Huffington Post: Pope Benedict XVI says condoms can be justified In some cases

NICOLE WINFIELD and FRANCES D'EMILIO | 11/20/10 07:33 PM | AP

 The man with the white hat is Bishop Richard Williamson, the Holocaust Denier. The Vatican has kept him under wraps.

VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI has opened the door on the previously taboo subject of condoms as a way to fight HIV. the pontiff said  male prostitutes who use condoms may be beginning to act responsibly. In the past the Pope had blamed condoms for making the AIDS crisis worse.

The pope made the comments in an interview with a German journalist published as a book entitled "Light of the World: The Pope, the Church and the Signs of the Times. " The Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano ran excerpts on Saturday.

Church teaching has long opposed condoms because they are a form of artificial contraception. However, the Vatican has never released an explicit policy about condoms and HIV.

Benedict said that condoms are not a moral solution to stopping AIDS. Pope Bennie the Rat said in some cases, such as for male prostitutes, their use could represent a first step in assuming moral responsibility "in the intention of reducing the risk of infection."

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Examiner.com: Pope Benedict is a world class ignoramus

Darth Benedict XVI

Pope Benedict began a State Visit to the United Kingdom and immediately showed himself to be ignorant of both historical knowledge and common sense. One advisor, Cardinal Walter Kasper, was removed from the trip after saying the UK as a "third world nation" that was being controlled by  "a new and aggressive atheism,"

Benedict managed to insult Britons, non-believers, and rational thinkers around the world.

Standing next to the Queen, the Pope delivered a highly-politicized speech to a Royal family that had ties to the Nazis during World War 2. The Pope used this speech to warn Britain about "aggressive forms of secularism" and "atheist extremism" in society. He recalled the Nazis "As we reflect on the sobering lessons of the atheist extremism of the Twentieth Century."

In a few short sentences, Benedict threw down a gauntlet by linking the atrocities committed by Nazi Germany with atheism. Although the Nazis had no real love for Catholics, Nazi Germany was a religious state. 

The Nazis drew upon both Christianity and Pagan influences. Nazi paraphernelia proudly proclaimed Gott mit uns (God with us).

The Nazis painted Teutonic Crosses on their aircraft. Nazi propaganda routinely referred to political enemies as atheists and Hitler was raised Roman Catholic. Some historians believed that Hitler wanted to start a new German Nazi religion.

Pope Pius XII's (1876-1958) actions during the Holocaust remain controversial. For much of the war, he maintained a public front of indifference and remained silent while German atrocities were committed.

He refused pleas for help on the grounds of neutrality, while making statements condemning injustices in general. Privately, he sheltered a small number of Jews and spoke to a few select officials, encouraging them to hide Jews.

Not only did the Pope Benedict buy into the lie that the Nazis were atheists, but apparently he has forgotten the history of an organization he was part of, both as a member of the Hitler Jugend (Youth) and as a member of an anti-aircraft gun crew.


Benedict did not stop there, however. He continued to state that "the exclusion of God, religion and virtue from public life leads ultimately to a truncated vision of man and of society and thus to a reductive vision of the person and his destiny. "

He wants to maintain "those traditional values and cultural expressions that more aggressive forms of secularism no longer value or even tolerate."

One can only wonder what traditional values and cultural expressions the Pope thinks are in danger of no longer being tolerated. Does that list include the continued molestation of children?

source: http://www.examiner.com/atheism-in-columbus/pope-decries-secularism-links-atheists-to-nazis


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Pope Benedict XVI: Female priests are the same as pedophiles

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Haaretz: Pope defends Nazi-era Vatican

Last update - 20:33 17/01/2010
By Sivan Kotler de Benedetti and News Agencies

Pope Benedict XVI used his first visit to Rome's synagogue on Sunday to defend the oft-criticized actions of the Vatican during the Holocaust, saying the Church had "acted in a discreet and hidden way."

The pope made the comments after a Jewish leader bluntly told the pontiff that his wartime predecessor Pius XII was "silent" in the face of the genocide of the Jewish people in Europe, and should have spoken out more forcefully against the Holocaust.

"The silence of Pius XII before the Shoah still hurts because something should have been done," Riccardo Pacifici, president of Rome's Jewish community told the pope, using the Hebrew word for the Holocaust.

"Maybe it would not have stopped the death trains, but it would have sent a signal, a word of extreme comfort, of human solidarity, towards those brothers of ours transported to the ovens of Auschwitz [death camp]," he said.

Meanwhile, Israel, via Deputy Prime Minister Silvan Shalom, asked the pope during his synagogue visit to open up the Vatican archives covering Pius' papacy.


"I asked the pope to find a way to make it possible to open the archives in the Vatican in order to give some details of the papacy of Pius XII in order to ease tensions between the Jewish people and Catholics," Silvan Shalom told Reuters at the end of the pope's visit.

In his speech in the synagogue, Benedict balked at the accusation that the pope turned a blind eye to the plight of Europe's Jews, saying: "The Apostolic See itself provided assistance, often in a hidden and discreet way."

Benedict was welcomed with applause Sunday upon his arrival at the synagogue, a visit he said would improve relations between Catholics and Jews.

He was greeted by Rome and international Jewish leaders as he arrived at the synagogue on the banks of the Tiber - a short distance from the Vatican - to begin the two-hour visit.

Several prominent Jews said they would boycott the visit, but applause greeted the pope as he arrived at the synagogue in the Old Jewish Ghetto, where for hundreds of years Jews were confined under the orders of a 16th century pope.

Benedict warmly shook hands with the synagogue's retired chief rabbi, Elio Toaff, who welcomed John Paul II when the late pontiff visited the synagogue in a ground-breaking event in 1986.

Rightardia comment: The Vatican needs to open its secret archives on the Nazi era. Benedict XVI proclaimed Pope Pius XII, sometimes referred to as the Nazi Pope, is eligible for beatification in a decree issued on December 19, 2009. Pope Benedict was a member of the Hitler Jugend and should clear the air on Catholic complicity with the Nazis. Let some Jewish scholars examine the archives and prepare a report

source: Hareetz

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Pope Benedict to Confront Secularism on His First Czech Visit

Sept. 25, 2009

By Jeffrey Donovan

(Bloomberg) -- Pope Benedict XVI will confront secularism when he visits the Czech Republic, a former communist nation with a centuries-long history of religious and ideological conflict where the percentage of Roman Catholics is declining.

The Catholic leader, who speaks out often about the risk of secular Europe losing its Christian roots, arrives in Prague tomorrow for a three-day visit to one of the few European countries yet to ratify a treaty on relations with the Vatican.

The trip is his first as pope to the Czech region, the theater of religious wars from the 15th to 17th centuries, and comes 20 years after the fall of the Soviet-backed regime in Prague.

Poepe Benedict has said, “The Czech Republic is geographically and historically in the heart of Europe, and after having endured the dramatic events of the previous century, it needs, as does the entire continent, to rediscover the reasons for faith and hope.”

Religious leaders have warned the Pope he faces a huge challenge in a nation of skeptics. There are few banners heralding the Pope's visit. The Pope wants to starts a religious revival in Europe, but the Czech Republic is one of the worst places to start.

The Pope's German heritage and social conservatism are not a big pluses either in the Central European nation.

Most Czechs view the Pope as being out-of-touch with the contemporary world. Less than one in three Czechs identify themselves as Roman Catholic. Before World War 2, four out of five Czechs were Catholic.

One of the Czech Roman Catholic leaders,Tomas Halik said, "The reanimation of the Catholic Church is a long term goal. And even the Pope can't work miracles.."

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