`  == Modern goals of the Priory of Sion ==  * the return to Israel of the lost treasure of the Temple in Jerusalem, which supposedly contains proof that the Merovingian dynasty is of both the Davidic and Zadokite lines; * the restoration of chivalry and Merovingian popular monarchies in all the member states of a European Union, which has declared federal status as the final step of European integration; * its control of, or transformation into, a dominant political party in the parliament of the ``United States of Europe``; * the election of a Merovingian pretender to both presidency of the European Parliament and the papacy of the Roman Catholic Church; and * the establishment of the ``Holy European Empire`` unified through an imperial cult, ideally marking the dawn of an ``European Century``.  I based these goals on the following quotes from the book The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail:  [Pierre Plantard] declared, for example, that the Prieuré de Sion did in fact hold lost treasure of the Temple of Jerusalem - the booty plundered by Titus's Roman legions in A.D. 70. These items he stated, would be 'returned to Israel when the time is right'. But whatever the historical, archeological or even political significance of this treasure. M. Plantard dismissed it as incidental. The true treasure, he insisted, was 'spiritual'. And he implied that this 'spiritual treausure' consisted, at least in part, of a secret. In some unspecified way the secret in question would facilitate a major social change.  In A.D. 70, during the great revolt in Judaea, Roamn legions under the Titus sacked the Temple of Jerusalem. The pillaged treasure of the Temple is said to have found its way eventually to the Pyrenees; and M. Plantard, in his conversation with us, stated that this treasure was in the hands of the Prieuré de Sion today. But the Temple of Jerusalem may have contained more than the treasure plundered by Titus's centurions. In ancient Judaism religion and politics were inseperable. The Messiah to be a priest-king, whose authority encompassed spiritual and secular domains alike. It is thus likely, indeed, probable that the Temple housed official records pertaining to Israel's royal line - the equivalents of birth certificates, marriage licenses and other relevant concerning any modern royal or aristocratic family.  ...a theocratic United States of Europe - a trans- or pan-European confederation assembled into a modern empire and ruled by a dynasty descended from Jesus. This dynasty would not only occupy a throne of political or secular power, but quite conceivably the throne of Saint Peter as well. Under that supreme authority there might then be an interlocking network of kingdoms or principalities, connected by dynastic alliances and intermarriage  a kind of twentieth century feudal system, but without the abuses usually associated with that term. And the actual process of governing would presumably reside with the Prieuré de Sion  which might take the form of, say, a European Parliament endowed with executive and/or legislative privileges...   A Europe of this sort would constitute a new and unified political force in interntional affairs - an enitity whose status would ultimately be comparable to tha tof the Soviet Union, or the United States. Indeed it might well emerge stronger than either, because it would rest on deep-rooted spiritual and emotional foundations, rather than on abstract, theoretical or ideological ones. It would appeal not only to man's head, but to his heart as well. It would draw its strenght from tapping the collective psyche of Western Europe, awakening the fundamental religious impulse.  In a very real sense the time is right for the Prieuré to show its hand. The political systems and ideologies that in the early years of our century seemed to promise so much have virtually all displayed a degree of bankruptcy. Communism, socialism, fascism, capitalism, Western-style democracy have all, in one way or another, betrayed their promise, jaundiced their adherents, and failed to fulfill the dreams they engendered... There is a longing for a renewed sense of the sacred that amounts, in effect, to a full-scale religious revival  exemplified by the proliferation of sects and cults, for example, and the swelling tide of fundamentalism in the United States. There is also a desire for a true 'leader'  not a führer, but a species of wise and benign spiritual figure, a 'priest-king'