Mass beatification of clergy from the guerra civil

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Bob
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Mass beatification of clergy from the guerra civil

Post by Bob »

The Catholic Church has decided to beatify (a preliminary step toeward eventual sainthood) 498 people, almost all clergy, from the guerra civil. I cannot help recalling the photos of clergy giving the fascist salute. What do our members think about this?

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Eli
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Post by Eli »

While some in the clergy no doubt supported the Fascist regime, many were slaughtered. According to Wikipedia "one miracle must be proven to have taken place through the intercession of the person to be beatified, though this requirement is waived for those who died a martyr" so, I'm guessing it is fair to say that all those being beatified were martyrs somehow, and not among those that might've supported the Fascist regime.

IMO what any religious organization does or fails to do is up to them.
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Post by Carlos »

Bob y Elí, esta beatificación hay que ponerla en su contexto.

Hoy como ayer, la Iglesia católica española forma una estrecha alianza con los sectores más conservadores de la política, es decir, con el PP. Es curioso que mientras este partido, primero con Aznar y ahora con Rajoy, se oponen a la investigación con células madre, al matrimonio gay, etc, la Iglesia se ponga a fabricar santos en serie en el momento en que se discute la llamada "Ley de la Memoria Histórica", que pretende rehabilitar a todos los que sufrieron persecuciones durante la Guerra Civil y la época franquista.

Los obispos españoles, con esa hipocresía suya tan característica, dicen que esto es un asunto meramente religioso, sin otras connotaciones, pero "casualmente" se les olvidan todos los sacerdotes vascos que Franco mandó fusilar, y muchos otros católicos republicanos represaliados, desde políticos a militares, obreros o simplemente practicantes de otra religión, como los luteranos, conceptuados como "herejes" cuando no "rojos" sin más.
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is
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Post by is »

I'm not exactly impartial on this one. So I asked a doctor friend last night if he had heard about the news regarding the 'mass beatification' of slain clergy during the Spanish Civil War.

He said most Asturians probably gave it little time, that it was yet another episode of posture politics by the ultraconservative Catholic Church in today's Spain as they see more ground being lost. The anti-clerical vein of many Asturians means this kind of news is often anecdotal/peripheral. In more 'Catholic' parts of Spain it might be taken seriously, though.

As for me, how so much news about organized religion makes it onto headlines in mainstream newspapers and broadcast news, is always surprising. This 'beatification', an arcane Early Christian formula in and of itself, smacks of political revanchism. So it makes sense that it might be an attempt to compensate, in a twisted way, for Spain's new Ley de Memoria Historica.

Here is an excerpt of Antony Beevor's 'The Spanish Civil War' (1982). My edition is from 2001, pp 70-71:

"The slaughter did not follow the same pattern on each side. In Nationalist territory the relentless purging of 'reds and atheists' was to continue for years, while in Republican territory the worst of the violence was mainly a sudden and quickly spent reaction of suppressed fear, exacerbated by desires of revenge for the past.

The attacks on the clergy were bound to cause the greatest stir abroad, where there was little understanding of the church's powerful political role. The Catholic church was the bulwark of the country's conservative forces, the foundation of what the right defined as Spanish civilization. Not surprisingly, the outside world had a fixed impression of Spain as a deeply religious country. The jest of the Basque philosopher Unamuno, that in Spain even atheists were Catholic, was taken seriously. Centuries of fanatical superstition enforced by the Inquisition had engraved this image on European minds. Even so, it was surprising how few foreign newspapers made the connection between the religious repression dating back to the Middle Ages and the violent anti-clericalism which developed in the 19th century. For the anarchists, at least, the church represented nothing less than the psychological operations branch of the state. As such, it was a target which ranked in importance with the civil guard.

...During the war the Nationalists claimed that 20,000 priests had been slaughtered; afterwards they said that 7,937 religious persons were killed out of a total community of around 115,000. This figure would still appear to be high, but undoubtedly there was a terrible slaughter. Even so, liberal Catholics abroad were later to state that the killing of priests was no worse than the right's killing of left-wingers in the name of God. The Spanish church was furious at this attitude, yet it said nothing when the Nationalists shot 16 of the Basque clergy including the arch-priest of Mondragon. The most sensational item of propaganda in the world press involved the raping of nuns, yet the detailed Nationalist indictment of Republican crimes published in 1946 offers no evidence for any such incident, while hinting at only one."
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Post by Berto_Zorea »

Carlos wrote:Bob y Elí, esta beatificación hay que ponerla en su contexto.

Hoy como ayer, la Iglesia católica española forma una estrecha alianza con los sectores más conservadores de la política, es decir, con el PP. Es curioso que mientras este partido, primero con Aznar y ahora con Rajoy, se oponen a la investigación con células madre, al matrimonio gay, etc, la Iglesia se ponga a fabricar santos en serie en el momento en que se discute la llamada "Ley de la Memoria Histórica", que pretende rehabilitar a todos los que sufrieron persecuciones durante la Guerra Civil y la época franquista.

Los obispos españoles, con esa hipocresía suya tan característica, dicen que esto es un asunto meramente religioso, sin otras connotaciones, pero "casualmente" se les olvidan todos los sacerdotes vascos que Franco mandó fusilar, y muchos otros católicos republicanos represaliados, desde políticos a militares, obreros o simplemente practicantes de otra religión, como los luteranos, conceptuados como "herejes" cuando no "rojos" sin más.
La Iglesia Católica en España hoy no representa nada ni política, ni social ni culturalmente. En la calle está muerta. Cada día hay menos vocaciones y su voz solo es oida cuando los medios de comunicación se hacen eco de noticias como ésta para crear polémica.

La beatificación de estas personas está pedida desde hace años, antes de que gobernase Zapatero e incluso Aznar por lo cual relacionarla con la Ley de Memoria Histórica es polemizar una casualidad.

Las beatificaciones son estudiadas una por una y son propuestas para aquellas personas que murieron por su fé, como fué el caso de los miles de religiosos asesinados en España durante la guerra civil por el simple hecho de profesar su fé, algunos casos son estremecedores, ahora mismo me viene a la mente la masacre de Barbastro en Aragón. El mismo cura de mi pueblo (Tiraña-Llaviana) fué ajusticiado al comienzo de la guerra en la casa de su familia y llevado al frente de Uvieu donde le pegaron dos tiros en la cabeza por el simple hecho de ser cura.

Es decir, ninguna persona que haya muerto por su actividad política (como es el caso de los curas vascos) o sus acciones en la Guerra puede ser beatificada, por el simple hecho de que la beatificación no es una cuestión política o de Ley Civil o Militar, sino que es un concepto religioso ante aquellos que han dado su vida por la fé.
Asturies ye Asturies ya´l restu tierra conquistá.
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