 |
9 May 2009
Casual anti-Catholic bigotry in the land of tolerance
The two previous comments followed from my reaction to the easy anti-Catholic bigotry that again raised its ugly head on one of Holland's foremost current affairs programs, Nova. It came in a report (7 May) - if you can call it that - on Pope Benedict's coming visit to Israel. Prefacing the report was the claim that the Pope would be hard put to to deal with three different religions.
The report opened with the Jewish side of things and, you guessed it, what followed was the lazy cavalier depiction of the Pope as anti-Semitic, all in the tone of "you know what I'm talking about (wink, wink) and I don't really have to explain it to you."
I never fail to be impressed by the openness of such a high level of bigotry in the Dutch media and, in the case of Nova, accompanied by their high-minded code of practice. The presenter on this occasion was Clairy Polak, pictured below.
Let's have a look at the code of practice that Ms Polak was following as she presided over the report before I go any further.
*The
Nova Code of Practice
Nova strives to bring the news and its
background [to you] with as much accuracy and precision as possible. In
this, independence and impartiality are at the forefront.
Beautiful. It gives you a warm glow, doesn't it?
The trouble is that Ms Polak opened with the unexplained claim that Pope Benedict had rehabilitated a holocaust denier, Bishop Richard Williamson. That was followed by a holocaust survivor describing her shocking experiences in one of the Nazi death camps. The vision of Williamson denying the numbers of Jews killed was shown once again, after which the reporter, her voice full of meaning, said that "the Pope keeps him in his Church (De Paus handhaaft hem in zijn kerk). Notice the his church, not the Catholic Church, but his Church.
There is no further detail given of the Williamson Affair. With the picture of the Pope fixed as anti-Semitic and guilty of sympathising with a holocaust denier, and the background picture of the Catholic Church being responsible for the holocaust established, the report proceeds with the tragic story of the holocaust survivor. The rabid anti-Catholic mythology that informs reporting in the Dutch media was reinforced.
This was nothing less than a shameless, unconscionable and scandalous distortion of the Williamson Affair, the details of which are readily available to anyone with an independent and impartial mind. But let's not kid ourselves: impartiality is hardly to be found in media enterprises, and certainly not in the usual PC editorial room of a Dutch news organisation.
I have made two comments about the Williamson Affair (1 2) and don't need to repeat myself. There are many comments to be found on the internet that will explain and defend the Pope's motivations. How hard is to point and click? I will leave it to Rabbi Yehuda Levin to explain to the forty-odd people who work in the Nova newsroom what the Williamson Affair was really about. I don't expect them to be impressed. What I expect is that the impartial and independent visitor to this site will read what Rabbi Levin has to say with an open mind
Left Wing of the Catholic Church Destroying the Faith Says Orthodox Rabbi
By Hilary White, Rome correspondent
ROME, February 11, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The dissident, leftist movement in the Catholic Church over the last forty years has severely undermined the teaching of the Catholic Church on the moral teachings on life and family, a prominent US Orthodox rabbi told LifeSiteNews.com. Rabbi Yehuda Levin, the head of a group of 800 Orthodox rabbis in the US and Canada, also dismissed the accusations that the Holy See had not sufficiently distanced itself from the comments made by Bishop Richard Williamson of the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) on the Holocaust.
"I
support this move" to reconcile the traditionalist faction in the Church, he
said, "because I understand the big picture, which is that the Catholic
Church has a problem. There is a strong left wing of the Church that is
doing immeasurable harm to the faith."
Rabbi Levin said that he understands "perfectly" why the reconciliation is vital to the fight against abortion and the homosexualist movement.
"I understand that it is very important to fill the pews of the Catholic Church not with cultural Catholics and left-wingers who are helping to destroy the Catholic Church and corrupt the values of the Catholic Church." This corruption, he said, "has a trickle-down effect to every single religious community in the world."
"What's the Pope doing? He's trying to bring the traditionalists back in because they have a lot of very important things to contribute the commonweal of Catholicism...
The full report is on: http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009/feb/09021112.html
*NOVA streeft ernaar het nieuws en de achtergronden van het nieuws te
brengen met een zo groot mogelijke nauwkeurigheid en precisie. Daarbij staan
onafhankelijkheid en onpartijdigheid voorop.
comment: gerard@gerardcharleswilson.com