A Jesuit. Chosen on the thirteenth day of the month, in the thirteenth year of the century. I can hardly wait to see what sort of strange creatures crawl out of the fundamentalist fever swamps.
People are calling him “Francis I”, but this is incorrect; he won’t be Francis I unless someone subsequently choose the name as well. It’s just “Francis”.
That he renounced the life of luxury that is normative for hierarchs is by now well known. He cooked for himself in a spare apartment instead of having servants in a palace. He rode the bus instead of being chauffeured. This is in itself remarkable enough to win me immediately over.
There are, though, allegations that when he was the Jesuit provincial of Argentina he was silent, if not complicit, in the evils of the dictatorship that ruled his country. Knowing of clerics unfairly criticized for their “silence” – think Pius XII – when speaking out would provoke more evils and silently working behind the scenes is in fact the only option, I will give him the benefit of the doubt.
Others are not so generous. Our pal Owen White, aka “Red Owen”, has denounced him as a right wing lackey. Owen only recently returned to being in communion with Rome, just in time to attack the new pope.
But Owen is a Marxist. No one short of Franciscan Fr Leonardo Boff, the father of liberation theology, would satisfy him as pope. But as Fr Leonardo has publicly welcomed the election of Francis, it is highly unlikely that the new pope is the oligarchic bogeyman of Owen’s imagination.
What’s more, there is plenty of evidence, in the man’s own words, that he is no friend to globalization and capitalism, that he is a man of the poor, one who rejects economic oppression.
I heard, by chance, driving home last night, Fr Sirico on Al Kresta’s talk show. Fr S was arguing that the new pope was not really interested in economics. He didn’t sound like he was convincing himself, as well he shouldn’t: there is a rumor, started by me, that the pope’s first encyclical is going to be entitled Anathema Sirico.
And then there is the name. At first there was some confusion: Xavier? Or Assisi? The Vatican was quick to clarify: he had taken the name of the poor man of Assisi. Coming on the heels of a Benedict, this is certainly telling.
When Joseph Ratzinger chose “Benedict” he was invoking the figure who is arguably at the root of Western Christendom. By choosing “Francis” the new pope is recalling the single figure who revived that entity, who brought, out of a moribund and decaying thing (sound familiar?), a new springtime of faith.
Both saints began as solitary, praying figures. It always begins in a cave.
It is sobering, of course, to reflect on Francis’ eventual fate, betrayed by his order, blind and lonely.
We can hope that his is a happier fate, this new pope, this man who first asked our blessing.
I really was not expecting to be much excited about the new pope; other than praying “Dear God, please, not an American” I didn’t have much of a stake in the matter, assumed it would be some typical bureaucrat or other.
I’m not sure why I thought that; surely the last two popes were not clerical drones. I guess I had heard about conflict within the college of cardinals, between the curia and what the media was calling “the party of reform”. And I thought the curia would prevail.
Oh, me of little faith.
But instead we got a man who lives in voluntary simplicity, who kisses the feet of AIDS patients, who walks the slums?
Thanks be to God.
And God bless Pope Francis.
Are we allowed to comment, or do we need to wait for Theodore to get the first word in? ;-)
That’s a bit sad. Especially given that I broke my Lenten promise (sort of) to comment at all. I justify it by blogging in joy rather than anger- which is an emotion I struggle with greatly.
I am not technically in communion with Rome at this time.
You’re a very romantic person Daniel, just the sort of person who gobbles up the humility spin. As I said on another forum, I am slightly disturbed by people who think that photos, some of them quite obviously posed, of a senior cleric riding a bus and washing the feet of AIDS patients are some sort of proof of humility and not, simply, instances of photo ops. Humility doesn’t parade itself, or sell itself as humble. The man clearly knows how to present an image of himself to the public. He has spent nearly his entire career as a church bureaucrat, he ought to know.
I think Boff would be a disaster as a Pope.
That Bergoglio was cozy with right wing elements in Argentina during Videla is beyond dispute, the questions just concern how cozy. In defending himself from accusations regarding his role with the two Jesuits who were kidnapped and tortured Bergoglio has argued that he used his connections with folks in the regime to secure their release. This only after having suggested to ordinaries that they not accept the two into their dioceses because of their radicalism, which contributed to their being captured. He was a middle class priest representing middle class Argentine interests in opposing those priests who rightly and courageously agitated against a brutal regime, a regime which used the name of Christ and Catholic integralist rubbish to promote its agenda (http://skepoet.wordpress.com/2013/03/14/the-theology-of-death/)
In any event, whatever his exact role in that affair and the naval use as a temporary prison of political prisoners on an island which the Jesuits owned, and other questions, we can say with certainty that during that time in Argentina priests had to take sides, and it is clear what side Bergoglio took. He was not a cheerleader of the junta (the man was too smart for that), but he was a comfortable middle class priest who was not going to rock the boat and who would align himself with the socio-cultural postures of the middle of the road right wing in Argentina. Since then, in keeping with the Communion and Liberation anti-Marxist ethos, when it comes to politics he likes to talk a lot about poverty and helping the poor, but he is deliberately vague about actual policies concerning economics, markets, poverty, and issues of land and the peasantry, etc. Yet when it comes to abortion and homosexuality, that policy vagueness is thrown out the window – he was very active in political efforts to derail the legalization of homosexual marriage in Argentina. He will no doubt make statements about free markets and poverty which make George Weigel a bit uncomfortable, but like the last two popes he will not say anything binding about the obligations of Catholics vis-a-vis clear economic policies, not with the clarity with which he has and will speak concerning clear policy positions Catholics must take concerning abortion and homosexuality. And this is ludicrous, and even more ludicrous is to consider the man an actual friend of the poor.
There were few more clear example of evil and antihuman political ordos in the 20th century than what Argentina experienced under Videla. Bergoglio was silent. He actively worked against priests who weren’t. The man’s actions were thus deplorable, and that he would now be celebrated by those who claim a solidarity with the poor is an absolute farce. May he rot in hell for cowardice and complicity.
Dear Mr. Owen: And may you be shown mercy with that same yardstick you wave so strenously and so self-righteously!
Owen, by any chance is your pseudonym John Cornwell? Most of your arguments seem to be just reworked propaganda that we’ve heard for years but has been debunked thoroughly. Don’t forget that Bergoglio’s accusers had their day in court, and he was found innocent.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=174220195
And thank God that Bergoglio was not like some of those Argentine priests of the day, like Mugica or Alberto Carbone, an upper class cleric who decided to demonstrate his solidarity with the poor by being involved in the successful plot to assassinate former (retired) President Aramburu. Now there’s a priest after Owen White’s heart!
What sort of clarity and what sort of binding policy proscriptions would you think are justifiable for a bishop, even the pope, to take? While I strongly believe in an extremely progressive, almost punitive tax rate for the US along with wide and generous provision of social good regardless of personal productivity, I can’t say that I think such policies are obviously demanded by Catholic doctrine or Christian ethics, much less that they are universals. I can easily say though that legal rejection of abortion and gay marriage are obvious universals of Catholic teaching. It may simply be that it is easier to say precisely what is prohibited than precisely what is proscribed. I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the clarity of the recent pope’s condemnations of wealth inequality which Daniel has cataloged here.
Have you seen today’s news on this topic from one of the two men in question?
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/publiccatholic/2013/03/priest-clears-pope-of-accusations/
Do you make much of his having been Ordinary for Eastern Catholics? I don’t know what that really entailed. I did read that Ukrainian Catholic Patriarch(?) said Pope Francis used to concelebrate the divine liturgy and “knows our Tradition very well.” Maybe his famous humility and affection for the Eastern Churches will lead some ways down the path of reconciliation.
I think virtually any pope not from the Anglosphere would hold social-economic views that would make Weigel and Sirico uncomfortable, and even occasionally articulate them. You can be quite far to the right in the real world and still be to the left of those guys on economics.
The accusations against Bergoglio remind me very much of Roberto Bolaño’s novel By Night in Chile. In it, an aspiring writer falls in with a literary circle, only to accidentally discover a man being tortured in the basement of the home where they meet. Bolaño’s metaphor for the Chilean middle class can easily be extended to the Church in Chile, Argentina, and Paraguay. It’s unsettling to think that, if the accusations are true, how closely reality mirrors allegory.
The only reason that there has been little said in the American press about Bergoglio and the junta— and that the picture of him communing Videla wasn’t on the front page of this morning’s papers– is American ignorance about just how wicked a regime our country was supporting there. A minimal amount of Spanish-language googling shows how evasive and unrepentant Bergoglio’s language has been regarding his and the Church’s relationship to the junta. I do not see how this is any less a scandal than if Cardinal Mahoney were elected pope.
I very much wish that every reader here with a desire to get sentimental about Bergoglio would read the works of Greg Gandin, and try to get some grasp on the horrors Catholic integralism and American sponsored right wing juntas bequeathed to Latin America.
Some of us don’t need to read an American academic like Grandin because some of us are Latin American and were in Latin America living this experience in the flesh before Greg ever began his graduate work in Guatemala. The arrogance of these folks is breathtaking, they know better than those who were there. Owen White and Grandin are much more “papista quel papa” (or more Argentine than the Argentines) on these things than the people of Latin America who are overwhelmingly rejoicing at the selection of Pope Francis (including the rejoicing of that well know right winger Maduro of Venezuela). I suggest you look at the front page of La Nacion, Argentina’s leading daily (like its NYT), on Wednesday and see the focus and read the voluminous and positive coverage. Or see the comments of Nobel Peace Prize winner Perez Esquivel of Argentina.
And Bergoglio was neither a Catholic integralist who supported the regime nor an American who sponsored right wing juntas.
Well of course Maduro is going to say that. He, as Chavez was, is always going to be gracious with these sorts of things. It would be political suicide for him not to at this particular point. Chavez congratulated Obama on both his election wins, and he even encouraged Americans to vote for Obama. That hardly means he liked the man.
As for the rest of your comments, typical right wing middle class Latin American dribble. If your experience of Latin America is a right wing middle class one, then your experience is worth shit. I suppose you support Capriles in the upcoming Ven elections. Please tell me you are also Opus Dei, that would make this perfect.
Sr. White: Verbitsky was a child when he was part of the Montoneros terrorist group? Are you crazy or just ignorant? He was in his thirties to forties! And as for the Montonero terrorists killing people “that deserved it,” there are plenty that didnt (the head of the country’s main – Peronist – trade union being one – but the Montoneros were left-wing Peronists).
Excusing such behavior and also attacking the Pope with such appalingly profound ignorance? And as for hysterically asking me of being Opus Dei “or middle class Latin American whose experience is worth shit”, I am neither but I now have come to the conclusion that you must be a 14 year old boy – the kind the beats up immigrants and flunks out of school after getting caught being naughty. Because that is the type of mindset and argument I am seeing here from you.
Here is some advice: stop sniffing glue and try to find steady work.
Manny,
Sure you’re neither – you embody the snobbish chauvinism so common to members of your class in Latin America.
Verbitsky was born in ’42. The Montoneros officially disbanded in ’75, and Verbitsky’s involvement in radical activities with members and former members of the group seems to have stopped by ’77. So he was involved in his twenties and early thirties. I may be a 14 year old junior high dropout, but I can do basic math.
The right-wing unionists are the worst.
I do not share your delusion that there is a moral equivalency between killing a member or supporter of that elitist class that is hell bent on forcing masses of people into submissive exploitation, and killing a person who is poor and or in solidarity with the poor and agitating on behalf of those exploited masses.
But it’s all typical chauvinistic integralist posturing. As Assata Shakur said, “nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who were oppressing them.” The intergralist christofascists had their elaborate religio-ideological justifications for why their tortures and kidnappings and killings were justified by the actions of their opponents were not. In a war, you have to fight in a manner that is commensurate to your enemy’s actions. For the leftists, the enemy was far more powerful, far more ruthless, and far more organized. Allende had been assassinated in ’73 and with him the hopes of democracy in Latin America died. It was reasonable at that time to consider that killing as many right wing filth as possible was the only way, and it was a far more just and humane thing to do than the horrors that the human excrement you seem to support wrought on the earth.
So, someone in his “twenties and early thirties” is a “kid”?
Your reasoning seems to be “he was a kid and not responsible but if he was responsible the filth needed to be killed”. Once again, the Religion of Owen: Christ-minus-love.
Daniel,
You’re desperate nitpicking contra any actual engagement is cute.
Yeah, in the same sense that only some right wing crazed teabagger is going to dismiss Bill Ayer’s decades long work on education because of Ayer’s former ties to the Weathermen, which he was in until his early thirties as well. Anyone who believes that Ayers is working via the same fundamental “vehicle” of radicalism now as he was then is deluded (and this is what the rhetoric of dismissal regularly implies – especially among those bent on tying Obama to the Weathermen via Ayers).
As a rule, anything you did 40 years ago can be said to be something one did in one’s youth. Even if you are 80. Verbitsky has said that he is glad that he didn’t actually kill anyone back then. My noting that Montoneros killings are not in the same moral category as junta killings is simply to convey my belief that while tactically Verbitsky’s choices may have been youthful indiscretions, his heart may have been in the right place. Wanting to kill right wing peronists and junta supporters and giving up on democracy post Allende is an understandable position in Latin America, especially post Allende, after the U.S. and the christofascists in Latin America made very clear that they would never allow a leftist democracy to succeed.
“As a rule, anything you did 40 years ago can be said to be something one did in one’s youth.” I assume this applies to the pope as well?
Yes, it does. We might note that one difference between the Pope and Verbitsky is that Verbitsky has publicly asserted his regret in being associated with Montoneros, and the Pope has never uttered a word of regret about his silence, or any other sins of omission or comission, relative to his time when he was regularly meeting with and at times communing junta members, and going after liberation theologians while giving a pass to Catholic leaders in Argentina who espoused Catholic defenses of junta torture and killings.
I am a native Spanish speaker, have read the reporting and you must be reading some strange far left-field sources because the coverage in Spanish media (especially in Argentina) has been overwhelmingly positive.
I was more talking about coverage of him from the mid-2000′s, when he started having to talk to the press about these issues. It’s natural that coverage at the moment would focus on the positive, as it’s a huge point of national pride (I’ve yet to talk to a South American about this who didn’t make a World Cup analogy).
Even in the period you refer to a lot of it was colored by partisan politics relating to the ongoing struggles in Argentine politics. Bergoglio was more a tool to be used or abused rather than a main focus. Much was a springboard to criticize him for having the temerity to say anything. He crossed the Justicialist Party (AKA the Peronistas, founded by that great humanitarian General Peron) and their allies in the press and in the advocacy community.
“Bergoglio was more a tool to be used or abused rather than a main focus.” This is a trope that’s has started to come up about him in ecclesial politics as well… In any case, he’s done an excellent job of being ambiguous in both his church-politics and real politics.
And by the way, his main critic in Argentina to this day, the “journalist” Horacio Verbitsky, was actual an avowed MEMBER of a terrorist group (the Montoneros) during those years that assassinated civilians and blew up bunches of people with bombs and is now an acolyte of the ruling party in Argentina (which like the Montoneros has Peronist roots). Some say he was even the head of the Montoneros’ intelligence secton. But it is Bergoglio who has the dubious past!
Verbitsky was a kid at the time, and most of the folks the Montoneros killed during that time more than deserved it.
I mean during the time Verbitsky was a member.
The bishops of Argentina issued an apology for their failures in 2012.
Evidently the pope’s first canonization is to be a victim of the junta.
And while Francis may have been quiet, behind the scenes he helped: ‘Bergoglio’s involvement was the bit about which the least was known. But his role has finally come to light thanks to a statement issued by Fr. Miguel La Civita, a close collaborator of Angelelli’s: “I met him when we were students. A few days after the assassinations took place, he took our Seminarists and hid them in the Jesuit Collegium Maximum he headed. These are not just stories I heard somewhere: I actually experienced these events in person. And let me make one thing clear: I was the archetypal third world priest, as they were called back then: liberation theology. The College used spiritual retreats to help the persecuted: it gave them a place to hide, had false documents made and helped them flee abroad. Bergoglio was adamant the military would never muster up the courage to invade the College.”
Alicia Oliveira, the famous magistrate who was persecuted by the military and went on to become a human rights activist also confirmed this: “Bergoglio also offered to hide me in the Seminary: I told him I’d rather be arrested by the military than live with priests. He laughed and said I was silly: in hindsight I can see he was right.” ‘
(From Vatican Insider)
Have you read that apology Daniel? It is completely half assed in light of the role the Church played in support of the junta.
I am very familiar now with the counternarrative the media is furiously getting out at the moment.
Are you aware that Verbitsky’s accusations don’t just come from Verbitsky? So far as I can tell he quotes at least 8 people in addition to the 2 Jesuits, and so far as I can tell none of them have denounced Verbitsky’s interpretation of Franny’s role in the various situations vis-a-vis the junta that Verbitsky describes. Further, at least two committees of investigators have said some very critical things about the man when attempting to discern his role during that time. The reactionary response to all this is to dismiss this as a leftist agenda against the man.
I will not say that all or any of Verbitsky’s accusations are true, or that those others who have investigated the man have been justified in being critical. I will say that the matter is quite complicated regarding his positive involvement (if any with the junta). The Cardinals certainly did not flee from even the appearance of evil when choosing such a man. I will also say that the matter is very uncomplicated in terms of simply asserting that in the midst of a regime which was very fervently supported by senior hierarchs and many clergy who defended the use of torture and killing in the name of Christ the man said nothing, and ever since has never specifically denounced those theological defenses of the junta, or the christofacism within the junta.
It is also quite clear that he is something of a nationalist who ties his nationalism with his religion. The language he uses here to describe Argentine’s who died fighting for the Falklands is very similar to language used by christofacists back during the junta, though not necessarily coming from the same ideology:
“There are angels who will accompany you, who are sons, husbands and fathers of yours, who fell there, in an almost religious movement, of kissing with their blood the native soil”
- from http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/03/18/pope-francis-intervene-on-falklands-argentina-kirchner_n_2901170.html?utm_hp_ref=uk
Interesting, to say the least. And for the record, yes, I support the UK being forced out of the Falklands, though not if it involves a resurgence in right wing Argentine nationalism.
Whatever one thinks of this writer’s views on homosex, he makes some other points which are pertinent to this discussion:
http://iglesiadescalza.blogspot.it/2013/03/different-image-same-structure-fr.html
“Primatesta wore a dilapidated cassock, had no car or property, was also sober and frugal.” Exactly.
This just in:
‘Accusations that Pope Francis denounced two priests to Argentina’s military junta during the 1970s have been denied by one of the survivors in a boost to the reputation of the new pontiff.
Francisco Jalics, who now lives in a German monastery, issued an online statement on Wednesday to clear up what he said were misinterpretations of
his earlier comments about the role played by the pope in his five-month incarceration by the navy.
He said he was addressing reports that he and another Jesuit priest, Orlando Yorio, were imprisoned because the leader of their order, Jorge Bergoglio – as the pope was known until last week – passed on information about them to the authorities.
“I myself was once inclined to believe that we were the victims of a denunciation,” Jalics said. “[But] at the end of the 90s, after numerous conversations, it became clear to me that this suspicion was unfounded. It is therefore wrong to assert that our capture took place at the initiative of Father Bergoglio.”
The latest comments follow a less categorical statement that he made last week soon after the pope was chosen. In that earlier comment, he said he and Bergoglio had reconciled and “hugged solemnly” in 2000. But he also noted that he “could not comment on the role played by Father Bergoglio in these events”.
Argentinian critics of the pope have continued to accuse him of wrongdoing, based on documents and old testimonies of Yorio, who died several years ago. Jalics’ failure to deny this added to their suspicions.
But in the latest statement, Jalics said “Some commentaries imply the opposite of what I meant.”
By contrast, his words on Wednesday were unequivocal: “The fact is: Orlando Yorio and I were not denounced by Father Bergoglio.” ‘
Of course this latest in a series of first-hand accounts will not deter your animus toward tne new pope. A priest who was an adherent of liberation theology says that Francis hid him, Amnesty International’s office in Argentina says the charges are baseless, and the president of the Supreme Court agrees. To me the evidence is overwhelming that not only was he not complicit, he was actively working to protect the victims of the dictatorship.
As for your contention that he never denounced the christo-fascist ideology, are you sure? Have you read all of his written works?
And now this:
‘Horacio Verbitsky, the Argentinean journalist who criticised Bergoglio for his behaviour during Argentina’s military dictatorship (1976-1983) admitted today, that some fresh statements issued by the Jesuit priest, Francisco Jalics exempt Jorge Bergoglio from all responsibility in the arrest and torture of Jalics by the military.
In an article on page 12 of the daily which published his accusations against the Pope, Verbitsky recalled that Jalics had declared his reconciliation with Bergoglio and “reconciliation is a Catholic sacrament which involves forgiveness for offences committed.” But he also admits that the “new statement goes far beyond that, exempting Bergoglio from all responsibility.” Nevertheless, the journalist added that the priest himself admitted he had thought “the accusations had been made against himself and Orlando Yorio and that it took him a quarter of a century before he arrived at a different conclusion” and before he could say that “it is a mistake to say Bergoglio was responsible for their arrests.” ‘
And this:
‘Today, the Argentinean intellectual and 1980 Nobel Peace Prize winner, Adolfo Perez Esquivel, met Pope Francis in the Vatican. “Being an accomplice means collaborating with the dictatorship; some bishops, like Mgr. Adolfo Servando Tortolo (castrensian vicar, Archbishop of Parana and President of the Argentinean Bishops’ Conference between 1976 and 1978) were accomplices; I would also like to note that at the time, Bergoglio was not a bishop but a provincial superior of the Argentinean Jesuits,” Perez Esquivel said.
“If it’s true that he didn’t have the courage, as other priests, monks, nuns and bishops did, to lead those who were fighting for human rights, it seems to me he did try to protest against the violation of these rights. We need to se these facts in the context of that terrible period of military dictatorship,” Perez Esquivel said in an interview with Luigi Sandri and Gianni Novelli for the April issue of religious monthly Confronti.
Perez Esquivel, a defender of human rights in Argentina, was imprisoned and tortured during the country’s military dictatorship. Bergoglio’s election to the papal throne is a “huge” historical event, Esquivel said. “I remember speaking to the Holy See’s “ambassador” in Argentina, Mgr. Pio Laghi, about the problem of the defence of human rights in Argentina and of nuns and monks who were being put behind bars and tortured. His reply was: “What do you want me to do about it? I am the apostolic nuncio; we protest, we protest to the military, but although they seem as though they are listening, they don’t do what we ask them to do.” Bergoglio and many others were the same; he limited himself to protesting.
“I don’t think it’s fair to accuse him of complicity with the dictatorship. Naturally, I understand the resentment felt by the families of the religious that were affected and some say: “Bergoglio didn’t do enough;” they don’t say he “didn’t do,” just that he “didn’t do enough.” This is true if his work is compared to that of certain courageous bishops such as the Bishop of La Rioja, Enrique Angelelli, who was killed on 4 August 1976; Paranaguá’s Novak Alfredo Ernest; the Bishop of Neuquén ,Jaime Nevares and the Bishop of Viedma, Miguel Hesayne, all of whom publicly defended life and human rights on a daily basis.” ‘
Daniel,
Esquivel has not been uncritical of Franny. He has also stated that “he had lacked the sufficient courage shown by other bishops to support our cause for human rights during the dictatorship.”
Verbitsky has no choice but to make the statement he did, if he wants a public hearing for the rest of his accusations against Franny, which go well beyond the two Jesuits. Verbitsky has repeatedly based his accusations on the testimony of more than a few persons. But Jalics and Yorio were the two main protagonists in the narrative, and with Yorio dead a statement, finally, by Jalics shuts the case down, for now.
Isn’t it quite noteworthy that Jalics, who has refused to testify in multiple investigations into Franny in the past, and refused to give account to various reporters and researches who sought statements from him, only now comes out with this statement. The man is a victim of torture, has been said to have been in a fragile state since the time of his torture, and his bread and butter and the roof over his head comes not from some remote podunk monastery in Latin America, but a religious house in Germany, not all that far from where his old superior in now in command of the entire Church. No pressure there at all, and God only knows what the Jesuits told him he had to do behind closed doors. But sure, that accusation is now tabled, until further information becomes available (and there will be a lot more scrutiny now, and investigative efforts). As I have said, my condemnation of the man does not rest on the veracity of that accusation.
I have read at least a dozen Argentine writers who have testified that Franny has never uttered a clear condemnation of the christofacism of the Argentine hierarchy or the junta. Had such a condemnation ever occurred, you had better believe it would have been pointed out repeatedly by now by the spin doctors.
I could have predicted your response.
And what of Amnesty International’s dismissal of the charge of complicity? And the president of the Argentinian Supreme Court? And Fr La Civita’s statement that Francis hid seminarians?
Your case is being reduced to “he didn’t speak loudly enough, when it may have been prudent to remain silent; open opposition may have endangered those he wanted to protect.
“I could have predicted your response.”
Yes, Daniel, and your responses have been so charismatic and unaligned with any ideology.
What about the reports of two commissions which found Franny “evasive” and reported a conviction that he was not reporting the whole stories, and that there were inconsistencies with what he was reporting? What about the numerous actors from the junta era who contest his narrative? What about the fact that there is no evidence that he helped more than a few people during the junta, and prior to his becoming pope the only person who stated that he did was him, while refusing to provide details and names of those additional persons he supposedly helped? The man was no Oskar Schindler, please, there is no evidence whatsoever that throughout the junta era he was running secret campaigns to help the targeted. That he helped a few (and the amount of help given may have been quite nominal) says nothing about his role vis-a-vis the junta. Plenty of collaborators with the nazis or with the Bolsheviks also helped a few people out now and again – that happens all the time when crazy totalitarian regimes are at play – even active sympathizers will help people get out of harm’s way at times. And the man was in a leadership position people looked to to state the truth concerning a Christian view of the junta. He didn’t.
You have a relatively short list of prominent persons who now are making public statements in support of the man. Remember that the election of a Pope is not just a spiritual event, but a political one, and that these persons all have political agendas. It is obviously of political advantage for many persons of variant political stripes to seek to use the elevation of an Argentine pope to their advantage. A classic case is a link I provide elsewhere on this thread, showing Cristina Kirchner in Rome kissing the pope’s ass. She can’t stand him, they have been political enemies for years, but she is going to use him to seek political advantage on an area they agree upon – the Falklands. If asked, she would never suggest that the man collaborated with the junta or was too cozy with them, because that would kill her opportunity to use the pope to her political advantage. But that doesn’t mean she doesn’t hold those views in private. The same logic applies to Esquivel. The head of the Argentine Supreme Court, Ricardo Lorenzetti, is also an Italian-Argentine, who has family connections to Franny.
From The Irish Catholic:
“Francis was certainly not the “junta’s Pope,” but he was not an active, public opponent either.
What are we to make of this? It is in fact very difficult to say at this remove both in space and time from the events in question.
Perhaps a quick look at what Church leaders did during the communist era in Eastern Europe will be instructive.
Take, for example, the very different stances adopted by Hungary’s Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty and Poland’s Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski toward the communist governments of their respective countries.
Mindszenty chose outright and open confrontation (although never encouraged violence) and was tortured and imprisoned for his pains.
Wyszynski chose the path of compromise and negotiated an ‘agreement of mutual understanding’ between the Government and the Church. He signed the document in 1950 even as other priests, who choose a more hard-line path, were still in prison and therefore felt betrayed by what they saw as collaboration.
In her book “Iron Curtain,” Anna Applebaum finds it hard to decide whether Mindszenty’s tactics or Wyszynski’s were better in the end.
We can only guess at the motivation of Pope Francis while he was Jesuit provincial during the years of the junta. Maybe be believed open confrontation would make things worse.
Maybe the support of some priests for armed rebellion made him feel very uneasy. As mentioned, not even Mindszenty advocated that approach.
He was also having to deal with liberation theology in that period, when some of his own confreres were confusing the preferential option for the poor with the Marxist option for the poor, and indeed were trying to make the Gospel itself a quasi-Marxist Gospel.
We must also consider the stance Jesus adopted toward the Roman dictatorship of his day. He never openly opposed it although his message was obviously deeply subversive of Roman ways over the long-term. Indeed, Jesus was criticised by the Zealots for not openly opposing the Romans. They were hoping for a political Messiah who would lead the Jews in rebellion against the Romans.
Does this mean that if Jesus was alive on Earth today and lived under a very unjust regime (there are still many to choose from) he would be attacked for not openly opposing that regime? It’s an interesting question.
From a Christian point of view, however, it certainly seems to mean that open confrontation, much less violent opposition, against an unjust regime is not an absolute duty. If it was, then Jesus would have been obliged to follow this path.
On the other hand, confrontation — and under certain circumstance, armed resistance — is not forbidden either.
It appears to come down to a prudential judgement. What is the best thing to do under a particular, concrete set of circumstances? There will always be disagreement about this, sometimes very angry and bitter disagreement.
Our new pope did not choose the path of open confrontation. That may or may not have been the right path, but it was certainly not an immoral path. If it was, then so was the path Jesus chose.”
Argentine peasant women, displaced from their small landholdings by the junta when it sold property rights to large multinational corporations as part of its overall privatization of land and industry scheme, used to regularly give coca leaves to their hungry children to ease the pain of their stomachs. The junta didn’t give a shit about them. The Church (at least the hierarchy) did virtually nothing for them. The base communities influenced by liberation theology were their only allies and means of organized support, providing food, shelter, access to basic medical attention, education, communication, and fraternity, and they used the only methods they had available to them to pressure govt and society to alter the situation – singing songs and praying and holding hands in public plazas in Argentine cities wasn’t working. That some middle class Irish reactionary thinks he can trump this with simplistic “what would Jesus do” nonsense is neither here nor there when seriously assessing that situation from either a religious or political perspective.
In all your justifications Daniel, you seem to be oblivious to the irony that you are heralding this man, who didn’t speak truth to power (and still refuses with regard to the junta and the christofacism that accompanied it), for now speaking truth to power when it is comfortable, even fashionable, for him to do so, and to do so in such an obviously posed manner.
“It appears to come down to a prudential judgement. What is the best thing to do under a particular, concrete set of circumstances? There will always be disagreement about this, sometimes very angry and bitter disagreement.”
This is a fundamental axiom of social action that fundamentalists cannot see. At this point, I myself do not have enough information to judge whether Bergoglio’s response as Jesuit provincial was the right one or not. Neither, I think, does anyone else on this thread. As far as we Catholics are concerned, we are not bound to assert one side or the other. The papacy is not dependent on the personal character of the man who is pope.
It’s funny, and ironic, when aristotelianly inclined moral postures are used to defend mediocrity instead of excellence. Because let’s face it, virtually nobody in the know looks at the man’s record during the junta and straight facedly praises him for his courage and powerful Christian witness. Not even those defending him from gross wrongdoing.
“At this point, I myself do not have enough information to judge whether Bergoglio’s response as Jesuit provincial was the right one or not. ”
It should be noted, again, that we aren’t just talking about the time he was Jesuit provincial. He has never made an outright condemnation of the theological justifications used to defend the junta’s kidnappings, tortures, and murders – even after being asked to do so, even after becoming the senior bishop of Argentina, even after his lack of doing so created controversy. He has, on the other hand, pointedly and deliberately gone after the theological “error” of liberation theology. Any casuistry which seeks to justify this one sided history of the man’s polemical reaction to the period in which the junta ruled is deplorable. He is certainly not protecting people from the junta now.
The “prudential judgment” trump card has also been used in discussions among bishops regarding those bishops who moved known sex abuser priests around, keeping them in ministry, even ministry which kept them in proximity to children. And I agree that this is the posture the Church in Argentina took toward Bergoglio – he did what he thought best under difficult circumstances, etc., etc., yada, yada. Of course in any given instance such a prudential judgment may have been just incompetence and not grave moral error, but one big problem with using that trump card, socially at least – the more you use it, as opposed to repenting, taking punitive actions against leaders within the Church (even if just to set an example), and begging the people for their forgiveness in real and not token terms (like the cringeworthy ones the Argentine bishops used in 2010), the more you insulate the culture at large viewing the Church as morally bankrupt. The RCC in Argentina has far less socio-political influence than it does in some other Latin American countries (hence losing the recent battle over same sex marriages, an amazing feat in a Latin American culture not particularly noted for a broad enthusiasm towards homosex), and this is in large part because of the role of the Church during the junta, and not just the active support, but also the passive, a more common occurrence. Argentinians may be thrilled that one of theirs got into the papacy, national bravado and all that, but the average Catholic there is not inclined to trust the Church to inform them with regard to how the state should operate, or civil society for that matter, or how they should live their lives. Having had a man as the senior primate in the nation who was known to have shrugged along with things, and whose more recent fervently apolitical admonishments regarding the poor are seen in the context of the country’s political history and his actions and inactions therein, only encouraged this nominalism (among other encouragements, obviously). Bergoglio had to carefully construct his image as a poor loving AIDS feet washing bus rider because of the political demands pressed upon him in a country where a lot of people remember what he didn’t do during the junta, and after. So such prudential judgments made by leaders in times of crises can and often do end up with significant collateral damage in the long term.
But I believe it implausible that we are really dealing with prudential judgement here. The man has made too many statements over the years which suggest that his political ideology is just a “kinder, gentler” version of the junta’s.
“The papacy is not dependent on the personal character of the man who is pope.”
Well, sure, if the man had personally killed thousands of Argentine radicals and personally cut the late third trimester babies out of the wombs of their leftist mothers before giving them over to good Catholic junta supporting homes, this would have no bearing on whether or not the Catholic dogma of the papacy is true. No one here is disputing that.
It’s just too bad that the Cardinals could not select a man who had managed to escape even the appearance of evil.
Oh well. He’ll still probably be better than that godawful JPII was.
You will note I make no assertion as to the character or performance of Bergoglio when he was in Argentina. It could be that what you say is largely correct. I haven’t studied the matter. I don’t know — though what I have seen does not incline me toward your opinion.
An appeal to prudence is very often a thin justification for cowardice, or worse. But that does not justify a refusal to consider what a man’s prudential motives might be when he acts in way that does not accord with one’s predilections. I have read some articles where authors are quick to condemn Bergoglio without a consideration of the circumstances under which he worked, or because he did not follow the approved radical script. I have read things by Catholics who naively assume that, because he is now pope, he must always have been a sterling character — prudent, brave, all-wise, and a paragon of virtue. Both approaches I think preclude any just appraisal. They also reduce every historical character down to a black hat or a white hat — which is, among others things, very boring.
All I know right now is that Bergoglio is now pope. Of what he was I have only an inkling. Of what he will be, I have no idea — though I have found indications of hope. I, and, indeed, the rest of us, will just have to wait and see. I will only add this: Oscar Romero did not condemn the oppression of the rulers of El Salvador when he was bishop Santiago de Maria. But he did rise to the occasion when be became archbishop of San Salvador. We’ll see what happens with Pope Francis.
Just curious, Owen; what do you make of Leonardo Boff’s enthusiasm for the new pope?
Christopher,
Fair enough.
Daniel,
Have you read any of the other things Boff has been publishing lately? The man insists on a Church with women priests, gay marriage, etc. His more recently found “environmentalism” is of the rich European jet set sort (Whole Foodism for European millionaires – the sort who bankroll environmentalist NGOs), and he is infamously known for picking up rich eurotrash at elite environmentalist gatherings. He has become a big proponent of population control, especially among the poor – not just access to contraception mind you, but more nefarious “control.” He now is writing about how Francis will usher in a return of the Church of Vat II, and this glorious anti-hierarchicalism that is coming. Boff is a joke. If Gustavo Gutiérrez were to make a strong statement in support of Francis (the man, not just some of his criticism of neoliberalism), I would take pause.
But Boff, well, that dude is crazy.
I would hope that the one of the first encyclicals written by Pope Francis I (he is the first, so we might as well get used to it) will take up the opportunity given this year to mark the 120th anniversary of the foundational Rerum Novarum, and write an economic encyclical.
I, for one, would be the first to read and study it.
Owen: The case against Francis is hearsay. He and his defenders say that he was working quietly behind the scenes. Speaking out may have been good PR but undoubtedly would not have made things better. I choose to believe him, not least because of the witness of his life. Oh, that’s right, that was just photo ops. And that Mother Teresa, posing with all those sick people. If I thought for a moment that the only time he rode the bus, washed an AIDS patient’s feet, or prayed was when a photographer was present I’d agree with you. But I don’t.
I could say “Owen White is an undercover FBI agent” and you’d be hard pressed to disprove it. And I couldn’t prove it. People would tend to believe it if they didn’t like you, or not if they did.
However, if I said “Owen White is a bloodthirsty and vengeful person, a real hater” there is plenty of evidence. I really don’t get your Christ-minus-love religion, and the same One whose command to love our enemies you reject said that if you are unmerciful you cannot expect mercy. I worry for you.
Oh please Daniel. You were fishing and I gave you the fish you knew would come. You like moralistic posturing and being indignant, and hey, so do I, so work it all you want. You “critique” a broad brush of comments I made on facebook, which cannot be linked to here, thus not enabling folks here access to the links I provided and the links others provided in my threads, nor to the actual conversation there which you generalize about with nonsense about Boff, etc., whatever.
And here again the same. Instead of responding to what I actually wrote you emote and make assertions that I have nothing to do with what I have written. As I make more than sufficiently clear above, Franny1 is worthy of condemnation regardless of the veracity of the accusations about the two Jesuits or the Naval use of an island the Jesuits used. Nothing that I condemn the man for is based on hearsay. Nothing.
You are on a spiritual masturabotory kick right now, eyeing up all that mass mediafied ostentatious “humility” of the man, like those suckers who get weepy with the background stories given about athletes during the olympics. He is a career ecclesial bureaucrat; he knows how to sell himself as broadly as his conservative theology will allow in a Latin American context. But if it gets you all excited, go for it.
What is inexcusable is your giving him a pass on things you would never give others a pass on. You are a tireless critic of those who compromise with Empire and warmongering and the treating of persons as chattel. Did Bergoglio actively give material support to the regime? Who knows? But the fact remains that he has been diligent in acting against the priests and movements who were agitating against the regime, and he has never publicly condemned the extraordinarily disgusting and blasphemous theology and ideology of the Catholic fascists involved in the work of the junta. That is despicable and he needs to be called on it. There is no conceivable way to rationally look at the situation and explain his silence in that regard. With respect to what we ought to demand of a cleric, Franny’s silence is far worse than that of American clerics who don’t speak against Empire, because what was going on in the junta (mass tortures and murders – torturing with the blessing of clerics) was done in the name of Christ, and defended, publicly, by Catholic hierarchs and priests. Not once has Bergoglio publicly condemned that ideology in any specific naming it sort of manner, but not for lack of specifically condemning ideologies, as he has repeatedly gone after liberation theology. Shame on him, and those who defend him.
Apparently Leonardo Boff does not think the pope is complicit in the evils of the junta:
“Why did Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio choose the name Francis? I think it’s because he realized the Church is in ruins because of demoralization due to the various scandals that have affected the most precious thing it had: morality and credibility.
Francis isn’t a name; it’s a plan for a Church that is poor, simple, gospel-centered, and devoid of all power. It’s a Church that walks the way together with the least and last, that creates the first communities of brothers and sisters who recite the breviary under the trees with the birds. It’s an ecological Church that calls all beings those sweet words “brothers and sisters”. Francis was obedient to the Church and the popes and at the same time he followed his own path with the gospel of poverty in hand. So theologian Joseph Ratzinger wrote: “Francis’ ‘no’ to this imperial type of Church couldn’t be more radical; it’s what we could call a prophetic protest.”(in Zeit Jesu, Herder 1970, 269). Francis doesn’t talk; he simply inaugurates something new.”
I will post his complete commentary on Monday…
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/priest-kidnapped-in-argentina-clears-pope-of-accusations/
I believe that clears it up once and for all.
Famous words a 12th Century young man from Assisi heard in his heart, “Francis, Rebuild my Church”
Owen, I won’t discuss your theories, but your facts about Montoneros are wrong.
They were not poor and agitating on behalf of their own class. Most of them were higher middle class (or even high class), they were initially catholic-peronist rightists (read their comunicado after the Aramburu killing, you won’t find any marxism there) and then, when their bosses decided they were going to be more funcional to their interests if they looked as marxists, they turned marxists.
Montoneros were created by Cnel. Guevara, to take revenge from Aramburu that had turned the Revolucion Libertadora from nationalist-catholic to liberal. And on their last years they were handled by Admiral Massera. Of course, not every montonero knew that, most were just useful idiots. But, in particular, Verbitsky was on payroll of Air Force.
I said above”or in solidarity with the poor and agitating on behalf of those exploited masses” – do any of you people read?
It doesn’t really matter what grudges were behind Montoneros. What is pertinent to this discussion is the motivation of people like Verbitsky, and those who were active in that period (early and mid 70s). By the time of Verbitsky’s involvement, Montoneros was engaged in leftist rhetoric typical of groups of that sort (the given up on democracy embrace violence sort), and it attracted leftists who believed themselves to be “in solidarity with the poor and agitating on behalf of those exploited masses”. We’re these middle class kids “useful idiots?” Of course. Montoneros’ strategy was dismal (in terms of accomplishing anything concrete), though they and other groups like them at least added fuel to the fire of ideological tension and put fear into the hearts of evil men. And far better that sort of useful idiocy than that of those scum who embraced christofascist nonsense or some other variant on right wing antihumanity.