Anti-Catholic Internet trolls

[Lion_IRC]

Did I just get accused of being a troll (and not being aware of the Gospel) - straight after having trying to advocate for more charity towards those with whom we disagree?

 

[intuitional]

Look up Bishop Robert Barron. He’s made a point of evangelizing to people on the internet. He started by making little YouTube videos about popular media and when people would comment and troll or put down the faith Bishop Barron would engage them. Most of his videos are when he was a priest so you should look up Father Robert Barron. He found that people fell into a few main categories and he discussed how he dealt with them. He’s an outstanding theologian and philosopher. He’s well educated and discusses how he deals with the new atheists as well as those that have just fallen away from the church and are angry with it. He’s written a few books as well

Here’s the main video I was talking about

 

[Sarcelle]

Did I just get accused of being a troll (and not being aware of the Gospel) - straight after having trying to advocate for more charity towards those with whom we disagree?

Who exactly accused you of being a troll?

I saw no post that did that.

 

[Rosebud77]

Who exactly accused you of being a troll?

I saw no post that did that.

I think the implication was that anyone who involved was wrong to do so.

 

[ToeInTheWater]

Who exactly accused you of being a troll?

I saw no post that did that.

The implication was that bending over backwards to be “charitable” to trolls isn’t really charitable because it’s “feeding” the troll, actually providing incentive to continue trolling to get more attention.

For example, I heard an episode of EWTN Open Line, when a caller stated that he was a Vietnam veteran with PTSD who had been married 5 times and wanted to know what to do about that since he wanted to “find the right girl at Church and get married” again.

Well, the host gave pretty generic “consult an annulment advocate” advice, possibly because a break was coming up. When I first heard the segment I was rather nonplussed and thought “but a guy who has PTSD who’s been married FIVE times, even if he can get all 5 marriages annulled, is he even capable of marrying validly in the Church? Why give the guy what might be false hope?”

But it later occurred to me that maybe that caller was just trolling and the host suspected that and was just trying to get him off the air in as quickly charitable way as possible without playing into his trolling too much. (Since I have also noticed that when callers have serious complicated questions they will ask them to hold and continue the conversation after a break, except of course if it’s a “break” meaning the actual end of the show for the day.)

ETA: I can certainly think of many posts that smack of trolling to me and I just try to ignore them at this point. Often my suspicion of particular posters being trolls gets borne out later when they get banned - though not even that conclusively rules in trolling, as opposed to people being sincere but just not willing to follow Forum guidelines.

 

[Katherine438]

Recently I have come across many trolls on the internet, mostly homosexuals or pro-choicers, that have been attacking the Catholic church for “denying homosexuals and women Christ.” This is absolutely insane because we all know that the Church is not anti-anyone, but pro-everyone.

What is more frustrating however is the fact that many Christians reply to these type of people. It is quite obvious that by replying, you are only giving them what they want. They want to upset you, because often times anger leads to sin. They want to make you question your beliefs. Like most anti-catholic people, they try and tell us what we teach or believe, when in reality what they are saying in untrue. They will stretch the truth and even flat out lie, but somehow they still feel as if they are right. In all honesty, I think some people actually want us to hate them.

We have given them out explanations on why what they are doing is wrong and they are very just explanations. If they don’t accept it, that is between them and God.

Wouldn’t it be better to just leave these people alone on the internet? Maybe say a prayer for them, instead of wasting your time replying?

For a while I was talking politics on a particular board and came upon many of these people who are atheists or anti-Catholic … it’s very hard, but in most cases I chose to speak of my love for my Church … state that people are not perfect … and then move on … I have since chosen not to post on that board anymore … I find that it’s just not good for my soul … as you stated, these people can cause us to feel or act in ways that are not good for our souls … somewhere in the bible, I can’t remember where … it was stated that you should discard an eye if it is doing you harm … I felt that that political board was doing me harm … as even though I was good in discussing issues a lot of the time, there were times when I was hurtful to others … so I gave it up. There were many anti-Catholic trolls on that board … not easy to deal with.