Posted on 12/16/2003 5:54:51 AM PST by sitetest
Edited on 12/16/2003 7:13:44 AM PST by Lead Moderator. [history]
[LM's note: This thread is degenerating a bit into Catholic bashing and general flaming, and is in risk of being moved to the smokey backroom. Please stop. I've locked it once, and it has continued. Any more and it is gone. Thanks.]
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - A top Vatican (news - web sites) official said Tuesday he felt pity and compassion for Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) and criticized the U.S. military for showing video footage of him being treated "like a cow."
Cardinal Renato Martino, head of the Vatican's Justice and Peace department and a former papal envoy to the United Nations (news - web sites), told a news conference it would be "illusory" to think the arrest of the former Iraqi president would heal all the damage caused by a war which the Holy See opposed.
"I felt pity to see this man destroyed, (the military) looking at his teeth as if he were a cow. They could have spared us these pictures," he said.
"Seeing him like this, a man in his tragedy, despite all the heavy blame he bears, I had a sense of compassion for him," he said in answer to questions about Saddam's arrest.
Martino was referring to the videotape released by the U.S. military which showed a grubby, bearded and disheveled Saddam receiving a medical examination by a military doctor after his capture in an underground hole Saturday.
Martino was one of the Vatican officials most strongly opposed to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq (news - web sites).
"It's true that we should be happy that this (arrest) has come about because it is the watershed that was necessary... we hope that this will not have worse and other serious consequences," Martino said.
"But it is not the total solution to the problems of the Middle East," he said.
Martino said the Vatican hoped the arrest of Saddam "can contribute to promoting peace and the democratization of Iraq."
He added: "But is seems to me to be illusory to hope that this will repair the dramas and the damage of the defeat for humanity that a war always brings about."
The Vatican did not consider the war in Iraq "a just war" because it was not backed by the United Nations and because the Vatican believed more negotiations were necessary to avoid it.
Martino said the Vatican wanted an "appropriate institution" to put Saddam on trial but he did not elaborate.
U.S. forces were keeping the ousted 66-year-old dictator at a secret location for interrogation before he is put on trial in the months ahead. He could face the death penalty.
The news conference was called for Martino to present the World Day of Peace message, in which Pope John Paul (news - web sites) took a swipe at the United States for invading Iraq without the backing of the United Nations.
I would agree with that, but offensive as well is Catspaw's pseudo compassion and apparent amnesia. Had Hussein dismantled his enormous caches of weapons of mass destruction and allowed weapons inspectors unfettered access to....well....everywhere, then Hussein would still be in power and no one, not Cardinal Martino, President Bush, or Catspaw would be saying a word about how Hussein treated Iraqi citizens. One could speculate if Hussein's victims would number the 9500 innocent Iraqi's who have died since their liberation began.
Pope John Paul II, in his pre-Parkinson's days, was every bit as much a witness to the horrors of WWII as he has been since. Those horrors did not phase him in joining with Ronaldus Maximus in inflicting fatal pressure on the Soviet Union when opportunity in the form of Solidarnoscz arose. No shots were fired by American forces but the existence of the rebuilt American military arsenal together with JP II's moral authority were effective.
It is as you say. It might just be that men like the pope who have lived in regimes such as Poland's for forty years, might know something about regime change, without, as you say, a shot fired.
We cannot, in our world, dare to live such morally antiseptic lives, ignoring the grievous evil inflicted upon Iraqis by Saddam. We may not be able to do everything that needs doing for the victims of the Red Chinese or of the North Korean regime or of Castro but we can and ought to do something.
I understand fully where you are coming from. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
I do not agree that is why the U.S. went in.
You may have noticed, if you were not so obsessed with you resentments of the RCC, that I agreed repeatedly with most criticisms of Renato Cardinal Martino who is clearly a liberal airhead. BTW, that doesn't make me an anti-Catholic bigot. Those who, on the other hand, make a hobby and habit of criticizing for the sake of criticism, or who have the effrontery, after apostasizing, to vandalize the RCC from the outside are another question entirely.
Generally, I avoid indulging in schadenfreude over the peccadilloes present in the spin-off, sequel churches that claim Christianity. They are none of my business and none of my concern. RCC foibles are generally none of yours. I have no standing to argue against internal governance decisions in your church, if any, nor have you standing to butt into RCC governance. You don't pay the freight. MYOB.
Apostasy from the Truth is what is not very prudent or healthy.
In Poland there had been several changes of communist regimes, often instigated by Catholic non-violent resistance under Cardinal Wyscinski (sp.?). The Polish Catholics have a tradition of "going to the mountain" and rallying in millions as the Black Madonna of Czestochowa is displayed by monks to rally Catholic solidarity. Gomulka's regime fell for failure to be able to intimidate the Polish Catholic leadership from so rallying the Faithful. The late Fr. Malachi Martin wrote at length of this tradition and of JP II's formation in it in his The Keys of This Blood. Regrettably, Iraq was largely lost to Catholicism centuries ago with only the Chaldean Rite remnant left in place. That strategy would not have been possible in Iraq. As a result of that formation and talent that is truly "on loan from God," JP II has consistently proven to be a magnificent player in geopolitics often outclassing all of his contemporaries simultaneously. These are somewhat secular concerns of the Vatican nation-state, however.
When Jan Sobiewski rode to the relief of Vienna, war was certainly necessary against an aggressive projection of Islam. The Battle of Lepanto was our battle. Ignatius Loyola was soldier before he was saint.
Granting the points in your first paragraph, we ought not to comfortably accept the truth reflected therein as a desirable truth. When Red China imposes a one-child policy leading to the drowning of innocent newborn girls by parents desiring a son, we ought to devise proportional and prudent strategies to put an end to such practices. As Putin attempts to re-establish the soviet hegemony in Russia and then in her former satellites, we ought to resist and to assist resistance by those directly affected. We are understandably anxious to play, as a nation, but also as our Church, the fine Roman hand of an iron fist in a velvet glove and to defeat those worth defeating without nuclear consequences and to avoid the death of innocents as possible. There must, however, be corollaries to just war theory to take into account the modern price of failure to act when technology has presented the possibility of swift annihilation. Moral principles do not change with the passage of time but new circumstances of advancing technology may call for new applications of those principles in response to the latest technological threats.
I believe that we must never let ourselves ignore those sufering in effective captivity under tyrants. How many Iraqis starved or died for lack of medicines or other necessities as Saddam applied oil revenue to bigger and better palaces and his own personal glory and behaved in such a fashion as to guarantee continuation of the embargo? God bless you and yours.
Now make sure you question my "right" to post or make something of my registration date or my spelling. Or call me a "butt-boy" or use one of your other many tricks!
... given that Saddam had over 300,000 innocent victims under his belt, ... do you think that the U.S. was wrong to go in and stop him from adding to that number ?
I do not agree that is why the U.S. went in.
Why do you believe that the U.S. invaded Iraq ?
Do you believe that we had any legitimate justification for doing so ?
While I agree with your statement, you seem to believe that your church has a patent on "the Truth", that is a very dangerous sentiment and it's far from reality.
Human Rights Watch is not a reliable source of statistics.
Do you believe that the RC church is incapable of error in doctrine?
I'll take this as a "yes" to my question.
Next question: Are other churches (besides the RC church) only true in their doctrine when they agree with RC doctrine?
There is no logical answer to this other than "yes." If what we hold is true, then whatever contradicts is false. It's tautological.
Unless you think truth is relative.
SD
Are other churches (besides the RC church) only true in their doctrine when they agree with RC doctrine?
There is no logical answer to this other than "yes." If what we hold is true, then whatever contradicts is false. It's tautological.
Unless you think truth is relative ...
... or the Catholic Church is wrong about some things ...
Thanks Dave for the straight honest answer.
Unless you think truth is relative.
No, not at all.
These 2 answers together mean that, in effect, RC's believe they have a monopoly on spiritual truth. The patent on "Truth" I stated earlier.
For the record, I don't believe any church, including my own, is incapable of error (infallible).
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