Our beloved Pope dares to tell it like it is

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From an Associated Press news story:
VATICAN CITY – Pope Francis on Sunday honoured the 100th anniversary of the slaughter of Armenians by calling it “the first genocide of the 20th century” and urging the international community to recognize it as such, a politically explosive declaration that will certainly anger Turkey.
Francis, who has close ties to the Armenian community from his days in Argentina, defended his pronouncement by saying it was his duty to honour the memory of the innocent men, women, children, priests and bishops who were “senselessly” murdered by Ottoman Turks.
“Concealing or denying evil is like allowing a wound to keep bleeding without bandaging it,” he said at the start of a Mass Sunday in the Armenian Catholic rite in St. Peter’s Basilica honouring the centenary.
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In a subsequent message directed to all Armenians, Francis called on all heads of state and international organizations to recognize the truth of what transpired and oppose such crimes “without ceding to ambiguity or compromise.”
Historians estimate that up to 1.5 million Armenians were killed by Ottoman Turks around the time of World War I, an event widely viewed by scholars as the first genocide of the 20th century.
Turkey, however, refuses to call it a genocide and has insisted that the toll has been inflated, and that those killed were victims of civil war and unrest. It has fiercely lobbied to prevent countries, including the Holy See, from officially recognizing the Armenian massacre as genocide.
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And of course there is already someone in the comment section talking about how “evil” Christianity is. :rolleyes:
 
BrethrenBoy said:
And of course there is already someone in the comment section talking about how “evil” Christianity is. :rolleyes:
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Yeah, and apparently Kim Kardashian went to an Armenian church and caused a stir…

the American press has their darlings…:mad:
 
I have to remind myself not to read comments. I worry about the people who make them! :eek:
 
DakiniArtist said:
I have to remind myself not to read comments. I worry about the people who make them! :eek:
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I try not to as stupid things people say get stuck in my head and I end up spending hours mentally forming rebuttals about why they are wrong. But sometimes I can’t help myself. It’s annoying.
 
I am glad that the Pope can make statements like this without having to worry about politics, but Turkey is an ally of the U.S. so I doubt the U.S. will come out and make a statement of condemnation of what happened to the Armenians. It would be politically foolish and wouldn’t benefit us and sadly in the world of geopolitics if something doesn’t benefit in someway it’s not worth perusing. The most the Pope can hope for realistically is for countries to acknowledge the .massive loss of life and admit that it is a tragedy. But I doubt any country will condemn Turkey.

And there is nothing we can do to change what happened. Lots of people died in WW1. Russia had an estimated 9.1 million casualties. Germany had an estimated 7.1 million casualties. pbs.org/greatwar/resources/casdeath_pop.html

So Armenia was far from the only one to suffer. All we can do now is make sure we don’t have another World War. Especially now that we live in a world where nukes exist.

But I do hope that all of the Armenians who lost their lives and all of those other millions that died in WW1 are at peace now. And it is incredibly sad that millions had their lives cut short because of politics that led to a world wide conflict.
 
Justin61790 said:
ISo Armenia was far from the only one to suffer. All we can do now is make sure we don’t have another World War.
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The Armenians were the only ones in WWI who were massacred by their own people and government without ever having the atrocity called genocide.
 
Many of those Armenian Christians who managed to survive the genocide fled to Syria, their descendants were living in peace with Muslims there until the last few years. So yet again they are suffering, their homes and churches destroyed in some villages by IS, though some people remain and are being protected by Kurdish Muslims who are fighting IS. Others are being sheltered in monasteries.

I’ve just been watching a BBC TV programme “This World- Kill the Christians”, where apart from them, Christians in other parts of the middle east were mentioned. Iraq being one of those places, their situation made worse due to the invasion by the US and Britain.

It was made clear by a priest Father Bazi that the West could be helping more. When asked what could be done, he replied “Open the gates, give my people visas”. Why don’t we?. Those minority Christians there are in a desperate situation.

An informative guardian article about the programme. theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/15/middle-east-christians-islamic-persecution-iraq-war
 
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