Socialism and Catholicism

[JoeFreedom]

I’m saying this…if we use the analogy to apply to your logic. “X” is bad. We spend a lot of money on “X”. “Y” has nothing to do with “X”. Therefore money spent on “Y” makes “Y” good because it isn’t being spent on “X”.

 

[AlNg]

if we use the analogy to apply to your logic. “X” is bad. We spend a lot of money on “X”. “Y” has nothing to do with “X”. Therefore money spent on “Y” makes “Y” good because it isn’t being spent on “X”.

I would say it is wrong to treat beautiful children, living human beings, as impersonal letters of the alphabet. IMHO, a child is much more than an X or a Y. A child is a beautiful creation of a loving God and should not be burned alive by a sticky burning gel attached to their skin. Why spend money on that? What good did it do anyone? Please answer as those children had to suffer horribly. It was all misery, suffering, pain and horror for what?

 

[JoeFreedom]

We aren’t having a logical debate. This is pointless.

 

[AlNg]

This is pointless.

I don’t think so. There is a point. Under capitalism there is pressure to spend money on war as President Eisenhower pointed out when he spoke about the military industrial complex. This money is largely wasted. Innocent children have been tortured and killed. Instead of wasting these hundreds of billions of dollars on wars, why not help the poor, the needy and the sick Americans with socialist programs? After all, isn’t the military some kind of socialism anyway? it is a largely government enterprise. So you already have some socialism. But it is socialism of the bad type. Why not replace the bad socialism with the good socialism?

 

[JoeFreedom]

Yes. Having this conversation with you is pointless. You’re arguments do not follow logic. You are mistaken what socialism is and what a military is.

I’m out.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

Cherry-picking examples is not a good way to estimate a statistic.

 

[AlNg]

You’re arguments do not follow logic.

My arguments are for the welfare of children and other innocent victims of wars and for the homeless victims of ruthless capitalist enterprises.

You are mistaken what socialism is

I don;t think so because there are several definitions of socialism. Different people have attached different meanings to the word socialism. A serious mistake is to think that there is one and only one form of socialism. The socialism that I have in mind is a social democratic economy informed by Keynesian economics. IOW a social democracy with a sense of compassion for the victims of poverty, sickness and injustice. I fail to see how this form of liberal democratic socialism, is in any way in conflict with what is taught in recent times by the Roman Catholic Church. In fact, the local priest has come out in favor of universal health care in the US.
And there are related philosophies attempting to apply the principles of social justice as articulated in the papal encyclical reum novarum.
The Holy Father of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis has said that it is the communists who think like Christians. Should we not follow the wise words of our holy Pope Francis?

Pope: “It is the Communists Who Think Like Christians”

During this week where Americans have been distracted by the unexpected upset of a presidential election that could very well change the course of our collective future, Pope Francis has been busy…

onepeterfive.com

It really sounds like you are an advocate for communism.

i am an advocate for Christian thinking about social problems.

 

[Nepperhan]

Communism is ostensibly the State where all individuals freely cooperate in joint ownership of all assets for the good of all. Socialism is the prior stage in the journey towards that optimal state where the governing body (the State) must enforce communal ownership in order to move people towards the utopian state of Communism.

You know, I reject your foreshortened views of these political maxims. You are demonizing political views in terms of a bogie man federal government taking over. Nevertheless, both differ from ‘democratic socialism’, which folks now say the US economy has mixed with capitalism.

 

[HarryStotle]

Cherry-picking examples is not a good way to estimate a statistic.

I suppose that the two examples I used involve the lives and deaths of millions of individual human beings. You might consider them inconspicuous examples, but I don’t. I wouldn’t really care if there were hundreds or thousands of innocuous examples to the contrary, morally speaking, because it does seem that two of the most significant examples over the past decades fit the mould. Where the slippery slope leads to nothing significant, it is true that most will not take the first steps to get on that slope. It is only where something of real moral importance is on the line that the slippery slope raises its ugly head, so to speak.

Here are a few more “cherries” that might be picked …

…accepting homosexual behaviour because those who are same sex attracted “cannot help it” has lead to everyone having a right to choose their own gender and force others to legally and socially acknowledge their choice regarding their gender (even though attraction to a gender couldn’t have been a choice.)

…no fault divorce has led to a complete breakdown of marriage and family since it effectively released all parents/spouses from any lasting commitment to their biological offspring and spouse.

… the permissibility of contraception led directly to abortion on demand.

 

[HarryStotle]

HarryStotle:

Communism is ostensibly the State where all individuals freely cooperate in joint ownership of all assets for the good of all. Socialism is the prior stage in the journey towards that optimal state where the governing body (the State) must enforce communal ownership in order to move people towards the utopian state of Communism.

You know, I reject your foreshortened views of these political maxims. You are demonizing political views in terms of a bogie man federal government taking over. Nevertheless, both differ from ‘democratic socialism’, which folks now say the US economy has mixed with capitalism.

Actually, you would have to speak to Karl Marx, the “father of communism” regarding the “foreshortened views.” Read Marx.

 

[HarryStotle]

The Holy Father of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis has said that it is the communists who think like Christians. Should we not follow the wise words of our holy Pope Francis?

The wise words, yes. When he speaks wise words.

His off-the-cuff, loosely stated, and ambiguous ruminations on politics, not so much.

Did the communists really “think like Christians” when tens of millions were consigned to work camps, tortured, murdered or starved in Russia, China, Ukraine, Cambodia, etc.?

I don’t think so.

But it was “the communists” who thought those things, and carried them out.

Should Christians also think like communists?

Logically speaking

If A then B does not imply, B then A.

So just because some thoughts communists might entertain align with some thoughts that Christians do, it does not mean all communist thoughts do. The question is: Which thoughts?
And, Are those thoughts central to both or incidental?

Communism is materialistic through and through. Christianity is not. The values of communism are solely concerned with this earthly existence and power. Christianity, not so much.

There might be a superficial “likeness,” but looking deeply into both reveals the vast differences between them.

 

[AlNg]

the permissibility of contraception led directly to abortion on demand.

Under communism in Romania, Ceaucescu made both contraceptives and abortion illegal. However, exceptions were made for women who had five children.

 

[HarryStotle]

HarryStotle:

the permissibility of contraception led directly to abortion on demand.

Under communism in Romania, Ceaucescu made both contraceptives and abortion illegal. However, exceptions were made for women who had five children.

An incidental similarity. The exceptions prove that Ceausescu was only concerned with the pragmatic implications of contraceptives and abortion for the State, not the underlying morality of either. He understood more children produced for the State could be indoctrinated to give more power to the State.

 

[AlNg]

The exceptions prove that Ceausescu was only concerned with the pragmatic implications of contraceptives

I don’t understand your proof. Some Eastern Orthodox priests and German Catholic bishops will allow contraception for a married couple with more than four children. How does that prove that they are only concerned with the pragmatic implications of contraceptives and are disregarding all moral considerations.

 

[HarryStotle]

HarryStotle:

It might be necessary to spend money on defence or weaponry to protect those people you cherish so

You mean like in Vietnam? Please advise us how the money spent burning children with Napalm in Vietnam protected the people who you cherish.

Johnson, who authorized the start of the Vietnam War and the use of napalm, was a Democrat, and a rather unseemly one at that. Napalm was used in the war from about 1965 to 1972. Speak to him and those in his administration about their rationale for its use. Why are you trying to hang everything done in the name of defence by anyone in government on me? Just a tad fallacious in your argument, there. Although much can be said in the negative about Nixon, who was President from 1969 to 1974, he ended the use of napalm and the war.

 

[HarryStotle]

HarryStotle:

The exceptions prove that Ceausescu was only concerned with the pragmatic implications of contraceptives

I don’t understand your proof. Some Eastern Orthodox priests and German Catholic bishops will allow contraception for a married couple with more than four children. How does that prove that they are only concerned with the pragmatic implications of contraceptives and are disregarding all moral considerations.

Eastern Orthodox bishops and German Catholic bishops do not represent me, nor orthodox Catholicism, so why are you attempting to place on me the burden of defending their views, which are not mine, nor the Church’s?

 

[HarryStotle]

HarryStotle:

The exceptions prove that Ceausescu was only concerned with the pragmatic implications of contraceptives

I don’t understand your proof.

My “proof” is that Ceausescu would have approved one or two child families, and forced abortions and contraception, if he thought those policies better furthered the good of the State, just like what has been and is done in Communist China. There is no determinable moral principle on the goodness or evil of abortion/contraception to be taken from his policies. The only “moral” end for communism is what was “good” for the furtherance of the Communist State in Romania, at the time.

 

[AlNg]

My “proof” is that Ceausescu would have approved one or two child families, and forced abortions and contraception, if he thought those policies better furthered the good of the State,

I don’t see how you would know that.

 

[MiserereMeiDei]

Was Ceausescu a benevolent leader? Have you read about when he was deposed?

 

[AlNg]

Why are you trying to hang everything done in the name of defence by anyone in government on me?

So are you in favor of taking the money from weapons used to torture children and using it instead to help the poor and the homeless?