Catholic Church spent $2M on major N.Y. lobbying firms to block child-sex law reform

[IntrinsicallyDisordered]

3 minutes ago, refugee said:

Really? I knew that YRR churches with membership covenants were very difficult to leave (as in, expressing the fact that you are leaving or thinking about leaving is cause for being put under church discipline, which has meant IRL that they hound you and may go so far as to contact other churches you might be interested in joining to try and get them to blacklist you. I know, it's crazy, why would anyone go to a church like that? But, as the bible says somewhere, sometimes satan comes disguised as a being of light).

But you can't leave the RCC officially? Your name stays on the rolls forever? No matter what?

Is it to give the appearance that the Church (not just the RCC but organized christianity) is not becoming an emptying shell?

Unless they changed it again and I missed it, yes.  You used to be able to write to the parish where you were baptized and ask to be officially removed as you were renouncing your faith.  They'd ask if you were sure, remind you you'd be excommunicated (aka here's your ticket to hell), and take your name off the roles of active Catholics.

Several years ago they changed it because "baptism makes an indelible mark on the soul" that cannot be removed (except by one of the excommunicable sins), so you're still Catholic.  I think it is much more about making it seem like people aren't fleeing in droves, than about theology.  From what I've heard if you request it now you're outright denied or told to ask someone higher up, who then denies you.  I guess they're counting on people not caring enough to get an abortion/try to kill the pope/desecrate a host in order to get out. 

It used to bother me but now I figure if I don't respect their authority anymore, it shouldn't really matter where they stand on the state of my soul (if I ever had a child I would not baptize them, since the unbaptized are held to a lower standard and have a greater chance of entering heaven than a fallen away or otherwise in mortal sin Catholic).

[Ungodly Grandma]

2 hours ago, IntrinsicallyDisordered said:

 "Everyone in the 60's thought predators could be rehabilitated without actual rehabilitation" they say.  "No one knew raping a kid was so horrible back then" they say.  Well, which is it?  You're the one, true church and everyone else can only get to heaven through you and your morality stands outside of time, or you're just as breathtakingly wrong as everyone else?  

I'm supposed to believe you're morally correct about LGBT people when you didn't know it was wrong to hide child rapists and do fuckall for the victims until like 10 years ago?  

I agree with everything you said, but I recently learned how to "snip" comments, so I did.

And no, NOT everyone in the 60's thought raping kids was not so horrible. Any normal person would see a problem with that. Only the "celibate" clergy, called father but usually had little relationship to anyone who wasn't a priest. A true father would kill a man who raped his child. Or damn near it. 

[2manyKidzzz]

I saw something today saying Fracis was removing bishops who hid molesting priests but nothing about the priests. This was on Facebook and I do not have a link to offer sorry

[laPapessaGiovanna]

Pope Francis on child abuse

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_5752d7c6e4b0c3752dcdc758

Not enough. They should be sacked effective immediately and denounced to the local authorities with which the Church must collaborate fully. Victims need to be comforted and see their traumas recognised and compensated as much as possible. The RCC should admit to be at fault and beg forgiveness from the victims. 

My father stopped going to the Mass the day Elisa Claps corpse was found in the attic of the church where she was last seen 17 years before. Here is a very good article on her story. The RCC through its priests helped to cover up this horrid murder.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2011/jun/29/danilo-restivo-murder-conviction-iceberg

[Cleopatra7]

2 hours ago, laPapessaGiovanna said:

Pope Francis on child abuse

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_5752d7c6e4b0c3752dcdc758

Not enough. They should be sacked effective immediately and denounced to the local authorities with which the Church must collaborate fully. Victims need to be comforted and see their traumas recognised and compensated as much as possible. The RCC should admit to be at fault and beg forgiveness from the victims. 

My father stopped going to the Mass the day Elisa Claps corpse was found in the attic of the church where she was last seen 17 years before. Here is a very good article on her story. The RCC through its priests helped to cover up this horrid murder.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2011/jun/29/danilo-restivo-murder-conviction-iceberg

A similar case happened in Texas back in 1960 when a priest killed a young woman who came to him for confession. He's only just now being arraigned because the church stonewalled the investigation:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/02/10/break-in-unholy-cold-case-police-arrest-former-beauty-queens-priest-in-her-1960-killing/

The fundamental problem with all the cases mentioned here is that the Catholic Church (and really almost all conservative religious groups) is that the hierarchy is more concerned about the public knowing about priests who do wrong, than doing something about the priests behaving badly. In Catholicism, this is called "creating scandal" and it is to be avoided at all costs. The fear of causing scandal is ancient, and I recently read a book written by a Carolingian era (circa ninth century CE) woman to her son where she instructs him not to criticize bad priests. This why sites like Catholic Answers and Fish Eaters won't talk about church scandals or if they do, they'll say that the stories were made up by the evil anti-Catholic secular media and you should just think nice thoughts about Mary and Jesus. However, the fact that "orthodox Catholics" are so dismissive of abuse and wrongdoing in the church is a scandal in and of itself. Should they even wonder why so many abuse survivors and their supporters leave Catholicism when self-described "orthodox Catholics" are so dismissive of their experiences and pain?

[Hane]

What @Cleopatra7 and @laPapessaGiovanna said re "scandal."

My mother once told me she was taught that it would be OK to receive communion at a public event like a funeral or a wedding even if one weren't "prepared" for the sacrament (i.e., had sins on one's soul and hadn't been absolved in confession), if failing to take communion would cause a "scandal."

[December]

The lobbying against legal reforms is horrifying and yet, sadly, not unbelievable. 

On 6/4/2016 at 9:46 AM, IntrinsicallyDisordered said:

Several years ago they changed it because "baptism makes an indelible mark on the soul" that cannot be removed (except by one of the excommunicable sins), so you're still Catholic.  I think it is much more about making it seem like people aren't fleeing in droves, than about theology.

Definitely sounds like a way to inflate the numbers artificially. Especially as most people are baptized as a baby, and participate in other faith-affirming rituals like first communion before they're an adult. By that standard, it sounds like they're counting people who may have been baptized as infants at the request of parents/grandparents, but haven't stepped in a church in decades?  

I would be interested to see what the difference in numbers between official members and practicing adult members looks like.