MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
The Pope’s Subversive Message
The following piece by Arthur C. Brooks (*) was published in The New York Times opinion page. It is a strong view on Francis's visit significance for US Catholicism. Read full article
Comments
Disclaimer & comment rulesUnity, eh. On the one hand, some say that Francis was “tricked” into holding a sign demanding talks about the Falkland Islands. What rubbish. He knew exactly what he was doing. The sign reflected the same view he held before he got to be pope. “El Papa” is a liar. Not too good when you're supposed to be God's representative on earth. But then he's an argie. Wouldn't recognise truth if it got up and kicked the balls he may or may not have. Being invested as pope requires being carried at shoulder height through the assembly of cardinals. Why isn't that photographed so the world can see whether Kirchner cut his nuts off?
Oct 10th, 2015 - 02:25 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Conqueror - are you anti-Catholic or anti-Pope Francis? You are so biased as to be nonsensical!
Oct 10th, 2015 - 03:57 pm - Link - Report abuse 0@2
Oct 10th, 2015 - 04:03 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Must be one of the believers.
Why is the RCC one of the richest, if not the richest, organisation on the planet?
Oct 10th, 2015 - 05:14 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Simply because the simpletons who believe in god and the RCC send this despicable outfit their money.
In poor countries like Nigeria they spend money they need to improve their lives on building 'the house of god' in their neighbourhood. Meanwhile the children only have a school uniform to wear, the rest of their clothes are in tatters. I know, I have seen it with my own eyes.
But wait, is that the blood curdling cry of the Bat Shit Mad Muslims that also infest Nigeria? YES, it is!
Oh dear, both the true religions of god. How is that even possible, there cannot be two claimants to the crown can there?
It doesn't really matter, there is no god, there is no paradise, there is however the gift of life brought about by millions of years of natural selection to the point where we are at now. Live your life and die happy, the final disappointment will not bother you, you will be dead.
Live your life under the yoke of religion and it will just be your disappointment will be here on earth. Nothing else will change.
@2. When are you hoping to be issued with a brain? Or a mind? Or at least an operating nervous system? Get that hand moving at 20,000 beats a minute and you could even hope to be a wanker!
Oct 10th, 2015 - 05:36 pm - Link - Report abuse 0I always thought that Mercopress attracted adult mature people(with the exception, of course, of the argentina malvinista trolls) - clearly I was wrong.
Oct 10th, 2015 - 08:09 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Are you all anti-Semites also! Band of idiots!
Brooks' NY Times article is incoherent.
Oct 10th, 2015 - 09:41 pm - Link - Report abuse 0He argues the pope is after something deeper than unity.
But only the last sentence says what the pope is really after:
“He is in the hunt for the whole human soul”.
I have no idea what that means and at a minimum it is a very vague statement.
If a writer spends 15 minutes demonstrating that the pope is after something subversive, shouldn't the conclusion state clearly what the author thinks the pope is really after, instead of, “he's after your very soul”.
I spent 15” reading this article to find out what the pope was really after only to be left hanging without an answer.
If Brooks doesn't have anything important enough to communicate clearly, then it isn't professional for him to be abusing a reader's time with hollow words that don't ultimately lead to any real conclusion.
Pope Francisco's message sounds very clear to those who want to hear. He is saying to the world's powerful: stop being so greedy. Live and let others live too. He tells them their offensive to consolidate a world where power and wealth is more concentrated than ever will be counterproductive in the end.
Oct 10th, 2015 - 10:35 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Big business believe with no Soviet Union anymore and China becoming capitalist they do not longer have to fear revolution and can set the clock back to the age of gold of wild capitalism, putting the masses at their place once for all.
The Pope tells them being too greedy will be their demise.
Up to them to hear.
@8
Oct 11th, 2015 - 04:16 am - Link - Report abuse 0I was trying to be more clear on what Brooks was saying, not the pope, but:
The pope has an awful lot of money too. Is the Catholic Church greedy?
What about greedy politicians who skim from a nation's treasury, the people's money? Do they hurt the masses? Was their anything in the Pope's message about that?
Nestor Kirchner had a basement full of bags of cash. Was he too greedy?
The automobile you drive is capitalist greed. The phone you speak on is capitalist greed. The computer you write on is capitalist greed. The home you live in is capitalist greed. It was all done for profit. None of it was provided for anything but selfish reasons.
The pope takes advantage of the products of capitalism too.
Maybe you should not involve yourself in those products of capitalist greed because you don't believe in “greed”.
Can I decide which part of your earnings you deserve and how much you need to give back because the amount you want to keep is just too “greedy”?
Or is it just the ones who “want to hear” like you, that are allowed to draw the line between legitimate earnings and greed?
Do you think you have been greedy? I bet not.
Do you think your nation of origin has been greedy towards its neighbors?
And of course, the U.S.A. is just greedy too. Their people in no way earned their standing legitimately. Other countries are in disarray not because of their own corruption, but because the U.S.A. and capitalists stole their resources from them. Right?
Was there anything in the pope's message about how corrupt governing will lead to a nation's demise?
Argentina is at the forefront of “inclusion”, fair economics. There government often criticizes corporate earnings and greed. And yet you won't go near Argentina.
#9 bushpilot
Oct 11th, 2015 - 07:41 am - Link - Report abuse 0Capitalism was no doubt a force of progress that developed productivity for many years--though workers had to fight tooth and nail to humanize their working conditions and compensation.
However, the dominant force of capitalism nowadays is not hinged in production but on financial speculation and absolute wealth concentration. This is the greedy capitalism Pope Francisco is talking about. The capitalism that uses fiscal safe havens to avoid paying taxes in the countries where it generates benefits; the capitalism that generates financial bubbles and then compensates itself when the bubbles burst; the capitalism that, in perpetual quest to maximize profits moves its operations to countries where lax regulations and abundance of low-paid labour allows maximization of profits.
The result? The richest one per cent globally are getting close to own more than half of all wealth by 2016.
@10
Oct 11th, 2015 - 10:09 am - Link - Report abuse 0As you are undoubtably the most intelligent of the trolls on here, tell us how you would make Argentinas poor rich as I expect that is their aspiration, given the the majority of the poor shy away from “ work ”?
@ 6 gordo1
Oct 11th, 2015 - 10:58 am - Link - Report abuse 0”Are you all anti-Semites also! SIC (?).”
Semites include (among others) the Jews and the Arabs.
I am most certainly not against the Jews per se, they are a hard working people with a very industrious society. I care not for their religion as I care not for ALL religions as they are the source of all the trouble in the modern world.
The Arabs are work-shy Muslims, the Wahhabi sect of which is determined to wipe out everybody who do not embrace the bat-shit mad so called religion of Islam.
The greatest conflict facing the west is that of Islam. How it will be resolved remains to be seen, but there are those of us who suspect they know the answer.
@6. You have no need to return.
Oct 11th, 2015 - 11:07 am - Link - Report abuse 0@8. Send us your money.
@10
Oct 11th, 2015 - 12:36 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Just google UK foreign aid budget. The UK gave last year £ 19 billion roughly U$ S 28 billion as foreign aid and gave Argentina £ 225 million over 20 years, and the dope of a pope thinks we ought to give more, he is absolutely loopy. In fact we give almost the entire amount that Argentina has in reserves ( if the figure of U4S 32 million ) can be verified to the poor in the world. Tell us how much Argentina and the Vatican give to the poor ( figure to the nearest pound sterling ) will suffice. What a hypocritical twat the pope is. Perhaps he has not heard of the internet and google.
@13 You have now convinced me that you are NOT an adult mature person! Are paulcedron in another guise?
Oct 11th, 2015 - 12:50 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Can someone provide proof that there is a God or a Mohammed or anything that resembles a higher being. If there is a God why does he allow all the conflicts around the world in the name of religion?
Oct 11th, 2015 - 01:07 pm - Link - Report abuse 0#14 golfcronie
Oct 11th, 2015 - 06:41 pm - Link - Report abuse 0“The UK gave...Argentina £ 225 million over 20 years, and the dope of a pope thinks we ought to give more.”
No. You either have totally misunderstood Pope Francisco's message or are willfully misrepresenting what I said @10.
Francisco is not asking for hand outs.
He is asking for less greed on the part of the economically powerful, those who can manipulate the rules of the game to suit growing concentration of wealth in fewer hands.
I will say again what I said at #10:
Is greedy capitalism what Pope Francisco is talking about, a capitalism that for example:
1. Uses fiscal safe havens to avoid paying taxes in countries where its benefits originate;
2. Generates financial bubbles gaining with speculation and then compensates itself when the bubbles burst;
3. Maximizes profits by moving its operations to countries where lax regulations and abundance of low-paid labour allows maximization of profits.
Those and other reasons make the top 400 richest Americans to have more wealth than half of all Americans combined. The same abysmal differences exist between countries of course.
Now, imagine only some of the benefits of global development based, not on aid, but on equal opportunities. More economical progress and education would give hope, therefore reducing violent conflict and reducing birth rates. Note that most people don't ask much; just an opportunity to live and raise a family with prospects of improvement.
That is what Francisco is talking about--and this is the opinion of a non-believer.
“He is asking for less greed on the part of the economically powerful, those who can manipulate the rules of the game to suit growing concentration of wealth in fewer hands.”
Oct 11th, 2015 - 10:20 pm - Link - Report abuse 0What about the politically powerful that manipulate the rules to concentrate wealth in their hands?
It isn't just bankers that are greedy and hurt people.
Did the pope say anything about corrupt politicians that skim off a nation's treasury?
The Roman Catholic Church is what it is - a status quo organization. However this is the first American pope, and it shows. Gone are the incompetence and appeals to authority of the European popes (and Europeans generally). If the Roman Catholic Church is to survive it needs more Americans.
Oct 12th, 2015 - 01:27 am - Link - Report abuse 0@19
Oct 12th, 2015 - 09:10 am - Link - Report abuse 0Thats why the pope does not want contraception and abortion as this will further the cause for more “ Americans”, trouble is it is the braindead in Latam that follow this road and end up with more children in poverty. We in the west give enough to your deadbeat countries that cant feed themselves. £ 19 billion we gave to deadbeat countries last year and what to show for it, more poor children that do not have enough food, where does the money go? Answer on a post card to your various governments.
@ 6 gordo1
Oct 12th, 2015 - 05:22 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Burn the Heathens.
@ 12 ChrisR
If current trends continue, there won’t be much left to fight.
Muslim are killing Muslims in large numbers, even with only basic weaponery.
@ 19 Hepatia
You probably haven’t noticed, but this Pope speaks English with much more of an Italian accent than Spanish, the two are quite distinct to an English ear.
What you have is another Italian Pope, but in disguise.
@ 21 Pugol-H
Oct 12th, 2015 - 06:14 pm - Link - Report abuse 0“If current trends continue, there won’t be much left to fight.”
Apart from those in the UK, Holland, etc. who have many children to bring forward their majority over the original society. They will win because they will VOTE their way to getting rid of the 'kaffers'.
15 pugol en contra
Oct 12th, 2015 - 09:26 pm - Link - Report abuse 0“You probably haven’t noticed, but this Pope speaks English with much more of an Italian accent than Spanish, the two are quite distinct to an English ear.”
but, how can you know it, dear pugol en contra?
you dont know shite about spanish or italian language, and even less about their accents.
but the worst part is that you dont know shite about english either.
remember, you isleteers speak patois.
@23 cara de orto podrido aka paulcedron
Oct 13th, 2015 - 05:57 am - Link - Report abuse 0So now you are an expert phylologist? What a b====o de m====a you are!
@ 22 ChrisR
Oct 13th, 2015 - 04:03 pm - Link - Report abuse 0We can let them “go fight Jihad” as well.
Strange how the word “Kaffer” has come back round again. Spelt Kafir this time with a somewhat more original meaning.
@ 23 pcIV
Mate, I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but when old red sock is speaking in English, as he did recently in the US, he speaks English with a pronounced ITALIAN accent.
Quite distinct from the accent Spanish speakers have, when speaking English.
Not unusual either, I once met some Argys, born and bred, who were of German parents and spoke English with strong German accents, which is very distinctive.
Italian is both his mother tongue and first language, like I said “what you have is another Italian Pope, but in disguise”.
24 gordo tirapedos
Oct 13th, 2015 - 07:00 pm - Link - Report abuse 0phylologist?
and what the f*ck is “phylologist”?
you mean philologist????
and what the f*ck has philology got to do with this issue??????
eh??????????????????????
@26 paulcedron aka cara de orto podrido
Oct 14th, 2015 - 05:57 am - Link - Report abuse 0“Phylologist”/”philologist - I misspelt to make you look it up. And, of course, it has all to do with your crappy comments in @23.
Idiot child!
you dont even know your “”own“” language, fartso.
Oct 14th, 2015 - 12:06 pm - Link - Report abuse 0gordo, boludo y burro: you have it all, fatty fartblower
@28 pcIV - cara de orto podrido/paulcedron/idiot child
Oct 15th, 2015 - 02:23 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Go on - keep on posting like that and you will be deleted by the moderator again!
http://en.mercopress.com/2015/10/10/the-pope-s-subversive-message#comment417106: To American ears his English accent sounds just what it is - South American Spanish.
Oct 17th, 2015 - 03:45 am - Link - Report abuse 0The thing about you Eurotrash is that you realize that without America you have no relevance. So you habitually claim that Americans are really Europeans to support your failing self esteem.
@30 HEPATITIS
Oct 17th, 2015 - 05:41 am - Link - Report abuse 0The totally irrelevant entity around here is ARGENTINA! Even its footballers win nothing these days!
(Bit I have to confess my admiration for the PUMAS)
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