The Pope Joins ‘Gang of Eight’?

Posted on | July 8, 2013 | 97 Comments

OK, that's it. I'm moving to Argentina. Or maybe Vatican City. Don't try to stop me, haters. https://t.co/h4Ev65sygV @AlexPappas @mattklewis

— Robert Stacy McCain (@rsmccain) July 8, 2013

When I saw this Tweet by the Pope, I was like, “Did George Soros pay him to say that?” The House is now considering the Comprehensive Piece of Crap Bill, and I was pretty pissed about it. Had the Senate Republicans or the Ford Foundation or some other open-borders lobby group gotten the Pope involved in pushing this legislative atrocity?

Apparently not.

Did you know that thousands of Africans have died trying to reach Italy? The European Union’s disastrous immigration policies — apparently, once you set foot there, they can’t kick you out — have made the Italian island of Lampedusa a mooch-magnet:

Pope Francis has visited Lampedusa to pay tribute to the thousands of refugees who have lost their lives trying to reach the European Union. The pope also criticized what he called the “globalization of indifference.”
The head of the Roman Catholic Church, who arrived on the tiny southern Italian island on Monday morning, tossed a wreath into the sea from an Italian coast guard vessel to commemorate the deceased would-be migrants. . . .
Later, the pontiff celebrated a mass on the island . . . in which he slammed what he described as “the globalization of indifference” and “the culture of wealth,” that causes people to become insensitive to the plights of others.
“We pray for a heart which will embrace immigrants,” he said via his Twitter account following the mass. “God will judge us upon how we have treated the most needy.”
Lampedusa, which is closer to Africa than the Italian mainland, has been the point of entry to the European Union for more than 200,000 people since 1999. More than 17,000 would-be migrants have died trying to reach the island during the same time period.
Around 4,000 have reached Lampedusa in the first half of this year alone, but this is well below the tens of thousands who reached the island during the Arab Spring revolts of 2011.

The “globalization of indifference”? Hey, dig this, Pope: How about encouraging the localization of responsibility?

If everybody is responsible, nobody is responsible. If it’s Europe’s job to take care of Africans, what is Africa’s job other than building boats so they can try to get to Europe? How about encouraging Africans to do something more productive than trying to leave Africa?

Also, speaking of “how we have treated the most needy,” Pope, I checked my records and you’ve never hit my tip jar. Just sayin’ . . .

UPDATE: Catholic readers might be shocked by my disrespectful tone toward His Holiness, but remember, I’m Protestant, so I can backtalk that guy and still get to Heaven. And why should this kind of gooey “social justice” nonsense — which intelligent people would reject as the idiocy it is, if Lindsey Graham said it –be exempt from criticism just because it’s coming from a dude wearing a robe?

C’mon: Was Rerum Novarum divinely inspired? Or was it, as I insist, a failed attempt by a fallible human being — a cleric with no training in economics — to strike a middle ground between the 19th-century radical Left and the reactionary Right? And upon the economic errors of Rerum Novarum, Catholics have erected an edifice of “social justice” doctrine that, a few decades ago, gave rise to the heresy of “liberation theology” that the Pope himself had to rebuke.

The duty of Christian charity cannot be transferred to governments, because that not only relieves the individual of his own obligation to charity, but it also encourages an attitude of helpless dependency and entitlement among the poor. “Social justice” thereby becomes a sort of adhesive that glues the poor to the economic floor, where sloth and profligacy are rewarded by government handouts and the lazy are encouraged toward envy of the industrious and thrifty.

Having turned Europe into a gigantic Social Welfare State, these economic errors have now made Europe a magnet for Muslim “refugees” who claim the right to emigrate on the basis of . . . what? Because they were born in Africa? Really? Just any person born in Africa can go to Europe and claim to be a “refugee,” because they’re African? There are 1 billion people in Africa, and I certainly hope His Holiness doesn’t mean they all have the right to move to Europe, whose citizens must have “a heart which will embrace immigrants” or else be condemned to Hell.

Speaking of being condemned to Hell, if you haven’t hit my tip jar lately, your immortal soul could be in jeopardy.

The Pope’s got his “social justice” doctrine, and I’ve got mine.

UPDATE II: A miracle! Like loaves and fishes!

FACT 1; @DaTechGuyblog links my blog. http://t.co/dBxGsSdmmY FACT 2: He just got an Instalanche. http://t.co/UtnOvwDTW2 Just sayin' …

— Robert Stacy McCain (@rsmccain) July 8, 2013

“Go thou and do likewise.” Amen.

Category: Catholics, Immigration

Comments

97 Responses to “The Pope Joins ‘Gang of Eight’?”

ComradeArthur
July 8th, 2013 @ 3:09 pm

RT @rsmccain: “Social justice” = a sort of adhesive that glues the poor to the economic floor http://t.co/6N0saw30Sl
PubliusNV
July 8th, 2013 @ 3:10 pm

RT @rsmccain “Social justice” = a sort of adhesive that glues the poor to the economic floor http://t.co/kiSLaqLv8E
rsmccain
July 8th, 2013 @ 3:23 pm

RT @PubliusNV: RT @rsmccain “Social justice” = a sort of adhesive that glues the poor to the economic floor http://t.co/kiSLaqLv8E
Da Tech Guy On DaRadio Blog » Blog Archive » An Instalanche More Miraculous than Stacy McCain Realizes
July 8th, 2013 @ 3:23 pm

[…] included this tweet in an update to his post on the Pope’s tweet concerning immigration saying about an instalanche I received […]
K-Bob
July 8th, 2013 @ 3:42 pm

Insta-Reet
formwiz
July 8th, 2013 @ 3:57 pm

“I’m Protestant, so I can backtalk that guy and still get to Heaven. ”

There are a billion Catholics that say otherwise.

Don’t throw away your Nomex drawers as you get older.
K-Bob
July 8th, 2013 @ 3:59 pm

I get what you’re saying, but Stacy is much closer to the mark. It’s one of those things that’s much easier to see from the outside than from within.

All “churches” are dysfunctional families. But the most successful dysfunctional families have a strong head of the family (Joe Kennedy, for example). That’s what’s been missing for far too long in not only the Catholic church, but in several large Evangelical congregations, as well.

The Catholic Church has been surfing the edge between having strong leadership, versus losing adherents, so it has moved, Carl Rove fashion, into a fugue state where they try to appeal to everyone, and thus appeal to no one.

No one that is not already “in the family,” I mean. I won’t bring up the unstated matter that seals the deal, so to speak, for most non-Catholics.

This is why folks inside the Church/family don’t see the problem as well as people on the outside do. This appeal to end the tyranny of borders is a clear example of the Rove/Fugue state that has eaten away at organizations since time began. It is indeed an aspect of the human condition that tends to want the church conformed of *this* world. If the Vatican thinks this will improve the image of that family among non-Catholics, then they are as misguided as Carl Rove.
NormaConnors
July 8th, 2013 @ 4:29 pm

RT @PubliusNV: RT @rsmccain “Social justice” = a sort of adhesive that glues the poor to the economic floor http://t.co/kiSLaqLv8E
ZION'S TRUMPET » The Pope Joins “Gang of Eight”?
July 8th, 2013 @ 5:07 pm

[…] The Pope Joins ‘Gang of Eight’? […]
JadedByPolitics
July 8th, 2013 @ 5:11 pm

The Pope Joins ‘Gang of Eight’? http://t.co/XCzKwZ2Ysi “The duty of Christian charity cannot be transferred to governments” #RightOn
thatMrGguy
July 8th, 2013 @ 6:11 pm

The Pope Joins ‘Gang of Eight’? http://t.co/wUgnQJvDOn
TMLutas
July 8th, 2013 @ 6:27 pm

And without some sort of understanding why you should wait at all, your sort of nit picking will ruin the process. Assimilation is not something that has an express plan.
TMLutas
July 8th, 2013 @ 6:35 pm

I don’t think that we’re talking machiavellian calculation here but sincere, consistent advocacy of biblical truths. If you’ve got previous border policy catholic statements that are inconsistent it would be the first I’ve heard of it.
TMLutas
July 8th, 2013 @ 6:47 pm

We’re competent, for certain values of competent. We’re absolute geniuses at government compared to Zimbabwe or Libya.
Bob Belvedere
July 8th, 2013 @ 7:22 pm

What many are railing against are those Leftists who began taking over the apparatus of The Church over a century ago and who have, as they have in all areas of The West, inserted their grimy selves into every nook and cranny of it.

John Paul The Great and Benedict did there best to battle it, but they were not as successful as they wanted to be, although they did make headway. Sadly, they may have been too late.

One also has to remember that the Pope is not an absolute monarch [except in matters of The Faith]. He is like the Holy Roman Emperors of old and sits atop a group of literal Princes, who retain a lot of autonomy.

Some have called the Leftist presence in the apparatus of The Church ‘The Super Force’ – I like that description.

FYI: I am a Fallen Catholic who believes that the Roman Catholic Church is one of the greatest forces for Good and a structural pillar of The West. It’s survival is essential for the survival of Western Civilization.
alpacaherder
July 8th, 2013 @ 7:23 pm

alpacaherder: “The Pope Joins ‘Gang of Eight’?”: http://t.co/H8etiiq7gf http://t.co/PNPk6dH5BG
Bob Belvedere
July 8th, 2013 @ 7:24 pm

Lacks oomph, K-Bob.
bobbymike34
July 8th, 2013 @ 8:17 pm

The question I have on this ‘social justice’ stupidity is this what you are saying is to return all illegals immigrants to places like Mexico or anywhere else that has a higher standard of living then Mexico and import HUNDREDS of millions of the world’s neediest, RIGHT?
richard mcenroe
July 8th, 2013 @ 8:26 pm

Surely no one is suggesting that the flood of North African refugees into Lampedusa has nothing to do with Obama’s bungled handling of the “Arab Spring”?
K-Bob
July 8th, 2013 @ 8:59 pm

True.
Excelsior
July 8th, 2013 @ 9:05 pm

Meh.

First World People always think the Pope is talking about First World Problems, because they think the world revolves around the First World.

Inevitably the Pope turns out to have been talking about global problems, with special focus on Third World Problems.

So too with the divinely-protected-from-error (not divinely inspired) Rerum Novarum and similar bits of Catholic social teaching.

American Leftists have of course carefully crafted their rhetoric to emulate it, and American conservatives, after decades of having to listen to those phrases appropriated out of context and towards socialist ends, naturally get skittish when they hear the Pope reiterating them.

What they miss is that the Pope is not saying “American middle class persons ought to be forced by their government, without regard to constitutional limitations of its power, to redistribute more of their earned income towards moochers.”

What the Pope is saying is usually more like, “Venezuelan jefes who obtained their stranglehold on land rights through intimidation, drug trade, political corruption, and the violation of the property rights of the local peasants, ought to be forced by their government to return their ill gotten property and create a political, legal, and economic system in which property rights are respected, such that even a peasant may hope of bettering his lot in proportion to his cleverness and industriousness.”

And of course when one says such things without naming particular countries, the verbiage is going to sound leftist. But it is not leftist; it is gospel. The problem is merely that leftists are very good at aping certain phrases of the gospel and hoping nobody will notice that they’re redefining all the terms.

The devil always quotes Scripture, according to His purpose, and is only too happy to assert that every productive American, if the government asks for his cloak, should give his tunic as well. Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi are, after all, the least — in every sense — of all Americans, and the devil is merely saying, “what you do for the least of these.”
K-Bob
July 8th, 2013 @ 9:11 pm

I agree with those points.

I’ve never been Catholic, but I still recognize the Catholic Church as having an unspoken sort of primacy among Christian denominations, not only among denominations that have split somewhat from the Catholic church (Greek Orthodox, for example) but also among those descended from Martin Luther’s protest. It’s not like the local Baptist Church has pledged any fealty to the Vatican, and it will in fact openly disagree, but when the Pope says something important, they all still listen with a great deal of attention.

This is why I prefer a strong leadership of that body. I have a gut feeling that Restoration here will depend in some part on the Vatican, just as John Paul’s visit to Poland in 1979 played a significant role in the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Sasshole
July 8th, 2013 @ 9:11 pm

[…] The Pope Joins ‘Gang of Eight’? – The Other McCain […]
Excelsior
July 8th, 2013 @ 9:53 pm

Not at all.

Nations that write and enforce unjust laws are unjust; nations that write and enforce just laws are just.

It follows that nations which entice and reward illegal immigration and then proceed to harshly punish a nearly random selection of those who respond to the incentives are unjust in doing so. And, it follows that nations which pass laws prohibiting migration, and then reward those who break them while punishing those who obey them, are unjust in doing so.

Were it feasible, it would be an entirely permissible policy, from a Catholic point-of-view, to prohibit all migrant labor into the U.S. and create an enforcement regime which captured and (gently) repatriated 99% of those who attempted to cross the border. (Although risk of persecution and the like might make forced repatriation unjust in some cases.)

It would likewise be an entirely permissible policy, from a Catholic point-of-view, to have entirely open borders. (Although risk to the stability of either the source or the destination society might make such a policy unwise to the point of injustice in some cases.)

But the U.S. is currently opting for the worst of all worlds:

1. Make it against the law to for most of the folks who most deeply desire to work in the U.S. to come in;

2. Make it pretty easy and (comparatively) quite lucrative for them to come in;

3. Make it dangerous for them to go to the police once they’re here, so that criminals can prey on them with impunity;

4. Set it up so that it’s very unlikely, on a month-to-month basis, that they’ll be targeted for capture, but that if they are targeted, families will likely be separated;

5. Keep promising amnesty to entice them to risk another few months here;

6. Keep encouraging them to engage in the kinds of vote fraud and leftist class-warfare and racial-division rhetoric which builds distrust of them among the most law-abiding citizens in their host country;

7. Keep encouraging racial mistrust in them, so that they fear anyone who doesn’t look like they do;

8. Occasionally change policy in a way that punishes those who waited patiently for a visa and rewards those who came in illegally.

Basically, it’s the American Left which has created all the aspects of the broken U.S. immigration system that most effectively persecute illegal immigrants.

Were it not for the Left, the enforcement regime would make attempts to cross the border look dubious; the rewards of working in the U.S. illegally would be minimized; the rewards for waiting patiently for a valid visa would be maximized; a lot more legal visas would be issued; voter ID would eliminate vote fraud; reduced welfare programs would shrink incentives for living here on the dole; and children of illegals would not automatically receive U.S. citizenship and the vote so the political process would not be corrupted.

But that’s just the U.S., remember.

Catholic teachings about migrant workers are, of course, directed at problem spots in THE WORLD, not just the U.S.

So, for example, they are probably directed more at Mexico, where border-crossing migrants are raped or murdered with impunity, than at the U.S., where they’re alternately and unpredictably coddled or caged.

When it comes to Catholic Magisterial teachings, the U.S. needs to remember: The world does not revolve around US.
Excelsior
July 8th, 2013 @ 10:01 pm

Yes.*

Next question?

* However, it is not satanic for a nation to allow any two persons (be they sex partners, tennis partners, or law partners) to easily and conveniently enter into a civil contract which grants the partners next-of-kin status, power-of-attorney, and tax advantages for cohabitation.

If that nation targets such civil contracts SOLELY at sex partners and chooses to exclude law partners and tennis partners, that would of course be an equal protection violation.

(For, in the absence of the possibility of conceiving children, there is no compelling state interest for the government to grant special privileges to sex partners but not law partners. Indeed, to require such information about the pair’s sexual interests WITHOUT justifying the requirement via concern for stable child-rearing IS a serious violation of privacy rights.)

So, a nation that allows civil unions — for EVERYONE, without regard to sexual proclivities — is of course not satanic.

But one which focuses specifically on sexual partners, without regard to a compelling state interest for doing so, is of course violating the rights of non-sexual Holmes-and-Watson or C.S.-and-Warnie Lewis kinds of pairings.

Discriminating against such folk is, I suppose, is satanic.
Wombat_socho
July 8th, 2013 @ 10:33 pm

‘Sup, Eastern Rite brother? (Ukrainian Catholic here)
This Stupid Week, Coup d’Etat Edition | Blackmailers Don't Shoot
July 8th, 2013 @ 10:35 pm

[…] friends this morning informing us that God told him that we need to link to his post about the Pope’s recent remarks on immigration. Well, I won’t argue with the Almighty. If you think that the United States has crazy […]
Pope Francis is talking to you |
July 8th, 2013 @ 10:38 pm

[…] conservatives, like Robert Stacey McCain and Susan Berry over at BigGovernment.com, have a problem with discerning what the Pope actually […]
K-Bob
July 8th, 2013 @ 10:39 pm

Strange concept. When has the church taken a major position with regard to borders before?

I’m guessing that, along with the vast majority of people alive since borders were established by actual treaties, that border enforcement was taken as a given by the Church, in the same way that governments, taxes, armies, and police are taken as a given.

No, this appeal to wipe away such Earthly distinctions appears to be modern in scope, and I’d guess it has garnered little attention in ecclesiastical circles. (It may well be part of “liberation theology,” I don’t know. But LT screams “communism” about as loudly as does “Obamacare,” so I don’t think of that as being truly “ecclesiastical” in nature.)
Evi L. Bloggerlady
July 8th, 2013 @ 10:41 pm

What about nations that allow for the immigration of gays who want to marry? Does that just send them to purgatory?
TMLutas
July 8th, 2013 @ 11:59 pm

Um, no. Just no.

You need to pay attention to what the Church is actually saying and not what its enemies are asserting it is saying. Welcoming the stranger texts start out in the Old Testament so the Abrahamic faiths have been chewing this stuff over for several thousand years now.

Also on hard vs soft borders, I’m guessing that US/Mexico borders are probably softer than Hadrian’s wall. Earthworks and sharp pointy things beat lines on a piece of paper for real borders any day.

In short, the idea that borders are a relatively new idea for the Church gives me the giggles. Do you realize how old the Church is?

The Church has seen it all, from hard borders with internal passport controls to utter chaos and no borders limiting movement (Vandals sacking Rome anyone?) and has had lots of centuries to ponder the whole thing. And it’s had further centuries to watch these cycles repeat time and time again.
TMLutas
July 9th, 2013 @ 12:02 am

Nice to meet you.
TMLutas
July 9th, 2013 @ 12:08 am

A century? That’s nothing compared to the Arian heresy. Go look at that one for a good example on how bad it can get and still have the Church recover.

St Nick made his bones fighting the Arians. Yes, that St. Nick.
TMLutas
July 9th, 2013 @ 12:14 am

No. Plan A, as I put it earlier above is for people who are born into a society to live a dignified life, marry, have children and prosper in a decent society. Fixing the things there that prevent that story from playing out across the third world and which cause the large migrations of economically desperate people is real social justice.

The left wing idea of let the immigration floodgates open is like the old idiocy of liberals giving the homeless shopping carts with big wheels because the ones the homeless were stealing from supermarkets would regularly have their wheels break.
K-Bob
July 9th, 2013 @ 12:16 am

Not buying it. Welcoming the stranger is not the same as a policy on borders. Not even close.

Your “giggling” looks rather peculiar, given that you are giggling at at your own idea here, not at anything I wrote.

I explicitly stated (look up the term explicit, if you need to) that the idea of borders was quite old. I mentioned treaties, did I not? You are aware that treaties predate the Catholic church, and by extension, Christianity, I would hope.

Given your tendency to make up things in a discussion, you are sounding more like a shill for LT and less for anything resembling a proper church of any sort. I’d wish you good luck with that, but when it comes to LT, I wish no such thing.
RichFader
July 9th, 2013 @ 1:09 am

Compassion for the migrant, on the basis of the Golden Rule, goes back to the Mosaic law. Don’t blame Francis. If you have to blame somebody, blame God.

Don’t get me wrong. American and EU immigration is a big sorry mess. American and EU social policy in general is a big sorry mess. And secular governments, over the long run, suck profoundly at Christian charity. No question. Personally, I think part of being compassionate to our and the Euros’ migrants would be to unscrew immigration and welfare laws. But as it was more our and the Euros’ fault than the Church’s that said laws are in a clusterscrew in the first place, it’s more our responsibility to unscrew them than it is theirs.
Your Tax Dollars At Work-Sending Obama On An Immigration Tour | The Lonely Conservative
July 9th, 2013 @ 1:24 am

[…] the Pope seems to be on the same page as Obama. Words can’t describe how much this distresses […]
DocWashburn
July 9th, 2013 @ 1:34 am

RT @CynthiaCHeath: THIS==>“@rsmccain: “Social justice” = a sort of adhesive that glues the poor to the economic floor http://t.co/pXrbZpHnl…
Ivanalaska
July 9th, 2013 @ 7:35 am

How about encouraging Africans to do something more productive than trying to leave Africa? http://t.co/VckwwL8rv1
TMLutas
July 9th, 2013 @ 11:37 am

Your idea that the Church hasn’t examined pretty much any bit of human interaction that predates it and hasn’t deeply examined its own scripture that it inherited from judaism and that the jews had been chewing over for centuries is what I find amusing.

Countries that governed that poorly for any length of time in the old days were invaded and taken over at the least sign of weakness. It *is* a fairly modern innovation that we don’t do that anymore after the death of imperialism. But mass movements of populations to avoid bad conditions is an ancient ill and like every other ancient ill has been chewed to death by the Church long before either one of us was born.

The winning move for the US conservative right in these days is to seize the moral high ground that’s just sitting there waiting. Conservative thought is perfectly fine with encouraging other countries to run on more functional (free market) lines. Creating structures to support that better instead of spreading economic pathologies (like the soft socialism american liberalism likes) is a natural activity for conservatives and libertarians and something that hispanics would be interested in voting for if we ever made the case to them.

We don’t.

Because we don’t, we’re throwing away a good number of votes by simply hiding our light under a basket. There’s no pandering needed, just a clearer explanation of who we are and what we want.

Achieving our policy goals (and we are generally winning) reduces the number of illegals in a good way, by making their lives better back home without the massive disruption that illegally immigrating causes.
K-Bob
July 9th, 2013 @ 3:20 pm

“Your idea that the Church hasn’t examined pretty much any bit of human interaction that predates it and hasn’t deeply examined its own scripture that it inherited from judaism and that the jews had been chewing over for centuries is what I find amusing. ”

This is why the rest of your comment is not worth reading.

These words are yours, not mine. Your idea, not mine. And it’s a stupid idea besides. Good job.

I hate discussing things with leftists. They simply cannot resist the urge to make shit up.
TMLutas
July 9th, 2013 @ 5:50 pm

The idea that I am a leftist is the funniest bit of all.
K-Bob
July 9th, 2013 @ 5:58 pm

No the biggest joke is that you are here arguing with your own made up nonsense. And you think it means something.
Joseph Dooley
July 9th, 2013 @ 9:30 pm

Pope Francis heads the Catholic Church. He instructs Catholics on how to be better Catholics, Christians on how to be better Christians. That means what we do as individuals and as a church to confirm Christ in our hearts and bring Christ into the hearts of others. In that context, there is nothing offensive about a call to minister to the poor, to immigrants, to whomever.

Is the Pope calling for open borders? No. Borders are enforced by governments whose purpose is to preserve their people. Insofar as we are left alone by our governments to govern ourselves, Pope Francis would like us to extend charity to our fellow man, wherever or however we find them. I do believe Christ Jesus would ask that of us as well.

More: http://redpillreport.net/2013/07/08/pope-francis-is-talking-to-you/
OCsirke
July 10th, 2013 @ 3:34 pm

RT @rsmccain: “Social justice” = a sort of adhesive that glues the poor to the economic floor http://t.co/6N0saw30Sl
FMJRA 2.0: Low Sun : The Other McCain
July 14th, 2013 @ 7:01 am

[…] The Pope Joins ‘Gang of Eight’? […]
CrustyB
July 14th, 2013 @ 10:19 am

At least the Pope is still right about opposing gay marriage and gay adoption being child abuse.