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Tuesday, June 6
View Article  Pope: How Could God 'Tolerate' Holocaust? Part IV
by Daniel J. Shepard on Tue 06 Jun 2006 12:00 AM EDT

Pope: How Could God 'Tolerate' Holocaust?

 

Part V

 

I am aware this series of articles has been out of character with this blog. The site hits has clearly shown this to be the case. I will post the following as the last of its kind to be found on this particular site.

 

This site will remain what it had previously been, namely: Pacifistic in nature.

 

I will open a new site to run simultaneously with this site. The new site will include article series such as this one. Its location will be found under the sidebar of this site listed as ‘Activism’.

 

This series may have offended some due to its appearent judgmental nature.

 

But is this series of statements a form of judgmental statements intended to be simply divisive in nature?

 

First of all this series of statements regarding Pope Benedict the XVI is not judgmental:

 

Fact:

 

  1. Pope Benedict the XVI is German
  2. Pope Benedict the XVI was a member of the Hitler Youth
  3. Pope Benedict the XVI is the undisputed leader of the Catholic Church
  4. Pope Benedict the XVI understands men act within the realm of free will
  5. Pope Benedict the XVI is well that it was man not God that committed the Holocaust
  6. Pope Benedict the XVI did ask: Why did God allow this (the Holocaust) to happen?

 

This series of facts, this indirect implication - by the Pope himself - of God being responsible for the holocaust, initiated the soul searching action of man seeking the answer to the question: Why did God allow the Holocaust to happen?

 

The action on the part of the Pope sends men seeking the answer to the wrong question: Why did God allow the Holocaust to happen as opposed to asking the correct question: Why did man let the Holocaust happen?

 

The action of the Pope had the effect of transferring the responsibility for the Holocaust, which names a collective act genereating not just the death of six million Jews but five million non-Jews, from man’s shoulders to God’s shoulders.

 

This process is the direct act of shifting responsibility regarding the actions of the Vatican from the Vatican to God’s shoulders. The act is repeated so often today. Leaders attempt to shift responsibility from themselves to the shoulders of others.

 

I know this series of short articles/questions regarding Pope Benedict the XVI was upsetting to many of those reading this blog. The very fact that the hits dropped from twelve hundred a day to two hundred a day clearly demonstrates the abhorrence the readers of this blog find in reading negative blogging. But the fact remains that the action of this Pope is a stark example of how we, all of us, to take actions which appear to be short term solutions to ugly personal problems we face on a daily basis by shifting responsibility from ourselves to others.

 

Truth is the issue here, not avoidance.

 

I am not suggesting the Pope step down from his position due to his past acts. I never made that statement.

 

I stated: The Pope, the leader of a religion which tells men to seek forgiveness of God, should seek simply do what he tells others to do, namely: Seek forgiveness of God.

 

But symbiotic panentheism states the divine is found not only in God but is found also in man. Man was made by God, in the image of God. Man was made by an all powerful Being and as such the divine is found in man since God made man in His image. Thus man is divine. As such the act of the Pope seeking God’s forgiveness is not enough if the Pope is seeking the forgiveness of the divine. For universal forgiveness of the divine, the Pope would need to seek both God’s forgiveness AND man’s forgiveness. That is what I stated.

 

In short: The Pope, as a leader, needs to lead by example. The Pope needs to take responsibility for his actions. The Pope should acknowledge his role in the holocaust and if he feels the need, to ask forgiveness not only of God but of man.

 

Such an act would demonstrate how others should act.

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Friday, June 2
View Article  Pope: How Could God 'Tolerate' Holocaust? Part IV
by Daniel J. Shepard on Fri 02 Jun 2006 12:00 AM EDT

Pope: How Could God 'Tolerate' Holocaust?
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20060528/D8HT21CO0.html

Part IV

I don’t understand how the leader of the Catholic faith, the leader of one billion Christians, ‘the human voice of God’ can fail to appreciate the responsibility of the Vatican.

 

Pope Benedict stated:

 

…He also did not mention the controversy over the wartime role of Pope Pius XII, who some say did not do all in his power to prevent Jews from being deported to concentration camps. The Vatican rejects that accusation…’

 

Shame on Pope and double shame on the Vatican. Most of the problems our species is experiencing at this point in history goes to the unwillingness of the individual to take responsibility of their actions.

 

Too often men hide behind the mask of ‘the nation’, ‘the corporation’, ‘the government’, ‘the Vatican’ in order to absolve themselves of their responsibilities. In fact there is no such thing as: ‘the corporation’, ‘the government’, ‘the Vatican’. These entities are in fact nothing but a collective action of men and it is the men who comprise such organizations who must stand up and take responsible for their actions commented while acting within said organizations.

 

Until the leaders of our societies and organizations begin to do just that, lead – take responsibility for their actions, events of the past, history will not change.

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Thursday, June 1
View Article  Pope: How Could God 'Tolerate' Holocaust? Part III
by Daniel J. Shepard on Thu 01 Jun 2006 12:00 AM EDT

Pope: How Could God 'Tolerate' Holocaust?
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20060528/D8HT21CO0.html

Part III

I don’t understand how the leader of the Catholic faith, the leader of one billion Christians, ‘the human voice of God’ can place the blame for the holocaust upon God.

 

Pope Benedict stated:

 

…Benedict did not refer to collective guilt of the German people but instead focused on the Nazi regime…’.

 

The German people have been given a pass by none other than the Pope. A society is responsible for its actions. A Pope cannot absolve the citizens of a nation of its responsibilities. To absolve the German people of its history is to encourage history to repeat itself. Even Hitler said to generals that the history of the Armenian genocide at the beginning of the century clearly demonstrated humanities indifference of history and as such no one would judge a nation for its past acts.

 

Now I will grant you that symbiotic panentheism clearly states that no man is responsible for the actions of those that came before him, however, that does not mean that history is to be distorted or rewritten with the express purpose of diminishing the acts of one’s forefathers.

 

I am German and as such will do everything I can to prevent Germans, to prevent humanity from repeating history, especially the acts of genocide.

 

And just what is it I am doing to prevent the genocide which is occurring in today’s world, genocidal actions such as occurs in Bosnia, Cambodia, Sudan, Nigeria, etc.

 

I am attempting to work against the acts of genocide through the process of describing a broader understanding of reality which clearly demonstrates the insanity of such acts.

 

Is this a humanitarian act on my part? Actually no. The act on my part is actually a selfish one on my part. Symbiotic panentheism is the only metaphysical model of reality, of which I am aware, which clearly demonstrates the significance of individualism wherein acts of altruism are done for selfish reasons.

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Wednesday, May 31
View Article  Pope: How Could God 'Tolerate' Holocaust? Part II
by Daniel J. Shepard on Wed 31 May 2006 12:00 AM EDT

Pope: How Could God 'Tolerate' Holocaust?
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20060528/D8HT21CO0.html

Part II

I don’t understand how the leader of the Catholic faith, the leader of one billion Christians, ‘the human voice of God’ can place the blame for the holocaust upon God.

 

Pope Benedict stated:

"In a place like this, words fail; in the end, there can be only a dread silence, a silence which itself is a heartfelt cry to God: Why, Lord, did you remain silent? How could you tolerate all this?..."

God did not perform the holocaust. God did not encourage the holocaust. God did not give His/Her/Its consent to men to initiate and carry out the holocaust.

What God did do was ‘create’ man in His image and that meant giving man free will, give man the gift or curse of being able to act as he/man decided. It was man who initiated the holocaust It was man who conducted the holocaust. It was man who watched as the holocaust was being carried out.

For shame on the Pope. I am a Catholic who does not believe in the infallibility of the Pope and this act of Pope Benedict clearly demonstrated the fallibility of the Pope for of all people the Pope should understand that had God interfered with the act of the holocaust God would have been retracting the very gift of free will He had bestowed upon man and demoted man to being nothing but a puppet. Such an act on the part of God would have relegated man to being nothing but God’s pawn and demonstrated both the insignificance of man and the validity of nihilism.

The Pope needs to pray for greater metaphysical wisdom and religious humility.

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Tuesday, May 30
View Article  Pope: How Could God 'Tolerate' Holocaust? Part I
by Daniel J. Shepard on Tue 30 May 2006 12:00 AM EDT

Pope: How Could God 'Tolerate' Holocaust?
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20060528/D8HT21CO0.html

 

Part I:

 

I don’t understand how the leader of the Catholic faith, the leader of one billion Christians, ‘the human voice of God’ can place the blame for the holocaust upon God.

 

Pope Benedict stated:

…"To speak in this place of horror, in this place where unprecedented mass crimes were committed against God and man, is almost impossible - and it is particularly difficult and troubling for a Christian, for a pope from Germany,"

It was The Pope himself who served in the Hitler Youth which in its own unique way contributed to Hitler’s obsession to cleanse the human race of its Jewish  influence, cleanse the human race of its ‘misfits’, religious leaders, Gypsies, handicapped, ‘genetically malformed, politically incorrect, …

The Pope should have fallen on his knees before the gates of Auschwitz and prayed for forgiveness and mercy from both God and man. As a Hitler Youth, the Pope was a at the least a passive collaborator of the Nazi atrocities and should, as an example for our species, declared himself unworthy to enter into the hallowed grounds of Auschwitz.

Instead the Pope moves his speech into a dialogue questioning why God would allow such atrocities to occur rather than take responsibility for his own actions which emerged from the personal sphere of free will which encompassed him.

The Pope was/is in denial.

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