Pope says some science shatters human dignity. Prada Papa Razti bleats that artificial insemination, among other things, “questioned the very concept of the dignity of man” in a speech to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
In an address to members of the Vatican department on doctrinal matters, Benedict said the Church had a duty to defend the “great values at stake” in the field of bioethics.How can Benedict raise ANY issues about human dignity or moral principles? He allowed priests to rape and molest children (and women) unchecked, enabling the criminal activity to continue by moving them around, and bought off destroyed families to protect the church from exposure.The speech was the latest in a series in which the conservative Pope has told his listeners that scientific progress should not be accepted uncritically.
Benedict, who headed the same department for years before his election in 2005, said the Church was not against scientific progress but wanted it based on “ethical-moral principles“.
He said this included total respect for the human being as a person “from conception until natural death,” and respect for the natural transmission of life through sexual intercourse.
51 Responses to “Hypocritical Papal eruption of the week”
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Yeah, b/c if you can separate the transmission of life from the sexual act, suddenly it’s not all about teh menz. The “female persons of the opposite sex” now have equal footing. And that’s just plain wrong.
Preach it baby. It’s what made me leave the Church.
When the Correctors return Bernard Law to Boston to face trial instead of rewarding him by giving him a suite in the Vatican and a $12K/month stipend, then I *might* consider listening to anything they say about sexual propriety.
Simply having the bishops meet and discuss the issue does not solve anything
Ooooh. The bishops had a meeting. They were very concerned.
Fuck that shit. Turn every case over to the authorities and let the courts sort it out as they should. No man who ever molested a child or woman was ever really a priest.
I have relatives who were priests and nuns. I know good people who try to do good. I just can’t play along anymore. The hypocrisy is just too much when it means sacrificing children to protect the hierarchy’s reputations.
And make no mistake, it still goes on. Cardinal George failed to follow the rules set up by the Bishops’ meeting and allowed a predator to continue to preside at a school and at least 3 more children were molested. George says he’s sorry, but who cares if he’s sorry? He ruined children’s lives b/c he didn’t listen and tried to maintain the status quo.
His reward for this? He’s now president of the US Bishops council. B/c it’s his turn, and heaven forbid a little thing like allowing child molestation interfere with a red hat’s promotion.
It’s hard for me, b/c socially I’m Catholic. I miss the people and the good priests I know. But I can’t just wait around supporting an institution and pray for the patriarchs to grow up and earn the respect they feel entitled to.
And I’m certainly not letting my children be afflicted. My son started young–at 3, when told about the Easter miracle, he freaked and said “Jesus is a ZOMBIE?!?!?” Now that he’s figured out Santa’s not real, he wants proof for God.
I may not be able to shake my social Catholicism, but I’m not going to let it cripple my kids. Loving my neighbors, forgiving others, and being kind doesn’t require priests. And as I was taught, the mission of the Church is to become irrelevent: once everyone believes, we don’t need the hierarchy to teach anymore.
OK, /ranting
“questioned the very concept of the dignity of the almighty penis”
Fixed that for him.
Sometimes I wonder what sort of mental images these guys have about sex. I like sex, but dignified is not the first - or even the 100th - word that comes to mind.
I agree with the main point of this post, but I think it’s important not to equate particular technological applications of scientific knowledge with the Progress of Science. It’s wrong, and it can and has been used to argue for all kinds of creepy things like eugenics.
Wow… so not only are you supposed to limit sex to reproduction, but now you’re also supposed to limit reproduction to sex, huh?
“Jesus is a ZOMBIE?!?!?”
I am sooo stealing this. If you think about it, he’s sort of an odd zombie, in that instead of him eating people, people eat him. And drink his blood. The puzzle pieces are slowly falling into place. Jesus is a zombie, Catholics are vampires. Is Richard Dawkins Buffy?
The anti-Pope, Richard Dawkins:
Wow, that scientific knowledge has certainly destroyed the specialness of each of us.
Mysteries are to be solved, not worshiped.
“questioned the very concept of the dignity of
manthe almighty penis”There. Fixed.
The Correctors in the hierarchy would be so much happier with ignorance. If you don’t understand how sex works, then it’s a lot easier to make it seem like a miraculous process subject to spiritual rules.
Oh yeah, Holly. IVF is verboten. If God decided to make you infertile, you just have to deal with it, even if we can understand the problem and fix it.
Catholics adhere to that about as much as they do to birth control restrictions.
I think the hierarchy wishes we were all still illiterate and had to listen to them b/c we couldn’t read the Bible, analyze for ourselves, and had to believe everything they said without question.
” I think the hierarchy wishes we were all still illiterate and had to listen to them b/c we couldn’t read the Bible, analyze for ourselves, and had to believe everything they said without question”
This is what drove me to rebellion as a third grader in Catholic school. They said that I should remain as a child forever and not think for myself. Just do what I was told. Of course this was in the 50’s, but I checked out and never looked back after that bullshit! I wonder if it has changed any today?
Didn’t the conception of Christ required artificial insemination? Or did god really stick his sex into Mary’s sex and had sex?
IOW - “Anyone in possession of a turkey baster past Sunday is going straight to hell.”
Jesus is a zombie, Catholics are vampires.
There is a theory that the reason the vampire myth caught on and spread was that it was an easy way to explain transubstantiantion to the ignorant peasantry.
IOKIYASF
It’s OK if you’re a sky fairy.
greater pets than Keats
Keats was a pretty good poet, but I’m not sure what sort of pet he would have made. High maintenance, probably, with the TB and all.
“Didn’t the conception of Christ required artificial insemination? Or did god really stick his sex into Mary’s sex and had sex?”
Just asking that question is enough to endanger your immortal soul, as Herr Ratzinger would happily tell you…
“They said that I should remain as a child forever and not think for myself. Just do what I was told.”
Now THATS more like it. God gave you a brain only as a test. If you actually use it, you fail.
Too bad you rejected that sound advice, Isopluvial, placed your soul in the same danger as Mercurial Georgia…
We call our cat Keats for short (his name is Keaton, as in Buster Keaton). He’s a pretty good pet — no sign of TB so far. The vet tells us that it’s totally normal for him to be humping my bathrobe even though he’s neutered, but it still kinda creeps us out.
I like that picture of Ratzinger.
Is that what he looks like when he sees a Protestant?
and to think of all the pets greater than Harriet that will never be born–nope, not possible.
I like sex, but dignified is not the first - or even the 100th - word that comes to mind.
That’s because you’re not doing it with monocles.
Can’t you be arrested in Texas for doing it with a monocle?
Wait–isn’t a monocle a man with only one testicle?
“Jesus is a ZOMBIE?!?!?”
-I’m using this, too!
Holly got it right. The church’s adherence to the natural law means that artificial conception techniques are as taboo as artificial contraception techniques.
Has the Pope lost his moral authority? Pam may misunderstand the nature of the church hierarchy. The church is not a monolith. It’s more like True Value hardware than it is Wal-Mart. Think of each bishop as the local franchise holder. The buck stops with the bishop. But the Pope pulled Law’s franchise because of his fuck-up. Further, I don’t think the Pope ever advocated tolerating child abuse.
He said this included total respect for the human being as a person “from conception until natural death,”
This might sound incredibly stupid, but what’s an “unnatural” death? Getting murdered? And if it’s “unnatural” then do you not get free pass into heaven?
what’s an “unnatural” death?
suicide, euthanasia. ya gots to leave this world the same way ya came in — in intense pain.
“Natural death” means no euthanasia.
SUFFER till God calls you home! No short cuts!
Pope Ratzi just changed the rules, too, and *requires* feeding tubes and water to be provided. Asshole. He’s never had to deal with anyone with end stage Parkinson’s. He’s trying to prevent another Terri Schiavo–now her parents could argue that to save her immortal soul, they have to give her the feeding tube and all extraordinary measures b/c they aren’t “extraordinary” but required under their religion.
Yep. That’s what Jesus had in mind.
If he thinks artificial insemination is evil when genetic enhancement takes off he’s going to have a fit.
That’ll teach you, for being a dirty flesh child and getting born into this world of sin.
And once again, I’m left completely stunned that anyone ever listens to institutionally celibate men when it comes to sexual health.
Wait a tic- so medical technology to create life is bad, medical technology to prolong life is good.
When is everyone going to realize all the cherry-picking going with these folks in their religion is in service to one thing…
“Has the Pope lost his moral authority?”
Did he ever really have any?
How can a man - coming out of a system created and maintained by other men who have purposely cut themselves off from women and therefore have eliminated the possibility of ever truly understanding what it’s like to be human - ever be considered a “moral authority”, especially when it come to issues surrounding the subject of human sexuality and reproduction?…
When I think of “natural death” I think of the kind that doesn’t involve being kept alive indefinitely by machines. So maybe “natural death” is the point at which you would have died if you hadn’t been brought back from purgatory or wherever by all of that nasty technology. That would mean, instead, that Ratzi has declared open season on anyone who’s undergone CPR or open-heart surgery or had a defib installed. (Hey, I think he’s just declared Cheney beyond the pale.)
“(Hey, I think he’s just declared Cheney beyond the pale.)”
Cheney looks like he’s dead, but he’s actually “trans-death”. He laughs at our ignorant understanding of “life” and “death”. After all, he’s Fourth Branch…
FWIW, the natural law principles upon which the Church relies for their procreation arguments don’t (surprise!) unambiguously support their interpretation. The argument roughly runs that it fulfilling our end (telos, finis) is good and frustrating it is evil. The end of semen is the creation of Our Tiniest Americans, so all non-reproductive sex that intentionally frustrates this end is evil.
The problem, of course, is that the end of semen is not the end of a human being, nor is our identity integrated with the discharge. If it’s not already patently ridiculous, consider facial hair. The end of such hair is keeping my face warm, but I might frustrate it by shaving. Hardly the sort of thing the Church gets its albs in a wad over, but no different in principle.
The talk gets a little loose on this blog. It is a shame that you cannot, through common honor and respect for all human beings, take the opportunity to truly listen.
I wonder about the nature of your hearts and its ability to find anything sacred or revered. Certainly not marriage. Certainly not each other.
It would appear that you live in a box surrounded by the walls of your own voice. And there is no beauty in the sound. Nor the song of life.
The words I hear are from the song of isolation and loneliness. There is enough anger and judgement in this world. We get it 24 hours a day. This blog is an exercise in the worship of __________. You fill in the blank.
“The talk gets a little loose on this blog.”
Loose talk makes Baby Jesus cry…
Yes, we do - usually from those who claim to worship ______. You fill in your own blank.
Oh, baloney, Hector.
Law did what he was supposed to do to protect the reputation of the church. The brotherhood of priests is far more important than any child.
He was yanked from Boston b/c Bostonians weren’t even going to go (and donate) to their big annual “Kiss My Ring” party. He lost the $$$$ and was facing the possibility of prosecution.
Yanking him to Rome prevented his prosecution, preserving the hierarchy’s reputation. He’s not being punished b/c he’s not been demoted in any way. He was forced to retire, but he lives in luxurious surroundings and gets $12 K /month for fun and games. He’s treated as an honored advisor to the pope. He’s IN THE VATICAN–that’s being rewarded for taking one for the team.
See, the problem is actions speak louder than words. The pope may never have announced “The brotherhood of priests is so damn holy that it’s worth sacrificing a few altar boys in order to maintain the semblence of holiness of the rest of us.” But by rewarding Law and not insisting on putting the lives of children first and foremost, he’s letting us know that’s what he thinks, and while it may not be “advocating” for tolerance of child abusers, it certainly isn’t punishing the priests who did or the bishops who allowed it to continue.
It’s putting the brotherhood above the people (who are the Church) and putting them above the weakest and most vulnerable members of the Church–children.
I cannot listen to anything he says with authority until he kicks Law back to face the consequences of protecting the reputation of the church over protecting children.
There are lots of good men who are priests and would never hurt children. Most of them never make it past parish priest, nor get to stay anywhere long. The jerks who rise in authority and power since JPII are by and large “Correctors” who want to order people around without explaining their reasoning and think that respect is something they are entitled to as Princes of the Church and not something they need to earn.
It’s probably always been this way, but I just know too much about Chicago’s Cardinal Francis George and his corrupt buddies. Knowing that the lay people and some priests are good isn’t enough anymore. The message from on high is shut up and obey.
Denis, do you have anything to contribute or are you just getting off on your holier than thou pontificating? Do you want to justify honoring Ratzi or Law? Give it a go! I’m listening.
I’m dying to hear why sacrificing kids to perverts is okey-dokey to people who have “common honor and respect for all human beings” and represents the “song of life”.
And why being angry at the abuse of children isn’t an appropriate reaction.
while the church’s stance on the beginning and status of human life is ABSURD, it cannot be denied that science does strike a blow to human dignity.
science is a tool, not a good. it may be used to benefit humanity or to lessen it. even in the case when it is used to better ourselves, it is often at a cost. science has allowed capitalism to expand exponentially, and vice versa.
heidegger’s essay on technology is worthwhile in thinking about this issue. the technological mindset does make us see the world in a certain… instrumental way, that cheapens the incalculable worth of human life. hence: the atomic bomb. science to kill more, faster.
Science “cheapens the incalculable worth of human life”?
It wasn’t a scientist who said “Kill them all. God will recognize his own.”
How can Benedict raise ANY issues about human dignity or moral principles? He allowed priests to rape and molest children (and women) unchecked, enabling the criminal activity to continue by moving them around, and bought off destroyed families to protect the church from exposure.
Wait, what?
When exactly in his career do you think the current Pope was in a position to do something? When do you think he “allowed” the abuse to occur?
Most of the systemic abuses occurred because the Bishops refused to listen to higher authority. The Church is something less of a military body or corporation than you seem to think, but I would think basic scholarship would reveal this. I could also point out that truth doesn’t reside within person but within correspondence to reality; otherwise you’re just tossing around ad-homs.
Of course, far be it from me to let scholarship interfere with good ol’ bigotry.
“It wasn’t a scientist who said “Kill them all. God will recognize his own.””
That is SO unfair! It’s been quite a while since there’s been a nice organized effort by religiously motivated people to eliminate unbelievers (or different believers).
At least a millennium!
Okay, at least a few hundred years, right?
Well, several decades - I’m sure there hasn’t been anything eliminationist for a few decades…
All right, yeah there’s still religiously motivated killing going on now (probably even this very minute).
But it’s not religious people’s fault!
Okay, it really IS their fault for allowing their religious intolerance to overcome their moral obligation not to take human life needlessly.
But I’m sure they THOUGHT they had a good reason. Or something…
Petey, the systemic abuses happened b/c the brotherhood of priests really thinks it’s better and more important than a few kids/women. Protecting their own was listening to the higher authority.
Unless you meant “Higher Authority”…of which our American Bishops have next to none.
“When exactly in his career do you think the current Pope was in a position to do something?”
Petey, when he was Cardinal Ratzinger, he was the Pope’s chief protector of Catholic ideology, including writing many of the documents that JPII put his name on.
He certainly was not just a lowly priest from a remote parish in a third-world hell-hole.
And, he’s been Pope for almost 3-years. If he doesn’t have the power to do something now, then…
“Of course, far be it from me to let scholarship interfere with good ol’ bigotry.”
Thanks, Petey. I know Benedict XVI’s bigotry against LGBT people, women, users of birth-control, and now infertile couples seeking parenthood can’t be considered REAL bigotry because God told him to do it.
But when people on Panadagon TALK about his bigotry, without admiring the ideological purity that drives his bigotry, then WE ARE THE REAL BIGOTS!!1!!111!!!
Thanks, I guess we’ve found a subject that we definitely can’t discuss in your presence…
while the church’s stance on the beginning and status of human life is ABSURD
It’s religion: it’s all absurd. Or highly significant. Or mandatory to believe. Or not.
The Pope can’t prevent child molestation. Child molestors seek positions where they get to interact with children. All the better if those positions give them worldly or other-worldly authority. The Pope can mandate that churchly child molestors be turned over to secular authority, and then sanction bishops who do not. Now, is Law a fugitive from American justice? Has Law been indicted? Has he fled to Rome to escape extradition?
The words I hear are from the song of isolation and loneliness.
—
Not really. Isolation and loneliness would be a welcome respite from the shrieking and lies of these religious panty sniffers who are constantly attacking my government and my way of life. A life that was largely free from religious laws and dogma. The RCC is no stranger to corrupting governments.
I’m doing everything I can to get away from the religious. It’s more and more evident that it is my only hope for living out my life in peace and happiness. As I watch the world about and see what has happened within my own family, I see that religion sows discord, violence, and human suffering.
From my Catholic upbringing, I took the major symbolic message of Christ quite literally: the myth of god has to die in order to save mankind. I wish it would already.
As for the pope, may he spend eternity having to listen to Jack Chick.
Here is another pix of Benedickhead in one of his favorite poses with Jesus on a Stick.
http://d1676417.u50.infinology.net/images/Pope%20Benedict%20XVI.jpg
And another one.
http://www.cbc.ca/gfx/images/arts/photos/2007/04/05/pope-benedict-cp-2759451.jpg
It think this is something he buys each time he goes to a state fair. It is hard to tell if it a sweet candy sort of thing or a salty dog.
I am furious with people like Petey.
When? WHEN? How about when he committed obstruction of justice? “Most” is a hell of a weasel word that covers a multitude of sins, but it sure as hell doesn’t cover this. Take your sanctimonious ignorance and shove it, or at least learn the facts of your faith better than this apostate.
“Mysteries are to be solved, not worshiped.”
MAjeff, I am filing this away for later use. Well Put.
This is post utterly stupid.
Bioethics doesn’t cease to exist just because the pope takes a position on an issue. You’re stating that any bioethical position that may impede science is automatically offensive. That’s ridiculous on its face.
Nice photo though, it adds so much to your ignorant point, as always.