Free Republic

[Catholic Caucus] Cardinal Fernández’s Dignitas Infinita condemns abortion, gender theory but is silent on homosexualityIn the newly released text Cardinal Victor Fernández criticizes abortion and the rejection of gender differentiation as attacks on human dignity, while neglecting to discuss homosexuality.VATICAN CITY (LifeSiteNews) — Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández has released his long-anticipated document on human dignity, written in line with Pope Francis’ encyclical Fratelli Tutti and modern teaching on dignity, which condemns abortion and surrogacy while notably remaining silent on homosexuality.Released via press conference April 8 – the transferred feast of the Annunciation – the new text, Dignitas infinita, aims to...

Pope Francis has been steadfast in his opposition to the war in Ukraine, decrying the violence that it has wrought on innocent civilians. At the same time, the pope suggested there was blame for the war to go around beyond Russia and Vladimir Putin. On Tuesday, an Italian newspaper published an interview with Francis where he declined to state what he believed was Putin’s exact motivations for launching the war against Ukraine on Feb. 24. However, the pope suggested that the West could bear some responsibility for what he says may have been its provocation of Putin. "Maybe it was...

Pope Francis, a leading advocate of Doormat Christianity, is at it again, trying to reverse nearly two millennia of Christian doctrine, by preaching total passivity -- even against violent aggression. On March 18, 2022, Francis declared before an audience that “A war is always -- always! -- the defeat of humanity, always. We, the educated, who work in education, are defeated by this war, because on another side we are responsible.” So far, all well and good, if only because such lofty but impotent words are expected. But then he went so far as to say that, “There is no...

Francis flip-flops, Parolin approves Italy sending weapons to UkrainePope Francis is making a sudden U-turn on the morality of war after declaring all wars to be unjust and upending the Church's doctrine on "just war". "There is no such thing as a just war; they do not exist!" the pontiff told participants at the International Congress of the Pontifical Foundation Gravissimum Educationis on Friday. On Tuesday, however, immediately after speaking to the pontiff on the telephone, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy told Italian parliamentarians that Francis had given him the green light to fight a just war. Pope Backs Ukraine President"Today...

Has the United States ever fought a war that was justified? Apparently not, according to many students at Howard University in Washington, D.C., who were asked about that by Campus Reform. "I cannot think of a single war that America has been a part of that has been justified," one student told reporter Eduardo Neret. When asked specifically if World War II was a just war, the student said it was not. "I don't believe America fought that war for the just reasons,” the student answered. One young lady responded: "The only one that I can, like, reasonably, like, justify...

Pope Francis has again said stupid things about war. In his latest plane presser on the way to Poland (dear Lord, are we going to have two of these for every trip from now on?!) he has again parroted the boilerplate leftist blither we were taught to recite in the 70s in our hippie free schools. CNA reports his comments: “When I speak of war, I talk about it seriously, but it’s not a war of religion. It’s a war for money, for resources, for nature, for dominion. This is the war,” Pope Francis told journalists on his July 27...

Italy (Ammoland.com) Pope Francis spoke with a group of young people at a rally of thousands at the end of the first day of his trip to the Italian city of Turin. Francis started by attacking the Right to Keep and Bear Arms as well as accusing the allies during World War Two of being complicit in the killing of Jews, Christians and homosexuals. Francis issued his toughest condemnation to date of the weapons industry, saying. “If you trust only men you have lost,” he told the young people in a long, rambling talk about war, trust and politics after...

Speaking with Breitbart’s Executive Chairman Stephen K. Bannon Friday, ethical expert and theologian Dr. Thomas D. Williams said that from the perspective of America’s involvement, World War II undoubtedly satisfied all the conditions to be considered a “just war.”

Developed in the fifth century A.D. by St. Augustine, the doctrine of a “just war” empowers rulers to wage war only as a last resort to confront grave wrongs. As Augustine wrote: “Peace should be the object of your desire; war should be waged only as a necessity.” Later, the Summa Theologica, written by St. Thomas Aquinas in the 1260s and 1270s, clarified that war could only be waged by a properly instituted authority like the state, that it could not occur for purposes of self-gain, and that attaining peace must be its central aim.

… Church teaching has long allowed for “just wars” — the use of force to stop an unjust aggression — as long as certain conditions are met. But participants at a conference sponsored by the Vatican’s justice and peace office and Pax Christi, the Catholic peace movement, said in a final communiqué Thursday that too often the doctrine had been used to justify and endorse military action rather than prevent it. …

adical Islam (al-Qaeda, ISIS, or whatever name it goes by) has not only declared war but has waged war against United States, Western civilization and all Christians since September 11, 2001. This is more than terrorism, it is war, as witnessed by the recent attacks in Paris, the downing of the Russian airliner, the beheading of captives and the brutal war being waged by ISIS in Syria and Iraq. It is time for Congress to declare war against ISIS and all other radical Islamic groups. It is time for United States, its allies, and willing partners to use our considerable...

Boulder, CO – -(Ammoland.com)- “You shall not kill.” As a Catholic altar boy and student at St. Jude’s School near Boston, Jack Coughlin learned the Fifth Commandment early in life. As a Marine Corps sniper and devout pro-life Catholic, Coughlin killed for a living. From rooftops, hillsides and shelled-out buildings, he focused the crosshairs on distant individuals, squeezed the trigger and ended their lives. By the time he retired, Coughlin had accumulated 60 confirmed kills in Somalia, Iraq and other foreign battlefields he will not identify. Coughlin, author of the autobiography Shooter ( tiny.cc/40gh1x ) , has little trouble...

An Iraqi bishop says waging war against ISIS fighters is the only way to save the Christian Church in IraqThe leader of one of Christianity's oldest communities reluctantly says that waging war against ISIS - killing their fighters - is the only way to stop the radical Islamists from destroying Christianity in Iraq. Archbishop Bashar Warda of Erbil speaks to Lara Logan for her report on the plight of thousands of Christians forced to flee ancestral homes from ISIS. Her story will be broadcast on 60 Minutes Sunday, March 22 AT 7 p.m. ET/PT. The situation with ISIS in Northern...

In our constitutional republic there are two criteria for determining if an action by government is moral and/or legal. Would U.S. military action against ISIS, which has become the face of evil in the world at the moment, meet that criteria? The first criteria is the "Laws of Nature and Nature's God." This requires the action committed by government to be moral, which means to be in accordance with natural law. This natural law requires military action to be morally justified given the human toll at stake. Dating all the way back to Augustine's City of God, this is what's...

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Symbolic killing: It’s a repulsive notion. Gang bangers do it, using killing as a rite of initiation. Shoot someone to show resolve. ... Totalitarian states do it. What they lack in legitimacy they make up for with fear, preserving the credibility of their threats to destroy all dissent. Is our public debate about launching some sort of military demonstration of power in Syria any different? The President doesn’t want to do anything of consequence—but he doesn’t want to be seen as doing nothing. ... I’m not a pacifist, far from it. There are times when military force should be used,...

One of mankind’s first recorded discussions concerning morality in warfare is found in Thucydides’ passage in his master work, the Peloponnesian Wars (431-404 B.C.), wherein Athenian commanders, who possessed overwhelming force, approached their adversary before commencing the battle with a surrender ultimatum stating that they would hear no protestations about justice, rather the weaker adversary must consider the incontestable facts of the situation and surrender. In other words, ‘the strong do as they will, and the weak do as they must.’ Obviously these ancients dismissed the concept of restraint in war as irrelevant. To their way of thinking, after the...

May Individuals Become Soldiers? 1184. What view does the Church take of a soldier killing another so-called enemy soldier? The Catholic Church takes the view that if the soldier knew quite well that the cause of his own country was unjust, he would be guilty of murder, unless he were acting solely in individual self-defense against some individual soldier of the enemy forces. If, however, he did not have certain knowledge that his own country's cause was unjust, he would be free from personal guilt in obeying his officers and fighting for victory, even though it meant his killing enemy...

Morality of War 1178. Is war justifiable under any circumstances according to the will of Christ? If all men did the will of Christ there would be no war. But if some people refuse to do the will of Christ, those who desire to fulfill His will may be compelled to fight and may quite lawfully do so. 1179. Did not Christ counsel meekness, and say that if we are smitten on one cheek, we should turn the other? An individual is free to practice heroic meekness where his own rights are concerned, if he so desires. But, when smitten...

Catholic Attitude Towards Capitalism 1113. Is it not a fact that the Church even opposes many wise reforms merely from ignorance or unwillingness to accept up-to-date ideas? That is not a fact. The Church has many of her clergy devoting their lives to sociological study, who are experts in such subjects. They are neither ignorant, nor in the least unwilling to abandon out-of-date ideas. But they insist upon weighing new ideas on their own merits and if they oppose some of them, they but seem to be opposing wise ideas to those who have not sufficiently studied the matter. 1114....