Rick, you are forgetting all the Catholic Priests that DON'T do that.
Rick, you are forgetting all the Catholic Priests that DON'T do that.
Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it





No, $1.6 billion is a significant amount of money, and most of the donations collected by the Church does not go towards charity. For the Vatican's charity, only 10% of donations are used for helping the poor.
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/11/vati...port-says.html
A significant amount of money donated to the church, hundreds of millions of dollars, has gone to protecting priests who have sexually abused children, and buying silence from their victims.
I'm sure this has a lot more to do with your church's political power, than how well their charities are run.





Persecution of people by your church goes on to this day. Your church is leading the fight against the rights of gays and women.
The issue isn't just that priests sexually abused children. The issue is that every single priest, bishop, and cardinal in your church, chose to protect the priests who were doing it. Not once did your church do what is right and stop it, and your church is still doing it. I know a lawyer who has been heavily involved in legal action against your church, and your church is still doing everything it can to protect criminal priests, and avoid paying victims. Most recently she had to go to court over a priest working at a daycare facility, after the priest had been prohibited from having contact with children.
No, abortion and contraception are women's issues and gay rights are human rights issues. For many women, access to abortion and contraception are a matter of life and death. Your church does not believe all life is sacred. Opposition to abortion and contraception is about imposing religion on others, not concern for life. Your church would rather see a pregnant woman and her fetus die, than allow the woman to get an abortion. This has already happened in Ireland, where a woman was prohibited from getting an abortion, even though her life was endangered by the pregnancy, and the fetus had no chance of surviving. The woman ended up dying. In Brazil, a 9 year old girl became pregnant after being raped. Your church fought to prevent her from getting an abortion, even though giving birth at her age, would endanger her life. After the girl got an abortion, your church excommunicated the doctor who performed it. Your did not excommunicate the rapist. Your church also opposes the use of condoms to prevent the spread of AIDS. Your church would rather see more people die from AIDS.
I'm sorry to tell you, but by any standard, your church is an evil organization.





An organization that believes that all life is sacred, including unborn babies, is evil? An organization that literally saves countless lives and helps 10s of millions of starving, scared and desperate people worldwide every single year is evil? An organization that provides the only safe schools in many of our most blighted cities, especially in the northeast, is evil? Interesting.![]()
As far as the decisions to protect pedophile priests, I fully agree that the policies that led to it were not right. They have since been changed, in no small part due to outrage expressed by the 10s of millions of Catholics here in the U.S. But to imply that "every single priest, bishop, and cardinal" was involved in those decisions or in protecting those offenders is ridiculous, lol. You're trying to paint millions of clergy members in the U.S. with the same brush over the actions of a relative few. C'mon now.
As far as your claims of persecution, those are ridiculous too. At least you stopped using the Jews as your victim group and switched gears to another group, lol. In fact, the church has been crystal clear in modern times in its opposition of violence against, and criminal prosecution of, gays. With that said, I will concede that is has opposed legislation which, in its view, weakens the position of the nuclear family. Many U.S. Catholics have mixed views on these issues, myself included. It's a complicated situation to say the least.
Finally and once again eagle, this is not the forum for an abortion debate. There are reasons why the country is split pretty evenly down the middle on this topic. Proponents of abortion believe as you do while pro-lifers believe that it represents the killing of babies. Nothing we argue here is going to change anyone's view on this topic and this is not the appropriate forum for it. But your wild eyed anger and need to demonize an institution that is coming from a legitimately well intentioned place, whether you agree with its position or not, is a bit disturbing.
Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it





Hey eagle, do you know how many households have used church food pantries at some point? In a study done in 2014, it was pegged at 22%. I'll bet it's much higher now with COVID-19. Heck, I'm guessing that people on this very board have used them, maybe even some run by the evil Catholic Church.
https://lifewayresearch.com/2014/11/...es-for-help-2/
I have been personally involved with one such endeavor sponsored by our evil Catholic Church, lol. Wanna' know what else my family has been directly involved in over the years under the umbrella of that evil organization?:
- Worked in Christmas toy drives for children who would otherwise not get a visit from Santa;
- Fed homeless people (directly with our own hands and through donations);
- Delivered needed baby supplies and equipment (car seats, bassinets, cribs, strollers, diapers, bottles, etc.) to the homes of single mothers who could not afford them;
- Provided direct help to immigrants, including translation and paperwork support;
- Donated diapers and baby supplies to a high school for teen mothers run by the same evil organization;
- Provide monthly donations to sponsor a child in a 3rd world country so that he could have clean drinking water and go to school (we receive letters directly from his mother each month thanking us)...
The list goes on. Over the years I've forgotten how many good works we have been a part of. Imagine the collective good done by 10s of millions of Catholics just in this country alone? It is staggering to imagine.
The moral of this little story is don't let your disagreement or even anger over a position that you disagree with color your broader view of a person, institution, etc.





Please stop with your gaslighting. I just gave you clear examples showing that your church does not believe all life is sacred, yet you continue to repeat this lie. Opposing abortion does not mean believing all life is sacred.
Your church spoke out against the SC's ruling, prohibiting discrimination against gays.
https://www.ncronline.org/news/opini...t-be-sustained
They're even worse in other countries that are less tolerant towards gays.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-p...-idUSKCN1US1EN
More than 10,000 children have been sexually abused by priests in your church. If not all priests went along with the decision to protect these priests, please show just one example of a priest doing the right thing, either in this country, or any other country in the world.
Not only does your church oppose abortion, even to save a woman's life, but your church opposes even the use of contraception.





Putting aside whether a grown man should ever use the word "gaslighting" when describing his interactions with another man, lol...
...you did much more than that. You pieced together odds and ends extreme examples of what you believed were bad moments and acts by the Church, over countless decades, to support a ridiculous contention that the entire institution was "evil." That was your word, not mine. As I tried to amply illustrate, doing so was not only stunningly myopic, but also displayed a profound ignorance of the entirety of the institution and the endless good works done every single day under its umbrella. Millions if not 10s of millions helped every single year in too many ways to count.
Other odds and ends:
Where did you get that 10,000 number and over what timeframe? I hope you're not digging up theoretical ancient history again.
The Catholic Church actually treats the life of the mother and unborn child as equal and wishes that all possible measures be taken to save both before either is let go. Your previous one-off example, as inflammatory as it was, is not the norm. Again, the premise is that all life is sacred. It drives not only the Church's view on abortion, but also things like its opposition to capital punishment. As much as you're struggling to grasp this, the abortion tail does not wag the dog, but rather a fundamental belief in the sanctity of all life is the driving impetus for the abortion issue.
Now I'm not going to sit here and say that I agree with every position of the Catholic Church because I do not. But it is an immense force for good in the world, including hope for millions who would otherwise have none. I've spelled it out ad nauseum now. Instead of looking for more reasons to be angry or offended, instead perhaps you could spend a few minutes actually processing all of the information that was posted and then factor it into your overall analysis.
Look, i don't usually mention this because i don't believe any Man should be telling any Woman what to do with her body. So i keep this to myself. (there are plenty of women on both sides of this issue, they can hash it out themselves. Do YOU know what it's like to be pregnant? I Don't). But i am pro choice. Sue me.
Fully, Compleatly, and Honorably... Pro Choice. And, frankly, i really don't give a flying FUCK what anyone thinks about it.
Last edited by Raziel; 07-28-2020 at 05:35 AM.
Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it





Raz, I was merely explaining to eagle the genesis of one institution's position on the matter and only in response to his direct implications that there was some nefarious underlying agenda. This is not the forum for a debate on the matter itself as nothing good can come from it. All it will do is trigger more Crazytown posts and potentially hurt the feelings of some of the pinks.
Sure.
Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it





It most certainly HAS been evil in the past, to the tune of many hundreds of thousands of people burned alive for praying incorrectly, millions killed in wars fought 'In the Name of God', torture, deportation, and repressive measures of all kinds. Just because the institution suddenly became 'nice' in the last couple hundred years--a drop in the bucket as far as the timeline of human history is concerned, and other than a shitload of priests buggering young boys of course--doesn't mean it no longer has culpability as an institution.
But whatever, we are beating a dead horse going back and forth with this. So maybe better to drop it; it's definitely a tangent to the original topic anyway. I don't always mind tangents, but more so when they get political.
It's definitely NOT the forum to debate abortion, since it's predominantly for female members.
And what's up with this? "...wild eyed anger and need to demonize." I know there's been accusations of bias from both sides, but really man, this seems a bit judgemental.
Probably I should just close this thread anyway.
You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.
Friedrich Nietzsche
Free your mind, and your ass will follow.
George Clinton
______________________________________





DJ, I don't disagree that the Crusades were horrible and that there were definitely other horrible things done by Church in pre-industrial times. But how many groups would hold up well if that was how they were judged? How many of this country's Founding Fathers were slave owners? How many religious groups were active in the slave trade worldwide? I could go on. The morality of today was simply not the morality of 250 to 1000 years ago. None of us were alive then. Heck, our great grand parents weren't alive back then.
But I agree that 'wild eyed anger' was probably a little over the top. I was perhaps a bit nonplussed by the anger I felt coming from the posts. It could have been handled better. Mea culpa.
We went from Satanism to the Catholic Church. This is great!
Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it





It's not even in the last couple hundred years that the institution became 'nice'. A lot of people aren't aware of this, but the Inquisition lasted into the 1870s, in areas controlled by the church. In the mid 19th century, the Catholic Church was kidnapping Jewish children, so they could be raised Catholic. It wasn't until 1965 that the Church acknowledged that all Jews, living and dead, were not responsible for killing Jesus. There are still some older Catholics today that are antisemitic, based on the church's teachings in the past. (see Mel Gibson) In 1930s Spain, the church kidnapped children of unwed mothers, and gave them to Catholic families to adopt. In Ireland, more than 30,000 girls were enslaved by the church, some because they were "promiscuous", some because they were born out of wedlock, and some, just because they were attractive. This continued into the 1970s. The church still has not apologized or compensated its victims.
https://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=129865&page=1
It's not my intent to bash Catholics or the Catholic religion, but to condemn actions by the church, that by any standard are wrong, or even evil, and not just actions from 1,000 years ago, but has happened in the recent past, and in some cases is still happening today.





From:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathol...nd_Jury_Report
The population of Pennsylvania is less than 4 percent of the total population of the US. If the figures are the same throughout the rest of the country, it would mean there are 25,000 to 100,000 victims. It's possible that in PA, the numbers are higher than some other states, but it's doubtful that there's a big enough of a difference for it to be less than 10,000. If the actual figure in PA is 4,000, it's hard to imagine that there aren't at least another 6,000 in the rest of the country, that makes up over 96% of the population.In 2018, a grand jury in Pennsylvania issued a report of 884 pages,[47] stating that there were over 1,000 identifiable child victims of sexual abuse by over 300 priests in six of the eight Roman Catholic dioceses in Pennsylvania,[48] while advising "that there were likely to be thousands more."[49]
Also from the above link:
No, the church does not treat the life of the mother and unborn child as equal. The church's view is that the life of the fetus is more valuable than the life of the mother. In the examples I showed, the church's position was clear that the the woman and the girl carrying fetuses should die, so that the fetuses could live. These are not "one-off" examples. There's no reason to believe that your church's position would not be the same for every other girl or woman in the same situation. As I stated earlier, the leading cause of death for young women, is unsafe, illegal abortions. Even in 21st century America, we still have to worry that it could happen here.The grand jury found that Church officials followed a "playbook for concealing the truth," minimizing the abuse by using words like "inappropriate contact" instead of "rape".[48] State Attorney General Josh Shapiro, whose office initiated the investigation, said in a news conference, “They protected their institution at all costs. As the grand jury found, the church showed a complete disdain for victims.”[48]
In Africa, during the AIDS epidemic, your church condemned the use of condoms to prevent AIDS.
https://khn.org/morning-breakout/dr00027847/
Whose lives were being protected here? If anything, lives were being endangered by your church's position.





And in the 1940s Germany slaughtered millions.
In the U.S. slavery was not abolished until 1865.
In the 1930s Russia starved millions of Ukrainians
Right up to the 20th century, Great Britain drained many colonies of their natural resources
We could go on and on. Practically every modern country in the world came about through violence, often involving the suppression or even genocide of an indigenous population. Many families and institutions, now well respected, established wealth and legacies through practices and acts that would be illegal today. Every long standing country, organization and cause have had individuals who have done misguided and/or bad things in their names.
Again, broader perspective.





Eagle, you do realize that you are trying to tell me what my own religious organization believes, right? Do you think I might be better positioned to know this than you?There is no world in which the modern Catholic Church automatically chooses one life over another. But hey, if you find a church policy which explicitly states what you believe from your (indeed) one-off examples, feel free to prove me wrong.
As far as your PA numbers, you are talking over 70 years and a tiny percentage of active priests. The rest we've talked about ad nauseum and it is getting circular, including bad policies, the demands for reform from Catholics and the fact that most everyday Catholics have never been confronted with this personally.
As far as the whole contraception issue, I actually disagree with the church on this and so do a majority of active Catholics. Condoms use, vasectomies, tubal ligation, birth control pills and other forms of birth control are as commonly used by Catholics in this country as in any other group. Just because the Church felt the need in the past to advocate its "go yee forth and multiply" stance does not mean that they are persecuting those who do not comply. As far as I know, nobody ever got excommunicated for using a condom.![]()





By the way eagle, your desire to hold the modern members of very old institutions responsible for the sins of the fore bearers is very Old Testament of you. You may have more religious inclinations than you think.![]()





I don't hold the Church responsible for actions in the past, taken by people who are no longer alive. I was just pointing out that some of these actions took place more recently than hundreds of years ago.
I do hold the Church responsible for actions taken by people that are still in power, and for, in some cases, refusing to acknowledge wrongdoing in the past or compensating people for the harm caused to them by actions of the church. There are women alive today in Ireland, who were enslaved by your church, and have never been compensated for what was done to them, or even received an apology. There are victims who were sexually abused by priests, whom the church is making every effort to avoid compensating them for the harm done to them.





This was happening in the 1970s. By then, everyone in western countries were in agreement that slavery was wrong.
Every decent person acknowledges that nazis were evil people, and Germany has banned the nazi party. Everyone acknowledges that Stalin was evil, including even leaders of the Soviet Union who succeeded him. The US fought a civil war over slavery.





No, I don't know what your religious organization believes, but I know what actions they've taken. Your church tried to prevent a 9 year old girl who was raped from getting an abortion, even though giving birth could have killed her. Your church refused to allow a woman to get an abortion, even though it was necessary to save her life. She ended up dying. In both of these cases, your church decided the life of the fetus had greater value than the person carrying it.
You don't understand. Your church is still fighting today, to prevent victims of these priests from being compensated for the harmed caused to them, and your church still protects these priests who were responsible.
Your church is still trying to impose its backwards beliefs on everyone else, regardless what its members think. Your church opposes every effort to make contraception more accessible to more people, and to educate teenagers about safe sex and contraception. This is a major factor as to why the United States has the highest teen pregnancy rate of any western country.
You either don't understand or don't care, that some of the money you donate to your church is used for protecting priests who sexually abused children and for fighting to prevent women from having access to contraception. It's no small amount either. Over $1 billion has been spent on legal fees over sexual abuse cases and for buying the silence of victims.
Last edited by eagle2; 07-28-2020 at 05:47 PM.
Yeah that IS weird. But its not the domain of the Church to do that. Parents need to do that. People can get contraception, condoms are 99 cents (I'll admit i have no idea how much the pill for women cost), just teach your kid to use a wrap and call it a day, fuck the Church on that.
Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it
I mean, these dudes hate Abortion, and they hate Contraception. Doesn't that seem a little counterproductive? Contraception means YOU DON'T HAVE TO HAVE AN ABORTION. It's ridiculous!
Wanna know why i don't have any kids? Because I've always wrapped the Rascal. That's why.
Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it
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