Pope now resigns!

Discussion in 'Religion Archives' started by R1D2, Feb 11, 2013.

  1. Aqueous Id flat Earth skeptic Valued Senior Member

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    6,152
    You mean Germans have different instincts than other nationalities? Or do you mean you have certain instincts regarding Germans?

    What does this mean? You mean rabbis are better than popes? Or just German popes. And what of German rabbis?

    How has this pope misled anybody? Or has he misled you.

    Does that include you, or just the Pope? Do you have to be responsible for your instincts about Germans, or leaders, or who is or isn't misleading others? And how does one act responsibly with information before making public

    Maybe you are. But it wouldn't have anything to with having a following. That's an invention. The Anti-Christ is probably a code word for Nero. So far you seem to manifest some of his personality traits.

    I don't think anything is as clear as one's own attitude. Or isn't that what your holy book teaches?

    No thanks. It's obvious the message of charity has been lost.
     
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  3. Aqueous Id flat Earth skeptic Valued Senior Member

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    At present they seem to be far more harmless than the fundies. And since the fundies are inherently anti-papist, I would question some of the hostility here against the Pope.

    I couldn't find any evidence that this is what happened. So far I've only read that the continue to preach against condoms. Other than being on wrong side of the issue, I haven't seen that they have reduced access to condoms. I do have actual knowledge they have actively rescued refugees from African genocide, and that kind of overt act gives me hope that they are not actively causing the spread of STDs.

    I wouldn't equate it to rape at all. I would reserve that comparison for the pedophile priests. Rape generally involves self-gratification at the expense of a victim's horror. You might say that some clerics get gratification from winning converts and imposing their social order on the world, and this might correctly be associated with a deviant sex drive, in a psychological sense. But what I'm seeing differently about this, than perhaps you see it, is that it appears to me that their preaching methods are gentle and harmless. As far as I can tell, they're merely preaching to their congregations. I don't see them doing anything violent, corrupt or with abuse of power. My thinking is that people either choose to believe them or not, but if they believe them, they don't buy into the idea of casual unprotected sex anyway, so no harm done. That's why I can't compare it to heinous behavior. I do think that if they were interfering in public policy then that would be tantamount to a crime. Short of that, I think they're probably more on par with a person who's a public nuisance. I'm not there, so I can't speak with a clear sense of the true impact, it's just that I haven't found any smoking gun.

    I haven't been able to find any thing more than the predictable anti-contraception preaching they're infamous for. As I recall, HIV-AIDS was linked to sexual transmission over 30 years ago, and throughout that time the Catholics have continued their anti-contraception rant. So I see this as nothing new. I doubt they've increased the rate of STD infections unless they're actually preventing people from getting condoms.

    You mean the right of marriage. I don't think they want to restrict the rights of gays in any other way, at least not that I've heard of. My understanding is that if a gay person was homeless, hungry or in need of medical care, no Catholic would deny them assistance on account of their sexual orientation. If I'm right about that, then it would seem to me that they are on the legitimate side of human rights, except of course the right of marriage. I also don't see them spewing anti-homosexual vitriol which is so prevalent among the fundies. It might be interesting to hear from the gay and lesbian members here and any straight friends and relatives of theirs, which person would they expect would assist them in the event of an emergency - a Catholic or a fundie?

    It seems to me they have weeded out most of the pedophiles, revised their rules about giving sanctuary to criminals, and trained their priests and administrators to notify the police of any reports or suspicions of abuse. Hopefully the scumbags that were hiding in the cloisters, pretending to be holy men, are long gone. I can't imagine that the Catholics could survive any fresh reports of a coverup. But I don't connect this with any pope either since it seems unlikely they would have anything to do with the affairs at the local level.

    I don't see how a pedophile priest represents the values of humane treatment that Catholics are famous for. They are some small fraction of criminals that were operating under the guise of priesthood. This wouldn't seem to relate at all to the innocent good people who are serving humanitarian needs, who are probably constitute 99.9% (or more) of the priests who dedicate themselves to relief efforts, plus the countless lay volunteers and the congregations who donate to their cause.

    In some regions (including some parts of Africa) I think the fundies probably outnumber Catholics. And though the population of people who call themselves Catholics is huge, a great many of them are not influenced by church authorities.

    My own view is that the Pope is probably a very good person who was chosen for the right reasons, and who represented their hope of getting away from such a long history of Italian leaders -- someone who represented a break from Germany's sordid past and the reunification of East and West (as in the reunification of the two Germanys). He always seemed to have peace, mercy, charity and reconciliation as the key talking points, and other than a few passing snipes at gay marriage, abortion, and contraception in general, I think these topics pale in comparison to his message of humanism.

    I doubt that any pedophiles are safe in the cloisters anymore, and I doubt that the leadership has many bad guys among them. It doesn't comport with their humanitarian work.

    I think the recent doctrines, under this Pope and his predecessor, have probably been more focused on human rights and acquiescence to science than ever before.

    I understand your suspicions, I just think they've probably weeded out all but the best of them by now.
     
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  5. Balerion Banned Banned

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    You're operating under a false premise. While Christian fundamentalists are dangerous in their own right, especially in their work against the teaching of evolution in public schools, their influence doesn't go much further than that.

    And I have actual knowledge that they're attempting to prevent condoms from being brought into the country and made available through family-planning clinics. Whether or not they've been successful in stopping this, I don't know, but why does it matter?

    What you don't seem to understand is the influence the church has in places like that. Many in that country are uneducated and are susceptible to misinformation. They don't have to actually put bodies in front of the delivery trucks, they simply have to tell their people that condom use is a sin, or as bishops all over the world did following Cardinal Trujillo's blatant lie, tell them that condoms don't actually prevent AIDS. You call that gentle and harmless? Get a clue, man.

    Of course they're preventing people from getting condoms. All they have to do is tell their followers that condoms are wrong, or that they don't work, and that's all it takes.

    Right, because saying homosexuality "destroys the very nature of the human creature" isn't anti-homosexual vitriol? Come on. And that was from Pope Benedict this past Christmas.

    Obviously fundamentalists can be nutty bigot scumbags, but their influence does not approach that of the Catholic Church. I think they both suck, but the Church's teachings and decrees have far greater impact than anything said by Ted Haggard just after he's been the meat in a man sandwich.

     
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  7. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    Catholic homophobia? Naww..whoever heard of THAT?


    Pope: Gays Are ‘A Concept Of Human Nature That Has Proven Defective’ And Threaten The Family

    by David Badash on October 1, 2012

    in Marriage,News,Politics,Religion


    "Pope Benedict XVI says that gay people are “a concept of human nature that has proven defective,” that threaten the family, and are not “fully-developed” human beings. The Pope, continuing his holy war on gay marriage, made the remarks late last month to a group of French Bishops he invited to the Vatican, in a desperate attempt to push back new French president Francois Hollande’s promise to legalize same-sex marriage.

    “The family is threatened in many places by a faulty conception of human nature.” Some translations have him saying the word “defective,” according to Care2. ”The family that is the foundation of social life is threatened in many places, following a concept of human nature that has proven defective,” another report states.

    ”Marriage and the family are institutions that must be promoted and defended from every possible misrepresentation of their true nature, since whatever is injurious to them is injurious to society itself.”

    Pope Benedict also claimed his positions are “not at all backward-looking but prophetic,” adding that the Church must “promote those values that permit the full development of the human person.”

    Pope Benedict is working overtime to stop same-sex marriage from taking hold in France. Over the summer, the Catholic Church revived a tradition originally begun in the 17th century and abandoned almost 100 years ago, to bash gay people, and included a prayer that calls children “objects of desires” for gay parents.

    And in may, the pontiff told Catholics point blank they should become more political, ignoring what the Bible teaches about politics.

    The Pope’s comments spurred recent attacks by American Catholic leaders on same-sex marriage and gay people.

    Cardinal Francis George of Chicago told 400 couples celebrating their 50th wedding anniversaries that the marriages of same-sex couples are merely “friendships.”

    Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas John Paprocki said any Catholic who votes for a Democrat very well may go to Hell, because their vote makes them “morally complicit” in issues like abortion and same-sex marriage.

    Archbishop John Myers released a 16-page fear-mongering letter comparing gay marriage to incest and warning marriage equality will lead to laws imprisoning priests.

    And Archbishop Peter Sartain said “human society would be harmed beyond repair,” should Washington state’s marriage equality law not be voted down in November."
     

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