It shouldn’t surprise us that a pope makes the generic statement that war is bad. That’s what popes do. Unfortunately, over the centuries, popes have been quite inconsistent on the issue of war and peace.
Just like the septuagenarian baby boomers who stand on a street corner with signs calling for world peace, the church’s admonition of the Trump administration’s attempt to prevent the radical fanatics of Iran from getting a nuke is woefully naïve.
Ultimately, aren’t we all for peace? Who in their right mind wants their son or daughter to have to go on the front line with the risk of losing their lives? Everyone with common sense wants peace, stability, and the ability to pursue happiness.
But to simply say that any type of military action is forbidden is to submit to evil. And the pope, of all people, should know about the evils that exist in the world.
Ironically, the Bible itself is laden with story after story of the righteous taking up arms for noble causes
In fact, you can look up on the painted ceiling of some churches and see vast murals of the angels battling Satan’s demons. Does the Pope suggest that the angels lay down their swords and let Satan be victorious in the battle between good and evil?
Of course, going to war is sometimes justified. Winston Churchill and Franklin Delano Roosevelt were not war criminals. They understood there was a need to fight and defeat the evil Nazis. Negotiations just weren’t going to get you there.
And when the communists were seeking to take over the world in the 20th century to snuff out all religions, including Catholicism, they were rebuffed only because the United States military stood ready to fight back, even if it meant going to war in Korea, Vietnam, or elsewhere.
Would the pope have been happier if the U.S. dismantled its tanks and allowed Mao and Stalin to take over every continent and to execute those who sought to continue a religious life?
There are many who try to take a moral high ground that they are somehow more evolved than those who feel the need to insert military force in certain circumstances.
That is the position of a loser and someone who will be forgotten in history when their opponents decide to use force against them.
In this case, it is no secret that the religious fanatics in Iran have always sought a bomb and are praying for the day that they will be able to use it, primarily against the Jews in Israel and the Catholics and other denominations in America — all infidels.
Anyone thinking that negotiations are going to prevent this is mistaken.
What’s most frustrating is that Pope Leo felt the need to express himself by criticizing U.S. policy. Meanwhile, you can hardly hear a peep from the church itself about the atrocities being inflicted upon Christians in Nigeria by the Boko Haram radical Islamic fundamentalists. Some Muslim nations still make it punishable by death if you convert to Catholicism.
We’d love to hear the pope speak out against Iran slaughtering 30,000 protestors or China placing Muslim Uyghurs in concentration camps.
If the pope is going to weigh into a political debate, he better be able to take the pushback.
It would’ve been totally acceptable for President Trump to disagree with the pope’s misplaced pacifism. But of course, Trump being Trump, he had to go to the next step and lose the high ground by posting pictures of himself pretending to be Jesus Christ.
The president was deserving of the enormous backlash that came with such a heinous posting. But that doesn’t absolve the pope from having weighed in on the battle that our nation is having to protect ourselves from the religious lunatics who want us dead.
The pope supporting Iran over America in this battle is the equivalent of gays supporting Hamas in its battle with Israel, despite the fact that Hamas would kill them if they were holding the hand of their partner in Gaza.
The pope’s ignoring of the Iranian threat against America is not nearly as repulsive as the church having looked the other way as 6 million Jews were exterminated by the Nazis, but it isn’t anything to be proud of either.
Our churches are the foundations of our societies. They teach us right from wrong and provide us with a conscience in our day-to-day activities. We want them to flourish, but it will be hard for them to do so when they actually become useful idiots for the people who want to destroy them.