So it has been announced that Osama bin Laden is dead.
Good.
The twisted, evil mastermind responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent human beings has been shuffled off this mortal coil.
This provides a measure of justice. Not full justice. That’s in God’s hands. But some justice.
Of course, Our Lord’s command to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us still applies. We must hope that Osama bin Laden repented at the last second, or that he had been crazy for years and not responsible for his actions, or that God might provide for his salvation in some other way.
And we must remember that Christ himself died to make salvation possible for all men, Osama bin Laden included.
But possibility does not equal actuality. As Pope Benedict has reminded us in various works, evil is real and hell is a real choice. If anyone, judging by outward, human appearances, was ripe for going there, Osama bin Laden was a plausible candidate.
This may have even applied to his final moments. Reports are still sketchy, but it is reported that he died resisting the offensive against his compound, which may mean he was wielding a weapon. It is also reported that a woman who was one of the five people killed in the compound was used as a human shield. This may mean — and future reports may clarify this — that bin Laden himself grabbed the woman himself and tried to use her as a shield while he pointed a weapon at her or at others.
Not the kind of choices one wants to make just before one meets one’s Maker.
After his death, steps were reportedly taken to confirm bin Laden’s identity, including the taking of a DNA sample that is still being processed. Then his body was taken out of Pakistan and buried at sea.
That’s a good choice, actually. It denies future Islamist fanatics of a burial site where they could alternately go on pilgrimage or bomb something.
Of course, they will be trying to bomb things anyway, but they would have done that even if bin Laden were alive. It’s what they do.
The question is: How do you minimize that?
Burial at sea is one measure. Another is found in the response issued today by the Vatican spokesman, Fr. Federico Lombardi, and reported by my colleague Edward Pentin:
Osama Bin Laden—as everyone knows—has had the gravest responsibility for spreading hatred and division among people, causing the deaths of countless people, and exploiting religion for this purpose.
Faced with the death of a man, a Christian never rejoices, but reflects on the serious responsibility of everyone before God and man, and hopes and pledges that every event is not an opportunity for a further growth of hatred, but of peace.
I was surprised that the Holy See had a statement so quickly and that it was so well done. This is what the Vatican needed to say, something that did not appear to let bin Laden off the hook morally but also did not appear to rejoice at his passing and that was an appeal for interreligious harmony and peace.
The statement that a Christian never rejoices at the death of a man is a positive affirmation that the Vatican needed to make. It’s also true in the sense that death as a physical evil is not to be wished upon anybody for its own sake. That is not to say that one cannot be glad that justice has been in some measure served, that bin Laden won’t be masterminding any more plots, etc.
Of course, it would be foolish for the Vatican to point out those things. They would be precisely the things that would inflame anti-Christian anger in the Muslim world and subvert the peace message the Holy See is trying to send.
We will, of course, have to see how well that works out. According to Wikileaks, bin Laden’s lieutenant Khalid Sheikh Mohammad said the organization had a nuke hidden in Europe for use if bin Laden were captured or killed.
Let’s hope that’s bad intel. And let’s pray that if such a device exists that it is quickly found and the plot to use it disrupted.
In fact, let us all pray hard about this and other potential reprisals, both here in the West and in Muslim-majority countries, where Christian minorities are at risk (Pakistan, where bin Laden was killed, is one such country; so is Iraq).
The fact that we may now face reprisals — and the fact that we might even get hit hard — may be cause for people to wonder whether killing Osama bin Laden was worth it.
Let’s hope so. Let’s pray so.
The decision required a judgment call, weighing the potential risks and benefits. History teaches that killing your enemies, and especially their leaders, is a good way to discourage them from attacking you. On the other hand, making a martyr of someone doesn’t always work (cf. Roman Empire, Christianization Of).
There are other moral dimensions to the decision to kill bin Laden. According to some sources the mission was to kill, not capture. That’s a potentially defensible choice based on the heightened risks that would be involved for the personnel responsible for trying to bring about a capture rather than a kill. Also, and even more so, a capture would create a security nightmare by having a live, captured bin Laden as the focus of “Free Osama” reprisals.
A mysterious disappearance would result in the same thing. Even if we didn’t announce his capture, his own people would know he’d been snatched and assume he was still alive.
“He’s dead. He was buried at sea. Move on with your lives” is a better message for the Islamist community.
The big question, still, is what kind of reprisals may be coming and whether bin Laden will long-term be perceived as a martyr or a failure.
Let’s pray.
What do you think?
It would have been correct Catholic morality to pray for bin Laden, especially for his conversion, over the last ten years. If one has had that stance for the last ten years, should one change in the light of his death? Granted, he can no longer convert, but it is alway right to pray for the salvation of people, even notorious sinners, and let the disposition of their soul be reserved to God. No prayer is ever lost. Even if the person were in Hell, the good disposition of the prayer will bring him merit and God can always apply the prayers to others.
This is not a day for rejoicing, but rather sober contemplation of just what the concept of mercy means.
Has the aphorism, ” Hate the sin, but love the sinner,” lost all of its meaning? Has Christ’s words become void?
(Luk 6:27f)
“But I say to you that hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,
bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.
To him who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from him who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt.
Give to every one who begs from you; and of him who takes away your goods do not ask them again.
And as you wish that men would do to you, do so to them.
If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them.
And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.
And if you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again.
But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish.
Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.
Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven;
give, and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For the measure you give will be the measure you get back.
“What good is to love these who are good to you? Do not the pagans do as much? Love your enemies. Bless those who curse you. Do good to those who hate you. Pray for those who abuse you.
It is by our adherence to these words that we prove that we are worthy of the name, Christian.
While I am glad that one architect of terror will no longer be able to terrorize, I can see no reason to rejoice. One may consider that if WE had prayed better and worked harder at our own holiness, things may have turned out better, ending with a conversion instead of a killing. God can make the dead rise. He can also give grace to make evil men reform. While that does not often happen, it is an act of hope to think that it might be possible.
Well, we have his head, now. I only wish we had been able to capture his soul.
The Chicken
+JMJ+
Thanks, Jimmy! Great article. When I heard the news, I was at first glad that he was no longer a threat. However, I still felt I should pray for his immortal soul.So I did, and at nine attended my usual daily Mass and offered it for his soul. I admit I had mixed feelings later when looking at the pictures on the internet of people rejoicing in the streets. Nice to know I did the right thing by praying for him rather than rejoicing.
Should read:
the good disposition of the prayer will bring him (the prayer) merit and God can always apply the prayers to others.
Rats. That still isn’t clear. I meant that even if the person one is praying for is in Hell, the person who is praying for the dead person will still gain merit.
Sorry, if that weren’t clear.
NICE OF YOU. YOU AND MARK SHEA SUPPORTED THE Iraq War. The Pope the late Blessed JPII did not.
Gee, funny now that he is a Blessed, have you changed your tune? I have the links to the old blog. “Get them”, you wrote. He did too.
And now funny that there has been a blogfest at the Vatican, you write this.
Nice but get real. Time to tune your heart in with the real magisterium, not you.
15 And the Jews who were in Shushan gathered together again on the fourteenth day of the month of Adar and killed three hundred men at Shushan; but they did not lay a hand on the plunder.
16 The remainder of the Jews in the king’s provinces gathered together and protected their lives, had rest from their enemies, and killed seventy-five thousand of their enemies; but they did not lay a hand on the plunder. 17 This was on the thirteenth day of the month of Adar. And on the fourteenth of the month[a] they rested and made it a day of feasting and gladness.
The Feast of Purim
18 But the Jews who were at Shushan assembled together on the thirteenth day, as well as on the fourteenth; and on the fifteenth of the month[b] they rested, and made it a day of feasting and gladness. 19 Therefore the Jews of the villages who dwelt in the unwalled towns celebrated the fourteenth day of the month of Adar with gladness and feasting, as a holiday, and for sending presents to one another.
20 And Mordecai wrote these things and sent letters to all the Jews, near and far, who were in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, 21 to establish among them that they should celebrate yearly the fourteenth and fifteenth days of the month of Adar, 22 as the days on which the Jews had rest from their enemies, as the month which was turned from sorrow to joy for them, and from mourning to a holiday; that they should make them days of feasting and joy, of sending presents to one another and gifts to the poor. 23 So the Jews accepted the custom which they had begun, as Mordecai had written to them, 24 because Haman, the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, the enemy of all the Jews, had plotted against the Jews to annihilate them, and had cast Pur (that is, the lot), to consume them and destroy them; 25 but when Esther[c] came before the king, he commanded by letter that this[d] wicked plot which Haman had devised against the Jews should return on his own head, and that he and his sons should be hanged on the gallows.
26 So they called these days Purim, after the name Pur. Therefore, because of all the words of this letter, what they had seen concerning this matter, and what had happened to them, 27 the Jews established and imposed it upon themselves and their descendants and all who would join them, that without fail they should celebrate these two days every year, according to the written instructions and according to the prescribed time, 28 that these days should be remembered and kept throughout every generation, every family, every province, and every city, that these days of Purim should not fail to be observed among the Jews, and that the memory of them should not perish among their descendants.
Does anyone know if Jesus would have celebrated Purim?
Jeanne, you seem to be criticizing Jimmy, but I’ll be darned if I can follow you. Perhaps some elaboration would help.
Does anyone know if Jesus would have celebrated Purim?
Yes, but not as a celebration of the death of men, but rather as a celebration of the mercy of God in allowing the Israelites to escape mass extermination.
God can foresee and permit the death of the wicked. This a far cry from saying that he either delights in their death or mandates that anyone else do so. This is not the purpose of Purim at all.
The great victory of the Jews and all of the threats of killing them came about because a degree of death against the Jews could not be annulled (as described in the Book of Esther, but even then, God found a way to limit the damage by allowing another decree to be written to allow the Jews to defend themselves. A small number of Jews defeated a much larger number of attackers. This is a common theme in the Old Testament and shows God’s particular care for the Jews.
The rejoicing, as I say, is in God’s mercy for the Jews, not in the slaughter of the people fighting against them.
Again, nowhere in the New Testament do I see any indication that one is to rejoice in the comeuppance of another. Indeed, there is more rejoicing in Heaven in one repentant sinner than ninety-nine righteous men. Nowhere do I see rejoicing over the vanquished, but rather the untiring attempt to convert them.
Indeed, St. Paul in his Hymn to Charity in 1 Corinthians says:
Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love hopes all things – even the almost impossible conversion of a mass-murderer. One may rejoice that at least some future violence is thwarted, but to rejoice at the death of anyone is, strictly speaking, a sin against charity and calls for a visit to the confessional.
I am truly sorry that we live in such an age where justice has become so personalized that we forget that while an insult to us is always finite, the insult to Christ from one mortal sin is infinite.
I am sorry, but while some people will have a more difficult time than others because of temperament and severity of treatment making their responses to insults and injuries reasonable and Christian, nevertheless, if we do not, how are we any better than mere pagans?
The Chicken
The world is a better place that he’s gone. He worshiped a false god, Allah (who is NOT the God of the Bible), and a false prophet.
Almost certainly true, but not for the reasons you give. There are false prophets and false god worshippers aplenty in the world. Relatively few of them are terrorists. Besides, the Muslims’ God is the true God.
Yes, but not as a celebration of the death of men, but rather as a celebration of the mercy of God in allowing the Israelites to escape mass extermination.
Really Chicken, that’s such a cop-out. And why are all the party-poopers assuming that the people who are celebrating aren’t celebrating their deliverance from a mass-terrorist? Are they judging the hearts and minds of these people? Only they know how to celebrate properly? Do you believe these people would not be celebrating if he was merely captured?
We should institute a national holiday recognizing this deliverance from a mass terrorist.
Let there be parades and libations for all! Dancing in the streets at our deliverance!
The god of Muhammadans is not the true God anymore than the Jesus of JWs is the true Jesus.
At some point one’s understanding of God is so far off that it is a different god.
I don’t find Harrison’s article persuasive —
“You do not seem to realize that Allah is merely the word for God in the Arabic language, just like Deus in Latin, Gott in German, Dieu in French, and so on. (It means literally the Divinity—the only one that exists.) So it is that Arab Catholics worship Allah just as much as Muslims do. In all Catholic Bibles printed in Arabic, God is called Allah in both Old and New Testaments. ”
I use the word “God” and so doesn’t my local process theologian. It’s the same God?
JP
Really Chicken, that’s such a cop-out.
In what sense? There is cause for rejoicing in the foreseeable preservation of life because a terror threat has been eleminated, but not in the taking of a life, even in justice. This is the Christian way.
The Chicken
His death *is* the deliverance.
The Catholic Church also permits the taking in life, in justice. Let us celebrate also the justice, since God is Justice.
The Catholic Church also permits the taking in life, in justice.
Yes, it does, but it does not permit rejoicing over the misfortune of another, whether just or not.
It says in Job, Chapter 31:
1 I made a covenant with my eyes, that I would not so much as think upon a virgin.
2 For what part should God from above have in me, and what inheritance the Almighty from on high?
3 Is not destruction to the wicked, and aversion to them that work iniquity?
4 Doth not he consider my ways, and number all my steps?
5 If I have walked in vanity, and my foot hath made haste to deceit:
6 Let him weigh me in a just balance, and let God know my simplicity.
7 If my step hath turned out of the way, and if my heart hath followed my eyes, and if a spot hath cleaved to my hands:
8 Then let me sow and let another eat: and let my offspring be rooted out.
9 If my heart hath been deceived upon a woman, and if I have laid wait at my friend’s door:
10 Let my wife be the harlot of another, and let other men lie with her.
11 For this is a heinous crime, and a most grievous iniquity.
12 It is a fire that devoureth even to destruction, and rooteth up all things that spring.
13 If I have despised to abide judgment with my manservant, or my maidservant, when they had any controversy against me:
14 For what shall I do when God shall rise to judge? and when he shall examine, what shall I answer him?
15 Did not he that made me in the womb make him also: and did not one and the same form me in the womb?
16 If I have denied to the poor what they desired, and have made the eyes of the widow wait:
17 If I have eaten my morsel alone, and the fatherless hath not eaten thereof:
18 (For from my infancy mercy grew up with me: and it came out with me from my mother’s womb 🙂
19 If I have despised him that was perishing for want of clothing, and the poor man that had no covering:
20 If his sides have not blessed me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep:
21 If I have lifted up my hand against the fatherless, even when I saw myself superior in the gate:
22 Let my shoulder fall from its joint, and let my arm with its bones be broken.
23 For I have always feared God as waves swelling over me, and his weight I was not able to bear.
24 If I have thought gold my strength, and have said to fine gold: My confidence:
25 If I have rejoiced over my great riches, and because my hand had gotten much.
26 If I beheld the sun when it shined, and the moon going in brightness:
27 And my heart in secret hath rejoiced, and I have kissed my hand with my mouth:
28 Which is a very great iniquity, and a denial against the most high God.
29 If I have been glad at the downfall of him that hated me, and have rejoiced that evil had found him.
30 For I have not given my mouth to sin, by wishing a curse to his soul.
31 If the men of my tabernacle have not said: Who will give us of his flesh that we may be filled?
32 The stranger did not stay without, my door was open to the traveller.
33 If as a man I have hid my sin, and have concealed my iniquity in my bosom.
34 If I have been afraid at a very great multitude, and the contempt of kinsmen hath terrified me: and I have not rather held my peace, and not gone out of the door.
35 Who would grant me a hearer, that the Almighty may hear my desire; and that he himself that judgeth would write a book,
36 That I may carry it on my shoulder, and put it about me as a crown?
37 At every step of mine I would pronounce it, and offer it as to a prince.
38 If my land cry against me, and with it the furrows thereof mourn:
39 If I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, and have afflicted the soul of the tillers thereof:
40 Let thistles grow up to me instead of wheat, and thorns instead of barley.
The Chicken
Masked Chicken
How do you explain that gladness about an enemy’s fall is part of many psalms and part of Mary’s Magnificat? Anyone who has read all the psalms knows immediately what I’m referring to. And since Mary was sinless, we cannot say she was sinning when she extolled the proud and the mighty’s fall relative to her exaltation.
How do you explain that gladness about an enemy’s fall is part of many psalms and part of Mary’s Magnificat?
I have no idea what you mean with reference to the Magnificat. It is reporting what God had done, not rejoicing in the acts.
As for the deprecatory psalm, etc., one may read them in the light of God’s mercy in terms of deliverance, but not as mere rejoicing in vengeance. I realize that Psalm 58, for example, is basically bloodthirsty:
Psa 58:1 To the choirmaster: according to Do Not Destroy. A Miktam of David.
Do you indeed decree what is right, you gods? Do you judge the sons of men uprightly?
Nay, in your hearts you devise wrongs; your hands deal out violence on earth.
The wicked go astray from the womb, they err from their birth, speaking lies.
They have venom like the venom of a serpent, like the deaf adder that stops its ear,
so that it does not hear the voice of charmers or of the cunning enchanter.
O God, break the teeth in their mouths; tear out the fangs of the young lions, O LORD!
Let them vanish like water that runs away; like grass let them be trodden down and wither.
Let them be like the snail which dissolves into slime, like the untimely birth that never sees the sun.
Sooner than your pots can feel the heat of thorns, whether green or ablaze, may he sweep them away!
The righteous will rejoice when he sees the vengeance; he will bathe his feet in the blood of the wicked.
Men will say, “Surely there is a reward for the righteous; surely there is a God who judges on earth.”
This is a miktam, but unfortunately, we have no idea what that word means. It could be a lamentful wishful thinking, we simply do not know. Also, David speaks of “gods.” We do not know to which wicked he is referring to.
The point is that if you would correctly apply this psalm, the adjectives of righteous or wicked can only be applied by God. If you can tell the righteous and the wicked infallibly, then sure, I suppose you could rejoice over their spilt blood. Now, the only man I know of who could so infallibly discern the righteous from the wicked is Christ and he has spoken on the issue.
Again, one may rejoice in actions, either real or imagined, and to the extent that future destructive actions have been prevented and a measure of natural justice has been granted, one may rejoice in the actions and the justice that has been brought about, but one may not rejoice in the killing, per se. In my opinion, that would be a violation of the Fifth Commandment, since taking delight in an evil (death is an evil) is sin. More than that, it would, potentially, put one in the state of judging someone’s soul.
You are free to disagree, of course, but while a measure of appreciation to God and those responsible for the administration of justice is perfectly allowable, as I assume the Psalm, above, is such an expression, delighting in killing, which is what I am commenting against, the Ding-Dong-the-Witch-is-Dead sort of moments that have been going on, shows me that these people are not directly involved in the suffering. Justice has a way of producing peace in those who have suffered an injustice, not arousing feelings of lust and glee. Justice actually quiets the passions, not arouses them. The celebrations of high-fiving and dancing have been, in my opinion, disordered expressions, perhaps understandable from a fallen human perspective, but, nevertheless, disordered. It matches the viscerality of our society.
As I say, in the face of such human suffering that bin Laden caused, it would be inhuman not to rejoice that the killer can no longer kill. It is, however, equally inhuman to rejoice that a man has failed, as far as we know, to find Christ.
What I am saying is that we should temper our dancing with prudence. I have seen little prudence in some of the celebrating that I have heard of.
The Chicken
Jimmy,
Whatever else Bin Laden was, he was not responsible for the deaths of thousands because he didn’t carry out 911 as only the deliberately blind still believe. There is so much evidence that this act of mass murder was a false flag operation designed to start the so-called “war on terror” whch is really a “war of terror”….
I hope you’re not one of those (unfortunately far too many people….) who would rather live with a comfortable lie than an uncomfortable truth namely that there are elements in our governments who are prepared to kill their own innocent people for their own NWO agenda. (Google gulf of tonkin incident/gladio/london bombs et al. See Terror on the tube by Nick Kollerstrom etc etc).
It seems to me that the lie about his continued existence is now untenable so the CIA/Mossad/MI6 have informed the grunting masses he’s dead. However many are claiming that the picture of his corpse is a fake. Even the british Guardian paper questions its legitimacy.
Are we really suposed to believe that the CIA with its billion-dollar resources couldn’t find him for 10 years? Are we surprised that he was ‘killed’ in an attack (read murdered..)? No due process there. Maybe an open trial would have been too much of an embarrassment and might have revealed Bin Laden’s CIA connections etc. And his burial at sea means no autopsy of course. Benazir Bhutto said in a 2007 interview that Bin Laden had already been murdered…….so you take your pick about who to believe…..
Confusion? Disinformation? Truth? You decide…………….
G
What I was talking about in my last commntnis called, sometimes, Schaudenfreude, sometimes, morose delectation. It is the deliberate taking pleasure in someone else’s misfortune. It is a sin.
The Chicken
Several points:
Jeanne in Tampa, just because JPII opposed the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq in 2003 doesn’t mean he was right. JPII also opposed the 1991 invasion designed to get Saddam out of Kuwait, which Saddam invaded and attempted to annex. Had the world listened to JPII, Saddam not only would have annexed Kuwait but he also would have attacked Saudi Arabia. That would have caused the Western world to send in far more troops, resulting in far greater military and civilian casualties.
If you are going to support JPII’s stance, are you prepared to accept the consequences of that stance: allowing a murderous tyrant to remain in power? Because that’s what would have happened if the world listened to JPII.
Masked Chicken, no Christian from any denomination has the obligation to pray for the unrepentant dead. Did Jesus ask His disciples when He met them between His resurrection and ascension to pray for Judas? Besides, how do we know that OBL didn’t repent? Well, he believed that killing the innocent for the sake of “jihad” was a divine imperative. Repentance, in his mind, would be an act of apostasy. Moreover, OBL disobeyed the Second Commandment by misusing God’s name to justify murder. A holy, righteous God Who values His reputation will not tolerate such abuse.
Your assertions not only make a mockery of prayer but also of any intelligent sense of moral consequences. If what you say really is Church teaching, then Church leaders have a lot to answer for before God.
Jeb Protestant, you are absolutely correct. Allah and Yahweh are not the same. Let me quote from Alain Besancon’s article, “What Kind of Religion Is Islam?” from the May 2004 edition of Commentary Magazine:
Contributing to the partiality toward Islam is an underlying dissatisfaction with modernity, and with our liberal, capitalist individualistic arrangements…. Alarmed by the ebbing of religious faith in the Christian West, and particularly in Europe, these writers cannot but admire Muslim devoutness…. Surely, they reason, it is better to believe in something than in nothing, and since these Muslims believe in something, they must believe in the same thing we do.
An entire literature favorable to Islam has grown up in Europe, much of it the work of Catholic priests…
Here are selections from my story for Front Page Magazine, “How Will Rome Face Mecca?”
Though all three faiths are monotheistic, Islam rejects the doctrines of atonement and redemption that define Christianity and Judaism. Moreover, no concept of a covenant between God and humanity exists in Islam. Instead, Allah decrees his law “by means of a unilateral pact, in an act of sublime condescension (that) precludes any notion of imitating God as is urged in the Bible,” Besancon wrote.
Islam also rejects the Christian doctrines of original sin and the necessity of mediation between God and humanity. In the Koran, Jesus “appears… out of place and out of time, without reference to the landscape of Israel,” Besancon wrote.
Most importantly, Judeo-Christian and Muslim concepts of divinity revolve around one irreconcilable difference:
“Although Muslims like to enumerate the 99 names of God, missing from the list, but central to the Jewish and even more so to the Christian conception of God, is ‘Father’ – i.e., a personal god capable of a reciprocal and loving relation with men,” Besancon wrote. “The one God of the Koran, the God Who demands submission is a distant God; to call him ‘Father’ would be an anthropomorphic sacrilege.”
Today, Abbottabad. Tomorrow, the Vatican.
Joseph,
Kudos. God spoke to the Jews figuratively about the Trinty as early as the three strangers talking to Abraham at the terebinth of Mamre. God is Love and prior to the angels being created, a one Personed God would be alone and there would be no love.
The Trinity was interpersonal Love existing prior to angels or men. A one personed God is kind of a loner who prior to the angels was not family within himself.
The death of Bon Laden was good for the people of the world and good toward the conversion of terrorists away from the delusions of his immunity from defeat. If a home invader comes in one’s window with a glock pistol in his hand, he should be killed by a Christian homeowner….no exchange of words. If he has no pistol in his hand and comes toward the homeowner, he should be killed because if he gets to your barrel, it could go either way. I would say that half the Catholic males on the internet seem unprepared to kill to protect their loved ones or themselves…..and the last two Popes are part of that strange pacifism that is not orthodox but simply the opposite swing of the pendulum that began with Inquisitional violence by Popes deputing Inquisitions. Now Popes are trying to make that history null and void….by espousing its far opposite.
“Masked Chicken, no Christian from any denomination has the obligation to pray for the unrepentant dead.”
Only God can know this, so your statement is wrong or even at best hypothetical. I am reminded of the story of the woman who was distraught because her son committed suicide by jumping off of a bridge. St. John Vianney consoled her by telling her that her son repented on the way down.
Praying for the dead is a spiritual work of mercy. The work does NOT say: pray for the repentant. It says to pray for the living and the dead. No one knows who is in Hell except God, so the presumption is to pray for all of the living and the dead. It is customary to assume that Judas did not repent and in Hell, but even that is a theological opinion, based on the interpretation of the words of Christ, although this interpretation has strong support in Tradition.
YOU do not know bin Laden’s heart. One is bound to follow one’s conscience, even if it is in error, as long as one has done due dilegence in forming that conscience. bin Laden, for all of his horrible acts, may be vincibly ignorant. I cannot say. His culture does not support him knowing the truth. Is this his fault? I cannot say and neither can you.
I repeat, one is bound, in charity, to pray for the living and the dead, including even murderers.
“Your assertions not only make a mockery of prayer but also of any intelligent sense of moral consequences. If what you say really is Church teaching, then Church leaders have a lot to answer for before God.”
No. I believe, instead, that it may be possible you have some work to do to understand the Church’s teaching.
The Chicken
P.S. Someone, upstream, turned on the italics and I can’t see how to fix it, right now.
Masked Chicken
Something is askew. Let’s read Aquinas on loving one’s enemy in the Summa T/ 2nd pt of the 2nd part/ Question 25/ art. 8
” …. love of one’s enemies may be considered as specially directed to them, namely, that we should have a special movement of love towards our enemies. Charity does not require this absolutely, because it does not require that we should have a special movement of love to every individual man, since this would be impossible.Nevertheless charity does require this, in respect of our being prepared in mind, namely, that we should be ready to love our enemies individually, if the
necessity were to occur. That man should actually do so, and love his enemy for
God’s sake, without it being necessary for him to do so, belongs to the perfection of
charity.”
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No one in line with Aquinas above has an obligation to pray for Bin Laden
individually. I do not see the Church holding special prayer services for him. Can you
point me to one Mass in Rome being said for him? How many of us prayed for the sex
abuser, Fr. Geoghan, when he was murdered in jail? He was in the news also. Does
the news media give us an obligation to pray for famous sinners while you yourself are
not praying for every pimp and ID thief who died yesterday all over the world. Face it.
Your supposed obligation is contingent on fame and media and you don’t pray for every person in your local paper’s obits each day…neither does the Pope.
Next I would ask if there is any limit to sincere erroneous conscience in your
schema. Would you extend that to a person who steals credit cards or pimps women?
But you would extend it to a person who leaves children in my area parentless for life
as three moms at a time held hands and jumped from the top of the world trade
because the heat of the fire was so brutal near them. And the man who did this had maybe a sincere erroneous conscience but you are not praying for some rural man who had sex with farm animals because he did not have a sincere erroneous conscience because bestiality is disgusting but murder isn’t? The Peace Core witnesses to rape
before the Senate committee yesterday spoke of men who raped them and laughed at
them as they..the raped women begged to be killed in Bangladesh. Do those men too
have sincere erroneous consciences about rape or is it just mass murderers of innocent
parents who have that?
Until we stop believing that all murderers, pimps, id thieves, rapists are all
repenting at the very last second or are all innocent due to erroneous conscience, I
can’t see how there will be any motive for evangelization….or missionary life. If literally
millions of criminals who die every year are all reaching Purgatory ( which requires
sanctifying grace…it is an honor not a default mode)…. then why preach anything if
heaven and purgatory are now where all good and evil go even when they are shot to
death while planning more murders? Pablo Escobar….blew up a plane of people to kill
one man and then died in a shoot out with police. No worry. Sincere erroneous
conscience.
Technically we can’t say such men are surely in hell. But the modern Catholic
heresy that floats through the literate Church in large part now… the way Cardinal
Newman said Arianism floated through the hierarchy during the 4th century is that
many ” just about know” that every criminal has an excuse that lands him in purgatory
for sure. John Paul in “Crossing the Threshold of Hope” and Benedict in an address
both opined that we couldn’t be sure Judas was in hell because the Church never said so. ROFLOL. Christ said so….” those whom thou gavest me I guarded and not one of them perished but the son of perdition”…..” but woe to that man….it were better for him had he not been born.” When you know what Christ repeatedly said of Judas, you know both Popes spoke absurdity and Augustine and Chrysostom spoke the opposite of our two Popes.
Look, to being with, in my first comment on this post, I made a remark that it is not wrong to pray for notorious sinners in this life (no one should disagree with that) and that it is also proper to pray for them after death. I said nothing about an obligation, which is what I take Joseph to be disagreeing with. He is simply putting words in my mouth and I am not obligated to respond to him, although I took the bait because I was distracted at the time. Mostly, in my comments, above, I talked about the rabid celebrating in the face of death.
It is meritorious, pray, for the dead. It belongs to Christian perfection (the perfection Aquinas I’d talking about). Strictly speaking, no one has to pray for anyone, but it is an act of personal charity (what Aquinas is talking about) to pray for the dead, even notorious sinners. There is no conflict with Church teaching. You are misunderstanding Aquinas.
I am not willing to discuss praying for those who have died beyond what I said, above. It is Church teaching. Aquinas agrees. No one has a SPECIAL obligation to go out of our way to do something good for an enemy, but if the situation presents itself, one must act. Going out of one’s way is perfection, but one is, normally, required only to use normal means. If one wishes, as a special act of charity, to pray for the soul of bin Laden, it is an act of merit, but it is not an obligation and I did not say that at anytime in my comments. I said that it was always right to pray, not that it was an obligation. In any case, it cannot be said that one cannot pray for him or even that one ought not to. In my comments, above, I said nothing about an obligation (the comments before Joseph’s) to pray specifically for bin Laden. In my comment immediately above, I said it was part of the spiritual works of mercy to pray for the living and the dead. That is true. I did not specify which people one could pray for – one is free to choose any specific persons, but in any case, bin Laden is NOT exceeded from that choice.
It is offensive to imply that we may not pray for our enemies. This betrays the cross of Christ, who, certainly, if anyone, had the right not to pray for his enemies, especially since he definitely knew who would go to Heaven or Hell and yet, he prayed for all men from the cross (most especially those immediately putting him to death). If the pray is not efficacious because the person one is praying for is in Hell, God will still credit the merit to the person who is praying as an act of charity and perhaps transfer the grace to someone who can use it. We don’t know who is in Purgatory, either, and sometimes we might wind up praying for someone who isn’t there. Jimmy addressed this issue a few years ago. God knows our limited knowledge of the state of souls in the afterlife and until we have better sight, it is always better to be safe and pray then not, or are you claiming to have definitive knowledge of bin Laden’s disposition before God – that would be violating Christ’s command to judge not and would be an act of pride, since neither you nor Joseph are God nor the Magisterium.
I am not gong to start an argument about this. Christian tradition is clear and I don’t want to muddy the water by endless debates. If I have been unclear in stating Church teachings, that is something that I stand to be corrected on, but I don’t want proof-texting from misinterpreted sources. It confuses the Faithful.
I seem to be in a grumpy mood, today, so I apologize if I come off sounding harsh, this is not my intention.
The Chicken
Masked Chicken,
I don’t think you’ll ever find Aquinas urging prayer for dead notorious sinners; in the section I quoted he goes on to give the example of feeding your enemy….thus a person who is alive. That is his version of the perfection of charity. Let’s put Aquinas in theological context. He states elsewhere that most men go to hell as many believed at that time. In that context, one can’t imagine him praying for those who seemed to die during plans to murder…..and he states no such act and the Church has no such custom as e.g. praying for Hitler.
I stated that we could not know who is in hell in our time. The NT is revelation and the
Council of Trent stated that we could know by revelation. Hence Judas. Hence when
God has the angel kill Herod Antippas in Acts 12 ….but further…..that the angel leaves
his body for worms to eat, that is a dire ending even vis a vis Ananias and Sapphira
whom God kills in Acts 5 BUT who are buried…not left out above ground for worms to
eat. There was hope for them in that detail. But if you or any man is praying for Bin
Laden, then you cannot be praying about his fate at the particular judgement so as to change it from hell to purgatory but you can only be praying for the dead as to their being relieved of some of Purgatory’s punishment. Is it the perfection of charity to thus pray for him while not praying more for his victims many of whom may be in purgatory?
Absurd. And show me the Church doing so. The New Testament says:
Gal 6:10 So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all men, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.
Chicken, you were clear. Others are putting words in your mouth, and criticizing you for things you never wrote.
“I stated that we could not know who is in hell in our time. The NT is revelation and the Council of Trent stated that we could know by revelation.”
That is a vast simplification of revelation. It is impossible to know if even oneself is in a state of grace by any sensible means and God does NOT normally provide such knowledge by revelations to individuals (thus, the prudence of St. Joan of Arc’s famous comment on the subject). Scripture is a rare exception, so it does not apply, here. Simply put, our knowledge is limited. If we can’t even know, generally, if we are in a state of grace, then how can we presume to know for others?I have already answered the question of what happens if one prays for someone who might, actually, be in Hell, but without our knowledge. None of the good is lost. It goes into the Deposit of Merit and may be applied to other souls.
The Chicken
Could someone fix the italics problem?
Bill Bannon, thanks so much for your support! I especially appreciate this comment:
“I would say that half the Catholic males on the internet seem unprepared to kill to protect their loved ones or themselves…..and the last two Popes are part of that strange pacifism that is not orthodox but simply the opposite swing of the pendulum that began with Inquisitional violence by Popes deputing Inquisitions. Now Popes are trying to make that history null and void….by espousing its far opposite.”
Bill, your words are far more true than you realize….
Masked Chicken, from the accounts of what has emerged after bin Laden’s death, we know two things:
1. When the SEALs reached him, he was caught unawares and panicked. People do two things when they panic: They either react on sheer instinct or freeze. Whatever they do, they don’t engage in serious, sequential thought processes that take time (such as those that might lead to repentence). Bin Laden froze. Once he did that, he was a dead man.
2. Bin Laden’s journals reveal that he planned to murder more Americans to commemorate the tenths anniversary of 9/11. This is a man who seriously considered repentence?
Your position is so filled with hypotheticals as to be effectively useless. We can tell from a man’s actions what he ultimately values, since his actions (and words) reflect those values. Christ said so Himself (Matthew 7:16; 15:11).
A note added in proof:
Dr. Ed Peters, on his blog, In the Light of the Law, has this to say:
A request for Mass to be celebrated for the repose of Osama Bin Laden’s soul that was printed in a Florida parish bulletin has irritated a number of people. Let’s try to sort it out.
First, it is obvious to the point of palpable that Catholics are free to pray for anyone, living or dead, and that such prayers are exercises in charity. CCC 958, 1032. Therefore, it is wrong to discourage others from praying for any human being.*
Second, a priest is free to offer Mass for anyone, living or dead. Canon 901, CCC 1371. The Pio-Benedictine restrictions against offering public Masses for certain persons (e.g., excommunicates per c. 2262) no longer bind. The faithful may now offer stipends for such Masses and priests may accept such stipends.
The Chicken
Your position is so filled with hypotheticals as to be effectively useless.
Again, you are judging by externals. The question was whether it is acceptible to pray for bin Laden’s soul. It is and you have offered no argument to the contrary, only a personal judgment of the man’s culpability. It is a personal opinion and no else except you are bound to accept it. No one is bound to pray for bin Laden, but the question was, may one? Unless one knows, definitively, that a person is in Hell, one may pray for the person. There is no arument you can make against this, since you do not have personal knowledge of bin Laden’s final disposition, no matter how strongly a case you might make for it. I am not wesseling.
The Chicken