Pope Asks God to Show Mercy on Sept. 11 Attackers

Reuters via iWon.com ^ | Sept 11, 2002 | Philip Pullella

[Pern]

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope John Paul, marking the anniversary of the attacks on U.S. cities, branded terrorism "ferocious inhumanity" but asked for prayers that God would show mercy and forgiveness for the attackers.

The pope also urged the world to change in situations of injustice that spurred the desire for revenge.

"We pray for the victims today, may they rest in peace, and may God show mercy and forgiveness for the authors of this horrible terror attack," he said in Polish, according to a translation provided by Vatican Radio.

The pope was speaking in unscripted remarks in Polish during a special general audience dedicated to commemorating the victims of the attacks by hijacked aircraft on New York and Washington landmarks.

The service included mourning music and a peace prayer.

"Terrorism is and always will be a manifestation of ferocious inhumanity, and because it is, it never will resolve conflicts between human beings," he told some 10,000 people in the Vatican's vast auditorium.

"Violence can only lead to further hatred and destruction."

But he called for changes in "scandalous situations of injustice and oppression, which continue to afflict so many members of the human family, creating conditions that are favorable to the uncontrolled explosion of the thirst for vendetta."

After his address, special prayers were read in several languages, including Arabic, for the victims of the attacks and for peace among religions.

MORE THAN 3,000 DEAD

More than 3,000 people died in the attacks on New York's World Trade Center, U.S. military headquarters at the Pentagon on the Washington outskirts and in a hijacked plane that crashed into a field in Pennsylvania.

The prayer read in Arabic asked believers of all religions to "firmly reject every form of violence and commit themselves to resolving conflicts with sincere and patient dialogue" while respecting different histories, cultures and religions.

Speaking in a somber voice in his address, the pope said injustices had to be tackled through urgent and resolute political and economic actions.

He said that when fundamental rights were violated in oppressive situations, "it is easy to fall prey to the temptation of hate and violence."

But one year on, the pontiff said it was not enough to commemorate the victims and pray for their families.

"We also want to interrogate the consciences of those who planned and carried out such a barbarous and cruel action," he said.

"One year after September 11, 2001, we repeat that no situation of injustice, no feeling of frustration, no philosophy or religion can justify such an aberration."

"On this very sad anniversary, we raise to God our prayer so that love may be able to take the place of hate, and, with the help of all people of good will, that concord and solidarity may take root in every corner of the earth," he said.

[Pushi]

I didn't read the whole thing, but the Pope's theology is a little off. According to my Christian belief, God will not show mercy because the attackers were not Christian. For a person to receive mercy from God, all he has to do is believe in God and believe Jesus Christ was His son who took upon himself the sins of the world and died for us, to save us from our sins. I believe that only those that believe this will inherit the Kingdom of God.

[MissAmericanPie]

What? No call for mercy on those homosexual priests that have turned the Church into their happy, hunting ground to savage little boys? Or does he think they are above needing it?

As far guessing, no one needs to guess about the blame the Pope is attaching to America and to the innocent victims by this statement "The pope also urged the world to change in situations of injustice that spurred the desire for revenge." Seems to me a sad lack of moral clairity, a lukewarm response to evil, neither hot nor cold, not his finest hour.

[GraniteStateConservative]

He believes in apocryphal texts. That's why he believes in praying for the dead. It's very understandable actually.

[GraniteStateConservative]

Salvation is for the living.

[sinkspur]

But I don't feel compelled to pray for their mercy, and I think the Pope muddies the waters of moral and spiritual clarity when he does so.

I'll trust the Pope's judgment on this one, Saber.

[Orual]

That would be extremely risky, since I don't know when I'm going to die.

But it doesn't matter, according to your words: No one deserves salvation. Where's the risk?

[sinkspur]

Salvation is for the living.

But who is saved when they were alive is not for you to say.

I'm outta here. This is becoming an adjunct to the Never Ending Thread in the religion forum and we've all made our points, over and over.

[HamiltonJay]

Again, your quote is in regards to the "LIVING", Jesus asked forgiveness for his living persecutors.. not the dead... what about this concept are you not getting? You pray for your persecutors as they persecute you, so that God may enter their hearts and show them the evil of their ways and that they may repent and become agents of the Lord.

Once your persecutors are dead, they are no longer your persecutors, but DEAD...in the afterlife and will be judged by God. Nothing in the new or old testiment suggests or requires that we petition the lord on behalf of a dead unrepetant persecutor.. nothing. I challenge you and anyone else to find one example where old or new suggest we should pray for mercy upon the souls of unrepentant persecutors.

[AD from SpringBay]

Where does it say in the New Testatment that praying for the souls of the dead will have any impact on God's Judgement of them?

That's an excellent question and one that needs repeating. Believers in Jesus Christ make a decision, either consciously or otherwise, as to what constitutes "source material" for their faith. One of the big things that Catholics, Protestants, and Fundamentalists (since the Catholic Organization was not in existance for at least 300 years after Jesus Christ, I place the early believers and those who want to have teachings like theirs in this category) disagree upon is the idea that the Bible should be the only source of information about God.

If a believer allows other sources(aside from the bible) to impact their thinking towards the will of God, treating these documents and people as inspired, then you have to next ask where to draw the line? Just as an example, some of the Popes throughout history were pretty wicked little fellows. So were they infallible and did they speak for God? Which of their writings are divine and whose to say?

I've chosen to stick with the Bible as The Word of God.

[general_re]

Obviously, they didn't repent, and there's no forgiveness after the fact.

You don't know.

Aquinas thought he knew - these men committed suicide, which is a mortal sin, and cannot have repented of it while they were alive by the very definition of suicide, as it was their final act. Was Aquinas wrong?

Man is made master of himself through his free-will: wherefore he can lawfully dispose of himself as to those matters which pertain to this life which is ruled by man's free-will. But the passage from this life to another and happier one is subject not to man's free-will but to the power of God. Hence it is not lawful for man to take his own life that he may pass to a happier life, nor that he may escape any unhappiness whatsoever of the present life, because the ultimate and most fearsome evil of this life is death, as the Philosopher states (Ethic. iii, 6). Therefore to bring death upon oneself in order to escape the other afflictions of this life, is to adopt a greater evil in order to avoid a lesser. On like manner it is unlawful to take one's own life on account of one's having committed a sin, both because by so doing one does oneself a very great injury, by depriving oneself of the time needful for repentance, and because it is not lawful to slay an evildoer except by the sentence of the public authority. Again it is unlawful for a woman to kill herself lest she be violated, because she ought not to commit on herself the very great sin of suicide, to avoid the lesser sir; of another. For she commits no sin in being violated by force, provided she does not consent, since "without consent of the mind there is no stain on the body," as the Blessed Lucy declared. Now it is evident that fornication and adultery are less grievous sins than taking a man's, especially one's own, life: since the latter is most grievous, because one injures oneself, to whom one owes the greatest love. Moreover it is most dangerous since no time is left wherein to expiate it by repentance.

- St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica

[geege]

Not so......may they all rot in hell forever........

[Taliesan]

I agree with all you've said.

It is perfectly human to want justice for killers but mercy for oneself. I believe they deserve justice, but I hope, for God's sake, they could somehow come to His mercy.

Part of the problem is that humans separate in our thoughts forgiveness and repentance. God does not. They are two sides of one coin, so that when we pray for God to forgive we are implicitly praying for the sinner to repent. Whether or not sinners after death have the ability to repent is God's concern, not ours.

Also, our prayer for God to forgive is for God's good and is not focused on the sinner at all. Those who become monsters like the hijackers are a great loss to God, and it is the extension of His kingdom to even them we are praying for.

Some object to this prayer because they think it implies that the State should forgive. Not so. The State has no capacity to even perceive or evaluate repentance, so it has no right to forgive. The state either dispenses justice or neglects justice.

Justice is a natural symmetry; it is perceived by common grace, which resides in all men. Mercy and repentance are graces which flow from Christ; all men do not have them. So when the State begins to even think about theological virtues it becomes a devil.

So the Christian prays for God to forgive the hijackers, just like He has forgiven me. I deserved death; He gave me life.

The State should punish the wicked men.

[Puddleglum]

Rebelbase wrote:

I'm not Catholic and I have a bit of confusion over this. Where does it say in the New Testatment that praying for the souls of the dead will have any impact on God's Judgement of them?

Well, Rebel, I'm Catholic but do not possess the best memory on the source of that teaching, in spite of aving read a book on it about one year ago. Sorry for the non-informative reply - I'd rather do some research than give you my meandering best guess. It may well derive from the "living Word," - the one you hear from the pulpit and we hear in our Church doctors and Church history. Not the answer you might want, maybe.

[Sabertooth]

I'll trust the Pope's judgment on this one, Saber.

With any scriptural basis? Everything you've offered thus far falls short.

Where is there an example of Jesus praying for mercy for the evil dead?

I'll agree that it's not our place to pray for anyone's damnation. The Archangel Michael set this example when he contended with Satan:

Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee.
Jude 1:9

But Michael didn't ask for mercy on the devil, either.

[BlueLancer]

This whole paradox is one of the reasons that I ceased to be a Christian when I became old enough to construct and rationalize my own value system. I don't have to worry about this "turn the other cheek" or "forgive them, they know not what they do" stuff.

Stark bloody vengeance and punishment is what I have in mind ... and what I hope to see carried out.

200 years from now, I want their children's children's children's children to cower and cringe in fear whenever they hear the sounds of jet engines overhead because their legends tell of fire from the sky.

I want them to hide in dark caves and holes in the earth, shivering with terror whenever they hear the roar of diesel engines because the tales of their ancestors talk about metal monsters crawling over the earth, spitting death and destruction.

I want their mothers to be able to admonish them with "If you don't behave, the Pale Destroyers will come for you", and that will be enough to reduce them to quivering obesience.

I want the annihilation to be so complete that their mythology will tell them of the day of judgment when the stern gods from across the sea .. the powerful 'Mericans .. destroyed their forefathers' wickedness.
Kill them all ... nits make lice.
(COL Chivington, Sand Creek)

[Orual]

Great quote from the Summa. Right on the mark.

Was Aquinas wrong?

Aquinas was right about everything.

[RedBloodedAmerican]

sink, when you stand before the Lord on Judgement Day, you won't be able to point the finger at the Pope and say "well, he told me you would decide at a later date..."

Light a candle for Atta on behalf of Osama today, will you? Thanks.

[KansasConservative1]

"God would show mercy and forgiveness for the attackers."

As a pissed off American, I am glad he (the Pope) has a Christ-Like heart. I say burn in hell you bastards.

[sinkspur]

Was Aquinas wrong?

Aquinas made no judgment about the souls of particular men, as some on this thread are doing.

Also, eschatological understanding has developed beyond Aquinas.

The Pope is not wrong to pray for the repentance of these horrible men.

[Desdemona]

"You're WAAAAYYY off base with this one.

In Catholic teaching, no he is NOT. JPII asked GOD to have mercy on the authors, no one else. That is God's place to forgive. We on earth don't have that luxury. We do what we have to.

He did not call for an end to the war. The calls to end violence were not directed at us.

He did not call for the UN to be involved. In fact, notice that there is no mention of the war at all or acting without approval.

Pay attention. This is a message of peace, yes, but His Holiness knows this has to be done. He's not going to come out and say "Let's Roll." He also knows that if we don't rout out the terrorists, there will be no peace. And that is what he desires above all.