Pope: "If I speak of Islamic violence, then I have to speak of Catholic violence.”

[kpete]

While in Poland, Francis made an unscheduled stop at a church in Krakow to implore God to protect people from the "devastating wave" of terrorism in many part of the world.

Francis replied that "it's not right to identify Islam with violence. It's not right and it's not true."

He added: "I believe that in every religion there is always a little fundamentalist group."

"I don't like to talk of Islamic violence because every day, when I go through the newspapers, I see violence, this man who kills his girlfriend, another who kills his mother-in-law," Francis said, in apparent reference to crime news in the predominantly Catholic country of Italy. "And these are baptized Catholics. If I speak of Islamic violence, then I have to speak of Catholic violence."

Noting he has spoken with imams, he concluded: "I know how they think, they are looking for peace."



http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/pope-talk-violent-terrorist-islam-41035349

[Kali]

1. Wow!

[DemonGoddess]

2. K&R!

[SickOfTheOnePct]

3. I'm kind of surprised

that the Pope isn't able to see the difference between violence committed by a religious adherent that is committed in the name of that religion and violence committed by a religious adherent that isn't committed in the name of that religion.

[GummyBearz]

5. Lots of people aren't able to see that difference

Many of them post on this board

[ck4829]

6. Or maybe the Pope sees what an attribution error is

When an outgroup (Muslim) commits violence, it's apparently done in the name of ideology and religion being the overriding causative factor.

When an ingroup (White, Christian, or non-religious) commits violence, people go out of their way to label mental illness, substance abuse, job loss, or other factors as being part of the cause if not the cause of the non-terror act.

[SickOfTheOnePct]

8. It's not "apparently done in the name of ideoglogy"

when the people committing the violent act state that they're doing it in the name of said ideology.

Operation Rescue is a perfect example of a group that has committed and/or condoned violent acts due to their religious ideology, in their case, fundamentalist Christianity, and they should and have been called out as Christian fundamentalist terrorists.

Timothy McVeigh was a Catholic, but he didn't commit his act of terrorism in the name of Catholicism, he committed it in the name of anti-government extremism, but apparently the Pope would call his an act of Catholic violence, although McVeigh himself didn't attribute it to Catholicism.

[treestar]

11. There were Catholic terrorists once

Not that long ago.

Similar, it was political really rather than based on the religion itself.

Terrorists are not doing what they do to make us all Muslims. It's to get the West out of the ME. No matter what they say.

[SickOfTheOnePct]

13. Absolutely there were Catholic terrorists

Probably still are some. But that's quite different than saying, as the Pope did, that every Catholic who commits a violent act is doing so in the name of Catholicism.

And unlike you, I tend to believe what the Islamic terrorists are stating as their reasons, rather than make up reasons that fit an agenda.

[treestar]

16. Seriously you think the terrorist attacks

are about making everyone else a Muslim? Why do they mainly attack other Muslims?

The Pope seemed to say the opposite, don't judge all on the acts of a few. The IRA wanted Britain out of Ireland, and they didn't care whether anyone became Catholic or not.

Sometimes the religion is just part of a culture. If in the ME they were Hindus, and the West had troops there, it would be Hindu violence. Doesn't matter what religion they are. Everyone uses their religion to fire up fighters in their culture.

[loyalsister]

25. Exactly

Convincing people to kill is convincing them to abandon a deeply instilled moral code.

Using religion as a righteous moral cause that helps justify it is really not all that different from how the US talked about making the world "safe for democracy" and Christianity. True or not, it's no accident that communism was tied to atheism.

[Igel]

18. You're right. They can't possibly know what their intentions are.

We in the West are so much superior we can know their innermost thoughts. Bleah.

I doubt that the Muslims involved in ISIS go around systematically killing Western Muslims who volunteer. They're Westerners, and ISIS must, therefore, the prediction says, want them gone. Thing is, that's not the case. The ideological prediction fails in the face of evidence.

It's a simple problem. I have multiple identities. I'm a registered (D), I'm a Judaizing Xian, I'm a father, I'm nearing retirement, I'm a teacher by trade, I'm a Slavist by education, I'm an amateur string player, I'm a translator, I'm an East Coast transplant, I'm a Texan, I think of "home" as Oregon, I have cats (to be said in the same tone of voice as "I have fleas&quot , I like Rush and Led Zeppelin and Bach and Reger, I'm white, I'm American, I'm middle class.

Which is my "defining" identity? Depends, and it doesn't necessarily depend on some armchair quarterback's opinion from 3000 miles away. If I'm auditioning for an orchestra nobody cares if I'm a father--if they need a violin, I can be there, but if it's an oboe audition, "Ciao, sucker." If I go to a school meeting I'm either a teacher or a father and I'm unlikely to start speaking by saying, "I'm a Slavist." If I'm overseas, "American" might matter more. In primaries, it's political affiliation.

But how do I define myself in general, what's my overall, default context? Dunno. I might not have a default context. It's certainly not "white." Perhaps "Judaizing Xian" is first and foremost, perhaps profession.

If I were to become a terrorist, I'm sure some oboist somewhere would say it's because I'm a violinist,somebody focused just on race would say it's because I'm white, Germanicists would say it's because I'm a Slavist, and it wouldn't matter in the least that I said it was because I was part of the Translator Liberation Front.They'd know the real reason, and it's always one that they like because it's what's important to them. We always see through our own corneas, and our mind's eye apparently works no differently.

[PrideofJefferson]

4. The difference

is that today there is little violence in the name of catholicism. We all know there is a difference in philosophies as practiced in our modern world.

[Sanity Claws]

7. All those abortion clinic bombings? And that is just the US

What about the bombings in Northern Ireland during the 1980s, 1990s? The Catholics and Protestants were bombing and killing, all in the name of religion.
That's just off the top of my head.

[SickOfTheOnePct]

9. Agree 100% that those were/are terroist acts in the name of Christianity

and should be called out as so.

[PrideofJefferson]

14. I think those problems

Are under control to a great degree. And those are rightly condemned as is the philosophy that inspired them. I always get a little frustrated when bad acts that we call out as atrocities are brought up to somehow mitigate a current act of terror and what may have motivated it's perpetrators. That Catholic Church molestation scandal and the underlying institutions that permitted it to happen have been called out and rightly condemned. Sometimes bad actors use faith to perpetrate evil with institutional and philosophical approval. Is the average secular Muslim to blame for terror, of course not but that doesn't mean that the higher ups don't have some role in radicalization.

[uponit7771]

21. world wide? tia

[Skittles]

27. LOL

a great deal of the misogyny and homophobia in this world is due to Christianity, and don't get me started on the misery caused by their stance on birth control

[Igel]

22. They were called out as terror attacks.

And because they mix politics and religion, some saw them purely in secular terms.

But if N. Ireland was all Catholic, I doubt that the IRA (the Real IRA or the presumably fake one) would have done much.

[rurallib]

10. Like Christianity, Islam has multiple sects

if all muslims are blamed for the acts of a few, then why not christians. Catholics are a sect of christianity.

If that is true, there is a long history of violence by catholics from back when they were the only group of christians with eras such as the inquisition. We can move into today's era with violence against gays, violence against abortion clinics etc.

Shoot I am old enough to remember local violence between Irish catholics and Czech catholics or Polish catholics.

The focus of our media is simply not focused on issues like this, so it doesn't get press.

[SickOfTheOnePct]

12. I agree 100%

that not all Muslims should be blamed for the acts of a very few. But I don't agree that when terrorist acts are committed in the name of Islam, as stated by the terrorists themselves, we should shy away from calling those who committed the acts Islamic terrorists.

The same goes for those who commit terrorist acts in the name of Christianity, be they Protestant or Catholic.

[PrideofJefferson]

15. Not to be blunt

But I don't think the current victims of Islamic inspired terrorism will be satisfied with "well, there was the Inquisition so suck it up".

[rurallib]

17. Agree - just pointing out some history

Thanks

[Igel]

24. Certainly Islam does have mutliple sects.

But when Muslims are accused, for years the immediate response was to deny this and circle the wagons. At first, we had to be careful and wait for all the evidence, maybe the preliminary evidence was wrong. Later denunciations of the attacks often led with, "This doesn't help our cause" or "This is bad because it makes people resent us." Utterly tone deaf, and oft-repeated.

People wanted to group Muslims into a monolithic bloc. This kind of group-defending critique of the terrorists confirmed this in the minds of many and said, "Yes, those self-appointed leaders also say that Muslims are a coherent, homogeneous bloc" even as they tried to say the opposite. Whatever spin was necessary by context.

Even within a sect, whether Xian or Muslim, most adherents are not violent. What happens sometimes is that many sectarians will justify their group member to a large extent. (See my first paragraph.)


A lot of today's violence, to the extent it's not random doesn't follow sect lines very closely. It's more a "older values" versus "newer values" thing. Abortion-clinic attackers tend to come from certain Xian sects, but not a sect, and even within those sects most condemn the attackers. BTW, how many such attacks have there been in the last few years? (It pays to remember: If there's a 2% victimization rate, when a Xian or white or middle-classer is victimized, well, it's part of that 2%. But if there's a 3% victimization rate for blacks or gays, then every person in that 3% obligatorily is seen as being victimized because he's black or gay.)


(Answering my own question: http://prochoice.org/education-and-advocacy/violence/violence-statistics-and-history/ lists 15 attacks over 5 years, from 2011-2015, in the US, and those mostly arson. No word on whether they were targeted because they were specifically abortion clinics or not. There have been a number of church arsons, for example, and a decent percentage of those were set by members or employees who were pissed off, mentally ill, or hoped for insurance money.)

[uponit7771]

20. A little leven levens the whole bunch

[uponit7771]

19. DING DING DING !!! +1 for the pope..... again

[Stuart G]

23. " If I speak of Islamic violence, then I have to speak of Catholic violence." ..incredible...

This statement, is honest and very very special..admitting during this debate..a historical fact...
Catholic violence...that it existed ..and was real..

This pope is amazing......

[Skittles]

26. call it religious violence and be done with it

[Quantess]

28. Fuck. FINALLY!

Let's talk about the absence of religious motivated violence among the atheists, agnostics, the non-religious, and the mildly religious.

Can we start talking about how wonderful the not-so-religious people are, for once?

[Quantess]

29. Let's talk about it then!! All religious inspired violence!

Religion does more harm than good. Let's start talking about it!

[malaise]

30. I've been saying that for years

and coming under attack right here on DU

[Quantess]

31. Curious. What do you get "attacked" for?

[malaise]

32. For daring to call out Christians and Jews who terrorize otherss in the name

of their religions

[Quantess]

33. But not muslims?

I see...

[hollowdweller]

34. Galatians 6:1

Brethren, even if a man is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness; each one looking to yourself, lest you too be tempted.