Is George W. Bush a Catholic Saint?

[wcepler]

Is George Bush a Catholic Saint?



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Where the bloody hell has the Catholic Church been during the last 6 years?



Talk about "disconnection"! Here's this gigantic, international religious organization that's forever talking about morality and God, but boy is it ever turning a blind eye to someone who arguably is the anti Christ of the 3rd millennial (if you like to play such theological games). A disapproving word or two from the Pope or some relevant Cardinal or Bishop could have electrified the planet. But silentio, silentio, silentio.



Dear God, what does Bush have to do to get the attention of these Catholic prelates? Eat his children? Castrate the Senate Democrats? Give the finger to the Trinity?



How about murdering New Orleans? Silentio. How about Bushian Texas energy companies raping Mother Nature? Silentio. How about stealing 3 elections (count 'em: 2000, 2002, 2004)? How about tax breaks for multimillionaires and back breaks for the middle class. Remember the middle class? Remember the "lower" class. Jesus did! Well, Rome apparently doesn't.



The Bush/Republicans are literally exterminating the middle and lower classes in America. We're being taxed into oblivion, our health programs and retirement plans are being systematically dismantled. Our science funding (e.g., embryonic stem cell research) and education policies are being abandoned. Millionaires are becoming multimillionaires and multimillionaires are becoming billionaires.

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/1375

(message from proud patriot Democratic Underground Moderator: in the future please limit
your snips of articles to 4 paragraphs as per the Democratic Underground copyright rules)

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

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

[nini]

2. Sweet.. another Catholic bashing thread

Yes.. it's the Catholics' fault W is ruining the world! :eyes:


I don't have the time to go and find quotes by John Paul II regarding some of W's policies, so this broad swipe doesn't fly.

I have issues with the Church, but blaming them for W is a bit much.

[barb162]

14. Exactly. Go after every religion which isn't going after Bush.

Don't pick on one. This is ridiculous! Have the Hindus , Buddhists, Lutherans, Episcopalians, Baptists, etal been named here? No. WHy not?

[crim son]

15. I wish you did have time.

Because I'd like to see them. I'd like to hear what His Holiness said before we invaded Iraq, and lately about our war. I'd be interested to hear what you can dig up concerning homosexuality and abortion too. And I'd love to see which appears to weigh more heavily on the mind of our Pope: the murder and maiming of thousands and thousands of innocents, or the Catholic version of morality.

Raised as a Catholic. Changed my mind.

[Demit]

18. JPII spoke out against Bush policy and the "unjust war"

http://www.infowars.com/articles/nwo/pope_bush_proposed_chaplain_nwo.htm

There's your link. If you want a whole boatload more of them, google it yourself. Use "John Paul II" and "unjust war".

[uppityperson]

3. Nice, welcome to DU

wow, you can start a topic with your first post? I think of him as the anti-christ, perhaps this is why the Catholic Church has stayed quiet and complicit?

[Richardo]

4. The Vatican is supposed to involve itself in US elections and tax policy?

Get real.

What a rant - what brought this on? Did you attend a parochial school by any chance? Nuns a little mean to you? Sheesh.

[redqueen]

5. Didn't they get involved by telling people not to vote for Kerry?

I thought I saw some people claiming they left the church at that time... could be remembering wrong...

[Richardo]

7. Not officially, in fact Ratzenberger (now Benedict) said it was not

...acceptable to withhold communion for someone for their political views.

On a parish to parish basis, who knows? There are about 80 million Catholics in the US, in 19,000 parishes. Anything's possible.

[redqueen]

9. Ah yeah I was thinking that as I typed that post, actually...

it was probably just one priest/parish.

My co-parent was telling me yesterday that it was the pope himself who approved of shifting pedophile priests around to different areas... *sigh*... how difficult is it to NOT act as if you know something for a fact, when in fact you do not?

With just that one change in communication, we could make so much difference.

[John1956PA]

12. In Oct. 2004, the PA Cath. Conf. Of Bishops issued right-wing propaganda.

I responded that month with a letter complaining that the conference was wrongly taking sides in the 2004 election. Until his recent departure to head the archdiocese of Washington, Bishop Donald Wuerl was at the helm of the Pittsburgh Diocese where he authored essays with an obvious right-wing slant. The Pittsburgh Diocese newspaper, The Pittsburgh Catholic, has as its general manager Robert Lockwood (formerly of the Catholic League) who has also penned right-wing commentary which has been published in said newspaper. The Pittsburgh Catholic edition appearing just before the November 2004 election contained several right-wing ads from alleged non-profit and PAC groups allegedly registered pursuant to state law. My cursory search of the PA Department Of State's website failed to discover any registration for many of those "groups" which I believe were merely shills for Republican operatives. In October 2004, windshield fliers were placed on automobiles during Masses; those fliers (and the newspaper ads I previously mentioned) essentially stated that it was a mortal sin to vote for Kerry.

The good news for the Pittsburgh diocese is that things may be getting better. Wuerl is now in Washington where he may get his wings clipped a bit. The Pittsburgh Catholic has announced that it will no longer accept political ads (perhaps because Santorum and Casey are both Catholic pro-life candidates). However, much of Pennsylvania remains a bastion of conservatism, and it will be important for the Democratic party to get out its base out for this election.

[ShortnFiery]

38. YES! The Arlington VA Diocese sent a letter from the Bishop

that was given to *all* the parishioners in *all* the Masses the Sunday before the 2004 Presidential Election.

The letter was so convoluted as to be absurd but argued much more convincingly to side with Bush for President.

I wish that I would have saved that letter. I almost quit my faith after that stunt but no, the "hate-filled" right wing of our Church do not own Catholicism. ;)

[redqueen]

6. The church is a homogenous entity?

I don't know about that... seems to me there is good and bad. Perhaps we ought not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

[kurth]

8. John Paul II's resistance to the invasion of Iraq was well documented

September 17, 2005 - Cardinal Pio Laghi, Pope John Paul II's special envoy to George W. Bush in March 2003, has told Italian RadioRai in a recent interview that the US president did not read the pope's letter urging him not to pursue the war against Iraq. Cardinal Laghi said that when he handed Bush Pope John Paul's letter, Bush didn't read it and set it aside, saying he had already pinpointed a solution. Laghi then explained that the president gave him an audience of 40 minutes, speaking uninterruptedly until Laghi broke in to say he'd come to Washington to present him with the pope's thoughts, not just to listen to him...

[redqueen]

10. Thanks for posting that, kurth!

How unsurprising that bush would blabber his idiotic nonsense at his guests, rather than allow them to speak with him. What an embarassment he is.

How sad this thread has been recommended twice now.

Reminds me of those who rail about how Democrats do nothing to stop Bush. Argh!

[crim son]

16. What's the use of a private letter?

Sure, the Pope "cautioned" against entering Iraq. I remember one or two such instances. But as the Vicar of Christ on earth, a continued and vehement public protest against the Shrub's actions could have influenced millions of people and potentially have either slowed or stopped our invasion. As it stands I know a hell of a lot of Catholics who believe, on religious grounds, that we've done the right thing going in. We haven't. If the Pope understood this, it was his responsibility to do more. IMHO. Flame away.

[muriel_volestrangler]

19. The Catholic church called it a "crime against peace"

VATICAN CITY, MARCH 17, 2003 (Zenit.org).- The president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace said that a military intervention in Iraq would be a "crime against peace."

Archbishop Renato Martino quoted Jesus' words on Vatican Radio: "If a son asks you for bread, you do not give him a stone," and added: "To a people who for 12 years have been begging for bread, preparations are being made to drop 3,000 bombs on them!"

"It is a crime against peace that cries out vengeance before God," the archbishop said. "Let us pray so that the Pharaoh's heart will not be hardened and the biblical plagues of a terrible war will not fall on humanity."
...
"He (the Pope) will insist even more on the need and urgency for peace," said the archbishop, who for 16 years was the Vatican permanent observer to the United Nations. "As always, he will be the Good Samaritan who will kneel to dress the sores of a wounded and weakened people."

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO0303/S00263.htm

Earlier:

Pope condemns war in Iraq

Pope John Paul II has expressed renewed opposition to the possibility of war in Iraq, saying the use of military force had to be the "very last option".

In a New Year address to Vatican diplomats, the Pope said war was "always a defeat for humanity", and called instead for more diplomacy and dialogue.

"War is never just another means that one can choose to employ for settling differences between nations," he said.

The BBC's David Willey in Rome says The Vatican clearly does not consider that America's planned offensive to topple Saddam Hussein meets the conditions of a "just war" laid down by the Roman Catholic Church.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2654109.stm

Pope urges world to avoid Iraq war

Pope John Paul II used his Christmas Day address to urge the world to avoid war in the Middle East, an apparent reference to the crisis over Iraq.

Without naming countries, the pope said efforts for peace were urgently needed "in the Middle East, to extinguish the ominous smouldering of a conflict which, with the joint efforts of all, can be avoided."

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/12/25/pope/

And a raft of appeals for peace: http://www.christusrex.org/www1/icons/pope-war.html

Any catholics who thought their church was OK with the war weren't paying the slightest bit of attention.

[crim son]

20. They were paying attention. They only thing you can find

to read around the house is Catholic literature. These people consider themselves to be informed; they are active in their Church. I've read this literature and it was, during the run up to the war and before the 2004 election, violently anti-Democrat. One of the articles you posted is in a New Zealand publication. The other two make indirect references to the U.S. and the Bush. I wonder, then, to what degree I should be blaming the media's presentation rather than the Pope(s). I must say, however, that my MIL who attends mass daily and participates in the service regularly, is online reading what's out there as well. If she had discerned a clear message i.e. that a vote against Bush was not a vote for, say, abortion, she mighn't have voted that asshole into office twice.

There's more to this issue than simply posting what the Pope might have said about the war in terror in general. The overall thrust of the Catholic message these last few years has been more anti-gay and anti-abortion than anti-war. Can you possibly have forgotten how Kerry was accused of not being a true Catholic? That's the message that resonated for many voters. They're listening; and they're hearing what's being shouted, not what's whispered.

Sorry for bad grammar and typos. I'm typing fast because we have a guest and I'm supposed to be entertaining!

[muriel_volestrangler]

21. I was replying to your post #16

which was entirely about Iraq, and nothing to do with abortion, homosexuality, etc. I'm not saying I like a lot of the Catholic stances on things; but they were vocally anti-invasion. It was far from just a private letter.

[crim son]

22. Oh, and I'm sorry.

In my head I am lumping it all together, and obviously not making it clear. You may be able to tell that I take what I perceive to be the Church's failure rather personally. As, perhaps, you do your position that She has not.

[VioletLake]

11. It's a common misunderstanding.

Shrub is an alcoholic taint, not a catholic saint.

[barb162]

13. What religion is Bush? Maybe go after that religion instead of

bashing the Catholic Church.

[crim son]

17. Millions of Catholics voted for Bush.

They shouldn't have. What's your point?

[cap]

24. Millions of Catholics voted against Bush

Heavily Blue states in the NorthEast and CA voted against Bush.

Millions and Millions of Catholics were in the major anti-war demonstrations around the world.


We are having another bunch of weirdo Catholic threads popup lately.

Let me tell you guys... hardcore Catholic old-time DUers are watching this nonsense and are willing to step in and tell people when there are nutcases spouting off crap that is not mainstream Catholicism. Some mainstream Catholic positions on the right-to-life are not what many of us here on DU believe.

But we refuse to be divided... For too many of us our identity is composed of our hyphenated status as Americans, our Catholic religion, our pro-unionism and our sense of social justice.

Remember, unlike many Protestant sects, we have to do go works to get into heaven...

With this current administration, we have a lot of good works on our list. A lot of stuff has to be undone so we can get to heaven.

[barb162]

26. Thanks for that brilliant post.

You are totally correct. Some posters pick out a religion, for some reason, often Catholicism, and then bash it. I think a lot of long-time Catholic DUers have already left. I just don't see them posting any more.

("We are having another bunch of weirdo Catholic threads popup lately.

Let me tell you guys... hardcore Catholic old-time DUers are watching this nonsense and are willing to step in and tell people when there are nutcases spouting off crap that is not mainstream Catholicism. Some mainstream Catholic positions on the right-to-life are not what many of us here on DU believe.")

BRAVO!

[ShortnFiery]

37. No, I'm a practicing Catholic of the Franciscan Variety ...

Well, I should be Jesuit due only to my fired-up temperament. :blush:

My daughter transferred from a Catholic School to Public Elementary this year. Last year she informed me that one of her teachers claimed that Dear Leader was a devout Catholic who attended Mass every week. I laughed and told my daughter, "Honey, don't correct her but Bush is Methodist and NOT a regular church goer. :P

It never fails to amaze me how some of our right wing conservative Catholic parishioners DESPISE all things liberal to such an extent that they will allow themselves and others to become both deluded and willfully ignorant.

Nope, I don't consider people upset with the actions of some of the Hierarchy and Right Wing Parishioners as abhorrent. So do I. :hi: However, I will not stop practicing my faith - it's our Church too and We Belong, i.e., liberal Catholics. ;)

[barb162]

25. probably millions of Baptists, Lutherans, etal voted for him too

Why is the article only about Catholics other than to be a catholic bash. That is the POINT

[cap]

27. I refuse to be divided by religion...

Catholic vote is both a splintered and a swing vote....

Let's not foster resentment... Let's rally the troops.

By the Catholic faith, you gotta do good works to get to heaven. Today's saint was canonized for her work in Warsaw helping the indigent youth and elderly.... She must've been an archetypal Democrat...

She would not have supported band aids or religious platitudes. Poland is still a heavily socialized country with many supports for the vulnerable. It is a most Catholic position to have the government help the needy. Many Catholic countries have big social support nets.

[smirkymonkey]

33. He's Protestant.

Specifically, Methodist. He was raised in the Episcopalian and Presbyterian churches, but became a Methodist after God told him that if he stopped boozing, he'd make him the president. That's why it puzzles me that he seems to have a direct line to the Vatican. Politics makes strange bedfellows, I suppose.

JFK was the only Catholic president this country has ever had.

[midnight]

23. As a Catholic I have to say that he would have to be saying

the our father at mass, and to recite that prayer means he would have to pray to be delivered from sin, and not the other way around. It appears he is deep, deep, deep into sin.

[cap]

28. 6th or 7th ring of hell????

Should he lick the streets of New York City like they did in some of the old time Catholic festivals? Join the Opus Dei and flagellate himself regularly? Crawl on a marble floor up to the alter on his knees (I've done that so see the back side of the alter of Our Lady of Czestohowa, and I'm not up for another round of that one... Ouch... Ouch... Ouch...)

I think hair shirts are too mild a penance.


Should he sit on a pedastal in the desert and fast?

Or how about washing the feet of every single person in New Orleans that was mistreated by his administration... and the relatives of the folks who died... I mean, just for starters...

Oh god... if we get into the list of making amends to all those he has harmed, I will never finish this post.


Soooo many mortifications of the flesh in order to earn true penitence and reconciliation.... It is so hard to chooose.

[Sanity Claws]

29. Why pick on the Catholic religion?

You're just a disruptor. If anyone joins you in your argument, you'll claim that progressives are narrow-minded, even though you were the one who started the fight.
What joy do you get out of starting fights? What is your problem?

[Judi Lynn]

30. Church leaders have been protesting Bush's Iraq War, but they don't

get coverage, usually. We only hear about them almost by accident!

Here's just one tiny snip I found in a jiff, looking for a link I could toss into this thread:

Religious leaders urge greater opposition to Iraq war
Written by RNS and United Church News reports
Wednesday, 27 September 2006

~snip~
In a weeklong series of nationwide protests against the Iraq war, several religious leaders have risked arrest during civil disobedience in an effort to inspire a mass mobilization of people of faith against the war.

The Rev. Joseph Nangle, president of the board of trustees for the United States Catholic Mission Association, and James Winkler, general secretary of the United Methodists' General Board of Church and Society, were arrested last week during protests in front of the White House.
(snip/...)

http://news.ucc.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=679&Itemid=54

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you ponder it for a moment, and really strain, you'll remember that, at various times, you've heard American churches (not the ones which speak in tongues, of course) have spoken out against this crap, and it really has stuck in my mind because the United Methodist Church has made its position clear several times, and it's the same church _{George W. Bush} claims as his own church. He has been spitting in their faces with his policies.

As far as I'm concerned, any excuse to rage against _Bush genocidal policies is a good one.

Thanks for the article, wcepler. Welcome to D.U. :hi: :hi: :hi:

[Judi Lynn]

31. The answer to the title question is "That's what Bush wants you to think."

Why else have we been innundated with all these crappy subliminable (for the idiots) photos?

[pnwmom]

36. Doesn't that just make you want to throw up?

Those pictures are so sick.

[Bridget Burke]

32. Well, he's not dead yet, for one thing.

He's not Catholic, either. He was raised Episcopalian but joined the United Methodists. (That Church also opposed the Invasion of Iraq.) However, he's gone beyond both denominations.

Bush has been toadying to the Religious Right--a movement with roots in a virulently anti-Catholic version of Protestantism. They are against abortion & gay rights--but reject Catholic teachings against aggressive war & capital punishment.

Do your homework.

[IndianaGreen]

34. In the Middle Ages, Bush would have been a henchman for Torquemada

or viceversa.

On a happier note, Bush would have been tortured by the Inquisition for just being an infidel Protestant. If anyone deserved torture, it would have been Bush.

[pnwmom]

35. Pope John Paul came out strongly against the Iraq war. Did we listen?

The Catholic church also opposes the death penalty and supports the "preferential option for the poor." Does Bush care?

Give me a break. The church is not a monolith and the individual members are no more responsible for what is happening in the United States than anyone else who is or isn't a member of a church.