Bush comment on the Pope = huh?

evilmax17

evilmax17

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http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/04/02/bush.pope.ap/index.html

President Bush on Saturday said that Pope John Paul II was "a faithful servant of God and a champion of human dignity and freedom."

Now obviously the President has to say something nice about the Pope, and we all know that Bush is hardcore born-again, and that's not what I'm surprised about. How, in any way imaginable, is the Pope a champion of freedom? HOW!? It seems that Bush doesn't even know the definition of the word, and is just using it as a synonym for "good". It's aggravating...

 
Err. You're bing unreasonable.

The Pope John Paul the II is probably one of the greatest champions of freedoms in the history of the known world. The man ranks up there with Mahatma Gandhi.
 
[quote name='Admiral Ackbar']Err. You're bing unreasonable.

The Pope John Paul the II is probably one of the greatest champions of freedoms in the history of the known world. The man ranks up there with Mahatma Gandhi.[/QUOTE]

My sarcasm detector is a little off, so I don't know what you mean. If you were being serious, how? His open anti-homosexuality would lead me against the "champion of freedom" thing.
 
This man was so feared by the USSR and the destabilizing effect he could have on Poland and the client states of central and Eastern Europe that when Yuri Adropov was head of the KGB he recommended they kill the Pope. Later Andropov became head of the USSR after Leonid Brezhnev died. It's widely rumored and even substanitally linked recently that in fact the KGB did hire the Bulgarian that shot the Pope in 1982.

I don't know how old many of you are but Lech Walesa and Solidarity was extremely dangerous to the communists. The Poles had to out law the movement and declare martial law or else Poland would have been invaded at some point in the 1980's the way Czechoslovokia was in 1968 and Hungary was in 1956. It was a terribly frightening time in east/west relationships and many expected major bloodshed over the Poles attempt at increased freedoms.

When the history of the 20th Century is written in 20-50 years the three major leaders in the west that are going to be attributed to the final demise of communism in Europe are going to be Reagan, Thatcher and John Paul II. You're likely not going to see as significant a religous leader in your lifetime.
 
Pope John Paul the Second preached tolerance and dignity. Yes, the church doesn't support hiomosexuality, but it's not like the Pope was out there spewing hatred for homosexuals. The man loved peace and believed in faith and reason.

The Pope has traveled the world and worked through the vatican to spread freedom and democracy. The church has been involved in democratic movements in Eastern Europe, Latin America, and Africa. This pope wielded immense diplomatic presence in the world and while a lot of the church's work with his leadership isn't well known it cannot be ignored. Everyone points out Solidarity, but the church has done so much more.

Personally I don't want to sound as if I am eschewing Reagans importants as a historical figure and possibly a top twenty president. He did play an integral role in the collapse of Communist Europe. But one thing I disagree with is the Pope/Reagan/Thatcher movement. That's not to say that Thatcher and Regan weren't important political figures of the era. But the Pope is the critical figure. I think it can be argued, and argued well, that without Reagan or Thatcher the Soviet Union would have stiill collapsed, but without the pope Eastern Europe might still be under dictatorial control.
 
The Pope was for freedom for all, and hatred for people not like him.

You can hate people and want them to be free.
 
As always I disagree with the extent PAD has gone, he seems to be taking figures he likes and increasing their importance (you really need to look at afghanistan and the amount of money poured into that war, and some of the risks that gorbachev took which, in the end, backfired). One of the mains problems was poland was of such strategic signifigance to the ussr, it had revolted before, and the pope is of gigantic signifigance to them (since he's polish), if you don't understand his importance spend some time around polish immigrants or people who's polish culture is important, or go to a heavily polish area of a city (toronto's little poland has a life size statue of him). But the pope is known for attempting to heal scars caused by the catholic church (muslims, eastern orthodox etc.), he preaches tolerance for different religions and different ethnic, racial etc. groups. Sure he's a hate monger when it comes to things such as homosexuality, a little more than can just be attributed to religious feelings (he has become increasingly vocal in his denouncements, instead of more passive denouncements), he has not supported womens equality, or even some level of increased rights, in the church.
 
[quote name='David85']The Pope was for freedom for all, and hatred for people not like him.

You can hate people and want them to be free.[/QUOTE]

Pope John Paul the Second didn't hate a man or woman on earth. He didn't agree with every man or woman, but he cared for everyone.
 
[quote name='Admiral Ackbar']Pope John Paul the Second didn't hate a man or woman on earth. He didn't agree with every man or woman, but he cared for everyone.[/QUOTE]

Very true. But that statement is way to hard for most on this board to accecpt.
 
I disagree with a whole lot of the Pope's positions, but I don't think its right to underestimate his importance and the amount of good that he's done in his lifetime. John Paul is definitely one of the most important political figures of the 20th century, almost certainly more important than Reagan in terms of how much he's accomplished. The fact that many people don't realize that (I've heard more than a few people refer to him as a 'figurehead') is a testimate to how much he he spent his time working instead of tooting his own horn.

I can say something about Pope John Paul II that I can't say about most people (especially people in positions of power), that I believe that he is/was a fundamentally good man, one who truly loved everyone, and who always did what he could to help anyone, no matter who or where they were. As i said, I disagree with a lot of his positions, but even when he was condeming something, he always took care to seperate people from the actions that he was condeming (something that his followers rarely do.)
 
[quote name='Drocket']I disagree with a whole lot of the Pope's positions, but I don't think its right to underestimate his importance and the amount of good that he's done in his lifetime. John Paul is definitely one of the most important political figures of the 20th century, almost certainly more important than Reagan in terms of how much he's accomplished. The fact that many people don't realize that (I've heard more than a few people refer to him as a 'figurehead') is a testimate to how much he he spent his time working instead of tooting his own horn.

I can say something about Pope John Paul II that I can't say about most people (especially people in positions of power), that I believe that he is/was a fundamentally good man, one who truly loved everyone, and who always did what he could to help anyone, no matter who or where they were. As i said, I disagree with a lot of his positions, but even when he was condeming something, he always took care to seperate people from the actions that he was condeming (something that his followers rarely do.)[/QUOTE]

I never said that the Pope hated anybody, and I wasn't trying to say he wasn't a good person or anything (not just directed at this post). I was saying that I think Bush is confusing "freedom" for "goodness". I ask again, what has the Pope done for freedom?

People have mentioned the Pope's hand in haulting the spread of Communism, but what does that have to do with freedom? I had thought that Communism was considered a threat to democracy, and not to "freedom" per say. Of course, if you believe that "freedom" and "democracy" are interchangable words, then I can see why you would bring this up. I don't consider them interchangable.

I was mainly thinking about his anti-homosexuality stances (which as alonzo mentioned, he has been recently much more vocal about), and his views of women in the church. I don't believe that the Pope "hates gays", or "hates women". Why does it even matter? I think it's propper to judge people by their actions, and the Pope's actions aren't admirable in either situation.

"We should tolerate homosexuality, but it is a sin, and should be treated as such." Yes, the Pope isn't saying "go out and stone a gay", but he sure isn't doing anything to make homosexuals feel comfortable in the world and in the church.

"Women are God's children, but can't hold positions in the Church hierarchy." The only defense for this that I've ever heard is that "Jesus's appostles were all male", which is complete BS. I won't go too much farther down that road (unless somebody else wants to debate it), but I think the point is clear.

I would say that the opposite of freedom is oppression, and I certainly wouldn't call "tolerance" the opposite of oppresion. If you really wanted to reach, you could say that JP2 was tolerant of homosexuality. So? I'm not saying he hated gays either, that's irreleveant. His stance on women in the church is laughable in today's society (and this looks to continue with the next appointed Pope). Are you telling me that JP2 is an example of somebody who championed freedom? Not as an example of a good person, not as an example of a political figurehead, but as a champion of freedom? I think not.
 
[quote name='evilmax17']
People have mentioned the Pope's hand in haulting the spread of Communism, but what does that have to do with freedom? I had thought that Communism was considered a thread to democracy, and not to "freedom" per say. Of course, if you believe that "freedom" and "democracy" are interchangable words, then I can see why you would bring this up. I don't consider them interchangable.[/QUOTE]
Well, I think it's pretty obvious that President Bush considers those two things to be interchangable. So I don't see why it's such a shock for him to say the Pope is a champion of freedom.
 
[quote name='evilmax17']People have mentioned the Pope's hand in haulting the spread of Communism, but what does that have to do with freedom? I had thought that Communism was considered a thread to democracy, and not to "freedom" per say. Of course, if you believe that "freedom" and "democracy" are interchangable words, then I can see why you would bring this up. I don't consider them interchangable.[/quote]
Freedom and democracy aren't the same, but they are strongly related.

I was mainly thinking about his anti-homosexuality stances (which as alonzo mentioned, he has been recently much more vocal about), and his views of women in the church.
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Actually, I think most of the recent 'Pope's stance' on a number of issues weren't really the Pope. He's been in poor health for quite a while now, and I think a lot of his assistants have been doing a lot of things in his name that he wouldn't necessarily agree with completely.

"We should tolerate homosexuality, but it is a sin, and should be treated as such." Yes, the Pope isn't saying "go out and stone a gay", but he sure isn't doing anything to make homosexuals feel comfortable in the world and in the church.
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Pope JP probably did more than anyone else in the Catholic church to seperate 'being' homosexual from homosexual acts, to the point where the Catholic church has admitted that 'being' gay may in fact be genetically-based, and that there's nothing wrong with that (something that I think would be HIGHLY unlikely under any other Pope.) He still consider(s/ed) homosexual acts wrong, but ultimately, he's entirely within his rights to do so. In terms of making people feel 'confortable', if you think someone is doing something wrong, why should you make them feel 'comfortable' with doing it?
 
[quote name='Admiral Ackbar']Err. You're bing unreasonable.

The Pope John Paul the II is probably one of the greatest champions of freedoms in the history of the known world. The man ranks up there with Mahatma Gandhi.[/QUOTE]

I have nothing against the Pope but he was no Gandhi.
 
[quote name='evilmax17']I never said that the Pope hated anybody, and I wasn't trying to say he wasn't a good person or anything (not just directed at this post). I was saying that I think Bush is confusing "freedom" for "goodness". I ask again, what has the Pope done for freedom?

People have mentioned the Pope's hand in haulting the spread of Communism, but what does that have to do with freedom? I had thought that Communism was considered a threat to democracy, and not to "freedom" per say. Of course, if you believe that "freedom" and "democracy" are interchangable words, then I can see why you would bring this up. I don't consider them interchangable.
[/QUOTE]

Maybe you should ask people that have lived under a communist oppression style governemnt if they feel like they had a whole bunch of freedom in their culture and lifestyle. Communism in it's defintion and basic theory isn't oppressive, but lok through the history books and you'll see governemnt regimes like the USSR were hardly a haven for freedoms.
 
[quote name='Duo_Maxwell']Maybe you should ask people that have lived under a communist oppression style governemnt if they feel like they had a whole bunch of freedom in their culture and lifestyle. Communism in it's defintion and basic theory isn't oppressive, but lok through the history books and you'll see governemnt regimes like the USSR were hardly a haven for freedoms.[/QUOTE]

That's true, but one can't really argue the way he ran the catholic church promoted freedom either. He didn't tolerate dissent, less so than his predecessors. Also, his contraception policy (particularly in africa where priests have a lot more power over people) has been devastating.
 
By "champion of freedom," you can refer to his religious freedom... man, you just need to read up on it and what he actually accomplished.
 
[quote name='alonzomourning23']That's true, but one can't really argue the way he ran the catholic church promoted freedom either. He didn't tolerate dissent, less so than his predecessors. Also, his contraception policy (particularly in africa where priests have a lot more power over people) has been devastating.[/QUOTE]

Yes, he has a lot of power in the church as it's leader (which once he aged so much he was more a figurehead than anything else), more so than anyone else, but he doesn't make Catholic policy or even rewrite them on a mere whim or his own personal beliefs. He may have denounced homosexuality, but he also did a lot to advance in the Catholic Church despite what you hear from others. Trust me, if the Catholic still thought the same of homosexuality as they did in the 60's there'd probably be much more hatred from the Catholic relgion.

To compare him to his predecessors is also unfair. For starters this is basically the only pope of the modern era as we know it. I'm sure in the 50's, 60's and early 70's chances for dissent and disagreement around the world were far less when things like 14-hour world wide newsnetworks or the internet don't exist.

Granted, he had his share of failures and missteps, but who the hell doesn't? I can't think of one leader of anything that did everything perfect and nobody ever disagreed with him or her. You say he hardly ran a Catholic Church promoting freedom, but the pope looks out for people but also has the duty to uphold what the ideals and beliefs of the Catholic Chuch. If it's a beilief of the Catholic Chruch that contraception is wrong and goes against God's natural order of things, then it's the belief of that relgion, just as it's your belief that the Catholic Church is wrong. Some say he's the Catholic Chruch's highest leader under God and he's there to interpupt God's teachings for Catholic, but it isn't the Pope's job to uphold the beliefs and ideals of all the people world wide.

Besides EvilMax wanted an example and people gave him one and I was simply supporting the fact that he didn't want his homeland of Poland to possibly sibmit to an oppresive communist regime, which would've been a blow to freedom and democracy at the same time.
 
[quote name='Duo_Maxwell']Yes, he has a lot of power in the church as it's leader (which once he aged so much he was more a figurehead than anything else), more so than anyone else, but he doesn't make Catholic policy or even rewrite them on a mere whim or his own personal beliefs. He may have denounced homosexuality, but he also did a lot to advance in the Catholic Church despite what you hear from others. Trust me, if the Catholic still thought the same of homosexuality as they did in the 60's there'd probably be much more hatred from the Catholic relgion.

To compare him to his predecessors is also unfair. For starters this is basically the only pope of the modern era as we know it. I'm sure in the 50's, 60's and early 70's chances for dissent and disagreement around the world were far less when things like 14-hour world wide newsnetworks or the internet don't exist.

Granted, he had his share of failures and missteps, but who the hell doesn't? I can't think of one leader of anything that did everything perfect and nobody ever disagreed with him or her. You say he hardly ran a Catholic Church promoting freedom, but the pope looks out for people but also has the duty to uphold what the ideals and beliefs of the Catholic Chuch. If it's a beilief of the Catholic Chruch that contraception is wrong and goes against God's natural order of things, then it's the belief of that relgion, just as it's your belief that the Catholic Church is wrong. Some say he's the Catholic Chruch's highest leader under God and he's there to interpupt God's teachings for Catholic, but it isn't the Pope's job to uphold the beliefs and ideals of all the people world wide.

Besides EvilMax wanted an example and people gave him one and I was simply supporting the fact that he didn't want his homeland of Poland to possibly sibmit to an oppresive communist regime, which would've been a blow to freedom and democracy at the same time.[/QUOTE]

He was a conservative pope, elected at a time liberal ideas were gaining ground in the church. One of the reasons he was elected was to strengthen its conservative traditions. But he didn't tolerate dissent within the church, toleration of dissent within an organization is not based on the era the person lived in, or the technology that exists.
 
[quote name='David85']The Pope was for freedom for all, and hatred for people not like him.

You can hate people and want them to be free.[/QUOTE]

He forgave a guy that shot him. That's real hatred right there...
 
[quote name='Admiral Ackbar']Err. You're bing unreasonable.

The Pope John Paul the II is probably one of the greatest champions of freedoms in the history of the known world. The man ranks up there with Mahatma Gandhi.[/QUOTE]
I have to agree... You're being a little unreasonable because you disagree with his politics. But its also a little understandable that you wouldn't necessarily equate the pope with freedom, or doing much of anything, since you probably grew up during his twilight years.

Theres a reason why people are already calling him John Paul the Great, and its not for what he did inside the church. He didn't really help the church itself very much.

When Poland was still ruled by a Communist regime, the Pope went there and met with the leader, General Jaruzelski. This is a guy who imposed martial law and had protesters shot dead, among other things, and he was shaking and trembling before the Pope. He wasn't afraid of shooting his own people, destroying costal cities, or invading Czechoslovakia, but... Holy shit, its the Pope!

Even when he was shot, he visited the man that shot him, in jail, and told him he forgave him. He went out and called him his brother, and asked people to pray for him and forgive him.

He's not like these religious people of today that emphasize the negative things, that go out and make it their cause to denounce gays, unwed mothers, and those satan-incarnate liberals, he made it his cause to promote compassion, love, respect, and freedom, and not nearly enough of these evangelicals realize that these are the real core Christian values. He knew that Gays were not what was important, and while he didn't particularly like homosexuality, he didn't hate the person for it.

The Pope was one of the most influential people of the 20th century, whether you agree with him or not, and often times, I didn't.
 
[quote name='alonzomourning23']He was a conservative pope, elected at a time liberal ideas were gaining ground in the church. One of the reasons he was elected was to strengthen its conservative traditions. But he didn't tolerate dissent within the church, toleration of dissent within an organization is not based on the era the person lived in, or the technology that exists.[/QUOTE]


That's your opinion... one can only tolerate so much of anything, I'm quite sure that modern technology has made the communication of dissent and disagreement easier to spread than anything else. In the end, if you tolerate enough dissent then that opens up the door for even more and before you know it the Catholic Church i snot the same and is basically in chaos. Dissetn in the Roman Catholic Church was already growing during Paul VI's papacy. And what is toleration of dissent anyways...dissent can be either a simple disagreement or the refusal to confrom to one's authority. If any leader just lets his subordinates constantly walk all over he won't be leader much longer, that's not religious, just common sense. Could he have been more open to the suggestions and ideas of his people...certainly, but the Roman Catholic Church isn't really a democracy (which doesn't make ignoring those around the right thing to do exactly).

Also, I assume by liberal ideas you're talking about things like Vatican II? For starters that or mainly any other ideals of the Cathloic Church have been liberal, things like Vatican were more of an attempt to bring the Church more into the wide open of society instead of cutting it off like it had been doing. It wasn't started to insert liberal ideas into Church Doctorine. If he was so deeply conserative compared to his predecessors then what was Paul VI's Humanae Vitae in 1968. It was perhaps the most signigant writing from the Vatican in the late 60's and spoke of the same conservative views on contraception, sanctitiy of marriage, the role of women in the Church and so forth. In fact IMHO if you compare the documents of the two John Paul II would appear to be at the same level of Conservatism as Paul VI. Besides, don't forget, John Paul II may have never been elected hadn't John Paul I not make it very long into his role as pope.

In the end I agree with dafoomie alot...John Paul II's secular accomplishments were probably more important or at least had a bigger impact than on anything he really did for the Church. The best thing he did for the Cotholic Church IMHO was maybe bring it even more into the light of the world's view by his travels, it didn't have much to do with actual Church policy and doctorine.
 
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