Posted on 01/11/2006 6:38:47 PM PST by Macoraba
Christopher Columbus is my all time number one hero. Hence I've come up with a Columbus alphabet akin to the Marian alphabet I shared in another post.
A - Admiral of the Ocean Sea
B - Bible Enthusiast
C - Crusader for the Gospel
D - Defender of the Faith
E - Evangelist of the Americas
F - Franciscan Tertiary
G - Genoa's Greatest Son
H - Holy Cross Bearer
I - Immaculata's Soldier
J - Just Man
K - Knight of Christ
L - Lover of Knowedge
M - Mary's Faithful Son
N - New World Discoverer
O - Our Lady's Champion
P - Pope's Man
Q - Queen Isabela's Vassal
R - Righteous Gentile
S - Spain's Hero
T - True Catholic
U - Untiring Seaman
V - Virtuous Gentleman
W - Warrior of the Church
X - Xenith of Explorers
Y - Youthful Dreamer
Z - Zealous for Spiritual Riches
I came to agree with the p.c. revisionists' judgement on Columbus.
It took the accounts of Father Bartolome de la Casas to convince me. Fr. de la Casas sailed to the Americas in 1502, went back to Spain and was ordained a priest, and returned to the Americas and tried to protect the Indians.
Sure Columbus was a brave venturer and a devout Christian, but he was given over to greed and murdered and enslaved for gold. No matter how devout, he was supremely wrongheaded, and no "just man."
I'm homeschooling my 9 y.o., and we're studying Leif Ericson, Columbus, and the other explorers now - and Fr. de la Casas will be our Christian exemplar.
Mrs VS
Christopher Columbus was the greatest men that ever lived, after Leonardo da Vinci.
It seems that he was a pretty intelligent sailor, but, as it always happens, he never realized that you never find what you are looking for, but what reality gives you. He was also greedy, envious and a poor leader, but hye, who isn't. I specially find amusing his view of the world: acording to Columbus, the Earth has the shape of a woman's breast and Paradise would be the nipple. An interesting character of his time, that's for sure!
Uh-huh. If you've bought into that silly bilge, I'll bet next we'll be hearing your fascinating insights on how George Washington was a war criminal.
Peddle it elsewhere.
The Greeks had accurately predicted the circumference of the Earth thousands of years earlier. Columbus' calculations were obviously badly flawed. He was, however, bright enough to recognize the importance of the trade winds.
It was upon these gentle lambs, imbued by the Creator with all the qualities we have mentioned, that from the very first day they clapped eyes on them the Spanish fell like ravening wolves upon the fold, or like tigers and savage lions who have not eaten meat for days. The pattern established at the outset has remained unchanged to this day, and the Spaniards still do nothing save tear the natives to shreds, murder them and inflict upon them untold misery, suffering and distress, tormenting, harrying and persecuting them mercilessly.
We shall in due course describe some of the many ingenious methods of torture they have invented and refined for this purpose, but one can get some idea of the effectiveness of their methods from the figures alone. When the Spanish first journeyed there, the indigenous population of the island of Hispaniola stood at some three million; today only two hundred survive.
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At a conservative estimate, the despotic and diabolical behaviour of the Christians has, over the last forty years, led to the unjust and totally unwarranted deaths of more than twelve million souls, women and children among them, and there are grounds for believing my own estimate of more than fifteen million to be nearer the mark.
There are two main ways in which those who have travelled to this part of the world pretending to be Christians have uprooted these pitiful peoples and wiped them from the face of the earth. First, they have waged war on them: unjust, cruel, bloody and tyrannical war. Second, they have murdered anyone and everyone who has shown the slightest sign of resistance, or even of wishing to escape the torment to which they have subjected him.
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The reason the Christians have murdered on such a vast scale and killed anyone and everyone in their way is purely and simply greed. They have set out to line their pockets with gold and to amass private fortunes as quickly as possible so that they can then assume a status quite at odds with that into which they were born. Their insatiable greed and overweening ambition know no bounds; the land is fertile and rich, the inhabitants simple, forbearing and submissive.
The Spaniards have shown not the slightest consideration for these people, treating them (and I speak from first-hand experience, having been there from the outset) not as brute animals - indeed, I would to God they had done and had shown them the consideration they afford their animals - so much as piles of dung in the middle of the road. They have had as little concern for their souls as for their bodies, all the millions that have perished having gone to their deaths with no knowledge of God and without the benefit of the Sacraments.
De las Casas gives details of the Spaniards working and starving the Indians to death, of massacres of women and children. Perhaps he does not fully realize how many of the Indians died because of Old World diseases, but that in no way excuses the active crimes of the Spaniards. He does omit describing the warlike nature of some of the tribes, or their relatively few attacks on the Spaniards. He's not exactly a p.c. hero either - he believed in a benevolent slavery, which would Christianize the natives, and advocated the importation of hardier Africans.
It's a mistake to judge people of the past entirely by the standards of our time, as if we had a corner on righteousness. But I'd guess Father de las Casas came a good deal closer to God's standards than did Columbus.
aka Mrs VS
I think he meant well but he was a little off. Similar to some of today's religious that protest out in front of military bases. This sentence was a good example. He was sincere but he was mistaken. How could there be 3,000,000 and a few years later only 200 left? Both numbers are exaggerated to the extreme. The bad thing was his writings were the basis for the "Black Legend" and that slander has been repeated mindlessly for 300 or 400 years to the point where people think it's Gospel.
...and a great Christian, to boot.
In hoc signo vinces.
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