He proved again how clueless and heartless he is during his visit to Brazil, where he said (referring to the native peoples of the Americas, particularly Latin America where the Catholic Portuguese and Spanish conquistadors invaded):
Christ is the Saviour for whom they were silently longing.
and
[…] the proclamation of Jesus and of his Gospel did not at any point involve an alienation of the pre-Columbus cultures, nor was it the imposition of a foreign culture.
Never mind that business about robbery, enslavement and genocide!
Love that papal infallibility, don’t you? (“Oh, and Limbo was just an idea we were batting around — for 700 years.”)
You know, I wasn’t a big fan of the last pope, but for all his misdeeds and sexist and homophobic statements, I think he was basically a kind-hearted man who was blinded by religion and the culture of the church. This current guy, um, he’s different.
Suffice to say, the tribes and their allies (many of them priests and church activists) are a bit put out by His Holiness’s comments. This should lead to some real awareness and organizing benefits for them. It’s already been on the news wires and is hitting the blogs. It won’t be so easy to snuff out the next wave of liberation theology in Latin America, with the advent of digital and satellite communications.
So, thanks Benny, for stepping in it.