Thursday, March 28, AD 2024 9:24pm

Live Not By Lies

 Live Not By Lies

Alexander  Solzhenitsyn

One of the more distressing aspects of the contemporary world is just how frequently people are asked to swallow the most total malarkey.  Case in point, current Catholic policy in regard to Islam.  This policy, to dignify ahistoric fervent wishful hoping, is best exemplified by Pope Francis in this passage from Evangelii Gaudium:

253. In order to sustain dialogue with Islam, suitable training is essential for all involved, not only so that they can be solidly and joyfully grounded in their own identity, but so that they can also acknowledge the values of others, appreciate the concerns underlying their demands and shed light on shared beliefs. We Christians should embrace with affection and respect Muslim immigrants to our countries in the same way that we hope and ask to be received and respected in countries of Islamic tradition. I ask and I humbly entreat those countries to grant Christians freedom to worship and to practice their faith, in light of the freedom which followers of Islam enjoy in Western countries! Faced with disconcerting episodes of violent fundamentalism, our respect for true followers of Islam should lead us to avoid hateful generalisations, for authentic Islam and the proper reading of the Koran are opposed to every form of violence.

Andrew Bieszad, at One Peter 5, has a brilliant piece in which he explains how this policy is directly the reverse of the position of the Church until the day before yesterday in historical terms:

I have a lot to say about Islam because there’s a lot that needs to be said that is NOT being said, and the Catholic faithful are suffering because of it. But I’ll begin with a simple proposition, one I will develop in future posts: The current, post-Vatican II view on Islam and Catholic-Muslim relations is in direct opposition to all related Catholic teaching that came before it.

“Dialogue” is not a solution to the problems of sin and salvation. That’s why Christ lived and died, established the Church on Peter, instituted the sacraments, and so on. This is understood intellectually by many Catholics involved in “dialogue,”  but it is almost never realized in practice. The fact is, most “interreligious dialogue,” especially with Muslims, is a poor excuse for the inability or failure of those Catholics to evangelize. They choose to seek acknowledgement, approval, and even friendship from others instead of addressing the important issues of death, judgment, Hell, and Heaven with them.

There is no easy way to address any of these issues because Catholicism and Islam are dogmatically irreconcilable. One must accept one and reject the other or vice versa. There is no “common ground” with Islam except in mere superficialities, and even those “similarities” are often rooted in directly opposing dogmas. It’s like two people agreeing that doughnuts are bad because one doesn’t like the way doughnuts taste, while the other thinks doughnuts are an unhealthy, nutrient-void substitute for real food.

But the greater issue, I believe, is the unspoken statement by the two Muslim women who called me an infidel: Dialogue cannot exist with non-Muslims because they are infidels.

Go here to read the rest.  A controversy roiled Saint Blogs about lying a few years ago, with some bloggers, I was not among them, stating that lies even to save lives were always sinful.  When it comes to Islam, and other topics, I think all Catholics need to recall Alexander  Solzhenitsyn’s admonition to live not by lies.  Wishful thinking, completely unhinged from reality, can only be called a delusion if not a lie, and in either case is unworthy of followers of Christ.

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bill bannon
bill bannon
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 7:12am

I’m at odds with modern police theory. If stones are thrown, the stoners should be shot dead because stones can cause comas and blindness. Shoot them and see how many stoning incidents follow. When God through Peter, killed Ananias and Saphirra for lying to the Holy Spirit, the passage in Acts 5 says this in verse 11: ” And great fear came upon the whole church and upon all who heard of these things.”
Death deters…that’s why Al Qaeda leader Zawahiri doesn’t list his address in Pakistan after the Bin Laden hit by the Seals. Truthfully US police would not shoot stone throwers either in my area but they would put them in prisons with the Hoover Street Crips and that is why even Pablo Escobar feared US prisons. Our prisons do not deter nearly as much as our inmates deter.

Michael Paterson-Seymour
Michael Paterson-Seymour
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 7:31am

I suggest there is a very obvious distinction to be drawn between statements made by the Magisterium on matters of faith and morals and on statements she makes about matters of fact.

As Pascal says in the 17th Provincial Letter to Père Annat S.J., “It is matter of thankfulness to God, then, father, that there is in reality no heresy in the Church. The question relates entirely to a point of fact, of which no heresy can be made; for the Church, with divine authority, decides the points of faith, and cuts off from her body all who refuse to receive them. But she does not act in the same manner in regard to matters of fact. And the reason is that our salvation is attached to the faith which has been revealed to us, and which is preserved in the Church by tradition, but that it has no dependence on facts which have not been revealed by God. Thus we are bound to believe that the commandments of God are not impracticable; but we are under no obligation to know what Jansenius has said upon that subject. In the determination of points of faith, God guides the Church by the aid of His unerring Spirit; whereas in matters of fact He leaves her to the direction of reason and the senses, which are the natural judges of such matters. None but God was able to instruct the Church in the faith; but to learn whether this or that proposition is contained in Jansenius, all we require to do is to read his book. And from hence it follows that, while it is heresy to resist the decisions of the faith, because this amounts to an opposing of our own spirit to the Spirit of God, it is no heresy, though it may be an act of presumption, to disbelieve certain particular facts, because this is no more than opposing reason – it may be enlightened reason – to an authority which is great indeed, but in this matter not infallible.”

T. Shaw
T. Shaw
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 7:57am

The global tragedy unfolds.

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The Truth shall make you free.

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Go forth and make disciples of all nations.

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You will not hear on MSNBC nor read in the NY Times that the Spanish Inquisition killed far fewer people in 150 years than the world-wide jihad in an average year.

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BB: Agreed. One marvels at the recent (March 1995) renovation that near-totally bans capital punishment.

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“. . . authentic Islam and the proper reading of the Koran are opposed to every form of violence.” ???????

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Islam may be the only religion that does not teach the Golden Rule (Qur’an 48:29). It teaches violence and hatred against non-Muslims, specifically Jews and Christians (50:5).
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Qur’an 4:46, says Allah has cursed the Jews for their disbelief.

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Twenty-six Qur’an chapters cover jihad. All able-bodied believers must join the fight (Surah 2:216). The Quran orders Muslims to “instill terror into the hearts of the unbeliever” and to “smite above their necks” (8:12).
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The test of faith is Allah is not found in good works, but in martyrdom while trying to murder unbelievers (47:4). Murdering unbelievers is the only sure way to salvation in Islam (4:47; 9:111).
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Murdering unbelievers is the means of obtaining forgiveness of sins for the mohammedan (4:96).
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The reward for murdering unbelievers is sexual delight with virgins and other carnal joys (38:51; 55:56; 55:76; 56:22). St. Alphonsus declared: “The Mohammedan Paradise is only fit for beasts; for filthy sensual pleasure is all the believer has to expect there.”

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Mohammedans are required to give aid and advance the murderers (8:74).
Mohammedanism requires global conquest and domination (9:29).

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The Koran is opposed to nearly all the fundamental Christian dogmas.

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From a Wall Street Journal editor letter: “I say to the Western scholars: Do not interpret the Quran for Muslims. We Muslims are capable of interpreting the Quran for ourselves. No other people have shown the level of hostility to another faith as Westerners have shown to Muhammad, the Quran and Islam. It continues to this day. Islam doesn’t need reformation; the Western mind needs reformation about Muhammad, the Quran and Islam.
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“It will be better for both of us.”

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Tahir A. Qureshi; Silver Spring, Md.

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The other day, they murdered a two-star general. Obama: crickets.

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Sound advice (it’s why we read the classics) from Herodotus Book IX, regarding the Phocians serving with the Persians at Platea: “Seeing what was coming, their commander Harmocydes urged them to sell their lives dearly. ‘Fellow countrymen,’ he cried, ‘you cannot fail to see that these fellows have deliberately planned to murder us […] Come then; show what you are made of, everyone of you. It is better to die defending ourselves than just to give up and be butchered – that disgrace, at least, we can avoid. Let us show them that the men they have plotted to murder are Greeks – and they themselves mere foreign trash.’”

Mary De Voe
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 8:41am

I guess the Muslims did not read Pope Francis’ Evangellii Gaudium.
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Thank you T. Shaw. Your reading of the Koran is appreciated and needed.
Thank you Donald McClarey for the video.

Botolph
Botolph
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 10:24am

The video is disgusting and reprehensible. No one will argue that. And there are no ‘buts’ to it either.

The problem lies in the Quran itself which has contradictory statements or teachings. There are indeed ‘peaceful’ statement and teachings, especially concerning ‘the Peoples of the Book’ [Jews and Christians] alongside hate-filled and violence prone statements and teachings. With no ‘magisterium’ to authoritatively interpret these teachings we have Muslims gravitating toward one side or the other. What we have in Islam is ‘everyone’ interpreting the Quran as he/she sees fit. That of course is ‘fundamentalism’

I believe Pope Francis, among others, is emphasizing ‘the peaceful element’. However it seems that those who gravitate toward the hostile and violent are in the ascendancy within the Muslim world at this time. Pope Benedict [intentionally?] exposed this violent side of Islam, as well as its lack of the logos, reason, rationality, in his famous Regensburg address. In a very real sense, both popes are right.

In the midst of all the horrendous news about fundamentalist Islam we should not forget that the Kingdom of Jordan welcomes Christians (both native to Jordan and from other Middle Eastern countries] We have a Catholic University now in Amman. Bahrain, on the Persian Gulf has welcomed Catholics building a new cathedral, the only Catholic church on the Arabian peninsular

Even if all Muslims were to turn ‘irrational and violent’, we, the People of the Logos become flesh, cannot and will not. That is what the Catholic Church is saying, and what Pope Benedict and Pope Francis are saying. Here, “the Sunday People”will be ready to enter into dialogue [note the root word: ‘logos’ in there] concerning common concerns which we have as human beings and yes, believing in the One God, the Creator [that much we can say: St John Damascene, and Thomas Aquinas back this up-contrary to the opinion given in the original article]. This is all part of pre-evangelization; we know it is not evangelization. [No one can be evangelized unless they have been ‘prepared’ for evangelization]
This is what the Lord is calling us to be and to do.

Art Deco
Art Deco
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 11:20am

for authentic Islam and the proper reading of the Koran are opposed to every form of violence.

Robert Spencer has been slicing this thesis to pieces in public fora for about 11 years now. The thing is, muslim populations and muslim societies can and do craft a modus vivendi with competing populations, arrangements which have in the past had some durability. We need to explore why this has been breaking down and how we might craft a new armistice. The number of authorities who wish to deny that the black letters can be fodder for revanchist politics (or wish to change the subject to Israel’s supposed ‘crimes’) just amazes.

bill bannon
bill bannon
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 11:35am

Botolph,
Google ” abrogation Koran “. Violent Muslims see the early peaceful sayings of the Koran as nullified by the chronologically later violent sayings of chapter nine of the Koran. Non violent Muslims see abrogation as having to do with the Koran abrogating the Bible etc. An abrogation verse is e.g. (2:106) “Any message which We annul or consign to oblivion We replace with a better or similar one.87 Dost thou not know that God has the power to will anything? “. Jihadists take that to mean violent chapter nine voids earlier peaceful verses within the Koran. Non violent Muslims take that verse to mean the Koran voids aspects of the Bible etc.
So whereas the New Testament abrogates much of Old Testament violence; it is the reverse for people like
ISIS who see their new covenant so to speak as abrogating peaceful passages that came earlier. Elijah killed about 552 idolaters with God’s help…102 by lightning…while Christ rebuked the disciples in Luke 9’s ending story for wanting to bring down lightning on the Samaritan town who refused Christ because His face was set for Jerusalem not Mt. Gerizim.

T. Shaw
T. Shaw
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 11:36am

Instapundit: “I CALLED THIS OBAMA’S RWANDA, BUT ACTUALLY SYRIA IS OBAMA’S RWANDA. SO I GUESS THIS IS OBAMA’S SECOND RWANDA? The Islamic State’s bloody campaign to exterminate minorities: ‘Even Genghis Khan didn’t do this.’ ‘We are being exterminated! An entire religion is being exterminated from the face of the Earth. In the name of humanity, save us!’”

This is rational. It’s institutionalized in the Q’ran. Convert or die. Or, pay a high tax and be uterly marginalized – the slower death of the culture/religion. Then, they wipe (blow up churches and staues) from the face of the earth all traces of the murdered religion and culture.

Botolph
Botolph
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 11:51am

Bill Bannon,

I agree that the violent Muslims interpret the Quran in this manner. And there is no doubt in my mind that they are in the ascendancy within the Islamic world.

The key is the Islam (in total) does not accept ‘logos’, reason and the givenness of creation. God is not Logos for them as He is in Judaism (Torah) and Christianity [Logos become flesh]
We Christians would state categorically that not only is God Logos but that God is love-not simply loving etc (which Israel believes) but love: Trinity of Persons: Lover [Father], Beloved {Son] and Love [Holy Spirit]

Further, as your post states, there is no authoritative ‘magisterium’ which can interpret the Quran authoritatively nor with whom we can carry on substantial dialogue. Relating with Islam is, by analogy, like relating to the 30,000 some Protestant denominations. However, dialogue (logos) and relate [agape] we must if we are really children of the God Who is Logos and Agape-love, missionary disciples of the Logos become flesh. That being said calling a spade a spade, dialoguing in truth, demands we call out the violence against fellow Christians and demanding the religious respect and freedom we give to Muslims in lands in which we are more populous.

What we see with Islam is actually the Church’s mission to all the world religions-dialoguing, ‘citiquing’ and ‘purifying’ them by means of the Logos and Agape. In this sense we begin to set up the conditions for true evangelization.

bill bannon
bill bannon
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 12:42pm

Botolph,
The leaders of ISIS know the Bible’s message about Christ and reject it. They are not analogous to Mayans in the 16th century. God is Love but He brought about the death of 1.1 million people in Jerusalem in 70 AD ( Josephus) by using the Romans as His axe. It wasn’t karma. Christ warned Jerusalem it would happen even to the infants within them…Lk.19:44 ” They will smash you to the ground and your children within you, and they will not leave one stone upon another within you because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.” Just as David’s baby was killed for David’s sin by God (but I’ll bet is in Heaven)…infants were killed in 70 AD perhaps in accordance with Exodus 20:5 wherein God says He punishes down to the third and fourth generation ( physically…not spiritually..see Ezekiel)…those who hate Him.
But being Love, He gave them almost 40 years to repent and escape…directions for which He gives in Luke 21:20-24. Had any Jew believed His word on the Jerusalem doom and how to escape, that Jew would have been saved by Christ’s word on the matter. They had 40 years to think and discuss with their young.
In short God is Love but not all His actions or ours will be tender.

Botolph
Botolph
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 1:28pm

Bill Bannon,

We are not as dividend as you might initially think. I have long believed that we have arrived at a moment in time in which Islam is being judged, as Jerusalem indeed was in 70 and ultimately in 135 AD. I believe that the rise in violence does not manifest an increase of faith, but a deep anxiety, fear and even nihilism in the face of reality. Just how realistic is it to “bomb” or force the whole world back to the seventh century.

People fail to realize that the Jews rose up in murderous rage in three distinct wars between 66 and 135 AD not simply against the Roman occupation of Judea but against their Gentile neighbors in Egypt, Libya and Asia Minor (Turkey). Actually hundreds of thousand Gentiles died before Rome decimated the Jewish population of the eastern Mediterranean as well as expel all Jews from their ancient homeland, rebuild a Gentile/pagan city on the few ruins of Jerusalem, and renamed Judea as Palestina, named for their ancient enemies, the Philistines.

I believe Islam is (relatively speaking) about to collapse with the majority turning to either disbelief or a sort of ” rabbinic style” Jewish like religion, open to the proclamation of the Gospel. Time will tell, of corse but the Lord Jesus is the Lord of history. Jesus is Lord!

Stephen E Dalton
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 2:19pm

The folks who are so naïve about the true nature of Islam should remember this saying: “watch what they do, not what they say.”

T. Shaw
T. Shaw
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 3:40pm

Botolph wrote, “I believe Islam is (relatively speaking) about to collapse with the majority turning to either disbelief or a sort of ” rabbinic style” Jewish like religion, open to the proclamation of the Gospel. Time will tell, of corse (sic) but the Lord Jesus is the Lord of history. Jesus is Lord!”
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Aside from the Hope for the crown of martyrdom, not sure that that will ease the anxieties of thousands of Iraqi/Syrian Christians presently being liquiditated.

Art Deco
Art Deco
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 4:11pm

“watch what they do, not what they say.”

True, but what they do is somewhat variable over time and place. Take Alistair Horne’s Savage War of Peace about Algerian politics from 1948 to 1962 (with prefaces and addenda). The Association of Ulema was mentioned only in passing. It was the least consequential political force in Algeria at the time. Political revanchism in the Arab world and adjacent areas (in countries with parliamentary politics and without) tended to be praetorianist or secular-fascist. The most ‘Islamic’ government therein was Saudi Arabia’s, which has long been a status quo power making practical arrangements with external parties. (It still is).

As for your trouble in Europe, it may be that Muslims and others are, in some way, tragically incompatible within the boundaries of one country. However, other countries have managed passably with muslim minorities of a dimension you see in Europe. What gives? Native fertility deficits, ruined labor markets, bad policies in the realm of common provision, institutionalized poltroonery (see the police in France), bad immigration screens, and the dysfunctional dynamic between elites and the vernacular society with the former pushing multi-culturalism in its ongoing campaign to rub the masses’ noses in it.

Penguins Fan
Penguins Fan
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 10:19pm

Charles Martel, Pelayo, King Alfonso the Avenger, Queen Isabel, Don Juan of Austria, King John Sobieski – they knew how to deal with Islam – fight it up to your last breath. Preferably, beat the $#?& out of them.

Dialouge with Muslims is impossible because Muslims are heretics stuck in the seventh century. Their “holy book”, written after the death of the pederast Mohammed, is a bunch of warlike, hate-filled contradictory nonsense.

“Veni, vidi, Deus vincit.”

Stephen E Dalton
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 10:35pm

Hey, want to watch a great movie about Christians triumphing over Muslims? Buy or rent ” Day Of The Siege”. It’s about the victory of King John Sobieski over the Ottoman Army at the gates of Vienna. It’s the best Christians vs Muslims movie since “El Cid”! I give it five stars!

Don the Kiwi
Don the Kiwi
Thursday, August 7, AD 2014 10:51pm

Over the centuries Islam has been the greatest protagonist the Catholic Church has ever faced. Throughout history, when the forces of Islam have perceived a weak Christendom, they have attacked.

This time round, Islam has been welcomed into much of the Western secularised world that was previously Christendom, but is now agnostic to a large extent, and Islam considers them weak and corrupt – not an unreasonable view. Muslims have infiltrated societies to the extent that when their population reaches a tipping point – around 5% – they begin agitating for Sharia and calling for jihad. This is obvious in many European cities, and is now happening is Sydney , Australia.

The time is fast approaching – indeed has arrived in places like Iraq and parts of Europe – where Islam has to be met with a defensive force, as the Catholic Church has done in the past, and be defeated. Otherwise they will continue to radicalise moderate Muslims – who will not go against their own beliefs – and the mayhem and murder will continue until they totally dominate.

Ivan
Ivan
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 12:48am

Most Muslims hear their Koran in Arabic, a language they hardly understand. It is usually the case that the (perceived or alledged) musicality of the verses drown out whatever the evil that is being said. This is similar to what the rappers do when they brag about killing cops and raping hos. In any society there seems to be a pathological element, hovering around ten percent, that takes pleasure in cruelty, sadism and the humiliation of others. For the well being of others, these elements have to be isolated and on occasions killed. The Muslims as a people are no more inclined to violence and sadism than others, but since their Koran endorses violence in pursuit of religious goals, they are usually helpless in the face of their sadists. The solution it seems to me is never to endorse the Islamic faith as an equal to other religions and never concede any rhetorical points whatsoever. The smarter Muslims will come around, the stupid Muslims are just village idiots and are usually harmless. The pathological elements can then be contained.

Don the Kiwi
Don the Kiwi
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 2:31am

Pleased to hear on tonight’s news that O’Bumbler is going to send elements of the USAF to sort out ISIS.
At last, he’s grown some cojones – albeit very small – and decided, despite his support for Muslims and those attacking the democratic governmetns of the area, to do something about the slaughter of Christains and Shia muslims, even though its some months since Maliki pleaded for help against ISIS.

Anzlyne
Anzlyne
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 8:53am

Don the Kiwi . My thought exactly. Only you said it much better than I would have

Anzlyne
Anzlyne
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 9:04am

Don the Kiwi I was responding to what you said yesterday. Especially this:
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The time is fast approaching – indeed has arrived in places like Iraq and parts of Europe – where Islam has to be met with a defensive force, as the Catholic Church has done in the past, and be defeated. Otherwise they will continue to radicalise moderate Muslims – who will not go against their own beliefs – and the mayhem and murder will continue until they totally dominate

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If God is willing Allies will band together and fight as they have in the past. .. At Lepanto and in the wars of the 20th century

Philip
Philip
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 11:14am

Anzlyne.

In union with allies and Holy Rosary.

T. Shaw. I thank you as well for your Koran quotation’s. This is a wake-up call, again, and Dearborn Michigan is one of many neighborhoods bringing the best Islam has to offer..cough cough.

Pat
Pat
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 12:06pm

” … That being said calling a spade a spade, dialoguing in truth, demands we call out the violence against fellow Christians and demanding the religious respect and freedom we give to Muslims in lands in which we are more populous. … ”

Who, what (such as an organization of Bishops or Cardinals), and/or where is the unified “we” and when will the call out happen?

Pat
Pat
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 12:17pm
Botolph
Botolph
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 12:26pm

It has already taken place, many times. One thing I would point out is that the pope and bishops speak with a tone unlike the direct and sometimes confrontational manner that we see, for example in St Blogs. To be honest, I hope people don’t speak in the ‘real world’ as many do in the cyber world

I myself have heard Poope Francis in very specific circumstances and times calling for respect for all people and calling for religious freedom. His most recent pleas for the Christians of the Middle East, especially Iraq is finally getting response in the media, at the UN and from the international community

Barbara Gordon
Barbara Gordon
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 8:34pm

“Pleased to hear on tonight’s news that O’Bumbler is going to send elements of the USAF to sort out ISIS. At last, he’s grown some cojones – albeit very small – and decided, despite his support for Muslims and those attacking the democratic governmetns of the area, to do something about the slaughter of Christains and Shia muslims, even though its some months since Maliki pleaded for help against ISIS.”

I called my US Congressmen’s office and told them in great detail about the first hand, up to the hour reports coming out of Franklin Graham’s international ministry, Samaritan’s Purse, and from Glenn Beck’s ministry in the starving, camps of the Christian mothers and children who have fled from ISIS -reports of systematic movements across the country by ISIS toward the camps along with systematic decapitation along the way by the terrorists with no where left for their victims to flee. I described the picture that ISIS took and released, of themselves standing proudly with their militarized weapons, over rows of perfectly aligned dead young men (ISIS exterminated like rats) face down in the dirt–the lines went on so far in both directions that the ends of the rows of the murdered could not be seen in the picture. I let my Congressmen’s staff know that since Osama was doing nothing that I wanted the US Congress to raise Hell until this genocide was ended. Cruz missiles, bombs, and Hell fire missiles from a Predator drone would take care of those terrorists without putting one foot on the ground.

This afternoon, I turned on Fox News on satellite in my car and heard that the US bombing of those viscious beyond description devils had begun. It should have started weeks ago IMHO.

This evening

Barbara Gordon
Barbara Gordon
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 8:38pm

Has the pope said a word about the stacks of dead, mutilated, murdered bodies of Christians–or like Osama has he remained relatively silent?

bill bannon
bill bannon
Friday, August 8, AD 2014 10:03pm

Barbara,
I think Francis is even more pacifist than the later life period of both his predecessors…here he is:
“Violence will not defeat violence. Violence is defeated by peace! Let us pray in silence, asking for peace; everyone, in silence … Mary, Queen of Peace, pray for us!” 7/20 angelus address
Bizarre…Violence alone stopped Hitler and Japan…peace emboldened them. Francis has never been intimate with the figure of the bully even if he has seen them from a distance.
St. John Paul forgot WWII also here:
” To obtain the good of peace there must be a clear and conscious acknowledgment that violence is an unacceptable evil and that it never solves problems. Violence is a lie. It goes against the truth of our faith, the truth of our humanity, the truth about Jesus. Violence destroys what it claims to defend; the dignity, the life, the freedom of human beings. What is needed is a great effort to form consciences and to educate the younger generation to goodness, to nonviolence, to love.
-Pope John Paul II- Message for World Day of Peace 2005

” given the new weapons that make possible destructions that go beyond the combatant groups, today we should be asking ourselves if it is still licit to admit the very existence of a just war.” – Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) just before the 2003 US invasion of Iraq.

Madness….all three. I have a b&e criminal in my city who could shoot me some night as he once hinted because I beat him in a fight after he broke in one day. If he calls to me and threatens us from outside our locked bedroom door some night, I’ll shoot him right through the door with – tactical shotgun. Case closed. These Popes are over cultured. In Plato’s Republic Book III, he states that too much sports makes men brutal and too much culture makes them feminized. Judith in Scripture was not feminized when the context called for violence.

Penguins Fan
Penguins Fan
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 5:48am

Pope Francis is from a part of the world that has had no contact with violent Islam. He has no experience with it and it shows.

One can point out the conditions under which Karol Wojytla lived as a young man and this, along with Vatican II, shaped his worldview. He, too was from the Church of Nice. I think 9/11 woke him up – too late in my opinion.

The Vatican has tried to be amenable to the Muslim world, before WWII or WWI. This is in part due to the small Catholic populations in the Middle East. Certain radtrads blame Israel. The Holy See has not always had a good relationship with Israel for many reasons.

The West has abandoned its Christian culture and in its place has embraced pleasure, sex, leisure, sodomy, porn, multiculturalism and any other sort of stupid brain cell killing time wasting activity. We have learned nothing from 9/11.

The great heresies have, over the years, faded away – Arianism, Nestorianism, iconoclasm. Even Protestantism, in its “mainline” forms, is disappearing. Islam, the barbaric seventh century heresy remains, funded by oil wealth. Without the oil wealth Islam would be nothing. Islam was allies with Germany in both world wars.
Bishop Sheen said there would not be peace in the world until the Muslims convert. This flies in the face of that stupid Vatican II statement about Islam.

Art Deco
Art Deco
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 7:13am

These Popes are over cultured. In Plato’s Republic Book III, he states that too much sports makes men brutal and too much culture makes them feminized.

St. John Paul was quite the athlete and both John Paul and Benedict had survived the 2d World War. Benedict had some military service. Francis supposedly once had a job as a bar bouncer and has spent much of his life in Buenos Aires, a locus in which daily life requires … coping skills. They may have been overly feminized by their old age but I doubt they started out that way.

The real problem is not their person but their thinking. The deficiencies of John Paul were on display in 1991 when he refused to countenance the use of force when what was arguably one of the half-dozen or so ghastliest regimes on Earth (and the only one among them sitting atop a natural resources bonanza) conquered a harmless oil principality, generated a six-figure caravan of refugees, trashed the place, and treated everyone therein with the utmost brutality. (Scott Richert has since been calling us all ‘cafeteria Catholics’ for not falling in line behind the inanities of the Vatican diplomatic corps).

bill bannon
bill bannon
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 8:07am

Art Deco,
Yes 1991 was absolutely bizarre.
Thousands of nine year old girls survived WWII. Two army brothers in WWII…one fighting in the trenches…the other cooking sos at an army base far from the enemy. “Survive” is mainly about the former.
I stated …”later life period of both his predecessors”. In late life, Benedict commissioned his own personal fragrance….and had a 28,000 book collection and loved classical music. It’s the aggregate…especially the fragrance.
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/pope-benedict-orders-own-personal-fragrance-184228715.html

Barbara Gordon
Barbara Gordon
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 8:39am

Well, from what news I saw, Obama is using the 500 lb bombs to protect a group of people who practice a form of Zooasterism who are trapped on a mountain top and who are surrounded by ISIS. No direct help for the Christians.

Art Deco
Art Deco
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 8:41am

It’s the aggregate…especially the fragrance.

It sounds like a prank story. That aside, I gather (from the disaffected spouses of Europeans billeted in America) that it’s modal across the pond to use cologne instead of deodorant, at least for the older generation. One of my office mates had a temp just off the boat from Nepal who never seemed to bathe. Nothing else offensive about him, clean clothes, clean white teeth, just the acrid odor of sweat; later I had one from India. He bathed; he just didn’t brush his teeth all that often. People are funny about hygiene.

bill bannon
bill bannon
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 10:29am

An Indian paper has far more detail than Western news sources because they have people in those areas of Iraq under seige….see especially the last ten paragraphs:

http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/world/isis-forces-indian-nurses-out-of-tikrit/article6174607.ece

Barbara Gordon
Barbara Gordon
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 12:46pm

Beheading of Christian children–heads placed on sticks in parks for display.

Christian men who pay the fine for being a Christian have their daughters & wives taken from them for use as sex slaves.

(see video at the link below)

http://allenbwest.com/2014/08/isis-beheading-children-obama-drops-two-bombs/

bill bannon
bill bannon
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 3:05pm

Barbara,
ISIS should be not an Iraq issue but a World Court/ UN issue for blatant war crimes in three countries so far and all nations should be gathering to send forces to shoot or capture everyone of them. This is not just the US responsibility. ISIS has thousands of passports and all Western nations and even China for its Moslem trouble in the north west are named by them and susceptible to e.g. suicide bombing by them….and India which was mentioned by them as an oppressor of Islam. The world should be gathering and should DESIRE to gather at the UN with military intent based on unrelenting war crimes….including India and China.

Anzlyne
Anzlyne
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 4:54pm

Can we get out in the streets and pray
public prayer lots and lots of out spoken prayer

http://www.cnsnews.com/mrctv-blog/barbara-boland/leader-isis-systematically-beheading-children-christian-genocide

when we pray by ourselves it is like lighting a candle when we pray en masse it is a bonfire (john vianny said something like that)

Anzlyne
Anzlyne
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 4:55pm

Flooding the streets of cities and capitals with praying people putting pressure on governments to take defensive action for these children and all people against this Evil

bill bannon
bill bannon
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 7:36pm

Anzlyne,
I suggest the long run. There are very young and teen captive girls of these men many of whom no one in your lifetime is going to rescue. Adopt them forever in your prayers. One of their faces will haunt me for a long time…looked like 7 years old…balling her eyes out. Pray for them til death that they find Christ by seeing his opposite in these men and pray that they plan their escape with much forethought. And if you pray unceasingly like Elijah, your adopted girls will perceive Christ and will escape one day…for sure. You can take that to the bank.
Opium brides are common in Afghanistan. Gangs loan farmers seed money…farmers can’t pay in product and the gangs take their very young daughters as payment. Then the farmers go on opium. A young, hard luck life in the US is a mansion compared with these female victims of Islam in those countries. Think long run. Adopt them in your prayers…til death. Christ said it’ll get worse before it gets better…” wars and rumors of war….these things are but the beginning of sorrows.” Mt.24:6–

Barbara Gordon
Barbara Gordon
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 8:59pm

This article at the following link has a video of the representative of the minority groups, currently being slaughtered by ISIS, Pleading with her government to stop the genocide. It appears she is completely overwhelmed by emotions and falls to the floor at the end. I have no interest in the article itself– it is the video that I wanted to add to the discussion at hand. She lists all of the minority groups in her speech. http://m.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/08/our-moral-obligations-in-iraq-yazidis/375778/

bill bannon
bill bannon
Saturday, August 9, AD 2014 9:14pm

Barbara,
That clip was on tv and may well have been part of Obama moving toward airstrikes along with other input….things from intelligence people we’d rather not see. These people are more evil than the majority of criminals.

Barbara Gordon
Barbara Gordon
Sunday, August 10, AD 2014 6:41am

BB wrote: “ISIS should be not an Iraq issue but a World Court/ UN issue for blatant war crimes in three countries so far and all nations should be gathering to send forces to shoot or capture everyone of them. This is not just the US responsibility. ISIS has thousands of passports and all Western nations and even China for its Moslem trouble in the north west are named by them and susceptible to e.g. suicide bombing by them….and India which was mentioned by them as an oppressor of Islam. The world should be gathering and should DESIRE to gather at the UN with military intent based on unrelenting war crimes….including India and China.”

Bill, I agree in theory with what you have stated. In reality if we wait for those other nations to act or the UN to act–all of us will be dead.

The simple truth is that like most politicians/previous presidential admins, the Osama Admin only acts on behalf of mInority populations when it is to his benefit politically.

Barbara Gordon
Barbara Gordon
Sunday, August 10, AD 2014 7:27am

The second video in this article at the link below is of the Orthodox archbisop of Mosul telling how the destruction of all Christianity/Christan sects took place.

http://m.cnsnews.com/mrctv-blog/barbara-boland/my-people-are-being-slaughtered-iraqi-parliamentarian-archbishop-confirm

Barbara Gordon
Barbara Gordon
Sunday, August 10, AD 2014 7:31am

It appears that our current American president released from prison the madman who is now leading ISIS–as one of his first acts as President.

http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2014/jun/19/jeanine-pirro/foxs-pirro-obama-set-isis-leader-free-2009/

bill bannon
bill bannon
Sunday, August 10, AD 2014 8:14am

Barbara,
Read your last link to the bottom. They conclude that the charge against Obama on this is false. Baghdadi was most probably released in 2004 according to US records not 2009 and only one prison worker “thinks” he saw Baghdadi in 2009 but the records show him being released in 2004. The real 2009 release was not a release anyway but a transfer to Iraq custody as per an agreement signed before Obama entered office. Obama is way late in this ISIS crisis but he can’t be blamed for releasing Bahgdadi whichever date is correct because if 2004 then that preceded Obama or if 2009, it was a mandated in writing transfer to Iraq who released him.

Barbara Gordon
Barbara Gordon
Sunday, August 10, AD 2014 10:34am

Bill, thank u for pointing out what the conclusion of the link is. That is a conclusion by a rabidly pro-Obama website–that is not my conclusion. I do not agree that turning this devil loose to the Iraqis was not an actual release–it was. Obama has just recently recently released some more of these devils from US custody–into the oversight of Yemen–quite the joke. His admin also claims that those more recent transfers were not actually releases of murderers who plan to kill us all. He also failed to give congress the required notice in law before the releases. I remember exactly when this devil leading ISIS we are discussing now was released and his promise to see us in New York. Obama upholding any agreement of a former admin is a joke as well–he is constantly issuing decrees as if he is a monarch. Our current president abides by only the agreements and rules he wishes when he wishes.

However, please let me thank you for pointing out the discrepancy in the article itself. I do not agree that Obama is not responsible for his release despite the apologist argument.

cpola
cpola
Sunday, August 10, AD 2014 2:06pm

In 2003, there were about 1.5 million Christians in Iraq; today they are estimated to be less than 200,000 in number. And their numbers continue to dwindle every day.

The Islamic extremists, presently in charge of large parts of the country, are bent on wiping out 1900 year old history of Christianity in Iraq, as a whole, and the city of Mosul in particular.

let us recall what happened in March 2000, when the then pope – John Paul II – went to the state of Jordan and said this:

“May Saint John Baptist protect Islam”

Well the Vatican in the last few decades have tried to appease Islam but to no avail. Is it not time to change the tune?
http://popeleo13.com/pope/2014/07/21/category-archive-message-board-82/#more-652

Barbara Gordon
Barbara Gordon
Sunday, August 10, AD 2014 10:30pm

Cpola said: “In 2003, there were about 1.5 million Christians in Iraq; today they are estimated to be less than 200,000 in number. And their numbers continue to dwindle every day.”

Why did they start decreasing in 2003?

Art Deco
Art Deco
Sunday, August 10, AD 2014 11:55pm

“In 2003, there were about 1.5 million Christians in Iraq; today they are estimated to be less than 200,000 in number. And their numbers continue to dwindle every day.”
==
More likely fewer than 400,000 at one time.

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