Thursday, January 29, 2009

A recent obituary of one Cardinal Pio Laghi caught my eye - a catalogue of machinations on behalf of the far right, and against democracy. The Vatican is probably crawling with such individuals.

John Paul wanted US support for the practical assistance he was providing for the Solidarity trade union. Their cooperation spread wider than Europe, however. Laghi lobbied hard and successfully to obtain Reagan's support to cut US funding to development programmes that included provision of abortion. He also effectively tore up an outspoken anti-nuclear letter, drafted by America's Catholic bishops in 1983.
Most controversially, he conveyed to Washington that the Vatican shared Reagan's dislike of the democratically elected Sandinista government in Nicaragua. John Paul objected in particular to the presence in that country of three radical Catholic priests. Laghi was therefore privy to US efforts to undermine the Sandinistas.
...
In 1974, he was sent to Argentina. His six years there coincided with the worst excesses of the military dictatorship in what was known as the "dirty war". Many in Argentina believe that the church hierarchy supported the generals in their misrule, and that Laghi - who played tennis regularly with one of the leaders of the junta, Admiral Emilio Eduardo Massera - turned a blind eye to the murder and "disappearances" of thousands. "Perhaps I wasn't a hero," Laghi said later of his time in Buenos Aires, "but I was no accomplice."

"No accomplice" can be interpreted as not physically participating in the kidnapping, killing and torture.

No comments: