Hello, member of the Ideology of Evil[sup]TM[/sup] checking in. Our “attempts to pit human rights against the family and against man” were progressing wonderfully until this book came out. We would have gotten away with it if it weren’t for this meddling pope!
Seriously, though, what is going to gain by a book that makes him sound like more of an extremist asshole than we already knew he was? Most liberal Catholics I meet now either distance themselves from the pope immediately, or half-apologize for being Catholic. They’re not going to change their mind over something like this – they’re far more likely to leave. And the conservatives are already conservative.
I try to be respectful of other people’s beliefs and values but when something like this comes along (equating equality under the law with evil) I can only shake my head and walk away in disgust. What little respect I had for the Roman Catholic church just went down the drain with this revelation. Most individual RC’s are fine, but, IMNSHO, the institution is rotten to the core.
Well, lest we become as annoying to some as the Pontiff, it must be acknowledged that the Roman Church is all of its individual members. There is this problem of hierachy and the authority it carries, but the Church is a pretty complex organization, and defies reduction into a simple pyramid.
That said, I don’t understand why so many Catholics cling to the faith while rejecting just about everything that makes it unique among Christian sects. If you can’t even agree to disagree with the Pope, or utterly reject the idea he has any authority, I don’t see what having his underlings excommunicate you is going to matter in the grand scheme of worhip according to your own principles.
Oh, I’m not implying that what the Pope is saying NOW is insignificant, or that it’s just detail. I was pointing out that not everyone takes everything he says at face value. They’re still Catholics because they believe in the religion, but not in the Pope.
Hasn’t pretty much every pope been against the Enlightnment since the Enlightenment happened? The enlightenment worldview is of a secular, democratic society, where truth is consensus-based and power comes from the people.
The Catholic worldview is of a religious, autocratic society, where truth is absolute and power comes from God. There’s a pretty basic contradiction there.
And, in all honesty, who does this surprise? Is there anyone who, before hearing about this, thought that the Catholic church was ok with abortion and gay rights?
I see your point. I was simply saying that I will treat individual RCs as good people until they demonstrate otherwise. There are many RCs here that I respect and will continue to respect despite the idiotic pontifications of their religious institution. I wonder how much longer the RCC or even Christianity in general while survive. With the problems the Anglicans and the Greek Orthodox are having, are the institutions of Christianity collapsing in upon themselves as they fossilize themselves out of existence?
Nobody is surprised by the general attitude, but based on the citations in the review, he now seems to be associating individual rights, gay marriage, abortion, contraception, and divorce are symptomatic of a society sinking into amoral, totalitarian(!) permissiveness. He also reminded the reader that Hitler came to power via a democratic election, and then the German Parliament gave him dictatorial powers. It’s not even strictly true, but the point was that we can go equally wrong in our democracies today.
Yeah, but he’s just restating an old argument…that the calls for individual rights are leading to people claiming that people need to respect their rights to act immorally (as he sees it).
I found [www.straightgoods.ca/ViewFeature5.cfm%3FREF%3D65+pope+gay+rights+vatican&hl=en]this](http://64.233.179.104/search?q=cache:uMv4dbi7yowJ:[url) article on Catholics and Gay Rights and here’s a snippet. It’s kinda beautiful/sad.
I believe in the brotherhood of man, all men, but I don’t believe in brotherhood with anybody who doesn’t want brotherhood with me. I believe in treating people right, but I’m not going to waste my time trying to treat somebody right who doesn’t know how to return the treatment.
“Why yes, I think it’s wonderful that people are slowly drifting away from our religion due to its lack of grounding in both observable reality and science! We used to have a grip over virtually every aspect of Westerners lives, but now that that whole lovely Enlightenment thing is over, it’s alleviated us of that whole burden of power and influence thing! Now that I’m almost out of a job, do you think Wal-Mart might hire me as a greeter and I’d get to wear one of those smashing blue vests instead of this stupid hat?”
