Priest Kidnapped by Junta: Reconciled With Pope

[struggle4progress]

By DAVID RISING Associated Press
BERLIN March 15, 2013 (AP)

... The Rev. Francisco Jalics, who now lives in a monastery in southern Germany, said in a statement that he had talked with the Rev. Jorge Mario Bergoglio, who was named Pope Francis on Wednesday, long after the 1976 kidnapping of himself and fellow slum priest Orlando Yorio.

Bergoglio has said he told the priests to give up their slum work for their own safety, and they refused. Yorio, who is now dead, later accused Bergoglio of effectively delivering them to the death squads by declining to publicly endorse their work ...

"It was only years later that we had the opportunity to talk with Father Bergoglio ... to discuss the events," Jalics said Friday in his first known comments about the kidnapping ...

"Following that, we celebrated Mass publicly together and hugged solemnly. I am reconciled to the events and consider the matter to be closed," he said ...

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/priest-kidnapped-junta-reconciled-pope-18736030

[JDPriestly]

1. So Bergoglio is not a man of courage.

Well, I suppose it would be impossible for a man with real courage to become a Pope today.

[moobu2]

2. Sounds like Francis was tying up all those loose ends after he got rejected as Pope

In the last conclave.

#1 Hire a biographer to tell of his heroic (false) stories of him rescuing enemies of the state. Check!
#2 get some survivors of his cruelty to forgive him. Check!
#3 ride a few public buses like Jesus did. check!
#4 wait long enough for victims to die off. Check!

Besides, If I go pull a knife on someone and take their money, they can forgive me all day long, but I would still have to pay the price for my actions. This priest is living in a monastery too and may even be delusional or mentally ill from some form of physical or emotional deprivation these nuts often inflict upon themselves. Who knows.

[struggle4progress]

3. The Bergoglio-Jalics meeting reportedly occurred in 2000. Ratzinger became Pope in 2005.

So your claim that Bergoglio was motivated by Ratzinger's election seems somehow wrong

[No Vested Interest]

4. You have presented these accounts

in a straightforward manner.
The attempts at slander of a person never known to many until two days ago have been pitiful, laughable.

[moobu2]

7. Bergoglio, now Pope Francis, has probably had his eye on the golden throne for decades.

He was very ambitious obviously. The fact that he was rejected in 05 was only because of concern about the Dirty War but I guess the Cardinals felt by now he had put all his ducks in a row where all that was concerned and he could deal with the bad publicity fairly easily. The positives outweighed the negatives to them. The idea that Pope Francis wasnt expecting it is pure BS.

Pope Francis was extremely well respected by Pope John Paul and Pope Ratzinger because of the way he protected the church during the and 70's from all those leftists, socialists, labor activists and liberation theology believing nuns and priests who turned up tortured, dead and missing thrown out of airplanes while they were still alive after the Policía stole their babies. It's always, protect the church first. That's why they tried to cover up all those 1,000's of child molesting priests at the expense of their victims - to protect the church.

Pope John Paul and Pope Ratzinger both had this intense irrational fear and hatred of anything remotely connected to Marxism, socialism and or liberation theology because those philosophies empowered the common people. They wanted the church to be all powerful in everything regardless of who gets hurt.
This is from Wikipedia.
"In liberation theology he (pope Ratzinger) declared, the "people is the antithesis of the hierarchy, the antithesis of all institutions, which are seen as oppressive powers. Ultimately anyone who participates in the class struggle is a member of the "people"; the "Church of the people" becomes the antagonist of the hierarchical Church.

See? All they ever really cared about was protecting the church, and the people were the threat, the enemy, the "antagonist".

Here is a photo of the now Pope Francis sucking on Pope John Paul's hand for your enjoyment.

[struggle4progress]

8. "One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact"

-- Mark Twain

[Act_of_Reparation]

9. Quoting Twain to defend the Church?

The same Mark Twain who said: "No God and no religion can survive ridicule. No political church, no nobility, no royalty or other fraud, can face ridicule in a fair field, and live."

The old man is rolling over in his grave.

[struggle4progress]

10. I'm quoting Twain on the subject of conjectures unsupported by fact

[Act_of_Reparation]

14. Kind of like the stories of Bergoglio sheltering political dissidents?

Because there's certainly no evidence for that.

Bergoglio only "reconciled" with one of the priests in question. As the previous poster noted, Fr. Olando Yorio is very conveniently deceased. Even then, while Fr. Jalics said he "considered the matter closed", also said he could not comment on Bergoglio's involvement in the kidnapping.

In other words, Jalics did not contradict Yorio's allegations.

Now, I won't go as far as to claim Bergoglio was a collaborator, but all evidence suggests he abandoned dissident priests to the whims of the junta, rather than stick his neck out for them. Meanwhile, the Pope's assertions that he sheltered dissidents and intervened on their behalf are completely unsupported.

Maybe you think this is nothing to be concerned about, but Bergoglio's willingness to sacrifice his own people--and his stated principals--for his own safety should prove problematic for those championing this guy as some kind of humanitarian hero.

[struggle4progress]

15. Facts first, analysis second. You are, of course, entirely entitled to hold whatsoever opinion

you want, regarding the new Pope -- but to obtain an accurate view of the times in which we live, and the recent history that has shaped current attitudes and ideas, it is absolutely essential to get facts right, because no clear-eyed view of our world can result from mere supposition

Orlando Yorio, you say, "is very conveniently deceased," but I have found no reason to think his death in 2000 was anything other than natural. Francisco Jalics released a statement yesterday saying that he, Jalics, and Bergoglio had celebrated mass together in that same year, 2000: it seems he has been living secluded in a German monastery for some time and has generally refused to discuss his Argentinian experience with outsiders, which does not strike me as terribly surprising, since he was indisputably tortured by the junta, that being the sort of thing from which survivors do not quickly or easily recover. But if you can dig up solid information and put together a good case, then you should certainly try your hand at it

There is some information in the Verbitsky interview which the OP recently posted here:

... The first document is a note in which Bergoglio asked the ministry to—the renewal of the passport of one of these two Jesuits that, after his releasing, was living in Germany, asking that the passport was renewed without necessity of this priest coming back to Argentina. The second document is a note from the officer that received the petition recommending to his superior, the minister, the refusal of the renewal of the passport. And the third document is a note from the same officer telling that these priests have links with subversion—that was the name that the military gave to all the people involved in opposition to the government, political or armed opposition to the military—and that he was jailed in the mechanics school of the navy, and saying that this information was provided to the officer by Father Jorge Mario Bergoglio, provincial superior of the Jesuit company ...

I don't myself find this very helpful, since it only seems to indicate Bergoglio got nowhere in his efforts to get Jalics' passport renewed, after Jalics understandably fled to Germany. Verbitsky suggests the third document shows Bergoglio was somehow involved in the identification of Jalics as a subversive, but there are other natural readings: Verbitsky is summarizing a military officer's summary of whatever Bergoglio allegedly told him, so we are somewhat removed from the original conversation; and it seems incoherent to think Bergoglio was working to get Jalics' passport renewed, while simultaneously warning the military that Jalics was a dangerous subversive who had previously been imprisoned by the military. In fact, the conversation has probably passed through several strong ideological filters before reaching us: the military officer, learning from Bergoglio (in the course of the passport renewal request) about Jalics' imprisonment in the navy torture center, was unlikely to do anything other than report that Jalics was a subversive; and, of course, Verbitsky (who has described himself as an ineffectual anti-government guerrilla in those days) then brings to the reading of the memo the entirely opposite perspective that anyone, who did not take Verbitsky's own stance in that era, is suspect as a collaborator

Accurate historical memory is important, and it is especially important when confronting recent history, where truth is always in danger of drowning under waves of propaganda

[Act_of_Reparation]

16. You completely missed the point

I in no way suggested Yorio's death was the result of foul play, merely that it is convenient insofar as he is no longer around to tell his side of the story. While Jalics tried to distance himself from the controversy, Yorio was the one who accused Bergoglio in the first place.

This does mean Yorio's side of the story is entirely accurate. The lawsuit against Bergoglio was categorically thrown out of court for lack of sufficient evidence. In that regard, I agree that any allegation of collaboration is conjecture at best.

But, as I said, I am not accusing Bergoglio of collaborating with the junta, rather that he lacked the intestinal fortitude to stand up to them, whereas those who served beneath him suffered for the courage of their convictions.

This is a conversation worth having, but you seem fairly intent on dismissing its validity.

[cbayer]

12. You sure do have a talent for the tale.

Let me ask you this - out of all the cardinals that were under consideration for pope, is there any one of them you could have found something positive about? You seem so intent on making this guy entirely bad.

[mr blur]

5. A solemn hug is all that it takes, eh?

Tell that to a raped child.

[struggle4progress]

6. huh?

[cbayer]

13. What on earth does this have to do with that?

[cbayer]

11. This is an important statement and I hope it will help clear this up.

It must have been an incredibly difficult situation for all involved. At some point is the risk too high? Probably.