Posted on 07/10/2015 3:55:02 AM PDT by markomalley
The Pope, after arriving in Bolivia, stopped to pray at the death site of Luis Espinal, a Jesuit murdered by Bolivian paramilitary forces in 1980. Espinal is being painted in press reports as a reformer who stood against the military dictatorship in Bolivia. However, PopeWatch came across this little tidbit:
Father Albo showed a reporter a published photo of a crucified Christ attached to a homemade hammer and sickle, instead of a cross, that Father Espinal kept by his bed.
“He was of the left. This is certain. But he never belonged to any party or pretended to be part of one,” said Father Albo, who said he hopes to present a replica of the hammer and sickle crucifix to the pope.
Father Espinal “gave a lot of importance to the dialogue between Marxists and Christians,” he explained. “It was not pro-Soviet … (it was) the need for the church to be close to the popular sectors. Some understand this, others don’t. To me it is very clear.”
PopeWatch wonders if the Pope would honor a priest who was killed by a leftist government and kept by his bed a photo of a crucified Christ attached to a Swastika. Communists are every inch as evil as the Nazis were and as antithetical to the teachings of Christ. Many Jesuits, and others within the Church, seek to ignore these obvious truths.
Socialists/Communists have killed 120 millions the past 100 years.
This pope apparently does not care.
Few English language news sources are reporting that Pope Francis publicly reprimanded Evo Morales for presenting him with that blasphemous item.
Please provide a link in whatever language you can find.
http://www.mediaite.com/online/pope-francis-rebukes-bolivian-president-for-giving-him-communist-crucifix/
OK, I found an article that says the Pope was unhappy with it. The article goes on to say how Evo tried to explain that it was a symbol of the Church being close to “the people”, but the Pope did not appear to be completely sold.
Video at the site ...
http://www.el-nacional.com/mundo/reaccion-recibir-inusual-Evo-Morales_0_661733920.html
All he said was the equivalent of “that’s not good,” but then he accepted it. What most people don’t know was that Morales had already given him a pectoral cross with that same image on it, which the Pope was happily wearing at that time. You can see it in the photos of the Pope and Morales.
It wasn’t clear to me whether his remark to Morales was in reference to the “Marxist crucifix” or to the fact that a large and unmistakeable one was being publicly presented to him. After all, he was already wearing a smaller one, and since Espinal (the Marxist Jesuit who first carved this thing) is one of his heroes and he wants to have him canonized, he obviously knew what it was.
But obviously that is directly opposite Evo Morales' intention.
Do you have a source for that pectoral cross?
Meanwhile he has a hammer and sickle crucifix hanging around his neck and he accepted these blasphemous gifts. What he should have done was outright rejected it all.
Some people were hoping he'd said "That's not right". Fortunately, the Vatican acted quickly to clarify:
At a July 9 press briefing the Holy See press officer, Fr. Federico Lombardi, noted the lack of clarity in the audio of the exchange, and remarked that Pope Francis had been unaware the crucifix was a replica of Fr. Espinal's.
He also claimed that Fr. Espinal's use of it was not ideological but expressed a hope for dialogue between communism and the Church, adding that Pope Francis' remark likely expresed a sentiment of “I didnt' know”, rather than “This is not right.”
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-francis-apparently-not-amused-by-communist-crucifix-33337/
So the sacrilege of Christ crucified on the greatest symbol of evil and mass murder in human history is a symbol of "hope", according to the Vatican's own press officer.
The best case scenario here is that the Pope and his staff are completely incompetent, by allowing the Holy See to be put in that position by a vicious Stalinist thug without screening what Morales was going to be handing (and putting around the neck of...) the Pope in front of the cameras. And that's putting aside the obvious "Why is he there giving a communist gangster legitimacy in the first place???" question.
But given everything this Pope has said and done in the course of his pontificate, it's also the least likely scenario.
two articles
Listen Closely to Response of Pope Francis When Bolivian President Gives Him a Communist Crucifix
It Is Now Appropriate To Begin Serious Discussions as to Whether Pope Francis is, in fact, The Antichrist.
“hope for dialogue”.....
More of that so-called dialogue brought to us by Vatican II.
The great wrecking ball of western civilization.
This pope apparently does not care.
At least he shook his head and said, “This is not ok,”.
Soviets banned Greco-Catholic religion in Eastern Europe, imprisoned priests and people who did not convert to KGB run Russian Orthodox. Thousands died for Christ in Labor Camps and prisons.
Some “dialog”!
Coming - creeping to US!
I don’t know why he bothered to reprimand Morales. Frankly it is just the visual expression of everything that was in that encyclical. One could not blame Morales for being puzzled by his reaction.
If his words in Spanish were reported accurately, the Pope actually did say “this is not good,” but it’s not clear to me what he was referring to: the “crucifix” or its public presentation to him, since he was already wearing the very same thing but smaller around his neck. I haven’t seen the video, so I don’t know his actual words in Spanish.
Perhaps he did say to Lombardi that he didn’t know (in advance) that Morales was going to do this, and he probably didn’t know. But to make it worse, Fr. Lombardi came out with a strange statement yesterday that the “Holy Father did not have any negative reaction to the gift and did not tell me to say that he had a negative reaction.” So go figure.
Thank you. I watched it, and the Pope was being informed by Morales about the background of the “crucifix,” that it was made by his hero, Espinal, and the Pope then says, “No lo sabía,” which means, I didn’t know that. And then he smiles.
‘
It’s very muffled, especially the Morales’ explanation, but there’s no doubt about the Pope’s words or his smiling reaction. The fact that he instructed Fr. Lombardi to say that he wanted it known that he was not displeased by the gift, and that he did not want Lombardi to say that he had been, confirms this.
Somebody needs to rise up and free us from this heretic.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.