This image (click to enlarge) was taken during a state visit between socialist president Evo Morales of Bolivia and leftish pope Francis of the Vatican. The gift is a crucifix affixed to a sickle and hammer.
I’m reminded of these words from my Nietzsche and the Nazis (2010), about the philosopher on Christianity and socialism:
“The Judeo-Christian tradition says this is a world of sin, in which the weak suffer at the hands of the strong; that we should all be selfless and serve God and others, especially the sick and helpless; and that in a future ideal world
— heaven — the lion will lay down with lamb, and the inescapable power of God will bring salvation to the meek and judgment to the wicked.
“The Marxist socialist tradition says this is a world of evil exploitation, in which the strong take advantage of the weak. But we should all be selfless and sacrifice for the good of others, especially the needy — ‘From each according to his ability, to each according to his need’ — and that the forces of history will necessarily bring about a future ideal world ending all harsh competition, empowering the oppressed and eliminating the evil exploiters.”
Source: Nietzsche and the Nazis (Ockham’s Razor, 2010), Section 23, p. 55.
Yes! What is called secular humanism today is in fact a deadly embrace of two intertwined yet utterly opposed traditions: the Enlightenment, and the Germany centered reaction to it e.g. Kant, Hegel, Marx, etc., that isolated, distilled and surpassed in virulence the darkest tenets, tendencies and themes of traditional religion, while carefully couching itself in the former’s sensibility and terms e.g. “pure reason” and “scientific socialism.”
Socialism was a reanimation of the Christian ethics designed to appeal to the emerging secular ethos. Excepting fundamentalists most Westerners have rejected medieval cosmology, including its metaphysics and epistemology. They have also repudiated its politics, including policies such as the Inquisition, pogroms, witch-hunts and crusades. Yet few have questioned its ethics, though evidence of their incredible destructiveness everywhere abounds, historically and today.
Both traditions waged virulent wars against the self on every level, from intellectual to psychological to physical. To those who say that anti-self doctrines have failed, I would say that on an often genocidal scale they have succeeded.
I always believed this pope was the most consistent in thought and action. He is following the doctrine to the letter. Why people seem upset about this is beyond me.
Pope Francis has written a telegram expressing his condolences over the recent death of the Armenian Catholic Patriarch of Cilicia, Nerses Bedros XIX Tarmouni. He was 75-years-old and had recently been at San Peters Basilica to celebrate Mass in remembrance of the Armenian Genocide.