Mountain Views News          Saturday, March 16, 2013

B6

LEFT TURN/RIGHT TURN

 Mountain Views-News Saturday, March 16, 2013 

GREG Welborn

HOWARD Hays As I See It


POPE FRANCIS THE HEALER


As I See It 

 

 “I don’t know why any 
individual should have a right to 
have a revolver in the house . . . 
The kids usually kill themselves 
with it and so forth ... Can’t we 
go after handguns, period? ... I 
know the rifle association will 
be against it, the gun makers will be against it ... 
people should not have handguns.”

 

 If my column’s opening quote has no attribution 
attached, by now you probably know why – It’s a 
cheap way to get you to keep reading, if for no 
other reason than to find out who said it.

 For now, I’ll fill you in on the results of my 
checking out another of Greg Welborn’s startling 
statements. He asserted last week that Venezuela 
has “the highest murder rate in the world.” The 
world’s a pretty big place with lots of countries, 
so I thought I’d look into it.

 The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime 
did a study on this just last year. According to 
2012 figures, Venezuela is in one of the most 
dangerous regions in the world, and would have 
the highest murder rate - if it weren’t for Jamaica, 
Ivory Coast, El Salvador and Honduras (which 
has a murder rate twice as high as Venezuela’s).

 I always want to see how the USA stacks up. 
Out of 207 countries ranked from lowest murder 
rate to highest, we come in at 99. This puts 
us in the top half – but not by much. Folks in 
countries like India, Albania, Egypt, Cambodia, 
Turkey, Iran, Lebanon, Algeria and Serbia have 
better odds than we do of walking the streets at 
night and making it back home alive. 

 Greg also brings up poverty, stating that as of 
today, “Venezuela has sunk close to the bottom 
while China and India have climbed to heights 
almost unimaginable . . .” The World Bank uses 
makin’-it-on-$2-a-day as their international 
metric to define “poverty”. By that standard, 
according to the most recent available statistics, 
12.9% of Venezuelans live in “poverty”. In China 
it’s 29.8% - and 68.7% in India. There’s “wealth”, 
but often it’s distributed as in India where, in a 
land of 1.2 billion, ten individuals control over 
10% of the economy.

 Greg revived the name of Reagan-era U.N. 
Ambassador Jeanne Kirkpatrick – appropriately 
in a column related to Latin America. A big 
supporter of Iran-Contra, Kirkpatrick heartily 
endorsed siphoning money off arms sales to 
Iran to fund the Nicaraguan Contras, despite 
Secretary of State George Schultz’ warning it was 
an “impeachable offense”. As for the torture, rape 
and murder of those three American nuns and 
the Catholic lay worker in 1980, she suggested 
we cut the government of El Salvador some 
slack, because, after all, “The nuns were not just 
nuns; the nuns were political activists”. (When 
it was rumored Kirkpatrick was eyeing the job 
of National Security Advisor, Secretary Schultz 
threatened to resign if she got it.)

 Jeanne Kirkpatrick derided the U.N. as an 
“institution whose majorities claim the right to 
decide - for the world - what is legitimate and 
what is illegitimate.” She made clear her view that 
this was a “right” reserved solely for the United 
States. In this context, it’s understandable how 
Greg can claim “all this praise and worship” 
directed towards Hugo Chavez “is a lie”. It’s so, 
if for no other reason than the U.S. right-wing 
consensus says it’s so. The massive mourning by 
Venezuelans themselves, who repeatedly voted 
Chavez back into office, doesn’t count.

 Now, here’s what you’ve been waiting for: 
The one who wanted to deny any “right” to own 
a handgun, quoted at the top of this column, 
was President Richard Nixon. It was a caught-
on-tape moment shortly after the assassination 
attempt on former Alabama Gov. George Wallace 
in 1972.

 If you’d like to play more guess-who-said-
it, picture this scene from a few years earlier: 
A young activist warns against a government 
“either unable or unwilling . . . to protect lives and 
property”, and reminded that “Article number 
two of the constitutional amendments provides 
you and me the right to own a rifle or a shotgun.”

 Those who listened sought not only to exercise 
this right, but to do it responsibly – often 
instructed on how to properly clean and handle 
their weapons by recently-returned Vietnam 
vets. And, they took their “rights” a step further 
– insisting on a right to “open carry”, and proudly 
showed off their guns out on the street.

 This proved too much for Sacramento 
politicians, who suddenly got very interested 
in gun control legislation - specifically to ban 
the carrying of weapons in public. The group, 
though, wouldn’t back down; “they’re trying to 
pass a law against our guns, and we’re going to 
the Capitol steps.”

 The Governor had his own view, seeing “no 
reason why on the street today a citizen should 
be carrying loaded weapons”, and referred to 
guns as “a ridiculous way to solve problems that 
have to be solved among people of good will.” 
The group, though, maintained that especially 
in an era of civil unrest and a government they 
didn’t trust, it was important not to relinquish a 
“right” to protect themselves as they saw fit.

 The “young activist” quoted above was 
Malcolm X (“by any means necessary”); the one 
who announced “we’re going to the Capitol” was 
Huey Newton, speaking to Bobby Seale. The 
group was the Black Panthers. The Governor 
who nailed it on “open carry” was Ronald 
Reagan.

 Jeanne Kirkpatrick was into rationalizing 
support for thuggish dictators when they 
were on “our” side, and finding them morally 
objectionable only when they weren’t. The 
decades have seen shifting views on gun control 
depending on which “side” wanted the guns. As 
I see it, I’ll throw my support to the “people of 
good will”.

 So – Free Bobby! Free Huey! Power to the 
People! And for Governor Reagan, Right On!

 The Catholic Church has suffered much in recent 
years. There have been financial improprieties, 
publicly-fought political battles among its core 
lieutenants and, of course, dispiriting and deeply 
evil sexual abuse scandals. One could almost be 
tempted to dismiss the church as out of date and 
irrelevant to the modern world, but one would be 
wrong to do so. The Christian church has much 
to offer a hurting, broken world, and the Catholic 
branch of that faith has as long a history of doing 
right by its parishioners as it does in doing wrong 
by them. So, it is with a certain gladness of heart 
that I, an evangelical protestant, rejoice in the 
selection of Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio to 
become Pope Francis.

 To fully understand the significance of 
Cardinal Bergoglio’s selection, we have to step 
back a month to acknowledge the selfless act of 
Pope Benedict in relinquishing his claim to the 
seat of St. Peter in order to allow a more robust 
man to fill the role. Too often in the secular 
world – and sadly in the church as well – leaders 
cling to leadership positions which offer prestige, 
power and influence, even though they are no 
longer capable of meeting the requirements of 
the job. Pope Benedict’s resignation was the 
first in 600 years and reflects the selfless heart 
of a true servant, who held the interests and 
needs of believers world-wide above his own 
selfish desires. So before addressing the merits 
of Cardinal Bergoglio, let me take a moment 
to express appreciation and admiration to the 
humble Father, Bishop and Cardinal Ratzinger, 
who became Pope Benedict, served faithfully and 
then retreated quietly to a life devoted to prayer.

 With Pope Benedict’s resignation, there were 
many who cynically wondered and postulated 
about who, among the politically well-skilled 
cardinals, would maneuver his way to the papacy. 
But the conclave of cardinals surprised us. They 
didn’t choose the most skilled politician, they 
didn’t choose an insider, and, most significantly, 
they didn’t choose someone who has even a whiff 
of self-indulgence about him. Instead, they chose 
the humble, God-fearing and God-loving, and 
unpretentious Cardinal of Argentina.

 Jorge Mario Bergoglio has spent almost the 
entirety of his career in Argentina, tending in 
a very pastoral way to the needs of his people 
as a priest, then Bishop, and finally Cardinal. 
Along the way, he has consistently eschewed the 
trappings of luxury and privilege that are too 
willingly provided and too willingly accepted 
by the princes of the Catholic Church. Cardinal 
Bergoglio refused to live in the mansion provided 
previous Argentine cardinals but, instead, lived 
in a modest residence next to his office. He 
traveled by mass transit, not by limousine. By all 
accounts, he loved his flock more than he loved 
himself, or his office or the advantages that office 
so often provides. He was an honest, sincere man 
of the people.

 It is insightful and instructive that Cardinal 
Bergoglio hails from Argentina and experienced 
first hand the financial and political difficulties 
that beautiful land has suffered at the hands 
of its less-than-capable political leaders. To 
the mess that those 
politicians created, and to 
the promised cures they 
offered the long-suffering 
Argentines, Cardinal 
Bergoglio admonished, 
“to those who are now 
promising to fix all the 
problems, I say, ‘go and 
fix yourself’. Get to 
confession before you 
need it even more. The crisis will not be improved 
by magicians from outside, nor will it come from 
the golden mouth of politicians, so accustomed 
to making incredible promises.”

 You have to love a man who can speak truth to 
power – and corruption – in such an honest and 
humble way. This is a man, like his predecessor 
Benedict, who has known the oppression and false 
promises of tyrants and dictators. As Benedict 
stood up against the communist masters of his 
native Poland, so too has Pope Francis stood up 
against the Marxists of his homeland when he 
served from priest to Cardinal.

 Both of these men know the frailty and the 
resilience of the human spirit; both these men 
love people as God loved people. The Christian 
message is, after all, the story of how God so 
loved the world, and its people, that He gave His 
only son to pay the price for sin that we, the fallen 
and sinful, could not pay. God offered Christ to 
reconcile the world to His demand for justice 
and righteousness. God calls us in turn to love 
the world as He did and to work to make right 
what has long been broken. Among Christ’s 
followers are the many who are laity and the few 
who are full-time pastoral roles. On each group 
is the placed the responsibility to act as if we were 
doing our task for God and to act as if God were 
watching our every move and action.

 How refreshing it is then to see that one man 
has stepped aside when he felt he could no longer 
lead that grand mission and to see take his place 
another who clearly has the appreciation for and 
energy to lead that commission into a turbulent 
future.

 The cardinals could not have chosen a more 
fitting man for the time and place in which 
the Catholic Church finds itself. Jorge Mario 
Bergoglio is a man who will resist the evils of 
those who seek secular tyranny and the evils of 
those who clothe themselves in the vestments of 
the church while preying on its trusting believers. 
Jorge Mario Bergoglio, now Pope Francis, steps 
into a church at a time of great need. God will 
be well served, the people blessed and the world 
made better by the humility, selflessness and 
dedication that is the character of the man who 
now leads the Church of St. Peter.

About the author: Gregory J. Welborn is a 
freelance writer and has spoken to several civic 
and religious organizations on cultural and 
moral issues. He lives in the Los Angeles area 
with his wife and 3 children and is active in the 
community. He can be reached at gregwelborn@
earthlink.net.