pope francis, the us and liberation theology

Listening in to  the Beeb's World service reporting  on the election of the new Pope just confirmed my opinon of  it as a Western Propaganda Service. More interesting  than what they said  was what they did not say. There was no mention of Liberation Theology.

The was talk about one of the  humble sheep becoming the Shepherd.There was talk about a cardinal from "the developing world" and even the "third world" rising to be The Pope. There was no mention of  the conflict zone between the  Roman Church and the iconic South American movement  for social justice. Justice that challenged the might and the rights of  the right wing white governments  in south america . Pope Francis actually fought to prevent his Jesuits from joining the  Liberation movment.

Is it a wonder, then, that he has been selected now to head the Church in the increasingly left leaning South America? The US is still fighting the Liberation Movement in its southern 'sphere of influence' - the backyard it is loosing but still fighting to retain.


This article is definitely worth reading  and thinking about.

The Wikileaks Revelations

US Still Fighting “Threat” of Liberation Theology

by DANIEL KOVALIK

On September 15, 2011, I wrote to Rev. Msgr. Kuriakose Bharanikulangara, the First Counsellor of the Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the United Nations.   In that letter, which was prompted by the killing of the 79^th priest in Colombia since 1984, I expressed my concern for the continued killing of Catholic priests and other religious in Colombia.  I asserted my belief “that this assault on the Church in Colombia is both state policy of Colombia as well as the United States which is propping up that military with billions of dollars of assistance, and which views organized movements for social justice in Latin America as a threat to its economic domination of the region.   I am not alone in this opinion as other priests in Colombia, notably Father Javier Giraldo, S.J., have also expressed this view for many years.”

I copied Father Giraldo on this letter who responded to me with a short note which simply thanked me for the letter and stated, “It is correct the interpretation you gave of what I think.”  As for the Holy See, it never responded to my letter – presumably because it does not share my concerns for these priests.

Thus, in December of 2009, Professor Noam Chomsky gave a fascinating speech at Columbia University which summarized events known to few in the developed world:   In 1962, Pope John XXIII, through the Second Vatican Council, attempted to reclaim the early roots of the Church; the Church of the first 300 years when it was the “persecuted Church,” the Church of the martyrs.  The nature of the Church had changed with Constantine’s declaration in 324 A.D. that the Catholic Church would be the official Church of the Roman Empire, thereby making it the “persecuting Church,” with the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition and complicity with Nazism among the numerous crimes which flowed from this.

With the Second Vatican Council in 1962, the Church worldwide began to reevaluate itself.  In Latin America, this took the form of “Liberation Theology” – a philosophy which took a “preferential treatment for the poor” and which called for active support for social justice movements on behalf of workers, landless peasants and indigenous peoples and active opposition to military rule and corporate domination.

This philosophy, which combined Christianity with Marxism, was first formulated at a meeting of Latin American theologians, spearheaded by Gustavo Gutierrez, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1964. Brazil became ground zero for this new movement and Christian “base communities” dedicated to Liberation Theology began to spring up in that country and to spread throughout Latin America, with more theological meetings to develop Liberation Theology held in Havana, Cuba; Bogotá, Colombia and Cuernavaca, Mexico in June and July 1965.

As Noam Chomsky explains, the United States, not content to sit back and watch as an openly Marxist theology take hold in Latin America – a theology which threatened the U.S.’s economic and military domination of the region – quickly moved to wipe out this emerging movement through violence.   For its part, the Vatican, after the death of John XXIII, also moved to wipe it out through the censuring, removal and even de-frocking of liberation priests and bishops.

Wikileaks Cables

Recently, I was motivated to do a Wikileaks search for “liberation theology” to see what might be revealed about the U.S.’s current position toward that philosophy and the individuals who live by it.   In all, thirty-one (31) cables were revealed through this word search, and the cables involved numerous countries, including El Salvador, Cuba, Ecuador, Paraguay, South Korea, the Philippines, Haiti, Brazil, Venezuela, Lebanon and the Vatican itself.   These cables revealed the continued obsession with the U.S. State Department with Liberation Theology and the shared hostility of both the U.S. and the Vatican to this doctrine.

For example, the U.S. Embassy to the Vatican — in a cable entitled “Partners for Progress – Working with Vatican Development Agencies,” and dated January 24, 2003 – makes it clear that the U.S. and Vatican are currently on the same page when it comes to their opposition to Liberation Theology and its challenge to the unjust market structures which perpetuate poverty. (1)  Thus, the Embassy states:

THE HOLY SEE ITSELF APPEARS TO HAVE MADE A PHILOSOPHICAL SHIFT IN RECENT YEARS ON ITS APPROACH TO DEVELOPMENT. WHILE MANY POSITION PAPERS STILL CARRY MORE THAN A HINT OF A DEVELOPMENT MESSAGE ROOTED IN THE HALCYON DAYS OF LIBERATION THEOLOGY AND THE INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT THEORY OF THE LATE 1960S, RECENT STATEMENTS — AT THE JOHANNESBURG SUMMIT ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT, FOR EXAMPLE — REFLECT A POSITION CLOSER TO THAT OF THE USG [U.S. Government].   RECIPIENTS OF DEVELOPMENT AID ARE ASKED TO BECOME PROTAGONISTS AND PARTNERS IN THEIR OWN DEVELOPMENT. CONCEPTS SUCH AS TRANSPARENCY, GOOD GOVERNANCE, ACCOUNTABILITY AND MARKET LIBERALIZATION NOW PROVIDE A COUNTERBALANCE TO BLAMING “UNJUST STRUCTURES” OR “UNBRIDLED CAPITALISM” FOR THE WORLD’S WOES. THE POPE HAS REINFORCED THESE CONCEPTS IN RECENT MESSAGES AND STATEMENTS, WHICH SUGGESTS THAT THE NEW PERSPECTIVE WILL TRICKLE DOWN FROM THE DICASTERIES TO DEVELOPMENT AGENCIES TO SHAPE THEIR POLICIES AND STRATEGIES. GIVEN THE IMPORTANCE OF THE VATICAN’S VOICE THROUGHOUT THE DEVELOPING WORLD. EMBASSY BELIEVES USG DEVELOPMENT AGENCIES SHOULD SEEK TO BROADEN CONTACTS WITH THE HOLY SEE TO BUILD SUPPORT FOR OUR DEVELOPMENT POLICIES AND INITIATIVES AND TO DEVELOP SYNERGIES WITH THE MANY VATICAN-RELATED DEVELOPMENT AGENCIES. END COMMENT

In a May 6, 2007 Embassy cable relating to the visit of Pope Benedict XVI to Brazil, the U.S. Embassy there discussed this issue at great length. (2)   For example, under the heading, “The ‘Threat’ of Liberation Theology,” the Embassy writes:

Another major contextual issue for the visit is the challenge to the traditional Church played by liberation theology. Pope John Paul (aided by the current pope when he was Cardinal Ratzinger) made major efforts to stamp out this Marxist analysis of class struggle.  It had come to be promoted by a significant number of Catholic clergy and lay people, who in a political compromise sometimes sanctioned violence “on behalf of the people.” The more orthodox form of liberation theology that sided with the poor and oppressed had undergone a reductionist reading that the Vatican sought to correct. To a large extent, Pope John Paul II beat down “liberation theology”, but in the past few years, it has seen a resurgence in various parts of Latin America.

This same cable inadvertently points to the results of the U.S.-Vatican attack on this philosophy – the continued mal-distribution of wealth in Latin America.  Thus, in this cable, the Embassy explains that at a press conference following the Papal visit to Brazil, “the bishops complained about the ‘unjust distribution of wealth and the abysmal differences in the distribution of resources’ in their region.   They asked how this could happen when the majority of Latin America’s presidents, business people and professionals claim to be Catholics.”

Of course, this query answers itself.   The continued unjust state of affairs in Latin America is in no small part the result of the Vatican’s own actions, with the help of the repressive forces of the U.S., in promoting a strain of Catholicism which allows the rich and powerful in Latin America to feel comfortable about their wealth – that is, to believe that they have a far better chance of entering heaven than a camel through the eye of a needle as Jesus had warned – and in “stamping[ing] out” the Liberation Theologians who took active, real-world steps to challenge the unjust hold of the rich and powerful upon their nations’ resources and land.   In short, the continued injustice quite naturally, and quite predictably and intentionally, follows from the very actions of the Vatican and the United States.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/03/05/us-still-fighting-threat-of-liberation-theology/