That would be even better than “Ratzi Risen”.
Tell that to a rape victim or a child who was born with HIV.
That guy sticking out his tongue was meant for
Damn you people for actually making this a successful thread!
In other words, they should base their message on marketabilty.
Mass with Beer and Pizza, anyone?
Um, I don’t know, maybe the supreme leader of the church could be one?
Just by way of credit where credit is due, thanks for sorting that out and correcting my errors of presumption. I am rather averse to the idea that the Church had any business making threats of excommunication at all, but given that the issue had been raised, he appears to have done a credible job of dancing on the knife-edge.
For the rest of this thread, though, making a man Pope does not magically change him overnight. If you accept Papal Infallibility, it means that he will be so guided that he will not pronounce error in a full ex cathedra pronouncement. But given that there have been but two dogmatic pronouncements, and any three Catholic scholars will have at least five opinions on how many doctrinal pronouncements, but the answer can be summed up as “relatively few,” I believe that one is justified in critiquing the individual on the basis of his past willful behavior (as opposed to coerced behavior like the Hitler Youth thing), since the person he was, except for the possibility of his going ex cathedra, is the person he will continue to be.
In short, it was a choice that can only be explained by the intention of the Catholic Church to take a hard line towards any reform, reunion, or other possible move away from business as usual.
At 14? I don’t know the guy from Adam, and had never heard of him before he made it to the potential popes list, so I don’t have a horse in this race. But there is the chance that he has grown in character since his teenage years, isn’t there?
By the way, he also deserted the Nazi army at risk of execution. Maybe it was cowardice, but maybe it was that he finally discovered his moral strength.
No, but he’s done plenty as a Cardinal.
Nah, that’s Saturday. 
And since he has no jurisdiction over me, I can easily ignore what the Pope says anyway, so all this debating about Ratsiwhatever’s Cardinal Days (sounds like a summer playhouse thing) is just popcorn-muching theatrics from my perspective.
I just wanna bump this once, since Bricker answered a couple other questions that happened after it…
I’d really like Bricker to explain what he ment by celibacy not being a workable choice for all gays. If homosexual sex is incompatible with being a Roman Catholic, and the Roman Catholic church is the one universal church, AND celibacy isn’t “workable” for some homosexuals, then it would follow that some homosexuals can’t be saved by Christ; unless you consider homosexuality a choice, or you mean “workable” to be something different then I interpret it.
Me, too; but that just comes down to why neither one of us is Catholic. Excommunication, at least as a theoretical possibility, is necessary for the Church to remain Catholic. Not to oversimplify, but if you’re going to resist the idea of centralized authority with the power to define dogma, you might as well be Protestant.
I’d love to see the Bishop of Rome go back to being just “first among equals;” but I also acknowledge that in so desiring, I’m wishing for the end of the Roman Catholic religion as it has existed since at least Trent.
Personally, I don’t remembering him anwering my question, in post 72
No, wait, he did. Just not a good one.
FWIW, I’m not looking for a fight, just an exposition on what exactly he meant. He seems to know a great deal about the Roman Catholic church and I tend to enjoy his posts about it. I could certainly understand not wanting to get into a detailed discussion in this thread though, which seems to exist to roast the new leader of the church that seems to mean a lot to him.
That is indeed most clear.
The Catholic Church exists; it’s huge; many, many of those who belong to it believe it’s the sole path to Salvation; so what a Pope says matters quite profoundly to literally hundreds-millions-of people. That means even if you’re not a Catholic, or even a Christian, it’s not unlikely you inhabit a community, or even a nation, where the official stance of the Roman Church actually has a discernable impact on your society. And if one cares at all about the “world community”, that impact becomes a widespread concern whether one wants it to or not. I certainly would love it if the Pope were no more consequential than Pauly Shore, but that’s not how the world works. And when Bishops and Cardinals decide to weigh in on, say, American presidential politics, the potential impact of the Church is impossible to ignore or shrug off as somebody else’s business. I wish the reality was such that I could do as folks like Bricker recommend, which is to essentially butt out of the beliefs of others which I do not share, and withold judgement. I would be thrilled to never have to think about any of it ever again.
But I can’t. I care about science policy and ethics (e.g. stem cells); I care about politics; I care about public health policy (e.g. AIDS); I care about gender and sexual politics (I socialize with as my queers as straights these days). Some of these issues are, without distortion, directly related to my job, which makes the social influence of conservative Christian doctrine an even more immediate a concern than if I were in another line of work. I simply have to care. I’ve no choice in the matter. Even if I ingore it, it comes looking for me. I don’t have to try to find a problem; it finds me; in my job, in my family; in my circle of friends; in my community; in my country; on my whole fucking planet.
It’s just amazing to me some feel outsiders have no cause to complain or comment about how somebody like a Pope behaves. “Chicken Littles”? How so? I couldn’t make up the shit in the headlines if I tried. Ten years ago I wouldn’t have imagined it. I’ve got little old aunties bawling their eyes out because the Boston Archdiocese saw fit to transfer a pedophile priest from some MA suburb to the “boondocks” up in Maine, and not tell anybody even after he allegedly started didling boys up there. In Catholic schools around the world kids are being taught that condoms aren’t safe and highly effective barriers against HIV transmission. They’re not simply teaching premarital sex is wrong, which is their prerogative; they’re deliberately spreading misinformation that costs lives. aren’t. I’ve read articles recently about science ethics debates where Bishops are likening embryonic stem cell research to the attrocities of the Nazi Holocaust. So, if I do that sort of work, I guess I’m no better than Mengele, right? Well, no worries, Holy Fathers. Your efforts have saved me from walking that particular path into darkness, unless God loves rats too.
That could be the silliest non-sequiter I’ve seen this year. Silliest or the dumbest.
Believing that the RCC is the true Church does not equate to believing non-Catholics are damned. Protestants and others are “seperated bretheran” in “imperfect communion” but communion nonetheless.
By “not a good one,” you mean, presumably, that you don’t like the answer.
That’s not surprising. You don’t like the Catholic Church – why would you like its doctrines when they are explained to you?
[quoute=Metacom]I’d really like Bricker to explain what he ment by celibacy not being a workable choice for all gays. If homosexual sex is incompatible with being a Roman Catholic, and the Roman Catholic church is the one universal church, AND celibacy isn’t “workable” for some homosexuals, then it would follow that some homosexuals can’t be saved by Christ; unless you consider homosexuality a choice, or you mean “workable” to be something different then I interpret it.
[/quote]
We are all sinners. If celibacy isn’t workable because the drive to have sex outside of marriage cannot, after diligent prayerful attempt, be conquered, then there are two choices. One can pridefully declare that they know best - that what they are doing is not a sin at all - or they can acknowledge their transgression, and through the sacrament of reconciliation seek forgiveness and strength… knowing that no one will be free from all sin in the future.
This applies to unmarried heterosexuals. This applies to a civilly divorced person who is unable to obtain a decree of nullity. This applies to anyone, not married, who feels driven to have sex.
Is sinning incompatible with being a Roman Catholic? Absolutely not. Declaring that, because you are unable to resist your sin, it must not be sin at all, and that you, not scripture and holy tradition, know best what sin is… THAT is incompatible with being a Roman Catholic.
Thought experiment:
Let’s say that I am tasked with making America healthy. Let’s say that the extent of my efforts are to pronounce, “Eat healthy, exercise, and if there is a chance your children will have inborn disorders, don’t breed.”
I’ll solve all of America’s health problems within a generation, right?
I mean, since people didn’t listen to this, they won’t bother going to doctors or anything of that nature.
So you think homosexuality is a sin and anyone who thinks different is “arrogant and prideful?”
Wow, that’s an eye-opener.