The following article was published September 06, 2005. While the numbers have since risen to a couple thousand, the general fact remains ... there has been no mad rush to get married on the part of homosexuals.

The so-called need for legalizing in Spain homosexual marriages has one big problem. Hardly anybody wanted it - that is except the politicians


By Robert Duncan

The so-called need for legalizing in Spain homosexual marriages has one big problem. Hardly anybody wanted it - that is except the politicians.

That's certainly one way to read the news this past weekend that since July 3 when the government ramrodded through its same-sex marriage legislation - arguing that thousands of gays could now be rid of discriminatory practises - only 22 couples have bothered to get married.

That's right, only 22 same-sex marriages have been performed in Spain so far this year, according to an article in La Razon, a newspaper that contacted various Spanish marriage registeries.

That same La Razon article noted, "this means that around two out of every 100 of the 10,474 homosexual couples registered in the National Statistics Institute census have decided to take this step. The proportion is even smaller is we compare it to the roughly 35,000 hetero couples that have been married in the two months since the law has came into vigor."

Whatever happened to the so-called 5 percent to 10 percent of the Spanish population that were going to benefit from this new law?

That said, there are 291 same-sex couples that have registered to get married in the coming months, according to La Razon, with the majority in Madrid, with around 150 couples having registered to get married.

And there are still legal questions. At least two judges have held off a couple of same-sex weddings over concerns the government's legislation is anti-Constitutional. They've asked the Supreme Court to take a look at the legislation.


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I've got to tell you all about two new Spero Group websites that I think are pretty interesting.

The first site is The Daily Estimate http://www.dailyestimate.com. This site is dedicated to analysis and commentary. In other words, a deeper look at what's behind the news headlines.

The second site is Intel Beat http://www.intelbeat.com/, which is a news aggregator that draws on blogs and alternative news sites.

Here are just a few examples of what you will find right now on The Daily Estimate

Polar expedition 'little' territorial claim effect
Russian explorers have successfully dived to the bottom of the Arctic Ocean and planted a Russian flag directly under the North Pole.

Israel mulls open nuke program
Israeli officials leak information on high-level government discussions on the establishment of a nuclear energy program, and Security Watch sounds out Israeli analysts on the implications.
by Dr Dominic Moran

Terminator technologies
Experts study how to encode ethics for a new breed of robot warriors with a 'conscience.'
by ISA

Weapons of mass consequence
The huge US military deal with Arab states and Israel will benefit domestic friends and overseas adversaries.
by Paul Rogers

US: Black Muslims' bakery raided, reporter killed
An article written on the Nation of Islam receives a bizarre response and which can give readers a measure of the mindset of some of those associated with the 'Black Muslims'.
by Adrian Morgan

The new Sanctuary Movement
Echoing the 80s sanctuary movement, the new movement blends leftist politics with concern for new immigrants. Christians from Sojourners, Faith in Public Life, and Mexican American Cultural Center are involved.
by Stephanie Block

Kazakhstan officials adopt low-key language policy
It has been 10 years since Kazakhstan adopted a law that enshrined Kazakh as the state language, and required all citizens to learn it.
by Joanna Lillis

The Venezuelan powder keg
Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez is sending confused signals as to his intent, as he moves to cement his control over the military through large-scale military deals and the arming of a people's militia.
by ISA

Turkey ready for Kurdish tug-of-war
As the new Turkish parliament gets ready to convene on Saturday, rising tensions about Kurdish activities in northern Iraq will be high on the agenda as 22 members of the pro-Kurdish DTP sit around the table
by Yigal Schleifer

Will 'Europe' survive the 21st Century?
European integration fulfilled a very old dream. The Holy Roman Emperors, as putative leaders of Western Christendom in the medieval centuries, dreamed of restoring a unity unknown since the fall of ancient Rome.
by Walter A. McDougall

US: Vulnerability and redemption
As the US prepares for 2008 elections, the public must ask itself if any of the candidates are capable of fostering comity and a coherent foreign policy
by ISA

Indo-Israeli military ties enter next stage
A US$2.5 billion Indo-Israeli defense project marks a new phase in the two countries' relations.
by P R Kumaraswamy

Arms sales to Taiwan: A means to what end?
On 15 June 2007, Taiwan's legislature finally allocated funds to purchase part of a US arms package.
by Sam Black

Can traditional rituals bring justice to N Uganda?
Local justice offers an alternative to formal trials, but applying unwritten tribal codes may not be enough to bring closure to Uganda's brutal conflict.
by Julius Ocen

Chile seeks energy independence
As Chile seeks energy independence, an isolationist foreign policy may follow.
by ISA

Sri Lanka: Bloody mindsets
The decades-old civil war moves to the north and peace seems out of the question.
by ISA

Israel land bill racist?
With racial tensions building, the passage of a controversial land bill through Israel's Knesset is raising serious concerns for the future of inter-communal relations and the real crisis of Israeli democracy.
by ISA

Pakistan: Islamism - In the line of fire
This year has been one of tumult and challenge for the administration of President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan.
by Adrian Morgan

Ingushetia: Violence, leadership cracks
Since a career FSB general took over as president, he has appointed his relatives and allies to prominent positions as the economy nosedives and corruption sky-rockets.

And don't forget to check out Intel Beat!

In an exclusive Spero News interview, theologian and exorcist Father Jose Antonio Fortea speaks of the dangers of the occult arts, but also the Harry Potter series of books. He is travelling to the US for a series of conferences in August 2007.


By Martin Barillas

Trained by Vatican exorcist Gabriele Amorth, Father Jose Antonio Fortea is not only an exorcist, but also a writer, calligrapher and parish priest. He once thought he would lead what he has termed ordinary life as an attorney in Madrid, much as his father did before him, but sensed instead a vocation to the priesthood in his adolescent years.

A theology graduate of Navarre University in Spain, Father Fortea wrote a thesis there on exorcism. He has been a practicing exorcist for some twenty years. One of his cases, recounted in Spero News as "Marta: the possessed" in 2006, was of a seemingly normal young woman could go into a trance while possessed and writhe like a snake on the floor of chapel near Madrid. A session of her continuing exorcism was witnessed by skeptical Spanish journalists who came away shocked, shaken, and mystified.

Father Fortea’s efforts, with help from other professionals, have yet to bear fruit in her case. But others have been successfully relieved of demonic possession, while many have benefited from Father Fortea’s book and learned about the practice of exorcism. “”Interview With an Exorcist: An Insider's Look at the Devil, Demonic Possession, and the Path to Deliverance is available in English, while Father Fortea’s several novels and manuscripts are yet to be translated from Spanish.

Spero News Religion editor Martin Barillas conducted an interview via email with Father Fortea in which he answered questions about possession and ways to avoid it.


MB: May a possessed person receive communion? Why or why not?


FORTEA: Yes, it is not only licit but also quite necessary. In moments of crisis, the demon moves the body of the possessed even while possession does not diminish liberty. It is therefore that a possessed person may confess and be in God’s grace.

MB: What difference is there between a possessed person and a sinner who receives Holy Communion even when he is not well disposed? Are there cases when an ill-disposed person can or should communicate?

FORTEA: The difference lies in that a sinner has besmirched his soul. A possessed person may have a demon’s chains about his body, but his soul may be clean.

One must never communicate without having a clean soul. We must strive to purify our souls when we receive Jesus. Even in the final moments, in the queue of people who will receive communion, we can purify our souls a little more by making acts of repentance. People who communicate without having confessed grave sins are not conscious of what they receive. If they were, they would not do so.

MB: Father Fortea, with your long experience with exorcisms, can you give us a few specific details about some of those you have observed?

FORTEA: That is like asking a sailor who has made many voyages over the ocean to say something about what he has observed. There are so many things… But I can say that the power of the demon is much less spectacular that what people may think. Screams, writhing on the ground, insults, vomiting, physical assaults upon the priest, spewing thick sputum – these are what the exorcist sees habitually. More spectacular things are rare. Even so, I have heard screams impossible for a human being, surprising convulsions in the air, and knowledge of hidden things of which I alone and no one else knew.

MB: With reference to pornography, what danger do pornography addicts incur? And fans of black magic or the occult arts?

FORTEA: Pornography debilitates the spiritual strength of the soul but does not provoke possession. Black magic does provoke possession because it involves invoking the devil. The occult arts are quite varied; in my books, I analyze each one as to their harmfulness. For example, divination is a sin but does not provoke possession. However, voodoo is indeed a cause of possession for those who practice it.

MB: Is there evidence or observable signs of the possessed in terms of their behaviour or morale? Or do they appear to be “normal”?

FORTEA: What is specific to possession is that the person enters into a trance and it is another spirit that moves that body.

MB: What importance to you attach to the August 2007 meeting in Poland of exorcists? Is there a greater interest in the practice of exorcism on the part of the clergy or is there a greater number of possessed?

FORTEA: The ministry of exorcism has spread widely over the last twenty years because the practice of magic has grown in the United States and Europe. This is true even though magic may bear attractive names such as “New Age”.

MB: Father Fortea, would you tell us where you will go in the United States this year? Will you be giving conferences?

FORTEA: I will be going to two conferences, one in Pennsylvania and the other in Illinois, but they will be solely for priests who work in this ministry.

MB: What is the meaning of the fascination or obsession among some young people for the series of books by J.K. Rowling about Harry Potter the magician? Are they a danger to children? Can you present your ideas about the origins and effects of the Harry Potter phenomenon?

FORTEA: The books in themselves are not bad. They are merely literary fantasies in the manner of stories that have existed in Europe since the Middle Ages. I am neither in favour of condemning nor prohibiting them. To me, they are just unobjectionable stories. However, children are imitators by nature and tend to imitate what they read and what they see. It is therefore worrisome that reading these books may lead them to attempt the practice of magic or to believe that magic is not as dangerous as their instincts might tell them. It is therefore necessary for parents to warn their children of the dangers of magic.

MB: In closing, what prayer do you think is the most effective in combating demons, possession, and temptation?

FORTEA: People ask me which prayers are the most effective, but all of them are equally effective. There are prayers in which we beg God expressly to protect us from the snare of the Malignant One. But in reality, every prayer has the same power since in the end it is a petition to God, not a formula that has a power in itself. There are people who slowly repeat, over and over, the name of Jesus as an ejaculatory prayer in which is found everything they might ask. This is an example of how a single repeated word (as in the marvelous book “The Way of a Pilgrim” by an anonymous Russian author) can be better heeded than a long prayer; everything depends on the faith and the love that is directed to God. Sometimes we say long prayers, sometimes short ones, sometimes oral prayers, and sometimes mental prayers. But all of them protect us equally from the devil.

This article was orginally published at Spero News.
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The Spanish Socialist government's support of 'Minocracy' ignores a seismic demographic shift that could rip apart the country's social fabric

By Robert Duncan

Minocracy is well and alive in Spain, and from the stench in the Moncloa vicinity one wonders if the country isn't also experiencing a case of acute indigestion.

The residence of Spain’s prime minister is in the Moncloa neighborhood. The inhabitants claim to be Socialist yet favor "Minocracy" - or the rule of the minority - by blatantly disregarding their political base and election year promises.

For example, the government appears to be more concerned about garnering the support of fringe voters, when it is not settling decade’s old scores such as the rewriting of history. In one scheme the Socialists have dredged up past horrors of the Spanish Civil War to focus on the Republican victims, while failing to acknowledge that barbarities were committed on both sides. Such legislative stunts and others - like removing statues of the Dictator Francisco Franco at midnight - tend to lessen the Socialists' credibility: after all, if a statue needs removed, why not in plain daylight?

In other areas, instead of worrying about promoting families, the Spanish government has introduced fast-track divorces and embryonic testing.

Even with respect to terrorism, the Socialists have ignored the pleas of victims and instead expressed a willingness to negotiate with ETA, ignoring that for all purposes the Basque terrorist group is actually blackmailing the Spanish state.

Logic is not this government's forte.

This is also a government that is opposed to freedom of speech, and has repeatedly attempted to censor the voice of the Catholic Church by suggesting that those who practice the Christian faith should only do so in private.

The Spanish Bishop's recently exhorted Catholics to live their faith both in private and public. The Socialist party, in turn, responded with a document that stressed its intentions of imposing a system that advocated laicism.

That Socialist document serves to further explain why this government insists that Catholic Religion Courses in public schools should no longer be under the jurisdiction of the Church. Under the Socialists’ program the teachers who would be imparting these classes could actually be people who are opposed to the Catholic faith. To understand the gravity of this, the vast majority of Spanish schools are affiliated with the Catholic Church and it is where many students receive some formation for First Communion and Confirmation, both of which the Catholic Church considers to be sacraments.

In this era of inclusiveness, the Socialist government has also included the possibility that there are religion professors teaching Islam.

This is also the government that turned a deaf ear to the million-plus persons that marched in Madrid petitioning it to not pass legislation to legalize same-sex marriages and under the guise of being inclusive allowed the very definition of marriage to be redefined. At the same time, the government ruled that judges must perform the same-sex marriages, and could not opt out on the grounds of conscientious objection. Socialist law is apparently on a higher moral plane than that of one’s conscience.

There has not been a collapse of homosexuals rushing to get married in Spain, despite very high-profile exceptions. In Madrid in 2005 there were 259 same-sex couples married, 201 of which were between men, and the remaining 58 cases between women. Interestingly, of the Gay marriages, 182 were between Spaniards, 35 were with a South American, 15 included a North American partner, while 10 were with Central Americans, seven were with Europeans, and there was one Asian.

Those figures highlight not only the apathy toward the institution of marriage on the part of the homosexual subculture, but also the government's consummate desire to seek votes in detriment of enacting legislation to foment a higher birth rate and to protect the family, not to mention its ignoring large Spanish families.

These "numerous" - or large - families need help. Help that the Socialists promised while in opposition in the form of tax incentives and subsidies. Of the over 1 million families that qualify as being numerous - having more than three children - only around 6 percent qualify for a monthly pittance of roughly 52 euros that the government provides in the form of aid. There are no real tax breaks, and certainly no incentives on par with other developed countries to encourage families to have more children. Instead, the government promises that in January electricity rates will rise 6 percent across the board - once again punishing those with large families in an exorbitant manner.

Furthermore, instead of providing incentives to help Spaniards have more children, the current government is playing peek-a-boo with a seismic demographic shift that will rip apart its social fabric. According to a recent report, immigrants will represent over 25 percent of the population by 2050, sharply higher than the current 8.5 percent.

With the country becoming increasingly dependant upon immigration and one of the world’s lowest birthrates, the government absurdly turns a blind eye to the active abortion tourist trade operating in Madrid and Barcelona, and where the price includes airline fare, abortion and hotel. No word if the drinks are on the house. Even the Dutch and English have been appalled at the ease with which late-term pregnant women can get an abortion in Spain - the flashing of money can almost always find a willing doctor to forge a document that the pregnancy had to be terminated as it was a risk to the woman.

It's not surprising that under such a hodgepodge of a platform that one can find an abundance of misguided politically correct measures throughout Spain: from renaming a public school to not offend Muslim students - which had the audacity to have been inaugurated with the name of a past Pope - to ridding school calendars of Christmas celebrations.

It smells like sulphur around Spain's PM's residence. And it's not just the nearby sewage construction contributing to the fine fragrance.

This article was originally published in Spero News, and various other sites.

Robert Duncan is a journalist and ombudsman for foreign press in Spain. He is an Executive Board Member and Vice-President for the Organización de Periodismo y Comunicación Ibero-Americana, and Vice-President of the energy and telecommunications association, APSCE. He is News Editor for Spero News, and Editor-In-Chief of EnerPub. More of his writings can be found here, as well as at the Santificarnos website.

He has also been published in World Catholic News, National Catholic Register, Renew America, Lifesite.net, as well as Capital Hill Coffee House, Common Conservative, The Conservative Voice, Enter Stage Right, News By Us, Conservative Crusader, World Net Daily, Mens News Daily and others. Robert was the bureau chief for an international news agency in Madrid for many years, and was published regularly in Dow Jones Newswires, with articles appearing in The Wall Street Journal.

For those of you who have come here, and perhaps are wondering why the posting on Spero News is a bit slow ... well the answer is simple: The site has been hacked by some Chinese hackers. Meaning that we (well Clint) have been working over the weekend to get the site back up running full steam, and working on blocking holes.

Robert Duncan is a journalist and ombudsman for foreign press in Spain. He is an Executive Board Member and Vice-President for the Organización de Periodismo y Comunicación Ibero-Americana, and Vice-President of the energy and telecommunications association, APCSE.

He is News Editor for Spero News, and Editor-In-Chief of EnerPub, as well as for the Daily Estimate.

Robert was the bureau chief for an international news agency in Madrid for many years, and was published regularly in Dow Jones Newswires, with articles appearing in The Wall Street Journal and other financial publications.

He is also published in World Catholic News, National Catholic Register, Renew America, Lifesite.net, as well as Capital Hill Coffee House, Common Conservative, The Conservative Voice, Enter Stage Right, News By Us, Conservative Crusader, World Net Daily, Mens News Daily and others.

Robert is a member of the Navy League and the US Press Association, as well as the Spanish association for Directors of Communication, DirCom.

For more of his writings, spanning more than 20 years as a foreign correspondent, please click here.