An agenda exposed: Feminist Majority leader Eleanor Smeal headlines this year's SNAP conference
Lest there be any remaining doubt that the advocacy group SNAP is more about advancing a radical left-wing social agenda than providing actual helpful support for clergy abuse victims, this weekend's annual conference for the group in Washington D.C. is headlining a speech by Eleanor Smeal, the rabid president of the abortion activist group Feminist Majority.
Smeal's contempt for the Catholic Church cannot be overstated, as she has made it clear that the Catholic Church is her number one obstacle in advancing unfettered abortion-on-demand.
A few years ago, she told a pro-abortion gathering, "Opposition from the Roman Catholic Church and of the hierarchy is a major reason this issue (abortion) stays controversial. We've got to keep more pressure on this hierarchy [because] they're vulnerable now [due to the clergy sex abuse scandals]."
Smeal's appearance comes on the heels of last year's headline speaker, Rev. Barry Lynn, the ringleader of the loopy Americans United for Separation of Church and State, whose speech consisted almost entirely of him railing against the Catholic Church for its opposition to the Obama administration's healthcare mandate, thus providing more proof that SNAP really has another agenda at play.
Wheeling out tired Church bashers
There he goes again:
alleged Catholic priest Tom Doyle
Doyle actually admitted at last year's conference that he has "nothing to do with the Catholic Church," he has "nothing to do with the clerical life," he is "not associated with the Church in any way," he operates on his own, and his beliefs are "about as far away from the Vatican as you can get."
In other words, Doyle is a dissident priest who has essentially conceded that he is really not even Catholic.
The conference will also feature the angry psychiatrist Marianne Benkert.
This will not be Benkert's first appearance at a SNAP gathering, as the Catholic League reported that her talk at the group's 2011 meeting was "the most inflammatory address of them all."
According to the Catholic League, Benkert wildly claimed of the Catholic Church: "[It] refuses to acknowledge sin; it engages in scapegoating; it sacrifices others; it is a master of disguise and pretense; it fosters intellectual deviousness; it lies; it forces the faithful to submit their will to the Church; it is controlling; and it causes 'religious duress'."
In all, the League characterized Benkert's anger and hatred as "off-the-charts."
Indeed, in 2008, Benkert co-authored a rambling and bizarre paper with Thomas Doyle called, "Religious Duress and Its Impact on Victims of Clergy Sexual Abuse."
Politics and malice, not support
In the end, the issue of clergy sex abuse has become nothing but window dressing for a larger broadside against the Catholic Church. The appearances by Smeal, Doyle, and Benkert play very well into SNAP's real motive: to promote a radical, "progressive" social agenda in direct opposition to that of the Catholic Church.
The ongoing, relentless broadsides against the Catholic Church at SNAP's annual conferences, which have been repeatedly documented, certainly make it hard for SNAP to argue that it has no vitriol against the Catholic Church and that its mission is merely to provide support for victims.
[See also: "SNAP UNCOVERED: Shocking Facts About the Media's Favorite Church-Bashing Group"]
For a time, I (somewhat) supported SNAP and was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. But no more.
It was never really about sex abuse.
A blind man could see that.
Interesting, as it has become crystal clear that it is NOT people who care about protecting children who want to "keep the ball rolling," it is people who want to bring down the Catholic Church. Helping victims and protecting children was never the issue for them. How much money has SNAP given toward helping victims heal? How very nice for SNAP that the media has the same anti-Catholic agenda.
What a pathetic line-up of sad malcontents. Sounds like SNAP has moved into the anger-management field. They've become so desperate they don't even bother to hide their true motives anymore. By the way, how much do they pay people to go to these pointless meetings?
LOL!
You can't pretend to anyone; that if the Pope changes his mind about Gays or abortion or married priests or women priests that you wouldn't fall all over yourselves to obey him. Admit you would. Tell the truth and shame the devil.
With in the next 10 years something will have to give you are losing the attrition game. Priest wise. Something's got to give.
Faithful Catholics will never fear "losing" anything on earth, and will never cave in to the liberal or dogmatically and doctrinally flawed politicizations of true Catholicism.
Before the lefties drool all over themselves, they'd best review the world numbers (we do exist outside of the US, remember?) regarding priest vocations and student enrollment in seminaries, they are UP, not down. As mentioned in a previous post, our next generation of priests will originate from Asia and Africa – good luck with your bigotry and biases, there, boys. The socio-religious culture defining these continents make US conservative Catholics look like liberals. This is going to be fun.
No gay marriage, no married priests, no abortion, no female priests. If that's what you need to trip your religious trigger, be a Protestant (or anything else your little rainbow hearts desire). Leave Catholicism alone.
You simply can not change the Truth.
Re: Smeal: How desperate SNAP must be for $$ to come out of the lefty closet. Let's get that light of truth shining in all the dark corners and crevices of the dastardly lie that is the extent of the Church abuse matter.
Matt: Welcome back home, brother (to the Light of Truth).
Delphin,
Pope gives advice on stemming 'exodus' from Church.
By Philip Pullella, Reuters
Pope Francis, in a stunningly candid assessment of the state of the Catholic Church, said on Saturday it should look in the mirror and ask why so many people are leaving the faith of their fathers.
On the penultimate day of his trip to Brazil, Francis delivered a long address to the country's bishops in which he suggested elements of what could become a blueprint for stopping what he called an "exodus."
"I would like all of us to ask ourselves today: are we still a Church capable of warming hearts?" he said in a speech remarkable for its frankness about the hemorrhaging of the Church in many countries.
The Church has been losing members throughout the world to secularism and to other religions, including in Latin America, where evangelical groups have won over many converts.
You spoke to soon Delphin, your Pope, your leader even questions the future of your church.
And you claim us boys "are biased and bigots".
Also, where is this proof that you quote" student enrollment in seminaries, they are UP, not down". As mentioned in your comment.
I may not be able to use those fancy words, but I do read and I do listen and one thing that I listened to was a person tell me once" if you have those statements of others you don't have to be Hemingway".
Enjoy your weekend, BOY.
I don't see what any of these speakers has to do with the pedophile priest crisis and the hundred thousand of us victims who are out here wondering WTF Snap is doing. What more can Tom Doyle say? I mean he speaks at every conference. But this lineup is really weird, I have to agree with you on this one, David. Don't understand this selection of speakers at all, unless it's to further bifurcate what is left of any survivor movement. . .
-Kay Ebeling
Producer of City of Angels Blog, returning this fall at http://cityofangels12.blogspot.com plus my experience and thoughts about SNAP are at http://cityofangels2.blogspot.com See ya later
Ms Smeal, not knowing that Snap really is the church itself, probably was paid a speakers' fee or did it pro bono, as a tax right off. Or spoke because she just likes the victims cause maybe.
But why now? You know as well as I do Ms. Smeals a lefty and choosing Mz Smeal' to speak about Catholics,( JP2 Catholics in particular) is like having Hillary Clinton speak at the Cato Institute. It polarizes and unifies unilaterly one entire half in a rather large fight. the Catholics who support ending womens rights of choice. How to make SNAP even more outre to the rank and file catholics .the one's left in the church, Those who buy the political line set by JP2 .
SNAP Is no further "left" than is Doyle. Even if he resigned his priesthood I wouldn't believe him for an instant. He's the man behind the plan "The Project" as he named it.
The left in America is nothing if not overly democratic . Yet somehow SNAP and Doyle skipped democracy for victims in SNAP.
We victims when we were with SNAP could decide whether. we agreed to be at a demo,or not. But no other democratic events occured that weren't staged for effect fiegning being "above board" rather than as a consequence of some natural democratic urge.
The boy scouts, PTA, Fathers club, Mother's club all democratic to the core all represented Democracy itself to me as a kid. And then there was SNAP? . I have been on the left a very long time, A "left" without people, now that would be a miracle.. Ever see the left in America short of people? (Except in the '50's)
Me either. We've been out there doing what we do. You may not like us or what we do but we are democratic. "Remember People's Park in Berkley? Remember the Occupy movement . We are democratic to the bone. But somehow not SNAP .
So SNAP's supposed to appear what, the one exception to leftist history in U.S.? And why such a strong pro-choice bent now?. Remember SNAP does nothing that hasn't been cleared by who knows how many Church P.R. firms. Why make that left bend now? And why always at the worse times. alwayat the worst times WOLaws are up for votes. And there's SNAP pulling a hard left turn and using Ms Smeal to do it.. And again brought to you on a platter by SNAP. Can't you see the consistant downward treck SNAP has placed victims' on. CONSISTANTLY. World without end amen. 24 years of controlling the "victims movement" and now they turn left. NEVER!
They were allowing anti gay and anti abortion in survivors raps. Completely ignoring the fact of us gay people there who were victims ALSO. And SNAP had to be taken to the woodshed at 2 different national SNAP conferences for not knowing how gay folk might feel. And this is in 2003 TWO THOUSAND and THREE and FOUR.
That's 38 YEARS after STONEWALL.
How f'ing left is that?
SNAP is no more left than John Wayne was. On this I swear to your god.
I have only the greatest admiration for those who have the courage to speak up about corruption in an institution we were lead to believe we could trust to care more about children than about protecting predators, their dirty secrets and criminal activities. These are heroes and voices for the countless voiceless victims worldwide.I
Fresh from claims that this or that document dump or case or new venue (Austrialia, most recently) will really show everybody … JR now relays the prediction that things will really start to happen "in the next 10 years". Perhaps I was wrong: perhaps the coconut halves tied to vines tied to empty-crates actually do provide communications. Or perhaps it was a tin-foil hat after all.
JR may join commenter Ecker on his hilltop, fortified with the jug of Kool-Aid and the loaves and fishes for the picnic lunch, waiting for their Certainty to manifest itself for all to see. Some folks have been doing this sort of thing in this country since 1844.
As I said in my most recent comment on the immediately previous article, readers are welcome to weigh the possibilities that such wish-fulfillments will come to pass.
In comments a while back about Doyle and that 1985 proposal he made, I said that he and his team actually had made some very worthwhile points and that it was very regrettable that more wasn't done with it by the hierarchy.
A secondary point was made in the material: that Doyle's Report was nixed by some high-ranking staffer because of the suspicion that he was simply trying to build an empire for himself.
I think that that staffer was accurate in his estimation of Doyle’s personal predispositions. That doesn’t justify the ignoring of the Report, but it does seem borne out by Doyle’s subsequent ‘career’: rather than work within the organization of the Church he chose to build his empire elsewhere. (And yet, again, has never applied for laicization in order to free himself from the Church with which he “is not associated in any way” – which of course is not true, since he remains – by his own choice – an ordained priest of the Church.)
And, as we see, SNAP here demonstrates clearly the reality that the Catholic Abuse Matter and the Stampede has always been fueled by a broad congeries of ‘interests’, few of them actually concerned for the integrity of the Church and the well-being of genuine victims.
In fact, it seems clear now that with the number of abuse allegations so substantially dwindling, SNAP has to now run the risk of revealing that vast sub-surface web of alliances and ‘interests’ in order to Keep The Ball Rolling (and broaden its contributor base, no doubt).
It was a Perfect Storm type of boon to the secularists and – alas – much of the government that there were so many ‘interests’ within the Church, who were more than happy to serve as fronts for that larger secularist gambit to weaken the Church’s credibility and status. (The Beltway could not forget the hefty influence of the Church’s nuclear-war opposition in Reagan’s day; it also had to come up with some ‘Villain’ that could be blamed for the failure of some of its signature impositions – abortion, most notably perhaps – to succeed. Readers of a certain age will realize that 40 or more years ago, very few elite commenters thought that these newly-imposed ‘changes’ would still be highly-contested in the second decade of the next century.)
So the Church here plays not only the role of pinata for ‘victims’ of abuse (however defined), but also the role of Arch-Villain to distract from far more uncongenial thoughts: that some of the marquis secularist impositions of the past decades have failed to be widely accepted in the country. (If they had been, we wouldn’t be having this conversation and various interest-groups wouldn’t nowadays be so fearful that all of their ‘gains’ were still in great danger of being reversed.)
While the surface currents eddy and flow in the cultural life of the country, certain deep currents apparently remain stubbornly stable, despite the political class and cultural elites’ strongest efforts at imposing their agendas. (See my comments about the French Revolution in my latest comment on the immediately previous article.)
Those ‘liberating’ agendas certainly have not ignited a broad and deep and quick acceptance. Doubts continue to exist.
It is easier (necessary, even) to have a single Arch-Villain to blame it all on. And as we have seen, there are all manner of ‘voices’ one can scare up to serve as folksy fronts to keep up the appearances that this is all a ‘democratic’ and ‘popular’ concern and isn’t really about i) elites’ and government’s imposition of ii) bad ideas.
The Church has been in this situation before, and in the not-so-distant past. In continuing to reform herself she simultaneously a) enhances her own integrity and b) serves as a rallying-point for those who do not believe that any human community can survive without a strong grounding in the Metaplane and who do not believe that a purely this-worldly world can sustain itself and who do not believe that a purely this-worldly government can serve as the ultimate source of Meaning and principle.
This self-reform of the Church must continue and intensify.
Meanwhile, let SNAP in its present desperation continue to reveal the Oz-like machinery that has kept it going, casting fresh light on the whole subsurface web of ‘interests’ who, for whatever reasons, need to get the Church out of the way.
ATTRITION! Get it? ATTRITION. Your church is running out of priests. It doesn't take a Cassandra to predict with in the next 10 yrs your system will be forced to change by it's own lack of priests. What don't you get about that?
Looks like TMR is making the big time, again-
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/dave-pierre/2013/07/26/why-radical-feminist-eleanor-smeal-star-priest-abuse-victims-confab
"I have only the greatest admiration for those who have the courage to speak up about corruption in an institution we were lead to believe we could trust to care more about children than about protecting predators, their dirty secrets and criminal activities. These are heroes and voices for the countless voiceless victims worldwide.I"
Mercifully, cut off mid-thought (-less).
Unless, James was referring to the US public school system. Then, he may have a valid point.
http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2013/05/13/catholic_church_registers_growth_mainly_in_africa,_asia/in2-691722
Here's an "unfiltered by the biased media" source for Church growth in Asia, Africa.
Of course, it doesn't neatly fit with the lefts stated hatred of Catholicism, overall, and especially the Church in particular, so you will simply deny it as the lefts does with all facts.
I don't know from where the rest of the commenters rant originates regarding his reading or comprehension abilities (that's more of a self-reflection exercise better done in private).
Let's remember that our "sources" of information are key to the accuracy and truth of any article regarding the Catholic Church. The msm NEVER quotes or interprets our Pope (or any other faithful Catholic) accurately or within context, intentionally.
The lefts source, and basis for their hate-filled diatribes against the Church, is always bigoted lefty media outlets, from which they build their flimsy case for their bigotry on a very faulty foundation ("sand" rather than "rock").
That cheesy right wing blog's the "big time"? My I.Q. dropped 20 points just looking at it.
Sean Hannity and crew are a bad joke. "The lefty's are coming to get your stuff!"
Fear! fear! fear! FEAR! fear! Quick! you better kill someone that'll stop the fear.
The right always comes from fear. It lives off of it.
I can see it now, the back alley rooms or the basements of catholic individuals who wish not to be associated with the old school thinking as read here.
In regard to the comment by JR on the 28th at 1214PM in regard to “attrition” (exaggerated formatting omitted), let me quote from a recent comment on the immediately prior article here:
“Actually, a substantial uptick of older men – meaning in their 30s and 40s and 50s – are coming forward. And I think this is an excellent development: they have had experience of life and the world, will not so easily sink into some sort of hothouse clerical culture, will be able to work with both hierarchy and laity in a more adult and forthright fashion, and have already gone through the growing-pains and complications of younger men. And – having already held jobs in the ‘real world’ – will be ready to accept the many demands of their calling without feeling put-upon and needing as much TLC as younger men require; they can, in the fine Brit phase, ‘get on with it’.”
Readers may wish to view this article:
http://www.ncregister.com/site/article/seminarys-older-vocations-boom/
Publion opening paragraph on the article he wishes you to read states "According to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University, the population of Catholics in the United States has risen by more than 18 million during the last 40 years. As a result, there is an increasing need for priests to serve the faithful of our Church.
Then once again I will refer you to the statements I placed by YOUR pope on 7/28/13 at 12:07am
Its either snowing or alot of hot air is being blown around where Publion lives, but who would know more about the fate of the church then the man who resides in Vatican City.
This only again shows the sites Publion wants to reference are nothing more then a newspaper ad to sell his failing church.
Need for priests because of an increase in catholics. Your need for priests is because some are going to prison and others who may have thought about going to the seminary who may have received that "calling" are saying "why should I associate myself with the church"
The days when mothers wished for their sons to become priests are gone, and they will NEVER return.
BREAKING NEWS:
Pope Francis on Monday said “who am I to judge?” gay people as he discussed one of the most divisive issues affecting the Catholic Church.
Luca Zennaro / Pool via EPA
Pope Francis, who gave a press conference on his flight back from Brazil, said he had stayed away from the gay marriage debate on his trip because he wanted to stay positive.
“I have yet to find anyone who has a business card that says he is gay,” the pontiff said at a press conference in which he addressed the reports of a "gay lobby" within the Vatican.
“They say they exist If someone is gay, who searches for the Lord and has goodwill, who am I to judge?” he added
With all the respect in the world Mr James Robertson you called it.
"WHO AM I TO JUDGE"
I think Delphin and Publion just threw their computers across the room.
Maybe the Pope won't "judge" us but he seems to want us to judge ourselves wrong and follow the church's anti gay mythology.
In other words if we gays want to be really "good" we won't have sex with each other because it's just plain "wrong" according to catholic "teaching".
Isn't that a bit like Pontious Pilate washing his hands?
Hypocrisy.
Publion, Here is the solution to your increasing need for priests.
"Mary is more important than the apostles," he said. "One must think about women in the church. We have not done enough theology on this."
“Pope: Door ‘closed’ on women priests”
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2013/07/29/pope-says-ban-on-women-priests-to-remain/2595365/
No gay marriage, no married priests, no abortion, no female priests. If that's what you need to trip your religious trigger, be a Protestant (or anything else your little rainbow hearts desire). Leave Catholicism alone.
The above is a comment made on 7/26/13 by Delphin.
With comments being made by the pope over the last couple of days I hope for his safety he does not end up choking on his words.
Thank you Dennis, Identity politics has it's problems but they are nothing compared to the hate filled sexist racist world I grew up in. The American people are EMPATHIZING with us. And for that I'm more than grateful. And for your post in particular.
We are not the boogey man our oppressors, all oppressors are.
I had been busy with a long comment at the end of the immediately previous article, but I see commenter Ecker has been busy. Let’s see what we have.
In regard to the Pope’s comments I would first note that he spoke privately with the bishops in the context of a visit where millions made their way to attend his outdoor talks and ceremonies.
The Latin American ‘exodus’ toward other religious groups has long been one of concern, and this Pope’s primary pastoral and apostolic experience has been in that region of the world – so there’s no surprise there.
Also, ‘secularism’ – piggybacking in on various bits of modern culture imported from America (and to a lesser extent Europe) – is clearly pulling in an opposite direction from the various non-Catholic groups (primarily fundamentalist and/or syncretist – meaning that people are once again trying to blend in older religious traditions of their region, going back centuries to the various types of animism, blood-sacrifice, and blending of Catholic and those prior-traditional practices and beliefs). Certainly the evangelical-syncretist groups are still searching for religious Meaning.
The Pope does well – I would say – to raise these issues for this region’s bishops and set a course for their sustained deliberations. The key will be to develop a ministry more effectively engaged with people but not one that pretty much gives-away-the-store in order to make itself more attractive as a consumer item.
The fundamentalist approach certainly provides a more ‘quick-burning’ religious experience – in the short term. It does so, often, by appealing to more primal and visceral and immediate human emotions and predispositions. There are great long-term downsides to this approach, so the Church and the regional hierarchies will have to work out a way to reinvigorate Catholic religious experience without tapping into those primal and almost atavistic urges and tendencies, which would serve only to regress the region’s religious life back to much more primal and in some cases primitive times.
I would see this is precisely the sign of a healthy religious organizational approach – one that should have been more quickly embraced in the North American Catholic region (as I discussed in my most recent comment on the previous article). Ecker’s characteristic hope and – worse – his hasty jumping to conclusions in regard to the condition of the Church are what they are and I say let them just hang up there where they were put.
Certainly, since the Pope is working constructively and intelligently and maturely toward a re-forming and re-invigorating of that region’s religious ministry then he cannot be sanely construed as an “anti-Catholic bigot”, especially of the unthinking and perhaps crazed variety. The same cannot be said of certain strains of commentary we have seen on this site.
I had mentioned an article in regard to the new types of seminarians in a comment (29th at 351AM) on this thread. I will include the article link again at the bottom of this comment and my comment on the article is already up here on this thread.
I cannot make out the sense of somebody’s idea that “if you have those statements of others you don’t have to be Hemingway”. But it does sound like some sort of justification for the Proof-texting and Mental Shoebox approach, about which I have commented at length recently. Nor would I advise anybody to presume that simply ‘having’ “those statements of others” relieves one from the responsibility of competently assessing the worth of such “statements” (whatever they may be).
Ecker then addresses me on the 29th at 944AM.
Ecker then somehow connects the CARA observation that there is a need for more priests in the Church with the afore-mentioned papal comments … and somehow draws the conclusion that (as best one can determine from his written material here) that the Pope has sort of mostly admitted that the Church is in dire straits and not-long-for-this-world and my own linked-to article from Georgetown actually goes that way too.
Where to begin dealing with the primitive logic he deploys here? The US military is in need of troops and the Marines have always been looking for a few good ones … so may we then conclude decisively therefrom that both the military and the Marines specifically are organizationally on the way out?
We also can read the article and see where Georgetown’s CARA organization is going with its initial (and non-lethal) observation. Readers are welcome to consider whether the Pope or CARA are preparing people for the imminent demise of the Church or are even simply describing a problem for which they can see no workable solution.
And Ecker then notes on his own that the Catholic population in the US has “risen by more than 18 million” in the past 40 years. So clearly Ecker is having trouble keeping his mental train on the rails here.
And he then informs us – perhaps from tin-foil or coconut messages – that the reason for the decline in the number of priests is simply that “many who may have received that ‘calling’ are saying ‘why should I associate myself with the church” – an assertion for which he provides no factual backup. Does he keep up that wide a correspondence with the many persons who apparently think about being priests and then quietly decide not-to because they don’t want to be associated with the Church? Or are we just getting messages from the coconuts here?
Then, having used the material in the article I referenced for his own purposes, he now goes and says that such sites “are nothing more then [sic] a newspaper ad to sell his failing church”. As opposed, I would imagine, to Ecker’s own newspapery-‘ads’ to convince people that the Church is in extremis and we are welcome to join him on his hilltop awaiting the End (Kool-Aid limited, so BYOB).
And we also advised – again probably by the coconut telegraph – that mothers no longer wish for their sons to become priests. And – probably from the Wig of Future Assurance – we are also informed that those days “will NEVER return” (exaggerated formatting not omitted; when your point isn’t strong, yell it and that will make it stronger, apparently).
I don’t know who in comments here has been hoping for any “days” to “return”. The Pope and CARA seem robustly focused on the future – although a future that seems more grounded in actuality than the Church-less fantasies embraced or urged or demanded (take your pick) by Ecker.
Then at 1008AM on the 29th Ecker relies on the Pope as a reliable source of information – how nice, if uncharacteristic.
Apparently the Pope has said “who am I to judge” anyone “who searches for the Lord and has goodwill”.
As a result of which I am supposed to be throwing my computer across the room (something that happens often chez Ecker and JR?).
The Pope has said a) he does not see himself as one to “judge” b) persons who search for the Lord and has goodwill”.
Presuming the accuracy of the report, I am not sure why I would need to throw my computer across the room. I haven’t been involved in discussions here about homosexuality. Although I think the material in (b) doesn’t quite fit much of the material presented by certain commenters here and that goes quite a way to rendering Ecker’s point somewhat irrelevant.
I myself have assessed the conceptual and thought-processing quality of much material that has appeared in comments on this site. In which case I am not morally judging anybody but simply pointing out that they can’t throw a baseball as well as they seem to think they can (when they aren’t actually trying to toss a Pop Warner football from far left field to second-base to make the play they desire). But that’s something altogether different from what the Pope is talking about. Which again makes Ecker’s point rather irrelevant. Unless one presumes that if one’s material is not instantly and totally accepted then one is personally judged and rejected – but that is not a problem within my ability to resolve.
All of which goes to my prior discussions about the dynamics of the internet: you can wind up with a lot of people who aren’t really used to thinking, who yet want to keep asserting their material and probably under the strong impression that they must be listened-to or else … (fill in the blank). But that’s the challenge of reading and sifting material on the Web and it is what it is.
Lastly, from the Ecker comment of the 29th at 1122, I have to point out again the disturbing tendency to resort to imagery of violence and death, especially in regard to persons whom he doesn’t like. In this case the Pope is connected rather clearly and specifically with “choking on his own words”, although – also characteristically – the idea is couched as a faux-pious hope that such a thing doesn’t actually happen.
There are types of professionally-run groups that exist in this world where such a comment would draw some very careful scrutiny, and not at all of a positive nature.
http://www.ncregister.com/site/article/seminarys-older-vocations-boom/
No Thank You needed Jim. If I may copy a previous comment of yours, you called it.
Jim Robertson says:
July 26, 2013 at 6:59 pm
You can't pretend to anyone; that if the Pope changes his mind about Gays or abortion or married priests or women priests that you wouldn't fall all over yourselves to obey him. Admit you would. Tell the truth and shame the devil.
With in the next 10 years something will have to give you are losing the attrition game. Priest wise. Something's got to give
It seems that Publion sees me as the almighty and powerful OZ that I may wish harm to an individual and it would happen.
Well, if that is true I will attempt to grant Publion the same thing the scarecrow received.
I think religion is a lot like superstition, hedging bets, luck seekers, stuff seekers. health seekers love seekers.( I have 3 happy recovering addicts working on the house and they are happy. I wouldn't change that if I could. Krishna's are happy I like happy people and if religion makes you happy well I'am happy about that. I mean it).
But religion as fact hunhun
Religion seems more like: "What ever the imagination allows. And I personally love imagination but I know it's not real. I don't imagine a traffic light's green when it's red. (though I have tried.)
So how can we share a planet happily and healthfully and ecologically. That's share not serve. SHARE To me that's a very important question that religious and non religious alike should have front and center.
Another property bubble is on the rise in L.A. almost 30% since last year at this time and it too will end badly. Why? Nothings been done law wise to not have a reoccurence of a bubble.
I agree about language of violence but I'm not Dennis and this is the net and we are all on the curve in terms of perfection so lets cut some slack and not get all fearful, shall we.
We are all just people here. Which on one level is really pretty cool. It's our now; it's all we've got. IMHO
What married and/or female priests, priest vocation status, gay "marriage", parishioners status and abortion has to do with the whiney-gripe of the self-identifying clergy "victims", no one [logical] will ever know.
Unless, we eliminate their claimed cause celeb regarding minor abuse as the driver and replace it with pure, unadulterated antiCatholic bigotry.
The resident bigots "pink-o" slips are showing, again…..
I left out , The men working on my house are happy born again Christians. And god forgive me, Republicans. I try not to be a bigot. I try.
It is not my intention for anyone to fear me or think I am violent. What would that accomplish ?
In this country there are very few documented cases of clergy abuse survivors or their family members who have gone out to seek revenge on their abuser in a violent way. Although the attacks the victim went through were violent.
The last case that I know of happened in the state of California when a man after 40 years went after his abuser because of the abuse him and his brother received at the hands of this priest when they were I believe five and six year olds. (Time does not heal all wounds) and the only other case which has been talked about recently is the priest killed in prison not by his victim but by another inmate.
Publion does have such a wild imagination for him to say those things about me, HE DOES NOT KNOW ME. I am a great judge of character and I pat myself on the back for having that gift now, I only wish I had it years ago i would most likely not be here commenting on a subject such as this. But, Publion by his writings alone show he wants to be a colorful individual and by the length of his comments he wants to dominate this site.
I cannot change his or anyone elses thinking of me and in my book that's o.k. Because in the end the only people who I truly care about the way they think of me is my family and friends. Not anyone here on this site.
A couple of observations on the spate of comments following my most recent one.
First I note commenter Ecker’s (29th at 1008PM) curious addition: that I think he is Oz-like and “almighty and powerful”. I did not in any point in my text suggest that. The point I brought up – as delicately as I could – was that this tendency of his to connect death (vivid and violent) with persons with whom he disagrees is disturbing but characteristic of his material.
Notice that rather than deal with that somewhat difficult observation, commenter Ecker then went and created a different issue for himself, one that is far more congenial and yet is something I never mentioned or raised in my observation: that he is “almighty and powerful”. Thus he can compliment himself – after a fashion – while simultaneously a) appearing to deal with my observation and b) feel better by fending off the actual gravamen of my observation. And it appears that being “almighty and powerful” is something that for commenter Ecker is indeed an enjoyable imagining.
I think if this train of thought goes any further it is going to go toward places that are not proper material for commentary here, so I won’t pursue it further. But I offer these present observations as illustrative of what readers can run into in Web commentary.
And he concludes his comment – again characteristically – with an attack couched as a faux-pious hope: that I will get a brain. Charming. I can assure him a have spent and continue to spend a great deal of time and energy honing the one I have; and that not being “almighty and powerful” that effort requires a sustained effort that has become something of a life-discipline. One that I could recommend pursuing to the best of one’s abilities.
In regard to JR’s surmises about religion (30th at 1225AM).
First: being “happy” as an object or goal of “religion” raises more questions than it answers. What does it mean to be “happy”. Perhaps non-recovered addicts also feel “happy” – what does one do with that? Who is to ‘judge’ them and tell them that they need to change? In order to do more than reduce “religion” to a ‘feeling’ – and those things come and go and are highly mutable in humans – then one needs to do some serious thinking about what the purpose of the human being is, such that s/he will actually achieve ‘fulfillment’ (the “happy” bit simply follows the achievement of some level of genuine fulfillment and is not a goal in itself). A cargo-cult native might ‘feel happy’ having an abandoned refrigerator as a couch for his/her hut, but actually has no real idea of what the refrigerator could do if it were made to actually perform according to its purposes. One might simply leave the native with that ‘happiness’, such as it is, but you can quickly see where the native can be ‘happy’ and still have no actual grasp of the potentialities s/he is near but about which s/he has no conception.
Second: clearly Catholicism’s concept of religion is nothing like “whatever the imagination allows”. If it were then anybody could imagine anything they wanted to imagine and it would be ‘Catholic’. And it is precisely the objection of some to Catholicism that it has too many conceptual requirements (let alone the ‘rules’). It has been Catholicism’s ministry to combine the human need for Meaning with the human ability to ‘imagine’ – but in such a way as to harness those characteristic energies and needs to an accurate perception of the nature of God and of themselves as God’s creatures and of the nature of a human community of Faith communally dedicated to living out life along those lines.
Other religious approaches and other religions have indeed tried to take a less-demanding approach: giving freer rein to ‘imagination’ and calling whatever thereby pops up as ‘religious’. Indeed, liberal Protestantism – especially in this country and widely so since the mid-60s – has gone down that road. And – as the Vatican has always feared – significant chunks of American Catholic thought and practice has bent in that direction in that same timeframe.
But simply using one’s imagination in order to ‘feel happy’ is not all there is to it in the Catholic Vision.
And lastly, in regard to the Pope’s comments about gays (he will not “judge” gays who “search for the Lord and have goodwill” does not reflect – as far as I can see – his ‘changing his mind’ about gays. One can’t get that conclusion out of what he says unless one presumes that when he uses “search for the Lord” and “have goodwill” he is simply using unusual words to agree with one’s own feelings and thoughts about homosexuality. But a) if his phrase “search for the Lord” presumes a Catholic context and if his phrase “have goodwill” presumes a Catholic context, then I would say that he is trying to change the tone of the discourse but hasn’t actually “changed his mind” such that he is now papally asserting that anything ‘gay’ is now OK.
And b) he may well be addressing ‘gays’ generally but not specifically Catholic gays. Meaning that he is – again – trying for pastoral reasons to change the tone of the discourse but is not papally asserting a full and complete reversal of Catholic thought and practice. (This would make more sense, I think: Francis is not so untutored a churchman as to suddenly reverse a currently significant segment of Catholic thought and practice simply in a speech delivered at a (highly-publicized and perhaps largely attended) public event.)
There is certainly a conflicted area here: the Catholic Vision’s reliance on the Biblical procreation principle from (as I once mentioned a while ago here) one of the two Creation stories of Adam and Eve creates – in these days – a conflict as to the rightness of homosexuality as a human orientation (which is distinct from the selection of a particular lifestyle, as I also said: it is one thing to be homosexual and another thing to present oneself regularly and definitively to the world in a Carmen Miranda outfit, so to speak).
The core issue here is the question of sexual orientation (is one actually born with it; is it a characteristic of humanness or is it the equivalent of simply being born with a dysfunction; is it something that will contribute to human fulfillment or is it simply a distraction – as is any sexual activity when engaged-in merely for its own sake). These are fundamental issues which to which science itself has not been able to contribute any definitive answers. The ‘relationship’ emphasis in that second Creation story of Adam and Eve might open up more space here – theologically and conceptually – and possibly Francis is going to be looking more closely at that.
But to say that he has “changed his mind” about homosexuality is an assertion that cannot be legitimately conceptually derived from his comments as I have seen them here (I haven’t seen the full text of his speech).
And to suggest – as has been done here – that the Pope’s ‘changing his mind’ is yet more definitive evidence that the whole Catholic Vision is collapsing (and the Church with it) is something more on the lines of a crack-dream – if I may be vivid.
No one minds you being vivid; it's your being wrong that's the problem.
All religion is based in imagination if it were based in fact there would be obvious irrevefutable evidence not only of a god's existance but proof for all that the catholic god version is the correct god. You do not have any evidence for any of your religious beliefs. That's why they are called beliefs. So whether your god has a son, or a mother or can preform miracles is nothing but imagination without having any proof of those beings ever being true.
Faith is imagination and nothing else but.
Here's the increased seminary enrollment link for the research-challenged:
http://www.jknirp.com/cararep.htm
Please dear bigots, do your own homework from now on. If you knew better how to research for facts, you might not be so obstinate about many truths.
3723? Well that will not end attrition in the priesthood. you were bleeding out in the'80's too and there's a wee fact for you.
Apparently my comment of the 31st at 959AM and commenter Ecker’s of 952AM were submitted almost simultaneously.
I had said that I am not going down a certain road and I am not. But I will respond to the material that commenter Ecker has provided – which, as I have often said, is all that I work with on this site.
The “violent” to which I have referred need not be any overt tendency to physical violence, nor did I ever suggest that it was. It is, rather, an internal but clear predisposition toward violence in one’s feelings – which, in commenter Ecker’s material is then also plastered-over with a quasi/faux pious presentation.
Imagine, for example, if after an exchange on some matter, somebody were to say to you: ‘Well, we don’t agree at all and I certainly hope that you don’t go out now and get hit by a truck and then squashed like a bug and the whole bleeding mess then set on fire by gas that leaked from the truck’s tank that turns you into an overroasted marshallow heap of glop.’ You would, I think, sense rather quickly that although this hope was grammatically couched in the negative, yet the speaker was clearly deeply involved with some rather vivid and violent fantasies, focused rather clearly.
Whether the speaker realizes that about him/herself is another question altogether. Which brings us to what has become a familiar trope in the past few decades: you don’t know me (usually delivered with an exclamation point but in commenter Ecker’s material delivered with exaggerated formatting and in the third person referring to me: “HE DOES NOT KNOW ME”).
I think that this phrase and concept has arisen in contemporary popular usage because of the tendency of much post-‘60s thought to dismiss any commonality or uniformity among people (in order to reduce the strength of i) ‘traditional’ claims of human nature or essence and ii) in order to deflect objections to one’s personal preferred acts or beliefs or desires). Thus, if confronted with disapproval or objection or speculation as to why one was doing or saying this or that, one might simply claim ‘you don’t know me’ – meaning that one is a totally unique and totally complex individual and thus no other person could possibly have any grounds for doubting or disapproving what they – one presumes – have no way of knowing anything about.
But if that were true then there wouldn’t be any psychological profession and literature would not be of any use in helping to understand human nature.
So I would say this: from the material I have seen I have made the observations I have made (and I have explained those observations and how I formed them) and I stand by them. I don’t have a “wild imagination” and I certainly haven’t gone and ‘imagined’ what I have observed and explained; nor would I gratuitously do so – I have worked with the material that has been put up by commenter Ecker.
We then get an assurance that Ecker is “a great judge of character and I pat myself on the back for having that gift now”. I will only say that if that if he does – as he believes – possess that skill, then it is always good practice to use that skill in examining oneself. Perhaps some of those sessions in front of the bathroom mirror could be less about Wigs and more about deploying his purported character-analysis skills. Because his material here and his self-assessment (as implied here) do not seem as congruent as he apparently thinks they are.
And I also note that he starts off this comment with the presumption that others might fear him – thus he wants to reassure everyone. This is a remarkably practiced gambit: a) I didn’t say or imply that I feared his physical violence – which assumption of his gives him the opportunity to don the role of Assurer and Comforter as well as the role of Misunderstood and Misjudged victim. Rather b) I was trying – as delicately as possible – to signal that I thought there were some serious interior incongruences and disconnects, as evidenced – clearly, to me – by the remarks in his material as I had explained here at some length.
While one might presume that commenter Ecker simply isn’t good at reading comprehension, I would say that instead we see a rather long-practiced ability (perhaps no longer even requiring conscious thought) to deflect and transmute uncongenial self-information into something more congenial. Which is what it is and I will not go further.
And I will also say that my observations drawn-from and based-on Ecker’s material are too easily characterized as (merely) my “thinking” about him. I really don’t spend time just coming up with ‘thoughts’ about people; I consider the material they submit and then formulate responses and observations as carefully and accurately as I can. And I prefer to work with the conceptual aspects of material; although in some cases where commenters reveal relevant bits about themselves (whether they realize it or not) then I will draw whatever useful insights might be gleaned from that.
I have – as always – no way of knowing if anybody claiming to be a victim in comments here is a genuine victim or is otherwise-classifiable, so I would not be thinking of victim-revenge as an operative element here with Ecker.
I also note Ecker’s assertion that “by [my] writings alone show [I want] to be a colorful individual and by the length of [my] comments [I want] to dominate this site”. In the first place, writing long and involved comments is no way to get a reputation as “colorful” and indeed I have been recently characterized by one of Ecker’s valentine-partners as “boring!”. In the second place, I write long and involved comments because the issues we are dealing with here are serious and complex and because I want to counter the far-too-frequent internet tendency to toss off one-liners and ill-conceived bits as if they were definitive and useful summations of the issues. In the third place I have no wish to “dominate” this site and welcome exchange – especially counterpoint exchange, because it gives the readership more material to consider; but I do analyze everything that is put up and try to give my best thoughts on the matter (for which I have been accused by another commenter – who also doesn’t find it congenial to have his material looked-at closely – of trying to presume to “educate” the readership from a position of superiority). I can only assure the readership that I am not attempting to do any of those things and leave it to the readership to decide. Anybody, of course, is perfectly capable of ignoring my material if they wish and I do not demand affirmation or agreement of readers in response to my material.
The Geoghan case is one we have recently discussed.
The other case was the one that happened in Santa Clara, CA a year or two ago and was discussed at great length in comments here at that time (June, 2012). It was a dodgy case to begin-with, and at its end the jurors did not wish to discuss it but – as some might recall – a local attorney tried to paper-over all of the problems by concocting an explanation for the verdict that exonerated the local judge, the local prosecutor, the local police, the local jurors, the ‘victim’ who was actually the perpetrator of the assault – and blamed it all on the actual victim in the case, the elderly priest whom the perpetrator had sought out after decades. And in yet another similarity to what we have more recently seen in Philadelphia with the Billy-Doe case, the entire matter was transacted in a Congressional District deeply entwined with the national Democratic Congressional leadership (seated just north in San Francisco) and the actual Congressman for the District also a ranking member of the Democratic Congressional leadership.
If anyone's having a "go" at a pinata. It's you . The pinata your swinging at is the moral consciences of conservative( usually less educated intellectually or religiously, than you P). Catholics like D who think 4000 new seminary applicants show that the church is on the rise again
. Why don't you tell D that 4000 new seminarians won't even make a dent in the church's need for priests in America. You know it won't.
Sex is the most goofy; whacky; difficult; rewarding; fullfilling; depressing; healing and funny element in human life. And since as an atheist I don't believe it to be a magical but a biological drive, it seems that carrying on our gene's (as long as we and the planet last) is all what being alive is about. Just like the rest of the animals. We exist to reproduce but if we don't that's bad? No even the church says that it can. Can sex be used for pleasure with out reproduction? The church says it can if it's inside marriage.
Believe me the whole world knows what the church "thinks" and demands about sex.
Yet still we gays are born into Catholic families. We still are recreated over and over again by your god, but somehow our having sex for pleasure is wrong.
In ancient Sparta young males not having sex with each other was considered socially wrong The exact opposite of todays "norm". It seems to me sexuality at times can be arbitrary; depending on it's social matrix. Foucault showed this to be true in his History of Sexuality.
In response to JR’s of 210PM on the 31st
In what way can the discussion or and questioning of assertions and of ideas constitute an attack on “the moral consciences” (is there some other kind?) of persons?
And of “conservative” persons? Are we now informed that JR and others of that group constitute the “conservative” presence on this site?
Then JR characterizes his group as “usually less educated intellectually or religiously” than I am. Is this the same JR who recently asserted with satisfaction that he had educated himself the same way the Brits at university do, through “reading”? Are these persons “less educated religiously”? If so whose fault is that? There are plenty of books and courses out there.
And if they do see themselves as “less educated religiously” then why are they continually dabbling in religious commentary here? And not only dabbling but making the most overt and sweeping assertions? And lastly, why would persons who acknowledge themselves to be a bit behind the curve in terms of education still go and make and go on making so many flat-out sweeping assertions?
Then we are informed that 4000 new seminarians “won’t even make a dent in the church’s need for priests in America”. And is JR that well up to speed on the logistics of priestly assignments in the Church in the US that he can make such an assertion? ON what grounds does he make that assertion?
And then he asks me to tell another commenter about that because – he asserts – I “know it won’t” make a difference to have 4000 new seminarians. If he could quote anything from my material where I demonstrated that ‘knowledge’ I’d like to see it. Or am I now being given messages and instructions relayed from the Coconut Telegraph?
As I have said before, the first real mark of education is to not-make sweeping statements about matters for which one’s knowledge or supporting evidence are not able to provide demonstrable support. In other words, to know what one doesn’t know and to not-pretend that one does know. One can ask intelligent questions but that’s a far cry from making sweeping assertions that one cannot support. But that’s part of the education process – a more vital part – that is not available through reading and collecting factoids on 3×5 cards in the Mental Shoebox.
Then at 301PM there’s more.
A bumper-sticker burble that has to do with sex being the “most” (fill in the blank) “element in human life”. This is a Boomery and Me-Generation dodge of classic proportions: no need to think-things-through; just roll off a whole bunch of your preferred adjectives and agree to let it all hang out and shame on those who think ill of it.
I don’t know who said it was “magical” – it certainly wasn’t in any of my material. We are informed – and accurately – that it is “a biological drive” – but then so is aggression and the violence necessary to support aggression’s objectives … what’s the point here? So is eating … but does that mean that because it’s “a biological drive” it can have no limits? So is sleeping , but … ditto.
And if – in the atheist Gameplan – we are only here to fulfill our biological drives then it’s only a question of whether we sex or agress or sleep ourselves to death. And this is “all what being alive is about”?
Then JR’s mental train seems to leave the rails: “We exist to reproduce but if we don’t that’s bad?” What does that mean in the context of this comment? Is JR implying somehow that if we don’t do what “we exist to” do then that isn’t a “bad” thing? And then “Not even the Church says that it can” – can what?
“Can sex be used for pleasure without reproduction?” There is that second Creation story in which God creates Eve to be a companion for Adam – as I have mentioned in prior comments. Possibly the Church might allow that second story more weight. But the Church has always been aware of two difficulties with humans and the exercise of the sexual-reproductive urge: First, in humans – unlike most animals – the sexual urge is connected to the human powers of imagination and desire, which can create an almost addictive allure to what is – as JR says – basically “a biological urge” designed in most of the animal kingdom to achieve reproduction and nothing more. But in humans sexual activity can easily become something far more and if it’s not well-managed then – like nuclear power – it can get out of control very easily.
Second, sex is not the most basic reason why humans arealive. They have capacities of mind and soul (that urge for Meaning and not simply ‘meaning’) that clearly require serious concentration on how those capacities might be fulfilled. Surely the travails and derangements of contemporary ‘hook-up’ culture offer clear suggestions – indications even – of the flat wasteland that life becomes when sex becomes the primary defining element of the person. Unless of course humans are nothing more than animals.
I really can’t credit the assertion that “the whole world knows what the Church ‘thinks’ and demands about sex”. Surely, JR clearly does not. And once again, he undermines his own demand that he be believed.
Whether he reduces the “atheist” position on sex to incoherence or whether he accurately conveys an incoherent position … is anybody’s guess. Is there an official “atheist” dogma or doctrine on sex? Or is it to be whatever the individual “atheist” declares it to be? Perhaps the atheists need to get together and define their doctrine. But then, that would make them sort of a church … or something.
And then the late Foucault (died of AIDS-related issues in 1984) is brought in (or rather, the title of one of his books is mentioned). Apparently the point is that “sexuality at times can be arbitrary depending on its social matrix”. Which is true – as far as it goes but what’s the point here? That because the ancient Spartans had one idea and the Church has developed (rather comprehensively) another idea … then … what? What’s the conclusion to be drawn from this observation? That since two different cultures each developed different ideas about X, then there is no way to judge their efficacy? Or accuracy? Or – in any case – since we are not ancient Spartans and but are members of a Western culture so heavily influenced by the Church then what is the relevance of what the ancient Spartans thought? The Soviets initially wanted to do away with marriage altogether (in order to have children raised Correctly in Soviet communal-orphanages) but had to give up the idea when the Russian people resisted it too strongly for even Lenin’s methods to be able to impose it on them.
Or is Foucault being introduced here as a proof-text but without any serious discussion to explain just what ‘proof’ we are supposed to find in it?
Or perhaps this was just something on one of the 3×5 cards in the Mental Shoebox under S for Sex.
And why would the restrictions be “arbitrary”? How is that term defined and used here? Foucault was heavily invested in the concept of how power can influence belief in society – but if memory serves he didn’t consider the ‘power’ of tradition as rising up from below (from the people themselves) and focused almost solely on power as being imposed on the people from above, from ‘structures’ of power. But it is equally important to consider that what Gramsci tried to explain as ‘hegemony’ (i.e. that people are so indoctrinated with structures of power and belief that their beliefs ‘seem natural’) was actually the manifestation of some profoundly deep Sense within a people, from which their traditions organically spring (rather than merely being imposed from above by those ‘structures of power’).
Thus, then, bringing us to the Church in the West (and especially the US) in the past half-century: has a) the Church merely imposed some ‘alien’ belief on people? Or b) has the Church somehow given Shape to some profoundly deep communal Sense among people? It would seem that (a) requires a most amazingly and even superhuman organization – far more successful in its machinations than even the French Revolutionaries or the Soviet regime in Russia – of almost incomprehensible power and strategic acumen.
But if (b) then the Church is seen as the institutionalized expression of some profound and organic Sense among people and peoples.
But for the secularizing American elites and the government that has indentured itself to them (according to Dutton’s vision, mentioned in prior comments) the Church must be the Villain: the evil manipulative force that is the only real major reason why so much of the secularizing New Order is still highly-contested and resisted after half-a-century. Because if there is no evil Villain, then the possibility has to be considered that resistance to the imposition of the New Order of secularism is coming from some profound base within the people themselves.
Spontaneous resistance to the valorization of homosexuality in Africa is proving a deep problem for the Anglican polity, whose ‘missionaries’ are elites who preach the conventional Western elite Correct position. Where is that spontaneous resistance coming from? Not from the Vatican – whose ‘structural’ influence in Africa has not been strong.
The bigots don't like facts and usually challenge them or change the subject, but, they remain facts just the same. Seminarian enrollment increased, period.
An interesting lesson in just how the left distorts, twists and lies is how the fact that seminarians are on the rise is linked to growth of the Church (in US, in Brazil, worldwide?). That claim is being made by the lefty-antiCatholic bigot(s) here – not by me. No such extrapolation was made by me. This conclusion, as attributed to me, is just another figment of the leftist-atheist wild imagination, the same fantasm that imagines that all priests are pedophiles (instead of just a minority subset of deviant homosexuals); that imagines that the Catholic Church is engrosssed in a worldwide conspiratorial coverup of "everything" since the beginning of their establishment (lets go way back to St. Peter); that imagines the universe and life itself banged itself into existence (chuckle-chuckle); and that imagines that the lefties (socialist-communist-atheist-liberal-progressive) have the solutions to the worlds social and environmental problems (outright belly-laugh).
So, aside from the usual resident nasties – the good news is that 3.5M youth-young adults rallied with the Pope in Brazil….but, not much (if any?) positive coverage in the msm?
So, the Pope reaffirms Church doctrine regarding homosexuals, but the msm reports are… explicitly and intentionally wrong?
No political agenda there by the msm, [edited by moderator]?
P.S. here's a link to same sex marrige in the church a thousand years + ago, real factual, history. Please enjoy: http://www.towleroad.com/2013/07/historian-presents-evidence-of-same-sex-marriage-ceremonies-performed-in-the-christian-church-in-100.html
http://www.leaderu.com/ftissues/ft9411/articles/darling.html
http://www.firstthings.com/article/2009/03/in-the-case-of-john-boswell-4
Dave, it appears Mr. Neuhaus has his own ax to grind, a catholic one. He , like Pub goes on at great length but still doesn't say much. He simply claims Boswell wrong; and quotes Paul. and one or two reviewers of Boswell And then, like D declares his position "true" angrily. By crediting Thomas Aquinas who was around 1000 ce as an authority historicaly compared to the early Christians who according to real historic records weren't so homogenuous as the church later became..
Obviously a system could not tranform from the pagan to the christian overnight in terms of same sex sexuality.
People, culture had to slowly adapt and or be adapted from the "yehaw" sexuallity of pagan days (Though the bible in the OT says it's o.k. to have sex slaves.[ if you treat them "nice" I guess?]) to the new world order of sexual shame and guilt re enforced by Augustine; Aquinas and their followers.
I have read the Neuhaus review. After several paragraphs he launches into a lengthy review of relevant New Testament texts, historical issues, and various objections raised by contemporary theology, Protestant as well as Catholic. Thus JR’s typical toss-off characterization of Neuhaus (he “still doesn’t say much”) is incomprehensible once you have read the Neuhaus article. There are substantial issues and questions that are raised and discussed, with references to various other scholars (hardly characterizable as “one or two reviewers”) from several relevant fields.
>Neuhaus also raises the interesting point about “advocacy scholarship”, one of the many mutant varieties that have sprung up in the past half-century (“advocacy” science, journalism, law, and such) which are based merely on the idea that the researcher/scholar/practitioner should first take a personal position on behalf-of one side of the question and only then look at the relevant material to be studied under the influence of that predisposition(prejudice or pre-judgment, if you wish). Worse, there is a strong whiff of the presumption that since you are no doubt ‘advocating’ in a ‘good cause’, then merely ‘objective’ study – with its rules of evidence (does that sound familiar?) and investigation need not be closely followed since they might well only serve to ‘obstruct’ the good work in the good cause which you are trying to accomplish.
I would like some quotation to justify a) the assertion that Neuhaus merely “declares his position ‘true’ angrily”. If one were of a psychological bent, one might sense here some good old-fashioned psychological ‘projection’ on JR’s part, since here he more accurately describes his own modus operandi than Neuhaus.
And once again we see a shadowy and ill-stated form of the remarkably un-historical thought that the “early Christians” (to the extent we can know what they thought and practiced) were not “so homogeneous” (spelling corrected from the original) and that Aquinas, coming along a millennium later, was and remains a dubious source of Christian thought and praxis.
This stance is one borrowed from 19th century fundamentalist and liberal theology, which – having dispensed with the Church – then had to create for themselves a substitute Ground of authority, and thus they created the image of a totally accessible and coherent ‘primitive Christian community’ and the inerrant Bible. But there is a) tremendous historical complication involved in trying to ascertain what that community actually thought and did and b) the unhappy fact that it was not until the third century A.D. that the Church actually canonized the New Testament by declaring what Books were to be included and what (there were many) books were not to be included. So the very existence of the New Testament stems from the Church herself; those early Christian communities had no such canonical clarity as to just what was and wasn’t ‘the Bible’.
The Church played a vital role in the on-going development of Christian doctrine. And in doing so, there were avoided both the Scylla of a rigid and un-changing fixation on 1st century belief and thought and the Charybdis of an anything-goes approach to Christian belief (and in fundamentalist and liberal Protestant theology we see subsequent belief-groups respectively crashing intone or the other those rocks). The Church, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, has provided the dynamic developmental element that has simultaneously enabled Catholicism to change and yet to retain its essential core shape.
JR is on to something with his admission that “obviously a system could not transform from the pagan to the Christian overnight”. If he were to follow that thought for any distance he would have to realize just how complex and formidable a task the Church faced as various tribal and political groups were included in the Christian community. And this was as true in the 16th and 17th century New World missions as it was in the numerous missions throughout Europe and Asia Minor in the earliest centuries. (And this dynamic also – as I have said in prior comments – extended to the Church’s expansion in the English (as opposed to the Spanish or French) New World and the United States in the 19th century.
And are we to now believe that the post-Stonewall era did not re-introduce (or regress, if you prefer) sexual-activity matters back to the “yehaw”? Was not the essential Boomery approach to sexual-activity not something not very far from ‘yeeee-hawwwwww!’ (speaking the lines of a character in I-forget-which film, Jason Robards called it “a sexual philosophy somewhere to the left of Whoooopeeee”). Are there within the precincts of modern ‘gay’ thought some places where “chaste and virtuous” would be received respectfully? I am not expert in this area, but I rather think not.
And indeed, Boswell, as well as Foucault, became unavailable for subsequent scholarly controversy about their work when they both died of AIDS-related issues. It is what it is.
Then at 1219 on the 1st JR raises the interesting and highly problematic term “natural”. What does this term mean? Does it mean a) ‘natural because it is what usually happens’ or does it mean b) ‘natural in the sense that it is within the genuine character as ‘naturally’ Created by God’ … ? These are two very very different meanings of ‘natural’. One is welcome to go with the former, but that quickly regresses one (and everyone) back to Hobbes and primitivism (whatever humans are driven to do by their biological urges is ‘natural’). Or one can go with the latter: that there is a genuine nature and essence to humans and they must always struggle to bring their ‘bio-natural’ selves (if you will) into congruence with their ‘theo-natural’ selves. Readers are welcome to consider these alternatives and decide for themselves.
If JR can explain the origin and source of the human need for Meaning without some reference to the (b) position; if he can derive the origin and source for the human need for Meaning from – say – nothing more than evolution on the Monoplane, then let him share that thinking with us. I’d like to see that.
And where does he derive grounds for the assertions that readers here largely like the Fox News approach? I don’t. To me, the original Murdoch Fox News approach is simply ‘advocacy journalism’ from the Right rather than the Left, and is therefore equally unreliable for anyone trying to get a solid and comprehensive grasp on what is actually going on.
I include at the end of this comment three links to reviews of Boswell’s work, especially his book Same-Sex Unions in Pre-Modern Europe, published about two decades ago.
The first link is to a Fordham University (a Jesuit school) review that is very complimentary but still can’t avoid the problems with Boswell’s historical work.
The others are less laudatory but go into serious detail.
One thing that becomes clear is that the Byzantine practice of “adelphopoeisis” requires a competent grasp of – who can be surprised? – Byzantine culture and theological thought, and language, all from over a millennium ago. It appears that there is substantial difference between that Byzantine ceremony and what we today would call ‘marriage’ and that is explained in the latter two links.
To me it has always seemed a remarkably shrewd ecclesiastical and liturgical (Byzantine and to an even more fuzzy extent Latin Catholic) attempt to reduce the feuding between families/clans with which those centuries were rife: two men from different clans formally adopted each other as ‘brothers’ (the “adelpho” in the term) and by doing so united the clans – which meant that at least theoretically they could not war on each other and had to share resources and assets as well as treat each other as ‘family’ in terms of loyalty and comity. Not a bad approach at all, I would say. But it is hell-and-gone from ‘gay marriage’ as that issue exists today.
If nothing else, these reviews give us an inkling of just how complex historical research is, and how even more difficult it is to accurately draw comparisons between historical events and issues which are topical to people today. Surely more of a challenge than anybody’s Mental Shoebox can possibly meet definitively, accurately, and successfully.
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/pwh/bosrev-bennison.asp
http://www.newoxfordreview.org/reviews.jsp?did=1294-viscuso
http://www.traditioninaction.org/bkreviews/A_002br_SameSex.htm
P, Really the aids virus causing the death of both Foucalt and Boswell, means something special? Other than both caught a virus and died from that virus. Something religious or karma-esque perhaps?
And what about those who've died from AIDs who weren't gay radical historians or philosopher;. babie, hemophiliacs?
What's the meaning there? Is it too: "It is what it is"?
Interesting how the debate about the msm bias against the church, as evidenced by the dishonest reporting about the clergy abuse matter, always gets twisted into gay rights, privelages and entitlements, and a host of other lefty gripes.
Nah- none of this phony hype against the Church is really designed to punish or undermine her traditional-conservative (natural) social philosophy. Nope, I'll just never believe it.
Boswell must have been a member of the APA when homosexuality was removed as a psychological disorder before he morphed into a Church "historian-author". Just another [wrong] lefty apologist.
The Pope, and the Church (incl. faithful Catholics), have more compassion and love for homosexuals than any of those who promote the wrong path in life for them. Catholicism wants to save lives and souls for all eternity, while the evil that promotes a sinful life (for homosexuals, heterosexuals and all beings regardless of sexual identity-if any) aims to destroy life here, and the hereafter.
So you mean to say that SNAP is not getting together to discuss which child protection groups they are going to give money to? Shocking.
What could be more natural than homosexuality. It is so natural in fact that if it was'nt within nature's order the universe whould implode. Like D when ever she has to think too much.
Prove that there are "souls".
You can not.
Prove that there's an "eternal life" after death.
You can not.
What "evil" (du jour) are you referring to? Where's the "evil" in your screeds or ours?
Prove it.
Dave Pierre isn't attacking the MSM enough for you? He's doing the best he can.
Isn't Fox News the MSM? But you just love them. So is it, whoever you agree with who are good and who ever you disagree with who are bad?
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Let's put on our smartty wigs shall we ladies?
Let's imagine. The rather large number of gays now compared to the number or percentile of gays in early christianity probably roughly the same? Or were there more of us then?
I mean after all it was our decadence that destroyed those empires, wasn't it?
Well there we were all hanging about being decadent and all and up pops christianity.
And over time us gays found out, thanks to christianity, that we were terrible people. We did not know this. Before christianity we were just the boys next door but after christianity, our being sexual became the source for most of the evil in the world. If I remember correctly it was the gay Emperor Bigus Dicus that ordered the first good christians to death.I believe that was his name.
We on the left are a mere reflection of the light of your all consuming silliness. The moon to your sun.as it were.
Who was Jesus's mater before Mary bore him? Nothing comes from nothing remember?
Such silliness, only the illogical, irrational left could be so juvenile – no one has to prove anything to any of the lefty-bigots. Faith is sufficient for our beliefs - really, who cares about convincing you? Such arrogance. You were invited, you declined, good luck with that. We're not interested in joining your religion, stop proselytizing. Use the legislative process to promote your vision for society, mankind (Detroit, LA and Chicago come to mind), we're not interested in it, we have our vision for mankind here and the hereafter, Jesus gave it to us.
The lefts opposition present facts (repeatedly) about the msm antiCatholic bias, and back it up with reams (generations) of documentation, here at TMR, and elsewhere. The left can't defend any of their claims of a fair or honest msm via documentation (proof) concerning Church matters (any of them). An attempt at such an effort would be such an exercise in insanity that no one sane would ask for proof. Insanity requires treatment, not indulgence.
And, the former personality flaw is not the only disorder expressed by the left that requires treatment. Atheism is also about as insane a philosophy as any ever imagined by the colorful cuckoo-birds. Interestingly, Atheists comprise the same percentage of the worlds population, 2-3%, as do homosexuals and social-radical (antisocial disorders) anarchist [so close to antichrist, heh?] types. What a coincidence. Are they all the same 2-3%?
Before the left-whacks respond with "where's the proof", expecting other commenters to do their legwork, dont bother, you're on your own- as your doting mommies (should have) said "look it up yourself".
Let's be honest, somebody with a warped sense of humor started a new "religion" some generations ago, named it Atheism and waited to see how many antisocial (leftist) goofballs would show up through the ages to claim the booby prize.
Surprise, you won-
Booby Prize? Now that there's an Edjamacated title. You are a smart.
There is no CE; there is BC and there is AD, and there is the Gregorian calendar, worldwide.
Christianity- Live it. Love it.
Boswell, just another mentally-afflicted victim (3 percenter?) of his own "healthy, happy lifestyle", in the end.
Another fun fact; hetero marriage and celibacy promotes/sustains and long, healthy happy life. Not so much for those lifestyles that promote fornication.
God is certainly on to something-
CE refers to Christian Era, In order to really live it, Christianity.I had to leave it. Princess Boswell is dead. If we are only 3% why must you hate us so?
Is "God really onto something"? What is he a wise old prankster ? Who took out a quarter million humans in an afternoon. What a scamp.
Why do you insist we obey you and your imaginary god? And when I say "your sic god" because some Christians like us just the way we are even if we are sexual.
Bill Donahue supports marriage so much he's done it twice.
Bill has been married once and divorced. He is the father of two adult children.
Sorry Dave, I take your word about Bill.
Sorry Bill. When I'm wrong I say I am. I was wrong.
I hope he'll be able to recieve communion one day. Unless the church has changed it's mind about divorcees being "able" to receive the sacrament. (I told you I've been away for a long time. I don't know what the latest restrictions are.) I'm not being ironical here.
If a married man is abandoned by his wife, and the man could not prevent the divorce, he can receive Communion.
Grow up, to disagree is not to hate, stop the juvenile attempts to shut down debate, no one is buying it. No one disparages homosexuals here, deviant acts committed by them are at issue.
Why do only 3% of the population insist on identifying themselves only sexually? Heteros don't. No other animals do. Sexuality aligns with anatomy (form and function) in all life forms. That's a fact. The only time animals exhibit homosexual behavior (considered abherrent) is during opposite sex droughts. And then, it is only temporary and necessary to perform, practice important ritualistic behaviors necessary to succeed at mate-selection, bonding and reproduction. And, it is never consummated. That's a biological fact. PC won't/can't change nature.
Who cares what you do in your sexual life? Keep it off the streets, out of the parks, off the beaches, out of airport rest rooms, out of the schools and their classrooms, out of our Churches, mosques (good luck even surviving in there), synagogues and temples; keep it out of our childrens athletic departments and camps and boys clubs, and our religious celebrations (parades) and seminaries.
It is the 3% shoving their sexual behavior, as the one thing that defines their entire existence, on the 97% that is driving your perception of problems. Such a narrow sliver of the universe in which you reside.
Go away into your bedrooms with your sexuality and live, and die, your chosen lifestyles. It is your free will, for which you can thank God.
Lovely absolutely beautiful D.
Your laws were all over our bedrooms (and your's) and if gays hadn't stepped out the majority of those laws would still be there. Some Americans didn't like when the miscegenetion laws were repealed too. Tough.
I believe he can also be quoted as say "catholics don't get married for love, but to reproduce."
I guess after having his two children he thought his job was over.
In regard to JR’s of the 2nd at 112AM.
First, the whole idea is not to put on any “wigs” at all; the idea is to have an actual competence in processing (even more than acquiring) accurate information, thus being able to usefully and intelligently process the information or factoids one comes across in order to formulate a coherent position based on what evidence there is.
And again with this “ladies” bit … the cafeteria more than the sun-porch or the day-room, but it signals at just what tree-top altitude JR will be flying in this comment.
He asks us to “imagine” – but then it’s unclear just what we are supposed to imagine: it appears that he is asserting that there is a “rather large number of gays now compared to the number or percentile of gays in early Christianity” … but then he adds “probably roughly the same?” – so grammatically he is saying that both were and were-not more gays at one point in time rather than the other. It makes no sense as the comment is written.
Then – apparently – “up pops Christianity”. And does this comment presume that Christianity sprang up complete and completed in the earliest Christian centuries? That is surely a Cartoon construction.
And what is the point of this bit in the first place?
He raises the subject of homosexuality. And thereby we are already and immediately in difficult historical waters here because the concept of ‘homosexuality’ was only put forward in the late-19th century. We don’t want to make the mistake here of presuming that what is discovered in the brute material world as a ‘scientific law’ can easily be analogized to cultural issues. Thus while Newton formulated laws of Gravity and Thermodynamics and persons could realize that what he described in the 17th century was actually a description of dynamics that had been in operation since the beginning of the planet, we cannot easily claim with equal justification that the ‘discovery’ of ‘homosexuality’ in the 19th century had the same validity in the cultural realm as Newton’s Laws had in the material-Scientific realm.
And this sort of thing is dangerous historical maneuvering. Unlike scientific elements, which operate mechanically, human culture and history are to a great extent comprised of human thought and desire and will and capability – and those constitute essentially unpredictable variables. Thus nobody can really do for the cultural and historical realm what Newton and Einstein did in the material-Scientific realm. (I could have included Darwin here, but not accurately, since his theory has – since Agassiz and Darwin himself first realized it when the theory was new – that theory suffers from some very serious conceptual complications and difficulties that even today have not been resolved and indeed have only gotten more acute.)
JR then asserts that “before christianity” there were no cultural problems with homosexual activity (or orientation? … there is a notable difference) and what we would today call ‘gays’ were “just the boys next door”. Among all or most of the human cultures (even the tribal) and the great world civilizations … ? Can that assertion actually be historically supported and established as a fact? Or is it just a Cartoon arising out of desire and contemporary political ideological agendas?
The Monty Python quip pales into insignificance and worse in this context of such major and vital and complex historical issues. But the movie (Monty Python’s Life of Brian from 1979) was probably in the Mental Shoebox on a 3×5.
Notice though the cargo-cult-native effort at mimicry: the sober and cultured and suitably modest disclaimer “If I remember correctly” … JR certainly has put on his ‘smarty Wig’ and is doing his best to speak good into the coconut attached by a vine to the empty packing crate.
And again, to these types it’s all about mimicry, the appearance you can project rather than the substance of what you say and its congruence with actual reality. (And so I note again and again and again: with persons who are enmeshed in this approach, just what was their approach to their claims and allegations and assertions when they signed up for their whack at the piñata? And under oath.)
Nor does the Monty Python reference add anything to the coherence of the comment overall, unless JR is inferring that Christianity has taken revenge on ‘gays’ for millennia because “Bigus Dicus” once ordered them to death? Or is he inferring that ‘gays’ have been taking their revenge on Christianity since the days of “Bigus Dicus” (who, in the film, was Emperor when Christ was crucified and indeed on the day of the Crucifixion, and there was at that point no ‘Christianity’ yet established)? Or are we going to be snarked-at for thinking too much about JR’s little reference which he intended to have no meaning whatsoever? In which case I ask: why include it if it had no relevance or intended significance to the subject under discussion? (This is why classes are not held down in the cafeteria.)
Then JR refers to “we on the left”. But then who am I supposed to be oppressing with my comments (“the moral consciences of conservative( usually less educated intellectually or religiously …” of July 31st at 210PM)?
And then he gets himself into incoherent straits when he goes for the we-are-the-moon-to-your-sun bit. If that image is accurate, then Christianity/Catholicism is still the Sun, upon which all light depends. And tops off his sundae with the cherry that everything he opposes here is nothing but “your all consuming silliness”. Readers are welcome to draw their conclusions.
He is correct that “nothing comes from nothing”. However in a Multiplanar universe something can come from Something, even if that very real (and Real) something (and Something) comes from the Metaplane.
He is welcome to believe that there is only the Monoplane and the this-worldly and material. Surely down in the cafeteria those denizens don’t imagine there’s any other actual and real ‘place’ in the school building, where anything worthwhile is going on. Pass the ketchup and fries.
I promoted Bigus Dicus to Emperor. I think. (Oops. sorry P) I do what I do.
Glad you got the Python ref.
And if you don't watch Fox News where does your Bill O'Rielly like delivery come from? Could it have been a religious vocation?
Ah.The anger of Catholics, unforgettable in my life and I was the really good kid. That fear of hell can really keep you jumping. It sure did me.But so much anger.
If classes arn't held down in the cafeteria what makes you think the cafeteria is a place for your "classes".?You just asked me to pass you the ketchup and fries. Welcome to the cafeteria.( where most Catholics shop for their catholicism., apparently. That's according to the stats.)
Well Children of the Corn My perps' documents came out in L.A.. They did not even contain my letter in the '90's to. the head of the Marianists in Cuppertino Calif.
It seems the priest, I told when I was 16 about my abuse, went on to have a career long relationship with both of my perps. The correspondence at least partially is there.
There is also an email from Brother Bolts to a lawyer for the church and or it's insurors. Bolts who I told at my 20 yr. reunion about my abuse.
He called me "different" (his quotes) because I said to him, I was gay. And he even joked about that. Again I quote him: "( What do you do for encore?)"
Well it was 1984. No one had even heard of gay people in 1984.(irony).
Ah, Catholics!
P.S. Both my perps left their order.
My worst abuser because he wanted to marry. He'd been sent to Hawaii and headed a catholic co-ed highschool in Maui. (That failed it seems) I thought the order had booted him after me; but no. He refers to " the cloud hanging over him" in his correspondence referencing his history with me I guess. Others, maybe?
The other left because he had "lost his faith".
I was wrong The school's still going. Since 1848.
In regard to JR’s comment of 444PM today.
Once again I note that certain commenters give us their take on something, but don’t think on their own to offer a link to the material itself. May we have a link to whatever material JR is talking-about here?
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Yes P you may.http://www.lorpb.com/Orders-Released-Files.aspx
But why bother just write what you always do. I know your modus operandi so well. I could write it for you: No proof. Wasn't doing well with both teachers. Yada yada .
Except I had direct witnesses for Plieman. my whole freshman class room watched him squat down and rub his forarm across my groin. And he was,by far my lesser abusor; and he did the same thing to two other boys in class.In my opinion the whole room was perpetrated by these acts that and the fact that Plieman was the most angry violent man I'd ever seen.
But McGloin was the worst.
Yesterday when I saw these records for the first time and learned that Fr. Clemens, who I told when I was 16 what was happening to me, absolutly wrecked me. Clemens, later became the head of the Marianists in Calif and Hawaii ( or up there I don't know or care what his title was) I know Clemens was definitely McGloin's boss. And for years he was his boss and friend. It seems like quite a narrow little world.
And all those years I thought that after me they would have booted McGloin; but no he left himself in 1970 to marry a nun who had left. I heard that from Bro. Bolts at my 20 yr. reunion.
I was a ticket taker at the Ivar Theatre in Hollywood I had long hair and a beard It was 1968 or "69. McGloin walked in the theatre. He didn't recognize me. I literally doubled over with pain i got another person to take the door. My stomach cramped so hard. The audience went in to the play (Your a Good Man Charlie Brown with Radar from Mash as Charlie Brown). I left. My boss let me go home.
So much pain and anger keeps coming up for me after yesterday.
Clemens told me at 16 I could ask for a therapist if I felt I needed it. I was F*&%king 16 he was 40 (Clemens). How would I know if I needed a "therapist"? They didn't tell my parents ( I was sure they would and I just couldn't i was too ashamed.) This is awful to me.
P I'm glad you don't watch Fox news that's a huge point in your favor ( Probably the only point in your favor. Your ad hominem attacks never end do they?. Bill O'Rielly does that as well hence the comparison.) I was talking to D.
Catholic theology didn't influence US policy-law on either miscegenation or sodomy, Protestant-Puritan, both rabid antiCatholic, ethics did. And, the gay revolution had nothing to with the suspension of either law (which were obviously unconstitutional).
Try to remember, we're Roman Catholics here.
And you still claim that "maryjane" is harmless?
Say what? Who's talking about marijuana?
Do you actually "think" when the catholic church has laid out millions to fight gay marriage, That they had nothing to do with all sex laws . No opinion or anything about those laws? You're dreaming.
As I write this comment, the last comment up is mine of 719PM. The last of JR’s comments up is the one time-stamped 740PM. In this comment I am responding to his of 648PM.
JR’s ‘promotion’ of the “verwwwy gweat fwend in Wome” (to put the script text exactly) is a bit of exaggeration which merely brings me back to the point that certain types here have a rather loose approach to truth and thus we must wonder how loose their approach was to truth when the time came to make allegations and claims for the piñata events. After all – as JR himself says – “I do what I do”. Just so.
And apparently, in a boffo display of the mimicry of historical thinking, JR has figured that since my “delivery” is somehow – to his mind – very similar to Bill O’Reilly’s (with whose work I am not in any way familiar) then either I do watch Fox News or else – waittttt for itttttt! – I may have “a religious vocation”. A neat red-herring but what would be its relevance? If I were the Pope himself, would my ideas and questions have no standing of their own? That I am somebody simply trying to get to the core of a public matter of major significance with whatever knowledge and skill I can bring to bear … that isn’t enough?
Of course not. Because it is my ideas that he cannot address and so he will try something – or anything – else to create a distraction. We’ve seen all this before.
And then he tries to characterize my material as “anger”. Apparently the large amount of Abusenik material we have seen here over the course of more than a year is to his mind so sufficiently and demonstrably credible and substantive that the only possible explanation for any doubt or questioning is “anger”. We’ve seen this before too.
And yet also that this “anger” somehow comes from “the fear of hell” – and perhaps somebody can follow the line of reasoning in that. But we are assured that JR “was the really good kid”, bringing back the old trope of perfectly and utterly good kids who suddenly were utterly deranged (along numerous axes of analysis) by ‘abuse’. That’s one possibility. But there are several others.
I don’t “hold [my] classes” in the cafeteria. I comment on this site and as I have often said about the internet, anybody can come along and put up whatever they want to (expletives thankfully deleted). So – as I have said before – we find ourselves in the situation of trying to hold a serious discussion while anybody can drop in and do whatever it is that they do and like to do. It is what it is.
Lastly, there is the bit about Catholics and cafeterias. This is apparently a connection that appeared in JR’s mind: the old phrase ‘cafeteria Catholics’. Very droll. Not very relevant, but droll. As if there are few seriously committed Catholics (except, perhaps, “angry” ones). Readers may make of this what they will.
Still awaiting some link to something. I have no doubt the material thus linked-to will be informative, one way or another.
"Why don't you tell D that 4000 new seminarians won't even make a dent in the church's need for priests in America."
Logic would dictate [for most] that the claim that the Church is shrinking would necessitate the need for fewer priests. I am not sure what sort of logic claims that the Church is hemorraging faithful, yet, needs more priests?
Apparently, the decrease in priests has not stemmed the growth of Catholics in the US; she has ingeniously compensated by utilizing other religious (again, enrollment at seminaries has increased, hopefully, establishing a trend which will produce more priests).
Anyway, too much time spent on the lefts illogic-insanity; here is a link to the 2012 CARA reports. The uninformed should peruse these stats/reports for a better handle on reality (Truth), and more fruitful and honest discussions/debates at TMR.
http://cara.georgetown.edu/CARAServices/requestedchurchstats.html
Of course, none of this has anything to do with the [minor] minor abuse matter in the Church and the dishonest and bigoted media reporting of such, but, if it does nothing more than re-educate and possibly ameliorate the hate, and perhaps even save another soul, it is worth the effort to assist others with their homework.
A sit down with the ex spouse of the self appointed white knight of roman catholics around the world. Truly a conversation that I can only dream of.
How many skeletons can be removed from that closet ?
It would be worth a lifetime of reading Publion's and Delphin's lengthy and always defensive rants when it comes down to the matter of the catholic church, clergy abuse, and any other matters of the human race they feel they are experts in.
Wow Dennis . Well done. I agree. Overall and in their sub concious they are defensive but one on one they are brutally offensive. That tact was necessary why?
I never discounted your ideas per se as ideas.
it's the content and delivery that I loathe And do you own this site? Is this your party? Are you the host? No? So who are you to say anything about "anybody can drop in." You just drop in as far as I'm concerned. And though you may be literate, I say maybe, your take on this scandal is rather out there. No one else seems to have your take, anywhere but here.
I know many good; honest; faithfilled Catholics but from your behavior here, I wouldn't count you as one of them. IMHO
But I know that won't bother you one iota. You remind me of the brothers and priests i had in high school that's why i think your a cleric. you "think' like one.
And don't you and D, do what you do here? What's good for the goose etc.
When the bigots can't effectively respond to the facts and logic presented, they go on full-frontal assault.
Always the same sophomoric mental meltdown. How tiresome.
Then, there's the escaped (and very revealing) thoughts about skeletons and ex-spouses, loathing and comparisons to abuser-clerics. How very civil. True leftists in evey sense (Non-sense, more appropriately).
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