in fear that if they did do what they really
wanted to do, God would condemn them—like Satan and Lucifer—to spend
eternity in Hell...if there even is such a thing.
Let me suggest today that Evil—that’s a capital “E”—utilizes all of
the Co-Intel-Pro tools available. Evil—the “Deceiver,” the “most
cunning of all creatures,” it’s called in the Book of Genesis—knows
just how to confuse and to frighten, if not to eliminate otherwise
good people.
How does this Co-Intel-Pro work?
Evil infiltrates the minds of what are otherwise good people to
discredit and disrupt their religious sensibilities—God’s
truth placed
within their hearts—as well as to undermine any trust in religious
institutions and to scare off those people who would otherwise
challenge evil by naming evil for what it is.
For example, when our hearts tell us that we shouldn’t do something,
this Co-Intel-Pro tells us that it’s okay to do it and offers all
sorts of exculpatory reasons and excuses that introduce confusion
and doubt into our minds. Then, as we move from the simple—what our
hearts tell us—to the more complex—what Co-Intel-Pro tells us and we
ponder in our minds—the unreasonable becomes increasingly reasonable
and the good—God’s
truth—becomes increasingly less relevant.
Evil uses psychological warfare by having the media spread
disinformation. The goal is to bombard otherwise good people
that with the message that they are somehow in the wrong and behind
the times by trusting in God’s
truth. Evil also uses meetings and public events to strong-arm
otherwise good people—parents, employers, landlords, school
officials, and others—so that they will cower for fear of
embarrassment, harassment, or retribution. It’s all about
intimidating otherwise good people and silencing anyone who might
think of supporting them.
For example, this Co-Intel-Pro suggests that since “everybody does
it,” then it is certainly okay for anyone to do it. If we need more
convincing, all we have to do is turn on the television or read
magazines and newspaper articles. If all of that doesn’t convince
us, then it’s time for peer pressure to intimidate us. The more we
allow all of this external disinformation to influence our thoughts,
the less we listen to what is interior—the truth that God has placed
in our hearts.
Lastly, evil will use force and violence to frighten otherwise good
people and to disrupt their lives so they live in fear. And, if it
must, evil will eliminate those who stand in the way.
For example, this Co-Intel-Pro incites those it has already caused
to silence the voice of their hearts to coalesce in self-serving
ideological groups—for in numbers there is power—to force those who
object to capitulate or to face being ostracized, rejected, or even
put to death. The specter of being ostracized, abandoned, or left
hanging on a cross becomes too much to bear.
Through these and other Co-Intel-Pro tactics, the power of evil
successfully gets many otherwise good people to believe that what is
objectively wrong is objectively right and what is objectively
immoral is objectively moral. It’s all based upon the patently
false notion that intelligence can trump goodness.
That’s
why,
in today’s
gospel,
Jesus tells his disciples to be “little ones.” That is, to be
simple and trusting of God’s truth that has been placed within so
that, as they are obedient to what is interior rather than what is
exterior, Jesus’
disciples
will experience true freedom as God’s beloved sons and daughters.
This weekend, we celebrate the Fourth of July. “Independence Day,”
we call it. Two hundred and thirty five years ago, the colonists
fought a long and bloody war so they would never be again be
dependent upon any earthly sovereign. “Life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness” was their cause. But, what made their cause
noble is that the colonists rooted it in what is interior, the Laws
of Nature and of Nature’s God, which made these truths
self-evident. There are many today who are not much interested in
that noble cause. Trusting in their intelligence and not being
“little ones,” they would rather have life, liberty, and pursue
their happiness irrespective of the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s
God.
Today, Jesus challenges us not to allow Evil’s Co-Intel-Pro to
silence the truth that God has placed into our hearts. Instead,
Jesus calls us to be “little ones,” who consider the Laws of Nature
and of Nature’s God and, then, root our lives, our liberty, and our
pursuit of happiness in this truth “with a firm reliance on the
protection of Divine Providence.” To this, “we [must] mutually
pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.”
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HOMILY
