Hitler's Pope

[Terrance F. Flaherty]

calbert at pop.tiac.net wrote:
> 
> T. Flaherty:
> 
> > Why is this disheartening? That people believe in a pope or
> > a chief or a master or a teacher or a leader or guide or
> > holy one, or path walker or some human representative of an
> > ideal is something humans do and have been doing for as long
> > as humans have been walking on two legs. That the RCC has
> > more blood on its hands than a corporation should not
> > surprise anyone. The RCC has a very long history.  And does
> > it have more blood on its hands than England? This is a
> > better comparison, right? Or perhaps we should only compare
> > the great world religions. Are there damned spots on the
> > hands of Judaism? Chinese Philosophies? Japanese Religions,
> > American Religions?
> 
> I would only counter that few if any of the other faiths operate in
> the political arena like the RCC. It would be fair to say that it is
> a secular power player par excellence.

Right, no other faith acts as the RCC in western history, no
other faith acts as the Islamic faith, no other faith acts
as the shinto faith and so on. How are they alike, that's
what we are after, right? The RCC has more in common with
other faiths and their actions--political and so on--because
it is a religion and Not a multi national corporation. I can
give examples of other faiths that have just as much bad
blood and evil as the RCC, but this does not absolve them or
redeem them. M&D is a good place to turn, and we find
slavery, murder and so on, all over, and it gets rather
complicated and we find sheep slaughtered and
slaughtering.   

> 
> > These great world religions all have
> > bloody hands and yet most people are not disheartened. These religions are not
> > resilient because they have money and power and bloody
> > history, but rather in spite of these evils and they
> > demonstrate their resiliency by adapting contemporary styles
> > of philosophy to their fundamental doctrines.
> 
> Methinks Mr. Morris's statement was a bit broad, and may have
> referred to the need for a parsing intermediary twixt man and G*d,
> and not that of religion.
> 
> > We know more
> > about the RCC here in the west because we study western
> > history, but it seems we know little of the history of other
> > great world religions and I think comparing the RCC to a
> > corporation like Ig F or IBM doesn't make much sense and
> > when people do this sort of thing in the papers I know they
> > have a political axe to grind or they are ignorant of the
> > history of world religion and the history of religion, since
> > they always compare apples and oranges.
> 
> Again, take a look at the history of the Banco Ambrosiano scandal,
> itself a component of a greater campaign linked to the notorious P2
> reactionaries. When an institution behaves in a manner
> indistinguishable from that of a secular power, it is indeed fair to
> compare them.
> 

Yes, I know, but my point is that even as the RCC acts as a
political or economic power it is better compared to other
religions. 

> But I emphasize again, a whack at the institution need not, nor
> should it be a shot at the faith itself. Gotta be something to it, m'
> boys Evelyn Waugh ( though by most acounts a nasty curmodgeon), GK
> Chesterton, and Paul Mackin can't be that confused.
> 
> love,
> cfa