Is the Pope still Catholic?
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Samizdata question of the dayApril 8th, 2005 |
 35 comments to Samizdata question of the day |
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Huh?
Was Rome built in a day?
Is this thing on?
Ke?
Never mind them, Illuminatus. I thought it was funny.
In the eyes of the true believer, what else would he
wear?
If a bear s**ts in the woods, and no-one is around to hear it, does it still make a sound?
“Does the Pope shit in his pants?”
The Pope isn’t. Anything.
Damned inconsiderate of him to wreck one of my favorite sayings: “Is the Pope Polish?”
Happily, “Does the Pope shit in woods?” still will work.
Actually, now that he is deceased, he is to be baptised by the Latter Day Saints.
I pray for you…
You poor pathetic little non-entities. That you feel that now is the right time to air your smug, stupid little infantile comments, is beyond belief.
And please don’t respond by saying that I do not have a sense of humour, it is just that the exhibition of your stupidity at this time is, if nothing else, entirely inappropriate at this time…
And no, I am not a Catholic, but I do have the perspective to recognise and respect the passing of one of the great personages of modern times…
e.y.: you have no sense of humour. Specifically, you see offense intended, forgetting that it’s human nature to joke about things respected as well as about things not.
Like ey, I don’t see the humour, though I’m not scandalised by it.
“Pope” in the context means the head of the Roman Catholic church, though there are a number of other people who bear and have borne the title “pope” who definitely aren’t catholics, but coptic or from other Eastern churches.
Currently there is no pope–one ceases to be pope when one dies, regardless of one’s opinion about spiritual survival after death–so the question is meaningless for a short while.
However, when there is an RC pope, it rather depends what you mean by Catholic. There are a number of reactionary sects that consider themselves Catholics and the post- Vatican-II church as a herectic schism. They would all say that the quite traditionalist John Paul II was not a Catholic. The popes and anti-popes of the middle ages presumably busied themselves with excommunicating each other on similar grounds: the other was not a Catholic.
“Is the pope a Catholic?” is only amusingly jocular within the cosy surroundings of a predominantly protestant post-christian society. For others, including us serious athiests, it is open to question and might conceivably matter.
Perry,
This thread is crap. The jokes are not offensive, just retarded.
Samizdata is going down the pan.
Time to get off your a**e and use that editorial discretion.
I’m on strike from posting until we get a less stupid editorial policy on contractions and a “libertarian views” subject heading.
I was not particularly offended, just surprised that ‘so-called’ intelligent people have so little respect for a man who has achieved so much. No, he was not perfect, but then who is?
The nit picking over the definition of the title ‘Pope’, is compounding the stupidity of the original remarks. We should be showing some respect for ‘The Man’, not the title. If you have nothing good to say, then just be quiet, but perhaps even that is too hard for some to do.
If we cannot show a modicum of respect for such achievement, then what hope is there for the rest of us?
Julian, there is a time and place for ‘jokes’, the day of the funeral is not it.
Just to point up the general lack of candidates for mutual respect in general, just who would the ‘smart-arse’ juveniles who have commented above, rank as being worthy of our mutual and world-wide respect? It would be interesting to see if any nominate anyone more worthy than John Paul.
I have to agree with Gustave, this blog has declined over recent months, and it is quite noticeable that many of the more readable posters and commenters have been noticeable more by their absence, rather than by their contribution…
ernest young dubs the Pope one of the great personages of modern times.
I hope not! If that were the best that modern times had to offer in the way of personages, we would be bereft indeed. This Pope contributed zero, zilch, nada to the wellbeing of Catholics and indeed the rest of mankind, despite a very well oiled publicity machine and the novelty of being Polish. Now we are getting history rewritten – by the BBC, no less! – now there’s a surprise – to elevate his role in bringing down Communism. Communism was flattened by a spontaneous realisation that tens of millions of other people loathed it too, in the same way that the French Revolution, with fewer players, also experienced spontaneous combustion. The fall of Communism took place on a stage painstakingly prepared by Ronald Reagan in partnership with Margaret Thatcher. And if you want a hero, Lech Walesa, without an army, without bodyguards, without helicopters, without the absolute safety of a tiny kingdom to retreat to – but who put himself on the line, alone, would seem to be infinitely more worthy of admiration.
This Pope drove Catholics away from his Church in the hundreds of millions. He lost Ireland, for God’s sake! He lost Italy! Holland has legalised euthanasia. He encouraged the spread of AIDS in Africa and anywhere else anyone would listen to him by refusing to recognise that human nature is human nature. How dare he, someone who was celebate by choice, try to force it on others? Incidences of AIDS plummeted in the West, thank God, because gays took responsibility for themselves – no thanks to the Pope.
As to birth control pills, is there a woman in the world who has refrained from using them because the Pope disapproved? I doubt it. In other words, with his failure to recognise the world as it is, and humanity as it is, and working with it, he eroded the authority of the Catholic Church and the Papacy with the imposition of Medieval rigidity. The official Church policy, under this Pope, was to cover up child abuse by (celebate) priests. I think I read that there is a priest accused of serial paedophilia who has been given refuge in Vatican City, where he cannot be arrested, for years.
It does not take a Catholic, or even a Christian of another persuasion, to see that this Pope diminished the Church.
I too thought some of the jokes essayed on this thread had the crude, infantile “daring” of very young boys.
The blanket coverage by the BBC is a desperate back and fill operation to bury the voting fraud in Birmingham. They’ll be moving on to the wholly inconsequential (in a world sense) Prince Rainier, next.
I kind of agree with Ernest. The “gag” was puerile and not funny. Let’s leave the old boy in peace and get on with kicking Phoney out of power.
rgds
Verity, more than 4 million people descended on Rome- one of the largest crowds ever assembled in one place in akll of human hisatory. Did you not notice that most were young people?
So stamp you impotent little Libertarian feet in rage, will ya!
As for the most of the other posters here; I’ll pray for ya………so that G*d may reawaken your intelligence!
From the august Karl Popper to statements like “Does the Pope shit in his pants”?
Scratch a “literate Libby” and all ya find is an old worn-out, run-of-the-mill christianophobe…..exactly like on the Left!
Just another empty fascist ideology…….
John Palubiski – Thanks for your lucid refutation of my arguments.
1. Who said 4m people descended on Rome? Could you quote your sources, please? Four million people is half the permanent (people who live there; not commuters) population of London. Four million is the entire population of Houston, Texas. I think Tuscan Tony told us the Italian police were predicting two million.
2. Who estimated the crowds? Interested parties, by any chance?
3. How did four million people travel to Rome? There aren’t enough cheap flights and railways and highways and parking to accommodate an influx of four million people. Again, who compiled these figures, please?
4. When we endured the Diana deathfest, around 15m people who had never met her began talking in tongues and falling about, laying banks of hundreds of thousands of tacky cellophane wrapped flowers and ghastly soft toys at various public spaces and weeping in the streets. So what? People want to be part of a great event. It’s their way of connecting in a disconnected world. It’s needy, cheap sentimentality.
5. Why are you using an asterisk in the word God? Asterisks are normally used to denote vulgar language or profanity.
6. I’m not a Christianphobe. I think Christianity is, in the main, a very valuable religion and it has largely been the underpinning of the enlightenment and progress of the West. As a Westerner, I respect it and am sorry to see it in decline. A decline which this Pope, an authoritarian bigot, contributed to in no small order. The other entity that has had people scampering away from Christianity, soi-disant, is the Church of England. So they haven’t done themselves any favours.
7. I said in my post that some of the commentators on the thread were puerile, scatalogically-oriented infants.
Perhaps, with all the media coverage, and everyone, protestant, catholic, secular, islamic, etc saying he was such a wonderful guy he is no longer Catholic, with a big C but catholic, in the sense of universal. He, perhaps, is now a universal pope.
Peace,
Chris
Confused Lutheran – No.
Verity,
Just out of interest, who would you nominate as ‘The Man of our Times’. Someone with the universal appeal that the Pope obviously had.
You quoted Walenza, Reagan, and Thatcher, and admittedly all had their devotees, but none came near the sheer universal acceptance of John Paul.
Perhaps the Dalai Llama is cast in the same mould, but I doubt that he commands quite the same universal respect as the late Pope.
It would be interesting to know your candidate – if you have one!… although I suspect that no mere mortal could meet your exacting standards…
Everything Verity said.
There’s a term we use back home for JP II’s visit to Ireland all those years ago – “Catholicisms’ last hurrah”.
If a computer crashes in the woods and no-one sees it, does it make a log?
ernest young – I have listed above the reasons I think this Pope was a disaster – in that his rigid, doctrinaire and authoritarian message catapulted Western Europe into the post-Christian age as formerly Catholic countries dropped away like flies. There are a lot of people who, as it happens, like authoritarian edicts and are comfortable being told what to do. That is their business, but it is not a universal hunger.
There are also a lot of needy people who want to be in on big events. It’s like the Woodstock syndrome and the summer of love. It’s getting emotionally involved in Diana’s marriage and death and feeling faux grief for someone they never knew. People feel elevated by “being there”.
This Pope was living in the Dark Ages when populations were ignorant, there were no printing presses so no free distribution of information. In any case, they couldn’t read so were dependent on the priests to explain everything to them. As few of them travelled beyond their villages, the priest was the most authoritative person in the community. Those communities were agrarian. People got up at sunrise, worked in the fields or with livestock, went back to their house for their midday meal and went back to the fields. They came home exhausted. They had a meal. They had no artificial lighting, and besides, they couldn’t read, so who needed it? So they went to sleep. Circumscribed.
Things, I need not point out, have changed. People can read. Everyone’s awash with information and opinions. Even if they can’t read, they can watch television. People go to the supermarket and make a decision about which toothpaste to buy between 20 different brands all making different promises. If they want information, they just log onto the net and key in Google, which will flood them with information in a few seconds. People now make a hundred quick-reaction decisions a day. Shall I take this phone call? Do I have a chance to run this red light? Can I grab that space? All temporal, I agree, but people have become self-directed and decisive.
The Catholic church would do well to remember this if they wish to still be a going concern 50 years from now.
I am not trying to avoid your question, ernest young, when I ask one in return: Why do we (5bn humans) need “a man for our times”? The seeking after such universality is pointless. But I’d be interested in hearing your nominations, nevertheless.
I too have noticed a decline in civil and thoughtful discourse on this blog and since it is clear that the proprietor has no interest in policing it and since the level of discourse is both outrageously bigoted, uninformed and infantile, I think I’ll just remove it from my blog list. It’s interesting how this event, the death of John Paul II, has made it easier to weed out the blogs with a rational and responsible clientele from those which resemble the DU’ers more than Hugh Hewitt.
Arthur,
I’d agree these comments got a bit juvenile, but if a particularly bad Democratic Party member, or a Robert Mugabe, or a Dalai Lama, or a conservative Islamic cleric, or some other silly celebrity had popped their clogs and a comments section had developed like it has for this one, we’d hear *NOT ONE DAMN PEEP* out of those who are complaining now. Not one of them would be bothered to comment, and would happily chuckle along to the odd comment.
But when it comes to a Christian religious leader, oh no, that’s out of bounds. Can’t have that. Have to show the correct reverence, don’t we?
Tough. It may be a silly thread, but let us at least be consistent about it. The next “world figure”, or David Blunkett, or advocate of a secondary role for women, or advocate for no access to birth control, or speaks and acts out against a minority group, or interferes with political decisions who gets villified in a silly thread, I will expect people such as yourself to speak up about how we shouldn’t be so uncivil.
It would be the only consistent course of action
.
As somebody in Asia who has seen firsthand the Roman Catholic Church’s expansion(as well as that of other Christian sects), I am convinced that the Pope did not lose anything. If nothing else, he brought a dignity to the post that I only recently realized wasn’t there for many centuries(especially after reading Il Principe). Even those of my friends who are not RCs respect him greatly.
The gradual secularism and degrading of the power of religion was inevitable. JP2 did what he could to preserve the faith and the values which were the bedrock of Christendom, and I would think he did a great job compared to past popes considering the constraints he was under.
If we compare JP2’s achievements to that of his predeccessors, we’d find that he was a saint by comparison. Past popes were vastly more corrupt, more authoritarian, more evil, in every sense of the word. Only the lack of modern communications obscured their sinful deeds, providing a veneer of civility and faith.
JP2 had no such luxury. He operated in a world where information was only a click away, and still the offences commited by the Church weren’t as serious as people liked to pretend they were. Perhaps mass media was the spur for the Church to keep itself clean. Perhaps the Pope was a genuinely good man.
I bet on the latter. After all, the Church still hasn’t fully realized the power of the Information Age, which could only mean that they’re cleaner than in the past. And it is probably to JP2’s credit.
TWG
“Mankind will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest.”
Diderot
Libertarians inevitably have a problem with organised religion because it subverts the free will of its adherents. But as libertarians we are obliged (unlike our opponents) to respect the rights of others to hold view incompatible with ours.
Therefore, RIP JPII. You lived your life fully in accordance with your beliefs. I don’t share them, but I respect that. That respect is what being a libertarian principally means to me.
James,
I did say the man was not perfect, but he is still a great figure by anyone’s standards.
To say he ‘lost ‘ Ireland and Italy, is rather simpifying what actually happened. If you say he lost them by refusing to concede to a more progressive form of Catholicism, then good luck to him for standing by his beliefs, after all, he believed that life was basically a battle between good and evil, and that much of so-called ‘progressive thinking’ was basicallly evil.
That people in those countries mentioned chose to disregard his teachings, was their personal choice, right or wrong. That does not make his message necessarily wrong,
I would point out that there are many non-religious people who think the same way.
Verity,
Why do we (5bn humans) need “a man for our times”?
I never said that we need a ‘Man of our Times’,that was your conclusion. I asked if you had anyone who you might consider would fill such a role.
Yes, you did ask a question to avoid an answer, and you had the temerity to, childishly, in my opion, to ask me the same question that I asked you. From my previous comments I thought that even you would deduce that I considered John Paul to be the Man of our Times!
This Pope drove Catholics away from his Church in the hundreds of millions
Surely just another of your hypothetic exagerrations!
It does not take a Catholic, or even a Christian of another persuasion, to see that this Pope diminished the Church.
Just your opinion, or is it wishful thinking? there are many who would disagree.
James,
Just why should we give as much thought or concern for the names you mentioned in your last comment? None have much impact on our lives, or are even very worthy of even being mentioned. I could not give a monkeys about the demise of some nonentity, but neither would I feel the need to mock, deride, or otherwise make tasteless comments about them. The point you seem incapable of grasping is the sheer inappropriatness of such comments being made on the day of the funeral. The mockery reflects and demeans the commenter.
If we are going to be rude and insulting, lets do it while they are alive, and preferably to their faces. That way they just may get the message of just how despicable we find them. To speak ill of the dead is just plain cowardly, – and you do seem to be very good at doing that…
Tom Paine gets it right. I think that there is a tension between libertarianism, which I see as essentially grounded in a rational, reality-based view, and revealed religions, but I fully respect those who ground their views on different foundations. There is quite a strong tradition of Catholics being classical liberals, the greatest example of which was Lord Acton in the 19th Century. And St Thomas Acquinas, who revived interest in Aristotle, was probably the greatest genius the Catholic Church has ever produced. The Catholic doctrine of Free Will sits comfortably in the liberal world view.
I agree with the guy above who complains about some of the rather rude things said about the late Pope. The Pope was a flawed person and arguably over-rated, but I still give him immense credit for being a brave man on the Communist issue when many other “liberals” preferred to look the other way.
James, it’s unfortunate that in your mind and the minds of millions that Catholic and Christian are equated, but I think I understand why you do it.
I did find the jocular nature of this thread a little juvenile, but not offensive. Disrespecting the dead is of little or no consequence. JPII doesn’t give one single crap anymore about what we say about him. Personally, I find disrespect of the living exceedingly more offensive. Note that I do not equate disagreement and confrontation to disrespect. I have often wondered why we hold the dead in such high regard. It’s kind of like when Reagan died. Out of nowhere his staunchest enemies had nothing but positive stuff to say about him. Another example is my uncle. He’s a huge NASCAR fan and hated Dale Earnhardt. Before he died it was, “I wish that guy would hit a wall and die.” After he did hit the wall, it was, “It’s sad to see NASCAR lose one of its greatest drivers this way.” What gives? None of these people care anymore what we say, yet we show them such high respect, while in the same breath demeaning and degrading the living -who are susceptible to our insults. It all seems backward to me.
Ernest Young – I would have had no reason to be gratuitously insulting about the Pope while he was alive because I have absolutely no interest in his job of interpreting the word of God for other people. I am not one of the people interested in his thoughts and, until a week ago I didn’t even know this Pope’s name.
You quote me: “It does not take a Catholic, or even a Christian of another persuasion, to see that this Pope diminished the Church.” Just your opinion, or is it wishful thinking? there are many who would disagree.
My opinion backed up by evidence. Wishful thinking? Please understand that non-Catholics don’t really have no opinions about the Pope, especially strong opinions, because we do not care. He doesn’t touch our lives. He can forbid birth control until he’s blue in the face and it doesn’t touch the world’s billions of non-Catholics. We have no gripe.
Communism, which was on its last legs, would have fallen with or without the Pope, who was an anti-capitalist one-worlder, by the way.
I am finished commenting on this thread because some are responding to rational observations with personal abuse rather than refutation of points.
You can dub the late Pope “a man for our times” if you choose, but include me out.
JPII’s authoritarian style damaged catholicism? Disagreed. He anchored catholicism as a doctrine against the forces that would have “moderated” and “modernized” and in general PC-ized it into a C. of E. style nullity. Meaning, keep the trappings, dump every scrap of doctrine even down to allowing trendy vicars to declare atheism and preach communism. Given Verity’s objections to catholic doctrine, I personally agree with them, and add: I consider the bible to be a folktale, and the catholic religion to be nonsense. But it is a very interesting nonsense. It’s one of very few milennia-spanning organizations. If there is an argument about doctrine (given the premises they start with), it’s probably been hashed, rehashed, argued eminently a half dozen different ways, and settled by long and careful consideration. For them to change these conclusions without revisiting the logic would imply abandonment of their premises – they would cease to be catholics. So the achievement of JPII has been to answer emphatically “yes” to “is the pope a catholic” – when it was in genuine doubt – and thus preserve the interestingness of the catholic religion.
I admit the above is a very selfish reason to like him.
As to the whole bringing down communism thing, it’s arguable whether he was much help, but certain he wasn’t any harm.
Gustave, happy striking. The policy on contractions is unlikely to change and Perry has voiced his opinion on this post, which I share and would have expressed too, if only I cared to bother with a stupid posting such as this.
The readers of this blog know what both editors feel about the Pope and his church, so there is no need to go heavy-handed.
And by the way, this blog does not have threads…