The Pope and the Bomb

Pope on Hiroshima: Possession of nuclear weapons "immoral"

To hell with him.

Pope Francis on Thursday marked the 75th anniversary of the nuclear attack on Hiroshima by calling for peace and repeating that not only the use of atomic weapons but their mere possession is immoral.

Francis sent a message to organizers of the anniversary commemoration, recalling that he had prayed at the Hiroshima peace memorial during his 2019 visit to Japan and met with bombing survivors, known as hibakusha.

“It has never been clearer that, for peace to flourish, all people need to lay down the weapons of war, and especially the most powerful and destructive of weapons: nuclear arms that can cripple and destroy whole cities, whole countries,” Francis said in the message.

He repeated what he had said Nov. 24 at the peace memorial: “The use of atomic energy for purposes of war is immoral, just as the possessing of nuclear weapons is immoral.”

The Holy See was among the first countries to sign and ratify the new U.N. nuclear prohibition treaty, and Francis himself went further than any pope before him in saying in 2017 that not only the use but the mere possession of atomic weapons is “to be condemned.”

Pope weighs in

Pope Francis Prays For George Floyd, Decries 'The Sin Of Racism'

Catholics cannot tolerate racism and also "claim to defend the sacredness of every human life," Pope Francis says, commenting on the upheaval that has followed the death of George Floyd in police custody.

The pope is urging the U.S. to reach a national reconciliation, after days of protests and violence.

"My friends, we cannot tolerate or turn a blind eye to racism and exclusion in any form and yet claim to defend the sacredness of every human life," the pope said on Wednesday.

He added, "At the same time, we have to recognize that 'the violence of recent nights is self-destructive and self-defeating. Nothing is gained by violence and so much is lost.'"

Today, Francis says, he is joining the Church in Minneapolis, and across the U.S., "in praying for the repose of the soul of George Floyd and of all those others who have lost their lives as a result of the sin of racism."

The prayers, he added, would be for consolation for their grieving families, and for reconciliation and peace.

An idea whose time has come

New York City is moving 6,000 homeless people out of shelters into hotels

Didn't the pope urge this just the other day?

Pope Francis has been tested twice for coronavirus. 

As an elderly man, with a damaged lung from an infection in his 20s and recovering from bronchitis, he is particularly vulnerable to the most severe symptoms associated with COVID-19. 

Therefore, he is taking particular precaution, according to The Vatican press office. 

He eats his meals in private, keeps a distance from anyone who might be carrying the virus, and uses hand sanitizer before and after meeting any guests, CNN reported.

I feel that.

Here's the bit I remembered.

In the interview, Pope Francis addressed what he sees from world leaders. 

He denounced "the hypocrisy of certain political personalities who speak of facing up to the crisis, of the problem of hunger in the world, but who in the meantime manufacture weapons," as The Hill reported.

In particular, he highlighted the callous way the homeless were treated in Las Vegas.

"A photo appeared the other day of a parking lot in Las Vegas where they [the homeless] had been put in quarantine. And the hotels were empty. But the homeless cannot go to a hotel," the Pope said, as CNN reported. 

"This is the moment to see the poor," he said, adding that society often treats those in need as "rescued animals."

The most religious man in Washington?

So said by Lawrence O'Donnell of Mitt Romney.

How seriously do we suppose he takes that amazing mythology?

Plates in a rain barrel?

The angel Moroni?

And those are the least extravagant bits.

I can't imagine what he actually thinks.

But then I can't imagine what the Pope thinks.

Sometimes I am not at all sure what I think.

His preferential option for the poor

19th Century Vatican palace turned into homeless shelter at Pope Francis' behest

After the building was renovated in November, it opened its doors to the homeless.

“Beauty heals,” Francis said when he inaugurated the building at the time.

The Two Popes

Quite a film.

I knew about Ratzinger and his outlook, former head of the Inquisition, but much less about Bergoglio.

Although I did not remember R's piano skill. At 86, if you can believe it.

The pope denounces fetal euthanasia

Pope Francis Says Abortion, Even of a Sick Fetus, Is Like Hiring a ‘Hitman’

Pope Francis said Saturday that abortion was always unacceptable, regardless of whether a fetus is fatally ill or has pathological disorders. 

He also urged doctors to help women bring to term even pregnancies likely to end in the death of a child at birth or soon after.

I think he is wrong on this.

Bannon to Matteo Salvini: the Pope is the enemy

Trump’s ex-strategist advised Salvini ‘to target pontiff’s stance on plight of refugees’

Old news, but news to us.

Donald Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon advised Italy’s interior minister Matteo Salvini to attack the pope over the issue of migration, according to sources close to the Italian far right.

During a meeting in Washington in April 2016, Bannon – who would within a few months take up his role as head of Trump’s presidential campaign – suggested the leader of Italy’s anti-immigration League party should start openly targeting Pope Francis, who has made the plight of refugees a cornerstone of his papacy.

“Bannon advised Salvini himself that the actual pope is a sort of enemy. He suggested for sure to attack, frontally,” said a senior League insider with knowledge of the meeting in an interview with the website SourceMaterial.

After the meeting, Salvini became more outspoken against the pope, claiming that conservatives in the Vatican were on his side.

Pope Francis accepts Wuerl's resignation

Pope Francis accepts resignation of Cardinal Wuerl in wake of sex-abuse scandals

Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Washington Cardinal Donald Wuerl after he became entangled in two major sexual abuse and cover-up scandals and lost the support of many in his flock.

Wuerl, who turns 78 in November, becomes the most prominent head to roll in the scandal roiling the Catholic Church after his predecessor as Washington archbishop, Theodore McCarrick, was forced to resign as cardinal over allegations he sexually abused at least two minors and adult seminarians.

A Vatican statement Friday said Francis had accepted Wuerl’s resignation, but named no replacement; Wuerl’s office said he had been asked to stay on in a temporary capacity until a new archbishop is found.

The Latest: Pennsylvania prosecutor critical of Wuerl deal

The prosecutor who released a grand jury report in August on rampant sex abuse in six Pennsylvania dioceses says it is unacceptable that Washington Cardinal Donald Wuerl is retiring with no apparent consequences.

Attorney General Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania said Friday the grand jury report and diocesan records documented Wuerl oversaw and participated in a systematic cover up of child sexual abuse by clergymen while leading the Pittsburgh diocese.

The Pope appeals to heresy of the historical relativity of morals to defend the Church

The Church has taught the same sexual morality for going on two thousand years.

The moral law, it has taught, is part of the eternal law, itself part of the eternal divine law.

Youth today are scandalized

"In old times these things were covered up," the Pope told journalists on Tuesday. 

Old times such as, uh, yesterday, maybe.

"They were covered up also in the homes when the uncle raped the little niece, or the father raped his children. They were covered up because the shame was very big."

"It is how people thought in the last century," Francis continued. 

Now they are shameless? Or less ashamed?

"There is a principle that helps me a lot to interpret history. An historic event must be interpreted with the hermeneutics of that time, not with the hermeneutics of today."

If you say it in Greek this exculpatory bullshit is not so obvious a betrayal of Church teaching.

Take Pennsylvania, for example, the Pope said.

"Look at the report and you will see that when the church began to become aware of this, then we gave it our all to stop it."

The Pope also said that he and the church's watchdog, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, have removed guilty priests.

"And in recent times I have received many, many guilty verdicts from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and ... I have said go ahead, go ahead, but never ever did I sign a pardon request after a guilty verdict. One doesn't negotiate on this, there is no negotiation."

And do they now routinely turn such priests over to "the secular arm"?

Not that I am aware, and he did not say so.

So is it OK if the kiddie rapist is fired from IBM or Ford Motor Company, but the employer hushes it up and does not report the crime and turn over the evidence to the authorities?

Nope.

Not so fast, say church scholars

75 Catholic priests and scholars ask Francis to backtrack on death penalty

An open letter was published Wednesday morning in First Things, a conservative-leaning Catholic journal, and was signed by several prominent Catholics, including Fr. George Rutler and Fr. Gerald Murray of the Archdiocese of New York.

The letter argues that, by refining Church teaching on the death penalty, Pope Francis casts doubt on the authority of the church’s teaching body, known as the magisterium. 

“To contradict Scripture and tradition on this point would cast doubt on the credibility of the magisterium in general,” the letter reads, calling Pope Francis’s decision a “gravely scandalous situation.” 

The signatories call upon the College of Cardinals “to advise His Holiness that it is his duty to put an end to this scandal, to withdraw this paragraph from the Catechism, and to teach the word of God unadulterated.”

Infallible rejection of the death penalty?

Pope declares death penalty inadmissible, changing Church's stance

Pope Francis has declared that the death penalty is never admissible and that the Catholic Church will work towards its abolition around the world, the Vatican formally announced Thursday.

The change, which has been added to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, makes official a position that the Pope has articulated since he became pontiff.

The church now teaches that "the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person" and states that it will "work with determination towards its abolition worldwide," the Vatican said.

The declaration by Pope Francis, who is spiritual leader to the world's 1.2 billion Catholics, may have particular resonance in the United States, where capital punishment remains legal in 31 states and as a federal punishment.

Was this officially an infallible declaration?

Papal infallibility is a dogma of the Catholic Church that states that, in virtue of the promise of Jesus to Peter, the Pope is preserved from the possibility of error "when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church."

This doctrine was defined dogmatically at the First Ecumenical Council of the Vatican of 1869–1870 in the document Pastor aeternus, but had been defended before that, existing already in medieval theology and being the majority opinion at the time of the Counter-Reformation.

According to Catholic theology, there are several concepts important to the understanding of infallible, divine revelation: Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the Sacred Magisterium (Teaching Authority). 

The infallible teachings of the Pope are part of the Sacred Magisterium, which also consists of ecumenical councils and the "ordinary and universal magisterium". 

In Catholic theology, papal infallibility is one of the channels of the infallibility of the Church. 

The infallible teachings of the Pope must be based on, or at least not contradict, Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture.

And even if they say so, anyone can see it conflicts with the many passages in scripture, both the OT and the NT, that endorse the death penalty and so does not satisfy the official conditions of infallibility.

This will further divide Catholics and will certainly not change many minds.

Not so fast

Pope Reportedly Tells Gay Man 'God Made You Like This And Loves You'

Frances Langum at C&L writes, under that headline,

Is even the Catholic Church evolving on this issue? It appears so.

She quotes CNN:

A victim of clerical sexual abuse has said that Pope Francis told him that God made him gay and that his sexuality "does not matter." 

Juan Carlos Cruz, a survivor of sexual abuse, spent three days with Pope Francis at the Vatican in April, in which he discussed his sexuality and the abuse he suffered at the hands of a Chilean priest. 

Describing his encounter with the Pope to CNN, Cruz said: "You know Juan Carlos, that does not matter. God made you like this. God loves you like this. The Pope loves you like this and you should love yourself and not worry about what people say."

The traditional Catholic position is that while what we do is up to us, what we want to do is not.

And that God loves us all.

And that morally we must not fulfill some desires.

Nothing the Pope said - or reportedly said - conflicts with or departs from any of that.

I'll think he's really revising the traditional Christian and Catholic moral view when he says homosexual activity is not wrong.

Or, for that matter, any sexual activity at all apart from intercourse with one's spouse of the opposite sex making no use of birth control measures other than the rhythm method.

Wait for that.

Don't hold your breath.

Heresy at the Vatican?

Vatican scrambles after pope appears to deny existence of hell

Maybe.

But maybe not.

The Vatican has scrambled to clarify comments made by Pope Francis to a well-known Italian journalist that appeared to deny the existence of hell.

The Holy See issued a terse statement saying a lengthy article published in La Repubblica on Wednesday by Eugenio Scalfari, 93, the newspaper’s founder, was “the fruit of his reconstruction” and not “a faithful transcription of the Holy Father’s words”.

While the Vatican conceded that Scalfari, an atheist who struck up a friendship with Francis in 2013, had held a private meeting with the pontiff before the Easter weekend, it said an interview had not been granted.

During the meeting Scalfari asked the pope where “bad souls” go, to which he was quoted as responding: 

“They are not punished.

"Those who repent obtain God’s forgiveness and take their place among the ranks of those who contemplate him, but those who do not repent and cannot be forgiven disappear.

"A hell doesn’t exist, the disappearance of sinning souls exists.”

The Vatican said the “literal words pronounced by the pope are not quoted” and that “no quotation of the article should be considered as a faithful transcription of the words of the Holy Father”.

Scalfari is said to pride himself on not taking notes or recording high-profile interviews.

But this is not the first time he has been accused of misrepresenting the pope: in 2014 he was rebuked by the Vatican for an article saying Francis had abolished sin.

Pope Francis to honor Cardinal Law, the racketeer who ran the world's biggest ring of pedophiles

The Catholic Church is a despicable institution run by the most corrupt hypocrites.

They make Hollywood and the Congress look like congregations of choirboys

A Judgment Day Cardinal Law Can’t Avoid

Double standard, anyone?

Impunity for the Church and its big shots?

Oh, my, yes.

Pope Francis will participate in a funeral Mass for Cardinal Bernard Law, the former archbishop of Boston, who, for many Catholics, is the institutional face of the scandal. 

Pope Francis, the Holy Father many Catholics prayed would finally hold men like Cardinal Law to full account, will instead continue to honor him in death.

The victims were as young as 4 years old. 

Many came from poor families, led by single parents or immigrants who turned to the church for help, and to priests like Boston’s John Geoghan as an example for their sons. 

Mr. Geoghan preyed on and raped children like these for the duration of his priesthood. 

But Mr. Geoghan was one of the many pedophile priests whom Cardinal Law spent decades shielding and shifting from one parish to the next, supplying them with ever more victims, building a temple of lies.

. . . .

It emerged that the Archdiocese of Boston had settled claims against at least 70 priests in the decade before 2002, most in secret. 

The number of claims against the archdiocese has only grown since then.

Cardinal Law “put child molesters over children; it’s that simple,” Eric MacLeish, a lawyer who has represented more than 200 sexual abuse victims in the Boston Archdiocese, said after Cardinal Law’s death.

John Geoghan was defrocked and jailed. 

Forced to resign in 2002, Cardinal Law later retreated to the splendor of the Vatican. 

There, unpunished, he had multiple leadership roles, including on a committee advising the pope on bishops’ assignments. 

His chosen bishops still lead many American dioceses.

Was he simply afraid?

Looks it.

The de facto military ruler of Burma lied in his face, denying any tiniest flicker of ethnic troubles in his country.

But that very man is behind it all.

Not once did the pope protest while visiting the country.

Not once did he use the forbidden word, "Rohingya."

‘I Ask Forgiveness,’ Pope Francis Tells Rohingya Muslims in Bangladesh

On the eve of his return to Rome, Pope Francis on Friday used the word “Rohingya,” coming face-to-face with some of the persecuted Muslims whose plight had cast a long shadow over his visit to Myanmar and Bangladesh.

Critics had been asking why a pontiff who so often condemned injustice against the downtrodden had stayed silent earlier in the week, when he made his first visit to Myanmar, a country in which Rohingya Muslims have been raped, killed or driven into exile in Bangladesh by a brutal military campaign of repression.

. . . .

“In the name of everyone, of those who have persecuted you, of those who have done you harm, above all for the indifference of the world, I ask forgiveness. 

Forgiveness,” the pope said in emotional and apparently unscripted remarks, as the survivors stood around him. 

He did not address his own recent silence.

The Rohingya are stateless Muslims from western Myanmar who, according to the United Nations, the United States and many human rights groups, have been the targets of ethnic cleansing. 

More than 600,000 Rohingya have fled across the border to Bangladesh, where they live in desperate, sprawling refugee camps in areas like Cox’s Bazar, where the group that met the pope had earlier sought shelter.

Francis had in the past, from the Vatican, denounced the “persecution of our Rohingya brothers,” but during his visit Monday to Thursday in Myanmar, diplomatic considerations and a fear of prompting a military crackdown on the Christian minority had kept the usually outspoken pope from uttering the term Rohingya or directly addressing the humanitarian disaster.

That uncharacteristic silence prompted criticism and frustration from those who had grown accustomed to considering the pope as a moral compass in a world that had gone adrift. 

The Vatican found itself refuting the notion that the pope had relinquished the moral authority that imbued his office with influence.

But as soon as the pope left Myanmar, where the Vatican hinted that he had raised the issue with the military commander, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, and the country’s de facto leader, the tarnished Nobel Peace Prize laureate Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, he was more willing to broach the issue.

On Thursday night, at an event with Bangladesh’s president, he crept up to the word Rohingya, talking about Rakhine State where massacres, systematic rape and burning of villages have occurred.

Pope’s Avoids Politics in Myanmar but Can’t Quiet Questions on Rohingya

In his last full day in Myanmar, Pope Francis sought to pivot away from politics and the disappointment over his decision to avoid mentioning the persecuted Rohingya Muslims and to find safer ground in Catholic liturgy and interreligious dialogue.

But even as the pope removed his shoes to meet with monks in a pagoda and celebrated Mass at a colonial-era racetrack, his decision not to directly address one of the world’s most acute humanitarian disasters cast a pall over what the Vatican sought to portray as a historic visit of bridge-building with a fledgling democracy.

. . . .

Myanmar presented the pope with a treacherous diplomatic tight wire. 

The world expected a global figure who has championed the downtrodden to speak out for the more than 600,000 Rohingya who have fled to Bangladesh from Rakhine State in Myanmar to escape a military campaign of murder, rape and arson. 

But local bishops urged him to avoid addressing the issue out of concern that it could aggravate the problem and endanger the small Christian minority.

A tightening alliance between the GOP and the religious right

GOP tax bill would allow churches to endorse political candidates

Secularists generally say churches should have no tax exemption.

They have had one for decades, on condition they stay out of politics.

The GOP view has been in recent decades that they should keep the exemption and freely get into politics with both feet.

The House Republican tax bill released Thursday would allow churches to endorse political candidates, rolling back a 1950s-era law that bars such activities. 

The proposed change is listed at the end of the 429-page legislation.

It states that churches should not lose their tax-exempt status based on statements about political candidates made during the course of religious services.

The change to what is known as the Johnson Amendment has long been a priority of leaders on the religious right. They say the policy violates the First Amendment.

The Johnson Amendment prohibits 501(c)(3) nonprofits from engaging in certain political activities.

President Trump vowed to repeal the amendment during the campaign, saying it would "give our churches their voice back." 

Shortly after taking office, Trump said he would “totally destroy” the amendment, which allows the IRS to revoke a church’s tax exempt status if it’s deemed to be participating in a political campaign.

This will enable churches supportive of the left the same freedom, as well as Catholic churches that support a sociocon agenda on sex and abortion and a left liberal agenda on most other things, including an economic hostility to capitalism as marked, at least, as Bernie's own.

That's in the Old Testament?

Not that it isn't true, of course.

Pope blasts climate change doubters: cites moral duty to act

Pope Francis has sharply criticized climate change doubters, saying history will judge those who failed to take the necessary decisions to curb heat-trapping emissions blamed for the warming of the Earth.

Francis was asked about climate change and the spate of hurricanes that have pummeled the U.S., Mexico and the Caribbean recently as his charter plane left Colombia on Sunday and flew over some of the devastated areas.

"Those who deny this must go to the scientists and ask them. They speak very clearly," he said, referring to experts who blame global warming on man-made activities.

. . . .

For those who have denied climate change, or delayed actions to counter it, he responded with an Old Testament saying: "Man is stupid."

Not finding it at the Bible Gateway.

I get several hits on "stupid", but none on "man is stupid".

Labor, socialism, and "a more equal society"

For most of us, the history of Communism in the 20th Century, not excepting its history in Cuba and other loci in Latin America, has given socialism a very bad name, not only for economic misrule and failure but for political tyranny.

Not for all of  us.

But for most.

Ken Livingstone: Venezuela crisis due to Chávez's failure to kill oligarchs

Ken Livingstone: putting the record straight on Venezuela

Labour speaks out on Venezuela as pressure mounts on Corbyn

A Guardian summary of the state of play in late July

Why won't Jeremy Corbyn talk about what's happening in Venezuela?

Remember all those left-wing pundits who drooled over Venezuela?

(Rachel Maddow is a great fan of Naomi Klein, by the way.)

NYT, yesterday: Venezuela’s New Leaders Begin Their March Toward Total Control

The Vatican calls on Venezuela to suspend its Constituent Assembly

Even the Jesuits strongly oppose the regime.

And the Jesuit Pope.

Pope Francis pleads for halt to Venezuela’s ‘rigged’ constituent assembly

London Times, today: Venezuelan exiles beg Corbyn to condemn Maduro

Venezuela Troops Take Prosecutor Office as Enemies Targeted

Previously a supporter, she has become a dissident and recently vowed to use her authority to investigate claimed irregularities in the weekend plebiscite.

London-based Smartmatic, which provided the voting technology for the controversial vote, said Wednesday that the National Electoral Council voting numbers of more than 8 million people -- about 41.53% of registered voters -- are off by 1 million votes.

The Bolivarian Revolution will not be tolerating that.

A Vatican, Jesuit blast against American conservative Catholics

The original is not terribly long.

Evangelical Fundamentalism and Catholic Integralism in the USA: A surprising ecumenism

Not surprising, from the Vatican of this pope or from the Jesuits, and very interesting.

This is an attack on, among others, the type of Christian who prioritizes concerns related to traditional sexual morality over concerns related to war, poverty, the crimes and excesses of plutocracies, and the ruin of the environment.

Seems rather Modernist, too.

A report in CNN.

Catholic journal criticizes Trump 'value voters'

A report in America.

Italian Jesuit journal calls out “ecumenism of hate” between some Evangelicals and Catholics in U.S. politics

It was only to be expected that Rod Dreher of "The Benedict Option" would flip.

He is one of the kinds of Christian the Vatican article attacks.

Top Papal Adviser Denounces ‘Ecumenism Of Hate’

"Left-wing crackpottery on stilts," says Dreher about the whole piece.