Why does there need to be a qualifier? Sure he made the Catholic church hate gay people a little less. That’s nothing to celebrate, especially as the church celebrates the end of Roe v. Wade in America and continues to funnel money to anti-abortion campaigns in every state.
No, you’ve got it backwards. What I’m saying agrees with you: even for all the good things he did, beginning the long process of softening the Church’s stance on things like LGBT+ issues, same-sex couples, divorce, etc, he was still the head of a religious institution that advocates hate and spreads disinformation and protects child molesters and shit. The qualifier is there to show that the standard by which he is being judged in this light is an artificially low one: of all the popes we could’ve had he seems to have been the most inoffensive, but that’s a pretty fucking low bar.
Also I’ve seen lots of Protestant leaders celebrating the end of Roe v Wade and such, but I have not seen any evidence of the involvement of Catholic leadership in such things (not that I’ve looked very hard, admittedly.) Do you happen to have anything I could read for more detail on the subject? I’d like to stay informed.
I get that he did a lot of unambiguously good things, many of which I will unreservedly praise in isolation, but he was still the head of an organization that protects child molesters, justifies hate and bigotry, hoards wealth at a rate that makes Saudi princes blush, etc. Thus the qualifier: he’s the least-bad pope I can imagine having, but he was still a pope. it’s like saying a serial killer should be praised because he spent his days teaching self-defense classes to women to keep them from being victimized, but while that’s definitely a good thing, at the end of the day he was still eating people.
Oh yeah, the church isn’t perfect, what they did to Sinead was completely uncalled for. They should have acknowledged her and started excommunicating the priests responsible. I’m just still of the opinion that the church can be fixed as opposed to just abandoning it. That’s about I think where we differ. Hell, there was a point where the church had a brothel in it! So it’s come a long way since then. Still not perfect. My hope is that incremental changes can make it better. Make it to a point where good completely outweighs the bad and even if not, the earliest form of Christianity didn’t necessarily have a central governing authority, so long as individual Christians keep the message that is still good.
I’m not making an argument as to whether or not it’s fixable. No, where we differ is in the argument I am making that, as it stands, the Catholic Church has caused and continues to cause enough harm in the world that that calling anyone who by their position bears some of the responsibility for that harm ‘good’ without qualification is problematic. Fix it or not as you see fit, I’m not a Catholic or even a Christian so it’s no skin off my nose either way, but I’m not going to paper over its abuses just to satisfy the cultural norm of not speaking ill of the dead.
Sure, if you ignore the centuries of medical, mathematical and scientific research religion directly caused. From Islamic scholars to Catholic scientists who discovered genetics and concepts like the big bang. Don’t worry, you’ll grow up one day and realize the purpose of religion isn’t so black and white.
Yeah I guess the soup kitchens, services for the poor, rehabilitation programs, the red cross / crescent, support networks, salvation army, the Catholic Climate Covenant, nature reserves like Misali Island and civil right religious organizations like the Satanic Temple have had their day too.
I don’t see the leaders of soup kitchens constantly molesting children and getting away with it. All those things you mentioned are still doing good things. What good things have the church done recently other than fix the things they largely caused (i.e. homophobia), and does it outweigh the numerous horrific things they still do?
I’m just going to ramble so sorry if it’s a little incoherent.
One of the most progressive popes in recent memory. He continuously stayed in touch with the parishioners in Gaza and continously spoke out against the genocide, even on his deathbed he kept in touch with them, he encouraged Marxists and Catholics by becoming the first pope to outright acknowledge the similarities in Marxism and Christianity (doing so many times over the years), he replaced about 80% of the current cardinals with ones more progressive like he, hopefully solidifying his message and became the first ever pope to apologize and start to reconcile the relationships with the indengeious Canadians and what the church did to them with residential schools.
He encouraged unity between the Catholic and Orthodox churches, by working out and having both churches celebrate easter for the first time since the schism over 1000 years ago, helping to mend the churches possibly even more so than Ecumenism. He was one of the only public figures actually talking about the genocide in Darfur.
He was a proponent of LGBT peoples in the church. Definitely not on the same level as some progressive but he was the first pope to allow a LGBT+ advocacy group (Jonathan’s Tent) and give them spotlight, even giving them their own events in the calendar, also changing the direction of the church’s opinion on the LGBT community.
He was quite often criticized by conservatives as a socialist and Marxist but really he was just following the doctrine. He also had views on refugees and migrants that I can’t recall exactly right now. With regards to the sexual abuse scandals that rocked the church in the 90s (rip Sinead o’ Connor), he toughened the canon law to further go after the priests responsible. I recall he either fired or excommunicated some priests involved in the scandal but I can’t recall atm. Imo, he should have gone farther on it but it was as a start.
I think he should have railed a little harder against the American televangelists and the American tradcath movement but there are Christian groups doing that on their own (like the Trinity Foundation). He wasn’t perfect by all means. There were homes demolished during his visit in Timor-Leste and people displaced and he excommunicated Carlo Maria Viganò but when comparing him against the previous popes he left behind a tremendous legacy.
He is also the only pope to release a prog rock album.
So he successfully put on a friendlier face on his inhumane, repressive and hopelessly backward organisation without substantially changing anything? Big whoop.
He was very progressive by catholic standards
He reintated dialogue woth other religions woth some rare ecumenic traditions. Gave some vote and new postions for womennever seen before but not all what was asked from him. He was very active durning the pandemic, more then offering prayers but offering real help. He was like “yes pray but do what the doctors say too”. Still he bailed out some fuckers but went hard on others so IDK, and also has some debatable past with the Argeninian dictatorship regime of the 70s.
He tried to make the church more welcoming to all and less corrupt, you can have your opinions about it if worked or not but at leas was clearly different than his predecessors. This is a veedry boiled down version for sure if you want to have a better opinion there’s plenty on the internet to read about him.
Man I’m gonna miss him. Dude was a damn legend and the stuff he accomplished was nothing short if amazing.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Religion is poison.
Yeah, any statement like that must be qualified: he seemed like a decent person; for a religious leader.
Why does there need to be a qualifier? Sure he made the Catholic church hate gay people a little less. That’s nothing to celebrate, especially as the church celebrates the end of Roe v. Wade in America and continues to funnel money to anti-abortion campaigns in every state.
Oh, but he was a nice oppressor so that’s okay?
No, you’ve got it backwards. What I’m saying agrees with you: even for all the good things he did, beginning the long process of softening the Church’s stance on things like LGBT+ issues, same-sex couples, divorce, etc, he was still the head of a religious institution that advocates hate and spreads disinformation and protects child molesters and shit. The qualifier is there to show that the standard by which he is being judged in this light is an artificially low one: of all the popes we could’ve had he seems to have been the most inoffensive, but that’s a pretty fucking low bar.
Also I’ve seen lots of Protestant leaders celebrating the end of Roe v Wade and such, but I have not seen any evidence of the involvement of Catholic leadership in such things (not that I’ve looked very hard, admittedly.) Do you happen to have anything I could read for more detail on the subject? I’d like to stay informed.
That’s just it. Francis seemed like a very progressive pope.
Yep, he was pretty progressive… for a pope. For a normal person he was still pretty damned conservative though, hence the qualifier.
Yes, the glass is half full, but we’re still talking a shotglass inside a swimming pool.
He’s the nicest pedophile.
I have replied with a long post to another comment in this thread stating some of the things he did.
I get that he did a lot of unambiguously good things, many of which I will unreservedly praise in isolation, but he was still the head of an organization that protects child molesters, justifies hate and bigotry, hoards wealth at a rate that makes Saudi princes blush, etc. Thus the qualifier: he’s the least-bad pope I can imagine having, but he was still a pope. it’s like saying a serial killer should be praised because he spent his days teaching self-defense classes to women to keep them from being victimized, but while that’s definitely a good thing, at the end of the day he was still eating people.
Oh yeah, the church isn’t perfect, what they did to Sinead was completely uncalled for. They should have acknowledged her and started excommunicating the priests responsible. I’m just still of the opinion that the church can be fixed as opposed to just abandoning it. That’s about I think where we differ. Hell, there was a point where the church had a brothel in it! So it’s come a long way since then. Still not perfect. My hope is that incremental changes can make it better. Make it to a point where good completely outweighs the bad and even if not, the earliest form of Christianity didn’t necessarily have a central governing authority, so long as individual Christians keep the message that is still good.
I’m not making an argument as to whether or not it’s fixable. No, where we differ is in the argument I am making that, as it stands, the Catholic Church has caused and continues to cause enough harm in the world that that calling anyone who by their position bears some of the responsibility for that harm ‘good’ without qualification is problematic. Fix it or not as you see fit, I’m not a Catholic or even a Christian so it’s no skin off my nose either way, but I’m not going to paper over its abuses just to satisfy the cultural norm of not speaking ill of the dead.
Sure, if you ignore the centuries of medical, mathematical and scientific research religion directly caused. From Islamic scholars to Catholic scientists who discovered genetics and concepts like the big bang. Don’t worry, you’ll grow up one day and realize the purpose of religion isn’t so black and white.
It had its day
Nobody said it didn’t once do some good
That time is long gone.
Yeah I guess the soup kitchens, services for the poor, rehabilitation programs, the red cross / crescent, support networks, salvation army, the Catholic Climate Covenant, nature reserves like Misali Island and civil right religious organizations like the Satanic Temple have had their day too.
I don’t see the leaders of soup kitchens constantly molesting children and getting away with it. All those things you mentioned are still doing good things. What good things have the church done recently other than fix the things they largely caused (i.e. homophobia), and does it outweigh the numerous horrific things they still do?
deleted by creator
Isn’t that discriminatory against religious identities?
I don’t think you understand what the word word “discriminatory” means
Like what?
I’m just going to ramble so sorry if it’s a little incoherent.
One of the most progressive popes in recent memory. He continuously stayed in touch with the parishioners in Gaza and continously spoke out against the genocide, even on his deathbed he kept in touch with them, he encouraged Marxists and Catholics by becoming the first pope to outright acknowledge the similarities in Marxism and Christianity (doing so many times over the years), he replaced about 80% of the current cardinals with ones more progressive like he, hopefully solidifying his message and became the first ever pope to apologize and start to reconcile the relationships with the indengeious Canadians and what the church did to them with residential schools.
He encouraged unity between the Catholic and Orthodox churches, by working out and having both churches celebrate easter for the first time since the schism over 1000 years ago, helping to mend the churches possibly even more so than Ecumenism. He was one of the only public figures actually talking about the genocide in Darfur.
He was a proponent of LGBT peoples in the church. Definitely not on the same level as some progressive but he was the first pope to allow a LGBT+ advocacy group (Jonathan’s Tent) and give them spotlight, even giving them their own events in the calendar, also changing the direction of the church’s opinion on the LGBT community.
He was quite often criticized by conservatives as a socialist and Marxist but really he was just following the doctrine. He also had views on refugees and migrants that I can’t recall exactly right now. With regards to the sexual abuse scandals that rocked the church in the 90s (rip Sinead o’ Connor), he toughened the canon law to further go after the priests responsible. I recall he either fired or excommunicated some priests involved in the scandal but I can’t recall atm. Imo, he should have gone farther on it but it was as a start.
I think he should have railed a little harder against the American televangelists and the American tradcath movement but there are Christian groups doing that on their own (like the Trinity Foundation). He wasn’t perfect by all means. There were homes demolished during his visit in Timor-Leste and people displaced and he excommunicated Carlo Maria Viganò but when comparing him against the previous popes he left behind a tremendous legacy.
He is also the only pope to release a prog rock album.
So he successfully put on a friendlier face on his inhumane, repressive and hopelessly backward organisation without substantially changing anything? Big whoop.
So you didn’t read a single thing I wrote? Alright.
He was very progressive by catholic standards
He reintated dialogue woth other religions woth some rare ecumenic traditions. Gave some vote and new postions for womennever seen before but not all what was asked from him. He was very active durning the pandemic, more then offering prayers but offering real help. He was like “yes pray but do what the doctors say too”. Still he bailed out some fuckers but went hard on others so IDK, and also has some debatable past with the Argeninian dictatorship regime of the 70s.
He tried to make the church more welcoming to all and less corrupt, you can have your opinions about it if worked or not but at leas was clearly different than his predecessors. This is a veedry boiled down version for sure if you want to have a better opinion there’s plenty on the internet to read about him.