September 5th, 2008 By DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, Assistant Editor, TMV Columnist
Catholicism is rife with euphemisms, and …following the Pope’s actual intentions and motives is often reduced to a kind of Pope-omancy, interpreting a gesture or a smile as carrying volumes of unspoken information about the actual skivvy. The Church is not known for revealing the roots of its choices and decisions; nor its back-room gamblings and gambolings, so to speak.
However, being “invited’ to come speak with/ appear before the Archbishop is somewhat like being called to the Principal’s Office to, um, ‘chat.’ It is not high tea. It is not a social call, no matter how it might be spun afterward.
This, just in a few minutes ago from The National Catholic Reporter, the USA’s largest weekly online/print Catholic Newspaper, read by many whom some would call progressives, and as well as read by many that some would call conservatives.
SAN FRANCISCO — Calling recent nationally broadcast comments by U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi “in serious conflict with the teachings of the Catholic church,” Archbishop George H. Niederauer of San Francisco in a Sept. 5 statement underscored church teaching on abortion, the beginning of human life, and the formation of conscience — and invited the Catholic lawmaker “into a conversation with me about these matters.”
The statement was carried in the Sept. 5 issue of Catholic San Francisco, newspaper of the archdiocese.
Many Catholics “have written me letters and sent me e-mails in which they expressed their dismay and concern about the Speaker’s remarks,” the archbishop said, adding, “Very often they moved on to a question that caused much discussion during the 2004 campaign: Is it necessary to deny Holy Communion to some Catholics in public life because of their public support for abortion on demand?”
“The practice of the church is to accept the conscientious self-appraisal of each person” when he or she approaches for Communion, he wrote, alluding to Canon 912. He also quoted the U.S. bishops’ 2006 document, “Happy Are Those Who Are Called to His Supper”: “…we should be cautious when making judgments about whether or not someone else should receive Holy Communion.”
However, he continued, again quoting from the 2006 bishops’ document, “If a Catholic in his or her personal or professional life were knowingly and obstinately to reject the defined doctrines of the church, or knowingly and obstinately repudiate her definitive teachings on moral issues, however, he or she would seriously diminish his or her communion with the church. Reception of Holy Communion in such a situation would not accord with the nature of the eucharistic celebration, so that he or she should refrain.”
Much has been written in the foreign press about the real purpose of Pope Benedict XVI’s unprecedented election-year visit to the United States. Some charge that he came to bolster the only pro-life candidate, John McCain. Others have surmised that the Pope came to make common cause with President Bush to oppose the perceived threat of an expanding Islam.
“As for Catholics in the United States, almost a third of the population has been brought up in that faith, but today only 24 percent of Americans call themselves Catholic, less than a half of those who identify themselves as Protestant/Evangelical - almost 52 percent. The study clearly shows that the strongest adherents of the Catholic Church are amongst recent immigrants. Forty-six percent of U.S. nationals born outside the country are Catholic, while 24 percent of them Protestant.”
“The situation changes when we consider the religious affiliation of those born in the United States: fifty-five percent are Protestant and 21 percent are Catholic. In other words, a significant percentage of those who were Catholic in their infancy, have over the years decided to change their affiliation, switching primarily to Evangelical and Pentecostal churches.”
In other words, the longer immigrants remain in the U.S., the greater the likelihood that they’ll switch to another denomination or religion.
“To the Pope’s misfortune, the dynamics of change are influenced by factors beyond his control.”
By Carlos Martínez García
Translated By Halszka Czarnocka
April 23, 2008
Mexico - La Jornada - Original Article (Spanish)
The results of the trip are more media than real. Benedict the XVI’s visit to the United States ratified a pastoral line that doesn’t confront problems at their root but treats them superficially and postpones their resolution, to the detriment of the millions of Catholics whose disillusionment with the leadership of the Catholic Church continues to deepen.
A good number of commentators and analysts expressed surprise and even praised the papal decision to meet with some victims of clerical pedophilia in the United States. They forget that due to the peculiarity of United States society, both in terms of its religious composition and the vigilance with which it monitors leaders of any kind, Pope Benedict XVI was practically obliged to show some sign that these outrageous abuses will not happen again.
We know of the magnitude of the sexual abuses perpetrated by Catholic priests in that country thanks to the mobilization of those who were assaulted and the solidarity of people who assisted them in disseminating news about the size of the problem and suing the pedophiles in court. It was an organization of citizens and its insistence on documenting and making public the sexual attacks of clergy in that country, which made it possible to make the issue a public one of such national significance.
The various centers of ecclesiastic authority, both in the U.S. and Rome, did everything possible to conceal the scandals. When they failed in the attempt, they imposed damage control measures and tried unsuccessfully to minimize the problem.
It was an entire network of complicity within the U.S. Catholic Church that permitted thousands of cases of sexual abuse, not the isolated behavior of this or that cleric. In this regard there is convincing data:
“A study ordered by the North American Episcopal Conference in 2004 … concluded that the number of children victimized by about 5 000 priests over the past three decades was over 11,000. Since many cases have been resolved according to the culture and civil law of the United States, the relevant statistics include $2 billion that has been paid in out in this regard, which has contributed to bankruptcy of more than a few diocese” (from The Pope and Clerical Pedophilia in Mexico [El Papa y la pederastia clerical en México] by Miguel Ángel Granados Chapa, Proceso).
The Pope pronounced words and promised actions favorable to Latin American immigrants, the majority of whom entered the United States without a visa. The productive apparatus in the United States has benefited on a great scale from these so-called illegals by paying them low wages and providing them with almost no social benefits. For the most part, these people come to that nation as Catholics and are the main factor in the growth of Catholicism there. This reality has another less well-known side, which is creating concern at the Holy See in Rome.
“Bush sees the world in terms of good and evil, and he considers that only a united front encompassing all 2.2 billion Judeo-Christians will be able to resist Islam. Recent decades have seen increasing religious tension and the spread of theocracies, which now encompass almost all Arab countries.” Read the rest of this entry »
Did the Pope visit the United States in part to influence the U.S. Presidential race in favor of John McCain?
That seems to be the conclusion of a large number of mainland Europeans.
This article from France’s Journal du Dimanche au Quotidien, quoting French journalist V. Jauvert, points out, “Since April 16 - his birthday - Pope Benedict XVI has been in the United States for a rather long trip (for an old person): a week. And he didn’t go there just to blow out the candles on the cake offered by Dubya … The Pope is (subliminally) campaigning for J. McCain … the official visit of a Pope during a very tight election campaign is contrary to tradition. … this trip, beyond the spiritual and political, is a pretext to support the pro life candidate.’
Jauvert goes on to say that in 2004 before his elevation to the papacy, Cardinal Ratzinger wrote to American Bishops saying, “it’s not possible to defend the right to abortion and receive communion, and that therefore, those who vote for Kerry, who take communion each Sunday, “would be guilty of formal cooperation with the devil!”
“No one should believe that the Iraq War is really that high on the Pope’s agenda. When it came time for the Holy See to endorse a candidate for the last presidential election, the then chief-inquisitor who became today’s Pope found it more important to support the candidate who opposed the legality of abortion than the one who stood against the war. This meant that Bush garnered the support of about a million votes that otherwise would have gone to Kerry. Bush is President, so to speak, due to Benedict’s grace.”
Etschmayer goes on to say, “As Benedict XVI is a Pope of restoration, when he visits the United States during an election year it symbolizes a policy that is anti-liberal and is a sign of support for the only conservative candidate: John McCain. McCain’s talk of remaining in Iraq for even 10,000 years if need be changes nothing. In the end, the fact is that this Pope by far prefers a Christian theocracy that fights bloody wars over a liberal, non-Christian democracy that avoids conflict.”
By Patrik Etschmayer
Translated By Patrik Etschmayer
April 17, 2008
Switzerland - Nachrichten - Original Article (German)
The headlines looked to be rather promising for opponents of Bush: The Pope would give Bush a few verbal slaps in the face, unambiguously criticize him and perhaps the Pontiff would even administer a real beating. But one should not be deluded: Standing on the same foundation, these are two men that think reason and reality should take a back seat to belief in a world as one wishes it to be.
This unity stood out when George W. Bush integrated a core-belief of the Pope into his speech of welcome by stressing that it is important for the nation to heed “the dictatorship of relativism.” Ultimately, this means that both Bush and the Pope stand for an absolute believe in a God that accepts a diversity of faiths only in the sense that there are people left to convert.
It’s perhaps a little ironic then, that the relativism both of these men fight so passionately against exists between themselves, as Bush is a member of a Methodist Church while the Pope is the world’s top Catholic. As far as the Protestants, the Pope has already made his opinion quite clear: When he declared that the Protestant churches were in fact not real churches at all, it triggered considerable consternation among ecumenical [inter-church] organizations.
In this light, the Pope’s criticism of George W. Bush’s Iraq policy is doubly interesting and curious. It’s probably too simplistic to use oil to explain Bush’s drive to invade Iraq. This was certainly a major motivation but there might as well have been the hope of having his “Christian” army plant a flag of victory over the stylized Islamist fanaticism of Saddam Hussein, whose rhetoric certainly contained a religious component. Recall when Bush initially spoke of a crusade, it looked simply as a clumsy choice of words. But who today uses this expression in a military context? It’s quite possible that he actually meant it in a literal sense. A man that continuously stresses doing the Lord’s work will also be drawn into war for his master.
And no one should believe that the Iraq War is really that high on the Pope’s agenda. When it came time for the Holy See to endorse a candidate for the last presidential election, the then chief-inquisitor who became today’s Pope found it more important to support the candidate who opposed the legality of abortion than the one who stood against the war. This meant that Bush garnered the support of about a million votes that otherwise would have gone to Kerry. Bush is President, so to speak, due to Benedict’s grace.
READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, along with continuing translated foreign press coverage of the Pope’s visit to the United States.
Why is it that Popes don’t usually visit the United States during presidential election years? Lucas Mendez writes for the BBC Brazil, “As neutral as the papal robe is, his messages can and will be used by the candidates … every time Benedict XVI opens his mouth, Democrats and Republicans will interpret and “spin it,” according to their own political ‘gospels’” Read the rest of this entry »
April 16th, 2008 By DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, Assistant Editor, TMV Columnist
“–Wherever the land is dry and hard, you could be the water …
–or you could be the blade disking the earth open;
–or you could be the acequia, the ditch that carries water from river to fields;
–or you could be the just engineer mapping dams that must be taken down, and those which would serve the venerable all, instead of only the very few;
–or you could be the battered vessel for carrying water by hand;
–or you could be the one who stores the water, protects it, blesses it or pours it;
–or you could be the tired ground that receives it;
–or you could be the scorched seed that drinks it;
–or you could be the vine green-growing overland in all your wild audacity …”
“If there is an ancient secret to caring for and mending the significant lacerations to this “Oh-my-dear-God-beautiful” earth we’ve been given, by soul’s light it might be just a tiny four-word prayer from Creator to humanity:
““Please, just start anywhere.”
”
(from “The Rainmakers: Beer Bottle Old Woman, Tin Can Old Man” by Dr.E, see here)
The Pope, this morning, in response to President Bush’s welcome at the White House sprang up from his ceremonial chair with the vitality of a young man, no ooofs or ehhhs, (the Pope is 81 years old as of today, April 16, 2008).
This morning President Bush ritually asked that the Pope keep the USA in his prayers. But the Pope in response, said with verve, that in addition he would exhort the people of the USA to be in spirit and “even more responsive/responsible to the life of their nation,” the USA.
This does not mean, “There there, nice people, just separate paper from plastic, and you’ll be doing your part.” It means to unleash convenings, meet to ask questions, to plan, to think of how to bring to bear, to implement, in millions of ways, and sustainedly.
The Pope’s heartfelt “God Bless America” at the end of his address at the White House today, held a sincerity and timbre not seen for years in the usual GodblessAmericabyrote at the end of many politicos’ speeches here in the USA.
President Bush noticed, and in one of his best traits when well aimed, which is a very sweet boyish enthusiasm, he leaned toward the Pope and said of the prelate’s speech, “…that was an awesome speech.”
The contrast between predictable official welcomes, and a rather startling vitality in the Pope’s opening volley, is becoming an increasing part of this Pope’s pronouncements publicly. Just as such was when the Pope recently began to describe for the first time… the debt of honor earth’s people have toward caring for the planet.
Recently, in L’Osservatore Romano, an interview entitled “New Forms of Social Sin,” offered Archbishop Gianfranco Girotti’s remarks about “ecological” sin, which undergirded Pope Benedict XVI’s now ongoing public expressions of concern about global Read the rest of this entry »
April 16th, 2008 By DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, Assistant Editor, TMV Columnist
Probably because the Pope makes little of it, many may not remember that today it’s the Pope’s birthday: Born April 16, 1927. He’s a sharp and strong 81 years old. Age alone is no determinant about a person’s abilities to be a strong… Pope… or a President.
Relationships
Catholics have long had what often seems strange to others, either a kind of an arm’s length, “Touch-him-not,-he’s-like-God” relationship with their prelates, or a deep personal affection for their Church leaders, sometimes including “a talk-and-cup-of-Joe together” kind of relationship.
There are stories about the Pope that are not charming. But, one of the most charming stories I’ve heard was from my German publisher, who told me that when Benedict was elected Pope, one of the German newspapers, in a burst of pride, ran a huge front page headline: “WE ARE POPE!!”
The implication is that some have a sense that the Pope is a real person, knowable, joinable, and that his success is shared.
All grim interpretations of that all aside, I think the headline was sincere and innocent happiness.
BRIEF BIO of Joseph Alois Ratzinger, Pope Benedict the 16th
Here is a bit of the Pope’s biography, including the part many, including many Catholics, are concerned about and often want to hear far more about; his involvement as a young man in Nazi Germany.
There is also inferred here the close family life the Pope had as a child in a relatively small village, and also how he was presented and given opportunity auspiciously time and again to advance in his calling. There is also a small reference to his motto of ‘truth’ as an appointee over the Bavarian archdiocese after the war, which many would like to see a good deal more fleshing out with specifics. This is from the Vatican Library, an official brief bio of Joseph Ratzinger, now known as Pope Benedict XVI:
…born at Marktl am Inn, Diocese of Passau (Germany) on 16 April 1927 (Holy Saturday) and was baptised on the same day. His father, a policeman, belonged to an old family of farmers from Lower Bavaria of modest economic resources. His mother was the daughter of artisans from Rimsting on the shore of Lake Chiem, and before marrying she worked as a cook in a number of hotels.
He spent his childhood and adolescence in Traunstein, a small village near the Austrian border, thirty kilometres from Salzburg. In this environment, which he himself has defined as “Mozartian”, he received his Christian, cultural and human formation.
His youthful years were not easy. His faith and the education received at home prepared him for the harsh experience of those years during which the Nazi regime pursued a hostile attitude towards the Catholic Church. The young Joseph saw how some Nazis beat the Parish Priest before the celebration of Mass.
It was precisely during that complex situation that he discovered the beauty and truth Read the rest of this entry »
April 15th, 2008 By DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, Assistant Editor, TMV Columnist
Again, a disclosure: I am a Catholic.
Catholic social teachings
disagree with abuses of power,
disagree with politics that omit and oppress the poor and needy,
disagree with trampling the preciousness of the life force,
disagree with any idea that preemptive war is good,
disagree with any idea that humans are not worthy of justice and dignity… and much more.
These principles are in place to keep the world from going dead black with avarice and sloth and cruelty and the sounds of many mouths banging in scorn like empty pots. They are not always easy to live, but they are to be rooted in the heart and soul, and to be striven toward even though it is hard in the winds that swirl through this world.
Here, one journalist writes about some who present George Bush as having a seemingly ‘Catholic conscience.’ You can read the entire article by Daniel Burke here “A Catholic Wind in the White House,” and you can read my article I filed this morning at The National Catholic Reporter in my weekly column there where, speaking as a Catholic, I felt I had to refute the idea that George Bush is in any way following sacred Catholic social teachings. You can see that article, entitled, “Silencing a Woman: Retrieving Her Voice,” here.
April 13, 2008, in the Washington Post, Daniel Burke, a national correspondent for Religion News Service, writes about how some imagine President George Bush is actually a secret Catholic ‘believer,’ and has met with and surrounded himself by Catholics during his administration… that his policies have directly grown out of Catholic social justice teachings… and that the Pope is coming to see the President and his Catholic appointees specially, as the Pope is his ally… even though the Pope disagrees with President Bush’s Iraq war and torture.
“Former Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson, another evangelical with an affinity for Catholic teaching, says that the key to understanding Bush’s domestic policy is to view it through the lens of Rome. Others go a step further.
“Paul Weyrich, an architect of the religious right, detects in Bush shades of former British prime minister Tony Blair, who converted to Catholicism last year. “I think he is a secret believer,” Weyrich says of Bush. Similarly, John DiIulio, Bush’s first director of faith-based initiatives, has called the president a “closet Catholic.” And he was only half-kidding.”
Mr. Burke’s article goes on to say,
“As the White House prepares to welcome Benedict on Tuesday, many in Bush’s inner circle expect the pontiff to find a kindred spirit in the president… this Protestant president has surrounded himself with Roman Catholic intellectuals, speechwriters, professors, priests, bishops and politicians. These Catholics — and thus Catholic social teaching — have for the past eight years been shaping Bush’s speeches, policies and legacy to a degree perhaps unprecedented in U.S. history….”
But, I must say otherwise:
…At a time when hardworking fathers and mothers are literally piling the children’s toys and bunk beds at the curb, for they are losing their homes in the sub-prime mortgage bunco scheme promoted by the grotesquely avaricious…
…at a time when 25% of older women only have a social security check to live on and nothing more… and they have inherited nothing but a President who wishes to do away with social security… and who admires those who call this hard earned savings account belonging to individuals who worked all their lives long, “an entitlement…”
…during a time when the last small farmers, ranchers, and overland independent truckers are being run out of business from sudden spikes in fuel and government’s one-sided subsidies… and our farmers, ranchers and trucker-heroes are becoming desperate for they not only take care of their own families, but have long taken care of us, their nation’s families at a root level, delivering the food and necessities we need…
…at a time when pharmaceutical companies produce much good, and have some charitable programs, yet still, at the back door, many also hold onto medicine patents that would have expired, thereby allowing the formulas into public domain and bringing down the costs of vital medicines for human beings in need…. but instead, some change the formula in slight and meaningless ways and thereby file to re-patent the medicine again, so they are its only producers, and prices remain high… often out of reach of those in most dire straights… and all this is okay-ed by our government…
To read the rest of both Mr. Burke’s article and mine, please see the links above….
April 14th, 2008 By DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, Assistant Editor, TMV Columnist
First, a disclosure: I am a Catholic who comes from a long line of deeply ethnic old believers. I’ve had my bewilderments with the Church hierarchy, and my critiques and condemnations of some of the actions of some within the hierarchy as well…. but also hold to the deep social teachings from the heart of the Church which share their core with other philosophies and other faiths’ tenets, especially the Jewish concept of tikkun olam, to attempt, as one can, to take on the repair of the world soul.
Catholic social teachings speak against dictatorial power, do not support politics that omit the poor and needy, disapprove the slighting of the preciousness of the life force, turn from the idea that preemptive war is desirable, refuse the idea that humans are to be exploited and used instead of treated with decency, reject that people are to be put to death… and much more. Catholic social principles are hard to live by sometimes, but without them, the belief is the world would be far more vulnerable to becoming a soul-less wasteland.
My father, a tailor from the old country, used to warn that it was suicide to speak of politics and religion in the same breath, that it brought out the scorn-demons on both sides. But, in our time, it cannot be avoided apparently, for the Pope is about to land in the USA to visit only two cities; New York City and Washington D.C., the USA’s pinnacles of politics and politicos…
Too, the Pope is seemingly avoiding the Boston Archdiocese and Los Angeles and Chicago where live mountains of Catholics, but also where the Church hierarchy markedly looked the other way and literally obstructed child victims from justice as they were being sexually predated upon by certain priests in the last place on earth one would ever imagine a child would be unsafe…
Those scars will never be talked away. Not by popes nor apologists. Never.
But, in another turn, already the media’s guesses and analyses are flying about the Pope’s hidden motives and overt intents to meet with pols and those in power here, and to speak at the UN; some will worship without questions, some will demonize without facts. But, many in media will have space to speculate about what the Pope will, won’t, say, what he meant, didn’t mean, what he will support and what he will condemn, whose campaign he will lean more toward supporting–without meaning to.
Some will imagine how the Pope will interfere, admonish, try to corral the free speech and thought of Catholic Universities some of which have, amongst other structures, gay and lesbian sacral groups, and so on.
I’d suggest to look for the humanity in whatever Pope has to say or do, to rest on that wherever, whenever that might occur. Just my two cents’ worth from meeting tens of thousands of people a year when I teach… Far more than admonishments and punishments, the people of the earth are in need of love without academic précis, and fully worthy of unconditional blessing…
for the rhizome, the living life force underground, ever glows and thrives on warmth and light and water, rather than on opprobrium, exile, and scorn.
Pope Benedict XVI has called on the media to underpin its work with ethical considerations and do more to promote the “dignity of the human being”.
The pontiff said there was a need for what he called “info-ethics” - as much as bio-ethics in the fields of medicine and biological research.
He said the media was often used to promote vulgarity and violence and to legitimise “distorted models of life”.
So he’s following the stories about Britney Spears, too..
But he also said the media helped to spread democracy and promote dialogue.
This isn’t the first time the Vatican has put its two-cents in on the news media. According this BBC report, It has often accused the media of promoting consumerism (by the way, make sure you patronize TMV’s advertisers) and “lifestyles that it considers unethical, such as pre-marital sex and homosexuality.”
December 24th, 2007 By SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
Thousands of pilgrims joined local Palestinians in celebrating Christmas Eve in the West Bank town of Bethlehem, and the observances were more cheerful than in previous years, reports VOA. “It’s a more joyful Christmas. We have more tourists, we have more pilgrims coming to the city of Bethlehem, twice as much as last year,” said Bethleham Mayor Victor Batarseh. “All the hotels are booked. I think this Christmas brings more joy to all the citizens of Bethlehem.” The mayor attributes the change to a lull in violence and the revival of the peace process. More here…
While in the Vatican City Pope Benedict XVI on Tuesday used his Christmas homily to speak out against selfishness and the degradation of the environment as he celebrated midnight mass at Saint Peter’s Basilica, reports AP. “Man is so preoccupied with himself, he has such urgent need of all the space and all the time for his own things, that nothing remains for others — for his neighbour, for the poor, for God,” he said, recalling the story of Christ’s birth, when “there was no room in the inn” for the baby Jesus.
“And the richer men become, the more they fill up all the space by themselves. And the less room there is for others,” said Benedict, wearing a white brocade robe.
September 30th, 2007 By JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
The video and YouTube age makes if more difficult for cover stories. One of the images literally flashing around the world is of Cameraman Nagai Kenji being shot dead from the back. It’s there for everyone to see - a graphic document of repression:
Once upon a time if outrages occurred, they could be contained. Governments, organizations, celebrities or security forces could put out tidy cover stories and most people wouldn’t notice.
But then came the video camera revolution which spread the word throughout the county and often beyond. Then came the 24-news cycle with cable news networks craving more new info and images to fill hours naysayers once scornfully said pioneer CNN could NEVER fill and keep audiences.
And now we’re into the YouTube era, where anyone official or otherwise can post an image on the Internet that will be carried throughout the world — not just influencing those (particularly young people) who increasingly get news online, but television programs, print news editors and television news directors who find interesting tidbits that spark program or story ideas.
Myanmar is now being pitchforked into the headlines with more and more stories each day. For instances, as you read this:
China is the key to political change in Myanmar, not UN envoy Ibrahim Gambari who has met the military junta, the former US ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton said here.
But there was no sign that Beijing would change tack and pressure the junta, Bolton told BBC television while attending Britain’s opposition Conservative party conference in Blackpool, England.
‘I think it’s very unclear that (Gambari) will be able to achieve anything. I have a lot of respect for Ibrahim Gambari personally but he’s in a very difficult position because the Security Council is divided,’ he said.
Gambari was dispatched to Myanmar at the weekend by UN chief Ban Ki-moon to intervene after the junta unleashed a military campaign to shut down mass protests several days ago, leaving at least 13 dead and hundreds arrested.
A worried Pope Benedict XVI added his voice Sunday to calls from abroad for Myanmar’s military leaders to peacefully end their crackdown on protesters demanding democracy.
Benedict made his first public comments on the deadly crackdown a few hours after a U.N. envoy met with some Myanmar government leaders and detained opposition leader Aung San Sui Kyi, whose steadfast, peaceful challenge to the regime earned her the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991. She has spent years under house arrest.
“I am following with great trepidation the very serious events” in Myanmar, the pope told pilgrims at his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo outside Rome.
He expressed his spiritual closeness to the “dear” people of Myanmar during their “painful trial” and he asked the entire Catholic Church to follow his lead in praying intensely for them.
He said he “strongly hoped that a peaceful solution can be found for the good of the country.”
And he should worry: according to Al-Jazeera, the military’s control is tighter than ever:
Reutersreports (via the New York Times that Pope Benedict has urged world leaders to do something about global warming before it is too late. The Pope said: “A decisive ‘yes’ is needed in decisions to safeguard creation as well as a strong commitment to reverse tendencies that risk leading to irreversible situations of degradation.”
He went on to say that “New generations will be entrusted with the future of the planet, which bears clear signs of a type of development that has not always protected nature’s delicate equilibriums” and that “”Courageous choices that can re-create a strong alliance between man and earth must be made before it is too late.”
The author of the article rightfully points out that the Vatican has become increasingly ‘green’ under the leadership of Pope John first, and Pope Benedict now. Pope Benedict seems to know a lot about this issue and seems to believe it should be a priority for him and the Church.
He is, of course, quite right.
I am one of those people who believe that global warming is real, and that we are slowly but surely destroying the planet we live on and on which we are dependent. I agree with the Pope that something should be done. On the other hand, I also believe that the entire controversy or spectacle surrounding global warming / the environment at this moment is not productive. We have to look at this issue seriously, but we should not automatically dismiss everything critics say. For one thing, we should fight global warming, but we should try to do so with the least damage to our economies possible. Perhaps we will suffer economically in the short run - which is not a problem if doing so means that we save the planet of course - but we should try to limit the economical damage.
Another thing I find frustrating about the global warming debate is that Europe is willing to act - and we are already acting - but that the biggest spoilers or poluters of the world (America and China) seem to see things differently. As I understand it, China is working on this issue, mainly because China has turned into one big cloud of fog. In the US, meanwhile, a lot is said about global warming, but little is done. Of course, Europe should act in its own interest and even in the interest of the rest of the world even if others do not, but as long as America and China do not follow suit, whatever we do will not have the necessary impact.
It is good to see that the Church takes the leadrole on this issue. The Church should not keep silent; the earth is God’s creation, and it seems logical that the Church does her utmost best to preserve it.
In the interests of full disclosure, I inherited some fairly heavy baggage when it comes to the Roman Catholic Church.
My father attended a parochial school for 12 years and dutifully returned the favor as an altar boy when he was younger and as a star football player when he was older. But when it came time to get hitched, he had the temerity to want to marry a woman whose father was a Jew in a church ceremony and the local diocese said “No way, Jose.”
So my parents were married in an assistant parish priest’s office on a weekday afternoon to the unwelcome accompaniment of a Hopalong Cassidy record being played at full volume in the adjoining office of an elderly priest who was nearly deaf.
Although my siblings and I were given a religious upbringing and required to attend church and Sunday school, my father would have rather walked on hot coals than exposed us to the Catholic Church, which when we were old enough to understand he would refer to as “that enormous guilt machine.”
And so I come to the ongoing pedophile priest scandal with enormous sympathy for the victims and none whatsoever for the church.
Note that I say ongoing because there is little indication that the church has learned anything from the scandal other than to mouth insincere platitudes at press conferences and hire the best lawyers that their parishioners’ collection plate offerings can buy to push back against the many thousands of young innocents who have been fondled, fellated and sodomized with the knowledge — which is to say tacit approval — of an imperious church hierarchy all the way up to the Vatican.
This sordid attitude has been on full display in Los Angeles, the largest Catholic archdiocese in the U.S.
Cardinal Roger Mahony certainly seemed to be contrite in making the obligatory apologies in announcing a $660 million settlement for more than 500 victims of sexual abuse by his clergymen, but it is the back story that tells the true tale.
Mahony caved in to the plaintiffs’ lawyers after four years of fighting back against the victims, thereby prolonging their guilt and their suffering, and only then because he would have to soil his cardinal’s robes by having to testify at trial.
The settlement, under which each victim will received about $1.3 million for treatment and therapy, seems appropriate. But it carries with it a another price: A guarantee of silence from the victims and a bar against the archdiocese having to hand over incriminating documents, let alone cleaning its Augean stables.
Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez nailed it:
“Was anyone surprised?
“If so, God help you.
“All along, the Los Angeles Archdiocese — which was once compared to La Cosa Nostra by the head of a Catholic review board — had one primary objective.
“The truth? Not a chance.
“Justice? Forget about it.
“The top priority?
“Keep Mahony off the stand.
“Under oath, he would have been forced to explain exactly what he knew about the scandal and what he did, or didn’t do, in response.
“Apparently, that’s not something the cardinal wants anyone ever to know.
“Kind of scary, isn’t it?”
Meanwhile, it’s obvious from the Vatican’s response to the settlement that it still doesn’t get it: A spokesman harrumphed that sexual abuse of children is not just a Catholic Church problem and other faiths should take steps to acknowledge and deal with such “wickedness” within their own ranks.
The Catholic Church in America does many fine things. I refer specifically to its network of inner city schools, in many places the only opportunity for children of color to get a decent education.
The church has paid out over $2 billion for its pedophile sins so far with more payments to come. It has made some efforts to weed out or get help for its troubled priests.
But just think of what that $2 billion could be used for had it not encouraged a culture of depravity and then covered up it up.
June 14th, 2007 By MICHAEL STICKINGS, Assistant Editor
I realize that the Roman Catholic Church is “pro-life,” which is to say, vehemently anti-abortion, no matter what, but I’m not so sure it’s such a great idea — given a) its own long history on the wrong side of human rights, and b) its more recent concern with human rights, including opposition to the death penalty — to go after Amnesty International for promoting abortion choice.
And that is precisely what the Church is doing. As the BBC is reporting, “[t]he Vatican has urged all Catholics to stop donating money to Amnesty International”. This is nothing if not counter-productive.
In its defence, Amnesty is claiming that it promotes choice, not universal abortion rights, which is fair, if unclear, but of course the Church is absolutist in its stance on abortion — and this includes opposing abortion even in extreme cases (rape, incest). The Church points to what it calls Amnesty’s “pro-abortion about-turn,” but Amnesty’s deputy secretary general, Kate Gilmore was right to argue that the “Church, through a misrepresented account of [Amnesty’s] position on selective aspects of abortion, is placing in peril work on human rights”.
Evidently, though, anti-abortion absolutism, even when combined with misrepresentation, as here, is more important to the Church — or at least to the Vatican, to be more precise — than Amnesty’s important work on human rights. Would it not have been better for the Church to criticize Amnesty’s position without going so far as to call on all Catholics to stop donating money to it? Given that Amnesty and the Church now have so much in common, and can do so much together with respect to human rights, why endanger the noble work that Amnesty is doing?
![[NZZ am Sonntag, Switzerland]](http://worldmeets.us/images/bushpope_nzzamsonntag.gif)
![[La Tribune, Honduras]](http://worldmeets.us/images/popepedofile_latribunahn.gif)
