Wednesday 18 March 2009

Collapsing Roman Catholicism (Plus)

Of course, it is not collapsing, but it is morally and ethically. The man in charge knows where his mouth is, and shoves his foot in it with regularity.

Well, he's not really saying anything different about condoms than his predecessors, who were all equally idiots when it comes to the range of means to prevent sexually transmitted disease. But apparently this Pope was once going to consider whether condoms could prevent death as well as prevent life, and yet in his march to the purist right - with holocaust deniers and excommunicating those who helped a child rape victim - his added words on this subject just underline the stupidity of what exists of Roman Catholic hierarchical leadership.

Yes, people can stop having sex. They can stop having babies too, as this is what happens when they stop having sex. The trouble is, people keep having sex, and indeed they marry and suddenly start spreading things to the marriage partner. The Roman Catholic hierarchy wants lots of babies, but it can't if people stop having sex. If they have sex with someone they don't know, bung a thing on.

The world of sexual contact is not black and white. People get an opportunity, and they take it. They hide their indiscretions, and pretend to be who they are not. For decades I was a shining example for Roman Catholicism, though I wanted nothing to do with these so called ethical teachings (because they are trivial), and then along came an opportunity, and it was sexual but just failed to be fully sexual... And then it was with the individual whom I married. But even then it is all a gamble.

I watched a studio discussion on Channel 4 News. The rent-a-quote Catholic just shouted and bawled. It is pretty desperate being a Roman Catholic these days.

Personally, though, I think Christianity is crumbling, but there we are. I watched the Armand Marie Leroi programme again about What Darwin Didn't Know. It was slowly, carefully, well lectured, a perfect essay in one and a half hours. The eye has one source, it is so useful it is universal throughout evolved life, hugely diversified over time, but it proves we are all one. And then you listen to Christian creationists who say like-for-like alone and about irreducible minimums like eyes. Rubbish. But never mind them, who are a bizarre and pathetic group; it is that I cannot hear an argument for general Christianity any more that can be put with the clarity of an Armand Marie Leroi, someone with expertise. More and more it appears to be about less and less.

2 comments:

Erika Baker said...

Pluralist
"it is that I cannot hear an argument for general Christianity any more that can be put with the clarity of an Armand Marie Leroi, someone with expertise."

I agree!
The question is whether that is because such an argument cannot be made, or because the media insist on giving religion assignments to people like Cherie Blair.

But I also think that it is part of a bigger problem the church has with evolution. Where there is no deliberate fall from a perfect creation, words like Fall, Atonement, Sacrifice ect don't make sense any longer.

I'm not saying the underlying truths cannot be expressed with other words, but I cannot imagine that the church will be brave enough to begin that discussion, because it will turn into civil war within its own ranks.

Pluralist (Adrian Worsfold) said...

Well that's right, about notions of fall, atonement, sacrifice etc.. You can talk about service and then sacrificial service, that is voluntary and worthwhile, a personal duty or a demand that presents itself. That's about it I think.