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Paris, FRANCE (LifeSiteNews) — Bishop Athanasius Schneider is certainly the most outspoken bishop on the subject of abortion-tainted vaccines, but as a former citizen of a communist country – having lived as a child in a member state of the Soviet Union – he is also very much opposed to the “sanitary dictatorship” that is being set up in so many countries under the pretense of fighting COVID-19. As France is sliding into an increasingly totalitarian system where COVID “vaccination” will be compulsory as of September 15, and where both the public and employees are being forced to exhibit a “sanitary pass” for many ordinary acts of life, Bishop Schneider answered LifeSite’s questions about the eschatological dimension of these unprecedented requirements. 

“I do not say this is the direct sign of Beast, to be clear, but it could be already in part a prefiguration of this sign,” he answered, repeating several times that the measures being imposed are in a way making the state the “owner” of your body. 

“If the government has absolute power to force you, and to say how your body should be, then you have lost you last privacy because your body belongs to you,” he said. 

Bishop Schneider made very clear that we are under a double obligation to resist these developments: conscientious objection against the use of abortion-tainted vaccines must go together with practical resistance, for instance by creating networks that allow people to buy and sell, and also travel, without needing to obtain a sanitary pass. 

“We have already now to seek all the practical possibilities to avoid this new forced dictatorship over our body and our freedom. If we do not do this, there will be a totalitarianism that will be complete, and this will be the end of every human society,” he said, more than once using the word “slavery” to describe the consequences of the measures being forced on French citizens. 

But Bishop Schneider’s message is anything but pessimistic. Seen from the point of view of eternity, the present situation will be “to the benefit of the good of souls,” he underscored, recalling that all that God permits ultimately contributes to His greater glory. 

Nor does Bishop Schneider believe that transhumanism will be allowed to prosper up to the point where a new kind of man would be created by the powers of science: “God will not permit it.” 

Finally, he encouraged all the faithful to place themselves under the protection of the Virgin Mary, who has all powers of intercession on our behalf. 

Here below is the full transcript of Bishop Schneider’s recorded video interview with LifeSite.  

LifeSiteNews: The French government has introduced mandatory vaccination for the health professions and all those who work with sick people or the elderly. This ranges from firemen to home care assistants. There is a very strong mobilization against this “vaccine” mandate. For other people, the government has set up a sanitary pass; unvaccinated people can get one that is only valid for 72 hours after testing negative for COVID-19. This is in fact designed to prevent them from living a normal life, since without this test, which would have to be repeated every three days, they cannot access large shopping centres, cafés, restaurants, a large number of hotels, concerts, cinemas, etc. Fortunately, churches are excluded from this scheme, but visiting a person who is in hospital is prohibited, as is access to hospital for non-urgent care. With this QR code requirement, the unvaccinated person is effectively made an outcast, threatened with very heavy fines for any breach of the law. What do you think of this type of scheme? 

Bishop Athanasius Schneider: I think this goes fundamentally against human rights and human dignity because, as you mentioned, two classes of people will be established in society, and those who are not vaccinated are in fact becoming a kind of person who has almost no equal rights compared with the others. This means they become a kind of slave  because they have no rights: substantially, they have no freedom. I consider this to be very dangerous – this establishing of a two-class society. As I said, this is fundamentally contrary to human rights and human dignity: we are returning to societies of totalitarianism. We have known totalitarian systems where a special kind of people for various reasons, or for racial reasons, were marked by an exterior sign, and did not have the same civil rights as the others. 

So this is a really dangerous phenomenon. We are now approaching it under the pretext, of course, of sanitary measures and health care. This is only a pretext because there is no certain proof that the vaccination is really effective to prevent COVID contamination. There are even proven cases – this is not some conspiracy theory – of people whose names are known, who got the virus even after receiving COVID vaccination; they were tested positive and in some cases, people’s health conditions even got worse. Because we have those cases already, it should be a sign that this vaccination cannot be an absolute demand; therefore, we have to protest against these evident violations of fundamental rights and even against these violations of evidence which exist. When our society is turning into a place where evidence is simply denied, this is a sign that we are in a dictatorship because only a dictatorial political system denies evident facts in order to promote its program. It is clear that there is a program to vaccinate all the people in order to achieve a concrete political, social, or ideological objective. 

LSN: The Spanish Constitutional Court has recently decided that a theoretical vaccine, even in the case of a major epidemic, cannot be considered constitutional. 

Bp. Schn.: That at least is good news: that no one can be forced by a government to be vaccinated. A similar decision was made by the European Council. This is already a good sign because if the government has absolute power to force you, and to say how your body should be, then you have lost your last privacy because your body belongs to you. With this forced vaccination, the government is, not in theory but de facto, declaring that it is the government that will become the owner of your body. For me, this is the ultimate expression of extreme communism because communism aims to say that all belongs to the state, such as the means of production and so on – education, family, all is common. But now even the body, your own body, is becoming the property of the state. 

The communists were already beginning to [confiscate] parents’ own children, in order to take them to education camps, when parents did not obey state ideology. These parents were deprived of their children! Now some Western European countries are doing the same, taking away children from the family when they oppose gender ideology education in schools. Now we are witnessing something similar with de facto forced vaccination. When you have to have these green passes by being tested every third day; this is a practical, very cunning, and cynical violation aimed at forcing people to receive vaccination. I ask myself: now that the European Council and the Spanish court have issued that decision saying that the state does not have the right to force someone to be vaccinated, will the governments apply these decisions? Who will have the power to give us the guarantee that these decisions will be applied? But at least it is a beginning and a good step. 

LSN: In France there are already 11 mandatory vaccinations for children under 2 years old including the Rubella vaccine which is often abortion-tainted. However, these are not associated with a pass or a QR code. Do you think that with the imposition of a QR code we are entering into something different? 

Bp. Schn.: Of course, because you are completely controlled. You have no more freedom, even regarding the privacy of your body. Information about your body is in this code so, yes, it’s a substantial difference, and therefore we have to protest against this code that will affect the privacy of the body. 

LSN: You have spoken out strongly against the use of fetal cells obtained through abortion for the development, production, and testing of COVID vaccines. As we all know, many experts in moral theology have explained that for the individual who would use these vaccines, this would be a mere remote cooperation with evil, and that, in view of the issues at stake, we can accept this injection. You have already addressed these questions in substance many times; you have explained your thoughts and opinions. I would like to ask you today if you do not think that these leaders are depriving Catholics of the support of the Church with regard to their right – not to say their duty – of conscientious objection, which can even extend to refusal? 

Bp. Schn.: This is evident because … the church authority says okay, you can take this vaccination because there is a moral theory which says this is a remote material cooperation. They tranquillize and calm consciences with this; by this they are substantially weakening any resistance which we must oppose. 

We have to resist and protest against the horrible phenomenon in our society which is the so-called “fetal industry.” We must distinguish between two different industries that are of course intimately connected: the abortion industry itself which is horrible, and the other: the so-called fetal industry, the use of tissues of aborted babies and the marketing of the body parts of the aborted babies. Here they are being used for research or for the production of several medicines including vaccines. So the vaccines which were produced by using these cell lines, or tested on them, are a de facto part of the so-called fetal industry. This fetal industry needs to be distinguished from the abortion industry even if they are connected; but the fetal industry is closer to us, so when you are using the product, the vaccine is a direct product of the fetal industry. So we are no longer remote to this fetal industry, and it is a very grave immorality to participate with full knowledge and full freedom in this horrible phenomenon of our society. For a Catholic, the fetal industry is immoral and very grave because we are de facto collaborating with it, and especially committing a great sin of omission, in failing to protest clearly and strongly, at least against the use of cell lines in the fetal industry and in vaccination. 

Therefore, it is a great irresponsibility of the Church, even of the Vatican and of theologians who tranquilize and calm the conscience of the people, and who in this way are paralyzing the resistance. This is serious. 

I have to add another phenomenon. I recently spoke with a woman who has converted deeply to God. In her past life, she committed abortions, and after converting to God she recognized all the horrors of abortion. I spoke with her about abortion-tainted vaccinations, and she said to me that she could better understand this horrible situation of abortion-tainted products and medicines than I, or than any woman who has never experienced an abortion. She told me: “I can say that all that is connected to abortion in medicines and in their production is so horrible for me because I was so deeply wounded by the fact of abortion.” She told me she can never accept any medicine or product or vaccination which is linked in some way to the … assassination of a child. 

LSN: I meet many people now who, for various reasons, are absolutely opposed to the vaccine, but who risk losing their jobs, their families’ livelihoods, if they do not take it. They say: my duties of state are to ensure the survival of my family, and I cannot do otherwise than to receive this vaccine, even if I am totally opposed to it. Added to this is the fact that many medicines and other vaccines that everyone in France has received are already affected by this. What would you tell them? 

Bp. Schn.: For other vaccines and medicines that are contaminated with abortion, we have to have the proof: the pharmaceutical companies have to give the proof that this medicine was tainted or tested. As to the currently famous anti-COVID vaccines such as Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, [and] Sputnik, the pharmaceutical industry has acknowledged this. For other medicines we have as yet no public acknowledgment, so we can use them because we have no proofs. But we should ask this about every medicine. From the moment I receive from the pharmaceutical company the proof that a medicine is tainted with abortion, I have the obligation not to use it and to use another medicine. We must choose good companies and doctors who can provide us with an alternative medicine that is not tainted with abortion, or at least a natural medicine that God gave us – and maybe this will be more helpful for us. 

The second point is more difficult, involving people who know they will lose their job – especially parents who have to provide for their families. This is, of course, a very difficult question. But at least they should do all that is possible to avoid receiving such a vaccine. They can make a conscientious objection; perhaps they can even obtain a document from their doctor who will say that for a medical reason this person cannot receive a vaccination – because there is some allergy, for example. In such a case, they have to try to find all the possible means to avoid this, or even change jobs, even if this will leave them poorer. They have to choose this and not a vaccine because of this close support of the fetal industry – not of the abortionists but of the fetal industry. 

I think that God will reward these people with many spiritual gifts if they choose to live a poorer life rather than to co-operate with the fetal industry. Surely they will not die from starvation, God will never permit it! This was our experience in communist times. My parents did not collaborate with the Communist Party, for example; therefore, my parents could not have a profession, this was not allowed. And so they were simple workers, they had a low salary, and we lived in a really simple way. But God did not abandon us; we were happy in our faith and this gave us riches for all our life – even when the others who had accepted the conditions of the Communist Party had better living conditions than we did, and than other people, Christians, for example. And so I think we have to give again the primacy to the eternal life which we have so largely forgotten in recent decades. Even in the Church, even the good Catholics, we were invaded by a kind of materialism because we were so very  attached to the material life and giving it primacy over the eternal and the spiritual. 

So this is a principle: I would say change work, and even if I have to do a simple job like cleaning the streets, I will still have some means to sustain my family, but in a poorer way. This is a decision of conscience, I think, but God will reward these people, of course, and it will be a sign of protest, and a witness that we are not collaborating with the horrible fetal industry. 

LSN: What is your response to those who say that such measures, the sanitary pass, for example, and widespread vaccination, are absolutely essential so that we all together can recover public liberties, and that to refuse them is to show selfishness? We are hearing this a lot: people who don’t want the vaccine are being called egoists. 

Bp. Schn.: No, this is not egoism. If you get the vaccine, you will only find apparent freedom because this so-called sanitary pass is transforming you into a slave, because with this pass your body will belong to the state and no longer to you, in some way, with these codes and so on, and that is how you are losing your freedom. How can you call it egoism when it is not proven that the vaccine protects from contamination of the virus? It’s not proven that when you have received the vaccine that you cannot develop or transmit COVID. We conserve more freedom when we do not receive it. 

LSN: Is this QR code an attempt to impose the mark of the beast of which the Apocalypse speaks, or a sort of prefiguration of it, insofar as the non-vaccinated risk finding themselves the victims of a kind of confinement, which for many will make it impossible to earn a living or to pursue their studies? 

Bp. Schn.: We can say that this is perhaps already a kind of prefiguration of the mark of the Beast. Maybe I would not say myself, directly, that this is already the mark of the Beast. I have not yet all the elements to say this, but at least we can say it is a kind of prefiguration because the Apocalypse says you cannot buy or sell if you have not the mark in your hand, on your body. It is very close when people who are not marked in their body with the vaccine – this is a mark – cannot enter certain shops or supermarkets: they cannot enter, they cannot buy or sell there, and this is literally already being carried out. 

I think we have to be prepared to be excluded. Perhaps alternative systems can be established: for example, those who are against vaccination can perhaps make a new chain of exchange, the private exchange of products in a smaller manner, with small shops that are not submitted to the pass, or in the open air, or private chains of exchange of produce. I think it is possible to establish this. In France there are large protests against forced vaccination: I think these protests could lead to new mutual systems of buying and selling products that people need because so many people are involved.  Hopefully in other places and in other countries such systems of selling products can be created. 

We have to find alternatives; it is very important even for the buying and selling of products. When we are excluded from public transport, like trains, buses, and so on, we can create a system to travel with private cars. We must already seek all the practical possibilities to avoid this new forced dictatorship over our body and our freedom. If we do not do this, there will be a totalitarianism that will be complete, and this will be the end of every human society. 

I appeal even to nonbelievers, all people of good will: please already start to plan alternative systems, in transportation, in buying and selling products, maybe for studying also, by having private study centers. We have to develop these at least theoretically and then practically, with all these good people who are demonstrating: how to survive. We have to make a world alliance of protest and alternatives; if we do not, we will have a complete totalitarian system. And this we have to avoid. 

LSN: Can the QR code used to prove vaccine status already be in itself considered as a form of the mark of the Beast? 

Bp. Schn.: Yes. This code will contain all your private information about your health that is already under control of the state. This code is linked, as I understand it, to the vaccine. The vaccination contains at least some “footprints” of abortion, even if they are very far from the horrible assassination of children which is already in itself a satanic act. The using of their bodies, of their tissues, is also in se satanic because it is a revolt against God, the Giver of life. In this case the abortion-tainted vaccines have some satanic footprints, even though they be remote, of the Beast. So the vaccine, with its corresponding code number, is a prefiguration of the sign of the Beast. I do not say this is the direct sign of Beast, to be clear, but it could be already in part a prefiguration of this sign and therefore we have to avoid this also. This code is immoral in some way as, I repeat, the government is completely taking possession of your body. 

LSN: In your opinion, is it in theory permissible to find ways of circumventing the law in order to escape its harshness, for example, by means of a false certificate? I would not encourage people to do so because of the heavy fines involved.

Bp. Schn.: The de facto compulsory vaccine is an abuse of power on the part of the government; that is in itself immoral. By it, I repeat, the government is becoming the owner of your body and your privacy, and this is against fundamental rights. God ordered the structure of society which government has not the power to do. The intrinsically evil law of forced vaccination which is in some way connected or tainted with abortion and the fetal industry is immoral. Because it is a forced act, I think you can in this way present even a fake document. 

I would compare this situation with the immoral laws when some totalitarian governments issued immoral orders against the Jews. We know that Pope Pius XII and the bishops, when the Jews were persecuted by the Nazis, permitted the use of fake documents to protect the Jews. It was allowed because the laws against the Jews were intrinsically immoral. 

It would be a kind of self-defense: you defend yourself your body and your privacy from an aggressor who is [oppressing] you. In the same way you can defend your child or your family against an aggressor who would kill your children or take them into slavery. For example, when you are a mother and you have children in your house and evil people arrive who want to steal your children to put them into slavery: if they ask you if your children are there, surely as a mother you will say “no,” because you have to protect them. Telling them: “Yes, they are here, I will open the door and show you where they are” would be crazy if you were a mother. You say, “No, they are not here.” You will say an untruth, but because it is intrinsically evil to take your children into slavery. When there are no other ways, it is the last means of self-protection against the aggression of the state. 

LSN: What would be the precise responsibility of an elected politician who votes for such measures? In France they obtained a positive vote of the Assembly and the Senate; each time, a large proportion of the parliamentarians were missing, they were absent. The law was adopted with very few voters. In your opinion, what is the responsibility of these elected officials who voted for these laws or who were not there to vote against them; or the responsibility of the policeman or the gendarme who is in charge of the implementation of these laws? 

Bp. Schn.: The members of parliament have full responsibility, I think, because they are representing and are elected for the common good of the citizens. When they abstain or vote in favor of these dictatorial, totalitarian laws to control you completely, to disown you or your own body with this compulsory vaccination, they are committing evil because they are collaborating in making you slaves of the state, in making your body become a property of the state. It’s immoral to collaborate in making such laws, and also to abstain. As for the policeman who implements this, he has a lesser responsibility because he is only fulfilling the orders of the state. Maybe he is not even personally convinced, but he will be forced, so it is not so much his own responsibility as the fact that he is executing an unjust law. In some cases I think the police, as responsible citizens, can find some way to protect you, maybe not to be severe, for example, in checks and so on while formally obeying the law. In all dictatorships, even in Nazi camps, there are policemen who find a way to protect the people. 

LSN: What is your spiritual advice for Catholics who are worried? I see many who are very afraid now of the situation that is arising. What would you tell them to do? 

Bp. Schn.: First, I would give them the word of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Gospel. He says, Do not fear those who kill your body, but fear those who will take your soul, or damage your soul. We must not fear the government; we have to give the primacy to our soul, to our spiritual life, to the life of prayer with the sacraments, and thus we should be deeply rooted in our prayer every day. We must be rooted in our faith, in our conviction that our life is ultimately in the hands of God and not in the hands of the government, even in a dictatorship, even in a totalitarian system! Our life is ultimately in the hands of God who is our heavenly Father. He is our Father even when we are, in certain periods of time, in distress and persecuted and humiliated as with this forced vaccination. This is a relatively short time, so we have to look wider and further because God permits this ultimately only for the benefit of our soul. Saint Paul says all will contribute to the greater benefit of those who love God, all things will contribute to the benefit of a greater good for those who love God. If we are rooted in our faith, in the trust of the Providence of our heavenly Father, knowing that our life is in His hands, this should give us confidence. We know the current sanitary COVID dictatorship, this totalitarianism is short, it is relatively short, it is not eternity! History has always shown that dictatorships did not last so long, and God will even show to these new “sanitary dictators” that their power is limited. We have to believe that God will intervene in history. 

We must also concentrate deeply on the fact that maybe this is an appeal of God for us to go deeper in our prayer lives. We have to deepen our sacramental life with more regular confession, more regular Communion, and prayers. Maybe we should be more united with all those who are opposing this dictatorship, to make a chain. Maybe these difficult times are an opportunity to confess God, to be faithful to Him. But God is so good that He always gives the necessary graces, and He rewards us in difficult times and gives us His consolations. This is my counsel and my advice. 

LSN: It appears to us that there is a will to take over the human body, a transhumanist plan that is being put in place, and even carried out. Is it conceivable that God would allow mankind to fall – for most people unwillingly – into something so contrary to His will for mankind? 

Bp. Schn.: I think not because God reserves to Himself His divine powers of creation, and so there will not be a substantially new human being as transhumanists want to create. They will not succeed: God will not permit it. He is the Lord; we have to believe this. They will perhaps produce some things, but it will not be a human being, never, because God creates the soul which is the essential part of the human being. I repeat: I do not believe that God will permit this. His are the powers of the Creator, and they are reserved to Him. If they continue with these horrible things that blaspheme God, there will come the end of times as we read in the Apocalypse and the Judgment. And for us Jesus said: When this time comes, lift up your head because your salvation is close, lift up your head in confidence, your salvation is close! Once again, we must take this situation as an opportunity to deepen our faith, our prayer, and to be more rooted in the vision of eternal life, to be more supernaturally orientated to our eternal life because we are living here in the valley of tears, as we sing in the Salve Regina: hac lacrimarum valle. This is our situation, but there is also the deep joy that we have a Mother. She never abandons us, and she is always close to us. This is my advice, that never will she abandon us, she is the intercessional omnipotens, the omnipotens of intercession for us. She will take care of us; always, we have to flee under her mantle. Especially in these times, we must pray: Sub tuum praesidium confugimus, Sancta Dei Genitrix: we will flee under her protection. 

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