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But as to the meeting between the Pope and Kim Davis...after 50 years of being a semi-Catholic, that breaks the cord for me. I'll never walk back into a Catholic Church again unless it's to attend a friend's or associate's wedding, funeral, or some such event. As Popeye used to say, "That's all I can stands, I can't stands no more!"
On many other issues, including marriage equality, abortion, women priests, and the like, he is also pretty close to his predecessors, but those conservative positions haven't seemed to make him less popular with my liberal friends.
Maybe because your liberal friends realize that the Pope is still Catholic?
But as to the meeting between the Pope and Kim Davis...after 50 years of being a semi-Catholic, that breaks the cord for me. I'll never walk back into a Catholic Church again unless it's to attend a friend's or associate's wedding, funeral, or some such event. As Popeye used to say, "That's all I can stands, I can't stands no more!"
Wait, so after 50 years of being a "semi-Catholic" you just realized the Pope is against gay marriage?
Maybe because your liberal friends realize that the Pope is still Catholic?
Well of course they do, and so do I.
What I have a problem with, though, is that people commit the fallacy of an appeal to authority by criticizing the Republicans because they don't agree with the Pope about poverty, climate change, etc., but don't seem to realize that the same fallacious argument could be made against them for supporting marriage equality and women's rights.
How is:
"This holy man, the Pope, says we should accept immigrants, so it is incumbent on you to follow his moral lead."
different from:
"This holy man, the Pope, abhors abortion, so it is incumbent on you to follow his moral lead"?
I think he has a lot of good things to say, but every one of them stands or falls on its own merits, and not on the fact that he is the head of the Catholic church.
Location: NYC based - Used to Live in Philly - Transplant from Miami
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As a Philadelphian and a non-Catholic, I was excited prior and during Pope's visit to our city. I had to admit I got soft on him, especially after he blessed that kid with cancer and made that little boy smiled. And I became more "welcoming" to Catholicism as a whole.
But then when it was confirmed that Pope met with KD, I have this uneasy feeling.
I am not sure whether it is because I feel duped to like this Pope or I feel like I violated my being for opening up myself and starting to like this Pope, while knowing all along that after all he is still a Catholic.
I think the article is making a bigger deal than this really is. I assume the Vatican has always had someone doing PR for them, just badly...or at least a communications director. Any large organization should have this. I'm guessing they realized they do a really bad job at PR and decided to hire someone that does this well, day to day for a living. Just like any organization would do when they realize they do something badly.
A lot of you don't seem to understand what the Catholic Church is about.
The pope has been discussing religious freedom and conscience a lot in his visit. I got the feeling before the visit that liberals were very excited about what the Pope might say, and he disappointed them quite a bit. The Catholic Church, doctrinally and theologically, has always been "liberal" on economic issues (although not always in practice by bishops and cardinals). It applies what's in the Bible to the economic world. It always has. It's been complaining about capitalism since it appeared - the Church long predates industrialization and capitalism and began criticizing it in the 19th century (it also heavily criticized communism).
On social policy this pope has always been conservative. He never said homosexuality or abortion is not a sin. He's said they most certainly are sins, but under his leadership the Church is going to be like Jesus and forgive and not harp on it all the time.
A radical change for the Church would be to accept homosexuality or let women be priests and this Pope has said emphatically no on those issues.
This pope is not really doing anything radical. He's doing what the Church has always had popes do but with more pizzazz and dramatic gestures of humility and service. Anyone who knows what the Jesuit order is about would not be that surprised. It's like a math teacher who's better - it's still the same math, one just communicates a lot better. Previous popes mostly came from the Church's academic hierarchy - the people that wrote the theology. This one come from the Jesuit order, so it's like the difference between a practicing lawyer who does a lot of pro bono work and a law school professor.
What makes this Pope different is that he walks the walk - practices what the Church preaches. Previous Popes went through the motions but never addressed the hypocrisy of living in the luxurious Vatican or flying in a private jet and being in isolation from people. This pope gets into the weeds - literally going into the mines to pray with workers in dangerous situation or kissing a horribly deformed child and saying God loves him, driving around in a Kia and staying in regular hotels.
People who thought he was suddenly going to be a kind of social west-coast liberal or live and let live kinda libertarian guy on moral issues were in for a huge disappointment. His the head of the Catholic Church after all. The early Christians were persecuted by their government for their beliefs. Of course the head of an 1800 year old church that traces its origins to those victims is going to find common cause with a Christian taking an uncompromising stand of religious conscience.
**Full disclosure I don't agree or sympathize with Kim Davis myself**
Last edited by redguard57; 09-30-2015 at 12:27 PM..
Yep. Thanks Frances. Way to help those of us working towards making sure everyone has rights. Tell a non-Catholic way to go. Especially one who has been divorced three times. Let's make sure bigoted evangelical Christians get your support.
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