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January 27, 2009

Bishop Williamson - what WAS he saying?

I've read a lot of different stuff about the Society of St Pius X situation this week and last - though I've been reading about Bishop Williamson for several years.

Is he an antisemite? I've read a lot of commenters on Catholic blogs saying that Williamson is not a Holocaust Denier because he does at least agree that some hundreds of thousands of Jews died in concentration camps. I'm of the opinion that that kind of statement is denial of the reality of the Holocaust and what the Nazis were about. However, it's worse than that. One can argue that anti-Zionism or Holocaust minimization is not antisemitism, but I don't think anyone can argue about the antisemitism here, in an excerpt from Bishop Williamson's letter of September 1, 2002.

By lies, Judeo-Masonry brought about the first two World Wars. To get Americans to enter the First World War, President Woodrow Wilson told them that it would be the "war to end all wars." In fact, WWI established the Masonic League of Nations in Geneva and the Communist Revolution in Russia, and crushed numerous Christian monarchies, in particular the Catholic Austro-Hungarian Empire. And the Masonic Treaty of Versailles ending WWI deliberately paved the way for WWII, of which President F.D. Roosevelt promised it would "make the world safe for democracy." In fact, WWII established the Masonic United Nations, hugely promoted socialism in the USA and in the Western "democracies," and crushed the Eastern "democracies" under Communism.

WORLD WAR III

By lies, Judeo-Masonry is preparing for the Third World War. As the Depression of the 1930's necessitated WWII, triggered for the US by the supposed treachery of the Japanese at Pearl Harbor, so we see all the conditions created for another much worse Depression in the US, with the supposed treachery of Arabs last year against the Twin Towers in New York already igniting American public opinion to go to war against Afghanistan and now Iraq. And as we now in 2002 know with certainty that our governments and media told us far from the complete truth in 1941 as to who was truly responsible for the attack on Pearl Harbor, so we will eventually know that those truly responsible for the attack on the Twin Towers were certainly not those primarily held up as being responsible by our governments and media.

Feel free to say that all this is just produced by a hatred of Modernity or Modernism (the latter being defined as a specific error in Catholicism). I can't see it. Anyone who blames World War I and World War II on Judeo-Masonry and sees a coming World War III to lay at the same feet is an antisemite.

And this man was in charge of training English language seminarians for the SSPX for how long? And for the last few years running a seminary in Argentina?

The most interesting commentary by someone who knows Williamson, a former student, is here at The Sensible Bond, commenting on the recent video from Swedish TV:

The second thing which strikes me about his remarks is that when he quotes revisionists, he follows the Thomistic principle 'not to heed who says a thing but heed what it is they say.' Now, we really are in the thicket. This principle, forged by St Thomas as a means of students' developing their theological arguments, is thought sufficient by BW+ as a principle of historical research. Bad idea. The principle more appropriate here is: ask not what they say but why they say it. It is a principle he seems able to apply to the liberals but - proof again of his anti-modern passion - not to those who attack the liberals. Did nobody ever teach him that the enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend?

I find that helpful for understanding how a man lots of folks assure us in intelligent could go wrong; Thomism (and the dialectical method in general) is not an adequate resource for practicing history. However, that's not enough to explain the "Judaeo-Masonry" as anything other than Jew-hatred. I'm glad his superior in the SSPX now says "For this reason I have prohibited him, pending any new orders, from taking any public positions on political or historical questions." I hope it works.

Actually, I hope Bishop Williamson goes off in a huff into honest schism. I prefer that he not be associated with the Roman Catholic Church in any way.

Posted by CrankyProfessor at January 27, 2009 8:58 PM