Pope Francis

Arts & Sciences Religion & Spirituality
81

Yes, that is part of the reason for the letter.
They (the letter writers) want to clean the Church by presenting on record (for history, to show that lay people inside the Church, and a few priests who signed it, are fighting back in their own little way) real examples of pedophilists who were indeed protected along with all other kinds of sexual abuses, etc. by higher-ups.
Read the letter about what Pope Francis did with Former Cardinal Theodore McCormick. Read what McCormick did his whole life as a priest.
For Pope Francis to protect someone like McCormick, who has since been defrocked, is unthinkable, incredible, unbelievable, but the Pope did it. Those are facts.

Yes, these things happened (pedophilia, homosexual relations in the cloth, etc.).
You’re preaching to the choir about all those things and more (drugs, gay parties of higher-ups in the Vatican in their apartments, etc.).

This awful period cannot be resolved in a forum discussion here, and I certainly do not want to proselytize to anyone. That’s not of my business.

The Church has survived all kinds of things in its nearly 2000 years of existence (2-3 popes at once, Arianism, Protestant Reformation, etc), and it will survive this extremely shameful, unpardonable time period (post-Vatican II).

What the Church will likely be is more pre-Vatican II, more toward tbe traditional latin mass, and if that means a smaller size Church, but one that is true to its roots, then so be it.

The biggest AND only growth in Church attendence in the U.S. is at churches that are now holding full masses in Latin.

Again, I’m not here to proselytize.

82

Thanks for that post.

I like the idea of Latin masses. Kinda retro, kinda cool.

83

The interesting part of TLM growth in churches is it’s coming from the young crowd, 20-35 years, not from 60 and older who actually went to latin masses pre-VII.

I’m gonna stretch it a little, my opinion here, and call them the crowd who grew up on Harry Potter and related novels and who now as adults realize there is actual true mysticism (for lack of a better word) in the Latin part of the Church with all kinds of hidden symbols in the different parts of the TLM.

:2cents:

84

I was disappointed to find that googling “Latin rap” doesn’t turn up what I thought it should.

I was hoping for something more like this, except featuring togas, insane grammar, and perhaps a little light pederasty:

I hope that doesn’t mean inquisitions and burnings.

I don’t think it’s possible for the CC to be anything other than what it is. Corruption and wrongdoing flow through its soul. Its basic tenets - which depart from more widely-accepted Christian beliefs in important ways - make it inevitable. It was constructed as a tool of political oppression, and I don’t see how anyone would want to try to beat that particular sword into a ploughshare. What’s the point? To do it, you’d have to re-write the Catechism.

If Catholicism were any other religion, then Catholics could simply abandon the Church. But they can’t do that, because the Church is the religion. Without the Church, a Catholic isn’t a Catholic.

Very clever, that.

85

So are we ready for Papel Schism part 3? Revival of the Avignon Papacy?

86

Perhaps St. Louis.

87

Didn´t know Francisco had protected McCorwick, thought it was actually the opposite. Not surprised, though I have heard the Pope sopeak against other murky business.

I do not like the idea of going back to Latin or anything the masses just perceive, and internalize as faith and dogma and all that jazz. But whatever works.

The real issue her eis transparency and a structure as powerful and with so many means as the Vatican means any accussations can end up in mudsliging of the ones trying to clean up the place. Not saying it is necessarily the Pope.

The “things” happened and keep happening. it si just we occassionally hear about them now. The structures that allow that to happen are still in place and taking those down is far more important. A few wolves are caught here and there, but too many are still loose.

88

If we are ever enlightened enough to get a female pope, what should we call her? I mean Pope’s etymology comes from father, and it’s a masculine noun (papa). How would that work in a gendered language such as Italian?

89

In Spanish you just change the article: La Papa. La gerente. If you can change the gender of the noun, you do it. El ingeniero. La ingeniera.

ps. some Greek derived words ending in a might be masculine.

90

I found that there’s a legend of Pope Joan, who is said to be a female pope, but didn’t actually exist in real history. Judging from Spanish and French wikipedia articles, they called her Papisa, or Papesse.

91

Popette?

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92

I want a transgender pope. That’d show the Vatican is really caught up with the times.

93

The outfits are already pretty gender-neutral, so we’re halfway there already.

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94

That’s probably what they’d be called in Le Pays Maudit

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From Medieval Latin papissa.

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96

Originally, guys wore kirts/dresses and women pants. I think we should go back, especially in summer, as it keeps thingh fresh down under. Guys who want to reproduce need to keep the dangling bits cool, too hot kills the future generations, and with global warming, this may be necessary.

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97

Oprah? Brie?

Okay, okay–if “Papa” becomes “Pope,” then we’d obviously have to call her a Mope.

98

back to the topic of the OP…

/

First, it documents instances of heresy that cannot be denied…The truths at stake are not minor ones, nor are they hazy, debatable propositions.

Second, it is a step … for the historical record, for posterity. It will be seen clearly that Catholics in our day were willing to call out not only sins of clerical abuse, but also sins of heresy, which are worse in kind because they more directly oppose God Himself. The worst sin, teaches St. Thomas Aquinas, is that of infidelity or lack of faith; and this lack of faith is manifested in a denial of any truth of the Catholic Faith.

The signatories have been taunted as “lacking in sufficient theological qualifications.” This is false, since several signatories are highly trained theologians of good reputation. But it is also somewhat irrelevant. One does not have to be a medical doctor in order to recognize a compound fracture or a bleeding jugular vein; in like manner, one does not have to be a professional theologian to know when basic truths of the Faith are being contradicted outright.

Some more stuff in the article.
The author is not looking to convert people, but rather explain why they did it.

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That explanation is interesting because it gets to the root of why the Catholic church causes the evil that it does.

It directly and deliberately conflates the word of the Church with the word of God, ie., contradicting the tenets of the Church is heresy. There is no consideration for the position that, perhaps, the word of the Church is in conflict with the NT. This simply cannot happen: the Church is God.

So: while Kwasniewski goes off on a high-falutin’ rant about it being his moral duty - his duty to God, even - to correct the Pope regarding “truths taught directly by Sacred Scripture” the fact remains that there is no such Scripture addressing most of the topics in the letter. With the exceptions of divorce and idolatry (and Catholics have a fairly relaxed view of the latter anyway) the points at issue are inventions of the CC that have no basis in the Bible. In fact the letter quotes a whole load of Catholic hadiths rather than the Bible for its justifications.

Most of their objections are incomprehensible to a Christian. To take a simple example:

“A Christian believer can have full knowledge of a divine law and voluntarily choose to break it in a serious matter, but not be in a state of mortal sin as a result of this action.”

Most Christians don’t have any concept of “divine law” (at least not in the sense of codified rules) or “mortal sin” because no such things are described in the NT.

Item IV is a Christian statement - which presumably is why the men in dresses object to it.

They’re on pretty firm ground with item VII ("the diversity of religions is willed by God”).

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100

Or as Bob put it…you don’t have to be a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.

Burn it down already. Build a new Church from the ashes. And for fuck’s sake let the priests have sex with consenting adults.

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