Jimmy Akin

There’s a meme going around certain quarters that Republicans are nuts because a massive number of them believe that President Obama may be the antichrist.

I first encountered this on the Drudge Report, which linked to the British paper the Daily Mail, which has a story headlined:

Almost a quarter of Republicans think Obama ‘may be the Antichrist’ as 14 states sue over healthcare reforms

Here’s the entirety of what that article has to say on the antichrist subject:

Nearly a quarter of Republicans believe the Democrat president ‘may be the Antichrist’, according to a survey.

That’s it! No link to the original poll. No clue about how it was run. Nada!

A lot of other people are blogging it without linking it, to which I can only say, “Shame on you. Linking is an essential part of blogging. You’ve got to show people the source so they can make their own judgments. Blogging an inflammatory subject with no link is Just Plain Wrong.”

So I’m not going to do it. Here’s a summary of the Harris Interactive poll at the root of the meme

According to the Harris Interactive group, the poll . . .

. . . finds that 40% of adults believe he is a socialist. More than 30% think he wants to take away Americans’ right to own guns and that he is a Muslim. More than 25% believe he wants to turn over the sovereignty of the United States to a world government, has done many things that are unconstitutional, that he resents America’s heritage, and that he does what Wall Street tells him to do.

More than 20% believe he was not born in the United States, that he is “the domestic enemy the U.S. Constitution speaks of,” that he is racist and anti-American, and that he “wants to use an economic collapse or terrorist attack as an excuse to take dictatorial powers.” Fully 20% think he is “doing many of the things that Hitler did,” while 14% believe “he may be the anti-Christ” and 13% think “he wants the terrorists to win.”

Among Republicans, the numbers are different:

Majorities of Republicans believe that President Obama:

* Is a socialist (67%)
* Wants to take away Americans’ right to own guns (61%)
* Is a Muslim (57%)
* Wants to turn over the sovereignty of the United States to a one world government (51%); and
* Has done many things that are unconstitutional (55%).

Also large numbers of Republicans also believe that President Obama:

* Resents America’s heritage (47%)
* Does what Wall Street and the bankers tell him to do (40%)
* Was not born in the United States and so is not eligible to be president (45%)
* Is the “domestic enemy that the U.S. Constitution speaks of” (45%)
* Is a racist (42%)
* Want to use an economic collapse or terrorist attack as an excuse to take dictatorial powers (41%)
* Is doing many of the things that Hitler did (38%).

Even more remarkable perhaps, fully 24% of Republicans believe that “he may be the Anti-Christ” and 22% believe “he wants the terrorists to win.”

While few Democrats believe any of these things, the proportions of Independents who do so are close to the national averages.

What the press release doesn’t tell you, but what is in the poll summary table, is that a surprisingly number of Democrats believe similar things. They proportions are smaller than the above numbers, but significant number of Democrats believe that President Obama:

* Is a socialist (14%)
* Wants to take away Americans’ right to own guns (17%)
* Is a Muslim (15%)
* Wants to turn over the sovereignty of the United States to a one world government (12%).
* Has done many things that are unconstitutional (9%).
* Resents America’s heritage (12%)
* Does what Wall Street and the bankers tell him to do (15%)
* Was not born in the United States and so is not eligible to be president (8%)
* Is the “domestic enemy that the U.S. Constitution speaks of” (8%)
* Is a racist (7%)
* Want to use an economic collapse or terrorist attack as an excuse to take dictatorial powers (8%)
* Is doing many of the things that Hitler did (6%).
* May be the Anti-Christ (6%).
* Wants the terrorists to win (5%).

The Republican party, of course, has a large Evangelical component that is interested in the end-times, inclined to think we are living in them, and thus on the lookout to scope out current political figures with an eye to whether they might be the antichrist. That’s just going to happen to some degree. (Note also: It says “may be” the antichrist, not “is”). It’s like back in the ‘80s when some were suggesting that Ronald Wilson Reagan was the antichrist because he had six letters in each of his three names.

The more surprising number—if any of these numbers were real (more on that in a moment)—is how many Democrats think Obama might be the antichrist. If six percent of your own party think you may be the antichrist, that’s potentially newsworthy.

Rather than the nutty/scary/evil Republican meme, the more newsworthy headline based on these numbers would be something like,

“More Than 1 in 20 Democrats Think Obama May Be Antichrist (And Compare Him To Hitler)”

But are these numbers even real?

The poll was an online one that apparently used leading questions. (It wasn’t the completely unscientific kind of online poll, but it used methodology that is at least questionable.)

SEE HERE FOR A CRITIQUE.

So at bottom what it looks like we have is an iffy, leading poll being used to feed the meme of “conservatives have Obama Derangement Syndrome.” (As if we hadn’t just suffered through eight years of Bush Derangement Syndrome.)

When this kind of thing happens, and particularly when it involves religious matters (like who might or might not be the antichrist), it’s important to have a response.

So I wanted to give you the scoop on the poll (including a link! I had to search hard to find that!) and some perspective in case someone throws this your way (and they may; it was on Drudge, after all).

As a final bit of perspective, I’ll say this: Whatever his flaws may be and however profound they may be, President Obama does not fit the model presented in the Bible of the figure commonly referred to as “the antichrist.”

MORE INFO HERE.

The book of Revelation presents the Beast from the sea (commonly identified with “the antichrist” that John’s epistles speak of, though they may not be the same) as a European monarch who literally demands worship and who puts Christians to death and whose name adds up to 666 in a common alphabetic/numbering system in use at the time. That fits Caesar Nero (right down to the name adding up to 666), but it does not fit President Obama.

MORE HERE.

Of course, there may well be a future fulfillment of the antichrist archetype (I expect that there will be)—and there is a great deal of liberty of interpretation here since the Church’s teaching in this area is very limited—but we shouldn’t feed the meme identifying President Obama as the antichrist.

Your thoughts?

Not all of them, mind you. But, at least, he’s accused the U.S. bishops and the National Right to Life Committee of hypocrisy.

According to The Daily Caller:

“The [National] Right to Life and the bishops, in 2007 when George Bush signed the executive order on embryonic stem cell research, they all applauded the executive order,” Stupak said in an interview with The Daily Caller.

“The Democratic Congress passed [a bill] saying we’ll do embryonic stem cell research. Bush vetoed it in 2007. That same day he issued an executive order saying we will not do it, and all these groups applauded that he protected life,” Stupak said.

“So now President Obama’s going to sign an executive order protecting life and everyone’s condemning it. The hypocrisy is great,” he said.

To my mind, the addle-headedness of his comments is great.

President Bush, for all his flaws, vetoed a Bad Bill and then issued an executive order to further protect unborn life.

What Stupak did was vote for a Bad Bill with only a hope that the next pro-abort president (or even Obama himself, or the courts) won’t void the executive order he got in exchange for his vote.

Whatever else, Mr. Stupak does not seem gifted in finding good analogies to back up his charges of hypocrisy.

But perhaps he’s just expressing things badly (and offensively).

He goes on to suggest that had he not accepted the offer of the executive order that Mrs. Pelosi would have had the votes for the Bad Bill anyway, and it would have been passed without the executive order to blunt its effects on the unborn.

If so, his flippage on the issue would have been reasonable and praiseworthy (though his accusations of hypocrisy would not).

But is he right?

The bill passed with three votes to spare, 219-to-212.

But the Stupak gang provided more than four votes. Had they not voted for the Bad Bill, on its face it would not have passed.

Could Pelosi have had enough representatives who voted “no” who would have voted “yes” if Stupak hadn’t cut his deal to pass the Bad Bill anyway?

It’s possible, but it doesn’t strike me as plausible (else why make the deal with Stupak’s group?).

On the other hand, Pelosi could have just lied to Stupak about how many votes she had, and Stupak may have been stupid enough to believe her.

The Daily Caller is also running a piece titled Bart Stupak is either not very smart or he’s not very honest.

These certainly seem reasonable hypotheses, particularly given this video from November 2009 (CHT: Fr. Z):

So what do you think? Is Stupak’s reasoning good, bad, both? And what do you make of his charges of hypocrisy?

OH, AND THEN THERE’S THIS.

Just who is the hypocrite, now?

Okay, I didn't get a post done Saturday, so let's do a second one today and talk about the Copper Scroll, one part of which is pictured (left).

The Copper Scroll is one of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and one of the most unusual.

Why?

Well, for a start, it's made out of copper. That's very unusual, suggesting it was very important and meant to be durable. It required special work to make the thing (it being harder to engrave on copper than to write on parchment or papyrus).

It's also unusual because it contains a cryptic list of locations where treasure is hidden.

What treasure?

Answer Unclear. Ask Again Later.

Perhaps the treasure of the Second Temple, which was destroyed by the Romans. Some have suggested the treasure of the First Temple (destroyed by the Babylonians). Perhaps treasure owned by the Qumran Community.

Hard to say.

Has the treasure been found?

Possibly. It's quite possible that all or virtually all of it has been found over the ages by people who quietly used it to fund their own lifestyles.

It's also possible that it never existed. Some have suggested the whole thing was a hoax, though personally I'm inclined to doubt that. Why would someone go to the bother of making a copper scroll (difficult work, that; expensive copper sheet, hammers and chisels and all that)?

Have any of the treasure items mentioned on the scroll be found in modern times, providing authentication for the list?

Maybe.

Some have argued that one of the sites mentioned in the copper scroll is to be found in a place known as the Cave of Letters, near the Dead Sea.

The Cave of Letters is so-named because letters dating from the time of the Second Jewish War (A.D. 130s) were found there. In fact, documents authored by the revolt's leader–Simon bar-Kokhba–were found there. Also, a notable cache of personal documents belonging to a woman named Babatha were also found.

More on Babatha and her personal documents.

Interview with man who helped find the documents.

The claim that one of the copper scroll sites has been found, like everything about biblical archaeology, is controversial, and quite debatable.

BUT THAT DIDN'T STOP NOVA FROM DOING A DOCUMENTARY ABOUT IT. (Transcript if you don't want video.)

Interesting stuff, regardless of whose theory may be true.

  Generally not.

Or at least that’s the answer of Bishop Gianfranco Girotti (pictured) of the Apostolic Penitentiary.

According to Catholic News Service:

A priest who confesses sexual abuse in the sacrament of penance should be absolved and should generally not be encouraged by the confessor to disclose his acts publicly or to his superiors, a Vatican official said.

Likewise, the confessor should not make the contents of such a confession public, said Bishop Gianfranco Girotti, regent of the Apostolic Penitentiary, a Vatican court that handles issues related to the sacrament of penance. . . .

When a priest confesses such acts, “the confession can only have absolution as a consequence,” he said.

This may be an eye-opening response, but there are some qualifiers. The first is this:

Bishop Girotti spoke strictly about the response of a confessor, and not about the wider responsibility to acknowledge and investigate priestly sexual abuse outside the confessional.

So he’s not saying that everything possible shouldn’t be done outside the confessional to investigate abuse. He’s dealing with what goes on under the seal of confession, which—among other things—prohibits the confessor from himself revealing the penitent’s sin.

Then there is this:

“It is not up to the confessor to make them public or to ask the penitent to incriminate himself in front of superiors. This is true because, on one hand, the sacramental seal remains inviolable and, on the other hand, one cannot provoke mistrust in the penitent,” he said.

“From the confessor, (the penitent) can only expect absolution, certainly not a sentence nor the order to confess his crime in public,” he said.

In the first quotation Bishop Girotti seems to be saying that (a) the confessor cannot make the sins public because of the seal and (b) he should not ask the penitent to incriminate himself because to do so would provoke mistrust in the penitent.

(a) is very certainly true. (b) would seem to be questionable.

In the second quotation Bishop Girotti refers to “a sentence” and “the order” to confess publicly. There may be a translation issue here, but he may be alluding to one of a number of things.

Perhaps by “a sentence” he means (c) sentencing the penitent to self-incriminate as part of the act of penance required for absolution.

Perhaps by “the order” he refers to (d) demanding that the penitent self-incriminate but not as a condition of absolution.

If he is saying that a confessor must not require the penitent to self-incriminate as a condition of absolution then he is absolutely correct. If that were possible then any priest in the world would be able to circumvent the seal of confession by simply requiring penitents to publicly self-incriminate. It would defeat the whole purpose of the seal.

“You committed a sexual sin? I think it would be spiritually advantageous in motivating you not to do it again by admitting it publicly. Your penance is to admit it on YouTube.”

“You stole something? It would serve you well in motivating you not to do it again by self-incriminating. Your penance is to go turn yourself in to the cops.”

While public self-accusation was sometimes practiced in the early years of the Christian faith, the pastoral experience of the Church has been that it is much more pastorally advisable to assure penitents that they will not be publicly exposed, which is why the seal was created in the first place. To require penitents to publicly reveal their sins would defeat its whole purpose.

Rome is very serious about the integrity of the seal, and to keep anybody from even thinking about ways to circumvent it, the Code of Canon Law bluntly states:

Can.  983 §1. The sacramental seal is inviolable; therefore it is absolutely forbidden for a confessor to betray in any way a penitent in words or in any manner and for any reason.

§2. The interpreter, if there is one, and all others who in any way have knowledge of sins from confession are also obliged to observe secrecy.

Can.  984 §1. A confessor is prohibited completely from using knowledge acquired from confession to the detriment of the penitent even when any danger of revelation is excluded.

§2. A person who has been placed in authority cannot use in any manner for external governance the knowledge about sins which he has received in confession at any time.

So the priest could not sentence a penitent to self-incrimination as a requirement of absolution.

Could he order him to self-incriminate?

Apart from the elements required for the sacrament, such as the assignment of a penance, the confessor does not have authority over the penitent. A confessor could not say, “For your penance say three Hail Marys. Oh, and apart from your penance, I also order you to take up a career in journalism (or fill in the blank with some other act that isn’t part of the penance).”

For lack of ability to order the penitent to do something, the most the confessor would be able to do would be to implore, encourage, urge, etc., the penitent to self-incriminate, either before Church or civil authorities.

To what extent should he do that?

Here there is room for debate.

From the news story, Bishop Girotti appears to think that this should not generally be done out of concern that it could alienate the penitent—to discourage him from seeking God’s mercy in the way that is ordinarily required for the forgiveness of mortal sin.

To answer the question one would need to take into account both the goods to be achieved by encouraging the penitent to turn himself in and the harms that could result.

So I’m wondering what the readers think.

How strongly and in what circumstances should a confessor urge a penitent to turn himself in? Does it matter whether the penitent is a priest or a layman? If it is you? Does it matter whether the sin is sexual abuse or something else? What sins should be ones that a confessor encourages self-incrimination for? What ones shouldn’t he? How can we distinguish the two? And what would happen to your willingness to go to confession if you knew you would meet with a strong encouragement to self-incriminate?

It’s official.

The Holy See has announced the creation of a new commission, under the auspices of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and led by retired archbishop Camillo Ruini, to investigate the reported apparitions associated with Medjugorje.

Here’s a translation of the announcement, provided by Catholic News Agency:

Under the auspices of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, under the presidency of Cardinal Camillo Ruini, an international commission of investigation on Medjugorje has been constituted. Said Commission, composed of cardinals, bishops and experts will work in a reserved manner, subjecting the results of their studies to the authority of the Dicastery.

And here’s the original in Italian.

Details are sketchy. Fr. Federico Lombardi—the Vatican press spokesman—had little to add, though he indicated,

As the commission carries out their activities, Fr. Lombardi continued, they will decide whether or not to communicate information regarding their findings. Nevertheless, it can be assumed that it will be a “very discreet” project “given the sensitivity of the subject,” he remarked.

Speaking in Italian, he said to expect that investigations will take “a good while” to reach their completion and emphasized that the results of the commission’s activities will be submitted to the CDF, under whose mandate they are operating. The commission will only offer their technical findings to the Congregation, which in turn will “make decisions on the case.”

For now, the composition of the commission is “reserved,” as is the method they will pursue in their investigations, Fr. Lombardi said in closing.

So we’ll have to wait and see what happens.

But at the moment, I have a few questions that I’d be interested in the readers’ reactions to:

1) How long do you think we will have to wait before an announcement is made?

2) Being as objective as possible, what do you think the announcement will say?

3) What will happen to you personally if the announcement is contrary to your present view of Medjugorje?

There are a lot of myths about the life of St. Patrick.

One of them is that he was Protestant.

Or at least that he wasn't Catholic but was instead, I guess, a kind of proto-Protestant.

This kind of thinking is found in some Evangelical circles, where some of those of Irish descent have a desire to claim St. Patrick as one of their own.

This kind of thinking is understandable, based in human emotions.

It's also nonsense, historically.

So if you encounter folks at work–or wherever–denying that St. Patrick was Catholic, you might want to check out a piece I did lo some 13 years ago.

GET THE STORY.

Msgr. Charles J. Scicluna is the promoter of justice for the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith in handling cases where priests are accused of sexual abuse, which effectively makes him the prosecutor in such cases.

That’s the message that some in the media are rapidly trying to spin.

The Times carried the blaring headline,

Pope knew priest was paedophile but allowed him to continue with ministry

From that we would expect the kind of story that has appeared in the media over and over in recent years: Back when the Pope was still a bishop, one of his priests was a paedophile but rather than bounce him from the ministry, the future pope instead covered up his crimes and allowed him to continue in ministry, perhaps by transferring him to one or more locations.

That’s the narrative we are expected to infer from the headline.

But when you read the story, the details don’t fit.

For a start, it wasn’t one of then-Cardinal Ratzinger’s priests. He was the cardinal archbishop of Munich, but the priest was from the diocese of Essen.

And Cardinal Ratzinger did not, contrary to some reports, send the priest for therapy—or return him to ministry.

He allowed the priest to stay in a rectory so that he could receive treatment in Munich.

According to Phil Lawler,

There is no evidence that the Pope was aware the accused priest was an accused pedophile; he was evidently informed only that the priest had been guilty of sexual improprieties.

So what we have, apparently, is a situation in which the bishop of Essen (or someone) came to Cardinal Ratzinger and said, “There’s a priest from the diocese of Essen who has committed sexual improprieties and needs to receive counselling. Can you put him up in a rectory while he is given psychological therapy in Munich?”

And Ratzinger said yes.

How sinister is that?

This wasn’t his priest. Whether the priest would return to ministry after counselling wasn’t his decision. All he’s doing is allowing the man to have a room in a local rectory while he undergoes therapy.

And what if it turns out he did know that the sexual improprieties involved children?

At that time (1980) it was commonly thought that paedophiles could be cured through psychological counselling.

Even the British religion reporter Ruth Gledhill, writes:

What is often forgotten is how little was known of paedophilia. It was believed it could be cured, and that penitence was tantamount to recovery.

So, the narrative of a bishop secretively transferring his priests—who he knows are incurable, repeat offenders—from parish to parish does not apply.

However, at some point, Lawler notes,

the vicar general of the Munich archdiocese made the decision to let the accused priest help out at a parish. That vicar general, Msgr. Gerhard Gruber, says that he made that decision on his own, without consulting the cardinal. The future Pope never knew about it, he testifies. Several years later, long after Cardinal Ratzinger had moved to a new assignment at the Vatican, the priest was again accused of sexual abuse.

That time the priest was convicted and punished according to German law.

But we still don’t have a set of facts that supports the pope-as-paedophile-enabler narrative that the Times wants to suggest.

Even Ruth Gledhill (employed by the Times) acknowledges:

The latest scandal coming out of Germany is not enough to threaten the Pope or the Church. But on top of a succession of damaging revelations it can only increase the damage being done to its moral authority on the world stage. The killer fact that could bring down the Pope or Church probably does not even exist.

The Pope is pretty unassailable. He is not elected, he is a monarch, and the centralisation that has taken place under the last two Popes has cemented that power. Pope Benedict XVI has also indicated in his three encyclicals the depths of his own integrity and intellectual rigour.

Setting aside Gledhill’s failure to note basic facts of the subject she reports on (the pope is elected; remember that conclave thingie in 2005? how we got Pope Benedict? presumably she means that he doesn’t have to face re-election), I think she’s right.

Based on what we know today, there isn’t enough “there” there.

What do you think?