The caption of this post raises a question I have asked before: how can anyone moral and with any decency remain a Catholic given what we now know about the Church hierarchy's world wide conspiracy to protect sexual predators and cover up their crimes. Oh, and let's not forget how the victims of sex abuse have been treated. Or women. Or gays. Indeed, the Church hierarchy is a study in hubris, contempt for others, and moral bankruptcy. Yet millions in the Catholic laity continue to provide financial support to the criminal enterprise. It boggles my mind how anyone with decency can remain a Catholic. An op-ed in Digital Journal looks at the issue and draws conclusions much like my own. Here are highlights:
The Catholic hierarchy will never be convinced when it comes to gay marriage – or gay anything at all. There’s little or no point in continuing to try. Never the twain shall meet.Which prompts the question: Why do people want to have anything to do with the Catholic Church if they’re either gay or simply do not have a problem with homosexuality? This week we can read in the Washington Post the story of a Long Island Catholic kicked out of his parish jobs for marrying his male partner.
Another story to make headlines this week was that of the Colombian Senate, which has voted down a measure that would have made same-sex marriage legal. And the Catholic News Agency reports that: “The president of the Bishops’ Conference of Colombia, Cardinal Ruben Salazar, had issued a plea to lawmakers to consider the Church’s arguments on the question and to protect marriage as being a union of one man and one woman.”
So that’s it, then, is it? Lawmakers should listen to people with a particular superstitious belief – religion is nothing but superstition, after all – and make their laws to suit those beliefs, instead of looking at the needs of human beings with the capacity to love?
This sort of dangerous nonsense is being told to kids in Catholic schools, of course. Every day, they will be made aware of the Pope’s pronouncements on this and that, including one from the previous Pope, Benedict XVI, in 2010.
“In a strongly worded attack,” Digital Journal reported then, quoting the Daily Telegraph, “Benedict XVI insisted that marriage should be founded on the ‘indissoluble’ marriage between a man and a woman.” He was addressing a large crowd at the shrine of Fatima, when he said that same-sex marriage and abortion were among the “most insidious and dangerous challenges that today confront the common good”.
The Catholic Church ought to be on shaky ground when it comes to criticising others for their sexual orientation and preferences. Not only did we have the mammoth scandal over paedophile priests, only recently in the UK, where I am resident, a prominent cardinal admitted inappropriate sexual behaviour, and it prevented him from being able to go to Rome to choose a new Pope
Yes, despite all of this, senior Catholics continue to bleat about how wrong same-sex unions are, how degenerate, how sinful, how wicked.
We can only hope for small mercies when it comes to the poisoning of young minds in Catholic schools: we can only hope that gay kids will see the Catholic hierarchy for what it is and reject notions that their sexuality is evil, reject the idea that they will go to Hell, reject accusations that they are intrinsically evil and immoral. And let us hope that they will get on with their lives and their loves in the way nature designed for them.
I would argue that if one is truly moral and a decent person, then the only moral thing to do is leave the Catholic Church. If one must have a church to support one's inner needs, then check out the Episcopal Church or the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Likewise, if one wants to help the poor and less fortunate, countless options exist outside the Catholic Church. Just stop bankrolling a criminal enterprises that markets hate and bigotry.
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