Cranberry wrote:Eternal rest unto all those who are dying at this very second, who are dying alone and terribly young and terribly poor and who the world doesn't even know exist. To all those who do not have the name "pope" and who we rarely ever even think of, much less devote entire television shows and Internet message board threads to.
VATICAN CITY - Pope John Paul II assailed the moral perils of modern life as he traveled the world, a crowd-pleasing superpastor whose 26-year papacy carried the Roman Catholic Church into Christianity's third millennium in monumental strides. He took on the Soviet regime and emboldened eastern Europeans to bring down the communist system.
As the first non-Italian pontiff in 455 years and the first from Poland, John Paul preached a back-to-basics conservatism infused with a common touch and a longing to heal ancient religious wounds. And he survived an assassination attempt to become the third-longest-serving pope.
In his final days, the 84-year-old pontiff sought to set an example of a dignified death. A letter released on Good Friday reflected on his hospitalization as "a patient alongside other patients, uniting in the Eucharist my own sufferings with those of Christ."
John Paul's Polish roots nourished a doctrinal conservatism ? opposition to contraception, abortion, women priests ? that rankled liberal Catholics in the United States and Western Europe.
A sex abuse scandal among clergy plunged his church into moral crisis, with allegations that he didn't react to it swiftly enough. And while championing the world's poor, he rebuked Latin American priests who sought to involve the church politically through the doctrine of "liberation theology."
Warm and straightforward, an outdoorsman who wrote plays and poetry, the 264th pope stood as a moral voice for the world, battling what he called a "culture of death" in modern society. It made him a hero to those who saw him as their rock in a degenerating world, and a foe to those who felt he was holding back social enlightenment.
"The church cannot be an association of freethinkers," John Paul said.
As the abuse scandal struck in the waning years of his papacy, he summoned U.S. cardinals to the Vatican and told them: "The abuse which has caused this crisis is by every standard wrong and rightly considered a crime by society; it is also an appalling sin in the eyes of God."
His was a papacy of groundbreaking change ? his pilgrimage to his native Poland in 1979 in the teeth of the communist dictatorship; his appeal to God to forgive the sins of Catholics through the ages; his Vatican's long-delayed recognition of Israeli statehood; his conciliatory gestures toward Islam and the estranged Orthodox Church.
No pope ever traveled so much or so far: He visited more than 120 nations, reaching out especially to Asia and Africa as fertile ground for missionary work. He kissed the earth in each country, even though in his late years he was so frail he had to kiss soil in a bowl held out before him.
No pope delivered so many speeches: He warned in vain against wars in Iraq and the Balkans, deplored the plight of Palestinians and visited a mosque during a visit to Syria, the first pope to step into a Muslim house of worship.
No pope wrote so much, or so popularly: He produced 14 encyclicals ? major statements for Catholic clergy and the faithful ? and the best-selling book "Crossing the Threshold of Hope."
And no pope celebrated so many Masses for so many of the world's 1 billion Catholics: His open-air ceremonies attracted multitudes to St. Peter's Square and became a hallmark of papal visits abroad. His first visit to Ireland drew the largest crowd in the island's history.
In his later years, stooped and frail from ailments that included Parkinson's disease , John Paul realized his dream of leading his church into the third millennium. He marked it by making pilgrimages to the very roots of Western faith, Mount Sinai and the Holy Land.
His reign in the waning years of the millennium allowed him to shape the church for the next. He placed like-minded conservatives in the Vatican government and key dioceses, and named most of the cardinals who will elect his successor, expanding the College of Cardinals in 2001 to a record 183 members.
John Paul's papacy began in 1978, the "year of the three popes."
Paul VI died after 15 years as pontiff. His successor, John Paul I, died after 33 days as pope. On Oct. 16, the world was stunned when the oldest cardinal emerged from the conclave to deliver the customary announcement in Latin, "Habemus papam" ? We have a pope ? and the choice turned out to be Archbishop Karol Wojtyla (pronounced Voy-TI-wa) of Krakow, Poland.
Wojtyla's name had not been among the "papabile," those considered contenders for the Chair of St. Peter. At 58, this non-Italian was the youngest pope in 125 years, charged with heading a church in turmoil from the reforms of the Second Vatican Council.
And he came from a communist-ruled country where the church had struggled to survive against a hostile government.
Albino Luciani, the short-lived John Paul I, had taken his papal name from his two 20th century heroes, Paul VI and John XXIII, and by taking the same name, Wojtyla wanted to signal continuity.
Yet he immediately brought a new dimension to the papacy and a tradition-steeped Vatican where monsignors speak in hushed tones and the Swiss Guards still wear red, yellow and blue uniforms designed by Michelangelo.
"Papa Wojtyla," as Italians called him, ate pizza with the president of Italy.
He introduced working breakfasts and lunches in the Vatican.
He sat down for simple meals with factory workers.
He skied.
Frequently he melted into crowds in St. Peter's Square or abroad, a broad-shouldered figure in white robes, beaming, shaking hands and sweeping little children into his arms.
One of those occasions was May 13, 1981, five days short of his 61st birthday. As the pope stood in his white jeep, waving to the cheering throng in St. Peter's Square, he was shot twice by Mehmet Ali Agca, a 23-year-old Turk.
One bullet entered John Paul's abdomen, a second hit his left index finger. Although the abdominal wound seriously damaged the pope's intestines, the would-be assassin had failed.
"The miracle bullet and the Holy Father's robust physical build saved him," the Rev. Romeo Panciroli, then the Vatican spokesman, said the next day.
Leaving the hospital three weeks later, John Paul told doctors: "You thought you had changed me, but I'm still the same old rascal."
He then visited Agca in prison and forgave him. The reasons behind the shooting have never been made clear.
John Paul's swift recovery was indicative of the vitality he brought to the papacy.
A sturdy man with a strong voice, the Polish pope had command of a dozen languages, a sense of humor and timing, and an untiring desire to get to know and endear himself to all.
But to communists, he gave no quarter.
"Nazi paganism and Marxist dogma are both basically totalitarian ideologies and tend to become substitute religions," he wrote in 1989 in an apostolic letter hailing democratic reform in Poland.
As before, his words were directed beyond Poland's borders, and clearly bolstered the will of the opposition in the Soviet bloc.
In taking over from his Italian predecessors, John Paul brought a piece of Poland to his third-floor apartment in the Apostolic Palace overlooking St. Peter's Square. His personal secretary, the nuns who served him and the food he ate were Polish.
His trips to his homeland ? where for years the church had been the unifying opposition force ? prompted an explosion of patriotism and anti-communist feeling. His 1979 pilgrimage helped foster the birth of Solidarity; his 1983 and 1987 tours kept alive the spirit of the trade union movement after Communist Party cracked down.
In 1991, with the Iron Curtain gone, the pope returned to a free Poland for the first time, and cautioned Poles and other eastern Europeans not to take their freedom lightly.
"We cannot simply possess freedom, we must constantly fight for it. We fight for it by putting it to good use and using it in the cause of truth," he said.
John Paul was the most accessible modern pope, meeting with reporters on foreign trips, listening to the problems of everyday people in parishes and receiving visitors ranging from kings and presidents to circus performers and victims of terrorism.
He recited the rosary on a best-selling CD and directed that his 11th encyclical ? his strongest denunciation of abortion ? be released on compact disc as well.
During his papacy, John Paul traveled some 723,723 miles ? nearly three times the distance between the Earth and the moon. His pace slowed in 1990s after surgery for a bowel tumor, a broken leg and a hip replacement, and an appendectomy.
By 1994, he walked with a limp and used a cane. But still he kept traveling.
His world tours began with a swing through the Dominican Republic, Mexico and the Bahamas in 1979. He went to the United States that same year, and returned in 1987, 1993, 1995 and 1999.
His journeys took him to predominantly Catholic countries like the Philippines, where 4 million people turned out to see him in 1995.
But he also visited nations with few Catholics such as Japan and Azerbaijan.
Explaining his stop at the tiny island of Guam in 1981, he said: "To me, a small place is just as important as any big diocese. I don't want them to feel they are left alone."
He expounded a message he felt was needed in a secularized, dispirited society ? hope, confidence, firm values, moral integrity, brotherhood, social justice and the simple life.
He delivered ringing condemnations of human rights violations, hunger, the arms race and restrictions on religious freedoms.
Italians criticized the pope when he praised doctors who refused to perform abortions, and when he called for the repeal of the country's liberal abortion law. But they hailed him for denouncing the Mafia.
The pope's hard line toward communist governments initially earned him the Kremlin's wrath. Relations were further strained by allegations ? never proved ? that the Soviets supported the assassination attempt.
But the rise of Mikhail Gorbachev in 1985 opened a new era. Eager to invigorate his doddering superpower and win allies abroad, he lifted restrictions on religion, and in 1989 became the first Soviet leader to visit the pope at the Vatican. (The pope never was able to fulfill his dream of visiting Russia.)
Another wall fell when Fidel Castro visited the Vatican in 1996 and invited John Paul to Cuba, one of the last bastions of communism. John Paul made the trip in January 1998, giving the church a firmer foothold on the island.
John Paul also championed better relations with Jews ? Christianity's "older brothers," as he put it ? and the Vatican formally recognized Israel in 1993. The pope ? who had drawn criticism for meeting with Palestine Liberation Organization chief Yasser Arafat in 1982 ? then pushed for diplomatic relations with Palestinians.
During his visit to Jerusalem in March 2000, John Paul prayed at the Western Wall, Judaism's holiest shrine. Copying a Jewish custom, he tucked a note between the stones in which he apologized to God for the behavior of those who made Jews suffer over the centuries.
John Paul was also intent on improving relations with Muslims. On a trip to Damascus, Syria, in May 2001, he became the first pope to step into a mosque.
One of his major goals was reconciliation with other Christians. In Athens, Greece, he apologized for wrongs committed against Orthodox Christians. But he was unable to overcome centuries of hostility. Accusations by some Orthodox that the Vatican was seeking to expand its influence in traditional Orthodox territory kept John Paul from visiting Moscow.
John Paul made clear his church was no democracy, and codified church teaching in the light of 20th century reality in a new Catechism of the Catholic Church, the first major revision in 400 years.
He criticized liberation theology, a movement strong in Latin America that emphasizes political activism by the church on behalf of the poor. He told priests worldwide to get out of politics, and some did.
His approach to doctrine was unyieldingly conservative. In his view, there were rights and wrongs that no moral shading could change.
He reaffirmed the church's ban on artificial birth control and denounced in vitro fertilization, abortion, euthanasia, divorce, sex outside marriage and homosexual relations. In his later years, he led a campaign against same-sex marriages.
He demanded celibacy of Roman Catholic priests. He reaffirmed the church's ban on women priests and sought to close debate on the subject. However, he did give in to the demands of liberal Catholics to allow altar girls.
But that did little to satisfy the liberal wing of his church, which claimed he was overstepping his authority.
"When the pope does that which isn't part of his office, he cannot demand obedience in the name of Catholicism. He must expect dissent," nearly 200 theologians from German-speaking countries said in a 1989 declaration.
Some church liberals criticized John Paul's fondness for the conservative, militant Catholic group Opus Dei. The beatification of its founder, Josemaria Escriva de Balaguer, in 1992, 17 years after his death, was one of the church's most controversial in decades.
The pope angered many Jesuits ? an order with a tradition of independence and liberalism ? by naming his personal representatives to run the order. The differences were largely patched over by 1995, when Jesuit leaders endorsed initiatives that dovetailed with many of the pope's views: using the church to help women and forging cooperation with the laity.
John Paul also held separate sessions with Dutch and U.S. prelates, summoning them to the Vatican to admonish them for liberal practices, such as questioning priestly celibacy.
The pope's discipline was not limited to liberals. In 1988, traditionalist French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre ordained new bishops in defiance of the pope, provoking the first major church schism in more than a century. No Vatican official attended Lefebvre's funeral in 1991.
Also, his reconciliation efforts were marred in the eyes of some Jews by his ambition to beatify Pope Pius XII, who had been accused of failing to speak out strongly enough against Nazi genocide.
Karol Joseph Wojtyla was born in Wadowice, Poland, on May 18, 1920. His father, a foundry worker and a noncommissioned army officer, reared his two sons in piety and discipline, sometimes making them study in unheated rooms to toughen them.
His mother, Emilia Krezorowaska, was a former teacher whose frequent illnesses forced her to rely upon her nieces for help in rearing her sons. Karol was 9 when she died. In 1932, his elder brother, Edmund, a medical intern, caught scarlet fever from a patient and died.
While a student, Wojtyla worked in a stone quarry. He moved to Krakow in 1938 and in his free time wrote poetry, acted, played soccer, went canoeing in mountain streams and took daredevil swims in the Swaka River.
When Wojtyla was 20, his father died, leaving him with no immediate family in a country under brutal Nazi occupation.
His name appeared on a Nazi blacklist in 1944 for his activities in a Christian democratic underground. B'nai B'rith and other organizations testified that he helped Jews find refuge from the Nazis.
Stories circulated after he became pope suggesting that Wojtyla was married during World War II to a woman who was killed by a Nazi. The Vatican denied the reports.
The pope himself made a teasing reference to the rumors during his 1979 visit to Poland. He abruptly curtailed a reminiscence of his family by saying: "Well, that's enough of the past. I'm not going into details. There are a lot of reporters around, ready to investigate. Matters of the heart and youth should be left to God, who calls human beings at different stages of their lives."
John Paul has rarely discussed his vocation. In a visit to his birthplace in 1991, he recalled "that mystery I was taught by my mother who ? joining a small child's hands in prayer ? showed me how to make a sign of the cross." His father, he said, was also deeply religious.
In a 1999 visit, he reminisced about growing up in a small town, recalling his friends, his home, and Jewish neighbors who were sent to death camps by the Nazis.
He was ordained a priest on Nov. 1, 1946, at age 26 ? relatively old, even then. He was then sent to Rome where he scored highest marks in philosophy and graduated summa cum laude from the Angelicum Pontifical University in 1948.
A year later he returned to Poland, and began working as a parish assistant under restrictive conditions imposed by the new Communist Party regime.
After earning a doctorate in theology, he began teaching at the Catholic University in Lublin in 1954 and later at the state university of Krakow. He published essays in several French philosophical reviews, and contributed poems to Catholic periodicals.
The future pope rose in the church hierarchy, becoming auxiliary bishop of Krakow in 1958 and bishop in 1964. Three years later, only 21 years after his ordination, Paul VI made him a cardinal.
With his mentor, Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski, the primate of Poland and archbishop of Warsaw who died in 1981, Wojtyla was instrumental in formulating the Polish church's moderate demands for religious freedom in communist countries.
Thanks for taking the trouble of going into detail. That was a lot of work, and I appreciate it.
No worries, Jerry. I can't pretend it isn't hard work but it's very helpful to be forced to explain myself clearly from time to time.
As you can probably imagine, in a world of increasing specialisation, those of us who form partnerships to put together work from maybe half a dozen different technical fields are in danger of being understood by almost nobody. And of course, our advances and the methods that get us there come to seem obvious to us, so we tend to get a bit impatient.
Jerry Freeman wrote:I believe we have both overreacted to comments the other has made.
I'm sure that's right. It usually takes two to forge an ongoing misunderstanding so I apologise for my role in that.
Jerry Freeman wrote: Your post a couple of posts back ("It is compatible with the view that there is a dependence thesis going the other way ... .") makes it clear that I have interpreted your statement about the dependence of consciousness on brain function too generally.
Quite so. I'm sure you can now see why I insisted that my view was modest. Scientifically fruitful and powerful I hope for the time being, but metaphysically very modest. And, of course, like all science it is doomed to be superceded in time. So I don't think this work is the product of a closed mind or an unduly arrogant one. But you can't even contemplate work like this unless you are self confident. It takes quite a bit of professional courage to cross disciplinary boundaries as freely as my colleagues and I do, not that any of us want a medal for it.
One interesting project for scientists with your interests and intuitions would be to try to frame dependence theses that do go the other way. I see room for theses that are testable (scientific) and for theses that are not testable (metaphysical.)
Jerry Freeman wrote:My reaction was to some extent a response to the fact that the way your comment came in right on the heels of Annie's question about whether we are making an assumption about consciousness appeared to be a sort of summing up by you. It looked like you were jumping in and stating a conclusion to the whole matter when, in fact, you were only corroborating some data about the brain without intending to try to settle the big question.
Yep. That's exactly what I was doing. If I seem to be saying something dogmatically scientistic, just remind yourself that I'm not in any way opposed to work of the kind you would like to see done nor do I rule out unexpected twists and turns along the way; in fact I expect plenty. I'm almost certainly not making a big point.
Jerry Freeman wrote:My comments were in no way intended to be in reference to or a criticism of your work with states of consciousness and brain function. Everything you've said about that seems completely valid to me, and I have no argument with it whatever. In fact, I think that's quite an important body of work, and I'm very impressed with it. If my comments came across as disrespectful of that work, I've done a poor job of communicating and I owe you an apology.
Thanks. I never really thought you disrespected that work but I suspected you didn't see the connection between what you were misreading as big metaphysical claims adn teh scientific applications and therefore missing how scientifically powerful they are when understood in the limited way intended. To me, it's sometimes so staggering what we can discover about fetal psychological development if we put our minds to it adn pool resources that I have to pinch myself to remind myself that I've been a small part of it.
Jerry Freeman wrote:Your more recent comments make it clear that you do/did not intend to attempt to extrapolate from the brain function data you've referenced to draw conclusions about what consciousness ultimately is.
Absolutely not. But I can see how I might sometimes appear to be a wolf in sheep's clothing.
Jerry Freeman wrote: As I now understand you, you were only making statements about how individual consciousness behaves in the context of variations in brain function. Therefore, as I see it, the larger questions about what consciousness ultimately is and what is its relationship with matter beyond the relationship between individual states of consciousness and brain function, remain open, and based on what you've posted above, I don't think you disagree with that view. As I've said, those questions will probably remain open for quite a long time while science gathers the tools to address them. A century might be a reasonable timeframe for that development.
Quite so. It's a fiendishly difficult project you envisage and I do see problems in principle if by 'ultimate' you mean that we can gain a sort of God's eye view of things. But I welcome any attempt to push forward in these areas and have full respect for anyone who makes a sincere attempt. I have no ideological objections to this stuff at all.
Jerry Freeman wrote:I do believe science can and eventually will address those questions. As I've said previously, I think there tends to be a sort of bias or almost a superstition that certain things are inherently beyond the capacity of science. Perhaps some things are, but I don't believe we can prejudge which things those might be. Only time will tell, and I would prefer not to exclude any field of consideration from the scope of possible scientific discovery. To do that, in my opinion, would actually be unscientific, a case of experimenter bias on a pretty grand scale (this is a general comment and is not specifically addressed to you).
I agree about the bias and I dislike scientism as a religion substitute—which makes me all the more peeved when I think I'm being accused of that. My bet is still on the really big questions remaining matters of faith and not reason but if someone can show me I'm wrong I'll gladly update my views. But I think clarity on these issues is perhaps quite a long way off as I think you do too.
Over this, your white grave
the flowers of life in white--
so many years without you--
how many have passed out of sight?
Over this your white grave
covered for years, there is a stir
in the air, something uplifting
and, like death, beyond comprehension.
Over this your white grave
oh, mother, can such loving cease?
for all his filial adoration
a prayer:
Give her eternal peace--
missy wrote:Eternal rest grant unto him, Oh Lord......
Missy
Eternal rest unto all those who are dying at this very second, who are dying alone and terribly young and terribly poor and who the world doesn't even know exist. To all those who do not have the name "pope" and who we rarely ever even think of, much less devote entire television shows and Internet message board threads to.
The man who most agreed with you in this wish
just died in the Vatican.
missy wrote:Eternal rest grant unto him, Oh Lord......
Missy
Eternal rest unto all those who are dying at this very second, who are dying alone and terribly young and terribly poor and who the world doesn't even know exist. To all those who do not have the name "pope" and who we rarely ever even think of, much less devote entire television shows and Internet message board threads to.
The man who most agreed with you in this wish
just died in the Vatican.
I don't know if I believe that. I don't see how a person can believe that all people are equal in God's eyes and still support such a church structure as having priests and popes, especially ones called "The Holy Father".
The very office of pope is contradictory to the notion that we're equal before God, in my view. Dead or alive, the pope is no more holy and no more precious to God than me or you or any member here or Osama Bin Laden, for that matter.
That we're all equally sinful and tainted, and this includes any pope, is a hard concept for some people to accept, I have found. But it's true. The pope is no more holy than any of us.
missy wrote:Eternal rest grant unto him, Oh Lord......
Missy
Eternal rest unto all those who are dying at this very second, who are dying alone and terribly young and terribly poor and who the world doesn't even know exist. To all those who do not have the name "pope" and who we rarely ever even think of, much less devote entire television shows and Internet message board threads to.
The man who most agreed with you in this wish
just died in the Vatican.
?.. apart from the African childern who are born with A.I.D.S. because prophylatics are against the "Rules"..
"Suffer little children to come onto me.."
Maybe now there will be some reality..
Slan,
D.
And many a poor man that has roved,
Loved and thought himself beloved,
From a glad kindness cannot take his eyes.
Cranberry wrote:
Eternal rest unto all those who are dying at this very second, who are dying alone and terribly young and terribly poor and who the world doesn't even know exist. To all those who do not have the name "pope" and who we rarely ever even think of, much less devote entire television shows and Internet message board threads to.
The man who most agreed with you in this wish
just died in the Vatican.
?.. apart from the African childern who are born with A.I.D.S. because prophylatics are against the "Rules"..
"Suffer little children to come onto me.."
Maybe now there will be some reality..
Slan,
D.
That's so true, dubhlinn. One of the worst things on this planet right now is the lack of actually teaching people proper birth control and disease prevention. AIDS is as common and as horribly untreated as it is in places like Africa due in large measure to the Catholic Church's (and other churches', it's not just the Catholics here) "official teachings".
They seem to refuse teaching kids about proper disease prevention and birth control methods and allow them to die of AIDS because they fear sex outside of marriage, which is going to happen whether or not a pope wants it to.
Cranberry wrote:
Eternal rest unto all those who are dying at this very second, who are dying alone and terribly young and terribly poor and who the world doesn't even know exist. To all those who do not have the name "pope" and who we rarely ever even think of, much less devote entire television shows and Internet message board threads to.
The man who most agreed with you in this wish
just died in the Vatican.
I don't know if I believe that. I don't see how a person can believe that all people are equal in God's eyes and still support such a church structure as having priests and popes, especially ones called "The Holy Father".
The very office of pope is contradictory to the notion that we're equal before God, in my view. Dead or alive, the pope is no more holy and no more precious to God than me or you or any member here or Osama Bin Laden, for that matter.
That we're all equally sinful and tainted, and this includes any pope, is a hard concept for some people to accept, I have found. But it's true. The pope is no more holy than any of us.
Somebody is holy when he is especially devoted to God--this
is one common use. Also it means pious and devout, saintly,
morally and spiritually clean. John Paul II was more holy, therefore,
than you or me or OBL, though he was no more precious to God.
John Paul the II was considerably more holy than most people.
So was Mother Theresa and, in my eyes, Gandhi. Some people
are saints. Such people are appropriate objects of deep
respect, more so than OBL. We may be all equally sinful
and tainted, in some sense, but this is consistent with
there being good and bad people, some saintly, some
worthy of veneration, others not. God knows the differenc to,
but he loves all the same and we are all equally precious to God.
It's hard to see what the contradiction is supposed to with the
idea that we are all equally precious to God and the office of
Pope, the head of the Church--there is nothing in this that
suggest that the Pope is more precious to God than
anybody else. Nor do I see any difficulty with a structure of
priests and Popes and the idea that we are all equally
precious in God's eyes. Maybe you can explain.
If you mean we are all equal in God's eyes that God
loves us all the same, we are certainly equal in God's eyes,
according to Roman Catholicism. If you mean that we
are all equal in God's eyes that there are not better
and worse men and women from God's point of view, or that God
can't tell discern the moral difference between Mother Theresa and Stalin, or that under no circumstance will this
make a difference to what he does, then, as God isn't a moron, we are
not all equal in God's eyes.
Last edited by jim stone on Sat Apr 02, 2005 6:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.
[Needless to say, jim] I think we see things entirely differently.
I am not well versed in theological concepts and/or vocabulary, because unlike Dale I don't have a master's degree in Catholic theology (yet-Ha!), but I am trying. I have explained for, what, 17 pages? Evidentally many people here simply do not or choose not to understand what I am saying.
Last edited by Jack on Sat Apr 02, 2005 6:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.
jim stone wrote:
The man who most agreed with you in this wish
just died in the Vatican.
?.. apart from the African childern who are born with A.I.D.S. because prophylatics are against the "Rules"..
"Suffer little children to come onto me.."
Maybe now there will be some reality..
Slan,
D.
That's so true, dubhlinn. One of the worst things on this planet right now is the lack of actually teaching people proper birth control and disease prevention. AIDS is as common and as horribly untreated as it is in places like Africa due in large measure to the Catholic Church's (and other churches', it's not just the Catholics here) "official teachings".
They seem to refuse teaching kids about proper disease prevention and birth control methods and allow them to die of AIDS because they fear sex outside of marriage, which is going to happen whether or not a pope wants it to.
It's really sick.
Whatever you think of the Church's policy on birth control,
it is a mistake to suppose that that the Pope did not love
these children, and wish them to live. Or that he would
not have given his life to save theirs, many times over.
Maybe one day you can ask the priest, the learned fellow,
bout the Churche's policy about birth control, and how
it relates to the AIDS epidemic. You may be surprised
and interested at what you hear.
It is hardly unthinkable that the spread of Catholicism
in Africa, including the teaching against prophylactics,
may help stem the AIDS epidemic. The epidemic isn't flowing
from an unavailablilty of rubbers, or the conviction
that using them is immoral. If this seems mind boggling, you might get more info.
As this fellow has just died, and many are grieving,
maybe you can give criticizing him a break.
Last edited by jim stone on Sat Apr 02, 2005 6:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.
