Vatican boycotts Holocaust remembrance

[LiberalFighter]

Source: Guardian Unlimited

· Shock as envoy rejects invite to Jerusalem service
· Row grows over reference to pope's wartime role

The Vatican ambassador to Israel has sparked a row after refusing to attend tomorrow's annual Holocaust memorial service in Jerusalem in protest at a description of the wartime role of Pope Pius XII.

Monsignor Antonio Franco, who arrived in Jerusalem last year, has called on Israel's official Holocaust museum, Yad Vashem, to change a picture caption that criticises the pontiff for failing to condemn the deportation and mass killing of Jews under the Nazis. Earlier this month he turned down a formal invitation to Sunday's torch-lighting remembrance ceremony.

The museum said it was "shocked" at Msgr Franco's decision and called on the Vatican to open its archives for examination of the troubled history of Pius XII.

The dispute revolves around a paragraph-long caption of Pius XII installed when the newly designed museum was opened in 2005. A letter of complaint was also sent by the previous Vatican ambassador a year ago.

Read more: www.guardian.co.uk/pope/story/0,,2057042,00.html

[WindRavenX]

1. Things that make you go "hmm"

NT

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

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[emilyg]

33. i'm a survivor

not surprised at all.

[Kutjara]

3. Last one out of the Catholic Church, please turn off the lights.

How out of touch are Benny and his flunkies, anyway? Next, they'll be saying the Inquisition was just an April Fool's prank.

Presumably, when Shrub meets Der Popenfuhrer, they can reminisce about Adolf's best buddy - Prescott Bush.

[terip64]

36. You are so right. I won't go back since they decided that the gay priests were the sex offenders.

I was there and that is bullshit. It is just one lie after another.

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[BrklynLiberal]

17. There were many children who were not returned to their parents after

their Catholic caretakers had them baptized, and therefore the Church felt they owned their souls.

Book takes place in France after WWII. Michel's Jewish parents are killed during the war. ... Item title: MICHEL, MICHEL by Robert Lewis 1967

Robert Lewis, the author, was born in 1916. He has deicated his life to study, teaching, and writing. This novel is about the possession of the child Michel Benedek who is Jewish by birth but has been baptized in the Catholic Church by his rescuer at the end of WWII.
Michel is a pawn in the struggle between the Catholic and the Jewish forces which reflect the general attitude of France towards anti-Semitism and anti-Clericalism which exists to this day.
In the end Michel must make his own choice between the religion he was born with and the religion he fell into when he was rescued and adopted by a Catholic French woman.
This compelling novel will keep the reader spellbound till the very end.

[IndyOp]

37. "Michel, Michel" is a tremendously powerful novel -

I read it as a teen, over 20 years ago, and I can still feel the emotional conflicts that the author skillfully creates.

[BrklynLiberal]

43. I read it when it first came out..and still remember the emotions clearly.

[barb162]

57. Which Pope was a pedophile again? Link please.

And how about a link that the Church conspired in the Holocaust. Was the Pope a Nazi concentration camp guard or something?

[AnneD]

5. Great way to

win friends and influence people.

[madaboutharry]

6. To this day, there are Hebrew manuscripts

and Jewish antiquities that remain in the catacombs and basements of the Vatican. Israel has sought the return of these items, much of it stolen during the times of the Romans, for decades. It is simply wrong that they have not been returned. The difficult relationship between the Vatican and Israel can not be denied. This episode just another unfortunate example of it.

[LiberalFighter]

7. In that regards, the Vatican should lose their sovereignty

which would allow warrants to be filed to search the premises.

Personally, I don't believe that the Vatican should be recognized as a state/country.

[hang a left]

16. Absolutely!

They should NOT be sovereign. The Catholic Church aided and abetted the massacre. I don't blame them for not wanting to show their evil faces.

[Ian David]

20. You can file papers to revoke the corporate charter of the Catholic "Church." n/t

[LiberalFighter]

30. How would that be possible when they are in Italy?

[Ian David]

31. Each archdiocese is a corporation operating in the United States...

under the control of The Secretary of State's Office.

If you can make the case that they are operating against the best interest of the citizens, you can revoke their corporate charter.

[barb162]

58. Most large religious organizations in this country are NON-PROFITS

[Ian David]

62. Still incorporated under the authority of the secretafry of state's office. n/t

[Ian David]

19. I think The Vatican is a rogue nation. n/t

[Bjornsdotter]

9. I didn't know that

...that is just shameful.


Hmmm, now which commandment is about STEALING again? Seems the Vatican is exempt from that one.

Cheers

[Ian David]

18. A right-wing Republicker acquaintance of mine keeps complaining about that

Since he's usually wrong about everything else, I dismissed that particular complaint out of hand.

There's actually something to that?

[northzax]

47. probably

the Vatican has been collecting stuff for 2000 years, even they don't have a clue what is in all the catacombs and archives. the Church is renowned for bookkeeping and recordkeeping, as well as collecting.are there ancient Hebrew texts somewhere in there? most likely. but what? and where?

[Ian David]

51. They probably have a sled named "Rosebud," too. n/t

[SemperEadem]

63. I can't for the life of me understand how

they think the love letters between Henry VIII Tudor and Anne Boleyn are their property--they were obviously stolen by the Imperial Ambassador or some other catholic and stowed at the Vatican. Those letters should be returned to England, as they are English property.

[barb162]

59. Do you have a link for that claim?

[roguevalley]

8. unbelievable. how terribly small of the man, how terribly terribly small.

[KarmaKaize]

10. Very sad, but why are we surprised ?

Google "auto da fe", and you will recognize that from the time men, women, and children were burnt alive for not kow-towing to the Church, that nothing has changed since the Inquisition, and the Concordat signed between ADOLF HITLER and the VATICAN, negotiated by the man who was to become Pope "Pius XII", and which was in force during the entire span of WWII, during which Rome knew EXACTLY and in GREAT DETAIL about the extermination camps, should be a very good clue to what we are dealing with TODAY.

AMEN.

[Ian David]

21. Didn't Pope John Pedophile nominate Pius for sainthood, among other reprehensible criminals? n/t

[Zhade]

26. As you've intimated, we're talking about an organization that covered up CHILD RAPE.

Intentionally.

Know what I call that? Organized crime.

The Catholic Chruch*: The mafia, but with terrible fashion sense.

(*not a typo.)

[Ian David]

27. Not to mention using intimidation and blackmail to influence the elections of sovereign nations. n/t

[Celeborn Skywalker]

32. I liked Pope John Paul II

and will continue to support the Catholic Church.

[anotherdrew]

35. was hoping for Pope George Ringo I next but instead this... + can anyone identify this picture?

anyone able to identify this location?...

[rosesaylavee]

40. I give.

Where is this? And is that our lil' Ratzie in the middle? It sure likes very 'un-christian' to me.

[anotherdrew]

45. I really don't know what it is, hoping someone will see it and recognize it

and yes that is indeed ratzo in the middle

[Ian David]

42. That is Pope Ratso in the middle, and either...

1) Poseidon rising from the sea.
2) Satan summoning his evil minions from Hell.
3) Darth Vader emerging from the lava pits of Mustafar.



I can feel the anger inside you, young Skywalker...

[anotherdrew]

46. I don't know what's worse, the statue or the swiss-guards costumes n/t

[Canuckistanian]

50. In the name of all that's holy... WTF is THAT?

It looks like a live presentation of a Hieronymus Bosch painting... just more creepy...

[SemperEadem]

64. it looks like something from Parasite Eve

[Ian David]

41. Well, you're entitled to support an anti-semitic gay-bashing pedophile apologist if you want to. n/t

[MadMaddie]

11. And I will state the obvious......other than Condi....who the hell is

surprised by this......?:wtf:

[Ian David]

24. Condi probably admires Der Popenfuhrer's taste in shoes.

Fashion: The Pope Wears Prada
Newsweek

He may never make the best-dressed lists, but Pope Benedict XVI is nothing short of a religious-fashion icon, riding in the Popemobile with red Prada loafers under his cassock and Gucci shades. But his penchant for designer wear and a move to ditch the papal tailors who have dressed popes for more than 200 years are causing new wrinkles in the Vatican.
Story continues below ↓advertisement

Benedict has favored his tailor from his days as cardinal, Alessandro Cattaneo, and the 20-year-old religious-fashion house of Raniero Mancinelli, which has provided the pope with dazzling new vestments (some with shimmering, sequinlike details). At risk of losing the papal-dress contract are the Annibale Gammarelli tailors, who have made papal wear since 1792. But they blundered when Benedict had to make his debut blessing in a cassock that was too short, ending just above his ankles. Subsequent celebratory vestments made by Gammarelli are reported to have made the pope uncomfortable.

he Vatican won't comment on papal attire, and Gammarelli denies it is getting the ax: "We are still in contact with the Holy Father. Perhaps there was only an occasional gift by some friend of the pontiff," the tailor says.
—Barbie Nadeau

More:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10016674/site/newsweek

[VegasWolf]

12. The Pope, the Christian God's true representative here on Earth. nt

[Ian David]

22. Then they either need a better god or a better pope. n/t

[july302001]

13. arrrrgh!

The Vatican's stubborn attitude is so frustrating! I sense there's some connection with the attempt to beatify Pius XII...who doesn't deserve beatification.

Icy neutrality is far from saintly.

[Doremus]

14. They stood by silently while people were exterminated to save their own hides.

Nothing more be said.

Canonization?
Sure, if there are saints in hell.

[barb162]

61. Actually they were hiding and saving Jews in nunneries and other

church properties

[BrklynLiberal]

15. As if not saying it will make it not true. No surprise that the Vatican still

tries to use strongarm methods to spread its beliefs.

The ultimate of hypocrisy...

[sakabatou]

23. And the Vatican wonders why

people hate Catholocism...

[Ian David]

29. I don't hate Catholicism or Catholics. I just hate the guys in the dresses that run the thing. n/t

[Name removed]

25. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[barb162]

55. Got a mainstream link that proves he "pro-child rape"

[Spazito]

28. The Vatican's actions wrt to Hitler and Nazi Germany...

and it's lack of action wrt the holocaust deserves to made public as, it seems, the museum has done. The future Pius XII, Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, signed a concordat with Nazi Germany in 1933:

Pius XI and Cardinal Pacelli judged that their first duty was to secure civil guarantees for the autonomy of ecclesiastical institutions and their activities. After the abdication of Kaiser Wilhelm II in 1918, the Holy See had tried to sign a concordat with the Weimar Republic but did not succeed. The sticking point was the church’s insistence on state support for Catholic schools and for Catholic religious instruction in the public schools. This stipulation was not acceptable to Weimar’s parliament, especially to its Socialists, who held that it violated the separation between church and state. As the Vatican’s nuncio to Bavaria (1917-20) and then to the Weimar Republic (1920-29), Eugenio Pacelli had arranged concordats with individual German states—namely with Bavaria in 1925, Prussia in 1929 and Baden in 1932. Given this history, Pius XI and Pacelli had reason to be pleased when Vice Chancellor Franz von Papen came to Rome on April 7, 1933, to negotiate a concordat with the Reich’s new government.

The Concordat of 1933 gave the papacy what it wanted most, but it also required some concessions from Pius XI and Pacelli, as Joseph Beisinger has described in Controversial Concordats (edited by Frank J. Coppa, 1999). It stipulated that the state would permit parishes to administer the sacraments to the faithful and to instruct its members in the faith and that civil authorities would not interfere in the naming of bishops and pastors. These safeguards were important, because the predominantly Protestant Prussian government had closed Catholic churches, imprisoned bishops and pastors, and stopped the appointment of new bishops during Otto von Bismarck’s Kulturkampf (1870-80). The concordat asserted, too, that the state would give financial support to the church’s schools and that it would make Catholic religious education available in the public schools—religious education taught only by instructors approved by the bishops.

The Holy See’s concessions included the concordat’s requirement that clergy not engage in political activities and not hold political offices. Bishops were required to swear an oath of loyalty to the Reich and its legally constituted government. The bishops would sponsor only those lay organizations dedicated to charitable works and to social activities of a religious nature. Although it was agreed that a list would specify which organizations were protected under the concordat, this list was never completed. In addition, diocesan newspapers and church-affiliated publishers were left vulnerable to the state’s interference and suppression, because the concordat did not explicitly protect them.

The Concordat of 1933 embodied a problematic theology of the church, for it implicitly reduced the church to an organization concerned solely about a private, otherworldly realm unrelated to the social and political aspects of human life. It devalued the fuller reality of the church expressed in German Catholicism’s rich tradition of social and political activism, as realized in the Kolping Society, the programs of Mainz’s Bishop Wilhelm Ketteler (d. 1877) and the Catholic Center Party. As a result, it lost sight of Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum (1891) and Pius XI’s Quadragesimo Anno (1931). Moreover, it cast ambiguity upon the church’s civil autonomy by requiring the bishops’ oath of loyalty to the Reich.

http://www.americamagazine.org/gettext.cfm?articleTypeID=1&textID=3131&issueID=448

This excerpt is taken from America, the National Catholic Weekly and I did so deliberately. This version is, to say the least, the "kindest" treatment of what the signing of the concordat meant. I, a lapsed Catholic, cannot be so "kind".

This signing, imo, is the ideal example to iterate when one uses the expression "sold one's soul to the devil".

As long as the Vatican takes umbrage at the truth being told about this shameful part of it's history, the more it enforces my belief that the Vatican's actual guilt for the holocaust is much greater than the act of signing the concordat.

[arewenotdemo]

34. The truth hurts

when it was your Church that aided and abetted the Third Reich.

[Eugene]

38. Update: Pope's Envoy to Attend Holocaust Service (AP)

Source: Associated Press

Pope's Envoy to Attend Holocaust Service


Sunday April 15, 2007 2:01 PM

By ARON HELLER

Associated Press Writer

JERUSALEM (AP) - The Vatican's ambassador to Israel will attend
a Holocaust memorial service at the Yad Vashem museum, reversing
an earlier decision to boycott the event, officials said Sunday.

Vatican officials had said they would skip the Sunday event
because of a caption at the Holocaust museum describing the
wartime conduct of Pope Pius XII.

Officials from Yad Vashem, the Vatican's Embassy and the Israeli
Foreign Ministry confirmed Sunday that the ambassador, Monsignor
Antonio Franco, would attend.

-snip-

The boycott had threatened to upset fragile relations between
Israel and the Vatican.

-snip-

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6559335,00.html

[Scurrilous]

39. Vatican agrees to attend Holocaust memorial service

Vatican’s Ambassador to Israel Monsignor Antonio Franco will attend Holocaust memorial service at Yad Vashem, reversing earlier decision to boycott event due to caption at museum describing wartime conduct of Pope Pius XII; ‘it was only diplomacy,’ he says of affair

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3388179,00.html

<snip>

"The Vatican’s ambassador to Israel will attend a Holocaust memorial service at the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum, reversing an earlier decision to boycott the event, officials said Sunday.

The boycott had threatened to upset fragile relations between Israel and the Vatican.

The Vatican’s ambassador, Monsignor Antonio Franco, announced last week that he would skip Sunday night’s event because of a caption at the museum describing the wartime conduct of Pope Pius XII."

<snip>

"Franco told Ynet he merely wanted to draw attention to the Catholic Church’s stance regarding the picture of Pius, saying it was “only diplomacy.”

According to him, there is evidence that the pope worked diligently to help save Jewish lives during the Holocaust. He said he would attend the ceremony because he is “not against the memory of the Holocaust or the people of Israel.”

“We just want the truth about Pope Pius to be clearer,” Marco said."

[JNelson6563]

44. Glad to hear of this

This was one decision it was a very good idea to re-think and I am pleased that they did.

Julie

[barb162]

54. Yes, that was an excellent idea.

[northzax]

48. methinks the good Monsignor

overstepped his bounds and got a note from Tarcisio Cardinal Bertone.

[HuffleClaw]

49. horribly shameful and an outrage

though i can't say i'm surprised, considering the behaviour of the new pope about other matters. he sure aint john paul ii.

[TankLV]

52. What do you expect from a former Nazi?!

To say I am NOT surprised, would be an understatement...

And to think, out of all the possible candidates, they DELIBERATELY CHOSE this FORMER NAZI...

Dispicable...

[barb162]

53. Do you have a link that he joined the Nazi Party?

[kitty1]

56. Facts are Facts. It's a well known fact that Pius X11 stayed....

silent on the atrocities that were carried out by the Nazis.
Obviously to keep the Nazi wrath from raining down on the Catholic church at that time I would guess. But still there was no outcry against the largest massacre of a people during that century.
The Nazis tolerated Catholics at best. The fact that Mussolini was on Board with Hitler was the only thing that kept them around.
Am I wrong, or didn't Pope Paul apologize formally for the mistakes made by the Catholic Church towards Jews during that time and afterwards.
So why should this Pope be offended by the truth of that situation.

[barb162]

60. I am glad to see a papal rep was going to the Remembrance