The Catholic Church, at least today, has a fairly good record on science. Having been burned by Galileo (figuratively that is, almost literally for him), the Church has kept a rather low profile on scientific issues. Officially, for instance, it has reluctantly accepted the scientific validity of evolution. However, that doesn’t stop it from adopting faith based approaches to other disciplines. Philosophy is a given, and almost excusable. Also ripe for the truthiness approach is History, and Pope Ratzinger hasn’t disappointed. Like Colbert, he has no use for what’s in books if his gut tells him different. He gave his listeners in South America a history lesson recently:
…[I}n comment likely to generate controversy in Latin America, the pope said indigenous peoples, “silently longing” for Christianity, had welcomed the arrival of European priests who “purified” them. Many indigenous rights groups believe the conquest ushered in a period of disease, mass murder, enslavement and the shattering of their cultures.
There’s a twofer for you: A Pope spreading lies and a news organization playing the “on the one hand, on the other hand” card. Who knows, after all, where the truth lies. Are you going to believe massive amounts of historical evidence, or the Pope. Take your pick.
Okay, I admit it, we’ll never know if those folks were silently longing for the white man to come and convert them. Maybe they were. One thing we do know is that they weren’t silent after Columbus got to them-they were too busy screaming. A quick Google search for “columbus native peoples extermination” reveals this little gem, among many others:
All told, it is likely that between 60 million and 80 million people from the Indies to the Amazon had perished as a result of the European invasion even before the dawning of the seventeenth century. Although much of that ghastly population collapse was caused by the spread of european diseases to which the native peoples had no immunity, an enormous amount of it was the result of mass murder. A good deal, as well, derived from simply working the enslaved native laborers to death.
I’ll spare you some of the grisly details and the more inventive methods of killing that the Christians used to save souls. But I can’t resist this quote from Bertrand Russell:
“The Spaniards in Mexico and Peru used to baptize Indian infants and then immediately dash their brains out; by this means they secured that these infants went to heaven. No orthodox Christian can find any logical reason for condemning their action, although all nowadays do so”.
Well, not all. Obviously Bertrand Russell never met Ratzi. Those kids had their silent longings fulfilled, were “purified”, and now are happy with God forever and ever in heaven, as are the pious murderers who sent them there. Those grumblers in South America are just ungrateful swine.
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