Pope Benedict XVI has continued his ongoing condemnation of secularism during his visit to secular Britain. As Catholic Online put it "Benedict likened the rise of British atheism and secularism to the rise of the Nazi Party in his native Germany." (http://www.catholic.org/international/international_story.php?id=38293)
Benedict's comments to the British people, who valiantly fought the Nazis and their Axis collaborators in World War II, were received with gritted teeth, for the most part. Benedict, formerly known as Joseph Ratzinger also had a part in World War II as a member of the Hitler Youth, but is now the Supreme Leader of the Vatican State.
One of Benedict's chief aides, Cardinal Walter Kasper, who was due to accompany Benedict to Britain, bemoaned that 'England is a secularised, pluralistic country these days. When you land at Heathrow Airport, you sometimes think you might have landed in a Third World country. In England in particular, an aggressive neo-atheism has spread.'
The Pope, variously proclaimed as God's representative, or even God's embodiment, now lives in a palace in the Vatican. The Vatican has none of the issues with secularism or multiple faiths and beliefs that Cardinal Kasper alluded to in Britain.
The Vactican, that small, ideal state, is devoid of all non-Catholic places of worship, and non-Catholic citizens. Indeed, even its mercenary military force is not open to non-Catholics, let alone atheists, Jews or anyone else. The penalty for opposition to the Pope's proclamations - heresy - has often been decreed as condemnation to hell, if not always earthly torture.
We might forgive Benedict's weak grasp of democracy, history and the real world outside his palace. The golden age of non-secularism, while still practised in the Middle East, and a few other places, is long past for the west. It ended, coincidentally, with the end of the Dark Ages. The non-secular states are possibly the only ones where stoning is still practised and women are still tortured for non-subjugation.
Hitler was on the same wavelength as Benedict when it came to atheism and faith. Adolf Hitler, himself, was raised a Roman Catholic. Hitler often praised the German Christian heritage and German Christian culture. Hitler stated, "We were convinced that the people need and require this faith. We have therefore undertaken the fight against the atheistic movement, and that not merely with a few theoretical declarations: we have stamped it out."
Hitler saw Christianity as providing a valid basis for anti-semitism. Hitler stated "For eight months we have been waging a heroic battle against the Communist threat to our people, the decomposition of our culture, the subversion of our art, and the poisoning of our public morality. We have put an end to denial of God and abuse of religion. " He's talking about Jews, if that needs to be spelled out.
Echoing the sentiments of Pope Benedict stated, Hitler further stated "The Church's interests cannot fail to coincide with ours alike in our fight against the symptoms of degeneracy in the world of to-day, in our fight against the Bolshevist culture, against an atheistic movement, against criminality, and in our struggle for the consciousness of a community in our national life, for the conquest of hatred and disunion between the classes, for the conquest of civil war and unrest, of strife and discord. These are not anti-Christian, these are Christian principles."
British philosopher Richard Dawkins has commented "Even if Hitler had been an atheist, his political philosophy was not based upon atheism and had no connection with atheism. Hitler was arguably (and by his own account) a Roman Catholic. In any case he enjoyed the open support of many of the most senior catholic clergy in Germany and the less demonstrative support of Pope Pius XII. Even if Hitler had been an atheist (he certainly was not), the rank and file Germans who carried out the attempted extermination of the Jews were Christians, almost to a man: either Catholic or Lutheran, primed to their anti-Semitism by centuries of Catholic propaganda about 'Christ-killers' and by Martin Luther's own seething hatred of the Jews. "
The Pope, who is opposed to secularism, Islam, Judaism, Protestantism, amongst other things, also condemns condoms as abomination against God. One can picture the joyous return to medieval Europe that he might idealize.
Let's get back to the amusing Cardinal Kasper. Mr Kasper complained before his planned trip to Britain that "one is discriminated against" on British Airways for wearing a cross. British Airways, constrained from directly saying "what a load of papal bull****" diplomatically said that the Cardinal had been "seriously misinformed" in his claims about the airline, and that "It is completely untrue that we discriminate against Christians or members of any faith".
The Vatican defended the Cardinal's remarks as commentary on the UK's multicultural society and said that Kasper would not travel to Britain, due to health issues. Mental ones, one might suggest.
They might be the supreme rulers of God's domain, in their own eyes at least, but they are not the wisest or most gracious of guests when they step out of their own ivory palaces.
Irony is patently not Mr Ratzinger's strong suit. As one on-line poster said, with a delightful combination of British understatement and irony "I'm ever so glad the British taxpayers all paid £13mil for this c*** to talk s*** on our own doorstep. "