Freaking awesome: Even Pope Francis says "Enough with the gays and abortions already!"

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
41

I don’t think this is entirely fair,

You can be pretty sure that some think this way - but there will be others that truly believe (as I do) that an attempt should be made to reconcile the situation when the scriptures were written, to the same situation now.

That a document should be interpreted and updated in line with the beliefs of the society in which it is being read.

In other words - religion and the bible should be a living document

FWIW - to me, a completely irreligious person, I 100% reject as a reason for dietary restrictions the idea “because god said so” (on the front that god cannot speak to people) to me, I fully believe that the reason for Kosher / Halal is one or a combination of
a) a health reasoning that would not have been listened to if couched as a “science” issue
b) economic self interest from someone that had the power to influence
c) personal dislike from someone, or a group, that had influence and was either trying to remove the foods or get revenge against someone else

42

That’s reasonable if it’s a manmade document. But God is not man and supposedly he made his law to be eternal. Once a religion starts playing games with interpretations based on how society changes, then they are essentially acknowledging that the bible is actually a manmade document. And then it has no value at all. Which I think has more to do with the problems Christianity and especially Catholicism face than the fact that they aren’t conforming to society’s desires enough.

If anything, it’s the more fundie religions that are gaining adherents, precisely because people want that assurance that the rules come down from heaven, even if they might not find those rules pleasant to have to adhere to.

I don’t believe in God and I haven’t been a practicing Jew for a long time, but I still have affection for the faith and wouldn’t want it to just become Secularism with Sabbath candles. I’d imagine many Catholics feel the same way, although it seems many of them actually do want the church to just endorse whatever the societal consensus is, which begs the question of what exactly Catholicism is supposed to be.

43

Really? Where?

Acts 4:32-35

I agree with bengangmo if a faith does not look at its writings as a living document then it condemns itself to fade away.

44

The fastest growing churches are Jehovah’s Witnesses, seventh Day Adventism, Mormonism, and the various born again evangelical movements like Calvary Chapel and the International Churches of Christ. a lot of the people moving into these sects are former Catholics. I don’t think they are leaving because the Catholic Church isn’t liberal enough.

Adventism is the fastest growing:

If these practices sound quaint or antiquated, think again. They’re hallmarks of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, the fastest-growing Christian denomination in North America.

Newly released data show Seventh-day Adventism growing by 2.5% in North America, a rapid clip for this part of the world, where Southern Baptists and mainline denominations, as well as other church groups are declining. Adventists are even growing 75% faster than Mormons (1.4 percent), who prioritize numeric growth.

For observers outside the Seventh-day Adventist Church, the growth rate in North America is perplexing.

“You’ve got a denomination that is basically going back to basics … saying, ‘What did God mean by all these rules and regulations and how can we fit in to be what God wants us to be?’,” said Daniel Shaw, an expert on Christian missionary outreach at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif. “That’s just totally contrary to anything that’s happening in American culture. So I’m saying, ‘Whoa! That’s very interesting.’ And I can’t answer it.”

Seventh-day Adventists are asking a different question: Why isn’t the church growing much faster on these shores, which is home to just 1.1 million of the world’s 16 million Adventists? Despite its North American roots, the church is growing more than twice as fast oversea

This source says the Witnesses are actually the fastest growing, along with Pentecostal, while mainline Protestant demoninations are in decline:

According to a report by the National Council of Churches, the biggest losers are the mainstream Protestant churches – the Presbyterian Church, Methodists and Lutherans are all showing a dip in membership.

While each of them are down just a few percentage points (the data was compiled in 2009 and reported to the council in 2010) the declines have reached into the double digits over the last decade. Some of them are responding with ad campaigns.

“I think one of the things about mainline is that because it was the dominant church for so long, it took for granted that it would be publicly valuable,” said Rev. Serene Jones of the Union Theological Seminary. “To suddenly find yourself no longer the big guy on the block, meaning you suddenly have to start figuring out who you are and explain yourself.”

Pentecostal churches, on the other hand, are seeing a surge in membership. About 150,000 more people are attending the services this year, where members believe that the Holy Spirit can give you gifts, like speaking in tongues. Sarah Palin famously used to attend.

The closer a religion is to being just secularism with an amorphous belief in God, the less likely it’s going to be to hold on to adherents. THe less likely it will be relevant. If catholicism just endorses secular values, what is the point of the church? We already have MTV for that.

45

Who told you I’m a Catholic? I’m an agnostic of the teapot variety with a side of old fashion founding father’s Deism.

BTW the “Nones” like me seem to be among the “faiths” that are more on the rise than the ones you mentioned.

It just so happens that I’m also a lapsed Catholic so I still run around those circles for community reasons. There is a point to that, just like the more liberal minded Jews look at their past faith, it remains a part of their culture, and Israel today is one of the world’s most progressive countries in terms of equality for sexual minorities.

I would not be surprised that in very conservative Jewish sects they do not approve much of that development, but the point is that just as we dropped the idea that anesthesia and vaccines should not be used because pain was our punishment for our sins, we should not stop change just because a book from past civilizations told us to.

http://abob.libs.uga.edu/bobk/whitem10.html

So there is no turning back to the way the old time religions were, not even the Amish would drop the few bits of modernity they allowed themselves to use nowadays.

46

Modernity as it applies to technology, I understand. Modernity as it applies to social mores makes no sense, because that’s one of the core purposes of a religion. If a religion=secular values, then no one has any reason to follow the religion.

You’re right that “none” is really the fastest growing, but that’s due to the fact that when religion changes, the mask comes off. Change concedes God’s fallibility. There are a lot of creative ways that you can reinterpret the Bible or the Koran to allow for homosexuality, but not many people who can think are going to really buy it as anything other than it is: a concession to secular values, not a rediscovery of religious values. And once that concession is made, why should anyone continue to pay attention to religion?

Let’s apply this reasoning to science. Let’s say that science tells us things that are completely at odds with our moral values. Should science change to accomodate what we would like to believe? And if it did, would anyone take it seriously anymore?

It’s not really a great analogy except for the fact that both science and religion are supposed to represent searches for knowledge that are unaffected by local customs and social mores. If science just existed to ratify local belief and custom, would it have any value?

47

So what? The fastest-growing race in the Star Trek universe is The Borg. So what?

48

I’m just pushing back against this idea that the key to staying relevant is to liberalize teachings to conform more with whatever the current secular values happen to be. That’s actually the path to irrelevance.

49

Fast growing doesn’t necessarily equate to rightness or relevance. Speed of growth in proselytizing religions is more a function of effort and aggression.

50

Not rightness, but it definitely affects relevance. It’s not aggression, people have to buy what you’re selling. Why buy something you already have? that’s the fundamental problem with mainline churches, is that they are essentially selling people what they already have: secular values with a dollop of God on the side. The witness, adventists, Mormons, etc., are offering something more: a chance to abandon your sinful life and be born again.

People that find religion want to change, and they aren’t going to change if a church just tells them their lives are just fine, no sin to see here.

51

Let’s also not forget the growth of Islam, another religion that can’t be accused of watering down its message to conform to Western secular values.

52

I don’t understand why people are so happy about this. He’s not talking about any change of policy, he just wants people to quit talking about things that are unpopular. Let me know when they actually want to accept gays rather than sweeping their unpopular views under the rug.

53

It is a change in policy, sort of. Right now, Christians are all up in arms about fornication between two men, while seeing fornication between a man and a woman as a relatively minor offense. I think his point is that they are exactly the same sin, and that Christians should stop being selectively outraged about sin. Especially other peoples’ sin rather than their own.

54

Actually, there’s a little more to the story. He actually offered to let her list him as the father of the baby if she couldn’t get the real father on the lists. THAT makes the story about 100x cooler, and something that kid can carry with him the rest of his life.

I liked seeing that he wants to make the Church a larger and more inclusive organization, whereas the previous pope indicated he was fine with a smaller and ‘more pure’ Church. (Which is retrospect is somewhat expected and alarming from a conservative German who was in the Hitler Youth* as a child.)

What we need to remember is that this is a vast, old, hidebound and tradition bound organization. One man, even the Pope, trying to change it’s direction is like trying to steer an aircraft carrier with a canoe paddle. The fact that he is doing as much as he is - that’s utterly amazing and highly praiseworthy.

  • I know, I know, it was mandatory for all German children in that era. My grandfather (mother’s father) was in them briefly before his family left Germany for America.
55

Yeah, people have to remember that the Church is a huge organization, with a very long history, and an extensive hierarchy. Francis is the captain of the ship, but it’s still mighty slow to steer. He could just come out one day and say “Hey, God told me last night that there’s nothing wrong with homosexuality or birth control, and women can be priests same as men”, but what do you think would happen if he did? It’d be a schism in the Church, and probably well less than half would continue in the fragment he’s in, while the remainder would just get even more dogmatic and inflexible in those topics. He’s steering as hard as he can without that happening. And it might take a century or two to bring the ship of the Church fully around that way, but what’s that to an organization with a history ten times that long?

56

The RCC is an old and hierarchical institution that is slow to respond to changes in social thinking? The devil, you say.

If you feel they deserve to be given slack for that reason, more power to you. I’m not particularly interested in their excuses and their guilt accrues as each year goes by.

57

Pretty sure this isn’t about you.

58

Who is it about, then?

59

When they’ve got it fixed, they can let me know, OK?

60

I have a lot I’m not happy about with the Catholic Church, but as much as all that, I can still be happy for the small changes that one man makes without carrying on like it’s all about me and my anger.

Because you know what? I’m not Catholic. I have not and never will be a part of that organization. A billion or so people who are not me have belonged to it over the millennia, and will do so in the future millennia. They have no real reason to satisfy me and my needs, and it would be only my own ego that might justify spending so much rage at their failure to meet my demands.

But hey, whatever floats your boat. If daily rage against the Catholic Church is what keeps you getting up in the morning, have at it.