BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'

Subject: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 07:38 PM

PLEASE! Someone suggest a better thread title if this thread becomes a reasonable discussion. We'll see about that one??? >;-)

I have read a number of threads here about the Cat'lic religion and it's failings. The deal with the Pope is ongoing... Who? What are his challenges? And many others.

The question that seems to pervade all threads, discussions, whatever is why isn't the Cat'lic religion keeping up with "the times" regarding a number of issues? Be it priests being able to marry or gay marriage or whatever.

Allow me some space to ask something of you by way of... oh, I'll just say it and see what you think...

We will have a new Pope soon. How old will he be? My age? Can't see it. Even if he was, would he share my views or knowledge? Can't see it. So, if I am allowed to assume the new guy is gonna be at least 70 years old, he grew up in an age with far less access to, and the influences of, the same worldly education as I. He also was educated under a much older "system" of education beginning when he was 16 to 18 years old at the oldest... more like when he stopped weening which would be three to five years old if his old man had a stern hand (my old man used to give me a "I'll give you somethin ta cry about" when I weened).

I'll leave it there for brevity and try to bring home the crux of the biscuit.

Why does anyone get pissy about the fact that the Cat'lic church is at least 70 years behind "the times" with regard to SOME issues? Isn't it NOT rocket science?

If anyone can easily shoot down my postulates and questions, please do. If the thread goes south, and I can just imagine it will, I will ask for it to be deleted. But, to me, it's a valid question and worthy of the asking.

I have further questions. Let's see what takes place first.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 08:18 PM

Huge challenge...intertwined with Mafia. Another huge challenge..they are selected for their at least nominal adherence to their own rules. Most are sincere..but others are sincere who won't ever be made bishop or cardinal. If you say you believe in birth control, you probably won't be made cardinal, unless you keep it to yourself until you are made cardinal.

A number are speaking up...O'Malley has been brilliant..that innocent looking smile and behind it lies a very cagy skilled way of gaming. Shonborn has spoken up and was up against Sodano (M????) and pope smacked him down. Sodano is not a good fellow from what I can tell. There are some good ones..Archbishop Martin, Tagle and Shonborn got clean bill of health from abuse victims..they want Martin for pope. O'Brien has spoken out saying celibacy would wither away and priests should be allowed to be married although he did not see it for himself..of course he has recently been cast out for making advances on seminarians and abusing his power over them. That is not tolerable of course, but I want to hear more from him. A couple of Africans have made sensible statements regarding AIDS etc. One I could possibly vote for in some capacity...international rover or something...he does not seem to care about administration and is more interested in spreading the gospel..which is great but someone needs to administer..otherwise people like Sodano fill in the gap with cronyism, probably money laundering etc.

Many many people, including myself, really do not want the one from New York. He does not seem to be an inately good person and has lied straightfaced. I get creepy vibes from him. Perhaps that is why they keep bringing up Oullett, who seems nice enough but doesn't seem to have the whatever it takes to fight the Mafia. The one the Mafia is said to hate is Shonborn, who is from a royal? family in Austria, and probably does not have to worry about pensions, old age arrangements etc. I think having much truck with a band of killers (and how did Pope John Paul I die by the way and how was Mafia involved?) is not a good arrangement for a church that is supposed to be at least well-behaved, if not holy.

So you have a big mess. Someone with guts and courage has to step up to the plate. They can outsource the theology, the pastoral stuff, the PR etc. They can not outsource taking a big, perhaps fatal, step and cleaning lup the Mafia, the child abuse situation, the money laundering etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 08:59 PM

We will have a new Pope soon. How old will he be? My age? Can't see it.

Jeez, and here's me taking you for at least 93.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,999
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 09:01 PM

When religions become involved with money or politics, they ain't religions anymore.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Rapparee
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 10:13 PM

The late Archbishop of Milan said that the Catholic Church is at least 200 years behind the times.

Evolve or die. It's that simple.

The Church as understood by the Vatican has been irrelevant to a very large percentage of American and European Catholics for quite a few years now. The hypocrisy is massive -- for example, the claim that human life is sacred does not prevent a Catholic from serving in the Armed Forces where he or she might have to take life...but contraception is wrong from the git-go. Then there's the pedophilia issue, the money involved, the power involved, and with all this comes corruption.

And so the laity (and many parish priests) see the problems and ignore the Vatican as much as they can.

Someday soon I think a choice will be forced on the Vatican -- and a forced decision is rarely a good decision. But then, I'm not part of the Vatican Rag-gle-Taggle Bunch.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: mg
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 10:31 PM

I think the forced decision is here. We can only hope they make the right one. Most of the top candidates except for Bertone and the one from New York heaven help us and Turkson, who is appealing except for the agreement with seriously bad legislation, are OK it seems..a couple could be very very good. Some are probably nice enough, but don't have what it takes to get the job of reformation done. I wish Erdo's name was not Peter because he might be good..I don't know enough about him but he is in the top 8 or 10 at the moment. If you are just a humble shepherd of sheep, the wolf is going to eat you and then eat the sheep.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,999
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 10:44 PM

One day the lion will lay down with the lamb.

One of them will not have a good night's sleep.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Rapparee
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 11:14 PM

Yup. They frequently have to replace the lamb.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: mg
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 11:48 PM

http://www.churchauthority.org/blog/?p=128

interesting Italian writeup.

Here are some questions..it is odd that the pope has decided, or others have decided for him, that he will be entombed in a convent for life. Obviously, it protects him from lawsuits and arrest somewhat. But how could he just commandeer a whole building for himself and a few nuns and the ever present now Archbishop Ganswein..who somehow does not seem to have been a bishop after being a monsignor. Is that usual?

You can say, well he is near the library and concerts etc..but you would think he might want to spend part of the year in Bavaria...Is he protecting anyone, perhaps the Archbishop? Many questions.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: JennieG
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 12:34 AM

According to the 'Today in History' page in my local paper this morning (Saturday March 9) -

On this day in 1074 Pope Gregory VII declares all married Roman Catholic priests to be excommunicated.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Musket sans cookie
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 02:18 AM

The Catholic church will do the same as cigarette manufacturers. Concentrate on evolving countries with less educated and more vulnerable populations.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 04:44 AM

I think the Catholic Church has to get out of the business of compelling people to do stuff or not to do stuff. We've reached a point where a significant percentage of the laity are educated and sophisticated enough to make their own decisions. Some have a conservative perspective, some liberal, and many in the middle. If the Catholic Church is to survive, it has to open its doors to all of these perspectives and not force homogenization on Catholics. There's no reason why there can't be some breadth in things so that all can be accommodated. If the next Pope is conservative but is willing to respect and tolerate liberals, that would be a big step forward. I think Benedict almost made that step, but not quite.
-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Wolfhound person
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 05:31 AM

Time for one memmber, one vote - and the way they count in, I've got a vote. Even though I'm well collapsed as far as any organised religion is concerned.

Just read:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-21657407

and the Austrian count or whatever he is looks lively (never heard of him before).

As for the Archbishop of - is it Brasilia - "born in 1949 of German - Brasilian parents" - I wonder who his German parent was and when s/he immigrated?????????

Paws

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 06:25 AM

The more modern any church is, the more likely people are to understand it.
Ergo; if you remove the mystique, and the superstition. What do you have left to control the members?
The church needs superstition and mumbo jumbe, in order to scare folks into obeying, and thus believing.
I think that, the printing of the bible in English, and the removal of the Latin mass, caused all the drift away from religion.
You see, once people understand things, they lose interest.

It's along the same line as the old warning mothers give their daughters. "If you let him do that, he won't respect you in the morning"

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 07:03 AM

"If the next Pope is conservative but is willing to respect and tolerate liberals, that would be a big step forward."(Joe)

John is perfectly correct....is a little blunt.
"liberalism" is on a mission to destroy religion, that means the good stuff as well as the bad.......The thought of a completely secular world is too horrible to contemplate.

As I have been saying for years, the Catholic church must remove the celibacy rule....appoint married priests, preferrably with children.
and remove all the homosexuals from the priesthood.
How can they promote family values and marriage if 30% of priests are homosexual? It is sheer hypocrisy.
If they do not tackle these issues they can look forward to oblivion...and although I am an atheist, I am sure humanity will be the worse for the loss.
"

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 07:20 AM

> I think the Catholic Church has to get out of the business of compelling people to do stuff or not to do stuff. We've reached a point where a significant percentage of the laity are educated and sophisticated enough to make their own decisions.

> the Catholic church must remove the celibacy rule


Oh man, write it in caps, underline it, put it in red boldface.

Even without the scandals, they are losing credibility and followers worldwide in direct proportion to the extent that they fail at the above things. Sooner or later they'll have to implement such changes, if only as a self-preservation measure.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,BrendanB
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 07:30 AM

I am interested in Joe's response. There can be no doubt that he is better qualified than most to comment on the Catholic church and its machinations. However, it does raise the question of when does an organization become so loose as to cease to have a distinguishable character?
The Catholic church has got to evolve if it is to retain meaning and relevance but, at the same time, it has to be absolutely clear about its core values. The attempted cover-ups of paedophilia and other wrondoings in an attempt to protect the church has done an enormous disservice to the church and may have done irreparable harm. Could this be because there is a major problem with Curia - has the church hierarchy become so inward-looking and obsessed with image that gospel values have been lost?
The history of the Vatican has much that is murky, Roberto Calvi and Marcinkus spring immediately to mind. It seems to me that the organization must do away with a large part of the Vatican bureaucracy, bring in a great deal more transparency and recognise that everyone is fallible (even if they wear a red hat) and stop closing ranks to protect those responsible for wrongdoing.
Belonging to any club or organization involves accepting the rules and ethos of that organization, become too liberal or too conservative and you not only harm the organization but you call into question the values of the organization. When the organization is a church this effect is magnified as churches are targets for active dislike by many who seek to deride and condemn. Honest acceptance of the tenets of Catholicism and an end to lip service by too many senior clerics are probably two of the most important reforms needed.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 07:36 AM

...HAVE done enormous harm.... , THE Curia.
Sorry

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MarkS
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 08:14 AM

It is taking a while, but the church is coming to terms with the fact that while they may be a spriritual authority, they no longer are a secular authority.
And in that role they are slowly slowly slowly learning to inspire rather than command.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 08:33 AM

""liberalism" is on a mission to destroy religion,"

Do you check under your bed for lurking reds every night?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 08:42 AM

Very interesting and insightful commentaries.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: John P
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 08:57 AM

Yes, the Catholic Church needs to move farther into modern society to stay relevant, but the biggest thing they could do to prove that they believe what they say would be to turn over all records of child rape to the secular authorities, along with all the rapist priests and all the bishops and cardinals who were part of the international child rape conspiracy. They should also voluntarily offer massive reparations to the victims. When victims have to sue in court for reparations, it's hard to believe that the church sees anything wrong with rape. I've always thought the church was cluelessly medieval. Since the news of all the rapes came out I've upgraded that to actively evil. If the new pope doesn't address this issue in a real way, the church is going to lose more and more people. At some point, why should anyone believe anything they say?

I guess I should add that the church's massive effort and expenditure of millions of dollars to influence secular laws in negative ways (anti-civil rights, anti-woman, anti-birth control, etc.) also puts them in the actively evil camp. They are engaged in a well-funded and well-organized conspiracy to overthrow the Constitution of the United States by tearing down the separation of church and state. A bishop that advocates excommunicating politicians because he disagrees with their politics should get fired by the Vatican.

There is no hope for the church unless it finds a way to be moral again.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Musket sans cookie
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 09:14 AM

Akenaton -remove all homosexuals.

Is there no thread available where you don't see an opportunity to spread your vile personality disorder?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 09:35 AM

Yes Ian, that one struck me as well.

Today kick 'em out of the priesthood, whether or no they are obeying the celibacy rules.

Tomorrow out of politics, ignoring that they can no longer be blackmailed for secrets

Next? Who knows, but if he ever had his way there wouldn't be one left able to support himself, unless he stayed in the closet.

Akenaton has all the instincts of a committed Nazi.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 09:35 AM

I agree with much of what has been said. Over the decades we have seen large-scale cover-ups of wrongdoings that have served only to encourage the perpetuation of those wrongdoings. There are nowhere near enough priests and nuns rotting in jail for my liking. The Church allowed itself to be bought off by the Fascists in Italy and the Vatican oversaw the removal of Jews to death camps and facilitated the escape to South America of Nazi war criminals. There's talk of sainting the pope who did that stuff as well as Mother Teresa, one of the wickedest people who ever lived. Today, the Vatican has a £500 million property portfolio funded entirely by well-invested money paid to the Church (to persuade it to keep silent about fascism) by Mussolini. You can buy high fashion in Regent Street from a shop bankrolled by Fascist money. The Church is responsible for high abortion rates and keeping millions in poverty, especially women, by promoting ignorance about sex and forbidding birth control. I'm an avowed atheist but I'm all for people following whatever religion appeals to them. I do think they ought to think a little more about the kind of organisation they're associating with.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 09:44 AM

Link to an article about the Fascist money. Note the secrecy and the positively murky ways the money was invested.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jan/21/vatican-secret-property-empire-mussolini

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Greg F.
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 10:02 AM

Kinda like Pappy Bush & the Nazis, ain't it?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 11:29 AM

GUEST.....I dont have to check under my bed for "reds".

I am a proper red, not one of the pinkos you see on these pages.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Futwick
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 11:47 AM

"When religions become involved with money or politics, they ain't religions anymore."

That's exactly what they are.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 11:55 AM

I suspect many religions "rigidly" adhere to past practices, and they receive less public comment than the RC church.

A good question may be "why is there more concern expressed for internal RC matters, than with other religions"? (Take Islam, for example, where many adhere "rigidly" to past practices).

My personal answer is because the RC church is often "in your face", and in the news,still influencing many aspects of in western society.
Because of this,attention is drawn to what many see as conflicts between the RC church leadership with current society and with their interpretation of many of Christs messages - (IMO, those who are not RCs and non-believers in religion also see many Christian messages as important to a just and caring society).

At the basis may be the potential impacts fall closer to home in the western world than with other religions. Other factors may relate to the historic evolution of Christianity and related disputes, power struggles, questionable non-religious activities in the past (some that would seem counter to the Christian message), and different interpretations of "the Christian path" by various Christian churches. Since the RC church has a founding position in Christianity, this likely puts it more closely "under the microscope". Having a central, and often very visible leader compounds this focus and public interest beyond "the faithful of the RC". (For example, many people have an interest in the Dalai Lama because of his status as a celebrity, rather than his religions message).

In more recent times, a broader tolerance and understanding of gender and sexuality issues has emerged in western countries. While these issues have stimulated internal strife and discussion inside many Christian churches, most have kept the discussion internal and generally operate "in sync' with changes in their local society/government. While many of "the RC faithful" are generally in sync with these society changes, the top level of the RC church has not always (if ever) been in this position.

On a final note, IMO, the dismal way the center of the RC church dealt with the sex abuse scandal, did more harm to the RC church than all the controversial actions and issues related to it's leadership throughout all of it's history.

With any failure comes an opportunity for "meaningful" change. Whether the opportunity is grasped by the RC church, is in the hands of those who likely are less connected to the outside than its followers (or even anyone on Mudcat). What prognosis does that give for significant and "meaningful" change, regardless of who is selected by the would be "pope-folks" under the veil of the white smoke?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 01:06 PM

In a world which is disastrously, maybe even terminally, over populated.
All the Catholic church is doing by forbidding contraception, is helping this world commit suicide.
So blind, so selfish, so up their own arse!

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 01:16 PM

so up their own arse!

Interesting allusion there on the contraceptive front, John...

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 01:25 PM

Well they have to clean the shit out of their eyes to see anything approaching reality.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: ollaimh
Date: 09 Mar 13 - 10:47 PM

liberals don't want to eliminate all religion, but some would like to get rid of the the religions that have delusions of .. er ... well god.   adults really shouldn't have imaginay friends but if they do they should read about the idea of reification. or perhaps even begin to undrstand "emptuness"

it's really silly to think some "gor" tells you want to do, sillier to think that god understands anything better than your do, and silliest to imagine that god would make up rules for everyone.

especially when those rules include genocide, hate, killing and raping children. no "god" there.

this may not be compatable with catholic doctrines

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 03:45 AM

The Catholic Church policy against contraception has been in a stage of "benign neglect" for most of the time since Pope Paul VI prohibited "artificial birth control" in his Humanae Vitae encyclical in 1968. For the most part, the same goes for the policy against homosexual sex. In most parishes I know of, there are at least a few openly homosexual couples who are accepted and welcomed as members of the community - they don't go around broadcasting the details of their sex lives, but neither do heterosexual parishioners. For the most part, people and priests in Catholic parishes go about their daily routines of trying to be good people and serving the poor and trying to worship God in one way or another - and all of this other stuff just doesn't come into play very often.

Yes, most of the allegations of wickedness in the Catholic Church are true, but the proportion of wickedness is about the same as it is anywhere else. Yes, there were Catholic officials who assisted the Fascists during WWII, and there were Catholic officials who heroically rescued Jews and worked in the Resistance. Yes, there were were far too many priests who molested children and far too many bishops who covered up their misdeeds or at least bungled the handling of these crimes. And yes, most Catholics (and the vast majority of priests and bishops) know about these crimes and are outraged by them. At least in the United States, there are now very strict procedures that attempt to eliminate the molestation of children in the Catholic Church. As a volunteer who works with youth in the Catholic Church, I had to take a 90-minute class on abuse of children just this week, and I was fingerprinted to see if I had any arrest record. I thought it was a very good course, by the way - and it's not the first one I've had to take.

Yes, I would like to see divorced-and-remarried lesbian bishops who are allowed to practice birth control, but life goes on pretty well without that accomplishment. For the most part, those who practice birth control and homosexuality, will be welcome in the Catholic Church as long as they don't make an issue of these issues. And while women can't be ordained priests, they can have a lot of power in the Catholic Church. I spent the day today with a nun who is probably the most powerful woman in Sacramento - she runs an amazing center for homeless people, and she regularly does battle with all the movers and shakers in town.

Somebody said churches shouldn't be involved in politics. I disagree. Should my powerful nun friend back down on her fierce defense of the homeless, just because she's a nun and religious people shouldn't do that? Should my boss the nun stop getting arrested for protesting against warfare and capital punishment? Must I quit my association with an interfaith group that is campaigning for more humane treatment of releasees from our county jail?

In this thread or another, somebody was saying something about the duplicity of the Catholic Church in calling itself "pro-life" and allowing members to become soldiers and allowing nations to engage in "just war." Well, the Catholic Church is slowly and quietly moving toward a fairly complete pacifist stance, while allowing members to make their own decisions about their own lives.

I suppose it would be very nice to have a Catholic Church with all the "i"s dotted and the "t"s crossed, but it muddles along pretty well without those things. I'm sure it's not perfect enough to satisfy the absolutists, but maybe that's a good thing.

I went to the Los Angeles Religious Education Congress two weeks ago, the largest annual gathering of Catholics anywhere (some 30,000 Catholics meeting across the street from Disneyland). We had the best speakers and the best musicians the Catholic Church has to offer, and it was a lovely weekend. There were fundamentalist Catholic and Protestant protesters outside the area, shouting about how horrible it was that we weren't worshipping according to their specifications. If those hate-filled people were against us, then we must have been doing something right. Heck, they even said we had a "homosexual agenda."

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 04:25 AM

See Mea Maxima Culpa if it comes on a cinema - it shows the depths the church and its hierarchy sank to to protect the perpetrators of atrocities against - that `protection goes on
Perhaps Hercules might consider returning from the dead to clean out another Augean Stable.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Allan Conn
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 04:29 AM

"So blind, so selfish, so up their own arse!" And the institution as a whole doesn't seem to be learning its lesson. As I understand it the four complainants against Cardinal O'Brien (ie three practising priests and an ex-priest) only went public because of the way the church was dealing with, or not-dealing with the allegations. They weren't just protecting their own - they were protecting the more powerful among their own. What chance would a susceptible member of the community have of being believed or at least taken seriously if respected figures in the church aren't?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 04:47 AM

Just to put some perspective to what Jim Carroll says, it's my understanding that the movie Mea Maxima Culpa is about the director of St. John's School for the Deaf in Milwaukee, where the director molested a number of students over a period of several years in the 1970s. This was a terrible thing, and it affects me even more powerfully because I was in a high school seminary right next door at the time that this was happening.

But it was one priest who did these crimes, and it was forty years ago. And in the seminary I was attending next door, there were twenty-five priests who were remarkably wonderful people, and a couple of real bastards.

Fr. William H. Whalen, if you should ever Google your name, I want you to see this. You were a real bastard. Not a sexual pervert, just a bastard. I knew you for seven of my eight years at St. Francis Seminary, and I hated you all that time.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 05:36 AM

> The Catholic Church policy against contraception has been in a stage of "benign neglect" for most of the time since Pope Paul VI

"Benign neglect" is not good enough. That's merely another phrase for COP-OUT. Don't-look-at-it-and-hope-it-will-quietly-take-care-of-itself. This is not the same thing as having the courage/honesty to make a clear ruling and take responsibility for it. They could change it in the morning if they really wanted to.

There are still many people in thrall to the Church - especially here (Ireland) - who are bound by such outdated, intrusive edicts. They go on having marriage-straining babies they neither want nor can afford, sometimes at the risk of health. And don't count on being able to get a termination even if it's life-threatening. Remember what just happened in Galway.*

"Benign neglect" is ignoring the problem, NOT ADDRESSING IT. It only sweeps it under the carpet, out of sight. Like misbehaving priests.


*Savita Halappanavar died after developing septicaemia from a miscarriage which lasted almost three days. 

The baby's heartbeat stopped on the Wednesday. "I got a call on Wednesday night that Savita's heart rate had really gone up and that they had moved her to ICU," Mr Halappanavar said. "Things just kept on getting worse and on Friday they told me that she was critically ill." Some of Savita's organs stopped functioning and she died on Sunday 28 October. An autopsy carried out two days after her death found she had died from septicaemia, according to the Irish Times. Praveen Halappanavar said staff at University Hospital Galway told them Ireland was "a Catholic country".

"University Hospital Galway is to carry out an internal investigation… [They stated that] 'Galway Roscommon University Hospitals Group wishes to emphasise that the facts of this tragic case have yet to be established; that is the purpose of the review.'" From BBC: www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-20321741


Oh. They're going to investigate *themselves*. That'll be enlightening.

Erm… the "facts of the case" are that a woman with a three-days' dead fetus inside her was refused a termination and died of internal poisoning.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 05:57 AM

Sorry Joe - a little ingenuous here – to say the least.
My point to you earlier was that this ongoing affair cannot possibly be explained away as "one priest who did these crimes" and it is a horrific distortion of the situation to claim it is.
My letter on the 'Who Will Be The Next Pope' thread.
Jim Carroll

07 Mar 13 - 02:54 AM
Have just got back from Dublin after seeing 'Mea Maxima Culpa' - Silence in the House of God, a documentary on the emerging of the earliest revelations of the clerical abuse scandal that (hopefully) will remove any temporal influence the church may have on the lives of any human being anywhere on this planet.
The film begins with the systematic abuse of deaf children by Milwaukee priest, Father Lawrence Murphy. It goes on to describe the lengths three of the abused children went to to bring these crimes to the attention of the public, and the lengths the church went to to cover up the abuses and to keep Father Murphy in office so he could continue to work with deaf children and continue to abuse them.
The last section of the film shows how the Vatican reacted to the revelations of world-wide clerical abuse, from refusing to co-operate with the investigation of these crimes, to denying access to relevant documents and information, even to declaring The Vatican a separate State and therefore immune to prosecution for or implication in any of these crimes.
The retiring pope, who denied any knowledge of these crimes until the abuses became public knowledge, in fact lied. As an archbishop he was put in charge of dealing with all reported child abuses by clerics - every single reported case of clerical child abuse that became known to the church, or even suspected, passed through his hands.
Up to the present day The Vatican holds these and many other such documents in its archives and refuses access to them in order to protect the abusers and the reputation, wealth and (remaining) influence of church.
One interesting fact (to me at least) revealed by the film was that the earliest recorded case of child abuse by a cleric took place 1,700 years ago - it's been going on a long, long, long time.
I don't know who the next pope will be but I hope it is somebody honest, decent and brave enough to deal with these massive number of serial crimes, acknowledge the church establishment's role in them and bring some sort of closure to the surviving victims - but somehow, I doubt it.
I would make MEA MAXIMA CULPA - Silence in the House of God obligatory viewing to anybody who doubts the facts of these crimes; in fact, it wouldn't be any harm for anybody working with and having influence over children to treat themselves to a couple of hours worth of unremitting horror.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 06:20 AM

Bonnie says: They go on having marriage-straining babies they neither want nor can afford, sometimes at the risk of health.

How many families do that, Bonnie? In our parish of 800 families, the number is exactly two. Both are ultra-conservative, legalistic Catholics. The other large families in our parish have adopted their children. It's the same in other parishes I've belonged to - one or two very conservative families have scads of miserable children, and the rest have two or three kids. So, don't you think you're overdramatizing the effects of the ban on birth control? Most priests I know don't go telling people not to practice birth control, and I have never heard a priest say anything against birth control from the pulpit. For that matter, I have never heard a priest say anything against homosexuality from the pulpit.

---

Jim says: the earliest recorded case of child abuse by a cleric took place 1,700 years ago.

So, Jim, when did the earliest recorded case of non-clergy child abuse take place, and when did the first coverup take place? I don't deny that far too many cases of sexual abuse by clergy took place. But in a church with a billion members, hundreds of such cases are only a small percentage. In the county where I live, dozens of cases of child abuse are reported every year - but there is no record of a single case of child abuse by a priest in this county ever. There have been ten cases in the next county over in the last century, but none in this county. My point is that while the crime is horrific, you cannot condemn the many for the crimes of the few.

And in Milwaukee, where there was a priest next door molesting dozens of children, I was living with 25 priests who were not. And yes, there was one bastard, but he was just a mean bastard, not a molester.



-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 06:32 AM

The death of one woman through neglect...is a tragedy.

The termination of thousands of unborn children in the cause of convenience is a moral crime.

There are many facets to most issues.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 06:59 AM

How many families do that? LOTS. Your parish is in California. Not Ireland. Or doesn't anything that's not in your own back yard count? Just because you haven't seen it (or don't want to look beyond your own horizons) doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

No I am not overdramatising. The ban on birth control IS the problem (or one of them), and those are its fruits. But you're obviously more worried about defending the church and rationalising its victims out of existence than about the wrongness of the issues.

For the record, I was picking up on the use of the evasive term "benign neglect", about which there is nothing benign. Re-read what I actually *wrote*. The birth control ban is still in place and therefore it has force and consequences. FACT.

That policy is hypocritical and damaging to many - their suffering is real, whether you choose to believe it or not. Your response is to just dismiss them as somehow not existing or find a rationale to omit them from consideration.

You're in denial. Selectively addressing only the aspects you want to, and ignoring the inconvenient rest.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 07:35 AM

" I have never heard a priest say anything against homosexuality from the pulpit." and why is that the case Joe?

When the pope has pronounced against the practice, in addition to the horrific health figures?

Could it be the huge over-representation of homosexuals in the priesthood?

I have also heard the Pope speak on the immorality of abortion as a last ditch means of birth control. Should the priesthood not be advising on the need to change our current sexual behaviour, start showing some responsibility for the "sacred" act of procreation?

If you wish to promote family values and responsible sexual behaviour, you need priests who actually know or CARE about the subject.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 07:43 AM

We are not all miserable sinners. Some of us are happy sinners!
It's the guilt. The church fosters a feeling of guilt, and atonement.
Even if you ignore the edict against contraception, you still feel guilty about doing it. So they have you in the guilt trap, then.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 08:39 AM

The Catholic Church policy against contraception has been in a stage of "benign neglect" for most of the time since Pope Paul VI prohibited "artificial birth control" in his Humanae Vitae encyclical in 1968. For the most part, the same goes for the policy against homosexual sex. In most parishes I know of, there are at least a few openly homosexual couples who are accepted and welcomed as members of the community - they don't go around broadcasting the details of their sex lives, but neither do heterosexual parishioners.

Well, Bonnie beat me to it. So, by "benign neglect" are you saying that every Catholic knows it is no longer a mortal sin to use contraception? Or are they all supposed to guess? All those people in Africa, where HIV/Aids is rampant because condoms are discouraged or not available? Have all those local bishops and priests been told about this benign neglect? Are you sure that most of them are not still preaching hellfire for birth control and safe sex? As for homosexuality and "benign neglect", my devoutly Catholic uncle led an absolutely miserable life because the Church's teachings against his homosexuality devoured him from inside. He died more than 20 years after the encyclical you refer to. Someone forgot to tell him that the Church's attitude had become "benign".

Yes, most of the allegations of wickedness in the Catholic Church are true, but the proportion of wickedness is about the same as it is anywhere else.

Then what is the point of it?

Yes, there were Catholic officials who assisted the Fascists during WWII..

So why are we talking about sainting one of the popes who connived in these actions? Why is there the continuing secrecy and cover-up of the Church's dirty financial dealings with Mussolini and the subsequent accumulation (effected equally shadily) of guilt wealth?

At least in the United States, there are now very strict procedures that attempt to eliminate the molestation of children in the Catholic Church.

So, after two thousand years of teaching that we should live by the principles laid down by Jesus, the organisation still needs this. Any idea what went wrong?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 08:47 AM

gnu, I haven't got any particular thoughts to offer you about the Vatican at the moment, but what I will say is that there are all kinds of different people who happen to be Catholics....or any other religion you might care to name...they don't necessarily fit the crude definitions other people (who don't know them) might automatically assign to them.

Here's a woman you might find very interesting:

Mary Karr

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: DMcG
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 09:02 AM

Yes, most of the allegations of wickedness in the Catholic Church are true, but the proportion of wickedness is about the same as it is anywhere else.

Then what is the point of it?

Compare and contrast with, for example, alcoholics anonymous or a self help group. An effort to achieve something and actually achieving it can be far apart and yet still worthwhile.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 09:22 AM

I am surprised that nobody on this thread has mentioned that distinguished RC novelist David Lodge's perceptive novel "How Far Can You Go?" (1980 - but not entirely outdated even now). Wiki it; & read it - it still seems to me [not a Catholic] to say many things, to judge from this thread, still extremely pertinent. Its theme is a group of Catholics and their relationship with their faith and its development from the 1950s - 80s; with many digressions from Lodge, an intelligent & perceptive Catholic layman. Lodge appeared to be a 'benign neglect' supporter. Of Humanae Vitae, and the reactions to it, he wrote, "With hindsight, it is clear that his best course would have been to procrastinate and equivocate indefinitely so that the ban on contraception was never explicitly disowned, but quietly allowed to lapse, like earlier papal anthemas against co-education, gaslighting and railways"; the idea which became "Benign neglect" SFAICS. But, as Bonnie and others point out, it doesn't seem to have taken universally enough ~ in Cal, fine; but rural Ireland?...

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 09:23 AM

LH
I believe we understand that perspective. But, while some of the faithful take offense when their church is criticised, I suspect they are not the target of the commentor "at issue".

At issue, I suspect is what is the RC church, the faithful,, who control their affairs, the local organization, the priests who link with the faithful, the bishops, who link between the priests and Rome, the Rome organization, or the pope.

Some practicing RC members put forward the notion that the RC church is the billion members, who determine their own actions. This does tend to "water down" many of the issues, does it not?


However, for most non RC s the church is much fewer, the organization starting with the pope and including a much smaller number who actually hold the power to make change (or not) within the organization.In many cases.

Joe O posts:
""But in a church with a billion members, hundreds of such cases are only a small percentage. In the county where I live, dozens of cases of child abuse are reported every year - but there is no record of a single case of child abuse by a priest in this county ever.""

My impression is you consistantly attempt to use this PR approach (which I have also seen in many RC-defence discussions). It reminds me of the type of double talk used by groups like the NRA, designed to confuse the actual issue, deflect issues, and brainwash the public. For the most part, it does not work and I suspect few here fall for it. So, why continue that approach?

Clear talk: Sexual abuse of youth by those working under the authority of the RC church "was and is" child abuse.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 09:23 AM

That is not the same thing. AA and similar groups are there for people with severe problems of addiction and so on. For people in difficulty. The Catholic church is supposed to be just that - catholic - all-encompassing, appealing to all Christians. Its teachings are supposedly based on those of Jesus. Those teachings emphasised goodness, kindness to neighbours, humility, the eschewing of excessive wealth, help for people in need and mutual respect. According to Joe's analysis, The world outside Catholicism, two thousand years after Jesus, is just about the same as within it. Therefore "what's the point of it?" seems a valid question to me.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: DMcG
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 09:40 AM

Yes, it is a valid question. The answer might not be straightforward, though. For example, AA increasing its membership is more likely to be an indication of success, not failure. Now, I agree the analogy is far from perfect and, as Joe said, there's plenty of failures in the Catholic Churches (of all sects), but to decide whether 'wickedness' has or has not been reduced in 2000 years in unanswserable, if only because the definitions are constantly changing (even within the RC church)

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 09:49 AM

I take that point entirely. I suppose that Joe would admit that the analysis was slightly loose and that I was nit-picking to take him up on it, yet I think it's still valid because there's a flip side: I think I mentioned some time ago about going to the funeral of a fiend who hadn't been near a church in decades (except, like a lot of us, for funerals and weddings), yet the preacher declared that his goodness was a direct product of his Christianity. There are many things that atheists do worse that believers (we're a bit rubbish when it comes to engendering community spirit, for example), but I'm not having it that the human race has to have religion in order to be good. So that sort of claim, the one about my friend, is very likely to blow back in religion's face when things go pear-shaped apropos of abuse. And deservedly so in my opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 09:50 AM

He absolutely wasn't a fiend! :-(

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: wysiwyg
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 09:57 AM

...why isn't the Cat'lic religion keeping up with "the times"...

Because one of its strongest beliefs is that the more things change the more they stay the same and the more important it is to remain faithful to (and apply) an ancient and designed-to-be-eternally- applicable "good"-- and to stand against it's being reinterpreted to fit temporary human ideas of its meaning.

The thought is that the faith is to be a bulwark IN those changing times, and to do that it must not be changed BY them. But since its stewards are mere humans, they (we) manage to frequently screw that up.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: John P
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 10:33 AM

Joe Offer: Somebody said churches shouldn't be involved in politics. I disagree. Should my powerful nun friend back down on her fierce defense of the homeless, just because she's a nun and religious people shouldn't do that? Should my boss the nun stop getting arrested for protesting against warfare and capital punishment? Must I quit my association with an interfaith group that is campaigning for more humane treatment of releasees from our county jail?

Joe, these things are very different than the Church spending millions of dollars to enshrine bigotry in our laws or preaching against specific politicians from the pulpit. They are different than the Church bitching about having to follow our employment laws until they win and don't have to offer legally mandated health services to their employees. If they don't want to follow our employment laws, they should staff their hospitals and other businesses completely with volunteers. There is a big difference between moral advocacy (which anyone can do, for religious reasons or not) and making church doctrine into laws (which no one but the church is going to do). One of the lines, for me, is whether or not they are engaging in politics (as in buying politicians and paying for public initiatives) in order to take away other peoples' freedom. Another is using their official authority to coerce their members into making laws that follow the Church's religious doctrine.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,999
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 10:52 AM

A problem seldom addressed is that of hammering the institution and not the individuals who commit crimes while under that institution's protective umbrella.

Cops commit crimes: breaches of their orders to protect and to serve, assaults, acceptance of payoffs, lies under oath, etc. When the individuals are found out, the institution of 'policedom' or 'law enforcement-dom' closes ranks to shield the individuals because it reflects badly on the departments, and conduct unbecoming (to greater or lesser extents) is swept under rugs to be seen or heard of no more. But it is remembered. We compound that injustice by then saying "Cops are bad" or "Law doesn't work", and despite the crass generalization, it begins to colour our perceptions of all cops, everywhere.

(Until about 1930, most if not all Protestant churches had birth control views very much like those of the Catholic church--read Rome/Vatican today. The Anglicans rethought the issue and soon after most if not all Protestant denominations did the same.)

The problem is that institutions compound the offences done by individuals by protecting them. We see this occur in the military, government, police forces, professions, and churches. Sloppy thinking got us into this mess. Further sloppy thinking won't get us out.

When the US Army had to deal with drug use in Vietnam combat units--war and recreational drugs do not go well together--it did. I think the process took about 15 years and finally it was more or less stamped out. No, not completely, but the magnitude of the problem in Vietnam which infected discipline and behaviours in the post-war army was lessened a great deal and a more effective army was the result. They gave out pink slips, options of court martial or resignation--in essence, dealt with the offenders and subsequently the problem. Had the military structure continued to 'allow' the problem to occur the military would have the same situation today that is being experienced by the Vatican and its role in denying that a problem exists. Either deal with it internally or eventually remarks such as those that surfaced after the Chicago police riots in 1968 will be accepted more readily: 'Too bad it takes 10,000 bad cops to ruin the reputation of one good cop' and it will have to be dealt with by institutions that dispense what serves as justice these days.

An ignorant population is much easier to fool, but today the internet makes what you ate for breakfast everybody's business. Organized religions have to clean up their act, and that means getting rid of bad priests, bishops, archbishops, cardinals, popes, foolish encyclicals and dirt within the organization. Until that happens, it will continue to be business as usual and SSDD.

(Just a few general thoughts not aimed at anyone in particular.)

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 11:13 AM

Joe... you said (late last night or early this morning Mudcat time):

"Somebody said churches shouldn't be involved in politics. I disagree." And the Constitution also disagrees.

Knowing you, and reading the rest of the paragraph, I understand what you are getting at - but I must take issue with the phrasing. I would say that it is perfectly fine, in theory,for religious people to involved in politics, but the logical extension of that is that any off-the-wall fundamentalist with the most extreme views can 'be involved'. Obviously, in the USA, that IS how it works. (Pat Robertson once ran for president.) What is not advisable is for them to do it in the name of their church. Is this nit-picking your statement? Perhaps- but I think it's an important concern.

The nun in Sacramento or your boss the nun.... or you.. who have valuable contributions to make to society, should not be constrained or ignored because they are known to be religious, but I always hope that their message and their goals will be couched in a manner that says "this is a good thing to do as humans", not simply because Jesus said so, or because the Bible has a verse about it.
I know this sounds a bit tediously pedantic, but far too many foolish ideas are promulgated when churches -as churches- become politically involved. There is of course no way to easily restrain the more extreme elements from using their church affiliation to affect political ends, but I'd hope that your 'boss the nun' doesn't pursue her goals in the name of the church, but only as a citizen who happens to be a nun.

( I think I need 12 more paragraphs to expand all that and include all the disclaimers and corollaries, but I'll spare you)

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 11:15 AM

(and I see 2 more responses in a similar vein while I was composing)

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 11:18 AM

An interesting perspective 999.

An additional thought, where wrong deeds are significant in number (and occur over time) in any organization, there are likely those who played some part in it that were promoted to high positions in that organization. Quite often, these individuals play a role in ensuring that the issues are not addressed in a manner that will reflect on them individually.

Is it logical to rule out a factor that some percentage of those people (those that offended, or enabled it to happen and continue) have not been promoted to high positions within the RC church? I would expect that the percentage would increase where the time period is significant and the turn over of staff is low (induviduals serve to old age). Regardless of the standing of the organization (cops, military, and even religious groups), it is not normal in human nature to desire to be found out and held to account.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,BrendanB
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 11:27 AM

John P, please correct me if I have misread your post but you seem to be equating involvement in politics with corruption. You are absolutely right to condemn the buying of influence, but one can engage with the democratic process in a perfectly legal and moral way. I would argue that, because religions are all about people, they have a duty to get involved in politics.
As regards the point of Catholicism I suppose the basic answer is that, as with other religions, people find a need for it. One could argue that such a need is rooted in self delusion, indoctrination or whatever but there are over a billion Catholics and I remain to be convinced that they are all in some way deluded.
The church has been around for a long time and I am not in a position to say whether the world is better or worse for its existence. I do know that most Catholics of my acquaintance make a positive contribution to their communities. I also know people who have no faith and make equally valuable contributions. I am not sure what one can draw from that. It could be argued that if all people lived their lives in genuine accord with gospel values and never offended against those values the world would be a much better place, but we are all fallible and that's never going to happen.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 12:14 PM

A problem seldom addressed is that of hammering the institution and not the individuals who commit crimes while under that institution's protective umbrella.

You've sort of answered your own question. It seems to me that, in the case of child abuse by priests and nuns, there is insufficient sanction imposed on both individuals and institution. If the activities are institutionally-entrenched (for example by hiding or protecting miscreants, or denying the existence of wrongdoing by the authorities), that will serve to perpetuate the wrongdoing. It will just carry on. Not enough wrongdoers, or people in authority, are being properly brought to book Just being allowed to quietly step down, or be moved to a distant parish, is woeful. There are priests around who have been moved in that way who, in any other walk of life, would be festering in jail. I heard the Scottish ex-cardinal described as "brave" by his colleagues. What they should have said that he was lying abuser who had serially misused his powerful position to exploit the vulnerable. Brave my arse. He got found out, decades after his offences, otherwise he'd be in Rome right now voting for a new pope. You can fondle little boys for decades and probably still get away with it. So this will go on and on. Surely there comes a point when a very large and influential body such as the Catholic church must be held to account in a major public enquiry. Internal corrections are proving to be not enough. There is institutional failure on a large scale. When this happened apropos of racism among police officers in London's Metropolitan Police, the organisation was required, under public scrutiny, to put its house in order. There has been good progress as a result (though we still have to go all the way). Until the Church is obliged to accept detailed public scrutiny of all its dealings, including financial, this problem will persist. There is too much secrecy and too much denial going on. You deny, deny and deny until you get found out. I can't think of anything more rotten than that in an organisation that claims to be teaching Jesus's message.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 12:54 PM

While I agree with the main thrust of your argument Steve I would point out that the Scottish Cardinal has not been accused of anything illegal. The complaints against him are of lewd and offensive behaviour towards priests. Reprehensible certainly, and who knows what may yet come to light, but recognising your forensic desire for accuracy I did not feel that we should overstate the case.
On the general question of individual/institutional responsibility I believe you are absolutely right, but we see institutions other than the Catholic church failing to answer for serious wrongdoing - recent scandals in the NHS for example.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 01:25 PM

Well, Guest (who are you?) I didn't want to overstate the case, not imply that he broke the law (though it's not inconceivable that he did, but let's not go there) it was the sheer long-standing dishonesty I was railing against in that instance, in contrast to the "bravery" his colleagues endowed him with.

Yes the NHS has a lot of questions to answer. There is a slight difference in that the problems are not necessarily all-pervading. They seem to be regional problems of culture arising from lousy management. That isn't to say that I want to defend or minimise in any way what goes on. There is still much fabulous work done by the NHS. Subjectively, I've endured a number of health issues in recent years and I have been dealt with unfailingly superbly by the NHS down yer in the Westcountry. I'd also point out that when things do go wrong in the NHS they are exposed and fully aired in public. You can't get away with the brand of constant hiding and denying that is, arguably, the most dismal aspect of the Catholic church at present.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 01:27 PM

Sorry, I appear to have not proofread that first paragraph. Shameful.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 01:29 PM

The child sex abuse scandal is not the only issue the RC chruch organization has to deal with. But, since it is significant, is not over and has not been dealt with properly with the organization, it will continue to publically brand (and dog) the RC church into the future.

Has the RC church organization clearly demonstrated that it have learned from their past mistakes? If no, here is advice for the next pope from one of the many abused:How the next pope can begin real change


Below are some examples (from the very many media reports) that indicate that many in the RC church still do not "get it" and continue down the path of denial, blaming the victims, using a variety of non-related situations to dillute the depth and impact of these crimes and "face up" to the true situation. These include approaches such as - blaming and demonizing the victims for the abuse, blaming the victims for profiting from the abuse (and resulting costs to parishes), making yourself seem the victim, claiming it meets some type of industry standard for child abuse, putting the blame on societies norms at the time, itself,claiming that it was in the past and recified, claiming it was already dealt with (when a few press statements/appologies does not make it so).   

The priest-abuser is the victim


Blame a permissive society

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 01:47 PM

That's right. That's why I say that the Church must be publicly held to account in all its dealings. If we must have organised religions let's at least have respectable ones. It's happened here with the tabloid press, the police in London, MPs' expenses and the NHS. All the dirty linen must be public.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Amos
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 01:54 PM

the Catholic Church has to get out of the business of compelling people to do stuff or not to do stuff.

Well there Joe, in his inimitable style of profound wisdom, has put it in a nutshell.

Spirituality--no matter what part of the forest it travels--cannot be compelled.



A

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 02:43 PM

That's for sure, Amos. My guess, going on the basis of a few individual Catholics I have known over the years, is that there are a good many Catholics who don't allow the church to compell them to do anything they don't want to...and who in any case still find something quite valuable in belonging to that faith.

One thing I object to in our secular governments is that they very often set about compelling their citizens to do stuff...or not do stuff...and I'm not talking about the normal civil crimes here (such as theft, murder, slander, arson, assault, etc). I'm talking about when governments muzzle free speech, muzzle the press and mass media, arrest people merely on suspicion of some form of disloyalty, incarcerate people without trial or legal representation, etc...

Our so-called democratic governments have frequently done things like this, most often in wartime (whether or not the war has been legally declared, which they seldom are these days).

No one should be compelled to act against his own conscience nor be punished for having an independent opinion...either by religions OR by secular authorities.

I'm a lot more worried about authoritarian and unconstitutional stuff like the Patriot Act and the NDAA and offshore war prisons like Guantanamo and legalized government torture than I am by the various wellknown misdeeds of the Catholic church. Yes, all that dirty linen (both secular political AND secular financial AND religious) needs to be made public...like Steve said (although he was referring only to the church)...and if it was, there'd be hell to pay.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,BrendanB
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 02:43 PM

Sorry, the last guest posting addressed to Steve Shaw was me, I forgot (again) that my cookie has vanished into that great biscuit tin in the sky.
BrendanB

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 03:14 PM

Spirituality is a personal matter. IMO, no more needs to be said.

Believers in a creator are all products of that creator, with none holding higher positions - though some may succeed in making folks believe they do. There are good salesmen in every aspect of life.

Some may choose to reach out to others for guidance, wisdom and assistance,and for social connections. Nontheless, spiritiality remains personal.

When it comes to organized religion, like with other human structures, some are put together well to represent and continue to represent its members and humanity. However, others are less well structured and take another, more self-serving direction.

Does "buyer beware" have a place in religious discussion?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 03:47 PM

"So, Jim, when did the earliest recorded case of non-clergy child abuse take place"
Not an issue, but a diversion.
The clerics who raped and physically assaulted (not forgetting the latest inquiry - used girls as slaves - I wonder if anybody heard the two ex Magdalene nuns on the radio this week describing their victims as prostitutes and scum of society and insisting they were doing a good job keeping the streets clean of such people, finishing their diatribe with "apologise - for what?") used the "fear of and respect for the collar" to rape children, they took advantage of their position.
Your reply is not unlike one given on another thread - that Israeli war crimes and massacres are excusable because there are worse such criminals elsewhere.   
Nowhere can I find here any reference to the role of the hierarchy from the Pope (Christ's vicar) down who lied and hid these crimes and passed the criminals on to continue ruining young lives - I take it you have heard of Brendan Smythe who blamed the 100 plus children he raped and said he was doing them a favour, or words to that effect.
We've had our arguments in the past but I really am surprised to find you a hard-line apologist for these crimes.
To defend them as you appear to be doing, with such flimsy and dishonest arguments..... oh dear!
The only good to have come from this sordid affair is that never again
will the church be trusted enough to be able to repeat these crimes. I'm left with the impression that many of you have not grasped yet the damage this has done to the church as well as the children whose lives they ruined.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Allan Conn
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 04:10 PM

"I would point out that the Scottish Cardinal has not been accused of anything illegal."

Do you know that for sure? It is not a police matter as such but we don't actually know what exactly he has been accused of and whether it would be or wouldn't be viewed as a crime. If though it was someone taking advantage of someone by sexual assault through his position of power then it would surely still be against the law even if the victims were male and over the age of consent and even if the matter hasn't been brought to the attention of the police? Though the main accusation against him is him being a hypocrite. He led the Catholic Church's assault against gay marriage in Scotland. A gay right's group gave him the title of Bigot Of The Year leading to the First Minister among others coming to his defence. He tried to deny consenting adults from formalising their relationships whilst he himself is accused of having a history of forcing his own sexual urges on unwilling young priests.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 04:32 PM

I do not believe that Joe was acting in any way as an apologist for the hideous behaviour of some clergy and religious - of which the Magdalen laundries were a particularly egregious example. I read his posting as a measured response to some previous postings which seemed to suggest that paedophilia was and is a peculiarly Catholic crime, which I do not believe it is. However, it has to be acknowledged that the abuse of their authority vested in them by the church makes their crimes particularly evil.
It is because of this that an increasing number of Catholics are calling for greater transparency and a severe simplification of the hierarchy in the church. It won't go as far as I want it to go, which is to sell the Vatican and all its treasures to various state owned museums (so that the art and treasures are publicly available) and use the money to support the poor and vulnerable. I am not even convinced that the Catholic church needs a pope, but then I'm a rubbish Catholic.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,BrendanB
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 04:34 PM

Dammit! I did it again! That last guest posting was me.
BrendanB

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,BrendanB
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 04:46 PM

Yes Allan, as things stand that is what we know. As I pointed out in the same post we cannot know what may may come to light in the future, you may believe he is guilty of criminal activity, but until evidence is produced he is entitled to the same presumption of innocence as anyone else - unless you feel that being a senior cleric in the Catholic church is a crime in itself? There are those who would have some sympathy with that view.

BrendanB

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: John P
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 05:16 PM

BrendanB: John P, please correct me if I have misread your post but you seem to be equating involvement in politics with corruption.

Involvement, no. Buying politicians and laws, yes. But that's hardly something that religions are any more guilty of than any other large and wealthy organization. A religious organization that officially tries to get laws passed that are based on their religious beliefs is, I think, acting unconstitutionally. The Catholic Church (and others) should lose their tax-exempt status for doing so. Spending lots of money and using "moral" authority to make laws that codify bigotry, ignorance, poverty, and death is evil. The Catholic Church officially engages in this type of evil.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,BrendanB
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 05:43 PM

I utterly condemn any attempt to suborn the democratic process, but I cannot condemn any organization that uses the democratic process in a legal way to advance its own interests, surely that is what democracy is about. We press our case, present it to the electorate and accept their decision. Is there evidence that would hold sway in a court of law that the Catholic church has overstepped the mark in this area? Where can I find it?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Allan Conn
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 05:53 PM

I'm just pointing out that someone not taking allegations to the police is not the same thing as there not having been a crime committed. I'm not saying he is guilty of an illegal act just that as we don't know what he's been accused of then we don't know if the accusations would amount to his breaking the law or not!

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 06:22 PM

As to tax exemptions for religeous grous:

""In an effort to stem massive debt accumulation, the Italian government made a historic change in 2013 tax code to boost revenue: the Roman Catholic Church will no longer be exempt from property taxes in Italy.""


Estimate- USA government loses $71.1 billion annually

USA Religious groups like tax exemptions - Are you surprised?

Religious groups say they operate ethically, no new laws needed

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 06:30 PM

Another perspective on religious group tax exemptions.

Church tax exemption-A USA Athest perspective

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,999
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 06:54 PM

I once lived in a city where there were churches on three of the corners and my place on the fourth corner. The tax people came to my door to collect tax money from me for the property. When I asked why the bill was so high I was told that because the other three corners were religious buildings used as places for people to pray and therefore they paid no tax, well, the money had to be made up somehow. I told one of the revenue agents to take his hand off my altar and the other to remove his hat in a house of worship then bid them goodbye.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 07:16 PM

Non-profit groups and charities have to file documents to qualify for a tax exemption in most countries. As far as I can determine, religious groups do not have to account for anything in most countries, regardless of the initiative - business or not , or how tyhe funds are used. That seems odd to me. (Anyone remember the lifestyle of Jim Bakker of the PTL - before he was found out, jailed for fraud, and IRS revoked the church's tax free status)?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 08:40 PM

Just as 90% of everyone in jail is innocent and gun owners insist they need guns, we wouldn't expect churches to circulate petitions demanding to be taxed, would we?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 13 - 09:52 PM

You know, as an avowed atheist who would be deliriously happy if there were no religion in this world, I am very concerned about what is going on in the Catholic church. This is nothing to do with the fact that I was brought up Catholic, still less to do with any sense of schadenfreude. Millions of people adhere to the Catholic faith, I'm all for anyone adhering to whatever they want to adhere to, and I think they deserve a better deal (incidentally, it's rather quaint of Catholicism to claim a billion members. I wouldn't mind betting that me, my mum, my sister and my brother are all counted in that lot even though we are all most decidedly not Catholics any more!). That's the point really. I don't really care that much if an individual bishop has been up to no good. And if a bunch of priests have been misbehaving, well any self-respecting setup would clamp down on it immediately, not shove it under the carpet. Sadly, in trying (by lies and denial) to demonstrate that it is above human imperfection, the Church has actually shown that it is just as "down there" in the morass as the bankers and the landlords and the union-bashers and the pimps and the traffickers and the money-launderers. Show me a virtuous Catholic church and I'll show you an organisation that we atheists would have severe difficulty knocking.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 12:26 AM

Well, as usual, I'm short of time on Sunday and Monday - but let me say this: I went to ten o'clock Sunday Mass at Galway Cathedral on Pentecost (May 27, 2012), just before I spent the afternoon with Martin Ryan.

I have to say, I was appalled by the Mass. There was no music, and there was no joy in the service. The church was about 1/3 full of people who mumbled their prayers, and the priest wasn't a whole lot better. I'd say that the sad state of that liturgy was probably a strong statement about the sad state of that congregation, and probably the sad state of the Diocese of Galway. No wonder people don't go to church in Ireland.

On my way back to my hotel, I went past St. Nicholas Collegiate Church (Church of Ireland/Anglican), and I could hear wonderful music as the 11 o'clock service was beginning. I went in and stayed almost an hour, and it was delightful. If I lived in Galway, I'd probably remain Catholic and do my damn best to liven up the cathedral congregation (I've been successful at that), but I'd also go to services at the Church of Ireland as often as I could (Martin Ryan says the canon at that church is unusual - and he's a folk musician). On the other hand, I visited several convents of the Sisters of Mercy in Ireland (I'm an associate member) - all of them were wonderful, and they fed us and fed us and fed us. That's not to deny the industrial schools and the participation of the nuns in the Magdalene Laundries, but those problems are gone now, and those cruel nuns are no longer alive or no longer in charge of young people.

And in my home parish in California, Sunday Mass is a lively, joyful celebration - with terrific music. That lively Mass enlivens the entire life of the congregation, and it's a joy to be there. I have a great time every Sunday morning, so good that I go to Mass twice every Sunday.

OK, so back to my idea of "benign neglect." It's how every organization operates. Policies that don't work are seldom rescinded, because that just stirs things up and gets the naysayers upset. What happens most of the time in most organizations, is that outdated policies are gradually forgotten, and might be rescinded after they've long passed from mind. No institution wants to be continually reminded that it has made bad decisions - better that those decisions just be forgotten, rather than fought about.

You know where I hear all the stuff about the Catholic Church sending people to hell for practicing birth control? It's from people who aren't Catholic. According to official Catholic teaching, no deed automatically sends a person to hell. I learned in third grade that it has to be a serious matter, done intentionally, and done knowing that it is seriously wrong. And if a person is later sorry for doing such a thing, it is forgiven - and that already-received divine forgiveness is formalized in the sacrament of reconciliation/penance/confession.

Now, all that is difficult to define in simplistic terms, so it often gets twisted. But in the Catholic Church, conscience reigns supreme. If you do the deed believing you're right, you're not guilty of sin.

Let me tell you why I think Catholic teachings on birth control and homosexuality are mostly in "benign neglect" - they're hardly ever talked about, and hardly ever written about. You'll find lots of recent Catholic documents on just treatment of workers and on the immorality of capital punishment and discrimination (against race, creed, color, sexual orientation, gender, and whatnot), and most warfare. You'll find a bit about homosexuality and even less about birth control in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (the compendium of official teaching), but really not much. Look what happened to Limbo - for fifty years, it was taught less and less, and then finally Benedict XVI said it was bad theology and that Limbo didn't exist. So, as a general principle, look at the amount written on an issue to see how important it is. You'll find that the various U.S. wars and the poverty widespread in the world, are far more important issues than homosexuality and birth control. Yes, there was a "fortnight of freedom" campaign waged by some bishops who opposed the Obamacare requirement that Catholic institutions provide contraceptives in employee insurance programs, but most American bishops didn't participate in the "fortnight" campaign.

As for child molestation - yes, it's still there and always will be there, but there are dramatically fewer occurrences. No bishop in his right mind nowadays, would defend a priest guilty of molesting a child - they got the message. In the United States, every diocese but Lincoln, Nebraska, adopted "no tolerance" policies regarding child molestation, and there is an extensive system of controls to ensure that priests other employees and volunteers do not molest children. These controls are not failsafe, and there will be offenses in the future; but the Catholic Church in the U.S. has made an extraordinary effort to enact preventive measures. Dioceses in other parts of the world are following suit. And Lincoln finally has a new bishop, and I expect that diocese will soon adopt a "no tolerance" policy.

Yes, bishops will still do their best to prevent bankruptcy and will be reluctant to pay million-dollar settlements, but denial of sexual abuse in the U.S. Catholic Church is now almost nonexistent.

No, the Catholic Church isn't perfect. In many places, particularly in Ireland, it's in really bad shape and need of reform. But when I go to church on Sunday, I know I'm in a good place. And still, I have fought all my life to right the many wrongs of the Catholic Church.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 12:51 AM

Jim Carroll, there's no question that Fr. Brendan Smyth was a horrible child molester, and nobody in the Irish Catholic Church will deny that nowadays. Let me remind you, however, that Smyth died in prison in 1997. I have no defense for what happened in the Catholic Church in Ireland fifteen years ago. It's all true.
Most of what I know about the Catholic Church in Ireland is through the Sisters of Mercy, since I'm an associate member of that order (which was founded in Dublin and has its headquarters there). I know that they had problems in the past, particularly in Ireland; but they're doing wonderful things now.

Jim, I know there's a lot of crap in the Catholic Church, and you have no idea how appalling that is to me. But this is my church, and I'm going to spend my life fighting the crap. I'm not ready to give my church over to those bastards.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Musket sans cookie
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 03:07 AM

Sorry Joe. I understand your point and wish you well in any crusade you may have in saving the good from the hands of the bad.

But they have the pointy hats white cloaks and red shoes. Not to mention the microphone when the media want a Catholic view on record.

Open question, and I sincerely would like to know this. Do you want to save your church from something it shouldn't be or turn it into something it isn't?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 04:12 AM

Guest
"paedophilia was and is a peculiarly Catholic crime,"
Nobody has ever suggested that , and it would be insane for anyone to do so.
The fact that others outside the Catholic church commit similar crimes, and worse is totally irrelevant, yet it has become a convenient bolt-hole for those who would defend the church by defending, minimising or totally ignoring it's crimes.
At the time these revelations were coming to light, many of those in the church dealing with the cases showed, at best, extreme scepticism, but often utter contempt for the victims and witnesses, often treating them as liars, and even participators in their own violation.
Last week's radio broadcast of two nuns (conveniently referred to as "Nun X" and "Nun Y") who showed without doubt that many the church officers still regard the things that they did were done "for the good" of their victims and for society in general.
This attitude appears to go through much church thinking like "Blackpool" goes through rock.
The Vatican still refuses access to documents essential to giving the survivors of these crimes closure and to making sure that these events are never repeated; it does so by claiming church confidentiality or even State immunity.
Transfer this stance to schools or hospitals or youth clubs or scouting organisations, or anywhere where adults are given access to vulnerable children and young adults, and tell us that you would find it acceptable.
I have no religion, though many of my family have, yet I owe the church a great debt of gratitude.
They excommunicated my father, a devout practicing Catholic and talented Collegian in Liverpool's S.F.X College, for fighting in the wrong war in the 1930's (Spain). Thanks to this act of great charity (my father didn't think so at the time) my sisters and I never grew up under the influence of any religion and were able to come to our own conclusions about our lives and responsibilities.
My chosen home now is the West of Ireland, where my wife and I spent many hundreds of happy and fruitful hours learning about traditional music song and culture from wonderful, kind, gentle and welcoming old people whose generosity still makes me catch my breath - all of these, without exception, were practicing and in some cases devout Catholics.
I have no axe to grind with religion, but I do with a church that betrayed and still betrays the massive and unquestioning trust that was placed in its hands.
Afterthought - there is a likelihood that some of those presently electing a new pope will have been among those who, if not actively, certainly passively, a part of these awful events and their cover-up - the retired pope certainly was.
Joe;
"you have no idea how appalling that is to me"
And you appear to have no idea how deeply these arguments upset me.
I've never met you (nearly did once) but I've come to respect you and like you from afar via this forum.
I have no doubt that you find these events distressing, but I'm afraid I don't believe that the best way to deal with them is by reducing them to one, two, or even hundreds of abusive priests, or that to point at the crimes of others is any way to put right the massive wrongs that have been inflicted on faithful followers, down the ages, as it turns out.
Best wishes,
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 04:21 AM

Joe, the reason folks don't go to church in Ireland is not because of the quality of the masses. You're missing the point. It's because the Church is out of touch with the daily lives and needs of its people. And that's because they have paid too much attention to running their own agenda and not enough to the realities and problems their followers have to live through and grapple with.

Their authority and wealth have protected them so much that they have not had to listen to anyone outside their own power base, thus they can't see from any perspective but their own highly insulated one. But life ain't like that for most of us. Hence the growing disconnect. (Someone above made the excellent point that having the internet means everyone can now communicate freely and in secret - and that's something they can't control. But the internet is only a medium. It would not cause problems if there were nothing to tell.) In the words of Don McLean:

They would not listen, they did not know how
Perhaps they'll listen now


> Let me tell you why I think Catholic teachings on birth control and homosexuality are mostly in "benign neglect" - they're hardly ever talked about, and hardly ever written about.

"Hardly ever talked about and hardly ever written about" is another way of saying they're shoved under the carpet. The. Ban. Is. Still. There. Can't you see how hypocritical that is?

If the fiat against contraception has not been explicitly revoked, then it's still a policy of the Church. Are followers supposed to decide which instructions to abide by and which they may break? If so, either the Church's directives are not binding but subject to individual choice (in which case, why make them?) or the powers that be are decreeing one thing but countenancing another, while looking in the opposite direction so they can claim "we didn't know". (Where have I heard that line before?) How is this approach not hypocritical, cowardly, and self-serving?

If the invisible subtext is that it's OK to break certain rules, how can one trust or respect ANY of them, if some are not meant to be upheld?

If the Church is going to impose external controls on human behaviour (or try to), they must say what they mean and mean what they say. Not pay lip-service while turning their eyes away. But it will require honesty and courage.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 04:57 AM

Agreed, Bonnie. The dismal Mass I attended in Galway was a symptom of the disease, not the disease itself.
But it sure made me think the Catholic Church in Ireland is very sick.

The Sisters of Mercy convents we visited in Ireland were wonderful, though. It seems they have dealt with their ills and moved to the right track.

I typed up a long response to your "pick and choose" remark, but it got lost. Let me remind you that according to traditional Catholic teaching, the conscience has primacy. Neoconservative Catholics take a far more legalistic view of their faith, but that's nonsense to me. Take what I said about "benign neglect" and apply it to other organizations you know. Isn't it the truth? Why shouldn't it also be true for churches?

Obedience to authority has no part in my religious faith. To me, authority in the church is meant to serve the people. Vatican II agrees with me.

Jim, nobody minimizes the crimes of child molestation in the Catholic Church any more - not even in Ireland or Rome. It's taken very seriously. Still, large portions of the church were not directly affected by the molestation, which was committed by some five percent of priests. To attempt to gain some sort of understanding of proportion, is not to minimalize the problem. It's just an attempt to get a realistic view. Even if the number were ten percent, that still leaves a huge percentage of priests who were not criminals.

And yes, one might expect a nun who worked in a Magdelene Laundry to rationalize what happened there. That's human nature. But the rest of us know what went on, and abhor it.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: mg
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 05:36 AM

this time between popes has been lovely. Some truth has emerged. More has been suppressed but people are not happy with that. I am surprised at how cynical so many of us are that there will be a fair election, that it won't be decided in advance, that these are honest and fair men..many undoubtedly are but who knows. You have a cardinal who mentions any reform about women or celibacy or whatever...slapped down. Yet one has gone on record somewhat supporting the kill the gays legislation in Uganda. Another has made bishops in us read nasty homophobic letters to us and tried to interfere with american elections..no slapdowns...supposedly there is more to come out of vatileaks if certain cardinals should be elected. why would a retiring pope with his dossier about scandals in the vatican not allow it to be read by all the voting cardinals? Surely you want to know who is mentionedin it.

We have two or a few days to get everything we can out in the open. Name names, good and bad. they are googling.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 05:57 AM

> Take what I said about "benign neglect" and apply it to other organizations you know. Isn't it the truth? Why shouldn't it also be true for churches?

No, it is *not* the truth. When secular bodies try it, we have rights and votes and unions and avenues of protest to deal with it. And it "should" not be true for any of them.

"Benign neglect" of an outdated and restrictive ruling - especially such a powerful one - should not be tolerated in *any* institution. If an organisation - the Church, the government, big corporations, whoever - make a ruling of the sort of magnitude and control that the contraception ban has, then it needs to be accurate and up to date, or else CHANGED to reflect the current situation, or else abolished outright.

To leave a repressive law in force allows too much opportunity for inconsistency and corruption. 'Scuse the shouting but:

IF A BODY IS GOING TO WIELD POWER, AND BENEFIT/PROFIT FROM THAT POWER, THEY NEED TO BE RESPONSIBLE AND HONEST ABOUT HOW THEY ADMINISTER IT.

The minute it's open to "interpretation" IT CAN BE MISUSED. It's not good enough just to put a rule in force - especially one as important as birth control - and then ignore it when it suits you. It's hypocrisy. And it's corruptible.

Why do you believe it's so acceptable to leave the ban as it stands and just benignly Neglect it? Why do you not think it should be rescinded? The only thing I get from you is that turning a blind eye is somehow OK. For the life of me, I can't understand why you're making excuses for this untenable and obsolete ban.

Which is what you're doing when you advocate leaving it in force, either overtly or covertly (i.e. benign neglect).

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Wolfhound person
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 06:10 AM

The only good Humanae Vitae did was to put explanations of contraception in the papers where it could be read by young people, particularly girls, to whom the information was not otherwise readily available at the time. I know, I was there.

H V was publicised and talked of as a ban, though, as far as the laity were concerned (in England) and no bloke understands (or ever could) the psychological damage done to a relationship by the perpetual fear of pregnancy in trying to adhere to it. Even when the calculations were possible it worked out as "if you want to, you can't" - to put it crudely.

Bonnie is right: the ban is still there and is presented as such.

Abortion was not a solution / available: it was presented, in any case, as an unforgivable sin which needed clearance from a bishop to get absolution from.
Abstinence was the only option, and that, for the majority of normal healthy human beings (I generalise!!) is no way to conduct a married relationship. The results could be disastrous, and echo down the years over several generations, I suspect.

Paws

PS The New Testament should start: "there was this ordinary bloke, who had some really good ideas - see what you think".

Personally I blame Constantine. Once it became a state religion, the party was over.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 06:16 AM

PS to my above rant: The Church leaders may benignly neglect the contraceptive ban, but many, many of their followers feel that as long as it's in force, they cannot. Whatever the party line in Rome is, it still wields a lot of power outside the hallowed precinct. Trust me on that. That's why their stance is so pernicious.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 06:52 AM

Rather than look at the priests, let's look at the victims. If 5 to 10 % ofpriests abused 5 to 10 children a year over a career of 30 years, globally, that would be a huge number of children sexualy abused.

Below is a link to a related calculator:Molesting calculator

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 07:14 AM

From today's newspaper:
A survey has found that over 50% of primary school teachers in Ireland do not want to teach religion - speaks for itself
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: John P
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 08:04 AM

Joe, if the church leaders are benignly neglecting the ban on birth control, then why are they refusing to cover birth control in their health insurance policies for their employees? I don't care even a little bit about what they actually believe, I don't care what their adherents do and don't do. I only care about it when they try to impose their religion on other people. Refusing to comply with our employment laws is forcing their religion on their employees. Or having a religious test in order to become employed, take your pick. They may be practicing benign neglect in the day to day lives of their flock, but they are NOT doing so when it comes to making (or breaking) our laws. So -- no, they don't get a pass on this. They are acting in unconstitutional and unethical ways.

It's really kind of dumb -- they are asking the rest of us to enforce a policy that they can't even get their membership to go along with.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 08:28 AM

A survey has found that over 50% of primary school teachers in Ireland do not want to teach religion - speaks for itself

Certainly when bearing in mind 92% of National (primary) schools in the country are owned and run by the RC church.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: BrendanB
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 09:18 AM

John P, your point about Catholic employers and employee health insurance is very interesting. It is, I think, a particularly American problem as in the UK the NHS obviates the need for such insurance.
You say that Catholic employers are refusing to comply with employment law, have they been challenged in the courts regarding this? As for passing a religious test (unless the job specifically requires a significant grasp of religion) that sounds rather like Sharia law.
I did a course on religion with the OU a couple of years ago. The tutor was very good, and an atheist. Makes you think.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 09:32 AM

I am absolutely with Bonnie on this point of benign neglect. Millions of Catholics the world over are taught in school various tenets of the faith, as interpreted (perhaps not always very well) by teachers and priests. How, after that, are they supposed to keep up with the kind of slow drift from one way of thinking to another? I am 61 now and I'm sure that much of what I was taught about the faith over my 13 years in Catholic schools is not taught any more, but the point is I'm going to stick with it unless someone tells me explicitly that things have changed (or unless I become an atheist, of course ;-) ) No priest from the pulpit is ever going to tell his flock that that can now ease up on stuff they've always thought are mortal sins. For the record, here's some stuff I was told:

I must not receive communion if I have a mortal sin on my soul (we were given a fair old sin list at one time, venial with one star, mortal with two stars).

Masturbation is a mortal sin, as is thinking about girls in an impure way (always deliciously imprecise, that one). We were even told that we should look away and pray to Our Lady whilst washing our genitals.

The only acceptable form of contraception is the rhythm method. Even coitus interruptus is not acceptable. Sexual intercourse is solely intended for procreation.

An unbaptised baby can never enter heaven, no matter how tragic the circumstances.

Catholics are the only people who go to heaven.

Homosexuality and abortion are such abominations that we don't even talk about them. There is no need.

OK, now I know that you'll tell me how outmoded all that lot is. But who, once I've left school, is ever going to tell me it's outmoded? Well, no-one - and I regard myself as one of the more savvy members of the human race! So I wonder about all those women in Africa and central America where the Church has an iron grip, and I wonder whether the benign neglectors really know what the local clergy are teaching. So we are expected to glean these gradual relaxations in thinking all by ourselves. I contend that that is actually immoral. You are setting up a situation in which some get it but millions won't. And the millions who won't are exactly the people who most need to get it. Well done, Church, for promoting poverty, disease, terrible rates of abortion and ignorance in developing nations.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Wolfhound person
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 09:56 AM

More or less the sanme age in this household, and that list of yours sounds awfully familiar, Steve.

The state of mind is still there, even if the day to day application of those (?) guidelines has eased up.

Paws

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 10:44 AM

It appears that the Catholic hierarchy is fascistic with the laity and followers at odds with the governance. If it is to survive, it will have to change. Priests and nuns will have to be allowed to marry, women will have to become priests and outmoded sexual instruction such as the ridiculous "rhythm system" be cast aside, not to mention the odious shielding of sex offenders in the clergy.

Aside from that, I don't care about this issue as I am a non-believer.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 11:28 AM

Agree with Steve Shaw below. It's great that educated and relatively affluent Westerners are liberated enough to cherry pick the bits of religious dogma which personally suit their way of life, but far more unfortunate that it is not the case for the majority of Catholics in places where there is little money or education to offer them the luxury of doing the same.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 02:04 PM

Even among the more privileged nations, how many people are aware that the ban is being Neglected, or that they get to choose, or follow their conscience, or however it's phrased? This is the first I've heard of it (though I'm not up on the latest rulings so that doesn't mean much).

But is it generally known about? The powerful within the Vatican agreeing among themselves to turn a blind eye, but keeping this fact quiet, is rather like harbouring secrets from their flock. I honestly don't know how widespread this knowledge is, or how that sort of thing works, so it's a genuine question.

I haven't heard of it here (one of the larger Irish cities) but as it doesn't affect me personally, it's not on my immediate radar screen. So what's the story with announcing it? Or don't they?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 02:45 PM

It is just plain wrong to terrify people and then expect them to figure out you were just whoofing them. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 05:27 PM

. . . Mother Teresa, one of the wickedest people who ever lived.

I know this is a VERY late response, Steve, but I'm a newcomer to this thread, and I wanted to read the whole thing lest I repeat what someone else has said.

But they haven't, so I'll ask: What in the world would make you say a thing like that?

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: ollaimh
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 07:02 PM

well i there mythological way the cathars got it right. the catholci church is worshipping satan, and thats why they hide mazis from justice for decades--in france, let child rapists move arounf untill the world almost lunches them, trades in the most vile banking pratices and attacks the adult survivors of priestly rape, and helped(with several other church) with the genocidal residential schools, where native children were subjected to illegal medical experiements, starved, deprived normal medical care, with a pre 1908 death rate over fifty percent-- a real slaughter of the inno0cents.

i don't by the way believe in mythological views but the cathars didn't have another way to see the world. catholci leaders even on mudcat come from american military intelligence, with complete acceptance of hiding nazis to this day.

i'm jusy hitting the high lights, but is there evil not done by these monsters, who have betrayed every trust put in them by the faithfull?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 07:17 PM

So, Steve Shaw, you got 13 years of Catholic education. That would take you to the age of 19 or 20, right?
And you're 61 now, right?

Can you seriously say that your Catholic education that ended 40 years ago, must suffice for the present time? What's wrong with getting an update, so you understand things in an adult context?

Now, if you were taught 40 years ago that masturbation, in and of itself, was a mortal sin, that was incorrect and a gross oversimplification. Some teachers taught that way, and it was wrong. The Baltimore Catechism (and other national catechisms of the 1950s and earlier) taught that for a sin to be serious, it had to be a serious matter, known to be serious, and done with the intent of doing serious wrong. Almost all the statements you made of what you learned in the 1960s, were incorrect theology in the 1950s. Maybe you were taught wrong, or maybe you understood wrong.

Bonnie, for your reference, here's a link to Humanae Vitae, the document that prohibited birth control - (click). Again, while it's on the books, it's really not talked about all that much. And neither is homosexuality. Therefore, it seems to me that it is not what I would call a central teaching, the core part of the Catholic faith. Abortion is another matter, since it is seen as taking a life, but neither birth control nor homosexuality have that level of importance in Catholic teaching.

Nonetheless, I'd like to see the restriction against birth control taken off the books. I just don't believe it has as much impact as you claim it has. I think that large families are a cultural thing, far more than being a matter of church law.

John P, the Catholic bishops are expressing their right as U.S. citizens to object to legislation that affects them. The law hasn't taken effect yet, and the bishops are still fighting it - as is their right. Many bishops seem inclined to accept the latest compromise offered by the Obama Administration.

Jim Carroll quotes me:

Joe;
(Joe Said) "you have no idea how appalling that is to me"
(Jim says) And you appear to have no idea how deeply these arguments upset me.

What's upsetting, Jim? That I acknowledge that child molestation was and is a serious problem, but also state the reality that most of the offense happened long ago and have been dealt with in a different way in recent years? That I ask for proportionality, acknowledging that the vast majority of Catholics did not commit or condone child molestation?
I abhor murder, and yet it happens in my society all the time. I support laws and procedures meant to prevent murder - but I do not support capital punishment. Some people have told me sincerely that since I do not support capital punishment, I am a horrible person and I am advocating crime. Is that true?


-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 07:33 PM

I can guarantee you 99% of what we were taught in high school was birth control was bad. Very little else. Almost no mention of homosexuality, and frankly anything I have heard about it did not suggest it was worse than heterosexuality, because how could it be? Everything was wicked wicked wicked. That is I think the main reason child abuse spread..the shame of being with a woman.

And I do not buy for a minute that large families in the past were cultural as much as forced. All those tragic stories about the mother being pregnant through declining health..probably fending off the father, who either suffered in silence, perhaps drank, and in extrmee cases, took an unnatural interest in daughters. Sons in meantime sympathized often with mother, developed a mother worship, and guess who became priests in some cases. There was so much poverty in these large families..so few resources. Some would have had large families anyway, and some women were built for it and had adequate resources, but many did not. Our questions in high school religion classes were always..but what if I have 12 kids and the doctor says the next one will kill me and I will leave 12 orphans behind..couldn't I then use birth control. The answer was always always no. And not said nicely either..at least they could have shown some sympathy toward the poor women..some of whom were our own mothers and ourselves projecting into the future..and the men were worked literally to death supporting these huge families. I do not buy what you are saying.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 08:06 PM

Now, if you were taught 40 years ago that masturbation, in and of itself, was a mortal sin, that was incorrect and a gross oversimplification. Some teachers taught that way, and it was wrong. The Baltimore Catechism (and other national catechisms of the 1950s and earlier) taught that for a sin to be serious, it had to be a serious matter, known to be serious, and done with the intent of doing serious wrong. Almost all the statements you made of what you learned in the 1960s, were incorrect theology in the 1950s. Maybe you were taught wrong, or maybe you understood wrong.

I was taught by the Salesian Fathers and Brothers at an all-boys grammar school in Bolton, Lancashire, from 1962 to 1969 (by which time I was 18). To name-drop, I went to both the primary and secondary school that Danny Boyle attended, though he was about five years below me (I wonder whether I ever bullied him on the school bus...). I'm a pretty honest broker, Joe. I don't make stuff up, and I was one of the brightest in a bloody bright year. I certainly didn't understand wrong. That's what those guys were like. It sort of confirms in a way, possibly, what I was saying about the Vatican officialdom not knowing what the ground troops are actually propagating to their flocks.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 08:15 PM

. . Mother Teresa, one of the wickedest people who ever lived.

I know this is a VERY late response, Steve, but I'm a newcomer to this thread, and I wanted to read the whole thing lest I repeat what someone else has said.

But they haven't, so I'll ask: What in the world would make you say a thing like that?

Dave Oesterreich

I know it sounds a shocking thing to say, Dave, but I've rattled on about it in other threads. I think I posted both the following bits on mudcat, but I could be wrong. There's some overlap 'twixt the two posts for which I apologise but I'm way too knackered to edit them into one sensible post, so here goes.

Mother Teresa taught that suffering and poverty were Godly virtues, not injustices to be opposed. Conditions in her orphanages and her Homes for the Dying were dreadful. There was gross neglect, physical abuse and the espousing of wacky (to say the least) "medical" practices that often left sick people in unnecessary agony, denying them even basic painkiller relief, with the claim that suffering brought people closer to Jesus. She denied medical training to the nuns working in her homes, claiming instead that God would empower the ignorant and weak. She forbade her sisters to read newspapers and secular literature. Her financial dealings were dodgy to say the least and she received donations from exceptionally shady sources. For example, she accepted donations from Papa Doc and praised him. She diverted donations away from needy people in favour of new convents and missionary work. She capriciously refused help to sick people who didn't exactly comply with her arbitrary qualifying criteria. All in all, an evil bastard if ever there was one. No doubt she'll soon be sainted by the Catholic church.



Mother Teresa was the very opposite of ignorant. It would be more accurate to say that she promoted ignorance. She knew exactly what she was doing when she accepted the adulation (and money) of dictators and fraudsters. She ran horrid institutions that were unhygienic, staffed by unqualified people and filled with neglect and unnecessary suffering and shabby medical practice, whilst at the same time channelling huge money into opening new convents and promoting missionary work. She claimed that abortion was the biggest threat to world peace and she condemned all notions of family planning and contraception, a great way of keeping millions of women in poverty. Her constant message was that the poor were good for the world and that poverty was good for the poor and that they should never fight it. Instead of encouraging the people of Bhopal to fight for justice, she instructed the stricken families to simply forgive Union Carbide. Not at all ignorant, but the deliberate arch-promoter of ignorance. Mother Teresa was the extreme fundamentalist arm of The Vatican and she was supreme when it came to doing the Pope's dirty work.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 08:28 PM

> I just don't believe [the birth control ban] has as much impact as you claim it has.

No, of course you don't. Not believing something is a whole lot easier than facing facts.


So is telling yourself what you want to hear.

> I think that large families are a cultural thing, far more than being a matter of church law.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jack Campin
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 08:45 PM

here's a link to Humanae Vitae, the document that prohibited birth control - (click). Again, while it's on the books, it's really not talked about all that much. And neither is homosexuality. Therefore, it seems to me that it is not what I would call a central teaching, the core part of the Catholic faith.

That's not how Keith "Bigot of the Year" O'Brien saw it:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/9121424/We-cannot-afford-to-indulge-this-madness.html

Keith O'Brien has more on his conscience than simply abusing his authority to pressure young men into having sex with him. Here he was doing an Irish-style coverup of a child abuser:

http://www.scotsman.com/the-scotsman/scotland/cardinal-o-brien-blackmail-threat-to-abuse-victim-1-2820121

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 11 Mar 13 - 10:44 PM

Yeah, Jack, I gotta agree with you. I was surprised that the Catholic bishops would get their hackles up over gay marriages. It's not like they're being required to perform gay marriages in church, is it? I was also surprised that the U.S. bishops made such a stink about contraceptives being covered by health insurance, since nobody was being forced to practice birth control.

I have a theory on that. There has been a rebirth of conservatism in the Catholic Church in recent years, and conservatives are feeling their oats. They are making issues out of matters that have long been forgotten - and they're having some success at it, since the rules were on the books. They start with little things like the wording of songs, and then move to bigger issues.

And their success does have me worried. We need another John XXIII to be elected this week, and we need him bad.

---

So, Bonnie, about this birth control ruling and its effect. I can count.

When I was a kid in Wisconsin, there were three large families in our Catholic school - the Vanderhoofs (17 kids - seemed every parish had one like that), the Kivlins (6 kids), and the Offers (5 kids). All the other families in the parish were smaller. The Vandehoofs seemed to get along quite well, and certainly didn't seem to be suffering. The Kivlins and the Offers were well off, and both seemed to be quite happy families. The Offers had 8 grandchildren, so you can see the next generation had smaller families. Don't know about the Vanderhoofs and the Kivlins. But note that all the other families in the Catholic school were smaller - mostly three or four childrens - in the late 1950s.

In my current parish in California, there are a couple of families with six kids, and they are very conservative. There are two other large families, but their children are mostly adopted.

Yes, here and there you see a suffering, unhappy Catholic woman with more kids than she can handle - and oftentimes, it seems the husband doesn't go to church with her and she's stuck taking care of all the kids. Whether those kids are a result of Humanae Vitae or not, is another question.

Polls show that in the U.S., 98% of Catholics ignore the prohibition against birth control. That about fits with my experience.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: mg
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 12:32 AM

we didn't consider 6 to be large families..had several of that or more on my block. large seemed to start at 7 or 8 and went up to 21.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 02:19 AM

MG, I think you're exaggerating. And whatever the case, it sure doesn't happen in Catholic families nowaways.

Steve Shaw, I acknowledge that there have been Catholic institutions like the one you describe and entire Catholic dioceses that have been oppressive. Even in the more balanced dioceses, there are oppressive regimes in certain parishes - but I wonder why anybody bothers to take part in such travesties when there are alternatives available.

In general, the negative comments in this thread seem to me to describe the extreme, not the usual Catholic experience. I don't deny the existence of the extremes people describe. But I have a broad spectrum of experience in the Catholic Church, both in the U.S. and internationally - and what people describe in this thread is not the reality I have experienced. It's far from perfect, but it's certainly not anywhere near as bad as what's described in so many messages here.

As far as I can tell from this thread, there is only one practicing Catholic among the persons who have made negative comments in this thread about the Catholic Church. That's mg, and her perspective is different from that of any participating Catholic I've known in this day and age. What she talks of, seems to be another era.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Musket sans cookie
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 03:48 AM

You can have different eras Joe. You can have different geography too.

The Catholic culture a couple of hundred miles North of me in Scotland or to the west in Ireland is a much greater distance than between your childhood and your present.

Yet Scotland and Ireland are far more sectarian than where I came from and Catholics were and still are never branded as such. Branded as supporters of a football team or whether they drink in pubs or working mens clubs, ,branded by occupation or hair colour but never really by religion.

Perhaps that is why I remain bemused by religious leaders pontificating and adherents apologising for them.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 04:10 AM

Joe's of 10:44 last night affords a prime example of how some Americans, even ones as intelligent as Joe, think that Wisconsin is The World and the US is The Universe, and extrapolate their arguments on that basis. The comparative "then'n'now" birth-rates among RC populations of Wisconsin & California, benignly neglectful as they may be of some aspects of the Church's official teaching, are really not relevant to the worldwide {& esp the Catholic 3rd World} picture, Joe.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 04:47 AM

"What's upsetting, Jim? "
Your latest response to the crimes of the church, which you have reduced to a "handful of bad apples" and "happened long ago" - will do for a start.
Nowhere to you acknowledge or, as far as I can see, even refer to the guilt of the Church as a whole in this affair.
Don't you find it at all important that the leadership of the world's most powerful religious body colluded in perpetuating the widespread, probably worldwide sexual abuse of children under its influence and often in its care?
Is it of no concern to you that the church - right up to the Vatican - fought tooth and nail to keep these offences hidden for as long as they could, hiding and denying access to evidence - still very much a feature of all this?
Doesn't it outrage you to learn that the retired pope lied about his knowledge of these scandals?
Is the involvement of the church as a body, from top to bottom not even worth a mention?
That the surviving victims of these crimes had to demand, often to the point of humiliating themselves, to have their cases aired, never mind acknowledged and dealt with, is bad enough. That any church member should write it off as "a few bad apples a long time ago" after the church leadership has offered little more than lip-service expressions of sympathy is what I find most offensive.
These go far beyond crimes of the individual - they are offences committed against the faithful by a church that still remains uncaring and unrepentant beyond the effect that it has on its own well-being.
They bring into question the role of the church its responsibility to its followers and its role in the world.
It has shown it cannot be trusted - if I were a Catholic, it is that fact that would be uppermost in my mind.
What upsets me personally is that it is somebody I have grown to respect and like who is supporting this by reducing its importance to a few criminals a long time ago.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 04:48 AM

> Polls show that in the U.S. 98% of Catholics ignore the prohibition against birth control.

Oh well, that's all right then. As long as it's OK where you are. And of course "polls" include absolutely every single Catholic out there.


When I was a kid in Wisconsin, there were three large families in our Catholic school

THREE WHOLE FAMILIES in the local school. Well, that proves the case. If "it doesn't happen in Catholic families nowadays" - i.e. those within your eyesight - then of course it doesn't happen anywhere.


Joe, you haven't a clue about what goes on beyond your back door. None. It doesn't even seem to concern you. You don't realise what a massive insult that is to the rest of the world. No wonder Americans get accused of insularity and ignorance. [I've just refreshed the thread and seen MGM's post. He's right, Joe. Living abroad does give you a whole other perspective.]

You've also managed to dismiss the views of non-practicing Catholics, though they're as relevant and valid as your own. There will be *reasons* why those people no longer practice their faith. But they're inconvenient. Easier not to look at them. Practicing Catholics are of course free to jump into this conversation. It's not like they've been barred from joining in.

Exclude, rationalise away, deny, accuse anyone you disagree with of exaggeration. "It's not the usual experience" / "it doesn't happen any more" / "it's only a handful".

Classic techniques for protecting yourself from ugly realities.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 04:59 AM

> What upsets me personally is that it is somebody I have grown to respect and like is supporting this by reducing its importance to a few criminals a long time ago.

Yeah. That upsets me too. Because I too both like and respect you, Joe. A lot. In so many ways you represent the best of Christian ideals. (And yes, I do know priests about whom I can say the same.) That's why this willful blindness is so disturbing.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 05:01 AM

Some time ago a woman in Ireland died because she was refused a termination to her pregnancy; she was told by hospital staff "this is a Catholic country".
In July, after nationwide pressure, the Government will present proposals of changes to the law regarding terminations in certain circumstances.
Pro-life (sic) organisations are on the streets in their thousands and will circulate leaflets by post to every household in Ireland demanding that things should remain as they are.
God moves in a mysterious way - doesn't he just?
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 05:17 AM

The pregnancy had already terminated *itself*. That fetus' heart had stopped three days before and it was DEAD. So it was no longer really an abortion.

A similar thing happened to my mother when I was very small. What would have been a very-much-wanted child (as was the case with Savita Halappanavar) died. So, nearly, did my mother, of the same internal poisoning. When the baby-to-be is already deceased, it really does move the goal posts.

Fortunately for my mother (and me), the hospital acted on medical principles rather than personal beliefs.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 05:21 AM

To be accurate, there was a foetal heartbeat.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 05:32 AM

No, that stopped on the Wednesday. It took her until the following Sunday to die.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 05:40 AM

I was going by Guardian, 17th November.
"The 31-year-old dentist died of blood poisoning on 27 October (Tuesday)in University Hospital Galway despite asking repeatedly to terminate her 17-week-long pregnancy. Staff refused to carry out an abortion because her husband said they had detected a foetal heartbeat even though the couple were told the baby would not survive."

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 05:53 AM

""As far as I can tell from this thread, there is only one practicing Catholic among the persons who have made negative comments in this thread about the Catholic Church""

Giood try Joe. But, that is an old and "tired" technique to minimize the opinion of others in a discussion, that is oft' used by politician, and PR types.

That minimizes the direct personal experience of those who were abused inside the RC church noted here by mudcat posters in one form or another. Minimizing and demononizing the suffering of those victims (most often the impact follows them through their life, which is now, not long ago) seems commonplace among some in the RC church.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 05:53 AM

I was going by the BBC:

The baby's heartbeat stopped on the Wednesday. "I got a call on Wednesday night that Savita's heart rate had really gone up and that they had moved her to ICU," Mr Halappanavar said. "Things just kept on getting worse and on Friday they told me that she was critically ill." Some of Savita's organs stopped functioning and she died on Sunday 28 October.

So it depends on *when* the heart was beating, which initially it was. The hospital used that as their reason for refusing, though why they continued to refuse isn't clear. All they would speak about was the heartbeat, but they didn't mention anything about the time-frame.

I just Wiki'd it, and it sez:

The death of Savita Halappanavar on 28 October 2012, at University Hospital Galway in Ireland, led to nationwide protests . . . Halappanavar, a Hindu of Indian origin, was suffering from a miscarriage when she was some 17 weeks pregnant, and she sought medical attention and treatment at University Hospital Galway. Her husband, Praveen Halappanavar, said that the hospital told them the foetus was not viable, but they could not perform an abortion under Irish Law as the foetus heart was still beating. During the next several days, Halappanavar was diagnosed with septicemia which lead to multiple organ failure and her death.

I think the "during the next several days" is the key. But it's not totally clear.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 06:01 AM

Actually the date of heartbeat-cessation is something of a side issue (and yes, I know I was the one who brought it up!) because the real question is: if a pregnancy - i.e. a living fetus - endangers the life of the mother, it should be terminated. IMO.

She was found to be miscarrying - which sounds like the child was never going to be born anyway. And what shape would it have been in if it had been?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 06:04 AM

"The baby's heartbeat stopped on the Wednesday."
Bonnie - please don't get this extremely unpleasant limpet-like troll involved in this thread unless you wish to see it disappear without trace.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 06:13 AM

Yes, sorry for the thread-drift! Ed T wrote:

> ""As far as I can tell from this thread, there is only one practicing Catholic among the persons who have made negative comments in this thread about the Catholic Church""

> Good try Joe. But, that is an old and "tired" technique to minimize the opinion of others in a discussion, that is oft' used by politician, and PR types.

> That minimizes the direct personal experience of those who were abused inside the RC church noted here by mudcat posters in one form or another. Minimizing and demononizing the suffering of those victims (most often the impact follows them through their life, which is now, not long ago) seems commonplace among some in the RC church.


Ed has put it better than I could. In fact, I think there's a pretty clear reason why there aren't more practicing Catholics defending the abuses and the bans.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 06:59 AM

Before I get pulled up for saying "defending" the abuses and bans: What's being defended is a core belief-system, in the face of repercussions over some of its evil behaviour.

So delete "defended" in my last post; but there's no single other word to put in its place which really says it all - minimising, rationalising, isolating in the past, excluding on some arbitrary grounds… take your pick.

I don't think for a nanosecond that Joe defends the sexual abuse (at least those instances of it that he'll admit to recognising) or any other atrocities. But he dishonours the very real - and ongoing - suffering of its victims* by this fantasy-reframing technique.



*Including those who have killed themselves over their experiences and now can't speak up. I worked on a suicide helpline in Cork and spoke to some of them on the phones, others in person; but this was somehow not convincing, didn't count as evidence unless I could "prove" it IIRC. Of course I couldn't prove it, so voila! It never happened.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 07:03 AM

Mark me down as agreeing absolutely with Bonnie and Ed. I have already described elsewhere the treatment I and my schoolmates received from "God's Stormtroopers", the Jesuit Brothers who taught at my grammar school.

There are other ways for children to be abused than sexual abuse, and the Catholic Church (the institution, not the faithful) has tried most of them at one time or another, usually on the faithful.

In my case it was verbal, psychological and physical abuse, in about equal portions.

As they would say in the Southern States, "It's a control thang!"

I consider myself fortunate to have shrugged off that control and am much the better for it.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 07:17 AM

Sigh. Well there may have one or two "negative" remarks about the Church on this thread, but as far as I can see most of the remarks in question have been critical, not negative.

In recent years the Church itself (not its critics) has shown itself to be fundamentally institutionally flawed. The errors we see arising are not sporadic or piecemeal. They propagate all the more because of lies and denials and protection of perpetrators. That is what's so sad. I don't see anyone here condemning two thousand years of Catholicism because of a few maverick priests and nuns, but I do see an institution that is rotten almost to its core. The institution, not Catholics. You're going to need more than a John XXIII. Every cardinal now in the ring is a product of a rotten setup, don't forget. Only a time-serving insider is going to get the job. Don't you think that sounds a bit hopeless?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 07:43 AM

"Yes, sorry for the thread-drift! "
No need for apology Bonnie - I brought up the subject and I certainly don't believe it to be 'thread drift'.
The reason I did so is that I believe the mixture of religion (any religion) and politics(any politics) is a toxic one and the worst of this mixture has surfaced when the church's power has been unassailable.
Despite all that has been revealed over the last decade, and despite the fact that the power and respect of the church has declined enormously in the eyes of the people (here at least), it seems that as far as the State is concerned, the voice of the church on such issues such as the ending of pregnancies for whatever reason, contraception, homosexuality, single-sex marriages ..... still rings loud and above all others.
Until the role of the church is confined totally to spiritual matters and is totally the business of the believers and their personal and uninterfered-with choice of church - certainly completely removed from any role in education other than it being taught as a philosophy, these problems will re-occur.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:00 AM

Good points Steve Shaw.

Joe O:
What is unfortunate is the reaction of many "practicing" RC's to legitimate criticism, some of which RC s tend to agree with,at least to some degree.

Rather than participating in a dialogue and considering different viewpoints, the tendancy of many Rc s is to "circling the wagons", turning outwards and ignoring or vilanize those with constructive ideas,which while they may differ from theirs, are no less logical. A more positive approach would be to openly consider genuine concern for the future plight of the RC church and ideas for change.

What you see is negativity. What I see are victims,former RC's and other Christians wanting a more open, accountable, caring and safe RC church, not the end of the church. Would that also not be the same goal for those who care for the future of the church from the inside?
I do not see people calling for the end of the RC church, but an end of practices they see as hurtful to persons and society and many that they see as uncaring and even "unchristian".

If the RC church ended tomorrow, it would be a sad thing for the many people in society who hold it close to their hearts. IMO, it would also be a sad thing for society in general. But, it is also a sad thing if in today's enlightened society this organization cannot make changes that a child could see as needed.

It is honourable to "stay the course" and try to make change from inside. But,I see no reason why it is less honourable to depart from an organization, one that you have lost trust in, and try to impact change from the outside, as many victims and concerned folks have chosen to do. Do I detect a degree of disdain for those who have chosen to leave?

My last comment is your frequent reference to your experience in the RC church. Joe, you should re-read some of your comments through the lens of a person who holds a different perspective on some related issues. Your experience is just that and does not necessarily reflect what is happening around the world with the RC church. (I am puzzled that you downplay the experiences of others in the RC church as "non-representative" at the same time as you promote your experience as "representative").I will not accuse this approach as being intentionally condescending, as I observe you to be above that word.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:07 AM

134 posts... I think I have gleaned the answer to my question.

Question #2 requires a list of the issues. Please join me in brainstorming a list. I'll start it. If anyone is not sure how to brainstorm, search "brainstorm def" first and then expand as required or simply watch the process... it ain't rocket science. It can be enlightening and FUN! So please join in and remember the most important rule of brainstorming... there ain't no rules... so blurt out whatever thought comes to your mind.

1. Marriage of priests.
2. Marriage of nuns.
3. Ordainment of women.
4. Punishment within the church of sexual abusers.
5. Birth control.
6. Abortion.
7.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:16 AM

Oh... first thought. Start your brainstorming posts with "Brainstorm" (Bs for short) and keep them separate from other posts. It'll save us all time.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:04 AM

Well I'm not a member of the Catholic church any more so it's not really my business...but I do have an issue with this business of letting priests and nuns get married. Don't get me wrong - I'd be all for it - but it seems odd to me to suggest that this would be the panacea to end child abuse. If it's being suggested that there's some simple correlation between sexual frustration and the propensity to harm children, I'm very suspicious. First, many married people are abusers anyway. Second, the vast majority of celibate people do not abuse children. Third, sexual abuse of children is a serious criminal issue. To suggest that a man who has been allowed to marry might otherwise have become an abuser is a little bit pat for my liking. There is surely something fundamental in the psyche of that bloke that must be pushing him in that perverted direction, married or not. The worry is that seriously flawed human beings are being allowed into the priesthood, and letting them marry is not the point. I suppose you could argue that the marriage prospect might attract a better sort of bloke. But I still think that the perception that you can probably get away with your abuse is the big issue that needs addressing first. It's complicated. Just saying we should have married priests in order to address the abuse issue is a bit simplistic, desirable though it may be.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: John P
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:43 AM

Brainstorm:

4. Punishment within the church of sexual abusers.

As in, immediately turn them and all records associated with them over to the secular authorities.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: John P
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:49 AM

Steve, I'm not aware of anyone saying that marriage for priests will take care of sexual abuse. They seem like two separate issues to me. Sexual abuse is a crime and ought to be treated as such, no matter who does it, married people, priests, or otherwise.

Keeping priests from getting married and not ordaining women just seems stupid. Well, and illegal anywhere that there are laws against sex-based employment tests.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 10:09 AM

"Punishment within the church of sexual abusers."
We are talking about the sexual abuse of children - child rape - a serious crime, punishable by, at least and, in Britain anyway, and an entry into the sexual offenders register.
Would anybody here suggest that a paedophile teacher should be punished by a stiff talking to by the headmaster, are are the clergy above national laws?
I've yet to read a case of a judge sending a serious criminal back to his family or community and allowing them to deal with it.
The behaviour of the hierarchy makes them accomplices in serious crimes, from obstruction of justice to placing criminals of the worst type in positions where they can continue their 'little weaknesses'.
In these circumstances, in any other environment they too would be facing serious criminal charges.
Why should the church be allowed to investigate, try and punish(!!!) child rapists or be immune from prosecution for assisting them?
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 12:16 PM

Steve, I'm not aware of anyone saying that marriage for priests will take care of sexual abuse.
I agree that they are separate issues. It's just that letting priests marry frequently pops up in the abuse context as if it would provide the solution (or part of it).

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 12:16 PM

Damn!

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 01:37 PM

Great article on bishop accountability today..Shonborn's mother has spoken out and does not want him to be pope because he does not like dishonest people and also would not do well with the bitchiness of the Vatican. I still think he would be the best, but I am OK with Scola, Oullett. Horrified by Bertone and aspects of Turkson. Bertone is still coming up 3 or 4 in gambling sites.

What I want to know is am I the only one horrified by D from New York? He strikes me as totally brutish and dishonest but am I misjudging him? I think he would be the worst pope in my lifetime and he is seriously being mentioned. I get the creepiest feeling whenever I see his picture.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 01:57 PM

Sorry - that should read "punishable by at least a prison sentence and, in Britain anyway, an entry into the sexual offenders register."
Senior moment!
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 03:23 PM

Sooooooooo... JohnP'... would you consider this acceptable during a Bs session?


4. Punishment of sexual abusers.
a. Punishment within the church.
b. Exposure of sexual abuse(rs) for investigation by secular authorities.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 03:35 PM

"Exposure of sexual abuse(rs) "
Poor choice of words in the circumstances, don't you think!!
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 03:51 PM

I suspect that most RC faithful, as good people, would know what should be done, or at least come up with it and work it out among themselves if they were allowed to have a greater say (and, I am not talking about the local parish stuff often thrown about as examples of real local empowerment).

That is not to say that everyone would agree, differences would likely emerge as some regional differences are met (as does with governments). Some may even leave if they do not have their way with change (like with the Anglican discussions. But, doing the right thing always carries some risk, as "not doing the right thing" also carries risk.

So, my suggesting is broad -a change in organizational structure to include more of the faithful in broader organizational decisions, versus the current "old guys network". To me this would inrease local input and impact real change to meet some of the deficiencies that are easy to see.

I realize that religion is not a democracy - but IMO, the RC church organization can do a better job of inclusion in decision making. Some "faithful" may say that is already happening - but, if so, it is not happening fast and broad enough, and the door of change is not wide enough.

Part of the slow reaction to the child sexual abuse issue was because of the current structure. Top folks saying they are sorry rings hollow, without breaking down the structure (and people) that caused it and the structure and folks that enabled it to continue for years. I remain unconvinced that potential abusers have not gone in hiding, only to emerg again, and to do a better job of hiding their sinful and harmful acts.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 03:54 PM

I thought about that but figured I'd lighten things up.

There's another one for yas. Yer welcome.

Say...

4. Punishment of sexual abusers.
a. Punishment within the church.
b. Disclosure of suspected sexual abuse(rs) for investigation by secular authorities.

Thereto...

1. Marriage of priests.

2. Marriage of nuns.

3. Ordainment of women.

4. Punishment of sexual abusers.
a. Punishment within the church.
b. Disclosure of suspected sexual abuse(rs) for investigation by secular authorities.

5. Birth control.

6. Abortion.

7.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 04:13 PM

Again, the Catholic Church hierarchy is analogous to a mafia run organization.
No wonder there is a connection historically.

Why aren't the Catholic laity leaving in droves? What keeps them hanging on?

Possible answer: an appeal to authoritarianism. Parental guidance with an iron hand or fist.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 04:23 PM

Does ""lighten things up" mean add humour, effervescence, take away weight, or remove ontent gnu, (as in "Light" meals or "Light" Ice cream or confectionaries", or "You light-up my life")?.

Just a humourous thought:)

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 04:26 PM

Note that I tried to "lighten" content by removing the "c".

;)

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 04:35 PM

""1. Marriage of priests.
2. Marriage of nuns.
3. Ordainment of women.
4. Punishment within the church of sexual abusers.
5. Birth control.
6. Abortion.
7. ""

Bs

1. Married Priests: YES! but irrelevant to abuse

2. Not sure about this. It would be necessary, not only to ask "Should they marry?", but also "Should they marry priests?".

3. Ordain women: Emphatically yes. They have much to offer and the presence of women would do much to assist in making very necessary changes in relation to contraception and abortion

4. Punishment of abusers: It should be made clear to all clergy that abusers will be handed over to the police for prosecution, and conviction will mean instant dismissal and excommunication.

Senior clergy should be told that any who attempt to cover up abuse will suffer the same action exactly.

5. and 6. Birth Control and Abortion: See above.

7. Education. adults and children should have full access to education about birth control, and women should have absolute right to choose whether to terminate up to the point of viability.

8. ALL the many and various churches, religions, or sects should be told that they must stick to saving souls and leave the bodies to secular law and justice. In other words "Render unto Caesar", failing which, they will lose charitable status and pay taxes.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 04:38 PM

Ed... to shine light on things... the major focus of the sexual abuse scandals.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 05:22 PM

"1. Married Priests: YES! but irrelevant to abuse" Not so fast. The frustration of an unnatural celibacy can cause a warped idea of sex. (Original sin).

2. Nuns should be allowed to marry whom they choose.

3. The ordination of women in a paternalistic religion runs counter to its stated purpose. Catholicism is run by men.

4. The word "abortion" (a pejorative) should be changed to "terminate unwanted pregnancy".

8. I agree with this entirely. Get the church out of bedrooms.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 05:23 PM

Gee, it looks like I stirred up a can of worms. I worked as a government investigator for thirty years - so I take crime seriously, but don't tend to get excited about it. I'm sorry if you view my dispassionate response as uncaring. I really am concerned about the sexual molestation scandal in the Catholic Church, and I want it to be resolved.

Still, my thirty years as an investigator compels me to work from the facts, and from a view of what is and what is not an effective response.

Much is made of the story of Fr. Lawrence Murphy of St. John's School for the Deaf in Milwaukee. The evidence indicates that Murphy molested as many as 200 deaf students at the school from 1952 until he was removed from active ministry in 1974 (Murphy died in 1998). There's no question about this - this is a horrific crime. It appears the crime wasn't prosecuted, but it doesn't appear that the Archdiocese of Milwaukee did anything to interfere with criminal prosecution. The flap about the Murphy case, was that the Cardinal Ratzinger failed to laicize Murphy. Murphy was not allowed to function as a priest, but many forces would not be satisfied until Murphy would no longer be a priest. Laicisation, which is a theological process usually based on elements that made the ordination invalid from the time it took place, is commonly known as "defrocking"; although it seems to me that removal of the function of priesthood would be a more apt thing to label "defrocking." When you're removed from your job as a baker, you're no longer a baker - but you still have the degree you earned at culinary school. So, since the guy wasn't functioning as a priest for the last 20 years of his life, it seems to me that he was functionally defrocked. I can't understand why he wasn't prosecuted in criminal court, however. Still, the criminal conduct ended in 1977.

The bishops of the United States put their most recent and most stringent measures against child molestation into effect in 2002, but they began taking measures in the mid-1960s. Yeah, there still are dioceses that are reluctant to release personnel files. As an investigator, I fought companies and government agencies about the release of records for thirty years. Companies have reasons to protect their records, and investigators have reasons to demand them. That's just the way it works. If an organization refuses an investigator, that's one thing. If that organization releases a court order for release of records, that's another. And yeah, you could pick on the Vatican's diplomatic immunity as a cover for releasing records - but the originals of most of those records are stored in the country of origin and available there if requested by court order. As an investigator, I did my best to obtain records from the originator, not the recipient.

There's no question that government officials and church officials in Ireland were in collusion in the industrial schools and in the Magdelene Laundries, and both sides are trying to protect their own asses and blame the other side. Once again, though, remember that the laundries and schools were closed by the 1990s, thus ending the abuse that took place there.

The child molestation crisis in the U.S. was mostly sorted out in 2002-2003. It is moving toward conclusion in Ireland, and I think the rest of Europe is a year or two behind. I'm sure that child molestation took place in the Catholic Church in Africa, Asia, and South America - but I don't know much about the state of things in those continents.

As a security specialist, I can tell you that the measures taken by the U.S. bishops are quite good - and Ireland and Continental Europe appear to be adopting similar measures. ALL employees and volunteers are screened and trained; and those working directly with children go through stricter training and screening, including fingerprints and criminal records checks.

If you look at the statistics, you will find a dramatic drop in the molestation of children by priests since about 2000. Offenses are now quite rare, and no bishop in his right mind would allow such offenses to continue or to go unprosecuted - the penalty is now too severe. What is happening now, worldwide, is the process of assessing blame and distributing compensation. It's a complicated process, and it's being carried out mostly by lawyers, not bishops. It's messy, and it's not good for public relations, but it's a process that must be done.

I understand the outrage. I guess I'm past the outraged stage because I knew about much of this in the 1970s, and I have been working toward the elimination of child molestation since then.

When there are facts available, I will seek verification - that's my nature as an investigator. I may question information that seems overblown, but I have never been one to deny verified information. I do try to put things into context and proportion and I realize that can be annoying to those who are in full-blown outrage - but it is only through facts and understanding that we can resolve problems such as this. I fully acknowledge that the child molestation scandal and subsequent coverup in the Catholic Church was widespread, and it was truly an abomination.

There are those of you who think I'm unqualified to comment on Catholic affairs outside of Wisconsin and California, but I assure you that I have worked hard to have a global perspective. I have close friends who have worked as priests and nuns in all the continents except Antarctica, and many were born in the countries where they worked. I'm an investigator with a theology degree who has worked and taught in the Catholic Church, and I've traveled extensively and can communicate in several languages. So, yeah, I think I'm quite well qualified to give objective information about happenings in the Catholic Church - and I try very hard to be objective and factual. And yes, I think that people who haven't set foot in a Catholic church for twenty years, are a bit less able to comment knowledgeably about the current state of affairs.

Oh, and let me assure you that as a rule, I don't like bishops and I don't trust them - with a few exceptions.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 05:41 PM

Hmmmm... okay... I suppose there is at least one rule to a Bs session. The resulting discussions are not supposed to start until the Bs session is completed, at least to a reasonable degree. It is always open to perusal and tweaking but it has to be at least given a chance to be considered carefully first. Once a consensus is had about moving to the discussion phase... we go for the debates and analyses and such.

If you put the cart before the horse, the cart cannot be steered. It goes hither and yon and... well, things can get fucked up pretty quick like.

Hahahhaa... I just had a thought. If the lads in Rome blowin smoke as I type didn't follow a reasonable progression of BS and careful analyses and consideration as they do, they would end up with the cart before the horse as well. I hope I do not offend... just strikes me funny.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 06:23 PM

Here you go, gnu, a light one:

""When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realised that the Lord doesn't work that way so I stole one and asked Him to forgive me.""
Emo Philips quote

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 06:29 PM

And, yet another:

"A computer once beat me at chess, but it was no match for me at kick boxing." Emo Philips quote

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 06:30 PM

For the record I do not call for priests to be laicized and especially not excommunicated. I don't think excommunication is valid in the first place, or what is baptims. Also, it is used as a threat over peoples' heads. So if they are Catholic that is what they/we are and we will have to adjust. I think laicized is the same thing. Also, for those who might be reasonably safe if they were in chains and locked to a pillar perhaps, we are going to need all hands on deck in case of natural disaster, or more likely, war. Some will have to be taken out of mothballs. There will be mass casualties.

What I call for is for children and vulnerable adults to be absolutely safe from them, whether that means jail, electronic devices
, essentially imprisonment in isolated monastaries etc. Also I am for brain operatios in the violent cases...voluntary taking chemicals to reduce urges are too fallible.

I am sympathatic to the people who are the abusers. What a wretched life they must live to not be able to control this..no one would wish it on them. But they have to be stopped either medically or electronically or by banishment. After that, I do not care if they are excommunicated or laicized. I think they should not be.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:00 PM

For once, I agree with mg. Priests who molest should not be punished by the Catholic Church. They should not be laicized or "defrocked" - the Catholic Church should have to live with the shame of having a priest who is a child molester.
The offender should be arrested, tried, and sent to prison. And yes, they should be suspended from ministry while awaiting trial and forever after conviction.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:11 PM

I am not sure why the Catholic church should be worried about the shame of having a priest, or thousands, who are child molesters. They made them and made their parents who made them. It is systemic. And probably for that reason they don't seem particularly ashamed..sure good at hiding it if they are..or it just melts into their general shame about sex between consenting adults..some of them cant tell the difference..all equally bad. If you hit someone on the arm long enough and hard enough, their arm is going to be deformed. Same same.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:55 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:16 AM

Oh... first thought. Start your brainstorming posts with "Brainstorm" (Bs for short) and keep them separate from other posts. It'll save us all time.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:55 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:16 AM

Oh... first thought. Start your brainstorming posts with "Brainstorm" (Bs for short) and keep them separate from other posts. It'll save us all time.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:56 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:16 AM

Oh... first thought. Start your brainstorming posts with "Brainstorm" (Bs for short) and keep them separate from other posts. It'll save us all time.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:01 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:16 AM

Oh... first thought. Start your brainstorming posts with "Brainstorm" (Bs for short) and keep them separate from other posts. It'll save us all time.


ARE YOU FUCKING LISTENING????????????????????????

CAN WE CETRALIZE THE DISCUSSION? CAN WE HAVE SOME DECORUM?

JESUS HIMSELF WOYULDN'T PUT UP WITH THAT SHIT!

GOOGLE BRAINSTORMING DEFINITION FER FUCK SAKE! Or just get some manners and READ THE DAMN THREAD!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:14 PM

Hmmmm... where did that post go? Did I dream that?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,999
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:21 PM

"The offender should be arrested, tried, and sent to prison."

As I said to Songwronger on another thread, if that's the way it's gonna be, why have a trial? Not all accusations are true. A certain teachers' association with which I am intimately familiar will defend any teacher for anything, period. No teachers' association of which I am aware will fund an appeal. One is innocent until otherwise proven. I think British law is the best that's ever been written. Except of course the American Constitution which is presently being redrafted.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:30 PM

You mean that American constitution that permits any Tom, Dick or Harry to carry lethal weapons around in his pocket?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:35 PM

Since NObody really addressed the OP but only addressed themselves...

Did I get your attention? Can we simply get back to the task at hand? Can you all take your minds off yourselves and help me do something I feel is important to me and to a lot of other people in this world?

In the OP, I asked a question. Some 140 or so posts later, I stated I had gleaned my answer. Nobody asked me what it was... no problem for me.

Then I asked for youse to join me in answering another question (as I alluded to in the OP). VERY few posts into that, it was ignored and I am not pleased... as you can see.

Oh, fuck it. I dunno why I bother. I vacate the floor. The discussion is yours. If a suitable chairman is acceptable to all I may consider rejoining the Bs as a participant in subsequent discussions. For now, I just can't deal with the childlike crap. I wished for a proper discussion... apparently, one can only have such in Rome.

Now... yees all think about THAT before you shit on the Catholic Church again.

>;-)

gnightgnu

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:50 PM

Well it's like this you see. I do vaguely recall the OP, but I'm not going to keep going back to it because if I have to go to the start of a thread of any length, then want to respond, the whole bloody thing takes so long to load up that I give up the will to live. So I just click on that little d. In terms of thread drift, the inordinately long loading time of threads on this site have a lot to answer for.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 10:40 PM

Sweet JAYSUS! Who gives a shit about the OP, Steve? NOBODY. I just said that fer fuck sake! I had moved on to the second screwing over of the Op-er and I am the OPer whose OP was ignored in Spades... big tine... buried under piles of shite until NOBODY could see it... not even me. Keep up.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Susan
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 12:47 AM

I don't mean to change the subject, but are you the folk song collector Jim Carroll? If so, I have a question about a song.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 12:51 AM

BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 01:17 AM

Hi, gnu -

The short answer is that the bigger and older an organization is, the slower it moves. I suppose you could say that there's an advantage in that the Catholic Church doesn't get lost in shallow fads....

Actually, there can be advantages to a strong reliance on tradition. It can help us to appreciate the wisdom of the past, and not get hung up on the ephemeral.

The trick, however, is not to let the past rule without question. Many of our best teachers from the past, are our mistakes. No need to repeat them. I love my Catholic religion and its traditions. I find the structure and doctrine and rules necessary to carry on those traditions, but I can't imagine why a person would follow rules that just aren't right. And standard Catholic teaching tells people that a rule does not apply when it leads people to do wrong. As always, conscience is the final arbiter.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 02:34 AM

'standard Catholic teaching tells people that a rule does not apply when it leads people to do wrong. As always, conscience is the final arbiter'.
.,,.
When did this 'always' begin, Joe; and this 'standard' become standard? Did the 'rule ... not apply', then to the Holy Office in C16 Spain? Or were they doing no 'wrong' in condemning 'hertics' to the auto-da-fe even tho many of these might have pleaded their 'conscience'? Did the judges consult their consciences? To what effect?

Just asking.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 02:49 AM

Well, Mike, the primacy of conscience was covered quite extensively by Thomas Aquinas in the 1200s. It was in the Baltimore Catechism in the 1950s, and that was based on the Catechism of Trent from the 1570s.

Mind you, this is for assessing moral culpability. If a person does something in good conscience, then he is not morally culpable from a theological standpoint. And yes, I suppose that some of the judges of the Holy Inquisition, did what they did in good conscience - even though they were wrong from an objective standpoint. And no, the judges of the Spanish Inquisition of the 1490s did not respect the primacy of conscience, and certainly wouldn't give a damn if Cervantes and others believed that what they were doing was right. The inquisitors were far more interested in political expediency.

And no, I won't defend the Inquisition. Many people who faced the Inquisition, were later named saints.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 03:26 AM

Guest Susan
"but are you the folk song collector Jim Carroll?"
Guilty as charged - ask away
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 04:35 AM

Joe:
"Lawrence Murphy"
That was the most appalling piece of dodging responsibility I have ever read and it sums up all the double-think that has gone on throughout this affair.
Murphy was allowed to continue his crimes long after he was found out; it really doesn't matter that he eventually stopped preaching, He was allowed to remain a priest to the end of his life.
He died a priest, he was buried as a priest in a priests plot, - and, by your own rule book 'went to heaven as a priest'. So far as your church is concerned his crimes were acceptable enough for him to remain a priest - all the rest of your justification of the church's behaviour is no more than double-talk.
He expressed not an ounce of contrition right up to his death.
One of the most disgustingly distressing scenes in 'Mea Maxima Culpa' was the visit to Murphy's house by some of his victims, filmed by them.
With some difficulty, after being berated by his housekeeper they eventually managed to persuade him to the door - he drove them off telling them to leave him alone, he was an old man - no contrition, no apology.... nothing.
I wonder whether your stance would remain the same if it was you or yours on the receiving end of such despicable treatment; somehow I doubt it.
It is watching scenes like this and the Brendan Smyth documentary, 'Betrayal of Trust' (freely available for viewing on U-tube along with much more) that I deeply regret that I don't believe in Hell or eternal damnation – these animals (sorry for the insult animals!) died unpunished and their accomplices still refuse to acknowledge their part in serious criminal activities .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODvv6tQ3naQ   
http://banishedbabies-ireland.blogspot.ie/2012/03/documentary-betrayal-of-trust-brendan.html
What comes over in all of these is the cold indifference of the church authorities and the smug attitude that "God, history and the State is on our side".
Your benign defence of the Church by simply ignoring and refusing even to discuss this matter in all its aspects and by your persistence in reducing it to "a few bad apples" will guarantee that it will run longer than 'Les Mis' or 'The Mousetrap'.
Last year in Ireland a an abuse victim who entered a church to protest the visit of a bishop who was involved in child abuse, was booed and driven out - abuse deniers still lurk in this country.   
Contrary to your claims, it is far from having been dealt with with in Ireland and it never will be until every implication of the fact that the most powerful church in the world colluded in the long term and widespread rape of helpless and vulnerable children, has been recognised and dealt with in its entirity - I suspect that this is also the case in the US and in the other numerous countries where similar behaviour too place.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/priest-sex-scandal-shocks-brazil/2005/11/28/1133026405263.html
http://www.thejournal.ie/readme/column-if-clerical-abuse-was-a-car-crash-wed-still-be-looking-for-the-victims-612209-Oct2012/
So far we know only of the events that occurred over the last few decades, and we have not the slightest idea whether it will ever happen again.
Yours getting sadder and sadder with each posting
Jim Carroll

PS Would be grateful if someone would be kind enough to explain how to do the blue clickies sometime -

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 04:37 AM

Believe me, Jim, Lawrence Murphy most probably went to hell as a priest. He molested 200 deaf children. But "defrocking" him wasn't necessary. He should have been prosecuted, tried, and sent to prison if found guilty. I am sure a trial would have found this man guilty, and I can't understand why there was no trial. This matter was in the press in the 1970s, well within the statute of limitations.

I don't excuse or deny his horrible conduct in any way, but I don't think the issue was whether he was "returned to the lay state" or not. If he's laicized, he's allowed to get married. If not, then he's supposed to remain celibate (which, for this guy, is an obscene irony).

But to make an issue out of Ratzinger's refusal to laicize Murphy, is not understanding the process. It's like saying a plumber is no longer a plumber, because he has committed a crime. The appropriate punishment was to prosecute him as a criminal, and fire his ass as a priest. And yes, he was fired. But why wasn't he prosecuted?

St. John's School for the Deaf was an esteemed institution, and students came from all over the United States. The school was located in the City of St. Francis, Wisconsin, a suburb on the outskirts of Milwaukee which has a population of 9,365. Within the city limits were a Catholic church and school, two Catholic seminaries (one now closed), two Catholic high schools (one for boys, one for girls - both closed now, I think), and the motherhouse of an order of Catholic nuns. I suppose that, with a population like that, the St. Francis Police Department might be reluctant to arrest a priest. They should have arrested him, though. Most likely, these serial molestations were the most serious crime that ever took place in the City of St. Francis.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 05:07 AM

And still you are reducing this whole affair to the behaviour of individuals Joe.
Your church was and still is implicated in serious crimes against children - does that not upset you enough to even acknowledge and perhaps discuss it some time
"But why wasn't he prosecuted?"
You damn well know why he wasn't prosecuted - for centuries the church has held entire countries and their governments by the balls; thanks to all this, we're beginning to see light at the end of that particular long, dark tunnel - I just hope we come out at the other side in my lifetime - if I thought so I'd put the champagne in the fridge today (I'm lying - I hate champagne)
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 05:17 AM

Jim, I agree with you completely. There's no question that my church "was and still is implicated in serious crimes against children," no question at all. And I find that appalling.

So, where's our disagreement? You know that I respect your opinion more than that of just about any other Mudcatter. If I had known about this at the time I lived in St. Francis, I would have stood before the City Council and demanded that they order their police department to arrest this horrible person. But I didn't know at the time. The School for the Deaf seemed strange because I never saw anyone outside there, but that's all I knew at the time. And hey, I was 14 years old when I lived next door to that school.

Fr. Murphy was buried in a Catholic funeral, and a bishop I knew well (and still admire more than any other bishop) presided at the funeral in 1998. This bishop was a very honest man, and I'm sure he would have spoken of Fr. Murphy's crimes during the funeral. I wish I knew what he said. Yeah, I know that many people might say the man should have been denied a Catholic funeral, but the Catholic practice is to let God (and the civil criminal justice system) do the condemnation. Still, I wonder why my friend, as a bishop, couldn't have faded into the background and let some other priest do the funeral. My friend was someone who always forgave people - and he got a lot of criticism for that.

Sister Helen Prejean ("Dead Man Walking") faced the same questions for ministering to inmates on death row in Louisiana.

-Joe-

Gnu, I know this will break your heart, but please remember that it is a Mudcat tradition that the thread originator does not have control of anything beyond his/her own posts. What other people post, is their business. The thread goes, where it goes.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 05:48 AM

Joe
Quickly - breakfast calls

Tell me again how these things have been long dealt with in the US
It appears that the church is still buying (at extremely high prices – though maybe not to the wealthiest church in the world) the silence of abuse victims
This from this morning's Irish Times
Jim Carroll

The Archdiocese of Los Angeles, Cardinal Roger Mahony and a former priest have agreed to pay a total of nearly $10 million to settle four child sex abuse cases brought against them, lawyers for the victims said yesterday.
Mahony, who retired in 2011 as head of the largest US archdiocese and is now in Rome taking part in choosing a new pope, was accused of helping a confessed pedophile priest evade law enforcement by sending him out of state to a church-run treatment center, then placing the priest back in the Los Angeles ministry. As part of the agreement approved by a Los Angeles judge earlier this month, none of the parties admitted wrongdoing, according to a plaintiff's attorney in the case. (Reuters)

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 06:52 AM

Along the same lines as Jim, I was reading this article alongside the latest posts in this discussion.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 07:05 AM

It is extremely difficult to find out exactly how many abusers and victims there have been, - part of the conspiracy of silence' no doubt,
This article – (over 2 years out of date – the situation has moved on since then) puts some of it into context, though nowhere has there been any indication of those who have been bought off, and we will never have the remotest idea of how many never reported it, but it will be certainly a far greater proportion than those women who were too ashamed (or too frightened of the maulings they will most certainly get from our legal systems) to report 'ordinary rape' (isn't that an appalling phrase.?)
"I'm sure he would have spoken of Fr. Murphy's crimes during the funeral."
He would have been the first one to have done so - can you think of one other occasion this this has happened, or is he a single lone voice crying in the wilderness?
Jim Carroll

UP TO 350 IRISH PRIESTS WERE LIKELY ACCUSED CHILD ABUSERS
New report shows it was far more than just a small element
By
JAMES O'SHEA,
Irish Central Staff Writer
One of the arguments made frequently in Ireland is that it is only a tiny minority of priests who were abusers. Yet the latest investigation, released yesterday, into six dioceses seems to indicate the opposite.
The report was compiled by the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church.
The figures, shown below, were on the RTE television website soon after the investigation made its findings public seem to indicate otherwise.
All in all a total of 85 priests across six dioceses were accused of child sexual abuse. If you extrapolate that number across the 20 other dioceses you end up with a number close to 350 if you include the fact that Dublin and three other archdioceses are still to be counted and will have far more accused as a result of larger numbers of priests.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 07:09 AM

Sorry, missed a bit of the article:
Of course the overwhelming majority of the cases were never pursued because of the unholy alliance between the church and the government and the police to cover it all up for decades
If you think things are getting any better think again perhaps.
Last month Father Patrick McGarvey (43) was elevated to the position of parish priest of Fanad, County Donegal, by Bishop Philip Boyce of the Raphoe diocese, the man whose diocese was one of the worst offenders when it came to clerical abuse.
According to the Belfast Telegraph, in August 2004 McGarvey was caught by undercover police at Foyleside shopping centre in Derry, watching men in the public restrooms. The police caught the priest while carrying out an investigation after members of the public had complained.
Is that the kind of man you want in charge of a parish? Would you let your kid near such a priest?
Will the church ever learn?

Here's a breakdown of the figures:
Raphoe (Donegal)
.52 allegations reported to gardaí against 14 priests
. Eight out of 14 priests out of ministry, six retired
. Four convicted of an offence against a child
. Significant errors of judgement made by successive bishops
. Too much emphasis on accused priests, not victims
. More attention should have been given to preventative actions

Read more: http://www.irishcentral.com/news/Up-to-350-Irish-priests-were-likely-accused-child-abusers-134769948.html#ixzz2NPtsd52V
Follow us: @IrishCentral on Twitter | IrishCentral on Facebook

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 07:13 AM

""But to make an issue out of Ratzinger's refusal to laicize Murphy, is not understanding the process. It's like saying a plumber is no longer a plumber, because he has committed a crime.""

That does not make any sense.

Most governing bodies having certification powers over professions, for example doctors, lawyers and even plumbers can remove it. So, a certified plumber can cease being a certified plumber. Let's not confuse this with removing the educational qualifications for a profession (for example, taking a PHD away from a doctor), that does not make sense.

The RC church has the sole power to name a RC priest a priest, and authorizing these people to practice under this title. So, logically the RC church has it has within it's power to withdraw the professional status (within the bounds of this planet), or, if it does not oficially have it now, it has the power (on Earth) to change it's own rules to make it so - if it had the will to do so. (However, I suspect the pope has such power now, if one wished to exercise it). They can leave it to the Lord (and, whomever) to deal with the situation beyond this planet, and beyond this life.

Where would society be if police officers remained police officers after consistantly breaking the law? Generally, they are removed from the profession, and cease to be police officers. Often where this has not happened in western society (for example, in LA), poeple have rioted in the streets to have it rectified.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 07:30 AM

Jim's link to JAMES O'SHEA ARTICLE

http://www.irishcentral.com/news/Up-to-350-Irish-priests-were-likely-accused-child-abusers-134769948.html#ixzz2NPtsd52V

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 08:39 AM

Thanks Bonnie
How's Packie by the way
Best
Jim

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Musket
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 10:03 AM

I reckon I too will start blowing smoke through the chimney.

Black when my posts to this thread disappear mysteriously.

White when one is still there the next time I log on...

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 11:08 AM

""Believe me, Jim, Lawrence Murphy most probably went to hell as a priest. He molested 200 deaf children. But "defrocking" him wasn't necessary. He should have been prosecuted, tried, and sent to prison if found guilty.""

I rather think that defockng and excommunication are not only necessary but obligatory Joe.

The church covered these mens' misdeeds to protect the reputation of the "Catholic Church".

How much better it would have been, to protect that reputation by not only handing over the abusers to well deserved secular legal punishment, but also by repudiating them and all their actions by publicly severing their ties with the Church, and depriving them (in the eyes of the faithful at least) of any chance of heaven.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 11:41 AM

Although I am not religious, I do see that the ideology of certain theological precepts
run counter to what the hierarchy of that theology profess. For example, I am a devoted American and subscribe to the Constitution, generally, which like all documents has its flaws. However, I don't approve of where the elected representatives of this country are taking us; away from American values of democracy and under the guise of "freedom",
distorting these values.

This is analogous to those who in certain theologies subscribe to their ideals without going along with the hierarchical program. I see this in Jewish, Christian, Catholic and Islamic people. It's true of many countries of the world when the people don't agree with their erstwhile leaders.

Bottom line: Talk is cheap. Action is what counts. For example, I admire the Catholic Worker for its social action with Dorothy Day and Ammon Hennesey. I admire the "boycott, divestment and sanction" movement of Israel which is supported by many Jews. I admire "liberation theology" and understand its role in South and Central America.

I can see that you don't have to swallow the whole enchilada.

Personally, I hope a time will come when people don't need religion but can make a choice to believe as long as they don't enforce it on others or harm others in the process.
I hope for the bricks of the Wall of Separation of state and religion to remain in place despite the fundamentalist religions that are trying to tear it down.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 07:19 PM

It is not for us or any member of the somewhat pompous church to try to make it so people can't get to heaven. I am not sure that is what excommunication does exactly. Who knows what sort of mental illness they have...the notion that a person could condemn someone to hell (or maybe you just meant non-heaven, which is what you actually said and is a different matter) is horrifying to me. If someone on earth can do that, what is the point of judgement day? What is the point of teaching us about a merciful GOd when any nutcase religious person can now condemn someone to hell or purgatory or wherever.

What I want is for them to be out of reach of children. That now means prison. I think before all the coverups it could have meant essentially imprisonment in a Catholic monastary/jail but probably too much water under the bridge.

I think of course their ability to practice as priests should be removed, but not their status as priests. They could be defunct priests or whatever, but the day will come when priests will be either so scarce or so needed in a massive emergency that they will be needed..in which case severe precautions should be taken and probably only volunteers should go to them. I would go to one.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 13 Mar 13 - 07:43 PM

"And standard Catholic teaching tells people that a rule does not apply when it leads people to do wrong. As always, conscience is the final arbiter."

That' what I was taught. Too bad some posters haven't a clue that IS what is taught.

And too bad so many do not understand that even when it defies a "ruling", that conscience STILL applies. It overrules all.

Unlike the idiots that show up at my door early on Saturday, first good weather and ask for $.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 05:45 AM

I asked Joe above to define 'always' as used again in gnu's post --

"As always, conscience is the final arbiter"

but was not entirely persuaded by his reply.

Was it so at the height of the activities of the Holy Office, aka The Inquisition? If so, many would question some of the 'conscientious' decisions reached, and ask why the victims' doubtless sincere pleas of having followed their 'consciences' in what were then deemed heresies did not prevail.

But if this 'always' hadn't started then [which, despite Joe's adducement of Aquinas, the above phenomena might appear to suggest], what are we to extrapolate from 'always'? Or, if it had, then what effect or significance can we attribute to the actual perpetual operation of the 'conscience'?

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 05:48 AM

.. or, to put it a bit differently, to some of us outside the One Holy And Apostolic Church, "conscience" might just appear synonymous with "cop-out".

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 10:33 AM

Suppose you're a Catholic doctor, who has the training and skills to perform a safe and medically-qualified abortion. Now suppose the life of your pregnant Catholic wife is seriously endangered and she will die if this pregnancy is not terminated. You know this to be a medical fact, beyond doubt. The baby is one you both want.

You commune with your conscience, your wife communes with hers, and you both come to the conclusion that you must perform the abortion to save your wife's life. It is really "trading" a life rather than taking one, because the wife will die if the baby is allowed to come to term. The alternative is that the baby dies and the wife lives. But that's assuming a normal healthy birth. There's no guarantee that the baby won't die too, at some stage, whereas the wife *will* without this intervention.

Using Joe's reasoning, in this case it would be OK for the doctor-husband to perform the termination, because they have sincerely consulted their consciences. Is this correct?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 11:56 AM

""If someone on earth can do that, what is the point of judgement day?""

I believe I am right in saying that only the Pope can excommunicate or decide what actions warrant excommunication, which is basically analogous with banishment or exile by kings , of transgressing subjects.

It is one of the areas of his infallibility, and it is an interesting fact that for a sigificant period in the twentieth century, reading Lady Chatterley's Lover could lead to excommunication.

I believe there are still books that catholics are debarred from reading.

My point wasn't about any of that. It was about the Church dissociating itself from the child abusers in the most serious and final manner possible within catholic doctrine and dogma, as a better protection of reputation than covering up abuse.

I don't particularly believe in Heaven, Hell, Limbo or Purgatory. I just think whitewashing an institution isn't the same as proving it is intrinsically white.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: DMcG
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 12:04 PM

Way back in something like 1962, when I was in a Catholic primary school and aged around 7, I remember a question like Bonnie's coming up. In short, that was when you are in the situation during childbirth you could only save mother or child, the teaching was to save the child always. I didn't agree then - or at you couldn't have such a simplistic rule - and I don't now.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: DMcG
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 12:16 PM

believe there are still books that catholics are debarred from reading.

From Wikipedia: The final (20th) edition [of the list of banned books] appeared in 1948, and it was formally abolished on 14 June 1966 by @ope Paul VI.


As I've said elsewhere, even the RC church does change over time ...

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 12:44 PM

> …when you are in the situation during childbirth you could only save mother or child, the teaching was to save the child always.

But if, as Joe says, the conscience has primacy, then you cannot have a hard and fast rule to cover all situations. These two concepts conflict.

When issuing these edicts, how much does the Church tell you about the primacy of conscience? Joe is well informed on the subject, but many of the faithful do not have his depth of research, learning or experience. Are ordinary lay folk told about primacy of conscience, in language they can understand (both literally and metaphorically)?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 03:04 PM

Speaking as a non-believer, I see the logic of not painting every Catholic or Jew or Muslim with the same brush. Conscience is a personal thing and everybody has a difference sense of it.

For example, in the Catholic practice, I see the value of Liberation Theology.

I see that Jews are on board with BDS in their criticism of Israel.

Certainly there are Muslims who don't accept the violent interpretation given by other Muslims of Jihad.

Ghandi, a Hindu preached an equal status of Hindu and Moslem alike.

I think if Catholicism is to survive, the followers will have to rebel against the unjust Church edicts. I think this may be true for other religions as well.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: DMcG
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 03:17 PM

…when you are in the situation during childbirth you could only save mother or child, the teaching was to save the child always.

But if, as Joe says, the conscience has primacy, then you cannot have a hard and fast rule to cover all situations. These two concepts conflict.

When issuing these edicts, how much does the Church tell you about the primacy of conscience?

As I say, when I was told that I was around 7 and it was over 50 years ago, so I hope you don't expect me to remember the conversation verbatum. But I think what were told was sophisticated and complex but not actually conflicting. Yes, in the end conscience has primacy, we were told. But also, you have to be careful to distinguish between something 'as a matter of conscience' and claiming something is for reasons of conscience when it is simply 'that which you wanted to do'. It is no mean feat separating those two. As for the 'always', while the teachers did try to cover quite subtle things with us, that was understood to be 'always' in the informal conversational sense rather than the mathematical.

And for those who doubt it, this was the sort of thing taught to 7 year olds in my school!

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 03:39 PM

Sorry, that post wasn't aimed directly at you - it was a general question which I hope Joe will address. But the example I gave tried to pose a genuine conscience dilemma, and I don't think the distinction is very clear.

So, some rules *are* binding...? But which? And how do you interpret? What if you believe you're acting in good faith? Joe?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 04:49 PM

Don't forget... the worst they can do is not communicate with you. So... you actually DO have the ULTIMATE choice. I could make a crass joke at this point in addition to the slightly crass joke above, but given my tirade above, I had better remain dumb. I may just end up in purgatory.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 07:39 PM

Just when you thought you may have figured out Catholics in Rome, there are the whole gaggle of non-Roman and un-popely Catholics, such as the Eastern Orthodox Catholics, the Polish, the Lebanese, the Greeks, the Russians, those in the Orient - yada yada. And, then there are the Anglicans, who are Catholic, not protestant (and, of course the Orthodox Anglicans, known as the Anglican-Catholics)*

*Note the Anglicans, though born out of protest-like the Protestants, are not Protestant at all. They are actually Catholics in drag - I mean disguise, (sans the Pope and Rome) thought they still tend to protest against the power of Rome, much like the Protestants.

Pope Leo XIII's in 1896,said the Anglicans weren't at all Catholics, because their succession was invalid (as it was a broken in apostolic succession by the use of the Ordination Rite of King Edward VI, which deleted all reference to the central priestly function and was deliberately designed to contain no indication of the "fullness of the ministry", specific tasks of the Catholic bishop or the "high priesthood", which the Holy See saw as essential. The RC's see that their point of view, based on Late Medieval sacramental theory, is valid for all periods of Catholic church history).

However, the Anglicans, who see themselves inside "as Catholic as the Pope", protested that (among allot of other issues, no such priestly functions or sacramental theology were also evident in the Roman Catholic Papal ordination rites of the 9th and 10th centuries - this would make the Roman Catholic ordinations invalid as well, using the same criteria the RC Pope used against the Anglicans) they are as Catholic as the any other Catholic.


To confuse things, the Anglicans have kinda patched up historic differences with the protesting Protestant German Lutherans (former catholic, Martin Luther), and they now share some facilities and can attend each other's services. Recently, the last Pope tried to move closer with the Anglicans, saying they were maybe Catholic after all the disputes. Now I am not sure where other original Protesting protestants lie, those founded under the French under John Calvin and the Swiss under Ulrich Zwingli.Let's not forget that John Wesley largely credited, along with his brother Charles Wesley, founded the Methodist movement and was an Anglican cleric (aka Catholic) that felt he was helping evolve Anglican Catholicism but was more influential in promoting an evolved Protestantism, especially in the USA.

I could go on and on-but, I am getting tired:)


But, before I leave, I will confuse yo a bit more with some religious statistics by country:World religions

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,999
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 08:36 PM

"Now I am not sure where other original Protesting protestants lie . . .".

They lie in church, just like everyone else.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 08:48 PM

Hahahahahahaaaaaaaaaa! THAT is priceless, 9!

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 14 Mar 13 - 09:04 PM

:)

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 03:21 AM

Bonnie asks: Using Joe's reasoning, in this case it would be OK for the doctor-husband to perform the termination, because they have sincerely consulted their consciences. Is this correct?

That is correct, Bonnie. The Catholic Church might excommunicate both the doctor and the pregnant woman - but excommunication is an administrative action of the Catholic Church, and does not necessarily coincide with moral culpability.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains it quite clearly:

1778 Conscience is a judgment of reason whereby the human person recognizes the moral quality of a concrete act that he is going to perform, is in the process of performing, or has already completed. In all he says and does, man is obliged to follow faithfully what he knows to be just and right. It is by the judgment of his conscience that man perceives and recognizes the prescriptions of the divine law... (underlining mine)

If you'd like to see the entire line of thinking, follow the link. I replied to MtheGM that the teaching on conscience goes back at least to Thomas Aquinas, but it's quite in line with the anti-legalistic teaching of Jesus that is expressed in the New Testament.

This idea of primacy of conscience is hard for our legalistic world to understand, and many in authority in the Catholic Church do some fancy dance steps in attempts to assert their own authority. Church authorities often don't make it easy for Catholics to follow their consciences in moral decisions. A Mercy sister in our province was excommunicated by her archbishop for following her conscience in just such a situation. She was vice president of St. Joseph's hospital in Phoenix, and a member of the hospital's ethics board. She voted with the board to allow the hospital to perform an abortion when the mother's life was in danger. The hospital also lost its status as a Catholic hospital, and it can no longer have a Catholic chapel. In a wonderful statement of solidarity, the world headquarters of the Sisters of Mercy in Dublin is now home for the tabernacle from the hospital chapel.

When I was a kid, our religious education consisted mostly of memorizing questions and answers from the Baltimore Catechism, a compendium of the teachings of the Catholic Church that was based on the Catechism of Trent of the 16th century. In many ways, it was a dumb way to teach religion, but I still have those questions and answers in my head - and they're still solid theology. Most of it had a very positive tone, and there wasn't the emphasis on hellfire and damnation that so many people say they learned from the nuns.

I didn't hear much about hellfire and damnation from the Dominican nuns I had in grade school, or from the diocesan priests who taught me for eight years in the seminary in Milwaukee.

We had Passionist or Redemptorist priests come to the parish once a year to preach a parish "mission" - nightly sessions for the men one week, and for the women the next week. They always did the "hell" sermon on the last night, and it was always the most popular evening because those preachers were so graphic and dramatic and colorful in their presentations. The preachers heard confessions for hours after those presentations. Oh - and that was the night that the preachers took up the collection to pay for their services. But other than that one night a year, we didn't hear much about hell.

The Passionists and Redemptorists still preach parish missions, but they don't do "hell night" any more; and men and women attend together. Both orders of priests are renowned for their preaching and storytelling.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 03:55 AM

In the oft-neglected Original Post, gnu asks, "Why does anyone get pissy about the fact that the Cat'lic church is at least 70 years behind "the times" with regard to SOME issues? Isn't it NOT rocket science?"

Well, I get pissy about it all the time. I hold to the general compendium of Catholic teaching; but I think the Catholic Church is wrong in its teaching about homosexuality, contraception, and ordination of women and married people. I think the child molestation scandal is good evidence that the authorities of the Catholic Church do not have enough expertise in sexual matters to be able to give credible directives on matters of sex.

I agree with the Catholic Church that abortion is the taking of a human life, but I think it needs to approach this issue with far more compassion and understanding. I also think that if the Catholic Church would ally itself with Planned Parenthood and promote birth control, it could make a dramatic reduction in the number of abortions that take place.

But they haven't asked my opinion lately, and they're not likely to change theirs in the foreseeable future. So, on these matters, I listen to my conscience and wait for the day when the Powers That Be are enlightened.

Oh....one other thing: Ed T questions my statement about laicization. I said, "It's like saying a plumber is no longer a plumber, because he has committed a crime." Ed wonders why the Catholic Church can't decertify a priest in that manner. Ordination to the priesthood involves reception of a sacrament. Once a sacrament is bestowed, it cannot be taken away. It just doesn't work that way. Laicization is not ordinarily done as a punitive measure, although it can be granted to men who have resigned from the priesthood and want to get married. What is supposed to happen, is that a priest who commits a heinous crime like child molestation is supposed to have his faculties (his license to function as a priest) taken away. If a priest does not have "faculties," he does not have permission to function as a priest, anywhere in the world. But some of the organizations began to demand laicization of child molester priests, and now it is done in certain cases.

I don't mean to be condescending if I ask what a person knows about the teachings Catholic Church if he/she has not been inside a church for twenty years, or has not had significant Catholic religious education as an adult. It's true, though. If what you know about Catholic teaching is from the newspaper or from what you learned as a kid in catechism class, you really don't know. Trouble is, most adults within the Catholic church have had no adult education about what the Catholic Church teaches, either. It's not all that complicated. Most adults with a college education should be able to understand the Catechism of the Catholic Church quite well. And the official Catholic teaching in the Catechism is far less harsh and far more rational that many of the understandings of Catholic teaching that I see expressed above.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 05:06 AM

This idea of primacy of conscience is hard for our legalistic world to understand, and many in authority in the Catholic Church do some fancy dance steps in attempts to assert their own authority. Church authorities often don't make it easy for Catholics to follow their consciences in moral decisions. A Mercy sister in our province was excommunicated by her archbishop for following her conscience in just such a situation. She was vice president of St. Joseph's hospital in Phoenix, and a member of the hospital's ethics board. She voted with the board to allow the hospital to perform an abortion when the mother's life was in danger. The hospital also lost its status as a Catholic hospital, and it can no longer have a Catholic chapel.
.,,.
Sorry, Joe, but you seem to me to be doing a good job on our side of this question, in demonstrating a thoroughly alarming degree of confusion and inconsistency in the beliefs and practices of your authorities in relation to one another, to their 'flock', and to the communities they serve at large. I mean, if even those in charge can go against the authority of the Pope, because their consciences tell them to do so as authorised by their official doctrines as you quote above, resulting nevertheless, however 'conscientious' their decision and practice, in their being removed from the Communion ['excommunicated'] and forbidden to continue to own premises in which to practise the liturgies of their Faith... If even the right hand of the Church doesn't know, or can't control, what the left hand doeth, how can you expect the rest of us to understand, or respect, whatever is going on?

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 05:45 AM

A person does not need to know the details of the internal teachings of the RC church to make a personal assessment of the result - or, to recognize if something seems "out of wack or wrong" (in their opinion).

One does't have to know all the fine details of the internal workings of a car to recognize that something is going wrong and the car does not do what it is supposed to do. One does not need to have the knowledge of a medical specialist, to understand when a body is not working well. One doesn't have to go through years of training and apprentiship to know when the plumbing isn't working.

Many aspects of Christian religions are based on history and are the result of centuaries of human interpretations of Christs instuction. When I look back at some of the history, and some questionalble persons involved, it puts it all in perspective for me.

It is certainly an accomplishmment that some folks have invested the time to understand all the fine internal workings of the RC church. While that detail may be needed to diagnose what needs to be done to fix it from inside (if the option "to fix it" is present for the faithful), it is not needed to know when it needs fixing and what needs fixing.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 06:13 AM

Now you're starting to catch on, Michael. From the outside, the Catholic Church appears to be an absolute monarchy, ruled with an iron hand by an infallible pope. That's not how it works, and that's not how it's supposed to work. Every bishop is supreme authority in his own diocese, so the Pope's authority over them is akin to herding cats. But then, pastors are more-or-less supreme in their own parishes; and bishops don't have a whole lot of luck herding them, either.

On top of all that, parishioners belong to the Catholic Church voluntarily. They're largely ignorant of Catholic Church teaching and policy, so pastors don't have a lot of luck controlling them, either. In the United States, Catholics seem to know more about evangelical Christianity than they do of their own religion, because the evangelicals have overwhelmed the broadcast media.

Ideally, the Catholic Church is ruled by collegiality, with decisions made by consensus. The nuns in the U.S. actually make this work, but the men still seem to think they need an authoritative structure.

You're right - the Catholic Church is an absurd structure frought with "thoroughly alarming degree of confusion and inconsistency." But the essence of the Catholic Church isn't the structure or the authority. Although they may disagree about ancillary issues like birth control and the gender of priests and homosexuality, almost all Catholics share a belief in the central doctrines, mostly as expressed in the Nicene Creed of 325 AD - and there's very little disagreement among Christians (not just Catholics) about the Creed. The central acts of Catholic worship are the Mass and the sacraments, which are treasured greatly by all Catholics.

That's the point - it's not an authority structure, it's a worldwide community of believers. It's amazingly diverse, both in the ethnicity of its members and in its spectrum of theology. And membership is voluntary.

So, if you want to understand the reality of the Catholic Church, repeat this ten times:

Catholic Church: herding cats

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 06:23 AM

How can it be a "community of believers" whose "membership" is voluntary", who are not subject to external authority, if they can be involuntarily removed from the membership of the community if their conduct in some particular does not conform to the thinking of this [putatively non-existent] authority?

I am sorry, Joe; but from where I am sitting, far from my 'catching on', you are just not making any sort of coherent sense.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 06:25 AM

Controversy seems to have arisen surrounding the election of the new Argentinian pope.
It centres on the on the role of the church during the reign of terror which led to 10,000 Argentinians being murdered and more being tortured and 'disappeared' at the behest of the military junta.
The church was,as tends to be the case, silent on these events at the time, but one aspect in particular has been raised. Priests working among the poor in ghettos were ordered to desist; those who refused, had the protection of the church withdrawn leading to two being arrested and imprisoned for eight months, several more 'disappeared' and were never seen again.
It's not clear whether your man was directly involved though reports have suggested that he should make his position clear.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 06:58 AM

At this point, I think I'd like to quote Ronald Reagan: "There you go again, Jim."

The incident in question happened in 1976. Two Jesuit priests were kidnapped by the regime and tortured. It was claimed that Bergoglio failed to inform the regime that he supported the work of the two priests, and that resulted in their captivity and torture.

Given the fact that the incident happened 37 years ago and that it isn't clear what exactly the offense was, I'm not quite ready to send the guy to prison.

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 07:12 AM

I agree with the Catholic Church that abortion is the taking of a human life, but I think it needs to approach this issue with far more compassion and understanding. I also think that if the Catholic Church would ally itself with Planned Parenthood and promote birth control, it could make a dramatic reduction in the number of abortions that take place.

I agree with everybody that the taking out Saddam, Osama and Muammar was the taking of human lives. I agree that the deaths of innocent civilians in Gaza, in Shatila, in Iraq was the taking of human lives. So what am I saying here? Well nothing. So what were you saying? You were doing no more than staking out the same tired old moralising Catholic position. That is more than implicit in your next sentence, which calls for "compassion and understanding". In other words, abortion is wrong but let's try to understand it a bit more. Well this won't do. This is what has got us where we are, with scandalously high abortion rates and all the attendant misery, disease and poverty, especially for women. How about a different starting point. Abortion is not wrong, but there is a lot wrong with the Catholic church's stance on abortion. If we start right there we are beginning to see the light. We are beginning to see what it is we need to attack, and it certainly isn't women, if we want to get abortion numbers down (and I'm convinced that the Church doesn't actually want this. The Church is nothing without its sticks to beat us with). The bottom line is that the Catholic church hasn't got a bloody clue about abortion. It hasn't got a bloody clue about good sex education, about contraception, about raising the status of women, about dealing with poverty. The Catholic church, some time quite soon, is going to make a saint out of someone who preached that poverty is a virtue, not an evil to be confronted, and that abortion is a threat to world peace. When you lionise a person like that instead of meting out richly-deserved ostracism (cf. Jimmy Savile), you just know that the Church will never, ever do anything constructive about abortion. We'll get the same old sanctimony, the same old moralising, the same old institutionalisation of the submissive place of women.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 07:53 AM

> The Catholic Church might excommunicate both the doctor and the pregnant woman - but excommunication is an administrative action of the Catholic Church, and does not necessarily coincide with moral culpability.


WHAAAAAAT? Excommunicate them? So there are strings attached to this conscience thing. Strings big enough to strangle you.

It's not good enough to say Oh, the rules aren't binding, and then neglect to clearly cite the horrific consequences if somebody breaks one (and excommunication IS horrific for believing, practicing Catholics, as it's meant to be). They. Can't. Have. It. Both. Ways.

I know you're going to write a big long thing contradicting me and telling me how wrong I am, but moral logic is moral logic. Making something "allowable" but then punishing someone for it is no different from outlawing it EXCEPT THAT IT'S HYPOCRITICAL. It's pretending one thing while actually doing another. And you just seem blind to this.

Excommunication is not only depriving people of their worship, it's also a huge social stigma in large areas of the world. It will damn them in the eyes of their neighbors and get them shunned in many cases, harm their businesses, cause their children suffering from their peers at school - AS THEY DAMN WELL KNOW. It is pure mendacity to pretend otherwise.

And don't you dare tell me I'm over-dramatising or exaggerating. Just because it might not happen there (where you are: but the US is a big place) doesn't mean it happens nowhere. As Ed T has already pointed out, you seem to think that no one's experience or perspective is valid but your own.

ED T and MGM have both made the other comments I would have followed with and I can't improve on them. But I can repeat them (the boldface emphasis is mine):


MGM

Sorry, Joe, but you seem to me to be doing a good job on our side of this question, in demonstrating a thoroughly alarming degree of confusion and inconsistency in the beliefs and practices of your authorities in relation to one another, to their 'flock', and to the communities they serve at large.

How can it be a "community of believers" whose "membership" is voluntary", who are not subject to external authority, if they can be involuntarily removed from the membership of the community if their conduct in some particular does not conform to the thinking of this [putatively non-existent] authority?


ED T

A person does not need to know the details of the internal teachings of the RC church to make a personal assessment of the result - or, to recognize if something seems "out of wack or wrong"… [or] know all the fine details of the internal workings of a car to recognize that something is going wrong and the car does not do what it is supposed to do.
[BS: read "does not do what it says it does".]

It is certainly an accomplishment that some folks have invested the time to understand all the fine internal workings of the RC church… [but] it is not needed to know when it needs fixing and what needs fixing.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 08:26 AM

"Given the fact that the incident happened 37 years ago"
And there YOU go again Joe
There is no 'sell-by-date' on crimes against humanity, nor should there be
It is immaterial how long ago it happened and how many people were involved, this was the action of the established church and, as you say, directly involves Bergoglio.
What do you say to the surviving 'Mothers of the Disappeared' who were still meeting regularly up to fairly recently - "it was a long time ago, forget your children, go home and take up knitting".
Bergoglio was involved, and if he is going to operate in any effective way he should clear up exactly what part he played and where he stands on such regimes now.
The Church has a history of siding with despotic and oppressive regimes, particularly in South America, Chile, El Salvador, Argentina, Brazil...
Some people still talk, read about and watch films of "Hitler's Pope", who nodded through many thousands of Jews to their deaths at the hands of the Nazis.
If the church has any future role, it has to concentrating on the populace in general rather than giving unqualified support to history's monsters.
Don't sweep this one under the carpet too Joe.
This has not come to light because of my "going again", it is a public issue directly brought to light by the election of the pope - I should have thought it was important for you and all Catholics to ascertain that you got a suitable man for the job.
The last pope came into office with a historical blot on his copy-book which was brushed under the carpet in the same way the complicity of the German people in the Holocaust was, "They made us do it". For the sake of your church, don't let it happen again.
BTW - the Argentina affair involved more than two priests - stop supporting by minimising it (again)
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: DMcG
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 09:56 AM

Bergoglio was involved, and if he is going to operate in any effective way he should clear up exactly what part he played and where he stands on such regimes now.

Whatever else happens, I think it is pretty clear that the degree of involvement and his guilt or innocence is going to be gone over pretty thoroughly in the next month or so. There are too many people on all sides interested in getting to the bottom of it for things to just fade away.

In the meantime, I think it premature of us, on either side, to behave as if we knew all the facts already. And it is very easy for those of us who aren't under the threat of being disappeared to say how people who are/were should behave. I know a woman who lived near Belsen during the war and had her arm cut off by a soldier for offering some Jews being marched to the camp some bread. Who blames her for not doing anything else to help them after that? And what about those standing next to her who saw it happen? Are they to be blamed? What about those who only heard about it?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 02:14 PM

I am a little confused abou the military thing as well. I am not going to condemn him because I don't know the facts and none of us ever know how we will behave when a bayonet is at our throats. But I think it is unusual that with a new scandal breaking out every day in the church that they would not have immediately issued a statement (which they are now doing in response to many discussions) that we know about the accusations and they have been cleared to our satisfaction..signed..all the cardinals. Otherwise they (shock) look like they could not have seen this train wreck coming..surely someone had a dossier on him and could have revealed this in session..as in do we want to start out a papacy with this to deal with..or has it been sufficiently debunked and there will be a small storm and then it will be over..I do not know. He does seem like a very decent man from what I have seen, sincere etc...I just don't know.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 03:14 PM

Jim, I think that you and the conspiracy theorists have a lot in common. Much of what you say is correct, but you have no sense of time or proportion. Once I hear solid evidence one way or another, I'll make up my mind about what the pope did in 1976.

Why is it when you make these accusations, you consistently fail to give dates and data?

And I have to say again that 1976 was a long, long time ago. I really can't do anything now about what I did in 1976. In fairness, I think I should be judged by who I am now and what I've been doing in the last five or ten years.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 04:53 PM

Bonnie, I think that your expectation is that the Catholic Church should have all the questions answered, and that all Catholics should support those answers. You wouldn't want to belong to an organization that dictated all that you're supposed to think and do, but you think that Catholics should have such an organization so that it's easier for you to condemn Catholics without your being thought of as bigoted. You want to redefine the Catholic Church in fundamentalist terms, to make it easier for you to feel smug about condemning it. Your line of thinking cannot account for the messiness that quite healthily exists in the Catholic Church.

But no, it's isn't all that clear-cut. There are many Catholics who are every bit as intelligent and well-meaning as you are. They also question the Catholic Church's discrimination against women and homosexuals, its scandalous failure to protect children from molestation, and its illogical condemnation of birth control. Thinking Catholics exist in the Catholic Church in large numbers, and they don't always buy the company propaganda. The balance of the discussion seems to be tipped toward those in authority, but those who "dissent" have one big thing in their favor: their participation in the Catholic Church is voluntary. And all those thinking Catholics are still there, slowly and quietly pushing for change.

Yeah, it was a heavy price for our nun to pay, to be excommunicated for following her conscience. It's how conscientious objection works, however - you have to be ready to pay the penalty, knowing that the Almighty has a far higher opinion of you that church authorities do. To be readmitted, she had to go through a demeaning process of renouncing her decision to allow the abortion. She was moved to another diocese where the bishop wasn't so intent on grandstanding on the abortion issue, and she's back at work doing good stuff. Her religious order, the Sisters of Mercy, supported her completely during this trying time. But if Catholics don't pay the price and stand up for what is right, can we ever make any progress?

No, that Catholic Church is not going to make abortion "allowable" for those who choose abortion in good conscience. Yes, the Catholic Church will continue to impose sanctions on those who choose to have an abortion. It takes the issue of abortion seriously, and it has to impose sanctions to make its position stick. Still, it acknowledges that those who choose abortion in good conscience do not have moral culpability - i.e., they can't go to hell for it unless they think it's gravely evil and freely choose to do it anyhow.

A woman I know and love had two abortions in the 1980s. This woman would have been a good mother to those two children, but she was unable to escape her relationship with the children's father, and didn't feel she could raise the children safely in his presence. So, she chose abortion, and took the lives of those two children. I think the loss of those two children was wrong, and it is cause for grief. Still, I think the woman made the decision that was right for her. Now, that might not be satisfactory to those of you black-and-white people who think that things must be either right or wrong. But in real life, we have to make a lot of decisions that don't offer clear-cut moral certainty.

I suppose that according to Jim Carroll's rules, if I'm a good Catholic, I should condemn this woman for her abortions for the rest of her life. But those abortions happened thirty years ago, and they can't be undone. Life goes on, and this woman is a wonderful woman It would be absurd for anyone to continue to condemn this woman for decisions she made thirty years ago.

Our lives are full of grey. It's not all black-and-white.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 04:59 PM

Joe - I haven't made up my mind, please show me where I have.
I am aware of the Church's past and you are more than welcome to put me right if I am wrong, but it is not "conspiracy theorising" to point out the recorded facts regarding the new Pope - unless you would like to show me I have imagined it.
Nor is it "conspiracy theorising" to point out that the question of in his role at the time of Argentina's military coup has become an issue.
I'm afraid you're one of those people who prefers to deal with problems by undermining the credibility of the people who raise them rather than dealing with the problem head on.
Do you really need dates and data to learn the truth of what has happened and is still happening in these places - I don't believe for one minute that you are unaware of them and couldn't confirm or disprove them with a few dabs of the finger.
It is yet another real problem that your church must deal with if it is going to survive; you have to be aware of the damage already done by hoping that these problems will blow away with the next strong wind.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 05:15 PM

I'll admit you told the story quite fairly, Jim. I just wondered why you failed to report the dates in your narrative, as you failed to report the dates of the molestations at the school for the deaf in Milwaukee.

The context of time, is a very important one. Your failure to include the fact that these incidents took place in the 1970s, definitely and unfairly tips the scales in your favor.

On the other hand, what's ironic about this is that you and I basically agree. I think the Catholic Church has a long and sordid history of being in bed with tyrants. I acknowledge and detest the Catholic Church's failure to deal with the child molestation scandal at the time it was happening (it's dealing with it now, but now is far too late). I think that the Catholic Church should bless homosexual marriages and ordain women and married people. And I think the birth control ban is silly. And while I see abortion as objectively wrong, I adhere to the longtime Catholic position that sometimes people must choose between two wrongs, and then they must follow what their conscience dictates. I don't defend the Catholic Church's position on any of these matters. But still, it's my church, and I stick around to do what I can to move the church toward change. And I see these issues as important but ancillary - not central to the essence of the Catholic Church.



-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 05:23 PM

Don't tell me what my expectation is, and then generalise it to the point of meaninglessness.

My expectation is that if a large powerful body is going to impose rules and regulations (or severe punishments for transgressing them) they should be transparent about the implications and consequences of those regulations. In other words, say clearly what they mean and mean what they say. Whether it's about abortion, the contraception ban, or anything else. There's too much leeway for inconsistency. I am not the only person to have problems with the contradictions and non-answers, as you can see from the above posts.

You could at least try to get what I'm saying right. And I'm not the only one to say it.

> so that it's easier for you to condemn Catholics without your being thought of as bigoted

> You want to redefine the Catholic Church in fundamentalist terms, to make it easier for you to feel smug about condemning it. Your line of thinking cannot account for the messiness that quite healthily exists in the Catholic Church.

BULL!! Do not put words in my mouth. Do not tell me what I want and what I feel unless you have some clue as to what it is, and can get it even half right. And do not, DO NOT, DO NOT EVER use the word "bigot" in connection with me. Ever. It is a lie. YOU DO NOT KNOW ME, YOU ARE NOT QUALIFIED TO JUDGE, AND YOU DO NOT SIT ON ANY HIGH MORAL GROUND FROM WHICH TO CALL OTHER PEOPLE NAMES. And, most especially, do not ever ever call anyone else "smug". Pots and kettles.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 05:40 PM

""participation in the Catholic Church is voluntary""

Most likely this was not the case for the far too many children who were offered up and molested throughout the years. Their parents did so in trust and with confidence that they were safe, and that this Christian-based church would enrich their lives. Unfortunately, this trust was violated again and again over the years. I suspect many parents ignored all the clues, and were blinded with the long-held belief that people they trusted fully, those in decision making positions of authority, could do no wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 05:42 PM

Bonnie, moral issues are complicated. You insist they should be simplistic, but they just aren't. Everything we do, has complicated implications. HOWEVER, the Catholic teaching on morals is that in the end, no matter what anybody else says, you have to follow your heart and do what you think is right - even if the Catholic Church says you're wrong.

Take just one issue, birth control. Pope Paul VI covered the issue in his encyclical, ("Human Life"). You can read the entire thing here (CLICK). In this document, the matter of birth control is discussed in context, and you can judge from the document its level of importance. Please note that the document says nothing about sending anybody to hell for taking a birth control pill.

If you at least browse through this one document, you'll see how moral issues are handled by the Catholic Church. It's all in print (and now on the Vatican Website) for those who care to take the time to read it.

Sorry I made you angry. It's not that you are a bigot. It's just that you aren't very tolerant....

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 05:55 PM

Time to fess up.Last cookie-less guest twas me.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 06:18 PM

Never mind Heaven & Hell, Joe. You speak with the utmost confidence about them, which is, in the true sense, an entire begging of the question about their very existence, which sounds like a pretty good fairy tale to some of us. I am sure that the person driven from her employment, and her Communion, by the Church for following her conscience, despite their own assertion, from Aquinas et al, that the conscience must be paramount, must feel very much consoled by the consideration that, tho the Church has driven her from the occupation she loves and the Communion & comforts of her Faith, because it must, despite its own teaching [or, rather, as the result of that confusion & inconsistency whereby two of its own teachings -- regarding the primacy of conscience v. the mortal sin of abortion -- are in conflict with one another], if she truly acted conscientiously she won't have to go to Hell after all! That must cheer her occupationless and Communionless declining years immeasurably, I am sure! Tho the consideration that there are probably many in authority in the Church who continue in the conviction that, yes, she will suffer damnation because she has committed a mortal sin for which she has lost the right to absolution by Confession, might give her occasional pause, at that...

One of the things that has always puzzled me about people's need for religion [I remember making exactly this point to a very Orthodox Jewish colleague once], is that life, by its very nature, is bound to be full of acute problems and difficulties from the off: so why-oh-why, I cannot help asking, do so many people embrace systems & lifestyles which seem to me to function entirely on the compulsion to add to them to the degree of ∞? Beats me!

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 06:29 PM

Since my attempt at centralizing the discussion thru brainstorming had NO effect on keeping this thread in line with the OP, allow me some drift too.... if you will... if you dare...

Define "Hell". Go on. I'll bet less than 0.0001% of you can do it... even the "GOOD" Cat'lics. I'll spot Joe on this.

Joe... don't answer for a while, please.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 08:26 PM

You are put in a fire and roasted for eternity.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 09:16 PM

Hell (A few definitions from the Urban Dictionary) - take your pick:

1)By far the most effective fear tactic created by an intelligent human being centuries ago used to control millions of people by taking the mystery of live and giving them insecurity of the unknown nature of death. There is no such place. People that claim they have had near death experiences to hell are lying.
The pastor mentioned hell quite often before passing the offering plate.

2) The life we are living now. Seriously, with over thousands of ways to die and suffer on Earth you shouldn't be surprised. At least in Hell you know you're dead so you can be as carefree as you want.

3) A place that child molesters told their victims they'd go if they told anyone.

4) A word used at the start of a southerner's sentence.
Hell,I think those chickens are just trying to get eaten.

5) The Department of Motor Vehicles. A place where you stand in line for 4-5 hours, in mid-summer, in a building with no air conditioning, only to be told by one of Satan's imps that you lack 1 one of the 5 forms of identification needed to exchange your Minnesota drivers licence for a Utah one.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 09:22 PM

A woman I know and love had two abortions in the 1980s. This woman would have been a good mother to those two children, but she was unable to escape her relationship with the children's father, and didn't feel she could raise the children safely in his presence. So, she chose abortion, and took the lives of those two children.

No. She chose abortion. Just stop right there.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 03:47 AM

I guess, Steve, that you see moral decisions as either right or wrong. You "believe" in abortion, so you see the choice of abortion as always right. Moral decisions are often far more complicated, and introspective people tend not to be so sure they're right. Because of my friend's decision, two young people are not living today. In at least some sense of the term, she took the lives of those two children. I think she made the proper decision, but I still think there's reason to grieve the loss of those two lives. If a woman has a miscarriage, there is cause for grief, even though it is a natural thing that happens time and time again. If a woman has an abortion, there is also reason to grieve - even if the decision to abort was the proper decision.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 03:56 AM

"Jim. Jim. I just wondered why you failed to report the dates in your narrative, as you failed to report the dates of the molestations at the school for the deaf in Milwaukee.as you failed to report the dates of the molestations at the school for the deaf in Milwaukee."
Because they are totally irrelevant to the discussion Joe
Quite frankly, I have become sick to the back teeth on another thread, of somebody defending the massacre of 3,500 unarmed refugees because "it happened thirty years ago".
It is totally unimportant how long ago these events took place, just as it is not important that child abuses stopped (if the have stopped) 10, 20, 30 - however long ago.
The fact that they happened, the way that they happened, why they happened and who was involved are all relevant to this case - when is not.
If somebody elected to the highest holy office there is, is accused of collaborating with a viciously murderous regime, that merits investigation and should not be given a get-out card because it happened a long time ago.
At the time I watched film reports of the 'Mothers of the Disappeared' standing silently with on the streets with placards requesting (not demanding) that they should be told of the fate of their sons and daughters. If the church, particularly if the new pope, was in any way part of that terrorism, then the Catholic faithful have every right to know how and why (if it matters and if they don't already know, they can simply find out when).
Atrocities do not have a shelf life, they are part of the history of our history and certainly the history of every person and every institution involved, and the more we know the more likely it is that they will never happen again
I didn't bring this matter to public notice (and I bitterly resent being equated with a "conspiracy theorist".
I believe it should automatically be part of any discussion like this so I drew attention to it.
Please tell my why the time these events occurred is important.
http://www.snapnetwork.org/survivors_voice/pollard_case_against_forgetting.htm
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 04:40 AM

And just who was it, Jim, that "defended" the massacre of 3,500 unarmed refugees? It was indeed a horrible thing, but it's history. Nothing, nothing at all can be done about it now - except that you can capitalize on it as ammunition to destroy somebody living now. You can carry on and on with your self-righteous horseshit; but in the end, it's just outright bigotry.

You start with the assumption that the Catholic Church that is part of who I am, is evil. Then you build on it with the assumption that Catholics must be evil or profoundly stupid to belong to their church.

Catholics don't deny that Catholic leaders have been in bed with dictators, particularly in Latin America. To say that Catholics deny or defend that, is a fucking lie.

Catholics don't deny the child molestation scandal. For Christ's sake, the victims were Catholic children! To assert that Catholics deny or defend the child molestation scandal, is a fucking lie.


And a person who tells fucking lies, may well be a fucking liar.

And a fucking bigot, on top of that.

I've had it with the lot of you, all you fucking bigots. What's the difference between you and the Know-Nothings and the Ku Klux Klan? Nothing, not a damn thing. I acknowledge all the wrongs of the church I love, and I've worked all my life to understand and correct those wrongs. But you bastards don't want to carry on a discussion. All you want to do is attack and destroy.

You're bigots, all of you. You're very self-righteous about it, but so was the Ku Klux Klan. Jim Carroll, Steve Shaw, and Bonnie Shaljean, you three are the worst of the bigots, no matter how self-righteous you may be about it.

I'm disgusted with you. I thought you were intelligent, tolerant people and that it would be worthwhile to discuss things with you. But no, you're blinded by your hatred. And I'm sick of it. I'm happy about the election of the new Pope. He seems like a decent, gentle man. I'm hoping that he will cure at least some of the many ills of my church. If you think of yourselves as fair, reasonable people, don't attack him unless you have proven evidence.

And don't say I defend the massacre of 3,500 unarmed refugees. You fucking liar.

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MartinRyan
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 04:46 AM

Calm down, Joe! As you well know, attempts to replace "the opium of the people" with cheap, proletarian weed only induce smugness in the purveyors.

Regards

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 04:51 AM

No, Martin, I won't calm down. All my life, I have believed that "liberals" were tolerant, decent people who would give others a fair break. That's not the case here at Mudcat. The liberals are every bit as bigoted as the fascists. Maybe it's time for them to learn that what they attack, is what others hold sacred - for reasons they can't begin to understand. And it has nothing to do with "defending" wrongdoing. Fucking bastards.

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MartinRyan
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 05:10 AM

The liberals are every bit as bigoted as the fascists.


Of course. Forty odd years ago, I spent a year as a post-grad student in University College Cork. The Chemistry Department had just appointed two new professors. For the first time in the College's history, neither was a Cork graduate. One (my research supervisor) was a conservative Catholic from Northern Ireland; the other was an English atheist - "liberal about everything except other people's religion", as I described him at the time. In many ways an intelligent, rational scientist with an inherent courtesy in his dealings with others, he simply had no idea what went on in the heads of those of a religious persuasion. You can imagine how he got on in conservative, Catholic Cork at the time...

Several of our regular disputants remind me of him - without the courtesy.

Regards

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 05:54 AM

It seems wrong, based on a difference of perspective/opinion on any topic, to negatively brand all of the liberal-leaning people on mudcat. And, IMO, it is wrong to indicate these folks views are all "cut from the same cloth". It also seems foolhardy to suggest fine mudcat folks lump all RCs and the organization together as evil. Differences of opinion on specific topics, and heated discourse, does not give good reason to demonize anyone.

It has been suggested earlier that Mother Teresa was not without her flaws, as earlier portrayed in the media. Unfortunately, a close look at any human reveals human flaws. But, at a minimum, my observation is this woman seemed to keep her language (at least in public domain) respectful and civil. There is something to be said for that.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 06:17 AM

240 posts compared to my 130 posts. I applaud you, Joe, for trying to wade thru the bullshit so long before turning from "gnu to Wildebeeste". There have been lots of interesting and insightful posts, some also very funny posts (Hell is the DMV - hehehehe, good one, Ed) but there have been far more ranging from pure bullshit to vile.

I do know one thing for certain : Joe is going to heaven. On accounta Joe knows what hell is.

In my case, it's a tossup, but there is always hope.

I will continue to read this thread for a while yet but I do find it difficult at times.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Joe Offer
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 06:18 AM

You know, Ed, sometimes it's appropriate to get angry, especially in the face of bigotry and injustice.

The word "fucking" tends to get the attention of the bigots, when nothing else works.

You will excuse my exaggeration. Heck, I consider myself to be a "liberal-leaning person." It's only certain individuals who express the bigotry, but it causes me great disillusionment. I thought they were bigger than that.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 06:40 AM

Dear Joe: I do not wish to aggravate your resentment at the obloquy of things you hold dear; and I appreciate your not including me in your list of the prime villains of the thread [at least, I think I do, but perhaps there is some ambivalence here!]. And I know you are not a person who is easily stirred up to such a degree of animadversion. But I do think that, with your deep beliefs, you fail to see that others feel just as strongly that beliefs of this sort are a mischievous drag on human enlightenment and progress; and so are bound to express themselves as vehemently against them as you do in their defence. I honestly do not believe that the nay-sayers to your convictions deserve the sort of opprobrium you have, most uncharacteristically it seems to me, heaped on them, for expressing their honest and deeply-held opinions in tones of emphatic conviction. They [we] see it as their [our] duty to do so to as great an extent as you feel honour-bound and motivated to contradict them. On a forum of this sort, may not contrary views be vigorously expressed without incurring such a degree of rage?

With respect, and genuinely loving difference of view

~Michael~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 06:56 AM

MtheGM... "...as you feel honour-bound and motivated to contradict them."

Talk about a poor choice of words given what Joe is upset about. I don't think it's true, either.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 07:20 AM

When I am not closely attached to an issue, I can just about argue either side, and easily see perspectives on any position.

However, there are some issues that are "closer to my heart" that cloud this broader perspective. These fall in the "danger zone" where I am more likely to loose my cool and tolerance to extreme views or approaches. I suspect we are all like that. When it happens to me I normally see myself as "spinning my wheels" and just losing traction on progressing on issues.

As to the new pope, I choose to be positive and not to rush to judgement (but, I may add that, because of the lessons of history, I am cautious about my level of enthusiasm) It is a minimum I would expect if I took on a new job and a big task. Because of the nature of the post, there are many media folks seeking out the warts,and many eager ears waiting to learn of of them.

Because he is human, and has been around for awhile, I expect and am tolerant to some warts. Just because the church organization has been accused of questionable practices, it does not mean that he has been an active part of that.

Additionally, I believe we have to be understanding that it is complex to operate under an extremely cruel dictatorship. One would have to be there to better understand the challenges. There are different views of the value of serving the needs of a larger number of people over the longer term, versus sacrificing this to help a few persons in pressing need. There is also the issues involved with the separation of church from governments, the good ones and the bad.

I suspect if we were to closely examined our past "heros" who have accomplished good works with the same rigor as today, there would be many warts showing. Today, leaders are under greater public scrutiny than ever before, and citizens are increaingly interested in paying more attention to the warts than the potential.(maybe the media and technologuy and social media plays a part in that, or, maybe it is just changes in society) But, IMO, even people who made mistakes in the past, and are not "perfect humans" (and will also make mistakes in the future) can accomplish good things.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 07:21 AM

Thank you for that little outburst Joe - it clears the air no end.
I have never as you claim referred to "the The Catholic Church that is part of who I am, is evil", neither do I believe it.
If you are as honest as you claim to be you will either show where I have or will withdraw your accusation and apologise.
That the Church hierarchy has carried out evil acts is beyond dispute - the covering up of child rape and passing the perpetrators on to fresh field and pastures new, thus allowing them to continue their practices is as evil as evil as it gets.
The continual denial of access of documents so the survivors of those abuses are unable to get closure comes a pretty close second.
Not far behind is the relegation of these crimes to "the past", which leaves the door open for the whole bloody affair to start all over again because they have been forgotten.
How dare you describe me or anybody else as a bigot because the behaviour of the church make us wish that these things never happen again and try to prevent them doing so by attepting to show what has been and is still shrouded in secrecy.
It is those who put a statute of limitations on such abuses who are the greatest bigots.
You never responded to the link I produced; did you even bother to read it. I didn't really expect you to; the continuing suffering of survivors of long-term abuse does not appear to interest you.
My definition of 'the church' takes in the rank and file faithful who give support and follow its teachings, including those who were betrayed and defiled by its officers. Thes include family members and dear, sometime lifelong frieds and aquaintences.
"And don't say I defend the massacre of 3,500 unarmed refugees. You fucking liar."
I never claimed you did and if you don't withdraw the accusation, it is you who is the fucking liar.
If you hadn't become so apoplecticly defensive about all this you might have read what I wrote - I suggest you put your head between your knees, take a few deep breaths and do so again.
Your bullying and aggressively hectoring attitude here sums up the reception that greeted many of the abuse victims when they finally had the courage to reveal what happened to them, thank you for giving such a clear example
Just as with the abuse, the churches historical relationship with dictators and human rights abusers speaks for itself, and that too has no statute of limitations, especially as one of those who may have been involve has just been elected pope. At the very least, your followers have the right to know.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 07:34 AM

Every once and awhile someone says something to each of us that makes us look at life in a different perspective.

With me it was a new (former) boss who was dealing with negativity in the workplace. He said, "when you talk with me, forget about making complaints. I can't do anything about any complaint. But, I can possibly do something with a request. So, instead of putting your energies into making complaints, it's best to put them into making requests and suggestions on how we can make changes."

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 07:41 AM

Jim.
I never claimed you did and if you don't withdraw the accusation, it is you who is the fucking liar

Your claim that ANYONE, member or guest, has been "defending the massacre of 3,500 unarmed refugees " is a lie, and you are a liar.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 09:18 AM

I want to know, please, why I am a "bigot".

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Allan Conn
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 09:57 AM

"To assert that Catholics deny or defend the child molestation scandal, is a fucking lie"

Well at least some leading Catholics do. Maybe not defend the act itself but defend the perpretators. Evidence of that is the cover ups that have gone on. Then there is the statement from a South African Catholic Cardinal today in his statement suggesting that paedophilia is not a criminal condition.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 11:13 AM

MtheGM... "...as you feel honour-bound and motivated to contradict them."
Talk about a poor choice of words given what Joe is upset about. I don't think it's true, either.
.,,.
-Gnu
I find this response of yours to mine addressed to Joe somewhat gnomic. In fact I can make nor heads nor tails of what you are on about. Would you care to elucidate, please?

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 11:20 AM

An interesting article:
You can't Saw Sawdust

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 11:34 AM

Only recently an article appeared in the Irish Times quoting an abuse victim's story of the first reaction when she told her parents what had happened to her. Her father took his belt and beat her for the 'lies' she told about what the PP had done to her.


While I have no doubt that on a personal level catholics abhor what has taken place, there's still the creeping suspicion the church would have liked the whole scandal to just go away and too many apologies were only issued under the overwhelming pressure of public opinion.

The way orders initially tried (and managed) to off-load the main burden of payments to victims to the Irish state may be taken as an indication the willingness to accept the consequences of all revelations and scandals was maybe not as complete as some would like us to believe.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Musket
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 11:43 AM

Fascinating word "bigot."

it is a word that non bigots use to describe bigots. It is also a word that bigots use to describe non bigots.

At the end of the day, religions like to think that 1) the law of the land isn't superior to their codes of practice and b) rational people should have to not only listen but respect the proclamations of those whom members of such cults call their leaders.

Joe tries to draw a balanced argument based on his sincere beliefs, background and assertion that religion still has a place in society. The problem is that to those who think otherwise, only the bad bits stick, as the good bits can be delivered without the irrational baggage.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 05:37 PM

""most people consider themselves not only to be skilled in reasoning, but in fact more skilled than just about everyone else.""

Charles S. Peirce, USA philosopher,largely responsible for the development of the philosophical school of Pragmatism

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Ed T
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 05:47 PM

""Few persons care to study logic, because everybody conceives himself to be proficient enough in the art of reasoning already. But, I observe that this satisfaction is limited to one's own ratiocination, and does not extend to that of other men.""
- Charles Peirce, The Fixation of Belief

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 06:26 PM

MtheGM... "...as you feel honour-bound and motivated to contradict them."
Talk about a poor choice of words given what Joe is upset about. I don't think it's true, either.
.,,.
-Gnu
I find this response of yours to mine addressed to Joe somewhat gnomic. In fact I can make nor heads nor tails of what you are on about. Would you care to elucidate, please?"

No prob responding to a guy like you... others, not so much. So...

"Honur bound and motivated" are assumptions of yours perhaps based on your interpretations of Joe's posts (Need I say IMO for the uneducated?). I certainly do not agree. I see Joe's posts as responses that are measured and well written in such a manner as to explain a singular certain very basic logic. Let me explin that logic in a way that most readers will understand (forgive me if I paraphrase and, Joe, if I got this wrong, smite me)....

Not all Cat'lics fuck little boys and damn near all Cat'lics would kick tha livin shit outtta any piece a trash that did. Got that!????

I could go on about how things are getting cleaned up on THAT ONE ISSUE or discuss others issues but I hope you get the gist.

Now... "contradict them"? WTF did he contradict? Fuck all except the fallacies... and the bigotry... and the lies. He never contradicted any valid statements or arguements that I read in this thread.

I guess, in the end, MtheGM, it may be solely interpretation. Such may lead to what happened when Joe couldn't take the bullshit anymore... but he didn't say what I have said often here and it happened to him herein... "Don't put words in my mouth." I go from gnu to Wildebeeste in a nanofuckingsecond when someone does that to me.

In closing, allow me to say to all of you who persecute the Cat'lic RELIGION... when those slimey bastards arrive at my door early on Saturday morning and want to SELL me their religion, I think to myself, being RC, "Who the fuck PAYS for religion?" So, that's when I say to them that I am Black Irish Catholic. If they say one more word, I say, "And it's a good thing we Cat'lics are TOLERANT of other religions. Otherwise, seeing as how there are SO many of us, you wouldn't FUCKING EXIST."

Think about all of that before any of you shit on Joe again for being simply logical and defending his FAITH... his RELIGION... and NOT those who have tresspassed against others. If ANY of you can't understand that you will never go to hell... ya ain't got the fuckin brains for it.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 06:38 PM

Oh, yeah... how we doin on the hell thing? Anybody besides good Cat'lics know what hell really IS?

I mean, why not ask? Youse never answered the OP or much partcipated the revised version. Dunno why... too complictaed? or are youse just too focused on shitting on the floor? (Again... floor.. naw... nevermind.)

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 07:31 PM

Now... "contradict them"? WTF did he contradict? Fuck all except the fallacies... and the bigotry... and the lies. He never contradicted any valid statements or arguements that I read in this thread.

He contradicted nothing. He simply lashed out and called three of us bigots. I'm waiting for the explanation of why Bonnie, Jim and me are bigots. I understand how honest people can feel cornered by powerful arguments and lash out. I've done it myself on occasion, then realised afterwards that losing my rag whilst others kept their heads was a pretty futile strategy. Bonnie, Jim and my good self put in considerable effort - maybe misguided at times, who knows - into what we post. Most often it's based on a fair bit of homework beforehand. I'm always happy with my standpoint, because I've done that collar-work, though I never feel it's impregnable, but I feel OK as long as I've done my homework first. Yes I'm biased against Catholicism. Well, against all organised religion if I'm honest. But that does not blind me at all to the fact that billions of people adhere to certain faiths, and what a bloody clot I would be to call them all fools or deny their right to hold whatever beliefs they want to hold. I do not agree with Joe on most levels, though I can see that he is a very sincere man in his beliefs and (like me as it happens) would like to see Catholicism in a much healthier state than it currently is, for the sake of its hundreds of millions of followers. One of the greatest sins of Catholicism is that it requires its people to be guilty, sinful, miserable wretches who are sorely in need of salvation. I take no pleasure in that "told-you-so" way when the Church hits the buffers, because that means its followers are suffering as well. I don'rt really care that much if someone calls me a bigot, but I think I'm owed a bit of an explanation at least.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 08:08 PM

Hey Joe, you're overreacting. You have every right to your belief system and if others take exception to something the Church does, they have that right too.

As much as religion tends to dominate the culture in the U.S., I don't think any branch of it is completely monolithic. There are Catholics and Catholics, Jews and Jews, Protestants and Protestants, Muslims and Muslims, etc.

As far as the Pope is concerned, the jury is out on him in his association with the Argentine dictator. This remains to be uncovered.

Many religious folk take a slam at their religion personally. I think that if they do this,
they belie their "faith" in which criticism shouldn't matter if they really "believe".

Everyone is a bigot in some areas of their lives. You and I have some of this too.

So cool off on the shouting folks down. They have a right to their opinions and so do you.

But throwing "bigot" around doesn't address the problem of communication. These people who you have cited have something important to address and it's not just hatred but criticisms that if you explored them, you might be in agreement.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 08:58 PM

In a peculiar way, the fact that this Pope connived in a vicious regime's activities, or that the last Pope was a member of Hitler Youth, matters very little in any substantive sense. Yes, these facts (and facts they are, despite the desperate spin put on them by the Vatican hierarchy) give gleeful atheists and the like some wonderful sticks to thrash Catholicism with. But the underlying, and far more serious, issue is that this Pope, despite his much-trumpeted humility and penchant for doing "ordinary things", is at least as reactionary as God knows how many popes before him. The Catholic community takes lying down the election of a chap by a bunch of shagged-out, utterly unworldly old cardinals in frocks, not a woman in sight, yet women are overwhelmingly the victims of Catholicism. The major issue for Catholics (if they see it as an issue, which I admit many may not)is that nothing can change as a result of the election of this pope. See how we rail against regimes in Iran, Egypt, China and the rest for their undemocratic ways, yet we gleefully accept the election of a geriatric Pope by smoke. Gimme strength!

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 09:08 PM

"He contradicted nothing. He simply lashed out and called three of us bigots."

Anyone can read all the posts on this thread. So anyone can determine whether or not that statement is true.

That's as far as I read. I am outta here. If you don't understand why... well, yer never goin ta hell.

HINT : Ignorance is bliss.

Blindness for the sighted is just plain sad as it isn't even a
poor excuse but a simple ruse by which they fool themselves and attempt to fool others.

Whaddya mean that don't make sense? Sure it does. Think about it.

gnightgnu

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 09:32 PM

Joe....Thats my boy!! :0)
They ARE bigots who want to destroy religion not because they are more intelligent or have greater understanding than people of faith, but because religion is seen by them as the last bastion of conservatism.....it is really a political agenda, and they care not a whit for the views of others.....they are illiberal in the extreme.

The fight back starts here you scumbags.... :0)

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 09:39 PM

If I call someone a bigot I have a pretty clear idea in my mind why I would be using that term. Akenaton is a bigot of the highest order, for example. His last post provides all the evidence one needs to make that assertion. We really ought to thank him for providing such a clear illustration of the true meaning of the term.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 09:39 PM

If I call someone a bigot I have a pretty clear idea in my mind why I would be using that term. Akenaton is a bigot of the highest order, for example. His last post provides all the evidence one needs to make that assertion. We really ought to thank him for providing such a clear illustration of the true meaning of the term.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 09:40 PM

I'll swear I sent that just the once.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 09:55 PM

Steve, you confuse bigotry with plain speaking....I doubt that you can contradict anything which i write, either on the health issues associated with homosexuality or on how homosexuality is perceived in the public sphere.

The world does not end at the walls of your "liberal" bubble.

I have no agenda to irradicate homosexuals....live and let live i say....toleration etc etc. I do feel it is correct to comment on what i see as bad legislation and to give my reasons for doing so. I know you think that makes ME a bigot, but THAT is more of a reflexion on your mindset than my views.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 10:05 PM

I came back to make another point because it was bugging me and I read Ake trying to suck up to Joe and make this thread about his (Ache's) gay agenda... nevermind... yer all goin ta hell... well, those with a concience that is.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 02:36 AM

""live and let live i say....toleration etc etc.""

That would be hilarious Ake, if it weren't so tragic.

I think you actually believe that ridiculous statement, in the face of multiple threads which expose again and again your total intolerance of travellers, homosexuals, British Pakistanis and fellow members of this forum, capped off with a rabid hatred of anything or anybody you categorise as "liberal", whatever that means in your bubble of intolerance.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 05:26 AM

"That would be hilarious Ake, if it weren't so tragic."
Not forgetting this is the guy who suggested that the Norwegian mass murderer Breivik had some 'important points that were worth listening to'
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 06:28 AM

It has taken me until now to calm down enough to even come back on the site, so this is the first time I've seen this thread since my previous message a couple of days ago. And I wrote this post before reading everything that follows my last one. Wow. Now I'm a "fucking" bigot. (Isn't there supposed to be some rule about no personal attacks on Mudcat? Or does that only apply to the rest of us?)

I'm going to send it anyway, as-is, because its basic point hasn't changed. For "I" and "me" you can simply read "we" and "us."

From: Joe Offer
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 05:42 PM

It's not that you are a bigot. It's just that you aren't very tolerant

Another lie. Joe, DO NOT make character judgments on me. Don't try to tell me what I "am". You Do. Not. Know.

Do not call me names simply because a viewpoint I have clashes with one of yours. You do not have the right to pronounce judgment on me. And you especially do not have the right to twist my words and paraphrase me with things I *did not say*. Most of the time I have been simply asking questions.

And: You're criticising me for TOLERANCE????? That's rich, considering the tolerance-level of the institution you spend so much time defending.

Nowhere have I shown myself to be "anti-Catholic" because I am simply not. Asking fair questions - which still have not been answered to satisfaction - is not being bigoted or anti- or whatever slander you feel like slinging my way.

There is a difference between critical query and attack, but this is such a vulnerable area for you that you can't seem to distinguish between the two. There is also a difference between moral issues being "complicated" and being self-contradictory. Reading through the texts does not make them less so.

But whatever about arguing points of religion: DO NOT ASSIGN CHARACTER-DESCRIPTIONS TO ME. You have no right to sit in judgment on anyone.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 06:47 AM

I've just put this thread into "printer-friendly" mode and made a PDF of it. 128 pages. Gosh.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 07:08 AM

In the past I have seen where Joe has gone back afterwards and edited a few of his posts. Wonder if that's going to magically happen again?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 07:10 AM

I have no agenda to irradicate homosexuals....live and let live i say....toleration etc etc.
This inane remark reinforces your image as a bigot. You can't see it, can you. "Toleration"? So homosexuals are to be "tolerated", huh? Any provisos for them while you're at it? Instead, how about celebrating diversity and difference and living together?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 07:35 AM

Feel free to correct my capricious italics any time in your pdf, Bonnie. :-(

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 09:06 AM

I dont "suck up" to Joe, for any reason.....I dont "suck up" to anyone, either here or in the real world.

I have been urging Joe to stand up to the "mice" who have been attacking him and what he obviously believes in. These people are not liberal, they are an excellent definition of "liberals".

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 09:17 AM

Erm, in case you hadn't noticed, Ake, Joe has been doing a great job of "standing up" (which is not how I'd describe it) to opposing opinions. Since when is it not allowed to express dissenting viewpoints and ask valid questions? I don't see why the demonisation of people who don't share his beliefs should go unchallenged.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 09:26 AM

Steve....how do you find it possible to "celebrate" a lifestyle that carries with it such horrific rates of sexual infection?

Are you so blinded by your agenda that you cannot see that male to male sex is highly dangerous to those who participate in it.
In my opinion,the extreme promiscuity which you say causes these inflated rates is a symptom of, and endemic to male homosexuality.

The church is correct to point this out, whether it be a fashionable viewpoint or not; unfortunately the church continues to encourage the practice by retaining the celibacy rule and filling the priesthood with homosexuals......the highest figure in the catholic Church in Scotland has just been accused of sexual misconduct with young men so something is obviously amiss.

However, that is very different from attacking the whole ethos of religious faith, as seems to be happening in this thread.
All churches should reflect a socially conservative view in their teaching, do do otherwise would mean they become only another cult.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 09:43 AM

Sorry Bonnie...cross posted.

I dont think Joe was referring to you in particular, your messages seem to be reasonable even when they are critical.
You also seem to know exactly what you are talking about, unlike a handful of other "attack dogs" who reside here.

Joe is trying to explain and defend feelings which are very personal to him, to a group of people who neither share, nor even have any understanding of such matters.
His outburst was understandable and long overdue...in my opinion.
He has apologised to you personally and from his words it can be easily deduced that he respects your opinions.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 09:48 AM

There is absolutely no reason why a homosexual "lifestyle" should be inherently more hazardous than a heterosexual "lifestyle". HIV is a predominantly heterosexual problem in much of Africa, which highlights the true issue, that sexually transmitted diseases are to do with poor education, ignorance often promoted by religion and the unavailability of condoms. You are using statistics to shore up your moral crusade, when the statistics actually reveal a lot more about what a bunch of numpties we are when it comes to sex education and how easy it is for religion and moralising to get in the way. It's the same with the horrid abortion rates. Moralising perpetuates these problems. Leave your morals at the door, stop being so bloody triumphalist about statistics that actually show something you're not talking about, and think about practical measures just for once.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Musket sans cookie
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 10:28 AM

What a thread eh?

Joe loses his temper. Akenaton explains his bigotry in plain easy to understand words but then fails to see what he is describing and then to cap it all the thread is about how the new Pope gets to grips with a reality he has no experience of. And neither did the cardinals when they chose an apologist for the Argentinian junta. Let alone his views on human beings, especially women and gays.

I doubt I shall be using his pronouncements as my guide.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 10:44 AM

Steve, please answer the question, why should we "celelebrate"
sexual behaviour which produces such results?

Apparently sexual custom in parts of Africa determines that hetero males behave in a very promiscuous manner, this is to be condemned, but at the moment we are discussing infection rates in the developed western countries where information and education is readily available.    Perhaps you could take a little time out from your "celebrations" to explain the huge discrepancies between homo and hetero infection rates, not only for hiv but for most serious, sexually transmitted diseases.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 11:47 AM

"Sorry Bonnie...cross posted.I don't think Joe was referring to you in particular"
.,,.
Yes he was, Ake; he specifically named Bonnie, along with Jim & Steve, as being those who had provoked his outburst. You weren't reading carefully. Not sure why he left me out; don't think I am revealing any cabinet secrets if I say I had some PM correspondence, which he initiated, with him on the matter.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 11:52 AM

Strange, because I hadn't written anything in the intervening time - and my previous post was simply defending my character. Not sure what provoked the fresh outburst in my case. Whatever new thing I did, I managed it while I wasn't even logged in!

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 01:22 PM

I don't think you can separate the Pope's "conservative" views from his embracing of an authoritarian regime. They are "status quo" as was the Argentine regime at the time of his sojourn there.

Dictators flourish under authoritarian views whether they are Catholic or not.

Again, you can't paint all Catholics with the same brush, as well as devotees of other religions.

But the basic problem with religion is that it causes war.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 03:46 PM

Subject: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 07:38 PM
************************************************************
Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:07 AM
****************************************************************
134 posts... I think I have gleaned the answer to my question.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:01 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 08:16 AM
***************************************************************
Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 12 Mar 13 - 09:35 PM
*********************************************************
bject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 15 Mar 13 - 06:29 PM
**************************************************************
ect: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 16 Mar 13 - 09:08 PM
****************************************************************
Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Bonnie Shaljean - PM
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 07:08 AM

In the past I have seen where Joe has gone back afterwards and edited a few of his posts. Wonder if that's going to magically happen again? In the past I have seen where Joe has gone back afterwards and edited a few of his posts. Wonder if that's going to magically happen again?
**********************************************************************

From a reasonable request to possible libel? What the fuck is wrong with youse? To wit....

Subject: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu - PM
Date: 08 Mar 13 - 07:38 PM

A partial quote from that OP.... "If the thread goes south, and I can just imagine it will, I will ask for it to be deleted."
***************************************************************

I request that this thread NOT be deleted but that it is kept for all eternity for every human to read in future.

I request that this thread be closed.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 04:25 PM

I do not "celebrate" any form of sexual behaviour, o "guest", unless it's one of those rare occasions when I'm getting enough of it. I said that we should celebrate difference and diversity. We should celebrate even more when we finally have a world in which everyone of whatever persuasion in whatever walk of life that does not impinge on the freedoms of others can be happy in their own skins and feel that so is everyone else. People like you simply stand in the way of that ultimate quest for happiness.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 07:30 PM

Hmmm.......Should the above post not be moved to the "Psychobabble" thread?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Mar 13 - 08:17 PM

No. Read it properly.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 18 Mar 13 - 05:28 AM

Grow up Steve.....do you really think homosexuals in general are fulfilled and "happy" individuals.
If they are, I have yet to meet one. All that i have met seem to have something missing in ther lives, as if they were participating in a theatrical production......a charade..

Things like "Gay Marriage" are of course the "props"

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 18 Mar 13 - 05:51 AM

Oh dear, Ake, this doesn't belong on this thread, honestly; and you know it. We have had previous threads, on one of which I recall listing 6 same-sex couples, M & F, known to me so obviously a pretty significant sample in proportionate terms of one man's total acquaintance, who lived happy, fulfilled and faithful lives. All, except one couple where bereavement had supervened too early, took the opportunity of Civil Partnership when the 2004 Act came in. Your acquaintance among gays strikes me as thoroughly inadequate to base such strictures on.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 18 Mar 13 - 08:10 AM

""Grow up Steve.....do you really think homosexuals in general are fulfilled and "happy" individuals.
If they are, I have yet to meet one.""

You grow up!

If they're not, it's because they meet too many sanctimonious bastards who want to run their lives for them.

Recognise yourself?

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 18 Mar 13 - 10:44 AM

aketon, you obviously don't know many gay people well. You are repeating the stereotype analysis that there has to be something wrong with being gay. In fact, whether homosexual or heterosexual, I don't know many people period who are fulfilled and happy individuals. Gay is not a disease but a biological preference found in nature. I am not gay, myself, but I recognize that people are different and that difference should be respected.

That doesn't mean I have to go along with ideologies that I think are repugnant. I hope I've learned to separate the worth of an individual from their ideological proclamations.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 18 Mar 13 - 03:51 PM

I value your opinions highly Frank, but at the end of the day they are opinions just like mine.....even Ian and Don have opinions...just the one each mind, but opinions none the less.

Time will tell if male homosexuals have the capacity to bring their behaviour into line, and infection rates down. If they are unable or unwilling to do so and are still "celebrated" by society for that behaviour, then the future looks bleak for society and homosexuals themselves.

In society you are correct in stating that there are differences, but all differences are not respected, nor should they be.

If "different" behaviour results in massive rates of ill health, then that behaviour deserves the utmost scrutiny from society.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Blandiver
Date: 18 Mar 13 - 05:45 PM

There is a story (refuted by Catholic apologists) that Mother Theresa withheld pain killers in her death houses as a matter of course. One woman, crying out in agonising pain, begged for painkillers, but was rebuffed and told that her pain was 'Jesus kissing her' for sharing the agonies of his passion. The woman cried out: 'Then please - tell Jesus to stop kissing me!'

Interesting therefore that this same bon mot was deemed to be a worthy bit as part of Mother Theresa's stand-up routine, where she delivers 'Tell Jesus to please stop kissing me' as the pay-off and has the audience rolling in the aisles. Here's a wee film of one such performance:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkIyQyrfQS4

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: gnu
Date: 18 Mar 13 - 05:53 PM

From my question to a discusion of homosexuality and Mother Theresa?

Sick shit. I dunno why I bothered to chek back. I shant be arsed to do so again. Have your fetish fest. You deserve it.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 18 Mar 13 - 07:32 PM

Sure ake but your opinion doesn't seem to be based on the scientific evidence that homosexuality is biological and found in nature. There is as much VD and rampant AIDS now in the heterosexual community as is in the gay community. I don't see heteros bringing their behavior "into line". Massive ill health is not restricted to the gay community. As a matter of fact, monogamous gay relationships have just as much chance of curbing AIDS and VD as do the hetero relationships. Don't make the mistake of assuming that gay relationships are necessarily promiscuous.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 18 Mar 13 - 08:23 PM

Here is an example of how politicians are using religion to get at oil but at the same time,
these fundies are wrecking the world.


Fundie Religion is growing elsewhere

This is thread creep but spotlights the role of religion.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: GUEST,Musket sans cookie
Date: 19 Mar 13 - 02:14 AM

Akenaton states above that gay people aren't happy people. If we accept that, although it is sweeping and based on prejudice. .. then it is worth pointing out that it can only be the case because twats like him use every opportunity to make hatred acceptable.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 19 Mar 13 - 03:59 AM

"Hatred" Ian?.....Who the fuck said anything about hatred?
This portion of the discussion was supposed to examine the Catholic Churches' response to "Gay Marriage" today, and whether or not legislation should be brought forward to support it.

Twats like you, use every opportunity to bring the word "hatred" into any discussion that you wish to close down.

The word hatred has no place in any discussion on immigration regulation(racial hatred), "Gay Marriage"(homophobic hatred, or any other contentious issue.

Grow up please.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 19 Mar 13 - 04:03 AM

This point is not meant to exclude the single by any means. But assuming, as experience seems to teach, that one of the bases of a happy life is frequently a satisfactory & happy marriage or long-term partnership, then I must point out to Ake, yet again, that my dear friends, past & present, Mandy & Nicola, Ben & Dick, David & Brian, John-Stuart & Ricky, Michael & David, et al, all in long-term relationships &, where surviving, civil-partnered since soon after the 2004 Act, appear to be as stable and contented as any of the heterosexual couples of my acquaintance. I just can't make out any rational basis for these peculiar views of his.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 19 Mar 13 - 04:29 AM

Mike...If you going to make a study of any particular form of relationship....it cannot be restricted to those "within your ken".

The statistics on male homosexuality tell a completely different story, including very high rates of psychiatric illness, sexual health problems and promiscuity.

The same sex couples whom I have known, have all been in the late years and I am sure their relationship was more to do with companionship than sex.
However sexually active young male homosexuals appear to have little interest in marriage or monogamy, hense the high rates of promiscuity.
In my opinion males are by nature, sexually predatory and the limiting factor in this behaviour is the production of a family and setting an example to ones children......a social braking system. Not the word "MARRIAGE"

Homosexuals cannot produce .....and this causes the social brakes to fail.......Only an opinion.

What is your opinion on the discrepancy in sexual health rates?

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 19 Mar 13 - 04:41 AM

Well, Ake, I may not be able to judge accurately only from those within my ken, but that seems to be exactly what you are doing in your 3rd para. I was talking of lifelong relationships, from youth onward. I remember, when Valerie & I told John-Stuart Anderson & his partner Ricky, who used respectively to act his distinguished one-man plays at, and administer, the Eye Theatre Suffolk in the 1980s, that we were approaching our Pearl Wedding [30 years] in 1989, they trumped us by telling us that they had passed their 40th. John-S unhappily died soon after and I have lost touch with Ricky if he survives. But their example certainly runs counter to your generalisation about later-in-life-companionship being the norm for such couples. And, as pointed out above, the statistics regarding promiscuity, STIs &c within the gay community are no higher than those among the single, unpartnered part of the heterosexual community.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: akenaton
Date: 19 Mar 13 - 05:04 AM

No Mike, my views are not based on the couples I have known, as i said they were all rather old and I am sure their interest in sex would have waned.

Sorry but I think you are wrong about the figures, which stae catagorically that MSM figures are much higher that hetero, even among "singles"; tho it would appear that you validate my point about the family structure having a bearing on sexual behaviour.

Unless of course, you think the word MARRIAGE has magic properties :0)

There is nothing to stop young people from committing to one another without using "the word"...and many do.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Musket
Date: 19 Mar 13 - 05:38 AM

Dear Akenation,

We at the Oxford English Dictionary wish to use examples for the noun "hatred" and wondered if we could use some of your posts? Especially the posts that are not about Gay relationships but religion which you still manage to introduce your irrational fear of others into.

Yours,

The human race.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 19 Mar 13 - 06:28 AM

""Mike...If you going to make a study of any particular form of relationship....it cannot be restricted to those "within your ken".""

How can anybody judge and assess anything which is outside of their knowledge and experience.

You state that "in your experience, the majority of homosexuals are not happy", then castigate Mike for telling you what his experience is, and how it differs from yours.

You say you don't hate, while calling us scumbags and bigots.

You are exposed every time you post comment as someone who not only hates, but also hates irrationally. You can't even bring yourself to address me directly.

You are a hate fueled, intolerant and pretty unpleasant character with no respect or liking for your fellow man, and your opinions are more than sufficient to brand you as a bigot yourself.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 13 - 07:17 AM

I can cheerfully echo, without naming names, similar examples to Michael's within my ken.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Stringsinger
Date: 19 Mar 13 - 11:32 AM

"The statistics on male homosexuality tell a completely different story, including very high rates of psychiatric illness, sexual health problems and promiscuity."

These statistics are totally invalid since they ignore even greater psychiatric illness, sexual health problens and promiscuity in the heterosexual community.

Why greater? Because homosexuals are in the minority.

Sexual preference is no indicator of mental, physical or social health.

Catholicism rejects homosexuality on religious and not scientific grounds.
In fact, many priests are closet gays as has been shown repeatedly.

I'm not gay but I know biased prejudice when I see it.

Subject: RE: BS: Catholic religion response to 'today'
From: Greg F.
Date: 27 Oct 17 - 01:49 PM

The War against Pope Francis

Pope Francis is one of the most hated men in the world today. Those who hate him most are not atheists, or protestants, or Muslims, but some of his own followers.

Outside the church he is hugely popular as a figure of almost ostentatious modesty and humility.

But within the church, Francis has provoked a ferocious backlash from conservatives who fear that this spirit will divide the church, and could even shatter it.

This summer, one prominent English priest said to me: ?We can?t wait for him to die. It?s unprintable what we say in private.

Continued here:

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/oct/27/the-war-against-pope-francis

---

Good point, Greg, but I see no need to resurrect this contentious thread when there's already another religion thread going. I'm going to close this one.
-Joe Offer-