Pope says 'backward' US conservatives replaced faith with ideology
Pope Francis condemned the "very strong, organised, reactionary attitude" in the US church and said Catholic doctrine allows for change over time.
Pope Francis has blasted the “backwardness” of some conservatives in the US Catholic Church, saying they have replaced faith with ideology and that a correct understanding of Catholic doctrine allows for change over time.
Francis’ comments were an acknowledgment of the divisions in the US Catholic Church, which has been split between progressives and conservatives who long found support in the doctrinaire papacies of St John Paul II and Benedict XVI, particularly on issues of abortion and same-sex marriage.
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Now the pos conservatives are gonna start calling the pope woke. 🤣🤣🤣
They're already doing that, have been for a long time. I have a Baptist coworker who thinks Catholicism isn't real Christianity...
I had a Catholic coworker who said some of her Catholic relatives were becoming “Christians”, which turned out to mean Evangelicals.
in the US they refer to Protestants as "Christians", mainstream Christianity is made up of Catholics, Orthodox, and Protestants
Right—my point is that my coworker (like the previously-mentioned Baptist) was implying that Catholics were distinct from Christians, in spite of being Catholic herself.
I was raised Catholic and the distinction was always made between Catholics and Christians. I didn't really understand that Catholics were a subtype of Christians until someone pointed it out to me when I was a teenager - I just thought Christians was a catch-all term for non-Catholics that believed in jesus.
What country were you raised in? I was raised Catholic in the Philippines and in the US and it was made explicitly clear in my education that Catholics are Christian.
I'm from Ohio and there is a massive Catholic community in my hometown and "Christian" as a term was always used as a throwaway term for the various non-denominational evangelical sects.
Catholics and Protestants do not get along, even today. When I went to college and people thought I grew up Catholic, they would try to "convert" me away from "ancestor worship and idolatry."
My father made that exact distinction and he grew up in Iowa.
I'm from New Jersey
I've seen a lot of that and not just recently.
All religions think all other religions are not "real", because of their "There can be only one!" Highlander shit.
https://media.tenor.com/JUa45Zo1SP8AAAAM/creed-bratton-the-office.gif
I think all religions are just fake copycats of the one true god.
Praise be Flying Spaghetti Monster
Ramen
Pork Belly
I mean, most protestant Christians dislike Catholicism, that's why they are called protestants after all.
The new part is American evangelicals and other extremists thinking that catholicism not being conservative enough...
Conservative Protestants have been saying that for a very long time though. The attitude is so pervasive that my wife, who grew up Catholic (but has not been one for decades), has to be reminded that Catholics are Christians.
Not for nothing but that claim is hardly new. Goes back to the Reformation.
To be fair, it isnt; but then neither is Evangelicism or Mormonism or any of these other wackadoo cults within which these assholes conflate their hatred and fear with faith.
What makes Catholicism fake Christianity in your view? Any faith that believes Jesus Christ is the Son of God that died for the sins of humankind meets the threshold, imo. The Catholic Church fits comfortably within that definition.
If I were being charitable I’d label these heretical creeds as Paulity. They have very little to do with the words and deeds of Christ, or living up to them, and far more to do with how Saul of Tarsus interpreted them.
You may recall the Catholic Church was born out of the first Nicaean Council, where they canonized the four gospels that best reinforced the idea of the supremacy of the Roman state, and burned the hundreds of other so-called “gnostic” gospels, which (judging by the content of the few that survived) far better encapsulate what I would consider “real Christianity”.
That said, the whole “No True Scotsman” fallacy really isn’t worth pursuing. It’s been this way since 325 CE, and there really is no painting a happy face on one of the most destructive and inhumane ideologies history has to offer. No matter what my opinion may be, you are correct in pointing out that the Paulity is the institution that is currently regarded as “Real Christianity”, as sick and anti-Christian as it may be.
All Christians use some interpretation of Bible and Christ.
From the outsiders it's a bit funny to observe these squabbles and the heretic accusations.
I believe you are mistaken. That was next big council. The 27 books were finalized by a man who attended the Nicaean Council. When he got back he wrote a letter stating which books he considered to be canon.
Well there is all that child sex abuse.
That is an institutional failing of the Catholic Church, it was never endorsed as a part of the Church’s dogma. While I would encourage any Catholic to ask themselves if they really should continue to support an organization that hasn’t done even close to enough to reckon with their many sins over the past two millennia, I still think it’s silly to act like they’re not Christian.
Fucking kids ≠ following the teachings of Jesus in my book.
This is also how the Catholic Church sees it.
Well then you can include baptists in that too.
the only difference between the priests and pastures is the "born again" churches do not have a central structure to follow up on it so they are all just one offs.
There's a ton of it in protestant churches too. The national Baptist church is under federal investigation for it right now. The US has always had an easier time hating Catholics.
To be fair, even the super conservative Catholics aren’t into this pope. Benedict was their jam.
There a whole YouTube channel by some ex fox host called church militant... It's all about hating gays and lesser religions. They talk shit about the Pope all the time.
It's like everything in America is just power struggles, selfishness, greed, and crime. There's no God or respect for life here. The "good guys" don't even go after the "bad guys" because the bad guys are ahead now. People are so naive here they think heartless crimes are not happening when it's right under their nose. Sometimes the good guys even get used in the plot. Just look at all the old politicians and Americans that got roped in Rogers stones mob puppeting of Trump. America had a mob affiliate for president. I think that puts in stone... Americas bullshit. It's going to take decades to get trust and genuine patriotism back.
I wonder where do they think it all comes from?
Even when I was one I had zero interest in that game.
Even the most minimal amount of compassion is a sin to these people. They're just straight up evil at this point.
Didn't they recently called Jesus / Christianity woke?
You know you fucked up bad when even the Pope is saying, "Whoa, slow it down there with the fascism, bud".
American Catholics have largely voted Democrat for much of the last century. This flip-flop to voting Republican is relatively recent.
It seems to me to be a bit of a religio-coup. Bishops have some autonomy, and Priests some as well. It's become increasingly common that both are in opposition to Rome on certain behaviors related to politics, and exactly how strongly they should be pushing people to vote and for what reasons. The dehumanization of Biden (publicly refusing him Eucharist) for his nuanced pro-choice views is in direct contradiction of papal behavior going back at least to the turn of the 20th century. Telling people that in voting, any sin is forgivable except being pro-choice... well, there's no basis in Canon Law for that attitude.
I live in a very Catholic area, and have a lot of Catholic family. Talking to them, they mention their priests say "you can vote for either party, as long as they're pro-life". The Abortion issue is not the only or greatest issue to Rome. It is AN issue, but disagreeing with the Church is generally not going to earn their full enmity unless you are preaching your disagreement. Biden (the target of that local church smear campaign) is absolutely not preaching pro-choice to anyone.
Pope Francis is right to be saying that because American Catholic Leadership has gone WAY astray from what Catholicism allows or mandates of them.
Conservatives are mostly christian, but if they aren't catholic the pope has little sway over what they do. And they love dissing catholics so yes they will more than they have been already.
If you have a throwaway email to see comments on the Newsmax site, it is Catholics and whatnot saying the Pope isn't the real part of the religion anymore.
Time for a reality check on the history of Popeing
https://youtu.be/6TxjrHPHypA
my god that is the best meme ever
Happy to share!
Thanks, ButtholeSpiders!
These christians will drop their Pope before they drop their politics
They already have. Only Roman Catholics really care what the Pope has to say. There are far more Baptist, Methodist, Evangelical, Pentecostal, and Presbyterian in the US than Catholics.
The Pope is the head of the Roman Catholic church, it's always been the case that only Catholics really care about what he says.
The Anglican Church is Protestant. Pretty sure they don't like being called Catholic, they had a whole thing about that.
Just a minor tiff really, just some spilled tea and crumbled crumpets really
No, Catholic just means universal. This most Christian denominations claim to the the Catholic, aka, Universal Church. In other words, they mean to say they are the correct denomination.
In normal conversation, Catholic Church equals Roman Catholic Church.
See e.g. wiki:
That doesn't change the fact that the Anglican Church also considers itself the Catholic Church.
The Act of Supremacy 1558 renewed the breach, and the Elizabethan Settlement charted a course enabling the English church to describe itself as both Reformed and Catholic.
*catholicism
For reasons I can't explain, many of those denominations don't even recognize the catholic church as being Christian.
The problem is much more fundamental than this. I have repeatedly had to explain to adults, in many different contexts the subset/superset relationship. People do not know that you can be part of a superset that describes all things in a subset. For some reason you are able to graduate high school without every actually figuring this out
That's always boggled my mind.
I had many childhood baptist friends who claimed with disgust that the Catholic Church isn't Christian.
I just can't see the reason (there isn't any) other than needing a conservative out group.
The reason is simple, actually. The Protestant revolution was ostensibly started with Martin Luther advertising that the pope was the antichrist.
Protestantism was basically the practice of declaring Catholicism to be a false Church. Then it evolved and they got more cordial. After 300 years of bloodshed
Technically, at the time of Martin Luther, the Roman Church was corrupt AF, so he wasn't totally wrong. It kind of still is, but hey, who's counting.
This is a true statement. But glass houses and stones. Let's not forget he wrote the infamous "On the Jews and Their Lies", and started supporting their persecution and outright murder. Many believe that his rhetoric directly caused the antisemitic attitudes of the Nazi Party. The aforementioned book was incredibly popular among Nazis.
And the Lutherans are smart to denounce that book. Catholics could learn from a religion deciding it actually did stupid things and fixing itself.
I just didn't think it was any more or less corrupt as any other Church.
It all seems like an unironic no-true-yorkshirrman comedy sketch.
Etc.
I feel like Martin Luther was an idealist, an innocent "true believer" who got shocked when he saw the harsh reality of what was going on in Rome.
Then he got his reform, established a new Church... and that's where he went wrong, because sooner or later Churches gonna Church.
TY! All those names are familiar but the events are not.
TIL.
I'm pretty sure the reverse is true.
There are some differences in the details of each denominations beliefs enough to mark some Christians as not real Christians. If only God could just make an announcement over the PA to clear things up...
Related: How many denominations only allow their own denomination to take Communion?
That ship has already sailed - I was just with my conservative uncle this last weekend when he complained that the current pope is "woke"
To these people, their political ideology is their religion
Absolutely agree. I am certain ifwe're real and appeared in person and spouted half the stuff attributed to him in the gospel they would call him "woke" too.
Absolutely no doubt. Kind of surprised no one has done a video series where you anonomize Jesus's teachings, then read them back to conservative Christians and ask what they think about them
The results would be hilarious, no doubt
Probably because they don't want Tucker Carlson siccing a mob on them
The pope? They'll drop Jesus Himself if it suits them
They already have. Been reports of congregations who have complained the the words of Jesus are too woke and weak...
does anyone know off the top of their head how/when Christianity became so tightly associated with the Republican party? No way it was always so extreme in US history
1979: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_Majority
My favourite bumper sticker ever said: The moral majority is neither
Interesting, I'm assuming that politicians who bought into this evangelical pandering benefited from this by getting votes/support?
They dropped the Jesus Christ of the New Testament half a century ago, and even then they pretended he was somehow as white as mayonnaise, so why not drop his earthly mouthpiece?
Honestly, I consider that a win. A huge reason I left the catholic faith wasn't because of the religion itself, but because of the people who claimed to follow Jesus but in practice did nothing like Jesus.
yout are not wrong given survey data
Pope Francis is completely right.
I'd say he's left
Pope Francis' condemnation indicates that at least they learned from that mistake.
Where "learning" from that mistake means:
"Hey, check what most people have been thinking about X for the past 50 years... OK, we'll support that"
To be fair that's because Hitler lied about being the most catholic ever and by the time they realized who he really was Italy was in too deep.
Dude was actually going to ban Catholicism after awhile, had already made a banned religions list that was slowly working its way up.
Unsurprisingly Judaism was the first on this list, more surprisingly Ievoha's Witness was the second.
Pope Francis was 9 years old when WW2 ended, so get off your high horse.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_and_Nazi_Germany
Religion is the biggest scourge against humans. Controlling behavior, brainwashing the young and stolen untold trillions of $$. Fuck religion. They all need to be labeled as cults and treated as harshly.
Religion, at its core, is basically rules that state "don't be a dick." Unfortunately, all of the dicks didn't get the message.
I would settle for taxing them.
"Cult" is just something the big congregation calls the small congregation.
"Man will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest"
We're doing pretty good on the king front, lets work on the priests a bit
IDK, if we're comparing scourges against humanity I'd say "the rich" in general are worse, be they kings, CEOs, religious icons, politicians, or whatever. Their pursuit of money and the power to keep that money corrupts everything. They ruin everything from companies to countries and even religions (makes them even worse).
Really though, the most evil thing is cancer. It kills indiscriminately and tortures its victims the whole way. Even if you win, you never get the peace of knowing it's truly gone. True evil.
Agreed.
I'll gain an iota of respect for Frankie and Catholics when they unilaterally decide to stop donating money to this church until they purge all of the child rapists and reform their teachings on confessions so child rapists are no longer protected.
I like the similar sentiment from a while back:
Religion can fuel some truly abhorrent things, but at the same time I know people who have used religion and faith to pull themselves out of a really bad spot in life.
There can be a middle ground between admonishing all religious practices and dogmatic bible thumpers, and that starts with religion being a understood as a personal choice and how people interpret the religion being a reflection on their self and not the every religious person ever.
Calling religion the biggest scourge on humanity is a huge exageratrion. I'd probably say slavery is significantly worse, and human trafficking shows no signs of stopping. Capitalism is also clearly worse, and it's the most impactful force today. A large reason religion, and specifically Christianity, has gotten worse in recent years is because of the influence of capitalism.
Modern day religion. In the past your faith was quite important and dictated morals. It's unfortunate it's been so twisted over the years. And by past I'm not just saying the 50s, but even back in the 1500s.
first Jesus, now the pope is woke? At what point do I start considering that maybe I'm actually the asshole here?
AITA for allowing a person with mental illness claiming to be god be put to death?
I've (30M) been reflecting on a past decision I made and I could really use some outside perspective. There was this significant event involving a certain crucifixion, and I had a role to play in it. At the time, I was faced with a lot of conflicting pressures and I ended up not doing much to prevent it.
Looking back, I'm starting to wonder if I made the wrong call. I know hindsight is 20/20, but I can't shake the feeling that I should've done more to change the outcome.
What do you think? Was I in the wrong for not taking a stronger stand against what happened, considering the circumstances? Your honest opinions would be greatly appreciated! 🤷♂️🙏
I think most of them just don't want to do that.
Pretty sure the head of a church of pedophiles and their enablers are about as far from Woke as you can get.
How many schisms would that make now? There was the Protestant schism, the Anglican one, Eastern Orthodox one (I think?), and uhh...I'm sure there may be more but at any rate, I guess they certainly are due for another given it's been awhile.
No Council of Nicaea fans?
Constantine: Ok guys, nobody leaves the room until we sort out this Holy Trinity thing you're all killing each other over.
I still have no clue what's up with the holy trinity tbh 🤨
I chalk it up to, "well, glad i'm not christian" and leave it at that as much as I can.
Well neither did Constantine. But people were killing each other over it, so... Council of Nicaea. From what I understand he didn't really say anything in the Council, just sat there and let all the priests argue it out.
I left catholocism shortly after getting my CS degree, but I think it works roughly like this:
Edit: stupid Lemmy can't render ampersands correctly: https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issues/3774
Think of it how like the US gov is made up of the executive, judicial, and legislative branches but they're all part of the government.
you can just smell the divinity
We're not all that different. We just replaced religion with ideology, but it's not all that different. Still killing each other over stupid shit and pretending it's the righteous thing to do.
The Anglican schism is generally considered to be part of the protestant schism.
Ngl I wasn't sure, it just pops out to me as its own thing, so thanks on the clarification!
That schism happened with Vatican II. After that point, it seems like Popes have regularly been political instead of doing what they knew was right, because they seem to think slight improvement by the congregation is better than alienating the conservative membership. I think the growth Sedevacantism terrifies them more than anything. The group is clearly heretical by every Catholic doctrine, but so popular you will not see any formal declaration that they are in a state of excommunication.
The thing is, we non-Catholics should be rooting the religion on to shed that craziness. Whether you like religion or not, Catholicism is not going anywhere and a progressive Catholic Church is better than a Regressive Catholic Church.
The pope ain't perfect. But goddamn do I love him stripping corrupt officials of their position, being much more chill towards my queer brothers and sisters worldwide, and telling the US arm to remove the giant sticks from their ass over abortion and divorce.
I hope he lives till 130 and keeps being a stabilizing force for good. It's a rarity to see religious officials who are not only reasonable, but actively trying to make the world a slightly better place.
You're just buying into and regurgitating his PR. The Pope talks and acts in opposition to his bullshit platitudes. It's business as usual against the lgbt community in every Catholic Church across most of the world, including the Vatican. He himself was a known homophobe long before he was pope. He continues to ignore and refuses to meet with the victims of priest sexual abuse. He is a bullshiter and I can't believe anyone on the left buys into any of it
Have you ever been to a Catholic Church?
Yes, the vast majority stick to their own politics and beliefs, regardless of what the Pope says. Go to South America and visit a church, see how lgbt acceptance works out down there.
Thankfully I have no reason to ever go near a Catholic Church again.
I don't think a octogenarian virgin who believes in imaginary friends is the authority I'd nominate to lecture me on abortion and divorce.
He said allowing people to transition was as dangerous as nuclear weapons.
Yeah, wow, such love and support.
I’ve been pissed at him since the Charlie Hebdo situation, and even if I might agree with some of the things he says, fuck him.
I never heard of that so had to look it up. A bunch of Muslim fundamentalists in France got angry and killed people at a satirical magazine. Not sure how that’s the Pope’s fault.
He basically said they had it coming.
He said that religions shouldn't be mocked.
And as one of the biggest persons in one religion, it is important to say that about other religions. They are kind of the same, so it would be like mocking himself.
While I don't agree with the statement that ideas shouldn't be mocked, I get it.
Putting aside the fact that it’s basically victim blaming, he went further:
What happened to “turning the other cheek”? Does that not count when someone makes the horrible crime that is satire on religion? Hypocrisy at its finest, no better way to describe it.
How high were you when you were this lol
except he did this as a reaction to Catholics leaving in a manner that is basically HEMORRHAGING numbers.
This is adapt or die reaction, not adapt because it's the right thing to do. Let them die.
You're wrong. Pope Francis is the most liberal pope who's ever existed and has pushed for human rights and decriminalization of the LGBTQ community.
Have you been listening???
In Slovakia, gay adoption AND marriage was on a referendum, and weirdly enough, Francis threw his support because against it. To "preserve the family"
So "kill a few million people with nukes" is the same as "gender theory"
God loves you but you ain't equal. Homosexuality is a sin, but not a crime. You are welcome in the Church, but you are also immoral and going to hell.
Sheesh, I was worrying a bit there. At least I'm not violating the laws of man.
The Church's position in general is that everyone is immoral and going to hell without the Church's help. (See original sin, the sacrament of confession, etc)
He isn't saying "gay is now ok." The pope is saying that the sin of homosexuality shouldn't be treated any different than the sin of lying, greed, stealing, envy, cheating, murder, child molestation, etc.
I think the quote from him below expresses his viewpoint with more nuance than I could:
"The door is open to everyone, everyone has their own space in the church. How will each person live it? We help people live so that they can occupy that place with maturity, and this applies to all kinds of people."
"What I don't like at all, in general, is that we look at the so-called 'sin of the flesh' with a magnifying glass. If you exploited workers, if you lied or cheated, it didn't matter, and instead relevant were the sins below the waist."
"We must not be superficial and naive, forcing people into things and behaviors for which they are not yet mature, or are not capable. To accompany people spiritually and pastorally takes a lot of sensitivity and creativity."
"Everyone, everyone, everyone, are called to live in the church. Never forget that."
Great. Just let me know when all those homosexuals the Church is so accepting of are allowed to receive any sacraments.
Oh interesting, had not heard that. I don't stay updated with the popes latest tbh.
Thanks!
Don't buy it. He's still a snake in a robe.
You're telling me the Pope is Catholic? That's fuckin insane man. How weird!
Not familiar with the situation, but looking it up, I see same sex marriage banned by the constitution, and an attempt at a referendum failed with low turnout. That doesn’t track with a religious figure riling up the conservatives.
I only have English speaking sources to go on, but the only Christian organizational involvement is see is against gender change surgery. Im not going to argue that, but it is also a lot narrower than your claim
"I greet the pilgrims from Slovakia and, through them, I wish to express my appreciation to the entire Slovak Church, encouraging everyone to continue their efforts in defense of the family, the vital cell of society,"
Seems pretty straightforward....
It’s not just that he’s the most progressive pope ever, but supposedly he was elected for exactly that reason. There’s a lot of inertia to change, like anywhere else, but enough of the leadership recognized where they wanted to go, enough to elect him
New Pope diss track just dropped.
Hey babe, wake up
This is the fruits of the GOP strategy that's been going on for decades to strengthen their support through Christian believers. The Pope is just recognizing the impact of that from the religious side, whereas Barry Goldwater warned of it's impact from the political side.
It certainly is a terrible damn problem, and we're knee deep in the shit right now.
Separation of Church and State: Good for the Church, Good for the State.
Pot meet kettle
Being called "backwards" by the head of the catholic church is quite something
And that conman was (at the very least) a friend of a very famous child sex abuser.
Pretty sure it was a Roman Catholic priest that burned all the Mayan texts. The Roman Catholic Church is the largest destroyer and oppressor that ever existed.
Broken clock right twice a day, etc.
American conservatives really hate that this pope prioritizes Jesus-y stuff like love, forgiveness, and taking care of your fellow humans.
I have a bunch of Catholic family members that are much more into being angry, fighting to shove dogma down everyone’s throat, and not helping anyone that doesn’t sit in the pew next to them.
Could you summarize what they found?
Mind you, none of that is 100% true. It’s just one of the most likely hypotheses. No one will ever know for sure what the hell happened to that girl.
I don't think that's very fair, he's been very consistent in his positions from everything I've ever heard about the man. He won't directly come out in support of LGBT, pro-choice, or contraception, but he hints that the church might be on the wrong side of many issues and is very vocal about the message of love and acceptance
Keeping in mind he's at the helm of a very large ship in a problematic place that likes to split apart, I think it's understandable that he balances keeping the thing together with steering in a better direction
He basically said Charlie Hebdo “had it coming”. Fuck him.
Media needs to find another word for speaking up in opposition to something.
Slammed. The pope lept from the turnbuckle, robes aflurry, and slammed the backwardness.
Oh mah gawd King, the the pope has a steel chair! A steel chair!
Ba GAWD, that's the Pope's music!
Commenter SLAMS media over use of word “blasted”.
Pope is 100% correct on this one. But on terrorist state ruzzia, he misses the mark by a mile https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qirI4eSTNag
It's organized crime and mob taking over America. And they are already in...
I mean their leader is charged with racketeering, so yeah, it's an organized crime outfit.
I doubt Trump is the leader. There's bigger people pulling strings. Trump's a pawn with a debt.
Well yeah, that would be Putin. But things are a bit fucky for him right now too, so Trump is kinda on his own.
Isn't god supposed to be unchanging according to their book?
Atheist here. But I'll put a Christian hat on for a sec.
Humans are fallable. God isn't. Human interpretation of God's will is fallible. Therefore the church must adapt as humans become better at diving God's will.
Hat off.
I don't think that's a contradiction. Now I'm going to stand in my garage for an hour and sing, hoping it'll make me a good car.
I never understood this argument. If God is all powerful how come he leaves his messages to interpretation. Shouldn't we all just be born knowing the exact wording and understanding? Also why does he need people to write his books and teach his lessons when again he supposedly is all powerful and could make it so we were born with this knowledge instead of leaving it to idiots who can't "comprehend God's great plan".
It's a way to select the good ones for his next experiment.
Except if God is truly omnipotent they can dumb it down to a point we can understand it or iunno increase our mental capacities. We aren't omnipotent so of course we can't explain every concept to a dog, but god could.
Ssssh. It's just a way to control Pharaoh's slaves.
Yeah it seems ridiculous now that I've deconverted and can finally look at this critically from the outside. It would be like raising a kid by leaving them a letter. If the god existed surely they would have the bright idea to drop some updated material every few decades and maybe make the occasional clarifying announcement to humanity.
Having a collection of religious texts, physically recorded by human hands, that provide information about the religion is a feature consistent with any religion that has a human-fabricated deity. Coincidentally, it is also a feature of every major religion. 🤔
Oh, but God does and coincidentally God's will always coincides with what the person proclaiming to relay God's will wants to be true .
this was part of what Jesus was supposed to do, actually.
... and Mohammed... and Joseph Smith...
Depending on which items of Abrahamic scripture you consider canon.
Atheist here, putting in a Christian hat. If you were omnipotent and creating a game, would you make it easy or hard?
If I was omnipotent I could make the game specifically challenging in it's own ways for every single individual on a changing whim, while also knowing their full skillset and potential plus what they want out of the game. If they want it casual, competitive, for fun, screwing around, etc. If they want zombies, new IPs, shooters, MMO, what ever. And since I was omnipotent I could weave them in such a way they all work together for every single player. And the players would know the rules of their version because as soon as they're born they know everything they need to know about the rules of their game.
I'd also have a working anti cheat for once and GMs to enforce said rules to a certain extent (small dig at the industry here :P)
EDIT: Do I really have to say that I'm not a Christian before arguing from their point. Didn't you muppets notice the blasphemy I added?
So that humanity can learn:
Then we'd be mindless puppets without free will. The guy, however, doesn't want to be admired by automatons but people who could decide otherwise.
It's the ole "if you slip your crush a love potion, is it actually love" problem and, indeed, no, it's rape.
What if you tell your crush they need to love you or you will throw them in a lake of fire to suffer for eternity while you enjoy sniffing the smoke?
That seems abusive. And maybe somewhat unhinged.
Actually Hell is only a lake of fire on pop culture. In theology it is a state of depression persisting throughout the afterlife brought on by seperation from the divine.
I really don't want to play Christian apologetics here, yes the whole thing is unhinged, and no I'm not even a Christian, this is all just comparative mysticism for me and I like The Sandman much better.
But specifically as to the hell thing the doctrine of denominations differ, e.g. Lutherans think that faith is not required before you have proof, that is, until you're standing at the crossroads of afterlife, heaven on one side and hell on the other. Capability to tell the both apart is something you probably should have taken some time to learn on earth, though.
It is possible to make Christianity make sense if, and only if, you interpret things just right. And it will put you at loggerheads with practically all Christians. Been there, done that, either they fall silent or they unleash the full force of their neuroses to ignore you, little in between.
And, of course, originally hell didn't even exist it was a question of oblivion vs. spend the afterlife in the radiance of god's presence. Not sure exactly where in the transformation from Judaism to Christianity that one happened but at the very least the vast majority of stuff about hell is bible fan-fiction.
Lol how does having that knowledge untainted message take away free will? To your example if someone doesn't know rape is illegal that doesn't mean it's a free pass if they rape someone and vice versa just because people know rape is illegal doesn't mean there aren't people raping other people out there.
Because knowledge is proof and in Christian understanding that would zonk your mind due to god's purported properties. Think of it like the ultimate high-ball, you'd instantly become a junkie.
What are you even saying? Just a long winded way to say "durrr you no comprehend God's will cause you silly stupid hoomen"
I mean there's a lot of things I don't understand, and don't think I can possibly understand, that are way smaller than how Christians describe god.
They understand it more like a consequence of physics, as a logically necessary property. Like a fat man jumping on a trampoline full of kids, sure they're still going to bounce but it won't be their bouncing, any more.
An all knowing all powerful God is incompatible with free will.
Those ascriptions are incompatible with logical consistency in general. But a Christian would say: God chooses to not use power.
Because that would be boring.
If we had all the answers, we'd be all knowing. If we were all knowing we wouldn't be distinct beings, we'd just be part of some hive mind that is God. Like an appendage of God.
Free will requires each of us to be beings that have knowledge and the capability to make decisions (even bad ones) outside God's control.
The old paradox, if God was so powerful could he make a Rock so big even he couldn't move it? Basically what free will is. Something created by God that can't be controlled by God. If it we were controlled by God it would destroy free will, which is something a Creator can't do.
He could be very clear about the law and his expectations (or even the fact that he exists) and we would still have free will to choose to follow the law or not.
Did the people in the bible who actually saw him not have free will? Did Adam and Eve not have free will? Do the people in heaven not have free will?
It's a commonly touted excuse, but it falls apart under a modicum of scrutiny.
I see your belief system is focused on nitpicking details to avoid the point. Commonly touted among people in the atheist belief system LOL.
Next you'll say I don't actually believe in God unless I think the Bible is 100% literal, because that's the argument you want to be having. But that's a boring discussion, so good day to you sir.
Hilarious.
What nitpicking details are you talking about? You mentioned that if we knew the truth about god and his law we would be a hive mind and not have free will. I was responding to that point, not avoiding it at all. And the rest of your comment is a straw man arguing against some atheist you have in your mind and never once addressed the points I made.
I don't believe in that paradox because if God is all powerful he could indeed make a rock so big he couldn't move it in that moment and at the same time could move it. Because that's what omnipotence looks like.
Yes but if moving the rock destroys the rock, then if God did that, God would become a destroyer. If God is defined as being a Creator, destroying the rock results in God no longer being a Creator and therefore no longer God.
But a paradox doesn't disprove the existence of God. Life is full of paradoxes. Like quantum physics, WTF is going on there? I don't know, it's a thing that exists even though it doesn't make any sense.
Wtf are you babbling about god has destroyed plenty of things, like when they supposedly drowned all the world during the Noah's ark arc, to the destruction of the cities of Sodom and gamorra.
Doctrinally god can remain infallible while altering his message to be what humans of a given time and place are ready to hear and act upon. Are your parents hypocrites for letting you drive a car at 16 but not at 4?
I knew a guy who thought like this, (Rest in peace, Robotech_Master, I miss you everyday)
He was a Christian who had a rather unorthodox way of interpreting the bible.
His take was that God is real, souls are real, and there is indeed a life after this one.
However he didn't believe in anything supernatural.
He believed God was simply a being beyond human comprehension who didn't have a good way of explaining the universe to a simple primitive species like man. So he dumbed it down with supersitions and myths in order to keep man heading in the right direction.
For example
God couldn't get an ancient people to understand shellfish kills you if you cook it wrong, so he just made up a rule that said "You will be killed by my divine wraith if you eat this! So you better not!"
And then when Jesus came along and humans knew how to cook shellfish properly he dropped a line about how "the old law doesn't apply anymore"
He believes Heaven and Hell, the Resurrection of Christ, and Souls were all legit... and have a rational explanation, man is just too inexperienced to understand the specifics beyond some colorful scripture and a few divinely inspired paintings right now.
For his sake I hope he was right, coming up on the anniversary of his tragic hit and run...
Yes, that's my point with "diving God's will".
I'm not sure what you mean by the car-hypocrite bit though.
That is a solid response. Thank you.
Good car? What the fuck are you talking about?
It's a reference to a quote, the providence of which I know not:
Jesus warned of being like the hypocrites when your relationship to God should be personal (and private).
Ah thanks
All good!
That's actually more of a doctrine that is made up by the organization and less something explicitly stated in the book. There probably are some psalms or other references that use the word (translated as) "unchanging", but in context, the original audience would probably not have interpreted it in the same way. Think God's love and power will never fail, not God will literally never experience anything or change. In the 10 commandments story, Moses has a conversation with god and changes his mind.
Lots of things like this.
The Levitical Law condemning Homosexuality was originally one condemning Pedophilia, but King James changed it in his translation in order to throw off suspicions that he was gay, which he totally was.
It's actually somewhat more complicated than that, and relates to the evolution of English words. The word "fornication" I believe was in a state of evolution when KJV was written, originally having a meaning more in-line with "married people who visit prostitutes" (a major issue of the day). It quickly evolved to include all premarital and homosexual relations. I'm not sure how cleanly the timing is, but King James himself had male lovers.
I am of the belief that KJV was not anti-gay as written. Language just caught up to it. It wasn't a big stretch, as homophobia was a common unofficial position pretty much unbroken between 100AD and 1500AD or so.
What? Definitely not.
At least catholic christianity emphasizes how Jesus brought change to the jewish traditions on how to live "close to god". Change is a thing in the catholic church, which is exactly why people have tried to make a lot of things they liked into unchanging doctrines over the centuries.
Ever heard of the new testament?
Not sure about the details but God being unchanging shouldnt coflict with humans changing.
Not really. If you read it Jesus specifically says that he came to amend the word of god. That's how we got bacon cheeseburgers and cotton-poly blend shirts back. Shame he didn't say anything about racism or homophobia but what are you gonna do?
God's immaculate, ineffable plan, you say?!
I mean he's right, but maybe he wants to add his institution to that list as well.
…or for satirical newspapers.
I mean the church caused a lot of this.
In the same way fish crawling out of water caused all of this, I guess
Religion in general is pretty backwards as well.
Has he met the Catholic Church?
Inquisitions? Witch burning? Who does he think did extremism biggest and best?
Sure, now they mostly just coverup for paedophiles and rampant baby murder at orphanages, but they were the OG extremists, let’s not kid ourselves.
Didn’t this guy pay a personal visit to the christofascist who refused to grant a gay marriage license September 2015? Guy wore a similar hat anyway.
Those are the same people who called Jesus weak so I think it's a bit late for the pope to weigh in
Note that he said this in a private conversation, not an official statement.
He will backtrack on this in less than a week, he always does this little dance.
Oh that's a shame. Francis has been a bit of a punk rock pope so far.
In relation to the ultra conservative Catholic church that is.
He's got russophilic tendencies too which is kinda blech.
I assume there's Russian Orthodox Church relations in there somewhere.
It's schism all the way down...
Wake me up when Catholics aren't forced-birth advocates that will vote in any fascist that aligns with their single issue.
Replacing faith with ideology - so doing things because you think they are right is worse than doing them because god tells you to?
In most Christian religions if you don't explicitly say Jesus died for your sins centuries before you were born, literally nothing else matters.
You can follow every rule because you personally agree with it. But if you don't submit to Jesus (and by extension your church's chain of command) then you're going to hell.
So if you're just doing what's right by your personal morals, it doesn't "count" even if it agrees with church teachings.
Obedience is more important than anything else.
And by the same token, you can torture, kill, and eat people and still go to heaven if you accept Jesus before you die. Jeffrey Dahmer was baptised in prison and apparently that made everything all right.
It’s a bonkers belief system if you think about it. It definitely doesn’t encourage being a good person like it claims to.
From a believer POV obviously
The whole point of organizing religion is telling people "you are
so dumbmisguided by the Devil so our scholars gonna tell you how to behave"I mean ... in this case they're not wrong.
That's fine if you give up the sanctimony of saying that God is on your side. Otherwise, you're dishonest.
I have a hard time understanding how anyone could have genuinely misinterpreted this.
So I think that by-and-large, the Evangelicals have had a crisis of faith and are seeking the US Catholic Church as a bastion of stability. And the US Catholic Church has been happy to accept Evangelicals into our flock, because we're all Christian here and spreading our religion is what we do.
This has become somewhat of a devil's deal however, as the Evangelicals have pushed the Church extremely rightward politically. Historically, the Catholic Church has been very pro-Latino, because the Hispanic community / immigrants are overwhelmingly Catholic (not just "Christian", but proper Catholics born and raised). But in the past 10 years or so I'm seeing more and more former-Evangelicals bring their politics into the Catholic tradition.
Nominally, this crap shouldn't matter to the issues of Church. But it does. Politics infects all wakes of life one way or the other.
In any case, I think its a good thing that (former) Evangelicals have migrated over to the Catholic church in such large numbers that this problem is occurring. And I'm not necessarily saying that we need to 'indoctrinate' our (former) Evangelicals to the policies or politics of the Catholics... but... maybe a little bit? I dunno. But a lot of these far-right rhetoric / fire and brimstone style religion (with anti-immigration / anti-Hispanic slants) is distinctly non-Catholic and heretical IMO.
Case in point: we Catholics finally have a 2nd president of our Faith: Joe Biden. And yet, the Catholic community was THIS close to excommunicating him. Rather than celebrate our achievement to get our 2nd president into the office, he is seen as a heretic to (half) of the US Catholic Community.
It's not like evangelicals are all coming to Mass now: the priest wouldn't give them communion anyway. Rather, what you describe is a political partnership, based on opposition to abortion, where the Evangelicals and Catholics started raising an assload of money together.
And this is what this is all about, money and political power and clout. And I think that's what the Pope is objecting to. Catholic doctrine is clear that life begins at conception, and is worthy of protection. But there is so much more to protecting life, at all its stages: education, help for the poor and hungry, assistance for the immigrant, compassion for prisoners (and opposition to the Death Penalty). US Bishops are sacrificing the rest of it at the altar of political power.
The ironic thing is that Protestants outnumber Catholics here. If the US Bishops get the theocracy they are aiming for, it is pretty much guaranteed that these Protestant Evangelicals will be running it. And Catholics will end up marginalized again.
No no no.
I mean I've noticed an uptick in Evangelicals properly converting into Catholicism recently. And simultaneously, a sudden surge in people wanting "Latin Mass" and other such very old traditions. Definitely a yearning for "traditional" Religion, and (former) Evangelicals seeking Catholicism because of it.
This is absolutely a "Church" issue because it relates to the religious+political views of our relatively fresh converts (well, within the past couple of decades).
That's an AstroTurf movement by conservative priests who want to be able to read the bible, no one understands what they said, then they go on a personal rant and telling them what to think and how to vote...
Mostly because they're upset the Pope is (relatively) progressive for a pope
Well, I'll have to look into this a bit more. I'm quite aware of the Traditionalists, but didn't realize they were pulling Evangelicals in, somehow.
It could just be biases in my social group. But I feel like the Traditionalists are doing big with the Evangelical crowd and doing a good job converting them to Catholicism. For better or for worse.
With regards to Church Politics: this means that Traditionalists are the ones bringing in the new RCIA year-after-year. Meanwhile, the liberal wing tends to lose out to Atheists. You gotta think in terms of Church politics, evangelicalism and such to see why this is a problem. It means that Traditionalists are very much slated to gain tons of (within-the-church) power, given the current situation.
I definitely think this is bad for the Church overall, though I'm unsure what to make of it or what to do about it.
Catholic concerts are the most evil people I've ever met.
edit: I meant converts but those suck too.
oops meant converts but christian concerts suck too.
Change over time? What, we getting new words from God? Gonna add a newer testament?
New testament 2, electric Boogaloo!
You talk like you don't know about New Testament: America
I thought that was the Book of Mormon. Maybe the Pope is a Mormon.
I just think he's saying that the interpretation needs to adjust to current times
Okay, what language are you interpreting it into? English to english? Or do you think the hebrew wasnt interpreted right?
How did
sevitavresnoc SU-s replace faith with ideology? I've never even heard of that group beforeIf bigotry is not allowed why do we get news from the ceo of bigots reaching top posts?
How long before the pope accidentally falls out of a window and a new American pope is called?
The Pope is late to the show.
The Pope is infallible, though, so it's like ... official.
It could to people it's targeted at. I know a lot of devote catholics because I was raised in that faith. Some of them might actually listen to these comments from the pope. At the very least, if they defy the pope, then they'll at least stop affiliating with the church.
If they stop affiliating with the church, that's a win IMO. these people don't follow Jesus
I think the wedding of capitalism and religion is an unholy one. As soon as people get tax breaks and shit for religion it becomes a scam fest.
John brown used religion to justify blasting some slavers at harper's ferry and I can't think we don't need more of that good spice today.
There are certain people that need some kind of easing of burden that religion can bring, but prosperity gospel and similar are essentially a type of necromancy where you steal as much power as you can from living humans to power your divine money machine.
Maybe they ran out of children to fuck?
So apparently bears no longer shit in the woods.
Pope Francis is my boy
The Catholic Church has actively ran the longest largest worldwide Pedophile ring in human history. For the past 1800 years the Catholic Church recruited, supported, obfuscated, defended, and excused pedophilia, which continues to this day. The fact the Catholic Church still allowed to operate, in any way shape or form, with youth of any kind, in any country, anywhere, means we've all purposefully lost the thread.
Beside the Catholic Church being outwardly obviously criminal, and only an extension of the Roman Senate two thousand years on, it's only shown how very little adults care about the systematic raping of children. Like, at all.
Fuck The Catholic Church. Fuck The Pope.
You really have a point here, but I don't think Catholic church is the only one in which these gross events happen, the thing is that being one of the largest religion along with Islam they get the most attention and media coverage around the world. It's just common sense. So yes, there are serious problems in that church, but I bet my ass that they're not the only ones doing that. Take the blindfold from your eyes, every religion has leaders that abuse the power they have upon its followers to commit deplorable acts.
Calling out the Catholic Church on this does not negate the fact that other institutions are also guilty.
Ding ding ding! Correct!
Yeah, like 70 years ago.
This is why I differentiate between Christians and Xtians
Honestly this is more a sign that americans culture is getting more rothen, just straight up, censorship is gaining a very real foot (in both sides) and its been working its way to make the religious nuts into full on nuts, and while they probably have been this way since the begining, religion kinda limited their madness by scaring them into believing they where gona go to hell if they didnt behave, but their bipartisan bullshit managed to replace religion in their minds and Just make them dance to wathever bullshit their favorite politician spews out this week.
And the left is no better, you guys used to promote anti-hate and freedom of speech, but now, What the hell happened to you? their head is so up their own assess that they became what they sought out to destroy, instead of promoting sane discussion they relegated into bipartisan tribalism and started censoring people they didnt agree with, even going as far as to defend the democratic party, even if their interests are as against the general population as the republicans, but since they where the ones that supposedly didn't want to oppress social groups (even if they totally still fucking do just look at the fucking border ffs) they are right and everything they spew out is right, and while trying to make a safe space online, in academia, and in political discourse, is just naive, promoting respectful language and tolerance to diferent social groups is not a bad thing, but the way they handle it is the definition of "the road to hell is paved with good intentions", specially in media.
They ended up making bipartisan hate grow into the other side on top of the hate they already had, and politicians (democrats and republicans ) took full advantage of this and we have what we have now in the political big picture.
American politics is just a fucking reality show now and I believe they deserve it, only problem is they take the rest of the world between their crotch and fuck us all up since they rule the world/economy. I really hope those guys wake up from their bipartisan bitch slapping nightmare and start fighting the real war which is the class war. Against, you know, the only assholes that get benefited by you too infighting.
Anyhow rant over, down votes to the right. But whrite a comment first, i really whant to hear why you disagree.
Says man who leads an organization that hasn't changed in 2000 years.
You are an ignorant blowhard if you believe what you just said. I'm not going to say they are up with the times but what you said is stupid. The fact that mass is done in the local languages instead of Latin was huge! And they also recognize that big bang theory and the sun is the center of our solar system which exists in the Milky Way galaxy that isn't the center of the universe.
I would hope they recognize the Big Bang theory, given that the idea was first put forward by a Jesuit.
But seriously, a lot of people don't really get how big the switch from Latin was. My dad attended church pre- and post-Vatican II and said that so many people complained loudly that we'd no longer have mass in a dead language. I guess the Liturgy of the Eucharist used to be done with the priest facing away from the congregation and a lot of people also complained when it was done facing the congregation. God forbid the plebes feel like participants in their own religion.
You know you're screwed up when a kiddie fucker calls you backward.
> a correct understanding of Catholic doctrine allows for change over time
> dogma : a fixed, especially religious, belief or set of beliefs that people are expected to accept without any doubts
looks like Francis is wrong, and not a Catholic nor a pope
And Jesus?
Who'd you define "dogma" and not "doctorine?"
Didn't he start supporting gay marriage because that's the Current Thing position now?
He's got some balls to accuse other people of replacing faith with ideology.
I don't think you know what "ideology" means.
I think most religions are a little late on the ball. But any kind of willingness to change is a good thing. And a, what I interpret, statement against, what I interpret, as fundamentalism seems like a good idea.
I think religions are inherently designed to have static principles though, unless the writings of origin are still being written