On Being Wise as a Serpent and Innocent as a Dove

Reverb continues with Williamson. Various comments have been made both in my comboxes and in the media that suggest to me that this is a “teachable moment”.

First things first, a reminder on my beliefs about forgiveness. Jesus pretty much sums it up when he say in Mark 11:25: “Whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father who is in heaven will also forgive you your transgressions.”

People will perform prodigies of rationalization to wriggle out of that terrifying and offensive command (a command *far* more scandalous than any of that pelvic business we *think* is the big issue with the Church). I have addressed the Scandal of Forgiveness numerous times and won’t go over it again.

However, I will say this: Forgiveness does not mean being a fool. So, for instance, when Bp. Williamson asks for forgiveness for sinning against prudence, but offers not a word for sinning against truth or charity, it is important to recognize what has happened. He has, of course, my forgiveness for his sins against prudence, because I have not only extended it, but he has received it.

He does not have forgiveness for his sins against truth and charity because, though I extend it unconditionally as Jesus commands (“forgive, if you have anything against anyone”) he has thus far refused to receive it, because he has thus far refussed to acknowledge any such sins.

Bottom line: it takes two to tango when it comes to forgiveness. We are obliged to extend mercy unconditionally (as Christ does when he dies for the people who are murdering him). We are not, however, obliged to pretend the mercy has been received when it is, in fact, being refused. Nor does mercifulness requires us in the slightest to refrain from speaking against evil when it is done or unrepented. So I have no trouble at all pointing out that Williamson’s impenitent refusal to retract his evil lies about the Holocaust and his Jew hatred constitute an ongoing blot which continue to embarrass Mother Church.

Now, some people try to argue that Holocaust denial is one of a cluster of kooky beliefs that, while extremely nutty, are not concerned with “doctrines of the Church” and therefore are not germane to whether or not Williamson is fit to be a bishop. So, for instance, one reader writes:

A list of beliefs which don’t necessarily condemn you to Hell (abridged):

-The Nazis killed far fewer Jews than suggested by most historians
-The moon landing never took place
-the Earch is flat
-The Earth is the center of the universe
-it wasn’t Lee Harvey Oswald
-Dinosaurs existed alongside man
-Dinosaurs never existed
-Floride in drinking water is a commie plot
-The Rosenbergs were innocent
-So was OJ

And now, a list of beliefs that are false:

-See above

I’ll agree what sin makes you stupid, but stupidity doesn’t necessarily constitute a sin.

This is true as far as it goes. None of these things are “doctrines of the Church”. Neither is the principle “2+2=4” or “water flows downhill” a doctrine of the Church. And if our life as human beings consisted simply and solely of believing the doctrines of the Church, while leaving our minds completely open to a diversity of opinion on all other matters such as not playing in traffic, not looking down the barrel of your Dad’s gun and squeezing the trigger, and having the sense God gave a goose, we’d be fine. But since we live in the real world we discover that, in addition to the formally defined doctrines of the Church, there is a whole cloud of moral teaching from the Church that urges us to have things like wisdom and common sense, interest in truth (even non-religious truth) and basic charity. And by this test, Bp. Williamson fails egregiously.

The measure of his failure is seen in notes like this (from a reader I am praying is simply young, naive, and foolish):

I guess what gets my goat about situations like this is that the people crying “Wacko nutjob!” and demanding that Bishop Williamson beg the forgiveness of every living Jew have not even taken the first step in examining his claims.

Now, I’ve talked to a great number of people skeptical about the numbers of Jews reported to have died in the Holocaust. I think they’re wrong, but I don’t think they’re wicked.

They base their theories on statistical evidence that 6,000,000 people couldn’t have been killed the way the standard narrative says they were.

They aren’t “Holocaust deniers”, they’re “Holocaust statistics deniers”.

To say that someone hates all Jews because they believe something controversial about history is simply sloppy thinking.

I know a man who is married to a Jewish woman, who has a lovely relationship with his Jewish in-laws, who loves his half-Jewish children, who loves his Jewish Savior and Mary, his Jewish mediatrix of all graces, but thinks the Holocaust numbers are a bit inflated.

Is he a rabid anti-semite?

This sort of thing is, alas, what we can expect more of as the Holocaust recedes into history and the living witnesses die off. Young fools who “don’t believe the Official Story” and who are inclined to believe in anything from crystals to pyramid power get sucked in to the normal cultural narrative which says that because everybody has a right to their own opinion, they therefore have a right to their own facts as well. But this is to play into the hands of malicious liars every single time and only naivete can excuse it. The simple fact is that it’s one thing to quibble about whether 6 million or only 5.6 million Jews were murdered. It’s another thing entirely to say that “not one Jew” was gassed and to suggest that the whole thing is a malicious lie.

Sorry, but that’s the malicious, agenda-driven lie and Williamson still proudly owns it at this hour. And it is a further, vicious, agenda-driven lie to then characterize the denial that millions were murdered as claiming “the numbers are bit inflated”. And, no, I am not obligated to give vicious, agenda-driven liars a hearing on this any more than I am obligated to listen to “honest” questioning about whether Bush destroyed the Twin Towers.

Predictably, after Williamson’s half-apology, his Rad Trad supporters are now feeling sorry for themselves again and maundering about poor Dick’s martyrdom.

Let us recall again what (among many things) Williamson has refused to retract.

Not one word of this or any of his other Jew-hatred has been retracted. All that has happened is that he has apologized for the “imprudence” embarrassing the SSPX. One could, with sufficient applications of will-power probably delude oneself into supposing he “is sincere” and therefore his culpability is diminished for regurgitating this pro-Nazi rubbish. But one can really only do this if one adopts the theory that there is no such thing as intellectual sin and that Williamson is not and has not for years labored to suppress documentable facts while exaggerating whatever he can find to prop up his hatred of Jews.

Hatred? Yes, hatred. There is no other word for deliberately choosing to label as liars those who experienced the horrors of the Holocaust. He participates, in a gravely culpable way, not only in the sin of murder, but also in the sin of bearing false witness against his neighbor. And anybody who makes excuses for him of the

“Golly! He’s just asking *questions*!” variety is, whether naively or culpably, participating as well.

An 11 year old with absolutely no knowledge of history might be excused for buying the “History is a lie agreed upon” conspiracy theory and saying “Gee whiz! What if the Holocaust never happened!” We live in a time where children are taught to reject the Official Story all the time. But as a general rule, the Official Story on vast stretches of history is official because it’s what happened and anybody older than 11 years old has the capacity to go find out. If such a person refuses to do so and stubbornly goes on repeating lies like “not one Jew” was gassed, they are no longer naive and stupid. They are guilty and culpable.

Williamson is guilty and culpable and has not given the slightest hint that he repents what he has said. He only repents that it was “imprudent” (i.e., embarrassing to the SSPX). Until the SSPX demonstrates that it cares about truth and not merely about appearances, the Williamson canker will only continue to fester. For my insignificant part, I continue to extend forgiveness for his wicked lies–and continue to note that neither my forgiveness nor anybody else’s, including God’s, will do him a bit of good till he repents of them and not merely of the embarrassment they cause.

Naturally, somebody will ask, “Then why is Benedict trying to reconcile with these people?”

My reply: “Why did God try to reconcile with a species that beat His Son to a pulp, crowned him with thorns, stripped him naked and nailed him to a cross?”

It’s what love does.