Anyone Not Catholic for Non-Theological Reasons?

[Skip_Wiley]

Can you provide substantiation at least as far as …getting rid of your ministers and turning them over to the police?

Boy, it must be fun to go to a dinner party with you. Every word out of somebody’s mouth, you must say “Prove it! Prove it!”

No, I’m not going to go and search the internet for examples for you because, frankly, there’s just no point in it.

There has actually been much done by the Catholic Church to rectify the wrongs committed by a very small minority… and further steps are being taken to make sure it does not happen again.

Right. The Catholic church pays the victims to keep quiet and sends the pedophile to another church.

By the way, I like the way you guys ask for non-theological reasons Christians don’t become Catholic and then jump on us when we answer the question.

 

[Skip_Wiley]

Have it your way… You are free to believe whatever you choose to. Catholics get the fullness of TRUTH from Christ, as well as the Church, and His Shepherd the Pope.

Baloney.

You would be very disingenuous if you were to deny getting your brand of truth from your church and your “pope”…or minister or whomever.

That’s fine. You can call me a liar if you like. It certainly isn’t the worst thing you’ve called me.

I am suspecting that you know little of what Catholicism actually embraces…so if you have any questions…feel free to ask.

OK. Why do Catholics have such little faith in their religion that, instead of making a reasoned argument, they immediately resort to belittling their oponents by accusing them of not knowing anything about Catholicism?

Please be advised however, that regardless of how charitable we can be…

That’s a joke, right?

 

[Cinette]

Skip, don’t you have any admiration for the Church in that it has owned up to the travesty and apologized for it?

In contrast, there was a recent study that showed that the rate of molestation was as high, if not higher, in Protestant churches.

Strangely, I never saw any apologies for that, and the media quickly forgot the story. I haven’t seen it mentioned again.

Is there a double standard?

The abuse by priests was something that deeply affected me because my first reaction was sympathy for the majority of holy and dedicated men. They give up everything for the priesthood. The victims had to be absolutely destroyed for life. I am glad it all came out in the open. We have to be VIGILENT.

I think that when this was brought into the open some bishops just didn’t know how to react and the scandal might have caused them to keep quiet. That was bad.

A priest who does a thing like that has much to answer for! This is a HUGE sin.

I do believe that they were a product of their times no matter what other churches they belong to. The ugly things we are exposed to every day. The ugly things constantly in OUR FACE!!

I think I would have been destroyed if I had been abused. When I was a little girl I had two experiences with friends of the family - one was exposure and another who tried to touch me. My Mother had prepared me well. She always tried to keep us away from people - she didn’t speak directly about them, she spoke to me about ME. How I must be pure etc. My reaction therefore was to put an immediate stop and I, from then on, refused to speak or even look at those persons. Some years later I saw one on a bus and I immediately got off at the next stop.

I once saw on TV a man (I think he was a fairly wellknown golfer in the States) talking about abuse he suffered as a youngster by a priest. He said the priest was a friend of the family and would come to dinner etc. He had been abused for a good number of years he said. Then he added “He (the priest) even married me and my wife”. Now you tell me!! - by the time he got married he would have been an adult - so how come he asked the priest who abused him to officiate at his wedding - this is crazy - how could he do a thing like that. I would want to get so far away from the person, I wouldn’t invite him to my wedding, let alone conduct the service??!!!:crying: :crying: :banghead:

I do feel very sorry for the victims and hope they have been able to put this behind them.

 

[Cinette]

How can I “debate and exchange views” when the Catholics here believe that “debating and exchanging views” means starting every post off with “Oh yeah? Well what could you possibly know? You’re a non-Catholic!”

I came on these forums to learn and debate. I have never been to a debate when people destroy each other.

Why do say I am a non-Catholic?

Why don’t you begin again and be civil and gracious. I know you believe in Jesus. Well then, remember that he sees everything.

 

[Janet_S]

In the political sphere, it must be noted that truthfulness in the relations between those governing and those governed, openness in public administration, impartiality in the service of the body politic, respect for the rights of political adversaries, safeguarding the rights of the accused against summary trials and convictions, the just and honest use of public funds, the rejection of equivocal or illicit means in order to gain, preserve or increase power at any cost — all these are principles which are primarily rooted in, and in fact derive their singular urgency from, the transcendent value of the person and the objective moral demands of the functioning of States.160 When these principles are not observed, the very basis of political coexistence is weakened and the life of society itself is gradually jeopardized, threatened and doomed to decay (cf. Ps 14:3-4; Rev 18:2-3, 9-24). Today, when many countries have seen the fall of ideologies which bound politics to a totalitarian conception of the world — Marxism being the foremost of these — there is no less grave a danger that the fundamental rights of the human person will be denied and that the religious yearnings which arise in the heart of every human being will be absorbed once again into politics. This is the risk of an alliance between democracy and ethical relativism, which would remove any sure moral reference point from political and social life, and on a deeper level make the acknowledgement of truth impossible. Indeed, “if there is no ultimate truth to guide and direct political activity, then ideas and convictions can easily be manipulated for reasons of power. As history demonstrates, a democracy without values easily turns into open or thinly disguised totalitarianism”. John Paul II, Veritatis Splendor 101
vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_06081993_veritatis-splendor_en.html