The head of the Italian Catholic bishops’ council declared Tuesday that the recent Islamic terrorist attacks in Berlin and Ankara have nothing to do with religion. Rather, they are the result of capitalist greed.
Bishop Nunzio Galantino was personally appointed to the position of general secretary of the Italian Bishops Conference by current pontiff Pope Francis on Dec. 30, 2013.
Galantino has spoken out in favor of married priests, communion for divorcees, and embracing gays. He ridiculed faithful Catholics who pray the Rosary outside of abortion clinics as a gesture of opposition to abortion, and instead praised those who focus on building a prosperous egalitarian economy and social welfare system.
I do not identify with the expressionless faces of those who recite the Rosary outside the clinics who practice interruption of pregnancy, but with those young people who are opposed to this practice and strive for the quality of life of the people, for their right to health, to work.
On World Youth Day — an event held every few years in which hundreds of thousands of Catholic teens gather from across the globe to worship and learn together — Galantino preached that God did not destroy Sodom, but rather saved Sodom, thanks to the relentlessly non-judgmental intercession of Abraham.
But the city is saved above all because Abraham, a man of prayer, is not a relentless accuser, he doesn’t speak against but in favor. Abraham, man of prayer, doesn’t point to the misdeeds, but he announces the possibility for something new.
In typical hipster fashion, the bishop’s personal webpage prominently displays his smiling face next to a quote by anti-Hitler pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer about being non-conformist and visionary. Putting aside the fact that Bonhoeffer is not exactly Joel Osteen, the fact that the head of the Italian Bishops Conference should pass over thousands of theologians such as Augustine, Aquinas, or even the writings of a pope or the divine utterances of Scripture in favor of a relatively obscure minister whose sole claim to fame is his violent opposition to German fascism should tell us a lot about the bishop’s real values.
Those values were on full display just hours after the blood of innocent Europeans stained the ground at a Christmas market in Berlin when he told the Italian media the attacks had nothing to do with Islam, but class warfare benefiting the military-industrial complex.
“At bottom, there is just selfishness and oppression,” Galantino said. “Wars benefit those who have power or money, those who trade in weapons.” In the end, he said, “poor people die in wars, while the well-off are enriched.”
The solution, according to the bishop? Stifle criticism and judgmental statements of Islam.
“Vulgarity and aggressiveness in language fuel a climate that brings out the worst in people and impedes efforts toward a peaceful coexistence. There is a terrorism of language, and you can kill with calumny,” he said.
Do nothing to stop violent non-whites and Muslims: check.
Blame the defenders of traditional European morality: check.
Portray the practitioners of moral evils as helpless victims: check.
Glorify the enemies of your traditionalist, European enemy: check.
Ignore the suffering of your traditionalist, European enemy: check.
Urge crimestop for Christians and Europeans: check.
The bishop has got it all. He sounds like a good Communist. He just happens to be a very high-ranking one who is a friend and ideological fellow traveler with the Pope.
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