ATHEISTS ONLY

@ossobuco,

I like this 'fit' / 'singing' thing. The whole is more than the sum of its parts precisely because the parts fit, me think. A painting cannot be reduced to an amorphous bunch of color strokes put together. It has form, structure and meaning at the level of the whole painting. That's where i see some transcendence, a beauty in higher spheres, a tropism of the mind towards a higher ground or a holistic view.

Not very clear i'm afraid.

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@Olivier5,

Whatever you say.

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@Thomas,

My brother kilt a coon . . .

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@Olivier5,

Then there was near the opposite, Pius XII.. whose underling Cardinal Montini, himself a later pope, refused to see a representative of the Yugoslavian Red Cross about the actions of the (I take it) fascistic Ustache Croats to the Serbs. I read a probably biased book about that (Spy in the Vatican), so there may well be two or more sides to that story. Interesting read, though.

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@ossobuco,

I believe there's a touch of anti-catholic prejudice in many critics of Pius XII. Indeed the CC didn't oppose the Nazi regime frontally, and signed a concordat with Hitler (which he violated quite systematically). It sought to preserve its own interest. The pope did not live up to his self-proclaimed mandate as the vicar of christ on earth. But which other church did print secretly 300,000 copies of a theological rebuttal of Nazism, and asked all its german parishes to read it to their flock? Did the German protestant churches do something similar at any point? Not to my knowledge.

Did the allies do anything to stop the holocaust, with all their military power? Nope... So why focus on the pope and his zero divisions (as Stalin put it)?

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@Olivier5,

Olivier5 wrote:

Quote:
. . . and the majority view among historians is that Hitler was only pretending to respect christianity for political reasons. He would never have been elected otherwise.

Gosh, I can't believe anyone would do such a thing.

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@Olivier5,

I didn't know about those copies of theological rebuttal, good point. I know there was quite a stir about him. In my childhood/teens, my mother thought he was a saint, not exaggerating. I had left the religion scene by the time I became aware of his role being widely talked about and was mainly just curious when I saw the Spy in the Vatican book in my used book store. One thing I remember in it was that he had a german housekeeper; what that's worth, nothing, but it was pointed out as just more bias on his side.

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@ossobuco,

Pius XII was indeed held in very high regard -- including by the Jewish community in Rome -- until a few historians started to revisit his legacy. He never spoke against the Holocaust until after the war, which is the main beef against him.

For info:

Quote:

Mit brennender Sorge (English: With Burning Anxiety) On the Church and the German Reich is an encyclical of Pope Pius XI, issued during the Nazi era on 10 March 1937 (but bearing a date of Passion Sunday, 14 March).[1] Written in German, not the usual Latin, it was smuggled into Germany for fear of censorship and was read from the pulpits of all German Catholic churches on one of the Church's busiest Sundays, Palm Sunday (March 21 that year).[2][3]

The encyclical condemned breaches of the 1933 Reichskonkordat agreement signed between the German Reich and the Holy See.

[... O5: the protection of the CC and its faithfuls is the letter's primary focus. However...] It condemned "pantheistic confusion", "neopaganism", "the so-called myth of race and blood", and the idolizing of the State. [...] The encyclical declares "that man as a person possesses rights he holds from God, and which any collectivity must protect against denial, suppression or neglect."[7] National Socialism, Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party are not named in the document. The term "Reich Government" is used.[8] According to Ventresca, Cardinal Faulhaber, who wrote a first draft, was adamant that the encyclical should be careful in both its tone and substance and should avoid explicit reference to Nazism or the Nazi Party.

[...] According to Scholder, the leader of the German Bishops conference, Cardinal Bertram, sought to blunt the impact of the encyclical by ordering that critical passages be not read out.[11]

The large effort to produce and distribute over 300,000 copies of the letter was entirely secret, allowing priests across Germany to read the letter without interference. The Gestapo raided the churches the next day to confiscate all the copies they could find, and the presses that had printed the letter were closed.

[...] Though Hitler is not named in the encyclical, it does refer to a "mad prophet" that some identify as Hitler.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mit_brennender_Sorge

Full English text of the encyclical:
http://w2.vatican.va/content/pius-xi/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xi_enc_14031937_mit-brennender-sorge.html

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@roger,

Quote:

Gosh, I can't believe anyone would do such a thing.

Yeah... Sounds familiar.

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I like the tags. We do rock, don't we.

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@Setanta,

Yeah, we rock. I've got cabbage rolls, and you put on a pot of coffee.

http://barfblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/cabbage_rolls_coffe_schmenge.jpg

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@chai2,

I love their audience parcipitation songs.

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http://www.clancysmeatco.com/resources/images/products/full/Cabbage-Rolls.jpg

And now, from the king of rock and roll accordion, some thoughts on the afterlife . . .

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@Setanta,

Ahhh!
Golumpki
http://able2know.org/topic/257628-1

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https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/e8/9b/6f/e89b6f9fb169afe570c08d737fa36df5.jpg

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https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/84/e1/45/84e1454b117d226f2970830604bc038e.jpg

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https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/f3/4c/84/f34c84539e03d17a0db476db8fb74aac.jpg

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@Thomas,

Nonono, whatever YOU say... :-)

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Surely this isn't a real atheist thread until you have a neighbourhood friendly theist trying to convert you all to the Lord, politely reminding you you're all gonna burn in hell for your sins.
Sorry I just came to drop off some beers, I'll leave them on the step, mozeltov!

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@Smileyrius,

Mozeltov . . . is that some kind of pasta?

1 Reply

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