Oh, he’s better than ought-to-be-interpol-most-wanted-on-thousands-of-counts-of-abetting-child-molestation Ratzinger?
Like I said… seems-like-a-nice-enough-bigot is really overshooting expectations. For a pope I actually like, well, call me when they start distributing the church’s vast wealth among the poor.
I know. All that goodwill, which the atheistic Pollyanna in me tried to spin positively, just went down the drain. No one forced Kim Davis to run for election, so I believe the Pontiff was way off base in trying to equate voluntarily running for a secular position with denying a person their human rights. But this is coming from an institution that prides itself on denying women their most personal and fundamental human rights, so what’s new?
OK, it’s your opinion that it’s gross, and presumably immoral.
It’s Kim Davis’ opinion that homosexual marriage is immoral, and presumably gross.
Is there any reason I should consider either one of those opinions to be valid?
The issue is that the “Catholic Church” in the sense of being universal isn’t interpreted as being the Roman Catholic Church by non Roman Catholics. For example, Episcopalians use the same text of the creed but answer to the Archbishop of Canterbury instead of the Pope.
New pope same as the old pope.
I’ve never seen “on fleek” used by anything other than 20-something white girls. Had ZERO idea that it was black slang.
Perhaps the problem here lies in the perception that Junípero Serra’s missionary efforts had no value. From an athiest perspective, of course, they had no value-- just one more collection of useless myths. From an anti-colonialist perspective, the fact that the catholic church supplanted other religious traditions is a great tragedy. But out of an estimated 2.4 million Native Americans, half a million are Catholic, and they are likely to have a somewhat different conception of this missionary work, though whether it outweighs his deplorable methods is a question that needs to be asked.
Well, that just made Matt Damon go, “Whew!”.
I think one could even think that having one’s forefathers converted to Christianity saved their souls from being punished by god for being too remote from Israel, or whatever passes for divine justice, and yet still consider Serra a monster. One can argue whether he did more or less damage than the rancheros or the army, but the fact was that he was adamant that the only way to bring the Ohlone away from paganism was to destroy their too-comfortable way of life, which he did, and pretty much destroyed them in the process.
OK, from a political science perspective, the Roman Catholic Church is akin to an Absolute Monarchy. What the pope says can affect the lives of 1.25 billion people in a more direct fashion than most other churches. So what he thinks is likely to translate into sociological and political change (or stagnation)
The Episcopal Church is headed by a presiding bishop (Katherine Schori) who does not owe fealty to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Instead the Archbishop is first among equals. I might add that the Episcopal Church is merely the 14th largest denomination in the United States, so not as interesting as the pope (or whatever board controls the Southern Baptist Convention)
From a journalistic perspective, the treatment of the Pope as a “spiritual leader of the church universal” may simply be a way of respecting the religious beliefs of the twenty four percent of viewers and readers who actually believe his pretence to authority,
I might add that the political science perspective is why boingboing feels a need to report on the Pope’s alleged meeting with Kim Davis. Will the Catholic Church continue to ally with other religious conservatives in queer bashing and other anti-liberal activities, or will it turn its attention toward what it calls “social justice”?
I think it’s a bit overdramatic to go after the Pope for this. We have no idea if what her lawyers are saying is even true. The Pope meets with all kinds of people that I would not want to meet with. That’s his job. He is supposedly the embodiment of the Church (all accepting, all loving, etc, yada yada). I am disappointed as well that he met with her but hope more that he was like, “hey, maybe stop being a horrible human being?” I dunno, now that I write that it seems naive. But one can hope.
I would like to thank the LGBT community for helping to bridge the centuries-old enmity between Catholics and Protestants.
Nothing unites two competing faiths like mutual hatred.
I have to imagine that you don’t rise that far in any organization without perfecting the art of being sadly unable to fit especially inconvenient things into your oh-so-packed-because-you-are-important itinerary.
We don’t have a tape of the conversation or anything; but unless we assume that he is badly under the control of his handlers, or the PR apparatus is capable of spreading fictions about him without him contradicting them, it’s pretty hard to imagine that he was helplessly shoved into a corner on this one. There are a lot of things to see, places to go, and people to meet in the US. Anything that made the cut was very likely picked. It should be noted that his trip also included some standard hobnobing with politicians, making a few enemies RE: climate change and the fact that being a randroid makes you a bad catholic, and voicing opposition to some upcoming executions; but it also included making time for a minor state level official of absolutely no interest except for the stance implied.
I definitely agree. We have to keep in mind that the Pope is not only a lifetime adherent and the embodiment of the Church’s doctrine, but he’s also Latin American, a culture not exactly progressive in terms of rights for gays and women. If he was asked to meet with Kim Davis, of course he’s going to agree with her stance on being a “conscientious objector” as she apparently puts it. But we have no idea what he actually said to her. Assuming he’s one step down from Satan for what Kim Davis’ lawyers said is extremely overdramatic.
Does Kim Davis pope in the woods?
This might give a little more insight into what happened. Father James Martin (editor of Jesuit magazine America) posted an interested article - Seven Points to Keep in Mind.
In particular, #4 and #7 make some excellent observations:
His words to her, “Be strong,” and his gift of a rosary seem to be the kind of thing the pope might do for anyone presented to him.
It’s also important to remember that the only source for what happened during the meeting is Ms. Davis, who would naturally be inclined to interpret the pope’s words and gestures as supporting her particular cause.
Most of all, despite what Ms. Davis said, a meeting with the pope does not “kind of validate everything.”
http://papalvisit.americamedia.org/2015/09/30/the-pope-and-kim-davis-seven-points-to-keep-in-mind/
Isn’t she and her lawyers sort known liars at this point? Do you think the Vatican would contradict her story (or it’s misrepresentation/misquoting)?
They certainly have their own take on the ‘secrecy’ part of ‘secret meeting’.
