The Vatican Declares War on the Transgender

As I have noted before, I think those who are hoping that Pope Francis will modernize the Roman Catholic Church are in fantasy land.  Yes, the Church is streamlining its annulment process, but that does little to change the underlying mindset of the bitter old men in dress in Rome and plush bishoprics across the globe.  The bottom line is that the so called leaders of the Church cannot let go of the 12th century writings of those who nowadays could well be deemed to be psychotic and mentally ill.  The latest example of the Vatican's embrace of 12th century ignorance is the attack on those who are transgender who are barred from being godparents.  Personally, I do not understand why anyone who is LGBT would want remain in any way affiliated with Catholicism.  That said, this latest Vatican attack  will perhaps be a wake up call those in the dream world of seeing Francis as a reformer.  Here are highlights from a piece in The Advocate:

The Vatican recently announced that it is “impossible to allow” transgender people to be godparents. In the warped logic of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith [formerly known as the Inquisition], identifying as transgender “reveals in a public way an attitude opposite to the moral imperative of solving the problem of sexual identity according to the truth of one's own sexuality.”

This ruling was handed down when Alex Salinas, a Spanish man who had been assigned female identity at birth, sought to become his nephew’s godfather. The local bishop originally agreed, but then asked for advice from the Vatican. The Vatican stated, “It is evident that this person does not possess the requirement of leading a life according to the faith and in the position of godfather and is therefore unable to be admitted to the position of godfather or godmother."

The Vatican’s declaration that Alex and other transgender people are unfit to be godparents is exclusionary and hurtful. It says to the Roman Catholic Church’s transgender members, to the people who love and care for them, and to the entire church that trans folk are “less than,” and not fully welcome in our midst. It is a blanket statement that anyone who does not fit neatly into binary gender categories is morally suspect, inherently unworthy to serve as a guide to an ethical, faith-based life.  

[T]his is another instance of church officials using the church’s sacraments, which are meant to be signs of how grace is present in human life, as dividers rather than builders of community. Transgender people have already been told not to seek ordination or acceptance into religious communities, that their baptismal certificates will not be changed to reflect their true gender, and that marriage is based on the birth gender. Now, they are told they cannot even be sponsors of someone entering into the life of the church.

My advice?  Walk away from Catholicism and encourage your friends and family members to do likewise.  If enough people leave, the Church will either accept modern knowledge or wither and die.

The GOP’s Reform Challenge - Mission Impossible?

How do you reform and modernize a political party whose base is increasingly defined by the open - indeed, proud - embrace of ignorance and a rejection of all modern knowledge?  How does a political party lead the world's remaining super power when its base wants to govern according to Bronze Age understandings of the world and its place in the universe?  It's a huge challenge and one that frankly I do not see the Republican Party overcoming until the Christofascists elements in the party are kicked to the curb and exiled to the political wilderness where they belong.  Years ago the GOP establishment welcomed these insane elements into the party and now they are like a metastasizing cancer that needs to be eradicated.   A column in the Washington Post looks at the impossible mission whats left of the sane GOP leadership is facing.  Here are highlights:

It is often argued, including by me, that the GOP needs its own Bill Clinton or Tony Blair — a leader to reposition the party and reinvigorate its political appeal. But if these figures are examples of successful reform, British Prime Minister David Cameron is a warning of its perils.  Cameron set out to modernize the Conservative Party. He has found that not everyone is happy to be modernized. 

Cameron’s embrace of environmentalism and gay marriage has also received criticism from older, less cosmopolitan party regulars. The quarrel has been fed by a (disputed) quote from a source close to the prime minister dismissing Tory activists as “swivel-eyed loons.”

The lesson for the Republican Party is sobering: A political coalition being stretched is at risk of being shattered.

For the GOP — beating against heavy demographic and generational tides — the attempt to modernize is unavoidable. In the next few elections, the ebb might be overcome with just the right presidential candidate, in just the right political circumstance. But in the long run, Republicans are borne away from power. There won’t be enough white and gray voters to win national elections.

The fundamentalist approach to reforming the GOP — an oversimplified Reaganism, advocated in the tone of Barry Goldwater — would only hasten the decline. It is an appeal to an electorate increasingly confined to Republican primaries.

Religious conservatives, for example, are the single largest constituency within the GOP, and compose about a quarter of the entire electorate. Such voters are not baggage thrown overboard to lighten the ship; they are planks in the hull. So the Republican Party is left with a challenge: It needs to become more socially inclusive without becoming socially liberal. Some think (or hope) that this is impossible.

The GOP will need to welcome new Americans and champion their economic and social mobility. It will need to remain true to the stable, pro-life convictions of its strongest supporters, while recognizing broad shifts taking place on gay rights among younger Americans, even within the Republican base. And it will need to speak to the concerns of working-class families who are the real swing voters in national elections.

But the Republican readjustment will also require a leader of a certain type. There is one combination that makes this transformation work at a national level: a reform-minded Republican who has the sympathy of religious conservatives. 

[I]t is a creative response to the Republican reform dilemma to make religious conviction a source of outreach. And it might accomplish something Cameron has not: making the party’s base a participant in the party’s modernization.

Personally, I think the column's author is dreaming - is hallucinating a better word? - if he thinks the Christofascist GOP base  will cooperate with any form of modernization.  In 2012 the GOP's national platform was written by leaders of registered hate groups.  Those folks are literally insane in my view and logic and reason will get nowhere with them.  You don't put the mental ward patients in charge and then foolishly hope for a good out come.

Oppostion Members Detained in a Tense Iran

One of the ironies of history is that the western democracies seem to make the same mistakes over and over again when it comes to labeling monarchist regimes as dictatorial and then standing by as far worse regimes over throw them and make past alleged atrocities look like child's play compared to the bloodshed that the "reformists" unleash. The parallels between what happened in Tsarist Russian and Iran are amazing. In each case the monarchist regimes - whose secret police killed perhaps numbers in the few thousands - were labeled as murderous despots and over thrown by alleged reformers claiming to be populous leaders who went on to murder tens of thousands (if not millions in the case of the Bolsheviks) of people. Both the pro-western, pro-modern Russian Tsar exiled Lenin and the Shah of Iran exiled Ayatollah Khomeini, respectively, which actions ultimately had disastrous consequences for the world. Had they been the murderous despots alleged, these agents of revolution and forces of evil would have been executed.

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Now, it seems that the population of Iran may be waking up to the fact that Islamic rule is not such a wise choice even as the forces of theocracy appear to be likely rigging elections and using military force to cling to power. People forget that Iran under the Shah was modernizing rapidly and that it had a educated sizable class unlike a number of its neighbors. Note how Ahmadinejad's remarks parallel something out of the old Soviet Politburo. Here are highlights from the New York Times on the after math of last week's election:

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The Iranian authorities detained more than 100 prominent opposition members, and on Sunday unrest continued for a second day across Iran in the wake of the country’s disputed presidential election.

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The leading opposition candidate, Mir Hussein Moussavi, issued a fresh statement calling for the election results to be canceled, as his supporters skirmished with a vast deployment of riot police and militia members on the edges of a victory rally organized by the government in central Tehran.

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A moderate clerical body, the Association of Combatant Clergy, issued a statement posted on reformist web sites saying the election was rigged and calling for it to be canceled, warning that “if this process becomes the norm, the republican aspect of the regime will be damaged and people will lose confidence in the system.”

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Calling the opposition protests “unimportant,” Mr. Ahmadinejad suggested that they were the work of foreign agitators and journalists. . . . . But Mr. Ahmadinejad’s electoral rivals appeared to be holding firm in their protest against the vote. Mr. Moussavi issued a statement saying he had asked Iran’s Guardian Council, which must certify the election for it to be legal, to cancel the vote. He also said he was being monitored by the authorities, and was unable to join his followers. His campaign headquarters have been closed down, he said. Another candidate, the reformist cleric Mehdi Karroubi, echoed Mr. Moussavi’s demand for the election to be canceled.

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“No one led these people in the streets,” said Basu, a 28 year-old opposition supporter who, like many others, was afraid to give his full name. “This is the least we can do — we cannot stay at home and watch them celebrate a fake election.” He opened his shirt to show long red welts on his chest where a Basij militia member had whipped him with a chain. Next to him, a female friend dressed in a black Islamic chador stood with a bloody scar on her forehead; she said she had been attacked by the police.

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My thoughts go out to Iranians who want the nightmare of Islamic fundamentalist rule to end.