Genocidal Maniac Christopher Columbus

by Thomas Dahlheimer

Because of the instructions Columbus and his men received from two 15th century Papal Bulls, they stole the native Taino people’s land that they, in 1492, "discovered" in the Caribbean Islands. And, likewise, because of these same two 15th century Papal Bulls, white Christians also stole the Dakota’s Wakan/"Rum" River Watershed traditional/ancestral homeland, which (in part) includes the land where the Anoka, Minnesota–Roman Catholic Church of Saint Stephen–Knights of Columbus building is now located.  Reference

Knights of Columbus building

And on the front of Anoka’s–Catholic Church of Saint Stephen– Knights of Columbus building, a building located on the south bank of the badly named "Rum River", there is a Knights of Columbus logo. It’s a logo that glorifies the organization’s extremely racist name.

The Catholic Church of Saint Stephen in Anoka, Minnesota has a long-established chapter of the Knights of Columbus. However, because of a local, national, and international movement to replace the profane name of the river that finds its confluence with the Mississippi River in Anoka [the "Rum River"] back to it sacred Dakota name, [Wakan], some of the Dakota people are beginning to return to this very sacred area of their traditional and ancestral homeland. And doing so, to appreciate and protect this sacred site of theirs. Because of their return to this sacred site, they are now having to deal with the extremely racist Knights of Columbus logo, which is radically desecrating this sacred site of theirs. Hopefully, they will be able to influence the Roman Catholic Church to change the Knights of Columbus organization’s extremely racist name as well as create a new logo for the organization.

In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue, in search of new lands, gold and wealth. He ‘discovered’ and ‘claimed’ many islands throughout the Caribbean. But, what right did he have to ‘claim’ these lands, when the Taino people had been living there for thousands of years?

According to a United Nations World Conference Against Racism document: "In the fifteenth century, two Papal Bulls set the stage for European domination of the New World and Africa. Romanus Pontifex, issued by Pope Nicholas V to King Alfonso V of Portugal in 1452, declared war against all non-Christians throughout the world, and specifically sanctioned and promoted the conquest, colonization, and exploitation of non-Christian nations and their territories." reference 

In this Papal Bull Pope Nicholas V directed King Alfonso to "capture, vanquish, and subdue the saracens, pagans, and other enemies of Christ," to "put them into perpetual slavery," and "to take all their possessions and property". reference 

And in Pope Alexander VI’s papal bull of 1493 (Inter Caetera), he stated his desire that the "discovered" people be "subjugated and brought to the faith itself." By this means, said the pope, the "Christian Empire" would be propagated. reference  These Papal Bulls, or "doctrines of discovery", sanctioned Christian nations to claim "unoccupied lands", or lands belonging to "heathens" or "pagans". reference 

Because of these two Papal Bulls Columbus felt justified and righteous to write in his journal that the Taino people were "very friendly", "an inoffensive people", "they could be much more easily converted to our holy faith by gentle means than by force", "weapons they have none", and that "with weapons and 50 men I could enslave the entire population". reference  He later wrote: "Let us in the name of the Holy Trinity go on sending all the slaves that can be sold." reference 

A Dominican Priest, Bartolome de Las Casas , was the first European historian in the Americas. He wrote, when referring to the Europeans’ first forty years of genocidal behavior in the Americas, "…for they are still acting like ravening beasts, killing, terrorizing, afflicting, torturing, and destroying the native peoples, doing all this with the strangest and most varied new methods of cruelty, never seen or heard of before, and to such a degree that this Island of Hispaniola once so populous (having a population that I estimated to be more than three million), has now a population of barely two hundred persons." reference

He also wrote: "They made some low, wide gallows on which the hanged victim’s feet almost touched the ground, stringing up their victims, in lots of thirteen, in memory of Our Redeemer and His twelve Apostles, then set burning wood at their feet and thus burned them alive. reference

This is why the Dakota people who are returning to their Wakan/“Rum” River Watershed traditional/ancestral homeland, which (in part) includes the area now known as Anoka, Minnesota, are opposed to Anoka’s–Catholic Church of Saint Stephen–Knights of Columbus organization’s extremely racist name and desecrating racist logo.

Although the truth is known about Columbus, our nation still honors him with a federal holiday. And think about how extremely racist it is for the Roman Catholic Church to still have a Knights of Columbus organization today. Columbus Day is a disputed holiday, with 17 states refusing too celebrate Columbus Day, they refuse to honor this late 1400s’ — Roman Pope guided–genocidal maniac on Columbus Day, and two states (Alabama and South Dakota) celebrate American Indian Heritage Day in its place. reference reference