C
Cinette
Guest
This is my point!
Do you see the desperation and sadness? Portugal, wonderful Portugal needs a spiritual renewal. The Clergy is not a good example
- Status
Do you see the desperation and sadness? Portugal, wonderful Portugal needs a spiritual renewal. The Clergy is not a good example
S
scapularkid8
Guest
It’s true. Look at Spain and the Reconquista: their culture is to this day influenced by the Church (disregarding questions of national policies in relation to the respect he lay people give the Church and the clergy. Most Spanish families are still honored to have a son or daughter become a Priest/religious.)
W
WH1988
Guest
Cinnete, I am glad that you are becoming more traditional, but you must understand that your arguments have three major flaws:
Fascism is thus a strange mix of left-wing economic policies with nationalism. It is strongly based on the cult of the leader.
The Estado Novo was not like that. In fact, many believe the greatest inspiration to the Salazar’s regime was the encyclical “Rerum Novarum”, of Leo XIII.
Salazar was a leader of the Centrist Catholic Party, during the anti-clerical first republic, and he was, indeed, very devout.
His regime was based on the values of “God, Motherland, Family”, which is still the inspiration for many of the Portuguese right-wing. He promoted family values and corporativism, as a mean to avoid clashes between workers and capitalists.
There were, of course, some points that can resemble fascism, like the Mocidade Portuguesa, ou the Legiao Portuguesa (paramilitary militias), but those were created precisely in order to please in some way the small group of portuguese fascists (lead by Rolao Preto), as they had no influence in anything else.
I fail to see how a regime that so clearly promotes Catholic values can be blamed for the poor state of Portuguese Catholicism. I would say that is true only in the sense that perhaps a country like Portugal needs to have an authoritarian government in order to defend Catholicism.
Thus, it is extremely wrong to say that we need a “twenty-first century” ruralization, or that “we cannot accept poverty in the twenty-first century”. We are not in New Jerusalem yet. Why in the hell should poverty end in the twenty first century? Using centuries as trademarks of progress, is a very marxist fashion, always tending to a kind of perfect and indefinite social future. God knows what kind of ruralization will be typical in this century.
- Salazar was certainly not fascist, nor was his government fascist in any way. I’m not alone here: most independent historians refuse to classify Salazar’s regime as fascist. It is considered a Right-wing Authoritarian Regime, with many Catholic influence.
Fascism is thus a strange mix of left-wing economic policies with nationalism. It is strongly based on the cult of the leader.
The Estado Novo was not like that. In fact, many believe the greatest inspiration to the Salazar’s regime was the encyclical “Rerum Novarum”, of Leo XIII.
Salazar was a leader of the Centrist Catholic Party, during the anti-clerical first republic, and he was, indeed, very devout.
His regime was based on the values of “God, Motherland, Family”, which is still the inspiration for many of the Portuguese right-wing. He promoted family values and corporativism, as a mean to avoid clashes between workers and capitalists.
There were, of course, some points that can resemble fascism, like the Mocidade Portuguesa, ou the Legiao Portuguesa (paramilitary militias), but those were created precisely in order to please in some way the small group of portuguese fascists (lead by Rolao Preto), as they had no influence in anything else.
I fail to see how a regime that so clearly promotes Catholic values can be blamed for the poor state of Portuguese Catholicism. I would say that is true only in the sense that perhaps a country like Portugal needs to have an authoritarian government in order to defend Catholicism.
- You are clearly influenced by marxist thinking - dialectic materialism, which is incompatible with Catholicism. Please think on the expression “twenty-first century”, and how you use it as an argument. The truth is that is an empty marxist argument. Thats like saying: “HOW CAN WE HAVE POVERTY ON TUESDAY? WE HAVE ALREADY PASSED MONDAY”.
Thus, it is extremely wrong to say that we need a “twenty-first century” ruralization, or that “we cannot accept poverty in the twenty-first century”. We are not in New Jerusalem yet. Why in the hell should poverty end in the twenty first century? Using centuries as trademarks of progress, is a very marxist fashion, always tending to a kind of perfect and indefinite social future. God knows what kind of ruralization will be typical in this century.
- That is not my definition of ecumenism. That’s THE definition of ecumenism, if you reject it, you are rejecting the Church’s doctrine.
K
Kaninchen
Guest
No he wasn’t. The Fasci Italiani di Combattimento was formed by Mussolini in March 1919, the Partito Comunista Italiano wasn’t formed until January 1921. He’d never been a leader, he was a journalist for the socialist paper Avanti! until he set up his own militarist/irredentist paper Il Popolo d’Italia in 1914.
This isn’t the thread for it but I’d really like to hear about Fascism’s ‘left-wing economic policies’.
D
DAPDN
Guest
Well, in a short reply, and having in mind the fact that this is not the right subject for this thread, I’m going to give you some answers about those “left-wing leaned economic policies” which WH1988 talked about.
When we refer to that term, in what concerns to the fascist/national-socialist regimes’ economic policy, we want to say that there were a lot of typical socialist/left-wing economic leanings in the economic constitution of those regimes. One may give examples like:
When we refer to that term, in what concerns to the fascist/national-socialist regimes’ economic policy, we want to say that there were a lot of typical socialist/left-wing economic leanings in the economic constitution of those regimes. One may give examples like:
- Central planning; Nazi Germany had the famous “Office for the 4-year plans”, which was held by Göring - pretty much like the USSR had their 5-year plans, at the time of Stalin;
- The rejection of basic economic freedoms like freedom of establishment and freedom of competition, thus rejecting the model of a free market economy - the fact is that private property and private economic initiative had to be approved by the central governmental authorities, to see if the “national” or “colective” interest was being attended by that particular business (this is actually a remark of the fascist/national-socialist regimes - the individual is nothing, and the individual interests are denied, only the colective interest matters);
- And, finally, to end with this example, protectionism; in some kind of mercantilistic way, fascist and national-socialist regimes tend to insanely make their countries totally independent from the rest of the world, by trying to produce everything their population needs, and thereby, drastically reducing their imports, while improving their exports. Of course, we know better that nobody but the individual knows what needs are his needs, and what goods satisfies him the most. But the fascist/national-socialist economic constitutions tended to deliberately ignore that, once again, because of the philosophy of the regime - the individual is nothing. All that matters is the colectivity.
K
Kaninchen
Guest
With the huge difference that there was not state ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange. It was mainly a ‘public works’ program and ‘protection’ program and a rearmament program, very many capitalist economies of the time, (including the USA) had ‘public works’ and ‘protection’ programs - many were soon to have rearmament programs.
The NSDAP* was a party supported by small business and paid for by big business - the latter did very well out of it (until the end of course). The problem I have with your analysis is that it defines as ‘left-wing’ anything that isn’t laissez-faire - thus very long periods, globally, of capitalist history would have to be defined as ‘left-wing’ which renders it a pretty meaningless term.
- The growth of the Party was accompanied by the electoral collapse of the right wing parties, not the left wing parties (or the Catholic Zentrum and BVP, for that matter, whose vote stood up pretty well).
Well, autarky was a necessary concomitant to the need for a period of war (ersatz rubber, fuel etc) where Germany (as in the First World War) could be cut off from raw materials and food rather easily. This was a capitalist economy preparing for war, not ‘socialism in one country’.
The ultimate aim of the regime was really ‘back to the future’ - small farms, artisan production, small business - the contradiction was that, to achieve it, required bigger and bigger concentrations of production.
Not really, as I said above, if the Reich was ‘left-wing’ the term is rendered meaningless.
W
WH1988
Guest
Please notice: nobody said the third reich or fascist Italy were left-wing, but that they had some important (very important) left-wing economic policies. It is obvious that you never met a fascist, they are deeply anti-capitalist, because they, as DAPDN said, share an important principle with communism: the primacy of the state over the individual, even if on a slightly lower degree. I would, however, classify those aspects of fascism as clearly left-wing in economical term.
That doesn’t mean, however, that fascism is a left-wing ideology - it’s rather an interesting hybrid political phenomenon.
That doesn’t mean, however, that fascism is a left-wing ideology - it’s rather an interesting hybrid political phenomenon.
B
bpcatholic
Guest
Are those the percentages of the entire population or just the Catholic population. According to the German Catholic Conference of Catholic Bishops website it says that 12% of Catholics, not of the German population, but ONLY Catholics attend Mass on a regular basis.I recently posted that it appears that in many once staunchly Catholic European countries, Catholicism has been pretty much abandoned to a great degree. I was called on this statement so, I decided to post some stats gleaned from various polls taken. Let us remember that in Polls of this sort the number that say they attend Mass is usually about twice that actually do. Recent studies in the US and Canada saw that if 40% said they attended Mass the true figure was closer to 20-25% with similar results coming out of Western Europe. With that in mind lets look at a few figures
Malta 84% The shining star
Ireland 71%, slipping badly, the latest polls show it to be around 50% I posted the higher figure as it compares with the same time frame as the other estimates
Poland 60% the only country which has showed an increase since the 80’s
Italy 48% Really scary when you think about it
Spain 30% even scarier
Austria 28%
Luxemburg and Germany tied with 27%
Belgium 26%
Switzerland 23%
The Netherlands 19%
France 12% :bigyikes: :bigyikes:
When you factor in the half that say they attend when they don’t, the figures are truly horrific and I feel are the reason that the Holy Father has made the re-vitalization of Catholicism in Europe a top priority of his pontificate.
These figures are from the World values Survey with the latest results from 2000.
D
DAPDN
Guest
There were a lot of major state-owned corporations, Kaninchen, and mostly became state-owned by processes which are very typical on left-wing leaned economies - for example, nationalizations. They used this process a lot, especially to deal with the companies that the previous jewish owners left behind. After this, sometimes they atributed (note that they didn’t sell…) the ownership of those enterprises directly to german entrepeneurs who were friends of the party - a clear example of this process was Oskar Schindler’s Enamel Factory in “Schindler’s List” - and sometimes they just kept them running, owned and managed by the State.
Of course that what you said makes sense - in fact, public investment was widely alocated to business sectors like war industries, and so on; but I honestly don’t believe that it would have been different if there was not a war going on. The National-Socialist/Fascist ideology is deeply anti-capitalist and completely against the free-market doctrine. I think they would keep their state-ownership of some of the means of production, in any way. And the argument of the war going on may not be plausible. In fact, Nazi Germany’s economy only started to change to a War Economy after the failure of 1941’s attack on Moscow, on the Eastern Front, and even then, only by the end of 1942 the german people started to feel the effects of the war on their lifes.
So if the Nazis didn’t change anything concerning their economic policy during a period of 3 years of war in which their overall economy was not modeled after a War Economy, what makes you think that, even if there was peace instead of war, they would have applied different property and means of production ownership patterns?
Well, but once again, I make an appeal that we may stick to the thread’s matter being discussed, not a paralel one, like this.
Of course that what you said makes sense - in fact, public investment was widely alocated to business sectors like war industries, and so on; but I honestly don’t believe that it would have been different if there was not a war going on. The National-Socialist/Fascist ideology is deeply anti-capitalist and completely against the free-market doctrine. I think they would keep their state-ownership of some of the means of production, in any way. And the argument of the war going on may not be plausible. In fact, Nazi Germany’s economy only started to change to a War Economy after the failure of 1941’s attack on Moscow, on the Eastern Front, and even then, only by the end of 1942 the german people started to feel the effects of the war on their lifes.
So if the Nazis didn’t change anything concerning their economic policy during a period of 3 years of war in which their overall economy was not modeled after a War Economy, what makes you think that, even if there was peace instead of war, they would have applied different property and means of production ownership patterns?
Well, but once again, I make an appeal that we may stick to the thread’s matter being discussed, not a paralel one, like this.
K
Kaninchen
Guest
Obviously we disagree absolutely about everything on the topic of the ‘left wing’ nature of Fascism and Nazism but you’re right, we should stop.
I’m sure we’ll have opportunities to argue about it at another time.
D
DAPDN
Guest
Yes, of course. Feel free to continue this debate by all means, but I hope that you know that what I am defending is supported by a lot of political scientists, economic theorists and experts and also by some historians, as well, apart from the clearly dominant dialetic-materialist (one might as well say “marxist”) majority in nowadays’ historians.
K
Kaninchen
Guest
You know, I really wonder at the reason for this post - am I to tremble or something? Even more, I wonder why you assume that somebody who disagrees with you on this subject is somehow in thrall to Marxists?
When I was young I was a politically active anti-socialist in a world where there were still real communists around - now, they were people who were really skilled at bluster.
D
DAPDN
Guest
Of course you are not to tremble, I just wanted to provide you of some information concerning the position which I stand for; some academic background. Just that. Where did you get that silly idea from?
And I also do not understand why you took for personal my words against the dominant dialetic-materialist majority in the historians. Well, if you are an historian, I might understand your interpretation, but have in mind that I didn’t know about that, nor did I have any means of knowing that.
Now, I sincerely hope that you don’t get mad at me because of these silly misunderstandings. And once again, I restate that you can feel free to continue this debate by all means, except this thread, of course.
And I also do not understand why you took for personal my words against the dominant dialetic-materialist majority in the historians. Well, if you are an historian, I might understand your interpretation, but have in mind that I didn’t know about that, nor did I have any means of knowing that.
Now, I sincerely hope that you don’t get mad at me because of these silly misunderstandings. And once again, I restate that you can feel free to continue this debate by all means, except this thread, of course.
K
Kaninchen
Guest
Well, on the one hand there was little me, in thrall to naughty, naughty Marxists; on the other there was you and all the great and the good in the world of experts. Silly me, I wondered whether you expected me to be intimidated.
One should be careful about making assumptions. I’m not a historian, on the other hand, being of a German/Italian Jewish background, the subject has always had more than a little interest for me.
D
DAPDN
Guest
Well, I’m sorry if I was, in any way, disrespectful towards you. Shouldn’t have been, if I was so. But I still think you exagerated a bit in your interpretation of my words or intentions, which, as I have already said, were only made to show you that my opinion about the subject was not a personal pseudo-intelectual caprice, but an opinion which has a scholar support. Only that, nothing else. And I do respect your knowledge about the matter - you have already proved so, as I previously made clear in one of my posts.
G
Gottle_of_Geer
Guest
The Church is more merciful than some of its members - it does not count lapsed Catholics as not Catholics; it includes them as Catholics.
There is no virtue in being, as it were, “more-Catholic-than-thou”
As for the C of E, they are Christians: they have valid Baptism, & the Popes seem to think they count as Christians.
Lack of practice does not make a former Christian - Catholic or other. What does so, is not time, but rejection of whatever form of Christianity one used to adhere to. Is an atheist of 10 years’ standing who was formerly Catholic more Catholic than a Catholic who is lapsed for 15, but does everything Catholic apart from frequenting the Sacraments ? 
Time is not what is decisive.
It can have 1,000 members in more than one way - turning up at Mass is a very poor index of whether or not one is Catholic.
K
KingAlfred
Guest
Viva la Falange! (just play’n)
A
anon52328184
Guest
LOL That was funny, king alfred!
C
Cinette
Guest
I am not a politician or theologian and I will not employ a lot of political jargon. I am going to talk simple language. I will paint a picture of what I witnessed.
I am aware that Fascism began in Italy –a simple definition is right-wing totalitarianism. In my view even South African apartheid was fascist. Like it or not Salazar was a fascist Dictator who had a strong secret service that controlled every aspect of life (PIDE). There was dire poverty and a high level of illiteracy. In 1959, when the Queen visited Portugal they locked up the beggars until she left!! How do you like that!!?
Jobs were scarce and large numbers of people went to work in the colonies and elsewhere. The economy was supported by these people who sent back money to their families. What about the gold from the black Mozambican miners who worked in the South African gold mines? (South Africa paid Portugal in GOLD, my friend!!!)
Salazar’s regime was oppressive. Everybody in the Colonies was considered a 2nd class citizen and there was job reservation and they could not be promoted beyond a certain level in government departments (Internal Revenue, Post Office etc) and also in the Banks. These jobs were for the elite from Portugal. We rented a house to a man who came to Africa for the “army” (conscription) but in his case he had family and friends in high places (“CUNHAS”) and instead spent his time as a Bank official!!! It counted DOUBLE towards his pension.
My husband was admiring a beautiful knitted jumper in a store in Lisbon. The attendant tried to sell him the jumper which would have to made up to his size and my husband lamented that he was leaving the following day for France and the shop attendant said that it was not a problem – they could deliver the jumper to his Hotel before his departure. There was a knock on his door at 2am and to his surprise there was a child who couldn’t have been more than 12 years old with a parcel for him – special delivery. I have seen the abuse of children in this way. Cute little page boys standing with the Porters outside Hotels.
PIDE, the hated political police, was everywhere and spied on people.
:crying: I could go on and on and on but have to get back to the topic.One would see pictures in the newspapers Bishops shaking hands with a high government official – big buddies. Attending State banquets. I even witnessed a cleric dressed in his robes at the airport waiting to greet the Governor General! The Church and the State were in cahoots. There was also the Concordata and we know what that meant…
So no wonder the general public hated the oppressive regime. Oh, and listen to this! Housewives had a special name for rubber “pot scrapers” – you know the kind used when baking a cake to empty the mixture in the cake tin – this ensures every particle of the mixture is transferred into the tin. Well it was known as a Salazar! :extrahappy: This should give the reader a clear picture!
Therefore, there were many who thought that Communism had to be better. Many of these people were atheists but were self-sacrificing, courageous – they suffered and never swayed from their position. They were heroes who spent many years in jail. I knew one who spent 56 days in solitary confinement in a closet under the stairs and for that time he couldn’t stand up. **A self-respecting person wouldn’t want anything to do with a Church that supported such a regime.:hypno: ** Yet there were many good people who did not abandon the Church and fought underground – both clergy and laity.
No, no, no my friend you cannot say that Salazar was not fascist. I have never heard of such a thing. This word is not in the Italian domain – it is not a brand. After the 25 April revolution Colonialism ended and at great sacrifice the Portuguese people slowly built up a better society. It is not perfect but life is better for the people.
My husband and his family were against the regime and were Communist sympathisers. He was not even baptised as a child. Today he is a Catholic who loves the Church, goes to daily Mass and learns as much as he can about the Faith. However, let me make this clear, it is the same characteristics which led him to support Communism which led him to the Church. He has a strong sense of justice and compassion for the poor. Opus Dei makes me wince because many of their people had top government jobs during Franco’s regime and they never censured the Franco regime.
I have come to the conclusion that a Dictatorship of the Right is not as bad as a Dictatorship of the Left. But then what is left? What is right? So a leftist is one who is against the status quo but then under the Soviet Union could one really call the regime leftist? It was terribly reactionary! So the left can be right and the right left
The Communist Party may do good things sometimes but always when in the opposition, never in power.
The Church played an ugly role! Make no mistake. We know what Fascism is and it is not Catholic. The Church should make a public apology to the Portuguese. I pray that the Portuguese people will return to the Church and become true, good practicing Catholics.
A
anon52328184
Guest
that definitely gives one a good picture of what life was like in portugal under salazar. i think i can understand why the average person would not trust the Church.
i agree that fascism is not a word “owned” solely by italy.
i pray that life will continue to improve for the people of portugal and that the Catholic Church in portugal will be able to draw people back to her and their trust and faith will be restored.
i agree that fascism is not a word “owned” solely by italy.
i pray that life will continue to improve for the people of portugal and that the Catholic Church in portugal will be able to draw people back to her and their trust and faith will be restored.
- Status