In the first quarter of 2021, hybrid electric vehicles made up 18.4% of total passenger car sales in the EU, almost doubling their market share in a year, according to data from the European Association of Automobile Manufacturers (ACEA). Demand for electrically-chargeable cars also increased in Q1: battery-electric vehicles made up 5.7% of all new cars, while plug-in hybrids accounted for 8.2% of EU registrations.
Sales of traditional fossil-fuel cars continued to decrease in the European Union, although gasoline and diesel still made up 65.4% of the car market.
Read more at:
New battery-electric vehicles take 5.7% share in Europe in Q1; hybrids 18.4%, gasoline 42.2% , diesel 23.2% - Green Car Congress
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Showing posts with label Decline. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Decline. Show all posts
May 24, 2021
August 27, 2020
Capitalism: if it can still be revived, needs a complete overhaul
Capitalism’s failures arise from two of its defining elements. The first is perpetual growth. Economic growth is the aggregate effect of the quest to accumulate capital and extract profit. Capitalism collapses without growth, yet perpetual growth on a finite planet leads inexorably to environmental calamity.
Those who defend capitalism argue that, as consumption switches from goods to services, economic growth can be decoupled from the use of material resources. A paper in the journal New Political Economy, by Jason Hickel and Giorgos Kallis, examined this premise. They found that while some relative decoupling took place in the 20th century (material resource consumption grew, but not as quickly as economic growth), in the 21st century there has been a recoupling: rising resource consumption has so far matched or exceeded the rate of economic growth. The absolute decoupling needed to avert environmental catastrophe (a reduction in material resource use) has never been achieved, and appears impossible while economic growth continues. Green growth is an illusion.
A system based on perpetual growth cannot function without peripheries and externalities. There must always be an extraction zone – from which materials are taken without full payment – and a disposal zone, where costs are dumped in the form of waste and pollution. As the scale of economic activity increases until capitalism affects everything, from the atmosphere to the deep ocean floor, the entire planet becomes a sacrifice zone: we all inhabit the periphery of the profit-making machine.
This drives us towards cataclysm on such a scale that most people have no means of imagining it. The threatened collapse of our life-support systems is bigger by far than war, famine, pestilence or economic crisis, though it is likely to incorporate all four. Societies can recover from these apocalyptic events, but not from the loss of soil, an abundant biosphere and a habitable climate.
There is no going back: the alternative to capitalism is neither feudalism nor state communism. Soviet communism had more in common with capitalism than the advocates of either system would care to admit. Both systems are (or were) obsessed with generating economic growth. Both are willing to inflict astonishing levels of harm in pursuit of this and other ends. Both promised a future in which we would need to work for only a few hours a week, but instead demand endless, brutal labour. Both are dehumanising. Both are absolutist, insisting that theirs and theirs alone is the one true God.
From March to June 2020, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos saw his wealth rise by an estimated $48 billion. The journal might also have added that 40 million workers had filed for unemployment compensation and that prison labor was being paid $1 per hour to fight deadly forest fires in California.
Bezos describes his strategy similarly, asserting that “the stronger our market leadership, the more powerful our economic model…we will make bold rather than timid investment decisions where we see a sufficient probability of gaining market leadership advantages.” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has conveyed the same approach, but more to-the-point; for many years, he allegedly ended staff meetings shouting, “Domination!”
The cliché is that we are all in this together. This is so only in the sense that some of us own luxury yachts capacious enough to hold luxury lifeboats while the bottom third clings to leaky life preservers. The mortgages of even many middle-class citizens are soon to be underwater.
What does it mean to have wealth approaching six-figure billions? Sen. Everett Dirksen once famously quipped “a billion here and a billion there and pretty soon you are talking real money.” It is helpful to translate these highly abstract big numbers into the real goods and services one could command with this money.
A state-of-the-art naval destroyer costs about one billion, about the cost of an NBA franchise. One can add a few luxury homes and still have spent only a small fraction of one’s wealth. Clearly possession of an ever-growing stream of goods seems to be an unlikely motivator of the mega wealthy.
During the pandemic, as during the world finance crisis, power has been both the means and the end of domestic and international economic policy. During the early stages of the global economic crisis, government responded by creating a $700 billion facility to purchase troubled assets from banks, but only about 10 percent of these expenditures went to lowering mortgage interest rates.
Federal Reserve treatment of the big finance center banks was much more generous. It lowered the interest rate charged member banks to near zero, a figure it held for almost a decade. The effects of this policy were not neutral.
Lower rates in the financial sector were supposed to encourage new investment in the real economy but instead did little more than stimulate a bull market in stocks and cheap money to finance stock buybacks and leveraged mergers and acquisitions. (Yves Smith , founder of the blog Naked Capitalism, points out that the only industry for which cheap money is a resource that might encourage further investment is finance. So much for restoring the productivity of main street.)
Monopoly power and concentrated wealth do immense harm to the bottom third of the wealth spectrum. We have returned to Franklin Roosevelt’s one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished. Late last year The Los Angeles Times reported: “New research establishes that after decades of living longer and longer lives, Americans are dying earlier, cut down increasingly in the prime of life by drug overdoses, suicides, and diseases such as cirrhosis, liver cancer, and obesity… the authors of the new study suggest that the nation’s lifespan reversal is being driven by diseases linked to social and economic privation, a healthcare system with glaring gaps and blind spots, and profound psychological distress.”
So what does a better system look like? There is no complete answer, and it also seems no one person does have. But a rough framework is emerging. Part of it is provided by the ecological civilisation proposed by Jeremy Lent, one of the greatest thinkers of our age. Other elements come from Kate Raworth’s doughnut economics and the environmental thinking of Naomi Klein, Amitav Ghosh, Angaangaq Angakkorsuaq, Raj Patel and Bill McKibben. Part of the answer lies in the notion of “private sufficiency, public luxury”. Another part arises from the creation of a new conception of justice based on this simple principle: every generation, everywhere, shall have an equal right to the enjoyment of natural wealth.
The moral case for egalitarian reforms is overwhelming. Obscene wealth disparities are a product of political and economic power, not virtue or extraordinary talent. On the center Left the most popular proposals are various versions of a wealth tax. Such proposals should surely be part of any reform package.
A wealth tax would begin to redress the damage inflicted by four decades of socialism for the rich. And it should be framed that way in order to counter in advance the inevitable carping that tax reformers are motivated by envy. Nonetheless more needs to be promoted in order to address the causes as well as consequences of this inordinate wealth concentration.
Trying to address wealth inequality without addressing monopoly power is like trying to stop a boat with a hole in the bottom from sinking by bailing out the water, but not plugging up the hole.
In addition, it is essential to develop policies that give working-class citizens more voice in designing the economic instruments that will produce future wealth for us all. Antitrust law, cooperatives, labor rights to organize, and democratization of the Fed would all be parts of such reform packages.
The moral choice seems to be, do we stop life to allow capitalism to continue, or stop capitalism to allow life to continue?
The window of opportunity to make radical changes to the defunct Capitalist system is getting smaller by the day, and if not dealt wih rapidly, is surely to result in civil unrest and violence of which the likes have never been seen before.
Those who defend capitalism argue that, as consumption switches from goods to services, economic growth can be decoupled from the use of material resources. A paper in the journal New Political Economy, by Jason Hickel and Giorgos Kallis, examined this premise. They found that while some relative decoupling took place in the 20th century (material resource consumption grew, but not as quickly as economic growth), in the 21st century there has been a recoupling: rising resource consumption has so far matched or exceeded the rate of economic growth. The absolute decoupling needed to avert environmental catastrophe (a reduction in material resource use) has never been achieved, and appears impossible while economic growth continues. Green growth is an illusion.
A system based on perpetual growth cannot function without peripheries and externalities. There must always be an extraction zone – from which materials are taken without full payment – and a disposal zone, where costs are dumped in the form of waste and pollution. As the scale of economic activity increases until capitalism affects everything, from the atmosphere to the deep ocean floor, the entire planet becomes a sacrifice zone: we all inhabit the periphery of the profit-making machine.
This drives us towards cataclysm on such a scale that most people have no means of imagining it. The threatened collapse of our life-support systems is bigger by far than war, famine, pestilence or economic crisis, though it is likely to incorporate all four. Societies can recover from these apocalyptic events, but not from the loss of soil, an abundant biosphere and a habitable climate.
There is no going back: the alternative to capitalism is neither feudalism nor state communism. Soviet communism had more in common with capitalism than the advocates of either system would care to admit. Both systems are (or were) obsessed with generating economic growth. Both are willing to inflict astonishing levels of harm in pursuit of this and other ends. Both promised a future in which we would need to work for only a few hours a week, but instead demand endless, brutal labour. Both are dehumanising. Both are absolutist, insisting that theirs and theirs alone is the one true God.
From March to June 2020, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos saw his wealth rise by an estimated $48 billion. The journal might also have added that 40 million workers had filed for unemployment compensation and that prison labor was being paid $1 per hour to fight deadly forest fires in California.
Bezos describes his strategy similarly, asserting that “the stronger our market leadership, the more powerful our economic model…we will make bold rather than timid investment decisions where we see a sufficient probability of gaining market leadership advantages.” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has conveyed the same approach, but more to-the-point; for many years, he allegedly ended staff meetings shouting, “Domination!”
The cliché is that we are all in this together. This is so only in the sense that some of us own luxury yachts capacious enough to hold luxury lifeboats while the bottom third clings to leaky life preservers. The mortgages of even many middle-class citizens are soon to be underwater.
What does it mean to have wealth approaching six-figure billions? Sen. Everett Dirksen once famously quipped “a billion here and a billion there and pretty soon you are talking real money.” It is helpful to translate these highly abstract big numbers into the real goods and services one could command with this money.
A state-of-the-art naval destroyer costs about one billion, about the cost of an NBA franchise. One can add a few luxury homes and still have spent only a small fraction of one’s wealth. Clearly possession of an ever-growing stream of goods seems to be an unlikely motivator of the mega wealthy.
During the pandemic, as during the world finance crisis, power has been both the means and the end of domestic and international economic policy. During the early stages of the global economic crisis, government responded by creating a $700 billion facility to purchase troubled assets from banks, but only about 10 percent of these expenditures went to lowering mortgage interest rates.
Federal Reserve treatment of the big finance center banks was much more generous. It lowered the interest rate charged member banks to near zero, a figure it held for almost a decade. The effects of this policy were not neutral.
Lower rates in the financial sector were supposed to encourage new investment in the real economy but instead did little more than stimulate a bull market in stocks and cheap money to finance stock buybacks and leveraged mergers and acquisitions. (Yves Smith , founder of the blog Naked Capitalism, points out that the only industry for which cheap money is a resource that might encourage further investment is finance. So much for restoring the productivity of main street.)
Monopoly power and concentrated wealth do immense harm to the bottom third of the wealth spectrum. We have returned to Franklin Roosevelt’s one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished. Late last year The Los Angeles Times reported: “New research establishes that after decades of living longer and longer lives, Americans are dying earlier, cut down increasingly in the prime of life by drug overdoses, suicides, and diseases such as cirrhosis, liver cancer, and obesity… the authors of the new study suggest that the nation’s lifespan reversal is being driven by diseases linked to social and economic privation, a healthcare system with glaring gaps and blind spots, and profound psychological distress.”
So what does a better system look like? There is no complete answer, and it also seems no one person does have. But a rough framework is emerging. Part of it is provided by the ecological civilisation proposed by Jeremy Lent, one of the greatest thinkers of our age. Other elements come from Kate Raworth’s doughnut economics and the environmental thinking of Naomi Klein, Amitav Ghosh, Angaangaq Angakkorsuaq, Raj Patel and Bill McKibben. Part of the answer lies in the notion of “private sufficiency, public luxury”. Another part arises from the creation of a new conception of justice based on this simple principle: every generation, everywhere, shall have an equal right to the enjoyment of natural wealth.
The moral case for egalitarian reforms is overwhelming. Obscene wealth disparities are a product of political and economic power, not virtue or extraordinary talent. On the center Left the most popular proposals are various versions of a wealth tax. Such proposals should surely be part of any reform package.
A wealth tax would begin to redress the damage inflicted by four decades of socialism for the rich. And it should be framed that way in order to counter in advance the inevitable carping that tax reformers are motivated by envy. Nonetheless more needs to be promoted in order to address the causes as well as consequences of this inordinate wealth concentration.
Trying to address wealth inequality without addressing monopoly power is like trying to stop a boat with a hole in the bottom from sinking by bailing out the water, but not plugging up the hole.
In addition, it is essential to develop policies that give working-class citizens more voice in designing the economic instruments that will produce future wealth for us all. Antitrust law, cooperatives, labor rights to organize, and democratization of the Fed would all be parts of such reform packages.
The moral choice seems to be, do we stop life to allow capitalism to continue, or stop capitalism to allow life to continue?
The window of opportunity to make radical changes to the defunct Capitalist system is getting smaller by the day, and if not dealt wih rapidly, is surely to result in civil unrest and violence of which the likes have never been seen before.
April 23, 2020
The Netherlands: Hospital admissions, deaths show steady downward trend
There has been a slight
rise in the number of coronavirus patients admitted to hospital, the
Dutch public health institute RIVM said on Thursday.
The number of new admissions, 137, is up 13 on Wednesday and takes the
total number of admissions since the pandemic began to 10,158.
The official death toll rose by 123, taking the official total to 4,177.
However, the real figure could be as much as twice as high, because
only people who have tested for the disease are included.
Nevertheless, the number of both hospital admissions and deaths continue
to show a steady decrease, the RIVM said.
Read more at DutchNews.nl:There has been a slight rise in the number of coronavirus patients admitted to hospital, the Dutch public health institute RIVM said on Thursday.
There has been a slight rise in the number of coronavirus patients admitted to hospital, the Dutch public health institute RIVM said on Thursday.rise in the number of coronavirus patients admitted to hospital, the
Dutch public health institute RIVM said on Thursday.
The number of new admissions, 137, is up 13 on Wednesday and takes the
total number of admissions since the pandemic began to 10,158.
The official death toll rose by 123, taking the official total to 4,177.
However, the real figure could be as much as twice as high, because
only people who have tested for the disease are included.
Nevertheless, the number of both hospital admissions and deaths continue
to show a steady decrease, the RIVM said.
Read more at DutchNews.nl:There has been a slight rise in the number of coronavirus patients admitted to hospital, the Dutch public health institute RIVM said on Thursday.
The number of new admissions, 137, is up 13 on Wednesday and takes the total number of admissions since the pandemic began to 10,158. The official death toll rose by 123, taking the official total to 4,177.
However, the real figure could be as much as twice as high, because only people who have tested for the disease are included. Nevertheless, the number of both hospital admissions and deaths continue to show a steady decrease, the RIVM said.
Read more at: Hospital admissions, deaths show steady downward trend: RIVM - DutchNews.nl
December 7, 2019
USA: Why is tourism to the United States on the decline? - Gun violence
The decrease isn't steep, but any decline is seen as alarming, given the overall rise in global tourism.
One of the major reasons for this decline in tourism to the US is the fear of gun violence in America, which is widely publicized around the world.
Read more at:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2019/09/06/more-people-are-traveling-world-than-ever-number-coming-america-is-dropping/
One of the major reasons for this decline in tourism to the US is the fear of gun violence in America, which is widely publicized around the world.
Read more at:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2019/09/06/more-people-are-traveling-world-than-ever-number-coming-america-is-dropping/
March 22, 2018
'Christianity as default is gone': the rise of a non-Christian Europe - by Harriet Sherwood
Europe’s march towards a post-Christian society has been starkly illustrated by research showing a majority of young people in a dozen countries do not follow a religion.
The survey of 16- to 29-year-olds found the Czech Republic is the least religious country in Europe, with 91% of that age group saying they have no religious affiliation.
Between 70% and 80% of young adults in Estonia, Sweden and the Netherlands also categorise themselves as non-religious.
The two most religious countries, Poland and Lithuania, and the two least religious, the Czech Republic and Estonia, are post-communist states.
The trend of religious affiliation was repeated when young people were asked about religious practice. Only in Poland, Portugal and Ireland did more than 10% of young people say they attend services at least once a week
Note Almere-Digest. Pew Research Center in 2015 said Europe’s Christian population is expected to shrink by around 100 million people in the coming decades. Maybe, as someone suggested, it is not that there is something wrong with the message, but rather that today the problem lies with those who bring the message.
It seems they have forgotten that Jesus, in most, if not all his spiritual teachings, professed an egalitarian society, whereby the division between rich and poor has been erased. It is little wonder that the Romans crucified him, and that his followers were persecuted. And, of course, it is the polar opposite of what today's "conservatives" stand for.
Early Christians practiced a form of "socialism". Acts of the Apostles tells us, "The believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he or she had need." Isn't it time for Christians to become revolutionary again when it comes to bringing the message of redemption, and willing to fight for it?
Read more: 'Christianity as default is gone': the rise of a non-Christian Europe | World news | The Guardian
The survey of 16- to 29-year-olds found the Czech Republic is the least religious country in Europe, with 91% of that age group saying they have no religious affiliation.
Between 70% and 80% of young adults in Estonia, Sweden and the Netherlands also categorise themselves as non-religious.
The two most religious countries, Poland and Lithuania, and the two least religious, the Czech Republic and Estonia, are post-communist states.
The trend of religious affiliation was repeated when young people were asked about religious practice. Only in Poland, Portugal and Ireland did more than 10% of young people say they attend services at least once a week
Note Almere-Digest. Pew Research Center in 2015 said Europe’s Christian population is expected to shrink by around 100 million people in the coming decades. Maybe, as someone suggested, it is not that there is something wrong with the message, but rather that today the problem lies with those who bring the message.
It seems they have forgotten that Jesus, in most, if not all his spiritual teachings, professed an egalitarian society, whereby the division between rich and poor has been erased. It is little wonder that the Romans crucified him, and that his followers were persecuted. And, of course, it is the polar opposite of what today's "conservatives" stand for.
Early Christians practiced a form of "socialism". Acts of the Apostles tells us, "The believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he or she had need." Isn't it time for Christians to become revolutionary again when it comes to bringing the message of redemption, and willing to fight for it?
Read more: 'Christianity as default is gone': the rise of a non-Christian Europe | World news | The Guardian
February 15, 2018
International tourism is booming, but not to the US - main reasons - Donald Trump Presidency and Gun violence?
 |
| Donald Trump and Gun Violence in US seen as main culprits |
It's a worrying trend for the travel and retail industries. International travelers tend to stay longer and spend more than their domestic counterparts.
In the first seven months of 2017, the U.S. took in 41 million international visitors, a 4 percent decline from the year-earlier period, according to the Commerce Department. That follows a more than 2 percent drop a year earlier.
It's a worrying trend for the travel and retail industries. International travelers tend to stay longer and spend more than their domestic counterparts.
Tourism and retail industry leaders recently launched the Visit U.S. Coalition, which wants backing from the Trump administration to help stem the decline. The coalition was founded by U.S. Travel, a lobbying group whose members include Marriott International and Macy's.
"Fewer visitors means fewer hotel stays, fewer meals eaten in our restaurants, fewer goods purchased in our retail stores, and fewer visits to our national attractions. It also means fewer American jobs and a loss to our economy," said Katherine Lugar, president and CEO of the American Hotel & Lodging Association, a coalition member. "We are committed to working together with the Administration to balance a welcome message with strong security to ensure we don't fall behind to other countries."
Roger Dow, president and CEO of U.S. Travel, called some of President Donald Trump's rhetoric "not helpful" but stopped short of blaming him or his policies for the drop directly. Dow pointed to a strong dollar and competition from other nations
.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request to comment.
Note EU-Digest: Many experts in the travel industry are blaming the decline on Donald Trump's continuous nationalistic remarks and hostility towards immigrants, and the increasing gun violence in America by local terrorists.
EU-Digest
September 11, 2015
Refugee Crisis 2015: Could Syrians Help Europe's Aging Population Problem? - by Lydia Tomkiw
European countries have some of the world's most rapidly
aging populations, meaning they need more young people to replace
retiring workers. As record numbers of refugees continue to try to enter
the European Union from conflict-ridden and repressive states,
including Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and Eritrea, officials said some EU
states could benefit from the influx of young refugees and families amid
a looming demographic crisis. Here’s a look at the current population
issues facing Europe.
The overall fertility rate, the average number of children a woman is expected to have over her childbearing years, has fallen across Europe since the mid-1960s, according to Eurostat. Europeans have been having fewer children and waiting until later in life to have them. This means that in order to keep the population across the continent constant, a fertility rate of 2.1, called the replacement level, is needed. As of 2013, the EU had a rate of 1.55.
While overall the 506 million population of the EU has shown growth, with an increase of 1.3 million people from 2014, the populations of 12 states have declined and the union faces an increasing population of people over 65 in every member state, according to Eurostat. The number of working-age people in the EU has been shrinking compared with those retiring.
The countries with the lowest fertility rates were Portugal at 1.21, Spain at 1.27 and Poland at 1.29. The countries with the highest rates were Sweden at 1.89, Ireland at 1.96 and France at 1.99.
Read more: Refugee Crisis 2015: Could Syrians Help Europe's Aging Population Problem?
The overall fertility rate, the average number of children a woman is expected to have over her childbearing years, has fallen across Europe since the mid-1960s, according to Eurostat. Europeans have been having fewer children and waiting until later in life to have them. This means that in order to keep the population across the continent constant, a fertility rate of 2.1, called the replacement level, is needed. As of 2013, the EU had a rate of 1.55.
While overall the 506 million population of the EU has shown growth, with an increase of 1.3 million people from 2014, the populations of 12 states have declined and the union faces an increasing population of people over 65 in every member state, according to Eurostat. The number of working-age people in the EU has been shrinking compared with those retiring.
The countries with the lowest fertility rates were Portugal at 1.21, Spain at 1.27 and Poland at 1.29. The countries with the highest rates were Sweden at 1.89, Ireland at 1.96 and France at 1.99.
Read more: Refugee Crisis 2015: Could Syrians Help Europe's Aging Population Problem?
February 5, 2015
Christianity in Europe: "Rather Green Than Dead" -The De-Christianized Europe
Joseph Puder writes in Frontpage magazine "that in many of the European countries, the shrinking attendance
and affiliation has forced churches to close down, or be sold to the
ever growing Muslim communities there"..
It also reflects the decline of the Christian faith in Europe -- both Catholic and Protestant.
This phenomenon bodes ill for Europe, whose Christian faith sustained and enriched it for centuries. Christianity today, more than ever before, can be a unifying factor in a continent that has lost faith in the future.
This loss of faith is manifested in the decline of fertility rates, marriages, and children. Conversely, the influx of millions of young Muslims with high fertility rates has transformed the educational system in Europe, where in some grammar and high-schools, Muslim children (mostly of North African parentage) count for over 50% of the pupils. It has also impacted on the culture and politics of Europe.
In today's Europe the subliminal statement emanating from the political and cultural elites is "we would rather be Green (Muslim) than dead." It is a symbol of submission, lack of will, and resignation. Europe has essentially lost its will to fight for its faith and culture. Decades of elevating multi-culturalism by the elites into a "religion" of sorts, has removed European pride in their national heritage. How can one explain European mega-mosques in Rome, Helsinki and the one being constructed in Cologne, Germany? No Christian churches (not to mention synagogues) or bibles are allowed in Saudi Arabia, nor are new churches permitted to be built in Egypt, Syria, Pakistan, or Iran.
A Pew Research Center and Wall Street Journal survey (2010) shows that the number of people in the Western European states that are unaffiliated is staggering. In the Netherlands it is 42.1%, in France 28%, in Germany 24.7%, UK 21.3%, and Italy 12.4%. These figures do not, of course, indicate that in Italy, 87.6% are regular churchgoers. It only means a nominal affiliation with a church. This is occurring in Italy, at the heart of the Catholic Church where the Vatican is located.
The Anglican churches in the UK are not faring any better. Anglican churches in Britain are being sold and transformed into mosques. A similar phenomenon is taking place in Germany and the Netherlands with Lutheran and Dutch Reform churches. Vatican Insider reported (11/9/2012) "About twenty Anglican churches In Great Britain 'shut up shop' each year. This persistent phenomenon has led the Church of England to publish a list of religious buildings it is prepared to sell." Marco Tosatti in the Vatican Insider writes, "The trend of converting churches into mosques is not just limited to the (Middle) East; according to Fr. Lazzara it is a common phenomenon across central and northern Europe."
In the Netherlands, as many as 250 buildings, where Catholics, Lutherans and Calvinists had prayed for over a century, were sold. Amsterdam's Fatih Camii mosque had once been a Catholic Church. The Church of St. Vincetius was auctioned off along with its liturgical furnishings and used in a 'profane' way."
Read more: The De-Christianized Europe
It also reflects the decline of the Christian faith in Europe -- both Catholic and Protestant.
This phenomenon bodes ill for Europe, whose Christian faith sustained and enriched it for centuries. Christianity today, more than ever before, can be a unifying factor in a continent that has lost faith in the future.
This loss of faith is manifested in the decline of fertility rates, marriages, and children. Conversely, the influx of millions of young Muslims with high fertility rates has transformed the educational system in Europe, where in some grammar and high-schools, Muslim children (mostly of North African parentage) count for over 50% of the pupils. It has also impacted on the culture and politics of Europe.
In today's Europe the subliminal statement emanating from the political and cultural elites is "we would rather be Green (Muslim) than dead." It is a symbol of submission, lack of will, and resignation. Europe has essentially lost its will to fight for its faith and culture. Decades of elevating multi-culturalism by the elites into a "religion" of sorts, has removed European pride in their national heritage. How can one explain European mega-mosques in Rome, Helsinki and the one being constructed in Cologne, Germany? No Christian churches (not to mention synagogues) or bibles are allowed in Saudi Arabia, nor are new churches permitted to be built in Egypt, Syria, Pakistan, or Iran.
A Pew Research Center and Wall Street Journal survey (2010) shows that the number of people in the Western European states that are unaffiliated is staggering. In the Netherlands it is 42.1%, in France 28%, in Germany 24.7%, UK 21.3%, and Italy 12.4%. These figures do not, of course, indicate that in Italy, 87.6% are regular churchgoers. It only means a nominal affiliation with a church. This is occurring in Italy, at the heart of the Catholic Church where the Vatican is located.
The Anglican churches in the UK are not faring any better. Anglican churches in Britain are being sold and transformed into mosques. A similar phenomenon is taking place in Germany and the Netherlands with Lutheran and Dutch Reform churches. Vatican Insider reported (11/9/2012) "About twenty Anglican churches In Great Britain 'shut up shop' each year. This persistent phenomenon has led the Church of England to publish a list of religious buildings it is prepared to sell." Marco Tosatti in the Vatican Insider writes, "The trend of converting churches into mosques is not just limited to the (Middle) East; according to Fr. Lazzara it is a common phenomenon across central and northern Europe."
In the Netherlands, as many as 250 buildings, where Catholics, Lutherans and Calvinists had prayed for over a century, were sold. Amsterdam's Fatih Camii mosque had once been a Catholic Church. The Church of St. Vincetius was auctioned off along with its liturgical furnishings and used in a 'profane' way."
Read more: The De-Christianized Europe
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