The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

[leswp1]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

He said preventing pregnancy "could be the lesser evil" in this situation. Apparently there's already a precedent for this: some nuns in certain parts of Africa at high risk of being raped are allowed to use contraception as well.

I didn't know that. I wonder what the Theologic logic is. If it is God's will to procreate and people cannot use BC if the chance of genetic anomaly how is this OK?

 

[FreshFish]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

I didn't know that. I wonder what the Theologic logic is. If it is God's will to procreate and people cannot use BC if the chance of genetic anomaly how is this OK?

While this may not be completely doctrinally correct, think of it in the context of vaccination. The Church is okay with vaccination, and in practical effect, this temporary situation-specific case is the only way to vaccinate the unborn child from contracting Zika. In this case Zika is not a genetic anomaly it is a disease from an external source.


Along these lines, if one spouse in a marriage somehow has contracted a sexually-transmitted disease (maybe from a blood transfusion? who knows), one presumes that condom use would be okay, not for birth control, but for disease prevention.



Theologians can expound more precisely but in a broader context it would be along these lines.



It is not "God's will" merely to procreate, procreation only occurs in the broader context of a loving couple in lifelong spiritual union creating a biological family: the physical union of their genetic material mirrors the sacramental union of marriage. Thus insulating nuns from forced pregnancy as a result of rape is also consistent.




It also would be consistent for the Church not to oppose civil unions for same-sex couples ("render unto Caesar...") as long as the civil union is not conflated with sacramental marriage, which needs to have X and Y chromosomes (physical <==> spiritual). I suppose the Church technically would be okay if a transvestite male who "identifies" as female marries a woman....

 

[leswp1]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Except previously the Vatican came out actively opposing condom use in Africa when HIV was ramping up and causing HUGE % of population to be infected. Some areas there were so many orphans from AIDs that is was of crisis proportions. Despite the risk to women who had infected partners they said it was a sin. Different Pope, and I am glad for the change but it really struck me that Zika is not as widespread as the HIV in Africa yet it was addressed in this way

 

[St. Clown]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Except previously the Vatican came out actively opposing condom use in Africa when HIV was ramping up and causing HUGE % of population to be infected. Some areas there were so many orphans from AIDs that is was of crisis proportions. Despite the risk to women who had infected partners they said it was a sin. Different Pope, and I am glad for the change but it really struck me that Zika is not as widespread as the HIV in Africa yet it was addressed in this way

I think you're looking at the difference between a European pope vs. a borderline third-world pope and life experiences those two backgrounds and views on life that creates.

 

[leswp1]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

I think you're looking at the difference between a European pope vs. a borderline third-world pope and life experiences those two backgrounds and views on life that creates.

Agree and am grateful for it. I still am curious about the logic put forth to refute what was previously decreed.

I am not Catholic but over the years I have taught teens at my church. Many of their parents have been Catholic and moved over to our church for various reasons. The parents ask a lot of questions regarding our denomination's standing on issues- everything from stuff about Popes to hot social issues. In order to understand where they come from and because I am curious about other religions, I look into what the Catholic Church's official stance is and read the defense for the position.

Lutherans are to base our opinions on what is stated in Scripture (all be it the person's opinion of what Scripture says). Catholics are to base it on Doctrine which may be Scriptural or by decree of the Pope (I am sure there is a more formal way to state this). Some of the stated reasoning is, to this non-Catholic, circular logic and makes no sense to me. It isn't that I disagree with what is being stated. It is that I do not understand the logic stated in the defense.

 

[Kepler]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Catholics are to base it on Doctrine which may be Scriptural or by decree of the Pope (I am sure there is a more formal way to state this).

Briefly, the two sources of doctrine are (1) the scriptures and (2) the divinely-inspired words of the apostolic succession as embodied in the church. That there can be no contradiction between the sources is considered axiomatic (though in any case they have a proof handy: God speaks through scripture and through the magisterial tradition of Holy Mother Church, therefore a contradiction would indicate a contradiction in God, which is impossible because God is one essence. Q.E.D.)

In the end it's a question of whether you put your absolute and unquestioning belief in guys who are making stuff up as they go along, or guys who were making stuff up as they went along 1850 years ago.

 

[joecct]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

The homily of Fr. Paul Scalia from the Funeral Mass of his father, Antonin Scalia.

If you wonder what and why we believe, he captured it.

http://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2016/02/funeral-homily-for-justice-antonin-scalia

 

[5mn_Major]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Kep, not sure why you even post on religion. You are the guy who begs everyone to elect him by promising to blow up the government. Why should anyone listen to you on any of these topics? Where's your credibility?

 

[burd]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

At a recent Sat morning breakfast group, one of my friends, who was raised Catholic, brought along a copy of the Baltimore Catechism he had been required to study growing up. I know every religion indoctrinates its own through texts, recited creeds, etc., but wow.

On the other hand, he turned out to be a creative and independent thinker, so who's to say.

 

[LynahFan]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Kep, not sure why you even post on religion. You are the guy who begs everyone to elect him by promising to blow up the government. Why should anyone listen to you on any of these topics? Where's your credibility?

This chestnut? None of us play college hockey, either, so what are any of us doing here?

 

[joecct]

At a recent Sat morning breakfast group, one of my friends, who was raised Catholic, brought along a copy of the Baltimore Catechism he had been required to study growing up. I know every religion indoctrinates its own through texts, recited creeds, etc., but wow.

On the other hand, he turned out to be a creative and independent thinker, so who's to say.

We're a black and white faith. Behaviour is either right or wrong - there are very few, if any, maybes.

I grew up with the Baltimore Catechism. It was part of the beadrock of my Catholicism.

When it was replaced after V2 in favor of the Church of Nice, it has lead to 50 years of bad catechesis that has lead to generations of the Church militant that have no idea what are the tenets of the Faith.

 

[Kepler]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Kep, not sure why you even post on religion.

I post because I'm fascinated by religion. It's as interesting and practical a human invention as law or language, and as passionate and dangerous a human invention as race or nationalism. Humanity has thought more seriously about it than any question except "what's for dinner," and created more art in its name than any other ideal except the girl next door. A culture without it would barely deserve the name.

You are the guy who begs everyone to elect him by promising to blow up the government.

I'm pretty sure you're confusing me with somebody else, though either way this has nothing to do with religion.

Why should anyone listen to you on any of these topics? Where's your credibility?

On the former, that's a choice we make. "I wonder that you will still be talking, signior Benedick: nobody marks you." There are certainly posters who I have just given up on. Again: your choice. On the latter, credibility derives from knowledge and sincere interest. I can't speak to the former except to say I do my best, but in the latter I am in deadly earnest.

Religion is like any aesthetic: though it be ultimately grounded in nothing but air, it colors everything we do, including what we think and is so deeply intertwined with the rest of human culture and history that it is impossible to understand them without an examination of it. Our inner certainties about it, whether they come from our parents, our culture, or our experience, are so personal that we literally cannot unwind them. Each of us knows what Beauty is and what Divinity is when we see it, and, while arguing that these are any more than subjective is truly Missing The Point, comparing notes and saying I'll show you mine if you show me yours is enriching and endlessly fascinating.

In short, it is exactly like one's hockey team allegiance. You may root for a different team, but the reasons you do and the feelings you experience are precisely like mine, though the sweater is different.

 

[unofan]

We're a black and white faith. Behaviour is either right or wrong - there are very few, if any, maybes.

I grew up with the Baltimore Catechism. It was part of the beadrock of my Catholicism.

When it was replaced after V2 in favor of the Church of Nice, it has lead to 50 years of bad catechesis that has lead to generations of the Church militant that have no idea what are the tenets of the Faith.

And you had to walk uphill both ways to school, too, while wearing an onion on your belt as was the style at the time...

I was raised Catholic entirely post V2. Trust me when I say plenty of us Gen X/Y/millennials know the tenants of the faith. V2 is not why people are leaving the Church in droves.

 

[Kepler]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

I grew up with the Baltimore Catechism. It was part of the beadrock of my Catholicism.

Odd coincidence. Last night my wife quizzed me on the BC (why wife thinks Catholicism is exotic -- this is what happens when everybody you grew up with is either Mormon or New Age) and I realized after a short while that not only did I not remember it but, as far as I know, I was never formally trained in it. That confuses me, because I was a Catholic in reasonably good standing until I was 13, and I was confirmed. Even a mechanical and rote memorization ought to have left a mark.

I envy those who received formal indoctrination in the BC. It would help a lot to have been given something of the same mental furniture as the philosophers one likes to read, and the BC was as far as I know an elaboration of the Bellarmine Catechism which is 500 years old. That's a lot of common ground lost.

 

[Kepler]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

I was raised Catholic entirely post V2. Trust me when I say plenty of us Gen X/Y/millennials know the tenants of the faith. V2 is not why people are leaving the Church in droves.

Tenets. This guy was the only tenant of the faith I know.

I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it. I have the same experiences as you. It is entirely possible that had we been given a different grounding in faith, with a more rigorous and overtly logical set of concepts and tools to categorize experience, we would have been more likely to reject the social mores which I assume you are assuming is the reason most Millenials left.

Cause here's the thing. Thomas and Scalia and the Catholics who post here are not stupid. They have the same appreciation for elegance in thought that I have and I believe I detect in you. It is at least possible that had we been imprinted with their way of storing information and resolving mental conflicts -- a different precedence order of operators -- we would have come to decisions similar to theirs.

It is somewhat scary to think just how much "we" are really just the product of all those different tensions and materials that molded us.

 

[burd]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Tenets. This guy was the only tenant of the faith I know.

I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it. I have the same experiences as you. It is entirely possible that had we been given a different grounding in faith, with a more rigorous and overtly logical set of concepts and tools to categorize experience, we would have been more likely to reject the social mores which I assume you are assuming is the reason most Millenials left.

Cause here's the thing. Thomas and Scalia and the Catholics who post here are not stupid. They have the same appreciation for elegance in thought that I have and I believe I detect in you. It is at least possible that had we been imprinted with their way of storing information and resolving conflicts, we would have come to decisions similar to theirs.

It is somewhat scary to think just how much "we" are really just the product of all those different affects that molded us.

I sometimes wonder how much my generation's cold war attitudes were shaped by the many times our elementary school teachers instructed us during drills to hide under our desks because the soviets were coming to get us. If your first grade teacher tells you that there is a boogeyman, there is a boogeyman.

 

[5mn_Major]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

You are the guy who begs everyone to elect him by promising to blow up the government.

I'm pretty sure you're confusing me with somebody else, though either way this has nothing to do with religion.

Odd that you can't see the analogy. You ask us to consider your points of view on faith and religion when you just have a deep seeded hatred of those (shown by every third post) making your opinions totally untrustworthy. This is a free exchange of ideas...but on many topics, yours just don't have credibility.

This evidenced by how your bias makes it so that you can't even see that western society (today's global society) has been forever, directly, positively changed by Christianity in terms of health care, slavery, child labor, British/US democracy, charity, women's suffrage, civil rights, etc, etc. Note: I've posted reams of data validating all this. But then you talk about how stupid people with faith are. Ironic.

 

[busterman62]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

link

 

[St. Clown]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

Odd that you can't see the analogy. You ask us to consider your points of view on faith and religion when you just have a deep seeded hatred of those (shown by every third post) making your opinions totally untrustworthy. This is a free exchange of ideas...but on many topics, yours just don't have credibility.

This evidenced by how your bias makes it so that you can't even see that western society (today's global society) has been forever, directly, positively changed by Christianity in terms of health care, slavery, child labor, British/US democracy, charity, women's suffrage, civil rights, etc, etc. Note: I've posted reams of data validating all this. But then you talk about how stupid people with faith are. Ironic.

And repeatedly, we here often read what you post a glossed over version for the history of All Glorious Christians and fail to realize or acknowledge the harms that your religion has done to the world, in addition to its attempted good. Biases aren't blinding to only a single group of people. In truth, Kepler has more times than not said that religion has provided some good to this world, and as another atheist on this board, he clearly demonstrates a greater desire to understand the history and underpinnings of the faith than I see from most of the Christians I meet.

 

[leswp1]

Re: The Religion Thread: A Believer-Atheist Alliance

We're a black and white faith. Behaviour is either right or wrong - there are very few, if any, maybes.

I grew up with the Baltimore Catechism. It was part of the beadrock of my Catholicism.

When it was replaced after V2 in favor of the Church of Nice, it has lead to 50 years of bad catechesis that has lead to generations of the Church militant that have no idea what are the tenets of the Faith.

I am not brought up Catholic. My husband was and has left the 'Church' but not his faith. He worships with us at a Lutheran church but will not take communion there, only at a Catholic Church. My FIL taught Catechism and is still extremely involved. For yrs he was in a relationship with a woman whose brother was a priest. We had the most interesting discussions about Faith. The person who would expound the most on the 'greyness' in Faith was the priest. I have always been fascinated with how the Catholic church deals with Bible study- many of the doctrines specifically contradict the Bible. I never could understand how the Priest could list all the contradictions, bypass them and still believe as deeply as he did.

Odd coincidence. Last night my wife quizzed me on the BC (why wife thinks Catholicism is exotic -- this is what happens when everybody you grew up with is either Mormon or New Age) and I realized after a short while that not only did I not remember it but, as far as I know, I was never formally trained in it. That confuses me, because I was a Catholic in reasonably good standing until I was 13, and I was confirmed. Even a mechanical and rote memorization ought to have left a mark.

I envy those who received formal indoctrination in the BC. It would help a lot to have been given something of the same mental furniture as the philosophers one likes to read, and the BC was as far as I know an elaboration of the Bellarmine Catechism which is 500 years old. That's a lot of common ground lost.

I came into the church in my late 20s. When I said stuff in the liturgy I was saying and listening to it. I run the HS discussion class at my church. Most of the kids have been brought up in the church. I am always astounded at how they are completely oblivious to what is in the service. They can say things by rote but if asked later what they said they have NO idea. If I ask what something means in the liturgy they don't even know it is in there. I watch their lips in the service. They are saying them. Like wallpaper. One of my challenges is to make them actually aware of what they are participating in. Blind faith is not my thing.