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What one did not hear from any senior member of the Argentine hierarchy was any expression of regret for the church’s collaboration and in these crimes. The extent of the church’s complicity in the dark deeds was excellently set out by Horacio Verbitsky, one of Argentina’s most notable journalists, in his book El Silencio (Silence). He recounts how the Argentine navy with the connivance of Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, now the Jesuit archbishop of Buenos Aires, hid from a visiting delegation of the Inter-American Human Rights Commission the dictatorship’s political prisoners. Bergoglio was hiding them in nothing less than his holiday home in an island called El Silencio in the River Plate. The most shaming thing for the church is that in such circumstances Bergoglio’s name was allowed to go forward in the ballot to chose the successor of John Paul II. What scandal would not have ensued if the first pope ever to be elected from the continent of America had been revealed as an accessory to murder and false imprisonment.

The sins of the Argentine church | Hugh O’Shaughnessy | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio is now Pope Francis I. This op-ed  seems legitimate (but see update below), and I’ve read similar accounts all around the web. Bergoglio also called gay marriage “destructive attack on God’s plan” in 2010.

 A questionable relationship with a dictatorship and opposition to gay rights is not a surprise in the context of the history of the Catholic church, but he probably won’t be the progressive reformer some hoped for. 

At least he’s an advocate of the poor, I guess?

 Update: The specific allegations  made in the text might not be substantiated, but he was already a relevant representative of the Argentinian Catholic church – which definately had problematic relationship with the Junta. Prof. Anthea Butler wrote a good overview why the situation’s complicated when it comes to Francis I. Argentinian (I think) writer Flavia Dzodan is speaking about his role during junta rule on twiiter

(Made a couple of updates. This text really is clumsily written…)


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