(7) CATALYST ISSUE APRIL 2021 - CATHOLIC CHURCHES ROLE IN ENDING SLAVERY!

 (7) CATALYST ISSUE APRIL 2021 - CATHOLIC CHURCHES ROLE IN ENDING SLAVERY

IN PURSUIT OF THE TRUTH - HTTP://WWW.CINOPSBEGONEBLOSGSPOT.COM - SUN. APR. 18/21

 

    The Catholic is the nation's largest civil rights organization. It defends individual Catholics and institutional Catholics against defamation and discrimination. Annual membership dues are $30., Senior citizens $20., and student dues are $20. Members receive Catalyst, the League Journal/. The Catalyst is published monthly except for combined issues of Jan.-Feb. and July-August. Today's report in on p. 13. "Catholic Churches Roe In Ending Slavery. Here is their address:

"Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights," 450 Seventh Ave. 34th Floor, New York, N.Y. 10123

     "During Black History Month, the subject of slavery was discussed in many forums. In some ubiquitous and historically accepted institutions in history. There is not a place on the globe where slavery did not exist and protests against it have been extremely rare. The Hebrews, Greeks and Romans saw nothing wrong with it, and neither did the Africans, Chinese and Japanese. Aristotle thought slavery was a normal way of life.

 

    It is important to recognize that, notwithstanding the American experience, slavery has almost had to do anything to do with race: people of the same race: people of the same race, ethnicity, tribe, or clan enslaved each other. Moreover it was not uncommon for former slaves to enslave others. That slavery still exists today in parts of Africa (which did not make it illegal until the 1980s) is proof of its tenacious legacy. 

     The first person in history to condemn slavery publicly was Saint Patrick. A former slave himself, he enunciated the wisdom of natural law without specifically invoking it. All men were created equal in the eyes of God, he said, and should therefor be treated as equal in the eyes of God, he said, and should therefor be treated as equals in law. It was this quintessentially Catholic concept  all humans possess equal dignity - all humans possess equal dignity - that eventually proved to be triumphant.

 

    In antiquity, slavery was so common that Pope Pius I in the second century and Pope Callistus I in the third century were slaves. It wasn't until the fourth century that a bishop rejected slavery, and that was Gregory of Nyssa,

    In practice, the Church's opposition to slavery began with its objections to the inhuman treatment of slaves; only later did it condemn the institution itself. But by protesting, it did more to lay the groundwork for the eventual demise of slavery than any other institution, secular or religious.     

 

    Given the Church's role in opposing slavery it was troubling to read a recent Washington Post article posted on line by Shannon Dee Williams, a professor of history at Villanova University. Apparently unaware of Saint Patrick and Gregory of Nyssa (who later become a saint), she claims the Church played "the leading role" in the history of slavery. She even goes on to say that the Church was "the first global institution to declare that Black lives did not matter."

    This is not simply an example of shoddy scholarship - it is a vicious lie.To make her case she cites papal bulls by Pope Nicholas V 1452 and Pope Alexander VI in 1493 as evidence that "the Catholic Church authorized enslavement of Africans and seizure on 'non-Christian lands." This account is seriously flawed. 

    Nicholas V's "Dum Diveras" was a response to those who sought "to extinguish [the] Christian religion." The pope argued that the King of Portugal had a right to protect his people and to hold in "perpetual servitude" the Saracens (Muslims) and pagans who threatened Christianity. The pope did not make sweeping statements about enslaving Africans, as Williams contends.

    Pope Alexander VI's "Inter Caetera" awarded colonial rights over newly discovered lands to Spain and Portugal. Nowhere in the Papal Bull does the pope even mention slaves or slavery. For Williams to imply otherwise is scurrilous.

 

    Had Williams dug a little deeper she would have cited Pope Paul III's decision to forbade slavery in the New World under penalty of excommunication. This was in 1537, at a time when no other leader, secular or religious, was denouncing slavery. In 1839, Pope Gregory XVI also condemned slavery, but it was Pope Leo XIII in 1888 who took the most authoritative steps to abolish this institution.

     It was the Catholic Church's teaching on natural law - all humans possess equal dignity dignity and equal rights - that proved to be determinative in the end. Aristotle may be the father of natural law but he thought it was normal for slaves to obey their masters. The Church disagreed. It invoked natural law rights - our equal rights come from God, not government - thus making the case to undermine slavery.... George H. Kubeck