Before January 21st, the GOP said Trump could not be tried for crimes WHILE a sitting president.
Now, the GOP says Trump cannot be tried for crimes because he is NO LONGER president.
That really says it all: The GOP wants immunity for Trump and by extension, for themselves.
The GOP says that to make Trump accountable and punish him for his criminal behavior/words regarding the broken laws during his presidency would destroy the “unity” President Biden wants to generate.
There can be no unity in this nation until laws apply equally to all
And that means both the prosecution of Trump et al co-defendants and the dissembling of institutional and systemic racism in America. To not punish is to treat the last few years’ atrocities as practice.
As a defense for Trump, it is a non sequitur … because, we Catholics know that FORGIVING someone does not mean they do not have to pay for their sins/crimes. Trump’s and the GOP’s behavior these past 5 years [I include the campaign] have broken many laws under “Caesar” not to mention shattering the moral laws of decency.
Those crimes represent a huge debt to the American people. Payment is due.
We, as Christians, also know that forgiveness, on our part, does not require the guilty to be penitent.
But God is God, and we know what a good confession requires for forgiveness.
As citizens with a moral obligation to promote the common good, we must also be acutely aware that if we let criminals run free to commit more crimes, we become complicit in those crimes. This includes the GOP elected who did nothing to stop Trump, who went along for the ride and now are claiming innocence while pointing to the violent mob as the ONLY GUILTY. There’s plenty of guilt to go around…and the guilty owe this country a debt. Yes, sins of omission are still sins.
While watching Impeachment -The Sequel…I’ve noticed the GOP keeps saying over and over–we MUST FORGIVE…
We must differentiate between Sin and Corruption.
This was a determination Pope Francis faced the day he became Pope and Pope Benedict Emeritus literally handed him the mountain of paperwork from the investigation into the debacle that was the Vatican finances.. full of bribery, kickbacks and embezzlement–corruption on a huge scale.
In the years that followed, His Holiness was confronted with the very very guilty whose greed and lust for power was unbridled. He was confronted with the very guilty who helped and participated in kickbacks and mismanagement for self gain. Francis faced the guilty who helped maintain the culture of elitism, as well as the complicit who through their silence, perpetuated and enabled this to continue. And finally, His Holiness had to face the innocent who had been betrayed.
So, just as the GOP vigorously rejects the idea of punishing TRUMP and his cohorts for their illegal activities and to maintain the Republican status quo of wealth and white privilege, so did the Holy Father’s detractors demand he stop. When he didn’t, they launched vicious attacks.
His Holiness faced vile attacks under the guise of traditionalists trying to retain the sanctity of the liturgy when really it was about maintaining the existing power structure of financial malfeasance. There were distorted “leaks” to the radical Catholic news media, all to portray him as an evil person trying to destroy the Church. The truth of the matter is that he was destroying The Status Quo of corruption, uncovering deep and festering wounds and purging the puss of fetid crimes. He and his team of outsiders were the antiseptic the Vatican so desperately needed if it was to survive.
The Democrats are suffering the same attacks from the GOP’s usual suspects and usual tactics of stalling vital help that would help the poorest of the poor, in the midst of a pandemic…why? Not for concern of the deficit as they profess because please remember, it was just months ago when Trump and allies were happy to add trillions to the deficit as long as the lion’s share went ONLY the most wealthy and powerful….Therefore, the punishment of those who have created this situation from the lies and anti-science at the beginning of the pandemic, to a nation in the midst of winter with a raging pandemic…and if the patient is to survive, we, too, must lance the festering wounds of lies, misdirection and obstructionists that penalizes ONLYr the least of us, the most vulnerable or more of us will die.
Democracy cannot survive without transparency, truth and justice–and that means punishing crime.
In the end, Francis brought in transparency, he brought in accountability, he stripped the power abusers of their power and those who committed the most heinous of crimes were turned over to the “laws of the land” for punishment and many were incarcerated and fined. He brought truth and dignity back to the Vatican.
And in our end, as we face the innocent poor, hungry, and homeless and unemployed who were betrayed by the wealth machine that is the GOP, we need to be able to say… “Yes, they are paying their due. They did not, this time, get away with it. There will be justice.” Too little and too late, but justice nonetheless.
Were Francis’ band of criminals forgiven? Most likely. But were they held accountable? Yes, again.
Pope Francis unknowingly prepared for what he would eventually confront on Day One as Pope. While he was still Bergoglio,(1991), he wrote an essay discerning the difference between sin and corruption… [taken From the book Wounded Shepherd by Austen Ivereigh- p61
“As long as a person was a sinner, there was hope, because the sinner accepted the truth of who she really was and how far she had fallen sort , once she was ready to turn to God in shame and repentance, she could be forgiven and change. The Church’s task with the sinner, as Jesus showed, was to be compassionate and merciful, always offering a space for her conversion.“
“With the corrupt, on the other hand, mercy could not yet reach them, because they had no shame. The corrupt denied the truth about themselves and refused to admit they were falling short; they turned not to God in shame , but away from God and out to others, whom they made complicit in their webs of deceit and self-justification.”
continuing, Pope Francis said: [of the corrupt in the Vatican finance scandal–but it applies perfectly to Trump and his crew]
“The corrupt could be turned around only by a major external shock, some great tribulation such as prison, bankruptcy, grave illness or a humiliating scandal.”
Think about it… what will Trump and his cohorts learn if not given a “major external shock”???? What will give them and others pause about doing the same thing again? Justice must be swift and sure and befitting the crime. For their sake and the sake of their soul there needs to be the shock of punishment.
Even if you despise what these people have done, as a Christian, we still need to worry about their souls… and the best case scenario is that at least some of the GOP members, so deeply complicit, will have a metanoia and come to see and acknowledge the error of their ways–Trump most of all.
We must pray for Trump and all those whose God is money and power and lust for they are truly lost.
We must change the culture so that betraying one’s oath of office comes with penalty–severe penalty.
If you read my last post [Christian Civics 101] you can stop here, because I’m injecting a portion that was leading to and is exactly the extrapolation regarding our civic duty with regard to each other and especially with regard to the punishment of the guilty… and what that means for OUR SOULS.
Only God is God, and “the State” is subordinate and accountable to God for its treatment of human persons, all of whom were created by God.
I’ll repeat the most important part:
The State is Subordinate and ACCOUNTABLE TO GOD for its treatment of human persons, all of whom were created by God.
AND THEREFORE, WE ARE ACCOUNTABLE FOR PUTTING THEM IN OFFICE and for what we let them do to the rest of us.
Our job as believers is to figure out what things belong to Caesar, and what things belong to God — and then put those things in right order in our own lives, and in our relations with others.”
I haven’t really seen much in the last 4 years….“Love your neighbor as yourself.” Matthew 19:19
The Judgement of Nations Matthew 25:31-46
31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, 33 and he will put the sheep at his right hand and the goats at the left. 34 Then the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; 35 for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’
Or did we let people be put in cages, left thousands going hungry/homeless in our wealthy nation, or dying from a pandemic, or stealing from the infirm and elderly to give to the rich– We cannot say, well, I didn’t do that personally…
IF YOU VOTED FOR THE PEOPLE WHO DO THOSE THINGS…YOU ARE COMPLICIT. PERIOD.
37 Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? 38 And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? 39 And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?’
40 And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family,[a] you did it to me.’
41 Then he will say to those at his left hand, ‘You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; 42 for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ 44 Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?’ 45 Then he will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ 46 And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
By doing what is right and godly by your neighbor, you gain eternal life.
By providing a rescue package for the millions of unemployed, those with unstable housing or hungry children during a pandemic… By making sure all people have access to the best vaccine.
Like dismantling systemic racism, especially in prison reform
Like ending the death penalty
By NOT doing right by your neighbor, you have everything to lose.
Like BLOCKING a rescue package that millions of people need in this country.
By undermining the Climate/Environmental protections for the sake of pure profit we lose the very earth that sustains us. The earth God said we are to care for as faithful stewards
By keeping kids in cages we disgrace our own humanity and lose our moral standing in the world.
By media telling outright lies that cost lives, we become an untrustworthy ally.
By letting those who promote violence and intimidation against co-workers keep their jobs we victimize the victim for a second time.
Financially, it’s been proven again and again in this country….
You simply cannot OUT-GIVE God’s generosity.
Every time America has had generous programs for everyone, for infrastructure, the country has prospered because God always takes what we give and multiplies our blessings.
You Simply Cannot Out-Give God
So while we await the verdict on Trump’s second impeachment at the same time we begin thinking about this coming Lent [Ash Wed on 2/17 btw] as a time of prayer, fasting and almsgiving… let us look inward to our sins and see if there is some unyielding “corruption” that we are in denial about, some festering wound that needs lancing and needs the light of Christ to heal us.
Thora Wease Writes 