{"id":93062,"date":"2023-05-22T10:36:47","date_gmt":"2023-05-22T15:36:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=93062"},"modified":"2023-05-22T10:36:47","modified_gmt":"2023-05-22T15:36:47","slug":"93062","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=93062","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

Armed Defense of Vatican Highlights Church Hypocrisy on Guns<\/a><\/p>\n

U.S.A. \u2014\u00a0<\/strong>\u201cA car driven by someone with apparent psychiatric problems rushed through a Vatican gate Thursday evening and sped past Swiss Guards into a palace courtyard before the driver was apprehended by police, the Holy See said,\u201d\u00a0ABC News reports<\/a>. \u201cVatican gendarmes fired a shot at the speeding car\u2019s front tires after it rushed the gate, but the vehicle managed to continue on its way, the Vatican press office said in a statement late Thursday.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yes, of course, and that\u2019s never been a secret. Established in 1506, the Pontifical Swiss Guard is one of the world\u2019s oldest military units, with its work augmented by the Gendarmerie Corps of Vatican City State. And while tourists might find their historical plumed helmets and halberds picturesque and quaint, they\u2019re the real deal, \u201clavishly equipped,\u201d as colleague\u00a0Kurt Hofmann has noted<\/a>, \u201cwith some pretty hefty investments in Sig-Sauer, Heckler & Koch, Steyr Mannlicher, and Glock semi-automatic handguns, personal defense weapons, assault rifles, and submachine guns, not to mention whoever manufactures the swords, halberds, and other more traditional weapons carried by [the Pope\u2019s] guards.\u201d<\/p>\n

Guns.com did a great piece<\/a>\u00a0on all their arms a few years back.<\/p>\n

All this makes some official pronouncements by Pope Francis more problematic and hypocritical than infallible.<\/h3>\n

\u201cDo we really want peace?\u201d\u00a0he asked<\/a>. \u201cThen let\u2019s ban all weapons so we don\u2019t have to live in fear of war.\u201d<\/p>\n

Responding \u201cYou first\u201d hardly seems out of line here.<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

Pope Francis also said that\u00a0weapons manufacturers can\u2019t be Christians<\/a>\u2014leading to the paradox of what that must mean for weapons end users, like his guards.<\/p>\n

And that leads us to the bipolar contention from the Vatican\u2019s editorial director that\u00a0being pro-life means being pro-gun control<\/a>, disregarding the above-mentioned armed-to-the-teeth Swiss Guard and also the Vatican\u2019s Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, which\u00a0in 1994 declared<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\u201cIn a world marked by evil and sin, the right of legitimate defense by armed means exists. This right can become a serious duty for those who are responsible for the lives of others, for the common good of the family or of the civil community.\u201d<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Ignoring \u201cfamily\u201d and focusing exclusively on \u201ccommunity,\u201d\u00a0National Catholic Reporter maintains<\/a>, \u201cThe \u2026 Church\u2019s position on gun control is \u2026 resoundingly clear: Firearms in the hands of civilians should be strictly limited and eventually completely eliminated.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCompletely eliminated.\u201d But no one is talking about taking your guns.<\/h3>\n

\u201cAccording to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, individuals have a right and a duty to protect their own lives when in danger, and someone who \u2018defends his life is not guilty of murder even if he is forced to deal his aggressor a lethal blow,\u2019\u201d CNS concedes, but offers a significant caveat. \u201cAccording to the catechism, the right to use firearms to \u2018repel aggressors\u2019 or render them harmless is specifically sanctioned for \u2018those who legitimately hold authority\u2019 and have been given the duty of protecting the community.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is a belief in authoritarian supremacy and the magic of the badge of the \u201cOnly Ones<\/a>,\u201d like the Pontifical Swiss Guard and \u00a0Gendarmerie Corps. That all citizens have this right and duty, as the Founders intended, does not enter this faulty equation.<\/p>\n

Having written on this topic before, experience has shown that some will get angry and dismiss reports like this as \u201cCatholic bashing.\u201d Such people are not being honest with you and not being honest with themselves. The truth is, Church officials, going all the way to the top, are subverting rights, either through ignorance or intent. Setting that straight and discouraging further attacks is a moral duty that those who believe in unalienable rights endowed by their Creator share.<\/p>\n

After all, we who are defending the human rights of Catholics and other gun owners aren\u2019t their enemies. Those are the secular violence monopolists that Church leaders support who use their\u00a0FBI undercover agents<\/a>\u00a0to paint traditionalists as \u201cfar-right white nationalists,\u201d with all the chilling ramifications it implies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Armed Defense of Vatican Highlights Church Hypocrisy on Guns U.S.A. \u2014\u00a0\u201cA car driven by someone with apparent psychiatric problems rushed through a Vatican gate Thursday evening and sped past Swiss Guards into a palace courtyard before the driver was apprehended by police, the Holy See said,\u201d\u00a0ABC News reports. \u201cVatican gendarmes fired a shot at the … Continue reading “”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,8,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-93062","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hypocrisy","category-rkba","category-self-defense"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93062","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=93062"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93062\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":93063,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93062\/revisions\/93063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=93062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=93062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=93062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}