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Saturday, June 2, 2012

180,000 Guatemalans Dead at the Hands of Evangelical President Rios Montt?

Guatemalan President Rios Montt Charged With Genocide


Rios Montt exemplifies the apocalyptic downside of Christian "Righteousness," the transmutation of presumed rectitude into malice. Just take the detour at Projection. 
Best Pax Posts On Psychological Projection And "The Shadow"


Trappist monk Thomas Merton explains "the righteous quest for perfection" and its routine evocation of evil: 
"The terrible thing about our time is precisely the ease with which theories can be put into practice.  The more perfect, the more idealistic the theories, the more dreadful is their realization.  We are at last beginning to rediscover what perhaps men knew better in very ancient times, in primitive times before utopias were thought of: that liberty is bound up with imperfection, and that limitations, imperfections, errors are not only unavoidable but also salutary. The best is not the ideal.  Where what is theoretically best is imposed on everyone as the norm, then there is no longer any room even to be good.  The best, imposed as a norm, becomes evil.” Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander 


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Merton

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Excerpt: "Drawing on his Pentecostal beliefs, Ríos Montt invoked a modern apocalyptic vision comparing the four riders of the Book of Revelation to the four modern evils of hunger, misery, ignorance and subversion, as well as fighting corruption and what he described as the depredations of the rich. He said that the true Christian had the Bible in one hand and a machine gun in the other." 


WHAT HAPPENED AT DOS ERRES

Originally aired 05.25.2012
In 1982, the Guatemalan military massacred the villagers of Dos Erres, killing more than 200 people. Thirty years later, a Guatemalan living in the US got a phone call from a woman who told him that two boys had been abducted during the massacre -- and he was one of them. ProPublica's print version: Finding Oscar.
This story was co-reported with Sebastian Rotella of ProPublica, Ana Arana of Fundación MEPI, independent journalist Habiba Nosheen and This American Life producer Brian Reed. Their essay “Finding Oscar,” which is accompanied by a timeline, slideshow and character guide, can be read atpropublica.org and is also available as an eBook. Annie Correal helped with research and translations.
PROLOGUE.
Ira tells the story of how Oscar Ramirez, a Guatemalan immigrant living near Boston, got a phone call with some very strange news about his past. A public prosecutor from Guatemala told Oscar that when he was three years old, he may have been abducted from a massacre at a village called Dos Erres. Ira also talks to Kate Doyle, a senior analyst at the National Security Archive, about the Guatemalan military's scorched earth campaign, which was going on when the massacre at Dos Erres happened. (4 minutes)
ACT ONE.
Reporter Habiba Nosheen tells the story of how investigators first heard of human remains at Dos Erres, and how they discovered what the Guatemalan military did there. (28 minutes)
ACT TWO.
Habiba's story continues. Nearly 16 years after investigators first started looking into the Dos Erres massacre, a prosecutor tracks down Oscar and asks him to take a DNA test to see if he is a survivor. But they find out much more. (25 minutes)
Photos from Matthew Healey for ProPublica and Alex Cruz/El Periodico de Guatemala:
PHOTO: Members of the elite special forces that committed the massacre at Dos Erres. This photo was likely taken during training by Lieutenant Oscar Ramirez Ramos, who was one of the commanders during the massacre.
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