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RSSThe Pope and totalitarian regimes
Pope Benedict XVI ignores the role of religion in the rise of the 20th century’s totalitarian regime
By Ed Kessler Published 20 September 2010 16:46
On the final day of his visit, which was also the anniversary of the Battle of Britain, the Pope talked as someone "who lived and suffered through the dark days of the Nazi regime in Germany". Earlier during his visit, in his address at Westminster Abbey, he touched on the totalitarian ideologies of the 20th century and argued that what gave rise to them (and to the slave trade) was a "misuse of reason".
There was no mention of the contribution of the Christian Church to the rise of Hitler, or the acceptance by all religions, at least in their sacred texts, of slavery.
If we take Pope Benedict's remarks regarding the Holocaust as an example, there is little doubt that he views it as one of the darkest moments in European history. At the Cologne Synagogue, earlier this year, he said, "I bow my head before all those who experienced this manifestation of the mysterium iniquitatis [mystery of sin]."
Yet, as far as his views on the origins of the Holocaust are concerned, there are serious problems. Benedict XVI presents it as primarily, even exclusively, a neo-pagan phenomenon that had no roots in Christianity but instead constituted a fundamental challenge to all religious belief, including Christianity. Certainly, for Hitler and his Nazi Party, race and not religion was the dominant motive for destroying Jews, but the Holocaust took place in a Christian culture and much of the Nazi anti-Semitic legislation replicated laws against Jews which were created in medieval Christendom.
In other words, if race provided the mythology and motivation for anti-Semitism, secularised religious language provided the justification. In Mein Kampf, Hitler did not hesitate to use overtly Christian language to appeal to a pious audience. Thus he could affirm, "I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the word of the Lord."
Many Christians came to agree with him and many more stood by as the Nazis enacted policies that built on the widespread racist and religious attitudes towards Jews in Europe that helped pave the way to Auschwitz.
Christianity provided an indispensable seedbed for the widespread support, or at least acquiescence, on the part of large numbers of baptised Christians during attacks on Jews and other marginalised groups, such as the disabled, the Roma and gay people. Christian anti-Semitism definitely had a major role, and Pope Benedict XVI's remarks can leave the impression, intended or not, that the Holocaust was simply the result of secularising modern forces in Europe at the time of the Nazis. He fails to deal forthrightly with Christian culpability.
Some liberal commentators, such as the American Catholic scholar John Pawlikowski, explain it as a result of the Pope's tendency to regard the Church as primarily an eternal and heavenly reality, basically unaffected by human history. This would explain Benedict's great reluctance to deal directly with the Church as a reality in human history.
The central problem for Pope Benedict resides in his fundamental vision of the Church. His ecclesiological perspective is one that sees the Catholic Church as a totally completed institution, incapable of any major redefinition, and without any need in the end to learn anything new theologically from a dialogue with other Christians, Jews or any other religious group.
This visit has been positive in many respects. Following his meeting with interfaith leaders, I certainly appreciated the pontiff's encouragement of the interfaith dialogue and his invocation of "abundant divine blessings" on all faiths.
His calls for respect and understanding, and his desire to raise religious and moral questions in Britain's diverse society, exceeded expectations. But this refusal to accept the Church's responsibility for this or other examples of mysterium iniquitatis will remain a major obstacle as it seeks to engage in wider society, with its mosaic of all faiths and none.
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47 comments
There is actually no doubt that the "Catholic Church was complicit in the murder of Jews" as you put it.
From a historical point of view they preached anti-semitic nonsense on the basis that the Jews are supposed to have killed Christ.
On a practical level,the bishops supported the Nazi Party and many leading Nazis were regular and enthusiastic church-goers,and welcomed as such.
The Protestant Church in Germany,founded by the openly anti-semitic Martin Luther,similarly supported Hitler's regime.
I think some people are missing the point a little bit here. His article is arguing primarily with the Pope's statement that a "misuse of reason" lies at the heart of many of the 20th centuries ills, which in itself suggests that a secular, philosophical atheism is to blame. Kessler is looking to redress such an imbalanced statement by saying that Catholicism played its part too. He is not saying that Catholicism is totally to blame.
But let's be clear Catholicism, Darwinism, atheism etc. are all just ideas and theories for interpreting the world around us - though religion tends to be more dictatorial. The people themselves who commit such terrible crimes as the holocaust are the evil ones.
And Wes, calm down. Why does it upset you so much to think that Cuba might have a better health care system than the USA? Also, I ended up at a Tea Party movement in Washington last Spring, and it seemed that it was full of homophobic, self-serving crazies. Do you deny this?
My mother, who was a Catholic, used to explain the historical persecution of the Jews as a divine punishment for having crucified Jesus Christ. They were, according to her, to be punished for ever and ever, generation after generation, for the murder of God!!
So this ties up nicely with the proposition that the Jews were murdered with the complicity and the silent approval of the catholic Church.
My mother who was only educated at primary level, had been indoctrinated with that terrible belief by Catholic priests and although she herself was horrified by it, she truly believed that was true.
Wes:
Did you actually write "God bless the tea party!"?? Are you an American?That could explain a few things about you.
But quite frankly,life is too short to talk to people like you.
The NS is starting look slightly obsessive here...perhaps Ed Kessler can explain the role of religion in Mao's regime, or Stalin's, or Idi Amin's, or any of the dozens of repressive states that repressed religion. Shona's almost right-the article is poor, but predictably rather than disturbingly.
Daniele, your mother was clearly educated by narrow minded bigots, but to use her experience as evidence that the Catholic church was complicit in the murder of Jews is bollocks. Try to get a grip on the concept of logic before you use one fact to justify a much larger assertion.
well I appreciate your comments guys, I just cherish so much our freedoms: freedom of speech, expression, human rights (we made such a progress in the last two hundred years)etc that can be found mostly in English speaking countries - democracy is not perfect but it is the best system ever developed, so far, there is still so much do to, for example if two people are in a committed relationship, no religion(Catholics included) should dictate if they can married or not that is up to the society to decide, also the real problem at least for me it is how women are still being treated in many parts of the world, what happens to the young girls in afghan schools(Afghanistan) who are trying to get better education? let's focus on real problems that have to be solved instead dwelling on the past for ever and ever?
Lox:
There is no need to be so rude about other commenters on this site.
I have not said my experience constituted "evidence". It is a personal anecdote which is simply indicative of a certain Catholic attitude to Jews which cannot be denied or ignored.You may not like it but Christian anti-semitism was quite virulent a few decades ago.They are now much better at hiding it.
In any case the Pope at the time of the Holocaust never raised his voice to condemn the murder of the Jews and after the war,the Vatican proceeded to help Nazi criminals to escape justice.What more proof do you want? Get a grip on the facts of history, Lox!
And nobody said that only religion was at the source of human inhumanity to man.What is shocking is that religion IS the cause AT ALL of so many human conflicts and the source of so many evil deeds while you religious people keep telling us that your God is love and peace!
Oh yes don't tell me,it is the "choice" argument. Don't bother, I've heard it all before.
I find it incredible that anyone would expect a teenager living in a Totalitarian regime to raise his voice to condemn the murder of the Jews. Let us remember he turned 18 at the end of the war. What were we doing from 14-18? He was serving in the anti-aircraft unit and then the army by conscription, not as a volunteer. And, there are living witness to the abuse he took for telling an SS officer he wanted to be a priest. So, if you are going to tell people to get a grip on the facts - I think that is advice you should heed as well.
Pope Benedict did not call for "abundant divine blessings" on all faiths - he called for them on all those present at the meeting. If Kessler can't get basic things like this right (one might as well say that a woman who loves an alcoholic loves alcoholism) why should his readers take him seriously when he pretends to analyse the role of religion in the rise of Nazism? As it is, I don't think Benedict would dispute the role of misappropriated religious concepts and language in the rise of Nazism. His view that it attempted to expel the Triune God is consistent with the Burleigh view of it as a secular religion, with the Fuhrer and his state as idols.
It is obvious that the long and dismal heritage of Christian Antisemitism helped create the conditions in which the Holocaust could take place.
However, it is equally obvious that the Nazis drew their main inspiration from a crude, racially-based misinterpretation of the concept of 'Survival of the Fittest'.
Should we therefore blame Darwin for Hitler? I don't think so.
Aren't we forgetting the elephant in the room. Islamofascism.
It's amazing how some people get their history from a silly American like Michael Moore instead of from history books. Here's the scoop on totalitarian governments and religion: They are competitors. Anyone who thinks that totalitarian governments work happily in conjunction with religious institutions are blind to the truth. What is at stake is power. Yes, there have been corrupt people in the Catholic Church. But make no mistake: totalitarian governments, which inevitably are fascist - see religious institutions as a threat to their quest for power, not an ally. It's all about who will control the people. True Christianity frees people. I say "true" because too often, unrepentant and sinful people have used the church to cover their evil plans. Unfortunately, that's what the world focuses on.
For those who think Cuba has such a great health care system: Watch this http://bit.ly/bviGUb
Regarding Pope Pius XII, who was Pope during the Nazi regime, the Vatican will be making its wartime records public, sometime in 2014. Meanwhile, an article in the UK newspaper The Times, clears the air: http://bit.ly/ce8nb0
There is also the wonderful story of Monsignor Hugh O'Flaherty, who helped save 4,000 Allies and Jews during WWII. http://bit.ly/a516aC
Just to be clear, I posted the above entry. I'm not the "Mary" who previously had commented. Sorry for any confusion.
bugger, William Byrd?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKT0omZ6fiU
Related to Vatican's responsibility to rise and actions of fascism a following quote gives one perspective:
"During WWII Croatia's Ustashe leaders declared that they would slaughter a third of the Serb population in Croatia, deport a third and convert the remaining third from Orthodoxy to Roman Catholicism. 3rd biggest extermination center – behind Auschwitz and Treblinka - created by Nazis was Jasenovac in Croatia. The death toll is estimated to be 300,000 to 700,000, some 80 % of them Serbs the rest Jews and Romas. While for Nazi-Germany Jasenovac was more a tool for ethnic cleansing for Ustashe religious aspect played crucial role. The religious motivation may be the explanation to the extreme brutality of butchers in Jasenovac. 743 Roman Catholic priests personally murdered Serbs, Jews and Gypsies. Jasenovac was for a time, run by Fr. Filipovic-Majstorovic, a Catholic priest. The Jasenovac system of Croatian camps also included a camp for children run by Catholic nuns who used toxic soda to save bullets."
(More in Jasenovac – Holocaust promoted by Vatican http://arirusila.wordpress.com/2010/01/26/jasenovac-%e2%80%93-holocaust-... )
As someone who is not a christian I am saddened by this blatant attack on christianity. Just because people who support christianity supported naziism does not mean christianity is a large, even a moderate reason for the rise of Adolf Hitler. Religion is completely absent in the rise of the Totalitarian Regimes of Stalin, Mao Zedong, and of North Korean, while on the contrast it's at the forefront of the totalitarian regime of Saudia Arabia and Libya.
Why not link the rise of Western democracy to Christianity if we are going to go so far as to say the fact that the church being a communal gathering spot makes it the reason why Democracy took hold?
@Mary:
I did not mean the present Pope,OBVIOUSLY, as the Pope who did nothing about the Holocaust, but the Pope who was residing at the Vatican during the war.
no I did not expect an 18 year old in the Hitler Youth to do anything about the murder of the Jews.
And to all those who refute the complicity of the Catholic Church with totalitarian regimes, You should familiarise yourself with the politics of South America in the 70's where horrendous human rights abuses were taking place as the church was blessing the evil generals and backing everything they did in the so called fight against communism, read "democracy".I was heavily involved with Amnesty International at the time and could tell you a few horror stories about the role of the Church during those terrible times.
But I think that a lot of you simply don't want to know. Fair enough! ignorance is bliss!
those of you attacking the church , please provide what is the source of your information: what documents do you use to support your claims? The Bible calls Satan father of all lies, if you cannot prove what you say that will make you sos
@Daniele
PLEASE educate us about great achievments of "church free"Cuba, and why Amnesty International is so quiet about violation of human rights in Cuba?????????????
daniele writes about her mother telling her that persecution of Jews by nazis was because they killed Jesus. that is not what the Bible says. Roman authorities killed Jesus. According to the history books at the time of Jesus Jews were under Roman Empire's occupation and only roman authorities had the right to execute people.
second how lame argument is to blame Christianity for nazis persecuting Jews, for example how do we explain recent hostility between Arabs(Islam) and Israelis during last 60 years. Arab-Isreali wars 1956, 1967, 1973, 1982, killing innocent civilians on both sides etc?????????
@Daniele
couple of years ago in catholic Brasil two catholic nuns were killed for defending the poor, why amnesty international was so quiet about that??????????????????
wes:
How about YOU proving that your bible is telling truths, any kind of truths, I am not fussy?? From some one who believes what a 200 year old ancient text says, Satan and all, as facts , to tell me to provide proof of what I say, is somewhat hilarious.
HAVE YOU GOT THE SENSE OF THE RIDICULOUS?
For the documents you need to believe me, you probably could find them in Amnesty International archives, but I am sure you would conclude that AI's work is the work of Satan, if it doesn't fit what you like to believe.
wes, please,continue to delude yourself if it helps you live your life.
@Daniele
recently catholic bishops in Cuba negotiated release of several political prisoners from communist prison, what do you have to say about that?
I am very open to the truth, the voice of reason, not to the bias, brainwashed propaganda(religious or not)
wes again:
Well, I could list quite a lot of achievements in Cuba actually.For a start, they have achieved the best Health service in the Americas, including the USA, and the best Education service in South America. The poverty they suffer is mainly due to the American embargo and YES, Amnesty has a few "prisoners of conscience" from Cuba on their books. I have been writing about one just recently. Nothing is perfect in Cuba, the fact you don't hear AI talk much about Cuba is because their human rights violations are NOTHING compared with scores of other countries.
Did you hear about the bishop Romero who was also murdered for defending the poor and being too left wing, in the 70's again, murder where the Vatican was suspected of being implicated??(no proof of course)
Do a bit of research wes. I don't know about the Catholic nuns you are talking about but there has always been nuns and priests who didn't toe the line with the Church and the dictatorships and had to be eliminated.No surprise there. Thank God, so to speak, there are some beautiful human beings who happen to be priests and nuns, but they are often punished for it.I have recently heard of a priest who has taken the cause of the Indians in the Amazonian forest and who is battling with the logging companies and the State to defend the Indians'rights. I salute such a priest!Unfortunately there are few and far between.
The Bible is the Word of God and everything in it is true - we can easly prove it
@Daniele
education how many students in Cuba have access to the internet and confirm your statment??????????
how many people in Cuba have access to the medications like in USA for example????????
@daniele
Cuba and USA embargo? you got to be kidding recently your idol Fidel himself confirmed "troubles" with Cuba economy are because of the state dominating everything
@Daniele
let us invite Cuban people to speak for themselves about the paradise they live in and tell us their story how about that??????????????????
Let the Freedom Reign
God bless our enemies
I am not sure about the Internet, wes, BUT I am sure that poor people in Cuba have more access to medecine than poor people in the USA. I've been there and I've seen it.It is also common knowledge. Michael Moore had made a whole program about it comparing Cuba's system with the appalling American one.Don't you know that 45% of Americans have NO access to health care at all because they can't afford insurance? and when Obama is trying to remedy this terrible state of affairs, Big Christians like the Tea party people want to stop it and calls it communism. You should keep up Wes.
Now as to your Bible being the word of god and everything in it is true, you've got me there.AND you can prove it! How the Hell (pardon the expression") do you do that?
Is there any point continuing this conversation when you come up with such absurd statements. I think not.
let us examin paradise in north korea????christianity free state??????
the pope and totalitarian regime
north korea versus south korea(christianity present) how many people died in North Korea because of the famine how the church was responisble for that???
@Daniele
why then people are trying (for the last 30 years) to escape cuba'paradise to the USA and not the other way around??????? don't they know cuban system is much better then that of USA?????
@Daniele
just out of curiosity
what AI data about prisoners in Cuba is based on????
@Daniele
if as you say people in Cuba have more access to medicine then poor people in USA why don't you ask USA Gov to start buying medicine from Cuba for poor people in USA sam as Wenezuela's president provides free oil for the poor people in USA???
if Michael Moore loves so much Cuba why then he doesn't move to Cuba( he can use the same boat used by Cubans who came to Florida) why does he suffer so much in USA ask him to move to a paradise in Cuba what is he witing for???
@daniele
why are you not sure about internet
or how many students in Cuba have an access to the internet, computers etc???
is it because it is the church's fault, or may be the pope does not allow them? why catholic bishops negotiated release of the cuban prisoners and was AI involvment is limited only to spreading lies on the web, misleading people, telling them halftruth about paradise in Cuba and how horrible US system is?
God bless the Tea Party movement
well the only achievment of cuban medical system is lack of obesity due to starvation of the people( not really voluntary lol)
and sadly major source of income are western tourists who bring american $
but you can believe in anything you want
I don't expect there's much hope of him acknowledging the right wing / elite agenda of the church throughout Latin America then either.
I've been to Cuba and there are plenty of overweight people there, I can assure you.
coming back to the pope and Nazi regime
there were more then 25 000 catholic priests killed by nazis regime
pope Pius X saved more then 100 000 Jews giving them baptism certificate (proof of being catholic) and vatican passports simply he smuggle them through the vatican to the midlle east
recently there was a news about a group of german priests whose job during the war was to hide and smuggle Jews out of occupied Europe
also ask yourselves what will happen to the pope if he made a statement accusing nazis of killing the Jews: he will be arrested and killed like everybody else, vatican will be occupied and the chance to save a 100 000 Jews will be lost, is that what you are asking for?
what is more important to make a statement or to save a life, human life?
do you honestly believe that if the pope will make a statement condeming nazis all of a sudden nasiz will stop killing Jews and surrender, is that what you are saying???
@writeoff - thats not just the Catholics, look at the Evangelicals in central America.
This article is disturbingly poor. Anything can be used as a justification for anything i.e. a mad man using biblical text to justify genocide but does this infer the religious group whose text it is, is therefore somewhat culpable?
if the US is so free Wes, why can't you get on a plane and go to visit Cuba ? Why like me you had to go thru a 3rd country then not have my passport stamped when entering and leaving Cuba. Also as far as Cubans trying to get into the US, why wouldn't they, unlike poor US citizens they get a house, welfare, medical and social security regardless of how little time they've been here, but then the republicans need their votes to carry Florida don't they !
The Popes Legions are well served by the Jesuits and Opus Dei.
"Refusal to accept the Church's responsibility for this or other examples"? You must be joking. John Paul and Benedict have repeatedly apologized for past grievances. Who else in humilty has? Catholic Christians were persecuted up to the time of Constantine (by Jews and Romans), martyred in Calvin's Geneva and Elizabethan England, yet I hear no apologies to Catholics. Regarding our Jewish brothers, I'll admit a long standing anti-semitism did exist. However, let me remind you that Pius XII, despite current, guilt-deflecting revisionism, did more to save Jews(estimated 850,000 saved) than any other religious or political leader.