The Road To A Francis Christmas: Compassion vs. Capitalism or Compassion vs Koch?

With Pope Francis I dedicating much of his reign to compassion to the poor, it's no wonder that much of America's Right have balked. Paul Ryan called Francis' concept of capitalism "naive" and Rush Limbaugh has denigrated the Vatican and its attack on "unfettered capitalism." John Stossel once held a symposium of sorts on the "good" of greed, in which he gave the analogy of a cake with only a small part cut for the lower classes - "why not just make another cake?" But Francis countered:

Now the Koch brothers have entered the fray, with one Washington Post OpEd piece (John and Carol Saeman) insisting that the Koch brothers love the poor as much as Francis (!!):

Patricia Miller, Religion Dispatches:

It’s through their association with Freedom Partners that the Saemans have become aware of the Koch brothers’ “deep concern for the least fortunate,” which they express by supporting organizations that “bear the common mission of advancing free enterprise and free societies.” The Saemans write that “promoting limited government alongside the Kochs is an important part of heeding Pope Francis’s call to love and serve the poor.” This despite Francis’ unequivocal statements almost exactly a year ago in opposition to the “free enterprise” ideology.

Of course, the Saemans resurrect the "tough love"/"bootstraps" kind of ideology as the REAL compassion, while scrapping all safety nets and welfare programs.

How very, very compassionate.

And how very, very wrong. The Saemans, it's worth noting, are financial contributors to the Freedom Partners Chamber of Commerce:

wikipedia:

Freedom Partners gave grants worth a total of $236 million to conservative organizations including Tea Party groups like the Tea Party Patriotsand organizations which opposed the Affordable Care Act prior to the 2012 election. A majority of Freedom Partners board is made up of long time employees of the Koch brothers.[6][7][8] In 2012, Freedom Partners made a grant of $115 million to the Center to Protect Patient Rights.

Getting Compassion Right

The truest form of compassion was given in the parable of the Good Samaritan: he did not judge the battered Jew, nor did he tell him that he, and not big government, was the answer. The Good Samaritan just did what was necessary for the Jew to live - to survive. Had he been passing by a Jewish beggar in the road, he would have seen to his food, shelter and clothing. He would not have told him to go out and get a job. 

Francis is scaring people like the Koch brothers simply because he is getting compassion right and people are beginning to question the Koch ideology. And along with the Koch ideology comes the "prosperity gospel" preachers, Christian Right churches assailing "social justice" and a horde of Paul Ryans, Rush Limbaughs, John Stossels, Sean Hannitys, Ann Coulters who praise capitalism as the savior of mankind. 

When will the message hit?

Of course, Francis’ message of compassion will take time: although Black Friday wasn’t as “black” as usual, that doesn’t mean that the American public has chosen to put more of its wealth into worthy causes. Ads for the “perfect” gift will still blare until late Christmas Eve and the kettles of Salvation Army will not see any jump in donations. 

But the Koch pitch of "just as compassionate as Francis" is showing some serious re-branding which may trickle down to some worthwhile agencies. Not the way Francis would like, but progress just the same.

The road to Christmas is going to be very interesting this year. 

Busy Days For Francis: Tackling Pedophilia, Celibacy, Compassion And "Humanitarian" Rick Perry

“Whether they are traveling because of poverty, or violence, or with the hope of reuniting with relatives on the other side of the border, it is urgent to protect them and help them because their vulnerability is greater and they are defenseless against any abuse or misfortune”.

Pope Francis has hit the news several times in two days and the subjects of debate are shocking and straightforward: the Vatican admitted that at least 2% of all clergy (including bishops and cardinals) are ... pedophiles. Addressing the subject, the pontiff also questioned the efficacy of celibacy (!). And with a very quick shift in gears, Francis made pointed remarks about other juvenile victims: the refugees flooding Texas, Arizona and California borders from Central America. 


Human Earthquake

"The Diocese of West Texas released this photo Wednesday of Central American refugee children apprehended at the southern U.S. border. Tens of thousands of them have fled their homes in Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, hoping to reunite with relatives in the North. It’s a humanitarian crisis, government agencies are overwhelmed, and the diocese is working with Episcopal Relief and Development and other agencies to find shelter, safety and legal protection for these refugees. It’s like a human earthquake, caused by violence and worsened by politicians; meanwhile Episcopalians and other churches are trying to focus on the kids." From The Daily Office.

Obviously, Rick Perry didn't like what the pope said. In a FOX News interview with Brit Hume, Perry said that deporting the children during the immigration crisis brewing in the south was "the most humanitarian thing we can do." Perry lambasted Obama's efforts to support border patrol, intimating that it was his "Katrina." But although he stated that the children should be humanely accommodated, his strident tone for the children's reasons for being here in the first place took over:

The former Republican presidential candidate said that he knew refugees would send the message back to their families that troops were on the border because “their conversations are being monitored with calls back to Central America, and the message is ‘Hey, come on up here, everything is great, they’re taking care of us.’ And that needs to stop.”

No, Perry could have been pleased with the Pope's plea for unconditional compassion.

And neither could Rush Limbaugh: 

There's a typical headline here about what happened in Murrieta, California. It's from Reuters: "Anti-Immigration Protesters Block Undocumented Migrants in California." That headline is a lie in several ways. One, these people were not protesting immigration. They were protesting illegal immigration and dumping, number one. And then Reuters called these kids migrants.

He also stated that many of the children probably carried communicable diseases. 

Naughty Murietta

Murietta, CA is part of affluent Riverside County. Check that: it's THE most affluent part of Riverside County. And the most Republican. And the least diverse. And the least Hispanic. It may have the only all-Rush Limbaugh and all-Sean Hannity cable channels in the country. Naturally, it hates any form of illegal immigrants, from babies to octogenarians. 

“The Town Where Immigrants Hit a Human Wall,” read a New York Times headline. “In California, an Immigration Flashpoint,” proclaimed The Washington Post. And the "flashpoint" was countered by faith-based organizations in the border states willing to help the children, taking Francis' plea to heart. 

Murietta is now a shouting match.

Leprosy In The House

For Francis, the matter of children seemed to dominate his thoughts this last week: the immigrant crisis in America came after a shocking admission:

"Many of my co-workers who struggle with me reassure me with reliable data that assess pedophilia within the church at the level of 2 percent. This finding should reassure me but I must tell you that I do not [find it] reassuring at all. I consider it very serious indeed. ... I find this situation intolerable and I intend to tackle it with the seriousness it requires," he reportedly said in an interview with Eugenio Scalfari for the Italian newspaper, La Repubblica.

He called the 2% a "leprosy in the house", just days after he met with abuse survivors and begged forgiveness. 

The Vatican officially denied parts of the interview, giving shadings to the "2%" comment. It also denied that the Pope commented on finding a solution to celibacy. 

Whatever the pending reactions to the outspoken Francis, it is clear that his devotion to children and the less fortunate is not to be diminished or demeaned by pundits like Rush Limbaugh, or negated by politicians like Rick Perry. 

Season Of Getting Part 4 : Tough To Take Heart Among The Limbaugh Scrooges And Their Trickle Down Christmas

The Season of Getting Part Four


Perhaps more than any other Christmas season in recent memory, this one has been a season of contrasts: it has been a season of extreme opinions, of extreme politics, of giving and getting - mostly on one side. But perhaps the biggest contrast is between the heartened and the hardened.


Tough To Take Heart





It's been tough this Christmas Season to find things that would make you take heart - give you hope. So very many things have surfaced regarding the hardened. For example: yesterday a discarded 10-week-old apricot poodle puppy was found barely alive on a conveyor belt in San Francisco's city dump. Animal Control named her "Gem" because they considered her a "diamond in the rough."

"Gem" actually serves as a symbol of the kind of throw-away, trickle-down economy we have. Instead of tending to her wounds and giving her up for adoption (or to a poor family who wanted her), she was cast away into a recycling bin. Maybe whoever threw her away thought some homeless person might rummage through the trash and find her. After all, they eat dogs in undeveloped countries, don't they?

Yes, that last was a cheap shot at the rich, but Gem's apparent worthlessness warrants a lot of cheap shots.

The Economics Of Limbaugh Scrooges And Pope Francis

Speaking of cheap shots, the pope continues to take them right and Right by personages such as Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity this Christmas Season because of his "trickle down economics is tyranny" statement. They called him a Marxist.

Pope Francis

"The Marxist ideology is wrong. But I have met many Marxists in my life who are good people, so I don’t feel offended [to have been called a Marxist]. There is nothing in the Exhortation that cannot be found in the social Doctrine of the Church... The promise was that when the glass was full, it would overflow, benefiting the poor. But what happens instead, is that when the glass is full, it magically gets bigger nothing ever comes out for the poor."

Or the poor get meager scraps from the table - like dogs.

Rich Kids - Love, Poor Kids - Guilt




The saying is true: Santa gives more to rich kids than he does to poor kids, and it's not just because the presents are too small to fit down drainpipes. It's because giving to the poor at Christmas time is merely a luxurious, gratifying pleasure resulting from a year-long guilt trip. The contrast to their own children is embarrassing. In the back of their minds, they come to realize that Francis is right: "trickle down" economics doesn't work. Time to make up for it. Just this once.

The Beautiful Ones

Francis also called the bombastic Christians (aka the Christian Right) "ugly." They undoubtedly have food drives and canned good bins "for the needy" placed prominently in their churches, but the way they have been trumpeting their Christianity ("There's a war on Christmas!") not only during the season, but all year long ( "We're so persecuted!"), tarnishes their Christian-ness. Their Tea Party liaisons and plethora of prosperity gospel preachers belie their true interests.

By contrast, Francis' statement implied that many progressive, social justice Christians are "beautiful". It also implied that "beautiful" people/souls need not necessarily be Christian. Francis has met "good" people full of heart from all races, creeds and ideologies. He probably has met some good atheists (shock!).

So the "beautiful" ones are those in which we must take heart. They are the ones the poor must depend upon - all year round. Depending upon people like Rush Limbaugh might lead you to finding your Christmas present in a recycling dumpster.

Give Til It Hurts vs Buy Til It Hurts: Francis Challenges Traditional American Christmas Greed

"The culture of prosperity deadens us; we are thrilled if the market offers us something new to purchase; and in the meantime all those lives stunted for lack of opportunity seem a mere spectacle; they fail to move us."

Black Friday always brings out the worst in American greed, and last week's was classic, with violence in parking lots and in stores all over the country. It made the retailer happy, the store managers cringe ... and the pope sad. It showed the manipulations of a got-to-have-it culture by cold and calculating capitalists. His first official published work was about this form of economic self-pleasure. For many, it was as if Francis was whipping the Waltons in the Temple, but for others, it looked like Francis was taking his papal whip to revered Madison Avenue Santa Clauses.

Such audacity from a pope will not be tolerated! So much has been said about the pope's missive concerning rampant capitalism that one wonders if the Right (Christian or otherwise) can keep up with all the "restrained" disagreements let alone the undignified ones.

Christian Post:

"This is just pure Marxism coming out of the mouth of the pope," [Rush] Limbaugh declared. The commentator noted that, until this letter, he had admired Pope Francis. Now, however, he must distance himself. On economics, the pope is "totally wrong, I mean dramatically, embarrassingly, puzzlingly wrong."

Of course, Limbaugh doesn't see anything wrong in the disparity between himself and the poor. 

David Brooks:

I guess I would wish he would emphasize two things, first, that capitalism over the last 25 years has been an incredible moral good. It has reduced poverty more in the last 25 years than ever before in human history, mostly in Asia. But that's been a phenomenal good. That's relieved suffering. And that has been a product of capitalism.

Brooks seems to think that capitalism itself reduced poverty, but capitalism itself doesn't see to a living wage. Francis is talking about unfettered, run-amok capitalism, the kind that George Bush gave free rein to during his tenure.

Perhaps the most forceful statements were made by FOX's Stuart Varney who said that "capitalism is liberating" and that Francis should stay out of the world economic arena simply because Varney does not want to mix religion and politics.

Huh? He might get canned from FOX for that last statement, or at least get a tongue lashing from Mike Huckabee. And as for capitalism being "liberating", he certainly doesn't address the sweatshops of Bangladesh.

The Juggernaut of Santa

In the world of greed, it's hard to beat the jolly old elf's bag brimming with toys - for good children or good adults. Change that last to "successful" adults, for in most of American culture success equals goodness. Asking some people to forego the signs of their success is like asking them to give up their souls - their reasons for living. Unfettered capitalism depends upon an unbridled drive for success and acquiring displays of success. 

In essence, the American Christmas is one huge display of success. What Pope Francis proposes is to stop the display and reverse course: show your success as a human being by helping others. Lessen the gap between rich and poor.

That will never do. Not for the Waltons, the Koch Brothers, prosperity preachers like "Bishop" Eddie Long or Pat Robertson. 

Yes, in his first substantive missive, Pope Francis has taken on Santa Claus. It's a pity he won't win. Not by a long shot.