Does the Church Have Any Weapons Left? photo: AP / Osservatore Romano, HO
Article by WN.com Correspondent Dallas Darling. When the Vatican proclaimed that it supported worldwide protests against economic inequalities, it was mindful of another scene that had unfolded around the first millennium in Europe. But first, the Catholic Church's Justice and Peace Department announced that businesses and state economies should always lead to the welfare and good of the people. While decreeing that people should demand a more equitable economic and social order, one that protests unemployment, homelessness and food shortages, the Catholic Church also issued a statement saying the economic and financial crisis which the world is going through calls everyone, individuals and peoples, to examine in depth the principles and the cultural and moral values at the bases of social coexistence. But how powerful and effective are such Church decrees, and do people really care about sacred judgments? By the time Pope Gregory VII attempted to excommunicate (banishment from the Church) King Henry IV over appointing bishops and unmitigated acts of violence, the papacy and Church had become greatly weakened. Not only had militant and corrupt ideologies overtaken the Church from within, but from without surrounding feudalistic kingdoms were continually at war and causing enormous civil strife. Superstitious beliefs had replaced the more virtuous qualities of love, service, forgiveness, and mercy. Economic sharing and simplicity, including acts of charity, had been substituted with pagan rituals and traditions of avarice and revenge. Even Church weapons like the Peace and Truce of God did not prevent kings and nobles and knights from shedding blood during holy seasons nor plundering and killing innocent men, women and children. Therefore, Pope Gregory excommunicated King Henry. He also placed German lands under interdiction (sacraments or signs of God's grace and salvation were no longer effective). Concerned that German kingdoms would rebel against his authority, King Henry traveled to Canossa. According to Pope Gregory, "having laid aside all the belongings of royalty, wretchedly, with bare feet and clad in wool," he (King Henry) stood before the castle gates of Canossa for three days with many tears imploring mercy." Even though Pope Gregory grudgingly forgave King Henry, King Henry never forgave the Pope. Seven years later, King Henry marched into Canossa and disposed of Pope Gregory. This conflict between the sacred and mundane, Canon and Secular Law, and Church and State, would continually reoccur over the centuries. After Pope Gregory's attempt for a new kind of "libertas ecclesiae," Pope Urban II, out of desperation, used the weapon of a "just" and holy war. He declared a unholy crusade against Muslims and pagans to try and conquer Jerusalem. He was fearful of a burgeoning population, ongoing wars between rival kingdoms, and a declining Church. He wanted to also assist Byzantium's emperor who had requested military assistance. But the crusades did not liberate the Church, neither did it unite Europe. While future crusades turned inwards leading to horrific inquisitions, they would also justify forced conversions and the death of millions throughout Africa, Asia an the Americas. Meanwhile, some merchants grew rich from the ongoing wars against Muslims. The looting of Constantinople and innovations from the House of Wisdom merely fueled the "idolatry of European markets." Like modern neo-liberal and secularized economies, backed by trans-national corporations, the Church itself experienced "selfishness, collective greed and hoarding of goods on a great scale." The accumulation of Church relics (sacred objects and material remains thought to have belonged to Jesus and his disciples) were advertised as a way to gain supernatural powers and bring about prosperity. Not only did the imperial Church try to monopolize Jesus' True Cross and Holy Sepulcher, but street preachers and vendors peddled bodily parts belonging to saints or anything connected to their early ministries. Even disposable items like teeth, hair, nail clippings, Jesus' sandals and traces of his blood, and milk from the Virgin's breast, could be bought and sold. Since the "idolatry of the market" promised holy and untapped powers, crusaders could never have enough relics. As the Church wonders if it has any powerful weapons left in its holy arsenal of faith, and as it grapples with monopolizing God's grace and salvation through excommunication, interdiction, just wars, and holy relics, it might want to remember there are other, probably more effective, weapons. The greatest of these, of course, are love, forgiveness, justice, and acts of mercy and charity. Proclaiming the Historical Jesus, the one who overturned the money changers' tables in the temple and then chased them out, not to mention Jesus' civil disobedience and nonviolent direct action campaigns against Imperial Rome, are also powerful weapons to speak about and too live. The Historical Cross, the one that evoked fear and terror because it symbolized what would happen if one challenged the Peace of Rome and its economic exploitation, is really the True Cross and should be embraced. Jesus did not announce or live the Holy Sepulcher, but instead he announced and lived the Kingdom of God. It was not a Kingdom based on feudalism and usury and war, but a Kingdom that would topple the rich and mighty rulers. One that would be where the greatest would be the servant of all. And it would be Kingdom signaling the beginning of God's action against evil in history, including militarism and retaliatory violence and foreign occupiers. Instead of seeking the Holy Sepulcher, pilgrims should pursue sharing food with the hungry, providing drink for the thirsty, welcoming the stranger, caring for the sick, visiting those in prison for their faiths and due to economic injustices, and clothing the naked. These are the real and more powerful weapons of the Church. Such weapons bring about the great reversal that Jesus spoke about and lived. This is how Jesus is vindicated, especially in the midst of neo-liberal economies that create "various forms of injustice, the negative effects that will follow on the social, political and economic level," and that "...create a climate of growing hostility and even violence, and ultimately undermine the very foundations of democratic institutions." Along with urging Wall Street powerbrokers to examine the impact of their decisions on humanity, those in the Church should reevaluate their own actions and how they influence others regarding "unequal and pre-existing balances of power that prevail over the weakest and poorest of the world." A "supranational authority" and worldwide "universal jurisdiction," one that guides economic and political policies, should first serve and help liberate the poor, actually the very same ones that Jesus came to serve and liberate. The Church should also recognize the enormous void and severe divisions that now exist in the world due to secularized states and their unholy market economies. A delegation of Muslim, Christian, Jewish, and Druse religious leaders, that recently met in Israel, should serve as a paradigm. The Council of Religious Leaders, an interfaith group, promotes toleration and compassion in the midst of misguided democratically-imposed wars in the Middle East. The council also believes economic and political inequalities and conflicts are mainly caused by selfishness and personal motives and interests. Pope Benedict XVI reiterated the importance of interfaith dialogue and peace in "troubled times." To be truly authentic, the Church must remember to fashion ploughshares and not swords. To be truly effective, it must always reject and condemn the militancy and weapons of the state. Dallas Darling ([email protected]) (Note: All quotations are from a recent statement issued by the Catholic Church's Justice and Peace Department regarding the global economy.) http://article.wn.com/view/2011/11/19/Does_the_Church_Have_Any_Weapons_Left/ ------------------------------------ Post message: [email protected] Subscribe : [email protected] Unsubscribe : [email protected] List owner : [email protected] Homepage : http://proletar.8m.com/Yahoo! 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