What do "gay" activists hope to achieve when they protest at the Vatican naked?

[livingwordunity]

one speaks of and for the flesh and the other is supposed to be speaking for and of God.

Actually, some of the obscene “gay” activist protests have involved things like “gay” men mocking nuns or saying blasphemous things about Christ or portraying Him in an obscene way. And some claim to be doing God’s will. Keep in mind that they considered it a victory that some Christians have caved in. And now some have made a new blasphemous “sacrament” for so-called “gay marriage”. I’m sure they won’t be happy as long as the Catholic Church doesn’t cave to it (which will never happen).

 

[fbl9]

Actually, some of the obscene “gay” activist protests have involved things like “gay” men mocking nuns or saying blasphemous things about Christ or portraying Him in an obscene way. And some claim to be doing God’s will. Keep in mind that they considered it a victory that some Christians have caved in. And now some have made a new blasphemous “sacrament” for so-called “gay marriage”. I’m sure they won’t be happy as long as the Catholic Church doesn’t cave to it (which will never happen).

That

 

[CatholicGeek1]

But why overlook this when people don’t overlook WBC protests (which at least aren’t done naked)? WBC gets universal condemnation because of their obscenity, yet when “gay” activists protest in an obscene way against the Catholic Church (which is very often) Catholics are supposed to ignore it? Meanwhile, the mainstream media takes the side of the obscene “gay” activist protesters and continues to vilify the Catholic Church.

I think for me it is because the WBC claims to speak on behalf of God. They are false prophets. To me their actions go far beyond a mere protest, no matter how distasteful that protest may be.

 

[livingwordunity]

I think for me it is because the WBC claims to speak on behalf of God. They are false prophets. To me their actions go far beyond a mere protest, no matter how distasteful that protest may be.

“Distasteful” is a word we would use for someone who has a fashion faux pas. I would say that the “gay” activists in these cases went far beyond that. I don’t see how what the WBC does is worse than a group of screaming, naked women who scandalize the Vicar of Christ and scandalize who knows how many hundreds or thousands of children with screaming and things like the “F” word and “God” painted on their naked bodies. Some also have “in gay we trust” painted on a naked torso. I think it’s important that Catholics know that this stuff is happening so we can know what kind of wicked spiritual forces we are up against.

 

[Julianna]

“Distasteful” is a word we would use for someone who has a fashion faux pas. I would say that the “gay” activists in these cases went far beyond that. I don’t see how what the WBC does is worse than a group of screaming, naked women who scandalize the Vicar of Christ and scandalize who knows how many hundreds or thousands of children with screaming and things like the “F” word and “God” painted on their naked bodies. Some also have “in gay we trust” painted on a naked torso. I think it’s important that Catholics know that this stuff is happening so we can know what kind of wicked spiritual forces we are up against.

In every group there is the lunatic fringe…they’re out there. The activists you write about are the lunatic fringe. Just as WBC is the lunatic fringe of the Baptists.

 

[livingwordunity]

In every group there is the lunatic fringe…they’re out there. The activists you write about are the lunatic fringe. Just as WBC is the lunatic fringe of the Baptists.

If they are the “lunatic fringe” why is there no other groups of “gay” activists that have publicly denounced what they do?

I have brought up this point several times, but no one who claims this to be just a fringe group can ever come up with a single example of a “gay” activist group that publicly denounces such behavior.

And it’s not like no one notices when they do a naked stunt at the Vatican in front of thousands of unsuspecting people and news cameras. It becomes news all over the world when it happens, but never a peep of public denouncement from any other “gay” activist group.

This is the total opposite of the fact that Westboro Baptist protests are universally denounced by just about everyone. Even the iconic leader of the American Christian Evangelical movement, Jerry Falwell, called Fred Phelps “a first class nut”. And there is no Baptist denomination accepts them.

 

[fbl9]

If they are the “lunatic fringe” why is there no other groups of “gay” activists that have publicly denounced what they do?

I have brought up this point several times, but no one who claims this to be just a fringe group can ever come up with a single example of a “gay” activist group that publicly denounces such behavior.

And it’s not like no one notices when they do a naked stunt at the Vatican in front of thousands of unsuspecting people and news cameras. It becomes news all over the world when it happens, but never a peep of public denouncement from any other “gay” activist group.

This is the total opposite of the fact that Westboro Baptist protests are universally denounced by just about everyone. Even the iconic leader of the American Christian Evangelical movement, Jerry Falwell, called Fred Phelps “a first class nut”. And there is no Baptist denomination accepts them.

you really expect the world to denounce some of their own?

 

[Elizabeth502]

This:

an adolescent reaction for attention.

as well as adolescent rage at being opposed by any authority figure when it comes to gratification of any kind.

Pathetic.

 

[livingwordunity]

as well as adolescent rage at being opposed by any authority figure when it comes to gratification of any kind.

The emotional arguments of the ones who want so-called “same-sex marriage” fit the description of what Freud called the “id”. And the moral arguments we Catholics use fit what Freud called the “superego”.

What Freud saw in personality traits we can also see in the larger picture of societal moral struggle.

In the Freudian view, human personality consists of three components the id, ego and superego. According to Freud,

• the id operates on the pleasure principle. In other words, the id wants to feel good all the time and not feel badly, without regard for anything or anyone else; loosely speaking, “if it feels good, do it.” The only concern for the id is that its needs get met to its satisfaction.

• The ego operates on the reality principle. The ego understands that the needs and desires of others also have to be met and dealt with. The role of the ego is to meet the id’s needs with the bounds of practicality and the consideration of others.

• The superego operates on the ideal principle. It is the moral part of us and arises from moral and ethical considerations placed on us by our parents and society; loosely speaking it’s our conscience. In a normal person, the ego is constantly working and negotiating to simultaneously satisfy the needs of the id and the superego within the bounds of practicality. The ego and superego have access to the conscious, preconscious, and unconscious. The id is confined to the unconscious.

The conflicts between the id, ego and superego occur in the unconscious mind and are the result of the work in reconciling sexual, aggressive and other morally or socially unacceptable impulses of the id. Because the conflicts exist in the unconscious mind they are inaccessible to the person and to a therapist. However, the conflicts sometimes bubble through to the surface via slips of the tongue, dreams, jokes, anxiety and what Freud termed as Ego Defense Mechanisms. These are used by the ego to reduce the conflict between the id and superego serve a useful protective function, but they usually involve a degree of self-deception and distortion of reality. Ego defense mechanisms are usually learned during early childhood help the ego deal with inner the inner unconscious conflicts between the id and superego. These defenses include denial (barring an anxiety provoking external stimulus from awareness), repression (barring an anxiety provoking internal stimulus from awareness), projection (placing unacceptable thoughts or impulses in yourself onto someone else), displacement, (taking out impulses on a safer substitute), sublimation (channeling unacceptable impulses in a socially acceptable way), reaction formation (converting the unacceptable impulse into its opposite), rationalization, (supplying a logical or rational excuse for a shortcoming), regression (returning to a previous more childish stage of development). Of these, only sublimation is viewed as a healthy outlet.

Source

 

[Deo_Volente]

Grace & Peace!

as well as adolescent rage at being opposed by any authority figure when it comes to gratification of any kind.

Pathetic.

No question that the protesters come across as petulant…but nude protest isn’t just about adolescent theatrics, it’s about making the body (which is the locus of the debate on sexuality) unavoidably present. I would imagine that the protesters believe that the Vatican is dismissive of their sexuality–to protest nude is to affirm to the Vatican that their bodies (by extension, their sexualities) are real, that the debate about sexuality is not about something abstract but something concrete (bodies, people). It is also to play into the idea (right or wrong) that religious folks find sexuality (and therefore the body) shameful and cannot possibly talk about it or engage with it without shame or without an overcompensating zeal which is born of shame–it says, “we, unlike you, do not find our bodies shameful.”

Affirming that the body is at the center of the sexuality debate is not necessarily an adolescent move. It could potentially open up avenues of conversation (what is the body for? who gets to decide what a particular body should do or not do? These are questions to which Catholicism has clear responses, but they’re responses with which the protesters could engage if they so chose.) But this protest appears to be shrill and hamfisted, cynically playing into the “puritanicalism” to which I’m sure they are opposed by consciously or unconsciously assuming (with those they imagine they are protesting) that the body is shocking.

In short, they didn’t do a very good job of saying or achieving anything worth paying attention to. As such, their protest is less outrageous than it is…meh. It’s a “not with a bang but a whimper” moment.

(However, dismissing their protest as pathetic [which it was] and merely adolescent [which it didn’t have to be, but wound up being] plays into and affirms the protesters’ own narrative–that the Church’s dismissiveness is indicative of an outdated and misguided paternalism. In the end, they can very cleverly look back at their failure and say [in a very adolescent way], “We showed them up for what they really are, didn’t we.” They’re deluding themselves…but that’s life.)

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!

 

[Elizabeth502]

I would imagine that the protesters believe that the Vatican is dismissive of their sexuality

No, Mark. God is disapproving of their sexual behavior. God has made that clear through Scripture.

The Vatican doesn’t care about their challenges to God’s law. Rather, they dismiss the disobedience and the disregard.

The Vatican is charged with proclaiming, encoding, and living God’s law, and with refusing to affirm disobedience to that.

(More of Mark’s agenda to discredit the Church’s teaching on sexuality. Nothing new here.)

 

[Deo_Volente]

Grace & Peace!

No, Mark. God is disapproving of their sexual behavior. God has made that clear through Scripture.

The Vatican doesn’t care about their challenges to God’s law. Rather, they dismiss the disobedience and the disregard.

The Vatican is charged with proclaiming, encoding, and living God’s law, and with refusing to affirm disobedience to that.

(More of Mark’s agenda to discredit the Church’s teaching on sexuality. Nothing new here.)

I doubt that the protesters saw themselves as protesting God. That may be how you see them, and that’s fine. But I don’t think that God’s law revealed in Scripture was very much on their minds. Although, who knows? But your comment here is a bit out of nowhere, no?

Because, Elizabeth…I actually agreed with your assessment of the protesters. After I posted, though, I thought, “I wonder if she’ll think that by agreeing with her and engaging with her comment that I was actually not agreeing with her? But why would she? I don’t believe that she’s constitutionally predisposed to misread what I write…do I?”

I’ve a feeling that if you wrote, “The sky is blue,” and I concurred with, “Yes, and just over there, with the sun, it’s beginning to go a lovely orange,” you would reply, “That’s just like you, making a reference to the gay rainbow flag by mentioning additional colors…God doesn’t care if you think the color orange is lovely!”

Anyway. Good job. Thanks for the reality check. I’ll think twice the next time I’m inclined to agree with you or engage with something you write.

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!

 

[Elizabeth502]

I doubt that the protesters saw themselves as protesting God.

That’s their problem and their confusion, not the Vatican’s.

Try to have a nice day, Mark.

 

[Deo_Volente]

Grace & Peace!

That’s their problem and their confusion, not the Vatican’s.

(Thinking…)

(Thinking twice…)

Indeed. I agree.

Try to have a nice day, Mark.

At this point, I sadly (but honestly) have no idea how I’m supposed to take this from you.

I’m inclined just to say, “Thanks, you too!” But I feel a disclaimer should probably be in order. Something along the lines of: Please note that my gratitude for your good wishes does not imply that I am attempting to discredit the Church in any way.



Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!