Recent news stories have reported that the Pope has praised Russian Imperialism especially with reference to the periods ruled by Catherine the Great and Peter the Great.
“Don’t forget your heritage. You are the descendants of great Russia: the great Russia of saints, rulers, the great Russia of Peter I, Catherine II, that empire — educated, great culture and great humanity, …”
“Never give up on this heritage. You are descendants of the great Mother Russia, step forward with it. And thank you — thank you for your way of being, for your way of being Russian.”
Both were aristocratic rulers noted for brutal repression and/or Imperialism. The Pope said they were enlightened and advocates of humanity. Their alleged virtue consisted of spreading and enforcing Catholicism.
The Pope failed to mention that the Enlightenment, the emergence of reason and rights (including freedom of religion) except in the arts, never reached Russia. Russia has been politically totalitarian, a champion repression and mass murder throughout its history: from pre-Communism to Communism to post-Communism.
It’s history is written in human blood.
What about Catholicism itself? It has much to apologize for:
- It was one of the earliest versions of totalitarianism and long opposed, by force, any competing religions
- it was based on faith (belief in the absence of evidence), dogmatism and obedience to authority; it never endorsed reason as a virtue . (It is not in the Ten Commandments)
- It long accepted the legitimacy of slavery
- It long opposed science and threatened one of the greatest scientists in history, Galileo, with death for opposing their false cosmology–it took the Church 400 years to admit their error
- It long opposed birth control and still opposes abortion
- It worshipped martyrdom (dying for one’s faith) more than life-affirming achievements
- It long made a list of forbidden books
- It viewed sex as a means of making babies but did not approve of it just as a pleasure
- The church cooperated openly with the Nazis and has tried to be accommodating to Communists
- It rejected reason as a means of knowing until Aquinas said reason could yield knowledge but he did not admit that it contradicted faith
- It was not pro socialist (because they were atheists) but it has tried to accommodate them
- For hundreds of years it has tolerated and covered up sexual abuse of boys by priests (lawsuits are still going on)
- It long forbade divorce
- It has always been critical of capitalism because, although it raised the standard of living in every country where it existed, some people were still poorer than others and the poor were to inherit the earth
- It considers pride, even if earned, as sin, and humility (seeing oneself as low) as a virtue
- It has strongly resisted acceptance of people who are gay
If Catholicism has become somewhat less oppressive over the centuries, these changes have been based on Enlightenment thinking, viz., that people have rights, that personal happiness on earth is good and that reason is one’s means of achieving it.
To complete the job the Pope must mercilessly condemn Putin’s Russia as a country of pure evil.
