The Pope thread

[archibaldcrane]

Imploring the middle class and lower classes (the majority of religious believers) to donate money / food / whatever is great, but ultimately it's a suggestion. Stating that using modern convenience that is literally a life-saver for millions is not a sin is something that would actually matter (contraception). But we've been through this, he wont cuz it's too radical, etc.

So encouraging over a billion catholics worldwide to serve the poor doesn't matter, but encouraging them to only have sex for procreation (without birth control) does matter? Do the pope's words matter or not, you can't have it both ways.

[BerenTebogo]

So encouraging over a billion catholics worldwide to serve the poor doesn't matter, but encouraging them to only have sex for procreation (without birth control) does matter? Do the pope's words matter or not, you can't have it both ways.

Well, first of all, encouraging over a billion catholics worldwide to serve the poor isn't a new thing. Wasn't that pretty much Jesus' main talking point? I don't really see the point of being part of a religion if you can't get behind the main message of the deity, but whatever. Jesus aside, the church has always encouraged outreach, donations, food drives, etc. I may have missed some new specifics, but I haven't seen him saying anything or pushing an agenda that wasn't already a fundamental tenant of the religion.

Also my issue isn't with sex only for procreation. It's more for third world countries where the law of the land / volunteer aid follows catholic guidelines. In poor countries dying during childbirth is still a very real problem. The lack of available female contraception means that getting pregnant as a result of rape / slavery / other shitty experiences can also frequently result in death. Cheap female birth control doesn't solve the rape problem, but if they can't have abortions and there aren't facilities to help care for women during childbirth then ???

That's pretty much my main gripe about his stance on contraception. It's not about italians banging out 8 kids a pop, that's whatever.

[archibaldcrane]

Oh - I thought you were talking about AIDS.

[Rooney]

First of all, we have no idea how his meeting with Kim went. Second, Kim's sins are pretty irrelevant - in the pope's eyes all are sinners, her sins aren't unique. Third, if you think "Who am I to judge" means "God approves of men marrying other men"...well...lol.

First, true. Second, kind of (purely my opinion on this one). Third, didn't say that, nor did anyone else here. If the pope is saying he is not qualified to judge (and I believe the bible says no single person is qualified to judge another person), then Kim Davis is definitely not qualified to judge, but he is supposedly supporting her position and telling her to "stay strong". That is hypocritical at best.

[Dimmauk]

Maybe the Pope felt bad for her? Even though she totally deserved it and brought it on herself, getting called a bitch wore troll by millions of people might be rough. Maybe that's why he said stay strong?

But, who am I to speculate?

[Ksandra]

Maybe the Pope felt bad for her? Even though she totally deserved it and brought it on herself, getting called a bitch wore troll by millions of people might be rough. Maybe that's why he said stay strong?

But, who am I to speculate?

First, true. Second, kind of (purely my opinion on this one). Third, didn't say that, nor did anyone else here. If the pope is saying he is not qualified to judge (and I believe the bible says no single person is qualified to judge another person), then Kim Davis is definitely not qualified to judge, but he is supposedly supporting her position and telling her to "stay strong". That is hypocritical at best.

This is, to me, the most logical explanation. Pope Francis has been working really really hard to get people to stop hating one another, and Kim Davis has received a lot of hate. I don't agree with her position at all, but I don't think she should get death letters n' shit for it. Should be just fired/let go/w/e and move on. (Yes, I know it isn't easy to just fire her, but her losing her job is how she should be "punished" if anything.) With that said, I'd like more details about it before jumping the gun one way or another.

I've said it before, I think that reasonable religious accommodations should be made at work (ie. Muslims getting break times to pray), but not when they severely hinder workflow. Davis is a weird situation. She initially wanted her name removed from all documents (same-sex and straight), not that she wanted no marriages to happen. Theoretically, I think that should happen if it was an easy fix (I say theoretically because I don't know how difficult it is to set something up.) I may not agree with her position to want to do so, but I agree that she should have the religious right as long as it doesn't create a huge issue. It sounds like having her name removed is a problem, but I don't know if that is because of her, or people wanting to make life difficult for her or what.

I don't like the woman at all, but I don't want her case to set the idea that no religious person is allowed to have religious accommodations based on whether people "like it" or not.

[Byrthnoth]

Maybe the Pope felt bad for her? Even though she totally deserved it and brought it on herself, getting called a bitch wore troll by millions of people might be rough. Maybe that's why he said stay strong?

But, who am I to speculate?

Figurehead of massive multinational organizations forsake privacy and personal opinion. Any opinion they express or action they take is seen as an endorsement or condemnation by their organization whether or not they or the organization likes it.

You don't have a random meeting with some schmo protestant (who you think is going to hell) just to make her smile. You meet with her because she is supporting a social agenda that you (and by extension your organization and, by proxy, believers) supports. If he met with her and played blackjack for 5 minutes, it have the same impact as whatever they did do. Maybe he did it whimsically out of pity, but he took a socially regressive position and then doubled down on it with the entire Catholic Church on his back.


Better than his predecessors? Maybe.

Going to update Catholicism to the 21st century? Almost certainly not. Francis seems more and more like he's just inviting sinners back to Church so they can give donations even though they're going to burn anyway.

[Wulfgang]

Been avoiding this because there's no point, but I can't sleep so lol.

Factually true statement: the current pope offers no more actual benefits to the health and welfare of mankind as a whole than his predecessors.

This is actually not true. You seem hyperfocused on modern social issues (e.g. abortion, LGBT rights, etc.), all areas in which his stance is not progressive in an absolute sense. In terms of the plight experienced by the indigent though, he has absolutely "offered more actual benefits to the health and welfare" of this socioeconomic class. It's not an insignificant population of people either; as a matter of fact, it is the majority of the world's population.

[BerenTebogo]

This is actually not true. You seem hyperfocused on modern social issues (e.g. abortion, LGBT rights, etc.), all areas in which his stance is not progressive in an absolute sense. In terms of the plight experienced by the indigent though, he has absolutely "offered more actual benefits to the health and welfare" of this socioeconomic class. It's not an insignificant population of people either; as a matter of fact, it is the majority of the world's population.

Examples of / evidence of? Aside from advocating for people to suck less towards their fellow man, which has been discussed.

I'm not saying you're wrong, but nothing I've ever read (skimmed) about his time in the pope office has left the impression of him making anything measurably better for anyone.

[Psion]

Examples of / evidence of? Aside from advocating for people to suck less towards their fellow man, which has been discussed.

I'm not saying you're wrong, but nothing I've ever read (skimmed) about his time in the pope office has left the impression of him making anything measurably better for anyone.

My parents were absolutely livid when they found out i was gay. its taken over a decade of them having to live with that fact for them to go from that extreme to pleasantly tolerable most of the time. (although my mother at least, still opposes gay marriage and neither parent wants to talk about it.) even when it's the bloody pope, you can't expect people's views to change overnight, especially if you're not someone who believes in fantasies. give it several years and you'll probably start seeing the subtle changes starting to show up... small perhaps to most people, but a giant step for people like me who have had to deal with their parents telling them that they didn't love them since they were a little kid. (and in my opinion, if you can't love someone for who they are, you didn't love them in the first place.)

[Jefe]

From the top of my head, his Holiness pushed talks between Santos and the Shining Path Gerilla aka "El Sendero Luminoso." So far both parties have agreed to seize fire and supposedly will end the 20+ year war in 6 months. I think they met as he left Cuba. Speaking of Cuba, he pleaded for the pardon of more than 3 thousand political prisoners, and he got em. Some Cubans are not happy because they said it wasn't enough and wanted Castro out. There's also the immigration crisis in Venezuela. The president basically told the Colombians to gtfo and Santos to take care of his crappy people, all this whilst dancing Cumbia with the waifu (he was making fun of them). The Pope caught wind and asked Maduro to work w/ Santos. As of now, Maduro reached out to Santos to resolve this issue. Idk.

[Xantavia]

This may just me being obtuse, but I legitimately cannot think of any actions the pope could take that would actually improve the quality of life of the poor as a whole.

I would think he could easily influence what the church and convents spend their time on. If he asks priests and nuns to make improving the qol for the poor their priority, that would be a start.

[Sho]

I understand the reasoning behind why people are being up in arms with the Pope meeting with Kim Davis, but the man had many secret meetings not limited to her, such as with the Little Sisters of the Poor, rape victims by Catholic priests, the transgender man from Spain, and more. The Vatican obviously does this to deflect obvious criticisms that would inevitably come. When it's about Kim Davis, I don't think it would have been any different if it was a clandestine or open meeting, however.

Pope can visit whoever he wants IMO. He's a Jesuit after all -- what he's doing is very "Christ-like." My problem is that meeting with Kim Davis shows that he didn't do his homework on the woman at all, or that he met her full conscious of the fact that she's broke the law numerous times. Davis can have a conscientious objection from here till the cows come home, just not when she's breaking the law and tax payers are paying her salary to do her job correctly.

What more annoying is that her meeting with the Pope will definitely embolden her, and people like Mike Huckabee to continue to stay in the public eye and be hateful bigots.

[Rooney]

You just listed members of his own religion, as well as the poor, downtrodden, and abused. These are exactly the groups you would expect the Pope to be meeting with. I may not agree with the Little Sisters of the Poor, but I see no reason the Pope shouldn't meet with them.

Edit: this goes back to Byrth's point about the Pope being a figurehead. Of course he can meet with whomever he wants, but who he should/shouldn't meet is an entirely different subset of people.

[Sho]

The point I was tryign to make was that he makes them "secret" meetings. As every bit as secret as meeting with Kim Davis (that we didn't know until after the fact). I don't think he needs to feel obligated to tell the entire world who he's going to meet with at all during the time of. The word will eventually get out anyways.

[Ragnus]

http://www.esquire.com/news-politics...davis-meeting/

More Vatican bullshit at work?

[BerenTebogo]

From the top of my head, his Holiness pushed talks between Santos and the Shining Path Gerilla aka "El Sendero Luminoso." So far both parties have agreed to seize fire and supposedly will end the 20+ year war in 6 months. I think they met as he left Cuba. Speaking of Cuba, he pleaded for the pardon of more than 3 thousand political prisoners, and he got em. Some Cubans are not happy because they said it wasn't enough and wanted Castro out. There's also the immigration crisis in Venezuela. The president basically told the Colombians to gtfo and Santos to take care of his crappy people, all this whilst dancing Cumbia with the waifu (he was making fun of them). The Pope caught wind and asked Maduro to work w/ Santos. As of now, Maduro reached out to Santos to resolve this issue. Idk.

I didn't know about any of this. Thanks for the info.

[Marootsoobutsu]

I didn't know about any of this. Thanks for the info.

The Vatican has also been working very hard to stem the influence of the cartels in Mexico to (currently) limited success. But keep in mind, basically everywhere in the Western Hemisphere south of the US is Catholic, and for a lot of those folks, that matters. The Pope is more important to many of the people there than their political leaders are, and a direct talk from him can change a lot, even if he has no "real" power outside of the Vatican. And Francis has a bigger emphasis on the New World than most previous popes have. JP2 was focused mostly on Europe (what with, y'know, the Soviets), and Benedict was basically horrible all around.

[Eurell]

Relevant?

Yes or yes?
http://i.imgur.com/RuLQkuA.gifv

[Marootsoobutsu]

Relevant?

Yes or yes?
http://i.imgur.com/RuLQkuA.gifv

It can't be real, but I want it to be.