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The God-less-father: Pope Excommunicates All Mobsters From Catholic Church
After hundreds of years knowing that no matter how many 'double-taps to the head' or 'sleeping with the fishes' orders they give, a quick penance and the mafia is going to pass through the pearly gates; the Pope, having met the father of a 3-year-old boy slain in the region's drug war, declared that all mobsters are automatically excommunicated from the Catholic Church. "Those who go down the evil path, as the Mafiosi do, are not in communion with God. They are excommunicated," Pope Francis decreed during his one-day pilgrimage to the southern region of Calabria - the heart of Italy's biggest crime syndicate. With the world already having a ChairSatan, is it now time for The SatanFather?
Pope Francis journeyed Saturday to the heart of Italy's biggest crime syndicate, met the father of a 3-year-old boy slain in the region's drug war, and declared that all mobsters are automatically excommunicated from the Catholic Church.
During his one-day pilgrimage to the southern region of Calabria, Francis comforted the imprisoned father of Nicola Campolongo in the courtyard of a prison in the town of Castrovillari.
In January the boy was shot, along with one of his grandfathers and the grandfather's girlfriend, in an attack blamed on drug turf wars in the nearby town of Cassano all'Jonio. The attackers torched the car with all three victims inside.
Calabria is the power base of the 'ndrangheta, a global drug trafficking syndicate that enriches itself by extorting businesses and infiltrating public works contracts in underdeveloped Calabria.
During his homily at an outdoor Mass, Francis denounced the 'ndrangheta for what he called its "adoration of evil and contempt for the common good."
"Those who go down the evil path, as the Mafiosi do, are not in communion with God. They are excommunicated," he warned.
As much as the church has been a force against the mafia there have also been instances of priests colluding with them, CBS News correspondent Allen Pizzey reports from Rome. Francis' visit and rhetoric could also be seen as a message that that won't happen again.
The big question, of course, is if there is a 'godthering' clause that enable the Dons access to the after-life? How long before Francis gets an offer he can't refuse?
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Did he said any thing about Obama?
Nah... that'd be razzizt.
But then again, the Sicilians are considered the UknoWhatters of Italy
When is he going to sell the Vatican's gold to raise money to feed the poor people the he cares so passionately about? Oh, wait a minute he wants the poor to FEED him? I got it now.
Whoa there. What happened to all that forgiveness that is supposed to be one of the Church's big things?
If one person has an imaginary friend, they're crazy. If a million people have the same imaginary friend, it's a religion.
Are you trying to tell me that Jews 2,000 to 3,000 years ago couldn't live in the bellies of whales, walk on water or raise the dead?
Because if you are then either YOU are a fool or hundreds of millions of Christians and Jews are.
Just sayin'...
Jesus was patient zero, the original zombie!
this comes after the Pope removed the bullet proof glass from his motorcade, right?
Has he also been informed about the hazards of nail-guns?
So it's official, then?
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/137529/moises-naim/mafia-states
Is this where you have the chicken biting the roaster's head off?
Excellent ! the italian community has long needed this.
His holiness wants a bigger cut.
dbl post...
Here. These should help. I wish I came across these as a Kid.
http://jesusbirthermovement.tumblr.com/
http://jesusbirthermovement.tumblr.com/post/51446102697/the-official-jes...
http://historyhuntersinternational.tumblr.com/
http://www.jesusneverexisted.com/syncretism.html
http://www.jesusneverexisted.com/surfeit.htm
http://www.jesusneverexisted.com/virginity.html
http://www.truthbeknown.com/josephus.htm
http://www.truthbeknown.com/washington-jefferson-mythicists.html
http://www.truthbeknown.com/suetoniuschresto.html
http://www.truthbeknown.com/suetoniuschresto.html
All he has to do now is excommunicate all priests, liquidate all the assets of the church and distribute to the poor.
The Rabbis should do the same with the filth on Wall Street. But I guess the donations are just too tempting.
It's all such bullshit mate.
Nobody can prove to you there is a God and you can't prove to anyone there is no God. So I guess you better just do what makes you happy.
If you want physical proof that matches Biblical accounts, look at the Shroud of Turin.
I visited a Coptic church in Egypt and there was some mould on the wall that looked, supposedly, like Jesus. People were touching it and then touching their babies foreheads. The absolute reverence displayed by these people was bloody fascinating. So there's that irrefutable phyical proof as well although the mould looked more like mould to me than jesus.
Had the same experience with a Gaia princess.
I think she actually believed she could just scrape it off the wall and put it in her moped and drive home. She looked like she was having a real good time so I just left her alone with her thoughts, never knew if she got stranded somewhere, wasn't my problem;-)
So, in your opinion, Jesus walked the earth, yes or no? Now you know of course he did, so, also in your opinion, why did the Roman state (and the Pharisee's) view Him as a threat?
I bet it had something to do with money and power. And Him being perceived as a threat by people with those things.
Yes, mostly power, that comes from people following.
They hate competition ;-)
Or, doing work for God (?)...
coz we all have evil within us, no?
Duality !
Yes. I don't think it's a matter of believing, I would state it as fact. From that salient point the rest would be, must be, fiction and I only say that because there was no way real time recording, scribing of what was happening. This is 2000 years ago. What happened are stories past from one generation to the next until the point in time the bible was begun to be written. There's no point arguing the toss because this is just reality. Why this particluar version of christianity emerged is no different a contemplation as to why did this particlur brand if Islam emerge. It just did. If it wasn't jesus it would have been someone else. all these powers attributed to jesus have been made up, embellished, exaggerated. How can it be any other way because there was no REAL TIME capture of events. We know how fallible humans are in this day and age let alone the horribly uneducated and superstitious people of thousands of years ago. It's bad enough now with all the dopes who watch dancing with the stars while the world is falling apart around them.
I think it was JLee who said it was hypocritical to bag christianity when we (as he claims) have all the benefits of a Judeo-Christian society. This is the type of hubris that only a theist can display. To say that there are no other cultures or societies that are as good as us, societies that had absolutely no notion of the jew or christian or ten commandments. Societies that today would be thriving in their original form if not for the bloody zealot missionaries intent on corrupting them with western values.
"To say that there are no other cultures or societies that are as good as us..."
And "us"...would mean what? State your culture and society. Please ;-)
And it doesn't help anyones understanding of anything or anyone when in REAL TIME one group sets about destroying evidence does it? You should understand this more than most.
Whether at the Temple Mount or thousand year old Buddhas in Afghanistan or destroying manuscripts in Timbuktu or ripping out tiles around a fountain, none of this is going unnoticed today.
The west, the US, Canada, Britain, Europe, Australia. Asia nor Africa had any notion of jesus and their civilisations thrived very well thank you very much. Interesting how the morals and ethics were not really any different to those places where the bible was widely distributed. I know there were startk exceptions such as cannabilsm in Papua Newq Guinea but on the whole, give or take the same sorts of tenets arose regarding murder, stealing, incest etc. No bible, no ten commandments. This observation is very inconvenient for those who preach the imperatives of god being the only source of morals.
You avoided answering both questions I asked of you, even after you agreed further up the thread that Jesus actually walked the earth.
I only mention this in passing because over the years (I'm 54 now) atheists/agnostics (what have you) have argued passionately that Jesus never existed...only to have to admit later that He, in fact, did.
I'd probably agree with you if I saw it.
So what's your opinion on the Shroud of Turnin? 35 years of scientific research and no one can explain a 3D negative photgraphic image of an entire body made by unknown, advanced technology with apparently, radiation coming out of the body that formed the image.
And the Carbon dating was corrected in 2013. It's just the right age.
I don't know. I haven't read enough about it. There would be so many pitfalls with getting reliable information one way or another. I don't know if your claim of 35 years of scientific research is right, I'm not even sure how you could be sure. I would immediately assume it is fake obviously. Believe me JLee, I have an open mind on the whole god thing. If a big face appears in the sky and it can be ascertained it has nothing to do with project blue beam (gawd, I can't even believe I'm saying that) then yeah, I'd say, shoot, they were right all along. Until there is proof that can be verified by more than one of our senses over multiple tests and by multiple people then I am doing what is encumbent on every educated adult and calling bullshit on the entire construct. This is not unreasonable. If we could go back in a time machine and follow jesus around I suspect you would be bitterly disappointed, not necessarily in the direct teachings but the more fanciful claims.
Despite my strict views on the whole god thing I qualify again and again that I have nothing against the individual such as yourself or any other human being regardless of their belief. We're all bumbling along with nary an idea of the what's, why's and wherefore's and I suspect in the coming decades we will be relying on our fellow humans more than ever regardless of culture, creed or belief.
The shroud of Turin was / is a Romanist hoax. For anyone who reads the Gospel accounts of the burial of Jesus they would understand that it does NOT match the biblical accounts.
There are other secular accounts of the historicity of Jesus that would stand the test of an evidentiary process. One doesn't need to use Romish superstition in place of such.
The shroud of Turin was / is a Romanist hoax. For anyone who reads the Gospel accounts of the burial of Jesus they would understand that it does NOT match the biblical accounts.
Untrue. It matches every account.
Interesting how your post goes up with a green arrow at the same time... Oh well, another miracle I suppose.
Let's check some Gospel accounts:
John 19:39 - Jesus' body was covered with about an hundred pound weight. Analysis of the shroud showed no chemical traces of the spices mentioned.
John 19:40 - the body was tightly wound (as the manner of the Jews was). Not covered with a sheet.
John 19:40 - the Jews' manner was to wash the body.
John 20:7 - Peter found the wrapped burial clothes and the napkin which was around the head wrapped up "by itself". That is, separate from the main burial clothes.
The hoaxes and superstitions of Romanism are almost limitless. The shroud is another in a long list of of them.
There's no excuse for you to mistranslate the Bible like that. Here is the official vatican translation.
John 19:39-40
Nicodemus, the one who had first come to him at night, also came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes weighing about one hundred pounds.
They took the body of Jesus and bound it with burial cloths along with the spices, according to the Jewish burial custom.
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0839/__PXR.HTM
Turin forensic physician Baima Bollone (1983) and Middle Eastern archaeologist Eugenia Nitowski (1986) found traces of aloe and myrrh on their Shroud cloth samples
Post-resurrection:
John 20:6-7
When Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there,
and the cloth that had covered his head, not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place.
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0839/__PXS.HTM
You guys are arguing about something written decades and decades after the fact. Nothing is right. It's made up, the result of story telling. Do you perceive the scribes were reasearching existing texts in some grand library with micro-fiche. They had no such luxury. They msut have sat down from scratch, with nothing and started writing. How can any of it conceivably be fact.
Oh right - the angels told them what to write.
It's made up, the result of story telling
Asteriod, by your own admission you haven't done the research to arrive at that conclusion. You've just chosen not to believe it. Thus, I would ask you to stay out of the debate.
The Shroud of Turin also matches the accounts of the torture of Jacques de Molay by Phillip IV's henchmen. It was carbon dated to that time, (14th Century).
It is alleged that de Molay's death gave rise to the (alleged) unluckiness of Friday the 13th too.
The 1988 Carbon dating has been debunked. It was re-dated in 2013 with the expected correct results.
Link?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/28/shroud-of-turin-real-jesus_n_29...
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/03/30/shroud-turin-display...
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/03/29/shroud-turin-dates-back-to-jes...
http://www.religionnews.com/2013/04/01/new-testing-dates-shroud-of-turin...
Somebody clearly didn't like the previous results. So it was "redated" in 2013 with the "expected correct" results.
Who do you suppose "expected" those results to be "correct"?
'Who controls the past,' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.' -- George Orwell 1984
http://www.csicop.org/specialarticles/show/claims_of_invalid_ldquoshroud...
""Somebody"" was one of the original scientists who debunked his own result.
Did his owner take him in the back room and give him the what-for, an or-else and a new script?
Some "scientists" can be influenced to provide quite unscientific opinions. Global warming, aka climate change, and LENR, aka cold fusion, are excellent examples of this phenomenon.
Do your own research. I'm not here to discuss something that obviously won't ever convince you.
If you're "not here to discuss something that obviously won't ever convince you", why are you here discussing it? That's illogical just like all your other superstitious, nonsensical religious bullshit.
If you want a logical proof, check out Spinoza.
They are reserving what little they have left for Tony Blair and Adolf Hitler...
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2009/aug/28/blair-conversion-catholi...
When is he going to sell the Vatican's gold...?...
The proper use of gold whether it be in the economy at large, as deposits to be borrowed against and / or saved / lent / bought / sold for the sake of religous purposes continues to plague the mind of mankind. Jesus came down hard on the Jewish leaders of his day for their love of the metal and the "swearing" of oathes having more meaning and thereby enforcemnet than oathes taken on the temple itself.
His admonition was the temple, i.e. the rule of law, was far more imprortant than the metal stored in the structure used to "sanctify" the gifts contained therein.
It seems gold's value is in the fact it can stand the use as currency without wearing out and it's stockpiling in reserves, whether in a house of worship, bank vault, sea bed or hole in the ground was to be frowned upon.
The fact of the "Vatican's gold" being "sold" will only account for a temporary absence as it continues in circulation and inevitably returns as it's placed in "circulation". This is why though the amount of above ground gold in existence pales in comparison to the amount of currency in existence, it can still function quite adequately as currency as it's the exchange velocity that's important.
Just because the average human heart pumps ~1900 gallons of blood in a day doesn't mean we need more than ~5-6 quarts in the body to accomplish the feat.
jmo.
Wow. Talk about not getting the point.
As a person who likes to talk as if he cares about all the people, especially children, dying from all sorts of preventable causes, the pope might bother to spend some of that vast wealth to make a difference.
And like J said, if you teach a man to fish, you've helped him far more than just giving him fish, so how about using that vast wealth to fund projects like REAL alternative energy projects, or sustainable eco farming, or countless other awesome things any decent trillionaire would spend some of their coin on, surely...
Vinny the nose will not be happy
Remember Dennis Hopper in that scene, explaining what an eggplant was?
Yes, he believes in good knight obama's holy crusade of statist wealth redistribution. Of course, this does not apply to the Vaticans vast wealth or obama's soon to be, vast wealth.
Just you and our paltry wealth ;-)
Apparently not.
Bad news for the Kennedys, though. Or would have been, years ago. They used to do a lot of business with the mob.
So how's a poor mobster gonna get to heaven, now?
So Al Capone got in as did all the mobsters who died prior to this dictate from the pope but a mobster who dies tomorrow is shit outta luck. Fuck humans are stupid.
Thanks anyway for trying pope, your predecessors could have done this a hundred years ago but the Catholic Church always was a little slow on the uptake.
All of you people that proudly call yourselves catholic, when are you going to just let it go.
The Catholic Church was not slow on the uptake - See Roberto Calvi.
Google it, it's worth it.
So Al Capone got in
Too silly. And you're a proclaimed atheist so why care? Having doubts?
Hahahaha, havinhg doubts. Oh you christians so want other people to have your beliefs. It's not about having doubts, it's about NOT KNOWING. How you can subscribe to the bullshit spewed forth by christianity JLee is a deep mystery to me. Sure, there may be an infinitely powerful creator of this universe but there may not be either, You are so indoctinated that it defies belief. Mate, if you belive all this stuff about angels, and floods and talking bushes and immaculate conception and then rising from the dead and going to heaven on a sun beam, I'm just not sure how the rational part of your brain, well, rationalises this.
It's not you personally that I am attacking, it's the idea embedded from a young age in your brain. Not even your fault, programming is programming. The reason I partake in these types of debates is pure fascination with the human mind and trying to understand why throughtout millenia humans think they know, when it is patently IMPOSSIBLE to know. The human mind is so absurdly fucked up that from out tiny little speck in an infinitely large universe, we think we know the origin of the universe.
I just want to get that admission from you that YOU DO NOT KNOW.
it's about NOT KNOWING
We never know. Faith and reason bridges the distance. One morning I was making my coffee and a voice within spoke to me, said one of my prayers had been answered. Turned out later it was. I still have doubts, that's just human nature. But you have to trust and beleive, using reason to determine truth.
The real crime, to me, is refusing to even try to figure out the truth. Hey Ma, I have this wonderful thing inside my head with 100 trillion neural net connections that can process all kinds of things and store 3 million years of memories and not use it? You should be sent to the scrap yard.
If you hear voices then I dread to say, it could be schizophrenia. We have a family friend who claims the same thing yet she goes even further and claims to see flashes of lightning. She attributes this to god. Her brother committed suicide. She has all the hallmarks of mental illness. This is hardly an amusing or remotely funny anecodote. It is deeply sad.
The route to truth is via science not the ramblings of the bible. There has been so much work done on the brain through the study of evolution as to be astounding yet science has barely scratched the surface. Faith is is invalid concept, dispense with it. It defies the most basic tenets of the transitive nature of equality, if a=b and b=c the a must equal c. If faith can be used to validate one belief, it can be used to validate all beleifs. Many beliefs contradict each other therefore faith is a reductio ad absurdam.
If you believe chemical interactions can happen without the direct intervention of god then it may actually be possible that all you see before you is an inevitable culmination on the non symmetric nature of chemical reactions. Certain conditions favour some reactions over others and this, inevitably (whether you believe possible or not) leads to an arms race of complexity. Crikey, read David Attenboroughs The Living Plant or Life on Earth for Pete's sake if you want truth. There is so much information out there as a result of millions (maybe billions) of man hours of scientific research.
The origin of the brain will not be found in the bible my friend but the limitations of it may be.
When you boil it all down to the most basic elements of all of the arguments, it really comes down to this: Either you believe that consciousness arose from an aggregation of dead matter we call "the universe," or you believe that the universe arose from consciousness. Myself, I find the arguments for the latter to be more numerous and weighty than the arguments for the former.
I don't subscribe to any particular religion, but I am of the opinion that this reality is a subset of a far greater reality, and I believe in some sort of a "great mind" behind it all. If you can show me any decent proof that demonstrates how consciousness can spontaneously arise from dead matter, I'd be most appreciative.
"show me any decent proof that demonstrates how consciousness can spontaneously arise from dead matter".
EE - we are always looking for a quick answer. The use of the word spontaneous highlights exactly our inability to deal with deep time. Consciousness has taken billions of years to evolve, if this is spontaneous then I need a new stop clock. The quest to understand consciousness will take humankind hundreds if not thousands more years to unravel and that is assuming we survive that long. We seem incapable of examining the universe without imposing our infinitesimally narrow experience on its workings. A flat worm is living proof that a simple brain can evolve. A fruit fly is living proff that a slightly more complex brain can evolve. A fish is living proof that an even more complex brain can evolve all the way through birds, dolphins, apes and humans.The premise is that evolution is the engine behind these advances. Evolution in non scientific circles is still hotly debated. I can put this to rest with the simple train of thought. Ask yourself this. Is the offspring of any given species, whether plant or animal, identical? The answer is obviously no. Given this ask yourself the following question. Does every offspring of any given species, whether plant or animal, have exactly the same survival prospects? The answer again must be no. I don;t need to complicate this by stating how the survival prospects are different, we just need to agree they must be different if the offspring are all slightly different. If a given offspring has characteristics that confer a higher survivability it will leave more offspring. The only thing missing that we haven't discussed is the billions of years of time the process takes and that it the one achilles heel in our thinking. We simply can't conceive of virtually eternal (from the perspective of a human) periods of time.
Despite the description above many people just can't accept that chance mutations can create complex order. Just as many people can't accept coincidence without inferring predestiny or some controlling entity to have dictated the outcome. It's a limiting characteristic of our minds. I contend still that at the crux of the issue is that we are placental mammals. If we emerged asexually then I suspect we would have no concept of a higher power. From birth our parents are the higher power, god just takes over the role for many adults.
I find it intriguing that you can't accept a universe coming from nothing and the slow emergence of complex life yet you can accept a "Great mind" coming from nothing or always having existed. Why does your intrigue stop at the "great mind"?
It's evident that you don't grasp the problem. In the materialist model of metaphysics, the mind has to be generated from moment to moment by a 'material' reality from which it is ontologically distinct. That is certainly 'spontaneous' by any meaning of the word, and no appeals to long processes of brain evolution will ever sweep under the rug this fact any more than they will the logically insurmountable problem of deriving a mind from the objects of physics through some mechanism governed by its equations. It is insurmountable not least of all as it violates identity.
That is a straw man and twice a false dichomotmy. Both 'coming from nothing' and 'always having existed' are notions implying the idea of temporality which are completely inapplicable to the transcendent being that is God.
The issue is not an historical one of the emergence of 'complex life', but a metaphysical one of the possibility of mind and consciousness in a world which is fundamentally physical. The materialist's answer is, and will of necessity always be, since he deals only with physical mechanism, by hocus pocus; whereas his opponent will with full empirical and logical justification maintain that the 'matter' of experience is a mode of the substance of mind modelled through the abstract objjects of physics, while the nebulous substance of philosophical materialism is a mere indefinable abstraction concocted by the minds of materialists.
"completely inapplicable to the transcendent being that is God"
Talk about straw man argument. The word transcendent is a human concoction and is nothing more than a fire escape for theists who can no longer carry a debate. In an adult debate you can't sweep away the notion of where god came from by invoking a single word. I'll sweep away the whole debate by using the word "non-existent". There you go, god doesn't exist because he is non-existent. Theists use the word transcendent because the irrationality of their obsession with a creator reaches it's absurd illogical conclusion as to the creator of the creator.
As to your comments regarding mind and the physical brain you do a wonderful job of word smithing a counter argument. You must find the existence of magnetic and electric fields impossible in a physical universe because, well, they aren't physical. I'd recommend Daniel Dennets Consciousness Explained. It doesn't satisfactorily explain consciousness but goes someway, at least, to explain the emergence of mind.
JLee - You really have 3 million years of memories?
No, only 3 million attempts by atheists to lie about what I said.
“I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.” -- Stephen Roberts
"Religion. A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable.
Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel.
Pray, v.: To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy." Ambrose Bierce
As long as a drone does the actual killing remotely, god is cool with it.
Exactly, see Shabbat elevator
"A terrorist is someone who has a bomb but doesn't have an air force." William Blum
He should excommunicate the bankers. After all Jesus chased them out of the temple. The most immoral segment of mankind.
It ain't business, it's moral
Does that include all the Mafiosi from the Criminal UNITED STATES, CORP. INC.?
So, no redemption then.
Now who's acting like a godfather? ;-)
Will it too, be a matter of Dispensation of Indulgences?
Nah, this guy's a Jesuit.
Takes this shit seriously
Not a catholic myself so I'm not learned in their practices but I've had my eye on this cat.
He's dickin around with things apart from guiding people toward what he has chosen (outwardly) to do. I'm not saying he's an evil man, I'm saying he should leave the laws of the state alone and stay within "his law profession" lest he be captured by it...if he isn't already.
Not catholic either, but do spend much recreational time reading of philosophy, quantum mechanics, morals and ethics, classics and the like.
Yeah, yeah, I know... Odd mix, but then again, adds some interesting perspectives.
For example, the Reformation was at heart largely driven by economic demands. Tithing to the church as well as taxes to the crown. The peasantry wanted the tithing lost, the crown wanted the revenues as well as the elimination of the "divine" competition. Ah hah! And so the disparity between faith without works (must tithe to get to heaven) and sola fida (faith alone, and thus, no need to tithe)
Dispensation of Indulgences lies within the intersection again of the ecumenical and economics as well as violates basic roots of morals and ethics.
Newton as a "Natural Philosopher" also ventured to similar ground ... and in part, wound up head of the King's Treasure(y) and guided England off silver in favor of gold specie... Oh my....
Ah, goes on and on...
But fresh perspectives not "allowed" in modern media.
Plus... fascinates me that so many attempt to "debate" the topic of God and likewise confuse spirituality and religion...
Faith is an experiential phenomenon, not intellectual.
That "imaginary little friend" some refer to is just so ever close .... but no cigar ...
LOL
Well like you, I probably read way too much...lol...and like you have discovered the "arch-trinity" of government-church-people to be some great reading on many levels.
I did look up catholicism's Dispensation of Indulgences and it appears professional pardoners (sanctioned by the catholic church, very scandalous) led directly to the Reformation, of which my beliefs come, lets just say Protestant ;-)
Another interesting thing about beliefs, religion, spirituality, science and philosophy is, we have people who "believe" in morals & ethics, ghosts, wraiths, good & evil along with time and distance having been overcome by space aliens of some sort, yet, reject God.
It is, as I say, fascinating...lol.
Nicely stated. :)
For example, the Reformation was at heart largely driven by economic demands.
A complex thing to be sure. To me, the Reformation was driven by Copernicus and Galileo, who showed people the Church was incorrect in teaching the Earth was the Center of the Universe. This led to people not believing the Church "had all the answers", was not infallible, shook faith, and gave groups excuses to break away.
However, centuries later, geocentrism is again back on the map with the PLANCK space mission confirming the cosmic "Axis of Evil". Current science cannot prove or disprove geocentrism, therefore the Church may have been correct all along. We live in most interesting times.
"Current science cannot prove or disprove geocentrism".
What do you mean? Can't prove that the earth revolves around the sun or can't prove the earth is not the centre of the universe?
Science can't prove alot of things, in fact there'd be infinitely more things science cannot prove than it can. I'm curious as to the theists tactic of highlighting those things science cannot prove as it's failing yet accept blindly the childish, superstitious and plainly silly things claimed to have happened by the bible.
One other thing, why are thesists obsessed about the geometrical position of the earth in the universe? In your god created universe why can't the earh be 3.6782 light years from the centre, if there is is a centre?
The motion of the Earth cannot be proven. We know things are moving, just not what.
Albert Einstein:
""The struggle, so violent in the early days of science, between the views of Ptolomy and Copernicus would then be quite meaningless. Either coordinate system could used with equal justification. The two sentences: "the sun is at rest and the Earth moves", or "the sun moves and the Earth is at rest", would simply mean to different conventions concerning two different coordinate systems.""
The Evolution of Physics: From Early Concepts to Relativity and Quanta, page 212.
Stephen Hawking:
in his lastest book The Grand Design, has made exactly the same point than Einstein:
""So which is real, the Ptolemaic (also known as geocentrism) or Copernican system? Although it is not uncommon for people to say that Copernicus proved Ptolemy wrong, that is not true."" (page 41)
One other thing, why are thesists obsessed about the geometrical position of the earth in the universe? In your god created universe why can't the earh be 3.6782 light years from the centre, if there is is a centre?
The two main idea in cosmology are
1) The age-old Church Christian teaching that the Earth and life on it is the pinnacle of creation and center of the Universe, we are very special or
2) the atheist Earth is in no special place, the Universe is filled with planets that could support life we are nothing special, there is no GOD, etc.
But why is centre placed any more special than displaced two meters to one side. This is silly. The reason it doesn't make sense is because you're just reading stuff from the bible and palming it off as fact. The obsession with centricity is some ancient idea about order.
If you really think the planets are revolving around the sun and that whole system is then revolving around the earth you're just not with it mate. Something is seriously amiss. I don't mind debating science and religion but this is getting just too ridiculous. We're one post away from you claiming the earth is flat.
Pope Francis is confused and obviously not guided by divinity.
He visits the father of a slain child, who died in violence related to government prohibition of drugs.
But he also says elsewhere that we should not end but continue the war on drugs. Drugs should not be legalized, but remain criminalized according to Franky. If legalized this will lead to all types of horrors according to Franky, yet the death of this child due to the policy he advocates is unfortunate yet the proper course of action to address this issue!
Talk about Bling leading the Blind.
The blood of this child is on Francis hands as well as anyone else who advocates for criminalizing addicts, regulating what humans can do to themselves, creating a niche for violent criminals to serve customers who want drugs, and worst of all, misleading millions of people world wide with his half baked understanding of the world around us and human nature.
The guy believes in a grey bearded invisible sky man and you want reason from him?
Oh goodie, the atheists have arrived.
I'll alert Robert Penrose ;-)
We're not all that bad. In fact you and I are very similar. You know how you think of the gods that the Greeks and the Pharoahs and the Mayans and the Polynesians worshipped. Well I think exactly the same but just also think the same of the modern Western civilisations god.
We're very alike ;)
;-)
No problem. I just don't get all bent out of shape when someone mentions pan or isis or bahlam or gaia. I do when they mention marx though...lol.
You might if they were mentioned every single day, every day, over and over again. I would welcome isis, bahlam or gaia just for a change. So curious how a certain segment of the American population has become frantic with this idea of jesus.
Anyway, makes ZH an intersting place.
Pretty sure Christianity is worldwide (not just America), they are afterall being slaughtered in Africa almost daily, so your anguish at the very mention of Jesus or Christianity could be much much worse if everything were reported or commented on.
So there, that should make you happy...lol.
At any rate, I mentioned Roger Penrose in this section and he calculates the odds of evolution at 1010123 to 1.
Now there's something to try & wrap your head around, philosophically ;-)
Nice reply 'Bring On', :)
So 80% of the Italians are now excommunicated ?
How about those banksters ? they already worship the devil.
"How about those banksters ? they already worship the devil"
Psst, so does the Jesuit Vatican.
"syndicate that enriches itself by extorting businesses and infiltrating public works contracts"
Did 90% of the Bureaucrats and Contractors that are employed by the Federal, State, and local Governments of the United States just get excommunicated?
A side note: are the parish priests going to turn the Mafiosi away from mass/communion/confessional?
-THAT might be very interesting...
Is the Catholic Church going to relinquish all the funds tithed to it by the mafia, no of course not. Turning them away will hit the bottom line too hard.
How about relinquishing that German Nazi Gold.
You don't understand. The Catholics are able to wield the Ring of Power for the good of mankind. Or so they claim.
Humans have a primordial and genetic perogative to be subservient to a higher authority.
This is the genetic memory of a countless number of cataclysms.
Good to know that "Those who go down the evil path" are excommunicated. The wording indicates that Mafiosi are mentioned as simply an example.
Does that automatic excommunication apply to pedophile priests? To politicians and bureaucrats that wage war on their people and promote abortion which the Church says is an abomination?
If Pope Francis is being consistent, there are a lot of others he could have mentioned in his statement.
He would be the only catholic left.
The one thing consistent about Pope Francis are his inconsistencies.
Nah, I'm sure Congress has passed a law that excludes them from being excommunicated, a bit like how they can't be prosecuted for insider trading etc.
obviously child molester priests are fine though. :roll:
Obviously you have not read the Bible . It is ok be a Priest and a Molester.
Das rayciss!
Child traffickers too, apparently.
Cue mafia dons converting to Judaism.
Good bye. Weep thee not! And shove it where the Sun don't shine!
Apparently, I can't handle the truth.
"Sorry, this content can not be displayed in your region."
It is CBS news, wouldn't have been the truth anyway.
Thanks, the obvious always eludes me.
Then you should also know this is a non-story distraction supposing the West holds the moral high ground, and are doing God's work by judging.
Holy shit, dude. Your ass is on fire!
“Our job is to give people not what they want, but what we decide they ought to have.”- Richard Salent, Former President CBS News
" What did you dream? It's alright, we told you what to dream!" Floyd, P.
UnKindness is XXX, jus' sayin' they're for nothing.
Does this include Federal Reserve shareholders?
Time for the Mafia to become Muslim.
ROTFL!...my point exactly...what would it be called?
Shariatholism? ;-)
Sure, the religion the forbids usury. There's another religion that promotes the lifestyle more favoured by the Mafiosi.
One that considers all non members of the tribe as cattle.
But you two seem to have a soft spot in your heart for it, so it's all the muslim's fault.
We still talking about the tribe that supports the jizya tax or sumpin else? ;-)
Hah ha ha ha
Both religions forbid buggery of small boys but then again, practice is somewhat at odds .....
Yes, apparently hypocrisy isn't a vice that afflicts the evil with guilt.
Whocouldaknowed? ;-)
Most beautious!
Swedish health authorities discover every girl in one class had undergone genital mutilation http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/190641/
No they have an option, to Reverse and RE-JOIN the Orthodox version, the Patriarch in Constantinoupole Has NO PROBLEM IN SUPPORTING their Greek Brothers in Crime Politicians. He aparently blessed the Chief in Crime Foreign Minister Venizelos (Tourkoglu, his original name). Go figure.
yeah, all those virgins and stuff you get when your dead beats the hell out of a pair of wings, no pun intended.
How long before all the politicians are excommunicated?
Because of her longstanding support for abortion, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), a Catholic, must be denied Communion under the law of the Catholic Church, said Cardinal Raymond Burke, head of the highest court at the Vatican.
Pelosi prefers to commune by drinking the blood of the unborn.
The Catholic Church, screwing peoples lives up for 2,000 years and counting.
The Pope isn't a politician?
I went to a local Catholic church today when I heard "the eucharist" repeated over and over again as the means to salvation. Jesus was using metaphors when He spoke of eating His body and blood and they want to make it all of earth-shattering significance? Who are the real heretics here? The Pope is on thin ice, too bad we have so few reformers like Jan Hus, William Tyndale and Menno Simons!
As if Christians can ever agree on what's supposed to be metaphor and what's not ... on the other side of the coin at least the Catholic church doesn't take the creation story as literal. Win some, lose some.
The invisible man in the sky!!!
Well that would have fucked up the ends of Godfather 2 and 3.
What about pedophile priests?!
As a general rule in the South, we send them to God so they can be judged properly ;-)
Seems to work better that way than in NYC or Boston...
There is nothing worse than stealing the innocence and trust of a child.
I can't muster the forgiveness in my heart, better to let the only One who can give it...or not.
As I mentioed above, the Muzzies got a piece of that action, so to speak...
I think god's a comedian.
He cursed humans with religion and is sitting back laughing his arse off.
Assuming 'he' exists, of course.
Randy Newman's take
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEKuGcmW70I&feature=kp
I feel your sentiment but, there are sooo many ways in which adults steal the trust and innocence of children.
Certainly so...but fabricating Santa Claus to bring joy and delight to a child is no crime.
And its something that can be passed down to theirs and the good deeds can be "infectious" to all ;-)
The northerners are always on the lookout for southerner anti-intellectuals and know nothings...The more you people retaliate the more we will viscerally...
I think in the Catholic church, that's OK if they are minors, at least that seems to be the way it works looking at how the catholic church moved serial pedophiles on from one church to another when they were exposed.
Are all politicians, bureaucrats, and 'police' included? The mafia is relatively honest compared to those thugs.
What's the difference between a pol, crat, bankster, gun and badge thug and a mobster?
The mobster knows that he's a brutal thief. The others pretend they aren't.
"My guillotine likes them all. Especially the banksters."
I used to watch the Sopranos, am I out?
The Pope is anti-Italian too?
Anyone who commits mortal sin is already excommunicated latae sententiae by canon law without the need for an ecclesiastical procedure. The sinner must then seek sacramental absolution which includes a firm purpose of amendment before he can be readmitted to the Church. In the case of a serious crime like premeditated murder, absolution would be denied by the priest unless and until the penitent turned himself over to the civil authorities for punishment. Even though "Pope Francis" is in fact not a true pope but an antipope of the Catholic Church on account of the ecumenism and many other heresies he has taught from the Petrine See, what he has said here is neither wrong nor original.
I am disgusted, but not really surprised, by the staggering degree of ignorance there is in the world regarding Catholic doctrine.