The right-wing dictatorship in Argentina was notoriously brutal, killing an estimated 15,000 people (favored method: dropping from planes). Tens of thousands more were tortured. Now the issue of Church collaboration with this odious regime is coming to light. There seems to be something to it. Now, a priest, Christian van Wernich, is on trial for collaboration with the military during the “dirty war”. Another priest, Rubén Capitanio, testified and apologized, noting that “the attitude of the church was scandalously close to the dictatorship to such an extent that I would say it was of a sinful degree”.
Although certain elements of the Church have been accused of aiding brutal regimes elsewhere, including in Chile, the Argentina situation was of a different degree entirely. Why? One Argentinian commentator nails it: “Patriotism came to be associated with Catholicism.” In other words, what went wrong was that the Church forgot its “Catholic” mission and became swayed by nationalism, much as Protestant Adolf von Harnack did when he backed the imperial designs of Germany during the first world war. Today in the United States, Catholic like Richard John Neuhaus, Michael Novak, and George Weigel have taken similar wrong turns, in their attempt to align the Church with the military ambitions of the state. And before you start jumping up and down, no, I am not making some moral equivalence argument between these guys and their Argentinian colleagues. I am merely pointing out that nationalism– from Argentina to Poland to the United States– always leads the Church astray. They feed from the same poisoned trough.
(Hat tip: Michael Perry from Mirror of Justice)
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