What is the Origin of the Hammer and Sickle Crucifix? -- Marxist Jesuit

(La Paz) Evo Morales gave a gift that was as tasteless as it was blasphemous to the Pope on Wednesday.  What is it about the hammer and sickle and the Crucified One, which   Pope Francis will take back to Rome?

The communist symbol of sickle and hammer with the crucified body is the "symbiosis" of "social commitment and Christianity" and was a "tribute" to the Spanish priest Luis Espinal, who had distinguished himself through his "commitment to social struggle". "Morales probably meant Socialism and Christianity '" said Infovaticana .

The newly created icon was placed around Pope Francis' neck as a pendant (see picture).

The Jesuit and Marxist Luis Espinal Camps

Luis Espinal Camps was a Spanish Jesuit and Marxist, who was murdered in 1980 in Bolivia.

Born in 1932 in Catalonia, he joined the Society of Jesus in 1949, was ordained in Barcelona in 1962, in 1963 gained his licentiate in theology and after that attended  a course in journalism and audiovisual media at the Catholic University of Milan in Italy. The Jesuit was described as a gifted communicator.

Under the influence of socio-political left movement in Latin America, he went in 1968 at his own request to Bolivia. It was the time that  left and right engaged in a military struggle for power   in Bolivia, where communist guerrilla groups had been formed in the country and Che Guevara, who had arrived with Cuban guerrillas and Soviet support to enforce the armed revolution, had just been killed by the military.

Unlike other Latin American countries the left and right  took turns in Bolivia exercising  the government inscrutably in a fast rhythm.

Fight on the side of left movements

Espinal at a rally of miners unions and students 1979

Fr. Espinal, who considered himself a "worker priest" remained in the capital, La Paz, where he lived in a poor neighborhood with two other Jesuits. He worked as a theater critic for the daily newspaper Presencia and initially designed his own show on national television, in which he reported on the "worker priests" and took interviews with members of the Marxist guerrilla movement Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN). In 1971 he was awarded Bolivian citizenship. From that year until his death he was a member of the Jesuit radio station Radio Fides and chief editor of the weekly newspaper he founded, Aquí as a mouthpiece left "popular movements". He supported the miners' movement, founded in 1976 the human rights organization, Asamblea de Derechos Humanos and joined a public hunger strike in 1977 with the demand for democratization.

Luis Espinal was one of a number of Jesuits and got closer to various forms of Marxism. Unlike his brothers he did not go over to armed struggle.

When the Leftist Nationalist, Lidia Gueiler Tejada from the interim Revolutionary Nationalist Movement of Bolivia, was the President of the Republic, Espinal was abducted and murdered on March 21, 1980. Whether the offenders were sent by the drug cartels that soon afterwards supported the dictatorship of Luis García Meza Tejada, or from one of the various rapidly changing, and disempowered military rulers could never be clarified. Espinal followers see the reason in his public criticism of an amnesty for crimes during the tenure of President Banzer.

During the Pope's visit it has been repeatedly pointed out that Espinal was assassinated just two days before Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero. An attempt to put the Jesuit into a new line of geopolitical saints.

State-honored Christian-Marxist "Folk Hero"

 Hammer, Sickle and crucified, "Socialism and Christianity" on a chain that  was placed around Pope Francis' neck.

In 2007 President Evo Morales declared March 21 the "Day of the Bolivian Cinema" in memory of the assassination of Luis Espinal. Pope Francis prayed today in the place where Fr. Espinal was murdered. Here the Catholic Church's  leader said:

"Good evening, dear sisters and brothers,

I have come to a halt in order to greet you, and especially to remember. At that resembles those a friend, one of our brothers, a victims of interests, that did not want him to fight for the freedom of Bolivia. Fr. Espinal has preached the Gospel and this gospel bothered, and that's why they eliminated him. We hold a minute's silence in prayer and then we pray all together.

[Silence] "

President Morales declared to Pope Francis that the scandalous gift that he made to the head of the church is  a "memento" of Luis Espinal,  who was "known for his religious beliefs and stood up for the defense of the poor, the marginalized and the sick."

However, Father Luis Espinal received sharp criticism during his time in Bolivia mainly by the Church's sharp criticism and his sympathy for the revolutionary, Marxist movements. The weekly newspaper he founded in 1979, Aquí celebrated him today as a "martyr", "folk hero" and "symbol" of liberation theology . For his followers, and thus  is he honored by the presidency of the left-wing populist Evo Morales as well as official Bolivia, Luis Espinal is a leftist symbol in the fight against a flexibly defined "rights".

Several organizations presented Pope Francis a letter in which they expressed their desire for the beatification of Luis Espinal.

Update: apparently, the Pope wasn't angry and didn't say, "no, this is wrong" or variations on that.  Thank you Father Lombardi.  Catholic Snooze Service tries to downplay Espinal's obvious Marxism, and gets it wrong.  Bolivia was ruled by a Leftist President at the time Espinal was dealt with.

The Neocons trying to play damage control were also wrong.

Text: Giuseppe Nardi
Image: Infovaticana

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

Link to Katholishes...

AMDG