[Ansteorra] The Knights Templar may sue the Pope

[John Atkinson]

On Tue, Aug 5, 2008 at 7:44 AM, Jay Yeates <jyeates at realtime.net> wrote:

> this is what happens when the mail (the reversion of the Vatican's
> termination order) get's conveniently "lost" in transit .....
>
> sic the Dominican's on the Templar's, my moneys' on the Templar's ..
> especially since they are the ones who came up with the concept of the
> "banc"

Ah, but the Hounds of God actually won the last showdown. . . Money is
not flame retardant--even gold conducts heat exceedingly well.

I'd think the first step would be to question this modern
organization's ability to sue on behalf of the Templars--providing
documentation that they are actually a surviving descendant of the
Order rather than a bunch of romantics who adopted the name in the
19th or 20th century.

Or, if His Holiness wants real entertainment, he could offer to
apologize to the legitimate descendants of the Templars--but first,
all the organizations claiming the name have to settle which one or
ones actually have continuity and which ones are revivals--the
organization mentioned in the article with the fancy Latin name was
founded in the 19th century by the authority of the Corsican and then
again recognized by Napoleon III.  In their own website, they state
that "It reclaims the spirit of, but does not assert any direct
descent from the ancient Order founded by Hugues de Payens in 1118 and
dissolved by Pope Clement V in 1312."

I don't expect that problem is even theoretically capable of solution
without setting more people on fire, so it rather neatly would get him
off the hook.

I can't take seriously anyone claiming to be Templar Order that
doesn't fight.  To me that seems to defeat the purpose of a
'chivalric' order in the first place--but more significantly, a
crusading order whose original name was Pauperes commilitones Christi
Templique Solomonici, the Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the
Temple of Solomon.  More specifically, the Order was founded on a
perpetual vow to defend the Kingdom of Jerusalem, which is now
defunct, and a variant of the Crusader's vow, which would be
exceedingly difficult to carry out in these more complex times.  I'm
all in favor of charitable organizations, but combat is such an
essential element of the function of the Templars (once knights in
general, but distinction got tossed out the window a long time ago)
that adopting the name for folks who do nothing different from
hundreds of other NGOs is more than a little silly.

Ioannes Dalassenos
mka John M. Atkinson
-- 
"Thousands of Sarmatians, Thousands of Franks, we've slain them again
and again. We're looking for thousands of Persians."
--Vita Aureliani