My aunt and her "life companion"

[ToeInTheWater]

I believe you, but there are readers out there who read an anonymous post on the internet and conclude that Catholics in general believe that. Believe me!

I must admit it took me a while to realize this. I recall being shocked at one time to find a CAF poster actually advising parents to beating their children if they come out as gay. I also recall some posters not advocating violence against gays, but refusing to condemn it.

But I now realize these fringe posters, are indeed fringe, and not at all representative of Catholics in general, anymore than the WBC people are representative of the average Baptist.

 

[Peter_J]

I recall being shocked at one time to find a CAF poster actually advising parents to beating their children if they come out as gay.

I like to think that I’m not easily shocked by stuff that posters say, but wow.

In view of that, I’m actually kind of glad now that posters on here put the Pope down the way they do. I mean, it would be more disturbing to me if stuff like the above came from folks who like the Pope.

 

[ToeInTheWater]

I like to think that I’m not easily shocked by stuff that posters say, but wow.

In view of that, I’m actually kind of glad now that posters on here put the Pope down the way they do. I mean, it would be more disturbing to me if stuff like the above came from folks who like the Pope.

I suffer from insomnia at times, so I’m often on-line in the wee hours and see a lot of posts that get deleted by the morning. Fairly sure the “beat your gay children” post was axed fairly quickly.

I also recall that many posts got deleted in the wake of the Orlando nightclub shooting for being uncharitable to gay people. I didn’t even catch all of those.

I do think that the CAF Moderators do definitely catch the worst posts, so although I’ve critiqued them in the past I do realize they have a very difficult job. Sadly there do exist Catholic equivalents of the Westboro Baptists, though I do think they are in the minority, and a tiny one at that. But in general I do think some posters who claim to be “traditionalist” are more influenced by Fundamentalism, and a uniquely US form of it, than they admit, or are even aware of.

 

[Peter_J]

I suffer from insomnia at times, so I’m often on-line in the wee hours and see a lot of posts that get deleted by the morning. Fairly sure the “beat your gay children” post was axed fairly quickly.

I also recall that many posts got deleted in the wake of the Orlando nightclub shooting for being uncharitable to gay people. I didn’t even catch all of those.

I do think that the CAF Moderators do definitely catch the worst posts, so although I’ve critiqued them in the past I do realize they have a very difficult job. Sadly there do exist Catholic equivalents of the Westboro Baptists, though I do think they are in the minority, and a tiny one at that. But in general I do think some posters who claim to be “traditionalist” are more influenced by Fundamentalism, and a uniquely US form of it, than they admit, or are even aware of.

Good post.

When you boil things down, anonymity is a two edged sword. I’m glad for it because I wouldn’t want my identity available to the world (Jericho isn’t my real name btw ), but what if I get online and e.g. claim that NY Yankees fans are led by Satan? Will people read that and think that the Catholic Church teaches that?

Okay granted that’s a silly example, but sometimes that’s what it takes to get people to stop jumping to conclusions about Catholicism based on things posted anonymously on the Web.

 

[Peter_J]

P.S.

I suffer from insomnia at times, so I’m often on-line in the wee hours and see a lot of posts that get deleted by the morning. Fairly sure the “beat your gay children” post was axed fairly quickly.

Yeah. I generally take a pretty laissez-faire attitude wrt moderation of stuff on the internet (not that I currently moderate any website, I just mean what my philosophy about it is) but I’d definitely make an exception to that if someone was actually inciting violence. I think such posts need to be dealt with strongly, and even more so if it’s violence against particularly vulnerable people like gay children of homophobic parents.

Anyhow, we’ve gotten on to a bit of a tangent, but I’m guessing the OP will pardon us for that. I means statements like “Wouldn’t a nun being a lesbian be a cause for concern for the safety of the other nuns?” are a little hard to just ignore.