Pope says Iraq war threatens humanity

Reuters | 3/22/03

[AFPhys]

"weapons could never solve mankind's problems"

This statement is patently false.

You're right. However, all the Pope had to say in addition to this is the (pretty depressing) statement that only the Second Coming of Christ will solve all mankind's problems, and let that ferment with the masses.

[Sam Cree]

But sadistic dictators who have killed up to 400,000 are not a threat to humanity?

I hate to say the pope is a jerk, but he's really making me wonder. Come to think of it, the same goes for most religious leaders.

I find it all very chilling.

[aquawrench]

This is coming from the head of the Boy Factory.

[uncbob]

that weapons could never solve mankind's problems

Well back in the Old Days the Pope outlawed the crossbow

That didn't solve mankinds problems either

[laz17]

the proper translation of the commandment given to Moses is that one shall not do "murder".

That is quite true. The verbs "to kill" and "to murder" are very different in meaning and connotation. To murder denotes taking a life without just cause, such as killing someone to steal their wallet. To kill, however, denotes taking a life WITH just cause, such as killing a criminal about to murder an innocent in order to save the innocent's life... or killing in self-defense.

[Diva]

here's the link to Zenit, Go to March 20 and look under documents.

[fml]

Thanks for the link. Very interesting.

[Diva]

So I've linked to the Vatican site and the Zenit news site. One will get you to the Pope's statements of March 16, the deliberate misrepresentation by Reuters of which I believe has created the excuse for this anti-Catholic parade. The other link will take you to the official statement of US Bishops. So, what is being done by some on freerepublic, to trash and demoralize Catholics in this country is as bad in my view as what those little "pukes" in San Francisco are doing to all of us.

[jimmyfreedom]

once again the church on the wrong side

The pope is not the Church.... Most right thinking Christians fully support the Bush and his war against Evil. The pope is more and more irrelavant everyday....

[pt17]

I guess one of the characteristics of being a pope is that you don't have to deal in reality.

[Ole Okie]

I wonder if his Holiness feels war to liberate Europe from the bootheels of the Swatiska also threathened humanity. /sarcasm

Ach du lieber!

Do il Papa speak German?

QED. He's welcome.

[shempy]

Again, here is the quote:

"When war, like the one now in Iraq, threatens the fate of humanity, it is even more urgent for us to proclaim, with a firm and decisive voice, that only peace is the way of building a more just and caring society," he said.

Sorry, but there is no context that this statement can be put in that makes it mean something else.

[Wallace T.]

His stance on this war does not comport with the anti-Communist Polish bishop whom the KGB, using a Turkish Muslim extremist, attempted to assassinate early in his papacy. I suspect John Paul II is extremely ill and that he is the captive of some leftist clique inside the Vatican.

[Diva]

Sorry, but there is no context that this statement can be put in that makes it mean something else.

Well, as the head of the Catholic Church it is what I would expect him to say. He is not accusing the US of engaging in an unjust war. I've read reports that that is what hs is saying but I haven't read it yet. He is a man who knows the results of war quite well as he lived through a rather nasty episode in the history of the 20th century. I do not expect him to say that war is a way of "building a more just and caring society." I can just imagine how that would be interpreted! I doubt any religious leader outside some demented Muslim cleric would say that either. War is the last resort when dealing with countries and the lives of innocents, not to mention our own soldiers who have been put in harms way. I believe we reached the last resort with Saddam. I interpret the Pope's words for what I think they mean. War is bad and I think any American soldier would agree with me. But, I think Saddam must go, and I am sure the Pope understands this as well. I also keep in mind that his words can be used against Catholics in Iraq, so he must be careful and measured in what he says. If you choose to believe that his words of praying for peace or that war threatens the fate of humanity,(which I enterpret as his concern for innocent life in the midst of war whether they be soldiers or civilians), equals his being on Saddam's side or cares nothing about the fate of those oppressed by Saddam's evil regime, then I don't really know how to respond to you. I have read what our Bishops in this country have said in their official statement and I am satisfied.

I also know there are Catholic desenters, anti-American peace activists, and major media outlets that despise the Church or this Pope, who will twist his words and the statements of Catholic bishops to their pre-conceived wishes. But, there are many of us in the Church who support the war effort and who know and love some Catholic men and women who are there right now, who will not fall into the anti-Catholic trap that is being laid by some on this board, by some in the media, and unfortunately, by some who even call themselves Catholic.

[Kevin Curry]

I've read the relevant dispatches found at your links. Bishop Gregory sounds rationale and clear-headed enough. The Pope sounds detached and fuzzy, but then the only remarks that are reported are short remarks.

Another dispatch reports the archbishop of Baghdad as saying despite the incredibly powerful barrage and bombardment of Baghdad over the first few days of the conflict the essential civilian infrastructure--water, power, bridges, roads--remains intact.

Far from being shoot-from-the-hip Cowboys, the two tall Texans in this war--President Bush and General Franks--are demonstrating exquisite care to cause minimal--and if possible no--harm to Iraqi civilians. When in the history of the world has a powerful nation's armies shown such tender regard for an enemy's people?

And yet the Pope rails against the United States in this conflict. I suspect it is because he speaks from within the context of his own early history in which mass-murdering tyrants including Hitler and Stalin were archtypes. He is blinded and conditioned by his his own terrible history and therefore cannot distinguish the more moral contours of this war.

[B4Ranch]

The Pope needs to remember who freed Poland.

[Diva]

And yet the Pope rails against the United States in this conflict. I suspect it is because he speaks from within the context of his own early history in which mass-murdering tyrants including Hitler and Stalin were archtypes. He is blinded and conditioned by his his own terrible history and therefore cannot distinguish the more moral contours of this war.

The Pope sounds detached and fuzzy, but then the only remarks that are reported are short remarks.

So, which is it for you? Is the Pope fuzzy and detatched or railing against the United States? You are contradicting yourself! Perhaps you could give me the specific quote where the Pope condemns the US for our acts, where is it?

[laz17]

If you are including me in the group you claim is setting an anti-Catholic trap on FR, and attempting to link me to dgenerates such as the anti-American peaceniks, then you are more mistaken than you can possibly imagine. Read THIS and see whether I fit the type you describe:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/860196/posts

I take no pleasure in criticizing the Pope and the Church, and I wish they gave me no cause to, but when they deviate from the Word, then my allegiance must remain with the Word, not with a fallible bureaucracy. The sad fact is that the Church has been infiltrated by leftist elements that are perverting it from within according to Satan's plan of sabotage. They are so deeply entrenched that it would be nearly impossible to excise them. Were it up to me, leftism and those who practice it would be removed from the earth; such is my total abhorrence of them. But that is for God Himself to do as He sees fit when He sees fit. In the meantime, if leftists corrupt the Church from within like a cancer, the truly faithful would be better off not exposing themselves to false doctrine, and by maintaining a personal relationship with Christ which does not require the bureaucracy. In the end, the true Church is not the bureaucracy, but the faithful remnant of individuals each maintaining a personal relationship with Christ. At the start of the Church, it was just a small group of true believers. At the end, that is probably what it will be again, as the increasingly corrupt bureaucracy falls away.

[Diva]

Actually, if you read what I have posted I didn't accuse anyone specifically. I don't know for sure what anyone's intentions are but I do know and have run into on this board anti-Catholic sentiment in the past. I agree with some of what you have said, there are awful leftist elements in the Catholic Church. There are also very good bishops and preists and religious, its a big Church. Most of the seminarians I teach at a major seminary in this country are very conservative and supportive of this war. There are also very good folks on Freerepublic, that's my opinion anyway. But, there are also those who interpret what the Pope says in anti-Catholic ways because they either truely believe the Pope is capable of these nonesensical sentiments, they do not understand language has very specific meaning in Church teaching, or, sadly, they do not understand that the Pope's words can be interpreted by VERY anti-American and anti-Christian Muslim radicals who would love nothing better than to use his words as an excuse to claim another Crusade is being waged against them by the West. They have already made this claime, imagine if the Pope were to come out and say specifically what you think he ought to say. There are a lot of Christians living in Arab countries and they would very much be put at risk. He cannot appear to be siding with the U.S. if for nothing else the sake of Christian lives.