As per usual, the Vatican is incapable of any real self-reflection

I saw a seminary student in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. last week. It threw me off as I so rarely see young clergy.

 

I would SO like to know this kid's background and history.

 

You Karl Maldened it (story is from 2010), but the main point stands. The Vatican has completely gone off the deep end.

I believe in the spirituality of the Catholic faith ... I will never lose that. To wit, the concept of the Holy Spirit befuddled me when I was young, but as I get older, I think I understand it more and grasp how important it is to one's spirituality.

However, I separate the spirituality of Catholicism from the mortals who "run" the faith. I don't agree, at all, that the clergy in Rome can represent or dictate spirituality of the faith. They are men with fallacies just like the rest of us, some of them with a helluva lot more fallacies than the rest of us. They prove my point over and over again with their bumbling and anachronistic ways.

The Vatican II version of Catholicism that was preached to me in the 70s and 80s when I attended Catholic school might as well be from 500 years ago the way the faith carries itself now.

The abuse scandals, the knuckle-dragging attitudes about birth control and women, all are professed by like-minded ignorant people who say they represent the faith.

They don't represent my faith. I will never be ashamed to walk into a Catholic church, receive Communion, etc., in other words, to take part in the spiritual part of the religion. But the dudes who run it? They can get bent.

 

I would bet the falloff is about 80% due to the church's refusal to do anything significant to stop the pedophile predators and about 20% due to the continual second-class treatment of women (including male-only clergy and prohibition of married clergy).

I don't think birth control is a big issue. Most adult Catholics made up their mind on that decades ago.

 

Maybe it's just because I'm from a more recent generation, Bubbler, but I have a much harder time separating the spiritual side from the attitudes and the policies of the church.

I studied Vatican II of course, and obviously felt some of those changes as a kid (all masses in English, etc.) but I guess I never felt any of the reform in spirit.

 

That's cool. I completely understand that viewpoint. Some of my family have walked away.

 

I mean on the few occasions that I go to church each year, I can still be spiritual and respectful; I guess my dislike for the modern church is just always somewhere in the back of my mind.

 

Seriously lapsed Carholic, here. And, as I design the local church's bulletin every week (hey, a bloke's gotta the rent), I alternate from rolling my eyes to fighting back a power technicolor yawn reading the shit they put in there. The candles represent the "4,000 years" since Adam and Eve? Freedom of Religion (except for those that don't agree with Rome)? Women cannot be given the responsibility of priesthood?

As you said... Get. Fucking. Bent.

"Guess what? I've read my Bible, too. You know one of the few groups Christ got nearly violent with because of their hyprocacy? The zealots. You should ponder that a bit, Bishop,

 

When I was in Catholic grade school in the 1960s, evolution was taught as a Dead Dog Fact.

We basically laughed at the other denominations who claimed it wasn't. (Well, I did for sure.)


Marching backwards, steered by wingnuts.

I suppose they'll re-excommunicate Galileo soon too.

 

Knowing the history of Catholicism, I think your generation and mine was exposed to a brief window of enlightenment in an otherwise checkered past. Sadly, it appears the Vatican is backing up the truck to its historic norm.

 

My parents were movers and shakers in many Vatican II efforts in the 1960s, including increased participation of the laity in parish administration, liturgical modernization and ecumenical outreach to other faiths. It's pretty much been all deep-sixed now.

 

Yes, because all Catholic priests are pedophiles.

Just like all football coaches are child abusers because of Jerry Sandusky, all black men are uncontrollable murderers of white people because of O.J. Simpson, and all Jews are swindlers because of Bernie Madoff.

I doubt stereotypical suggestions like that would draw snarky "amens" here, or that they would be tolerated for long.

The level of bigotry toward Catholicism in these parts -- and the benign acceptance of it -- is puzzling.