Apparently the Vatican is appalled by the treatment meted out to Saddam Hussein. The rat was shown on worldwide television, unshaven and dishevelled, which in the view of the Catholic Church, is unbefitting a man of his former importance.
WHAT!!!!!
Not a word from the Catholic Church during Hussein's thirty-five year rule of terror. No complaints about the tens of thousands of people tortured, hanged, shot, stabbed, gassed or otherwise murdered by Hussein. But the church is appalled by his apparent mistreatment by the military and the media.
And I got to thinking, "How is it possible for one organization to be so wrong, so often, over such a long period of time and over so many issues"? For hundreds of years the Catholic Church thought it was a good idea to hang, drown or burn witches. During the same period the Catholic Church thought it was a good idea to torture heretics until they confessed their "sins," and then to despatch them with fire. Until Martin Luther spiked its guns, the Catholic Church thought it was a good idea to sell "indulgences." The Catholic Church murdered Copernicus and imprisoned Galileo for daring to suggest that the earth revolves around the sun.
The Catholic Church was right behind the Conquistadors throughout the destruction of the Aztec and Inca empires. It was a good idea because much of the gold stolen from that region ended up as Church property. The Catholic Church encouraged nations to participate in the slave trade because the Bible condones it and Christian nations prospered by it and therefore it was a good idea. Damned shame those interfering abolishionists put a stop to it. The Catholic Church fought the abolishionists tooth and nail but ultimately lost.
The Catholic Church remained silent while the Nazis gassed or otherwise murdered millions of Jews, gypsies and homosexuals. The Catholic Church helped Nazi war criminals escape to South America because it seemed like a good idea and the right thing to do. The Catholic Church did everything within its power to stir up trouble in Vietnam and succeeded in drawing the USA into that dreadful war. The Catholic Church sided with General Pinochet in Chile and approved of him murdering tens of thousands of Communists. This story was repeated right across South and Central America.
When thousands of Catholic priests were sodomizing tens of thousands of children it seemed like a good idea to move the offenders around the country, from parish to parish, and keep quiet about the whole thing. Were it not for the money it has cost the Church, the same shifty methods would still seem like the best solution to a minor problem.
Despite massive and overwhelming evidence to the contrary, the Catholic Church claims that condoms assist the spread of AIDS. It seems like a good idea to ban condoms and ensure that millions more Africans die of that disease. And now the Catholic Church wants us to hang our heads in shame because of the alleged maltreatment of Saddam Hussein.
Could it be because in Saddam Hussein the Church recognizes a kindred spirit? A man without mercy, compassion or principles of any kind?
The Catholic Church, in fact all churches, can only survive for so long as the world remains ignorant, poor, superstitious and credulous. Every census in Europe and Australia shows a decline in religious belief. Even the USA, that bastion of religious gullibility, can only hold out for so long. For the church to survive beyond the middle of this century there needs to be a disaster on a massive scale, something so enormous that the population of the world is forced back to its grovelling, subservient, "pray to god for deliverance," past.
It concerns me tremendously that the Church might deliberately manoeuvre politicians into a position where a nuclear war becomes inevitable. All it would take is for the Virgin Mary to whisper in the ear of a pope, and for Catholics around the world to heed the word of the Madonna. The machinery would be set in motion. It would seem like a good idea and the right thing to do.
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