Pope Benedict: Hamba kahle, or good riddance?

[rpannier]

snip
Few departure notes in the annals of history can compare to that of Cardinal Ratzinger’s – better known as Pope Benedict XVI – for its grace, humility and elegance.

It was a reminder to all of us of our vulnerability – that regardless of the power we wield, every moment of life is stalked by death and the journey towards it.

snip

A dignified exit though, does not equate to a dignified existence and a dignified existence does not necessarily imply contributing to a dignified life for all.

snip

Vatican Council II, in a simple yet profound – even revolutionary – statement, affirmed that the “church is the community of the people of God”.

snip

Benedict XVI used all the power at his disposal as pope to counter this and to ensure that the people, especially the most marginalised – women, single mothers, those living with HIV, those sexually “different” and those who were desperate to look at scripture through the eyes of poor – remained where an all-male hierarchy wanted them: contained on the margins.

snip

“He denounced, fired and hounded at least 105 theologians”, not only as head of the Inquisition, when he was known as “God’s Rottweiler”, but also as pope.

While it was his predecessors who brought back the Inquisition, it was under his watch as Cardinal Ratzinger that it was re-energised and extended, in a move desperate to quash theology by reducing it to a catechism and to affirming whatever the pope (or his curia) decreed.

Benedict XVI waged unrelenting attacks on base communities and Liberation Theology, even though this movement was the most Christ-like one for democracy, justice and freedom in centuries.

In South Africa, more than in many other countries, we experienced the value that this theology played in our country’s liberation struggle.

Benedict XVI was fierce in his affirmation of a moralism – not morality – of sexism (“no women priests ever”) and of homophobia.

snip

So what do I say? Hamba kahle, or good riddance?

link:
http://www.citypress.co.za/columnists/hamba-kahle-or-good-riddance/

[Enthusiast]

1. Thank you, No Elephants.....nt

[No Elephants]

3. You're welcome, but this is rpannier's thread.

Here. Take this intravenously, STAT.

:donut:

[Enthusiast]

12. You know what?

I noticed that and was surprised to see rpannier wrote the OP. Then, out of habit, I guess, I thanked you anyway. Duh.

[formercia]

2. Good Riddance

Without him, the War in Central America might not have happened. I hope he is held to account for all of the martyrs for Liberation Theology that were murdered in Latin America and elsewhere.

[No Elephants]

4. Can you say a little more about the Pope's role in the war in Central America?

Anyone who takes a vow of poverty, but wears custom made Prada shoes is not on the level.


The shoes of the Ratzinger fisherman (one of the many pair)






The shoes of the Wojtyla fisherman (also one of many pair)

[formercia]

6. Start here:

On 25 November 1981, Pope John Paul II named Ratzinger as the Prefect of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, formerly known as the "Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office", the historical Roman Inquisition.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Benedict_XVI#Prefect_of_the_Sacred_Congregation_for_the_Doctrine_of_the_Faith:_1981.E2.80.932005



Ratzinger’s letter on Liberation Theology

http://www.christendom-awake.org/pages/ratzinger/liberationtheol.htm



Warring against secularism

The pontificate of John Paul II has been marked by a determination to reinsert the Church and its beliefs into elements of human life from which secularism sought to expel them. (John Paul is ably assisted in this endeavor by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, whom the Pope appointed head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Ratzinger authored a two-part refutation of liberation theology in the 1984 Instruction on Certain Aspects of the "Theology of Liberation" and the Instruction on Christian Freedom and Liberation that came out two years later.) John Paul's main enemy, since his election in 1978, has been modern secularism. For the Pope, liberation theology is part of this secularism.

All human activity, John Paul has said, must have reference to the ultimate meaning of life, which is eternal salvation. While seeking to concentrate their efforts on life here and now, modern people have forgotten this essential truth.

In his first encyclical, John Paul II insisted that all authentic humanism must refer to Christ. All else is folly (1979: para. 10). Soon afterwards, he added that: "awareness that man's work is a participation in God's activity ought to permeate, as the Council teaches, even the most ordinary everyday activities. . . . Even by their secular activity must assist one another to live holier lives" (1981: para. 25, italics in original).

http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=643



The Pope's Holy War Against Liberation Theology

Apr 30 2008
Nikolas Kozloff
The recent election of former Bishop Fernando Lugo as President of Paraguay poses a sticky dilemma for the Vatican and underscores the hostile political environment facing incoming Pope Benedict XVI in South America. Lugo, who was known to his constituents as the “Bishop of the Poor” for his support of landless peasants, advocates so-called Liberation Theology, a school of thought which took shape in Latin America in the 1960s.

Lugo's oratory skills, learned at the pulpit, come wrapped in the Paraguayan flag. (Photo: Agência Brasil)
Recognizing the pressing need for social justice, Liberation Theology was minted by Pope John XXIII to challenge the Church to defend the oppressed and the poor. Since its emergence, Liberation Theology has consistently mixed politics and religion. Its adherents have often been active in labor unions and left-wing political parties. Followers of Liberation Theology take inspiration from fallen martyrs like Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador and Dorothy Mae Stang, an American-born nun who was murdered by ranching interests in Brazil.
Romero, an outspoken voice for social change, was gunned down in 1980 by a right wing death squad during a Mass in the chapel of San Salvador’s Divine Providence hospital. Stang, an advocate of the poor and the environment, was shot to death in the Brazilian Amazon in February 2005; her assailants were later linked to a powerful local landlord.
Joseph Ratzinger: Doctrinal Czar
During the 1980s and 1990s Benedict, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, acted as John Paul II’s doctrinal czar. At the time, John Paul was in the midst of a fierce battle to silence prominent Church liberals. “This conception of Christ as a political figure, a revolutionary, as the subversive of Nazareth,” the Pontiff once said, “does not tally with the church’s catechism.”
In 1983 the Pope wagged his finger at Sandinista government minister and Nicaraguan priest, Ernesto Cardenal on a trip to Managua, warning the latter to “straighten out the situation in your church.” Cardenal was one of the most prominent Liberation Theologians of the Sandinista era.
Originally a liberal reformer, Ratzinger changed his tune once he became an integrant in the Vatican hierarchy. As prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican’s doctrinal watchdog agency, Cardinal Ratzinger warned against the temptation to view Christianity in an exclusively political light. Liberation Theology, he once said, was dangerous as it fused “the Bible’s view of history with Marxist dialectics.”
http://nacla.org/node/4619
plenty more can be found....

[No Elephants]

8. Thanks, formercia. Can't make my way through all that today, but I will by the end of the week.

[Enthusiast]

13. Thanks for all that, formercia.

The church’s catechism doesn't tally with reality.

[No Elephants]

5. Nobody expects revival of the Spanish Inquisition.

[Contrary1]

7. Well, here's the way I look at it. (As a raised Catholic) Short and sweet...

The Pope is infallible. Therefore; maybe God is saying "Good riddance" ???

[No Elephants]

9. Hi How goes it? Are you settled in your new digs?

Happy Housewarming, btw.

[Contrary1]

10. Thanks for the good thoughts, NE...

Settled? Not even close. Can't remember a time when I was. And it doesn't bother me at all. I figure once I get everything done, I will be too. Not ready for that.
I continue through life, as I've always been...happily undone. :pals:

[No Elephants]

11. You always have my good thoughts, So does everyone in our little DU2 family.

I figure once I get everything done, I will be too

I'm with you. As a kid, I was extremely impressed that impoverished, sick former President Grant somehow managed to struggle through writing his autobiography, his only way to provide for his family after his death, but died the very day that he finished it.


I got so much from that. Among other things, whenever someone mentions crossing something off a bucket list, I always say make sure you never get to the end of that list. If you get close, add some additional things.

Well, it doesn't really matter if you are settled. It matters if you can find the really important stuff when you really need it. After you've gotten that far, the rest is all gravy. So, again, happy housewarming.

[Enthusiast]

14. Everything is in boxes?

But you don't know which box contains what?