Burning Concerns

Racism, Growth of Racist-Nationalism, Warfare against civilian populations

Four years after Hitler’s Machtübernahme (Take-Over), in March 1937, Pope Pius XI penned the Encyclical, Mit brennender Sorge (Burning Concern) — good but not strong enough — the Catholic Church’s “Concerns” about the Aryan doctrine of the Third Reich.

As a lifelong Catholic, one of my many shames, is how in July 1933, Eugenio Pacelli, who after the death of Pius XI, was elected in the conclave as Pius XII, signed the Concordat with the Third Reich.

I am especially ashamed by the fact that the Concordat ensured that only German nationals would be priests in churches within the Reich, with the pregnant meanings the term “German” carried under Aryan doctrine.

Although the Church tries to maintain that Pius XII refrained during the War from overt condemnation of Aryan-Doctrine and its genocidal (!!) practice — Pius XII, they maintain, was trying to enable the Church and the Faithful to survive the Third Reich — I have never bought it.

The presence of a murderous, naye, genocidal Third Reich presented significant worries to Pius XII and Catholics practicing in the War zones. I will not trivialize that.

But I grew up with Pius XII, and at 76, Pius XII is a living memory.

In the 1950s, Armando was indoctrinated with the Baltimore Catechism.

Say the words, Baltimore Catechism, and that will raise smiles to many Catholics of my generation. The Catechism featured model 1950s or even 1940s families well-dressed in suits and formal dresses, with girls and women not only formally dressed but having a veil that would fashionably rest over the eyes. Think Audrey Hepburn.

Well, the Church was very doctrinal about birth control.

And the same Pius XII, whose tongue the cat had bitten during the Shoah, found his voice in 1947 with the Italian society of Midwives.

There, Pius XII waxed eloquent about the virtues of MARRIED women giving birth; NO exceptions to the proscription against abortion — to be clear — NONE; and, if the mother’s health would not bear pregnancy, the duty of the married couple to carry the cross, live celibate, live heroically carrying the cross of sexual frustration to comply with the Magisterium.

Yes. I am a lifelong Catholic, but the contrast between the wartime Pius XII and that of 1947 praising heroic married couples who practice “chastity” to protect the life and health of the vulnerable woman, outrages me.

When I was a child of the 1950s, Pius XII was one of my idols, a man of unachievable sainthood.

Armando — already a reader — would at, say, nine years old, sit and read the Baltimore Catechism under a tree at 8061 San Marcello Circle, Buena Park, California, a member of St Pius V. Parish, and across the street from the new Buena Terra school. This was 1957.

Now, the Baltimore Catechism is comically clear in its questions and answers. Ideal for a child’s retention.

Plus it was richly illustrated.

Little Armando came upon the chapter dealing with Purgatory.

Little Armando was morbidly fascinated by the penciled picture of souls, recognizably souls of men and women, with look of concern and worry, in wavy pencil lines depicting the flames in which the poor souls were suffering.

Hmm. Little Armando does not want that. So, I read that it was possible to obtain indulgences.

Hmm. That sounded good.

Well, in the back cover of the catechisms were set out half a dozen prayers one could say to obtain an indulgence.

Now, I am sure that the writing said something like, 30 days indulgence (i.e., time knocked off of purgatory) for such and such prayer; more days for another prayer.

But little Armando, in his boyish impatience and astonishment, read it otherwise.

Armando imagined: These prayers were needed to knock off, say, 425 years of purgatory. Hmm, let us see. We are 1957. Christopher Columbus came in 1492.

Well, you get the picture of the scared kid.

Never talked to anyone about it. This was formative of any view I had of an afterlife.

So, the Church faced the greatest moral crisis in the history of humanity, and the Church failed.

Yes, there were many priests and nuns who helped refugees from the Third Reich. There were also many who were convinced Nazis and cooperated.

And there is a vast chasm between silence on the Shoah and a clear voice in 1947, commanding faithful couples to “chastity” if a pregnancy would endanger the woman.

Today and recently, we face wars that amount to war crimes against populations of noncombatants. Both Russia in Ukraine, Israel in Gaza and Lebanon, Pol Pot in the 1980s, Rwanda in the 1990s, Serbia against Croatia and Kosovo in the 1990s.

Today, we have one of two major political parties that have turned the obscene blood libel of Anti-Semitism (“the Jews steal your little ones; celebrate a Mock Mass, during which they eat your kids”) — which enflamed millions of anti-Semitic populations over the centuries and enabled the Great Lies of Joseph Goebbels and the Shoah — to now making current the blood libel against decent, good, gentle, cultured Haitian immigrants (“they steal the kitties and puppies in Ohio and eat them in Voodoo ceremonies”).

Racism is an immediate and grave danger not only in the United States but in the World.

The blood libel is adopted by the Presidential Candidate and Vice Presidential Candidate of one of two major political parties.

We need to elect Kamala Harris, the Joyful Warrior, who practices humanity and seeks to unite.

MAGA has adopted the blood libel and we must destroy it.

Cato the Elder (234-149 BCE) had repeated in each speech of the Roman Senate, ceterum autem censeo Carthaginem esse delendam. Essentialy, “Additionally, I am of the opinion, Carthage must be destroyed”).

Rome did ultimately destroy Carthage.

In the same spirit, ceterum autem censeo MAGAM esse delendam — “MAGA must be destroyed.”

Make no mistake, we NEED a responsible, Conservative Party representing the common values of Americans with fiscal restraint.

That spirit is embodied in such great Conservative economists as Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek.

Friedrich Hayek was opposed to my favorite, John Maynard Keynes. But Fr. Hayek was fond of Keynes personally and he engaged Keynesianism with mutual respect and reason.

I am Social Democratic — think Bernie Sanders/Elizabeth Warren — but I welcome Conservatives in the tradition of Bill Buckley, Russell Kirk, Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek.

We must promote diversity of viewpoint through TWO responsible, mainstream parties that promote human values of equality and the dignity and infinite value of each human.

Until we have two such parties, our duty is to elect the Democrats.

Ceterum autem censeo MAGAM esse delendam.

Here, by the way, is my pride in my career as GS-905-15 Counsel within the Navy Office of General Counsel (I retired in 2016):

I guess Armando OWNS “NAVY OGC” in the State of Mississippi. Before that, I had owned it in Arizona.*

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*Armando speaks ONLY for himself. God knows, I get in enough trouble just speaking for myself. Just ask Nancy, my well-loved wife (married 51 years — sigh!) — she’ll tell you. The NAVY speaks ONLY through ITS OWN approved channels. Everything here is mine AND NOT THE NAVY’s. But, God, I DO love the Navy.