Yawn…

For a religion so rife with insignificance, you sure can’t shut up about it. It’ll never fade into obscurity like you keep saying it will if you keep bringing it up…

I mean, that is what’s happening, isn’t it? It’s fading away and becoming less relevant…

Vinny, just as a clarification…the number of times someone raised an issue may impact on your interest level in a given topic, but not on the accuracy or relevance of what they have to say.

There are two threads in Catholicism that people point to when trying to condemn Pius XII…a deeply rooted anti-semitism (not universal, and not part of Catholic dogma, but a cultural flavour particularly strong among some of the European Catholic nations like Poland and Spain), and which Piux, and Vatican politics, or the accomodations a large and rich multinational organization has to make to survive in the real world. Those are both undeniable, but attackers like John Cornwell are, in my opinion, way off the mark.

Could the Church have done more to assist Jews during WWII? Of course. So could Canada and the US. Is there an anti semitic stream of thought among some Catholic cultures? Yes. Did Pius XII, as a man of his time and culture, share it on some level? Possibly. Did it impact on his actions as Pope? I’ve never seen convincing evidence or argument to that effect.

As for the new Pope and neopaganism…SL, we’ve had this discussion before. Many sources refer to the various German pagan or occult groups (e.g., the Germanische Glaubens-Gemeinschaft or the Thule Society) thrived in Germany in the early 20th century as neopagan, simply to distinguish them from paleopaganism or earlier movements. I understand your objection to it, but I think your suggestion that this is an organized campaign directed by the Vatican against your lot is a bit excessive…in part because I can’t really see Vatican condemnation carrying an ounce of weight.

Certainly. I think Pope Benedict is distancing himself from his involvement with the Hitler Youth (which I personally think, in his case, was rather like joining the Boy Scouts).

Link #1

I am certainly going to give a lot of credence to a biblical creationist site that, in discussing Donovans’ ideas says

In an ominous parallel with current clamours by humanist and self-professed ‘civil liberties’ groups to ‘keep Creation in the church’ and obliterate all traces of Christianity from public life and schools, ‘The various Christian Churches … were confined as far as possible to the performance of narrowly religious functions, and even within this sphere were subjected to as many hindrances as the Nazis dared to impose.’

– give me something academic and peer reviewed V. If Donovan is correct it is a concept and argument that has certainly not seen a whole lot of the light of day that I am aware of…. being a generally opened minded sort though I however would be interested in any links to any peer reviewed opinion of his hypothesis. Hitler sought to completely remove dissent, any person or group who spoke against him was a target.

Link #2

That’s really an either or V - nothing concrete at all.

I rest my case on Mein Kampf.

Balbulican: Agree’d, I never took seriously the Hitler Youth thing and I really don’t think anyone who gave the matter any thought did - he hasn’t been seriously called on that aspect of his life so the idea that he is attempting to distance himself from it by blaming the neopagan movement for Nazi atrocities at this point is a fairly weak [ virtually a non-] argument.

I find your anti-Catholicism fascinating and your anti-Catholic hate speech compelling, but I am still not sure what to make of it all.

Would you consider doing a hard-hitting series of anti-Catholic posts? And preface them with “As a Catholic-hating NDP supporter…?”

You’re a peach, thanx a bunch!!! ;-)

Ummm..no, that won’t do, old chap. I was hoping for some good “Davinci’s Inquest” or whatever that paperback novel is called sort of hate. C’mon, man, bring out that inner-Catholic hating hater! You know you want to!

Token on-topic response to your non-repsonse (not that you deserve one):

“it’s because every time someone like me”

Bah, I only catch like 30% of the ProgBlog anti-Catholic hatespeech at most. I really should automate the process, like an RSS alert on keywords like “nazi” and “Vatican”.

“you hate christians don’t you”

And in case I wasn’t clear, yes, I am accusing you of hating Catholics and Catholicism, ridiculing Catholicism, demonizing the Pope and the Vatican, and being hateful and disseminating hate on the internet toward Catholics. Whether that violates Section 319 of the Criminal Code of Canada is uncertain, as I am not a lawyer.

I’m not complaining or anything, it’s just an observation. Anti-Catholic guys do Anti-Catholic things, like repeatedly writing anti-Catholic articles. Walk the walk, old chap; if you search my site you’ll find that I stick up for Muslims and Buddhists too. I don’t like to see smug anti-religion leftists like you hate, ridicule, and encourage hatred of ANY religion.

Show me a devout Muslim\ Sikh\ Jew\ Catholic\ Rastafarian\ Buddhist who walks the walk of his religion and I’ll show you someone who I want as my neighbour. And someone I would vote for, too. To me, a guy like Ajmer Mandur, the CPC candidate for CPC in K-W, is a small c conservative. Businessman, family man, spiritual man.

“If your argument is that this is anti-catholic and hate speech”

It’s not your first anti-Catholic article, friend. It’s part of a pattern. Given the infinite subjects about which one could blog, why do you and so many of your fellow lefties insist on writing so many anti-Catholic and anti-Christian articles? It’s reasonable by your lack of articles criticizing other religions to infer that you believe the Catholic church to be different, worse, and more deserving of criticism than Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, and other religions.

And that won’t do, old chap; not because I am “offended” by that - heterosexual men don’t use that horrid left wing word - but because you need to play by the same rules as all of us. If I posted a series of anti-Jewish or anti-Rastafarian articles I would expect to take heat for it; you should be held to the same standard.

I’m not impressed with the anti-religious left at all, and you can forget about me and several million religious Canadians voting for any left wing party like the Liberals or the NDP any time soon. So c’mon, tough guy, keep pumping out those anti-Catholic articles! The 42% of Canadians who are Catholic surely appreciate it, and think highly of you and your kind!

Anonalogue: It’s all sort of a reoccuring theme isn’t it? State that the president of the US is engaged in disinformation and you must be anti-American, state that the the pope is engaged in disinformation and you must be anti-catholic - it’s b/s Anonalogue, the tactic of choice for those who don’t have any real arguments. Millions of people have disagreed with statements from the pope and the Vatican down through the ages, so what?

stageleft aside: Ya know, I can see you out in the streets denouncing people like Galileo and Copernicus chanting “Burn them now!! Let the fires that burn them be started with their heritical writings, let them and their pope hating, anti-church, bible hating, ideas of a round earth that is not the centre of the universe burn in the city square - burn them now!!” (end stageleft aside)

I have absolutely posted about church abuses, discrimination, and doctrine - so what? That makes me anti-religion now? I have posted articles backing the catholic church stance on certain issues…. hell dude, I even got an “amen brother” out of Vinny on one of them. I have posted articles far less than complementary about the modern neopagan movement (not as often, but then again I don’t have quite as many issues with them) - does that make me anti-neopagan as well?

balbulican: You may be missing my point, no one has seriously call the pope on his involvement in the Hitler Youth movement, therefore I do not see his current little disinformation campaign as a move to distance himself from it. As I said, anyone who gave the matter even passing consideration came to the same conclusion you have, that it was akin to joining the Boy Scouts, and not a material matter.

Hey, I’m a Deist. May I join in?

My Church is my own mind :) My Deism is an unconventional sort of Deism that likely neopagans might even suggest is awfully close, if not technically the “same” as their beliefs. However, I am a “dead Deist.” I’ll explain more some time - but I do believe god will be resurrected.

As far as the latest popish pronouncements, I find them interesting in that he seems to be removing personal responsibility and instead is attempting to place responsibility on an ideology that he himself does not really seem to understand.

I don’t put much credence in anything the Roman Catholic pope says regarding historical events. So, I lend no credence to his statements.