Pope Benedict Speaks

[kerryn]

WOW....

I've never read so much b..sht from you aethiests in a long time. How can you comment on a faith you know nothing about?

Your level of ignorance Julie, is astounding. I don't care if you're an unremitting aetheist as you declare but if you're going to make comments about anything make sure you know something about it.

Being in the very heart of Ireland you have plenty of people to ask. It might help you understand a bit more of what you criticise.

The issue is about paedophilia here in this post and you have strayed off target to have a go at the church. I'm RC and Irish. I have friends who prfess no faith at all - again fine by me but at least they can coherently argue about something about what they have tried to learn about.

The fault of the Church is that weak people tried to cover up weaker and more evil people. It doesn't mean that the teachings of the Church are wrong - quite the opposite. Mankind is weak and as Katholios said there are well over half a million priests - doing good works many amongst the real poor in this world that I and probably you haven't got the courage or stamina to do!

The basis of your argument and also yours Tony (odsox) shows a wish to remain in ignorance.

I've given up praying for you guys (aetheists) - no point in wasting prayers. OK so what? I will have to go to confession - but then I don't mind - a little bit of humility in the world goes a long way .

Furthermore lets look at the ideal world as you see it - the three most heinous regemes were Hitlers' Nazi Germany (aetheist) and 60 million deaths. Stalins Russia (Aetheist communist) 60 million deaths before and after WW2 and Chairman Mao (Stalinist Aetheist Communist) 60m deaths in the 1950's and 60's. Where's you're criticism of true aetheism and where it leads??

Paedophilia is wrong, wrong, wrong period but before you go sounding off on the Church and the 'faith' look at where 'aethesim in the last century took us nearly 200 million murders!!

Go and think about that one and learn a bit about the history of the church and ultimately why it exists (to stop such horrors!!)

Kerry N

[Millymollymandy]

Hello Kerry and welcome to Ish. Did you just join the forum to have your say about the catholic church, or to promote hair loss products? Either way we'd prefer it if you'd introduce yourself first and tell us a bit about your Ish lifestyle. Also please read our forum rules about advertising as I'm afraid I'm going to have to delete your signature as it's a bit spammy.

[JulieSherris]

The issue is about paedophilia here in this post and you have strayed off target to have a go at the church. .......

The fault of the Church is that weak people tried to cover up weaker and more evil people. ....

Go and think about that one and learn a bit about the history of the church and ultimately why it exists (to stop such horrors!!)

Kerry N

Now, we could take religion & argue it point by point... although I think we all have other things to be getting on with so....
I don't actually think the issue here IS paedophilia at all - I think it's gone way past that & the big thing I have a problem with is the way in which the RC church had knowledge of the crimes which were occurring, but still tried to cover it up - for a LONG time. Apparently, not just weak people either - unless of course the primate of all Ireland, Cardinal Brady is a weak person?

I don't actually disagree with ALL parts of religion, but there are just too many fairy stories emanating from the bible for me to take it seriously - sorry if that offends you, but hey, I'm not here to be bff's with everyone anyway.
The local catholics who drop in every now & again have come to understand now that although I'm willing to make them a cuppa & talk about the weather, I'm NOT going to take the mary statue on the village rota & if I do something wrong in life, then I am not going to sit in a little box to let someone else forgive me!

In my eyes, in my opinion, the RC church is a lot like ciggies & booze - they are the legal drugs of the day, where the RC church is the legal cult of the day - when we hear of cults, we know that a lot of them take the money from the members & then encourage the members to procreate, to swell the membership - is that not also a part of the RC church?
You see, there's a lot of every day things that I see which makes me shake my head in disbelief.... packs of condoms on the supermarket shelves - in security tagged boxes, at mega extortionate prices as well!! It's the little things like this that can be attributed directly back to the church of the country, but really don't sit well in 2010 civilization.

As for nazi-ism & communism - I think that's opening the spectrum a touch too broad - especially for a Monday!!

[grahamhobbs]

Unfortunately Kerry I do not think you have defended the church at all well, you have not answered the specific points other posts have raised and your wild counter swipes at aethiests are hardly informed.

The deaths in Russia and China, even if your figures are correct, were in the main caused by starvation due to mismanagement of the economy, hardly in the same league as the Nazi's extermination policies. Also I am not sure that Hitler would describe himself as an aethiest, his speeches are littered with references to God and the Almighty (although I accept you could hardly describe him as a religious person).

I am appalled at what has gone on within the Catholic church, but I am also wary about the way that the media can often witch hunt people and therefore I am always very interested in finding out the other side of the story, the real extent of these problems and most importantly how the church authorities dealt with them. Unfortunately your post fails to throw any enlightenment on the situation and you simply saying 'weak people covered up evil people' is not acceptable, especially when the now Pope was at the time the guy at the top dealing with these priests.

It seems that the revelations are encouraging muslim victims to speak out as well. See article in todays The Independent
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/co ... 30005.html
This article links religious sexual repression to paedophilia and the such like.

[Odsox]

Oh dear, it seems you must be an expert now to voice an opinion.
I'm obviously not qualified to have one of my own so I won't comment other than to say, if you are counting deaths perpetrated by atheists, be careful you don't overlook all the deaths caused in the name of God, from biblical times through the crusades and right up to Gaza today.
I think you will probably find there is far more death and ignorance caused by religion than atheism.

[MKG]

WOW....

I've never read so much b..sht from you aethiests in a long time. How can you comment on a faith you know nothing about? ...

The issue is about paedophilia here in this post and you have strayed off target to have a go at the church. I'm RC and Irish. I have friends who prfess no faith at all - again fine by me but at least they can coherently argue about something about what they have tried to learn about. ...

The basis of your argument and also yours Tony (odsox) shows a wish to remain in ignorance. ...

Furthermore lets look at the ideal world as you see it - the three most heinous regemes were Hitlers' Nazi Germany (aetheist) and 60 million deaths. Stalins Russia (Aetheist communist) 60 million deaths before and after WW2 and Chairman Mao (Stalinist Aetheist Communist) 60m deaths in the 1950's and 60's. Where's you're criticism of true aetheism and where it leads?? ...

Go and think about that one and learn a bit about the history of the church and ultimately why it exists (to stop such horrors!!)

Kerry N

I quite agree - never seen so much bullshit in my life. But it isn't coming from Julie and Odsox - it's coming for the apologists for the Pope. If I was you Kerry, I'd take your own advice and not comment on something you obviously know so little about. As is obvious from the thread title, paedophilia is not the issue - its the rantings of the head of the RC church. Of course, he isn't the only pope who has this strange habit - if you riffle through the pages of history, you'll soon find another pope who did everything in his power to support Nazi Germany (and wherever did you get the idea that Nazis were atheists?). Actually, I think I know - that idea must have come from the same source as the idea of "true atheism" and where it leads. I'm an atheist (actually, it's me who is unremitting rather than Julie), I have no sexual perversions as far as I know and I certainly don't have any urge to kill people. The idea that atheism leads to this kind of thing is insulting, condescending, medieval and idiotic.

I've read an awful lot about the history of the church - you won't believe me, but stopping such horrors has never been its reason for existence. Just how many people in this world do you think have died at the direct behest of the RC church? A few Crusades, the conquest of South and Central America, and the Inquisition did for quite a few, you know. Burning Protestants used to be a bit of a hobby too.

No-one is having a go at Catholics or their faith - but the regime at the head of the RC church is fair game, I'm afraid - especially, as I've already mentioned, when that regime claims that its head is infallible. Infallibility does not fit comfortably with lies, cover-ups and the abetting (because that's what it is) of the lowest of criminal acts. You said it yourself, Kerry - Go and think about that one and learn a bit about the history of the church.

Mike

[JulieSherris]

..... I quite agree - never seen so much bullshit in my life. But it isn't coming from Julie and Odsox - ......

Ha... I was told at the start of my sociology A'Level to always 'Bullshit with Confidence' - and have tried to live by that standard ever since!!

In any case, I'm glad other folks have stepped forward on this topic because I'm reading & replying, but it's a subject that doesn't really hold any interest for me. I know it's slipping under my radar, because I didn't even flare at the insults!

Personally, I'm more than happy doing what I do & if someone would prefer to live their lives in a different way, so be it & as long as they do no harm to others, that's just fine by me.

[Martina]

I just wanted to post on this thread to say that people need to pull their heads out of their butts, whether they are affiliated with the RCC, another church or no church at all. This issue here is pedophilia, which is no more represented in the RCC than in anyother organisation (religious or secular) that puts adults in contact with children. Does that make the situation with the RCC ok? No, but it does point to the pervasiveness of this problem. The fact is a better job has to be done to screen those who work with children. As for dealing with pedophilia, everyone is making it up as they go along and that is not being helped by ignorance about what pedophilia is and who commits these heinous crimes.

Just a couple of words on those two issues: Pedophilia is a compulsive sexual attraction to children, it is not the result of celibacy. Not having sex with an adult does not make you consider, and then commit, sex acts with a child as a substitute. It is usually the result of childhood sex abuse. A significant number of offenders are also victims, although the majority of victims do not offend towards others when the get older. However, others have said it's neurological, a rewiring of sexual drive caused by unknown factors. As for who commits these acts; overwhelmingly the perpetrator is a relative, next in line is some one the child knows or trusts (teachers, councillors, coaches, ministers, priests etc). Society, in general, is unsure how to deal with these offenders because fundementally we don't know why they are the way they are. Do we put them to death, jail them for life, chemically castrate, prescribe drugs and hope they will stay on them voluntarily, or try and redirect their urges with behaviour therapy? Who the heck knows, but the sooner we stop pointing fingers and get down to the business of implimenting screening processes that work the better. Unfortunately, the RCC has a long history of mismanaging this problem. They, like us, need to get a better, educated understanding of what they are dealing with and impose a system of stringent screening for candidate priest, ministers and nuns. Then there needs to be a cohesive policy From the Vatican to dioceses regarding procedures for dealing with accused perpetrators and actual perpetrators (such as reporting the situation to the police as soon as it as known and letting the criminal process take over in matters of criminal accusations). They need to recognize that they are ill-equiped to deal with this crime in-house and need to hand it over to bodies better suited for the job.

Sorry for such a long post, I just wanted to get that off my chest about this issue. I agree with some here, there is an opportunistic witch hunt going on in the media, but rather than feel victimized by that,maybe time would be better spent understanding that everyone is confused and afraid of this issue, precisely because it affects some of the most vunerable people we know and, for most (myself included), it's "knives out" when we hear about the systemic harm being done to children.

Thank-you for taking the time to read this post.

Have a good day,
Martina