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MAGA needs to learn new words. Radical leftist marxist communists (which are all contradictory things) is pretty fucking stupid.
MAGA ISN'T A MOVEMENT IT'S A REGIME.
Totallyyy not a cult.
/s
Whaaaaat? This isn't what Jesus would have wanted!
Greed 4:19 "You get your own fish and loaves. I paid for this. I can throw it on the floor if I want. Suck it up libtards!"
That's my favorite Bible story.
Thinking a second about this, he literally pwned MAGA
The entire conservative line of thought is backed by Christianity and American exceptionalism, and now there comes an American pope and tells "You're not following the God's word". That's a damn checkmate.
Wonder how many MAGA supporters, many of which are devout Christians, will start questioning their beliefs.
Also, lol, a Marxist Pope is top comedy.
They won't question their Christian beliefs for a single second because they didn't have any in the first place. They'll turn their backs and say "The Pope went woke," still call themselves godly Christians, and continue to spread hate. During that whole time they will never question whether or not they're Christian, they'll just hate the Pope too.
Yeah, exactly this. It can be confusing because they call themselves Christians, loudly and frequently - but their attitudes and beliefs have sweet fuck all to do with the teachings of Christ.
It's kinda like the way they use 'Marxist' for anyone left of Mussolini. I'm not sure if it's a deliberate attempt to shift definitions, or if they don't understand what the words actually mean. Wankers.
It's both, for different segments of the party. The GOP has always been comprised of the unwashed masses and the conmen manipulating them.
Yeah I mean, it's not like Catholicism is the only flavor of Christianity.
The whole reason the USA even exists today is because a bunch of shitty religious people got ousted from England.
I know a lot of people still view the Pope as the head of Christianity but there are many Christians who would not see it that way. Many who would dismiss the Pope with a wave of the hand and not a care in the world.
The evangelical right wing Christian movement in America certainly does not give a fuck about the Pope based on what I've seen.
They don't, but the neofascist movement loves the aesthetic of catholicism. Its why Vance converted. In fact I'd say that pointing to Vance and Biden as the two sides of modern American catholicism is a reasonable framing (we're gonna ignore the catholic workers because though their deeds are great, their numbers are few).
Christianity is the big umbrella of faith, Catholics are inside that umbrella and have been not so popular compared to other factions. Pope's are catholic.
Personally I think it's all horse shit but that's just me.
I didn't realize Catholics comprise less than Protestants. Still, 22% of Americans identifying as Roman Catholics is a big deal.
They don't. Almost half of all Christians are Catholic.
A "big deal" to people that give a shit, sure.
Much of the American Christian establishment is the type of Protestant that does not consider Catholics to be Christian.
I know that doesn't really make a whole lot of sense but that's how Americans "do religion".
Baptists don't care what the Pope has to say, seventh-day Adventists think he is actually the Antichrist. Most American Catholics don't really care what the Vatican has to say and would resent the implication that they're supposed to give a shit about the Pope's opinion.
Americans just don't do religion very well.
It amazes me that Catholics will ride along with that bandwagon. Like when they get that Christian Nation they want, when freedom of religion is ditched in favour of state endorsed religion, and all that remains is to decide whether it's going to be a Protestant Nation or a Catholic Nation, do they actually think it's going to go their way?
You're only an American If __________________
You live on one of the two continents called America
I didn't care about who the new pope was but he's getting more sympathetic by the minute.
There is no such thing as marxist pope.
Are you calling Lara Loomer a liar?
Every second of the day
Leo XIII called marxism a "deadly plague". I guess Leo XIV chose his name because he's ok with his predecessor.
Yeah, but the new Pope may be to the left of Mussolini, so MAGA doesn't like him.
As a liberal leftist or whatever they would call me... Yeah f** the pope and the church. Let's join together unified against a common evil.
I'm an atheist and I have no use for any religion, but if this new Pope pisses off MAGA, I could become a fan.
You know things are bad if the Catholic church is a last bastion for progressive social change
They're a ratchet. Calling them progressive would be a straight lie but they do go with the times, maybe 100 years behind, picking up all stragglers that can reasonably be picked up.
In 50 years, mark my words, they will marry gay couples, or at least bless them before the congregation (without sacrament, or maybe they'll invent a new, same-but-different, sacrament). Why? Because the Vatican recently gave priests authorisation to bless gay couples in private: Blessing the relationship, not just the individuals. Click.
Its weird to me that the same church that would allow flexibility to bless a gay relationship is also the same church that is inflexible regarding the confessional seal in cases of literal child abuse.
That is pretty fascinating though if true, considering that it would be completely upending the view of homosexuality as a sin. Im sure a priest cant bless something considered to be a sin, that would be antithetical
Lifting the seal won't help a thing, on the contrary it might make things worse because then paedophiles aren't going to confess, any more, and priests can't tell them that god wants them to go to the police.
It's akin to requiring therapists to tip off the police when you confess that you consume illicit drugs: All you're doing is stopping people from talking about it in the first place.
Are there therapists who are drug dealers and abuse that confidentiality for their own business interest? I'm reasonably sure. I mean there are a gazillion of therapists in the world, there has to be at least a couple of drug dealers among them. But that's no excuse to make it worse for everyone else.
People like teachers and of course child care workers should be reporters regarding this kind of stuff, but on the flipside the reports should go to a place where the victim then can find confidentiality. And maybe that's even what at least some priests are doing (afterwards confessing that they broke the seal), important bit being that the perpetrator can't know that the tip came from confession, and the official doctrine, "confession doesn't leak", is still intact.
On the one hand I definitely understand your argument, and its one Ive basically accepted as reasonable my entire life including when I was practicing Catholicism a long time ago as a kid.
However, in thinking about what you wrote I do question if there isnt a logical consistency in the idea that if there was no confessional seal that people who do the most heinous things would not repent.
I suppose its plausible that a child abuser wouldnt go to confess that if they knew the priest had to pass that information along, however I think the logical inconsistency is that they would then be at risk of dying without having confessed such a grave sin. Which hypothetically if they were a true believer of what the church teaches would be worse than any earthly punishment imaginable.
Now, if they simply didnt confess it to avoid prosecution then one might argue that they dont actually hold sincere beliefs and that the same person was simply using religion as a means to access and abuse kids. If they dont hold sincere beliefs then legally speaking they receive no protection under the law
The other thing is that is must be psychologically tormenting to some degree for priests to know other people are heinous criminals and being powerless to stop them other than saying “turn yourself in”.
I dont want priests to turn into some kind of reporters of all things to the authorities, but child abuse is among the most gravely disgusting things a person can do, universally, and given the problem of abusers in the church I think it would be great if priests were authorized to report it. Among the other most heinous of crimes like murder and rape and whatnot. Not “I cheated on my taxes” but shit that evidences a clearly dangerous person to others. We should be putting the rights of children and adults to be safe from that shit above the religious “right” of some random person to not be tattled on when they literally did something so awful.
Really if anything I imagine that the church making a big show of cleansing itself of pedophiles would actually be one of the few things that could bring a lot of people into the church. But I have no skin in that game, I just want to see pedophiles get their due comeuppance
And it should be noted that behind the confessional seal a respected figure, speaking with the authority of religion tells these people to stop. Catholics don't throw forgiveness around willy nilly, it's called penance for a reason, they demand change. Does it happen? Usually not. But there is social value in confession of faults and sins and being told that one can and is expected to do better
A Canticle For Leibowitz is not an instruction manual.
MAGA would melt down no matter who they picked because everything maga is doing right now is the opposite of what Jesus would do, and whoever is the pope is going to criticize maga for being terrible humans.