Guest essay by H. Sterling Burnett
Pope Francis evidently has decided to make fighting global warming an important papal cause in 2015. He praised the United Nations’ climate treaty efforts in Lima, Peru; the Vatican has indicated he will issue an encyclical letter to the world’s bishops; he is encouraging the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics to take up the battle against climate change; and he’s planning to address the next UN climate conference in Paris to pressure world leaders to adopt a strong climate agreement.
The Vatican Pontifical Academy of Sciences may be behind the pope’s rising interest in global warming as a moral and political cause. Its chancellor, Bishop Marcelo Sorondo, said, “Our academics supported the pope’s initiative to influence next year’s crucial decisions. The idea is to convene a meeting with leaders of the main religions to make all people aware of the state of our climate and the tragedy of social exclusion.”
Many Catholics undoubtedly support the pope’s efforts and, unlike many of his critics, I would argue the views of the pope, a significant moral leader, should be considered as climate policies are shaped. As the leader of the largest Christian denomination in the world, he is charged not just with saving souls but also with alleviating the suffering of the world’s least fortunate, and with leading the Catholic Church in efforts to make the world a better place.
Having said this, I also know moral imperatives and public policies should be grounded in the best-available science, in the reality of the human condition, and in the state of both the planet and the people. Concerning global warming, the pope evidently has been badly misinformed and led astray.
None of the disasters asserted by climate alarmists to result from global warming has come to pass. Hurricane numbers are down, deaths from natural disasters have declined, sea ice is on the rise, and crop production is increasing. Climate models have yet to be validated, missing the lull in temperature rise for the past 18 years and the declining rates of sea-level rise for the past decade. Instead, the gap between temperatures projected by climate models and temperature observed in reality grows yearly.
Investor’s Business Daily has speculated the Vatican is itching to tackle climate change, despite the above-stated facts, because,
[The] Vatican … has been infiltrated by followers of a radical green movement that is, at its core, anti-Christian, anti-people, anti-poor and anti-development. The basic tenets of Catholicism – the sanctity of human life and the value of all souls – are detested by the modern pagan environmentalists who worship the created, but not the creator. … Big Green believes that too many human beings are the basic global problem. People, according to this view, are resource destroyers. Climate change, they say, is due to the overpopulation of Mother Earth.
The pope would do well to question the sources of his information and to recognize his efforts should be focused on alleviating the poverty and suffering of billions of people in the world today. The best policy to accomplish that goal would be alleviating energy poverty worldwide.
As a CNS editorial stated,
Alex Epstein argues, rather than taking a safe climate and making it dangerous through the use of fossil fuels, we have been transforming a dangerous climate into a safer, more manageable one for human flourishing.
Humans have long fought a war with climate, and to the extent we’ve won it has been through the use of technology, most recently including, fossil fuels.
Note from Anthony:
As a Catholic myself, I’m disappointed in this stance, especially since it seems out of place with doctrines of the past where there Church denounced many issues of science through its history, only to later admit they erred, jumped to conclusions, and admitted such errors in judgment decades or centuries later.
For example, it only took the Catholic church 359 years to decide that Galileo was right after all, and that the Earth DOES in fact revolve around the Sun.
I plan to ignore the Pope and its science panel, as many are likely to do given their track record on getting science wrong in almost every case where science and religion have collided through history,
Oh nooes!! – the Pope and the entire Vatican is in on the whole AGW scam!
“Today we have changed our natural environment to such an extent that scientists are redefining the current period as the Age of the Anthropocene, that is to say an age when human action, through the use of fossil fuels, is having a decisive impact on the planet. If current trends continue, this century will witness unprecedented climate changes and ecosystem destruction that will severely impact us all.”
“The massive fossil fuel use at the heart of the global energy system deeply disrupts the Earth’s climate and acidifies the world’s oceans. The warming and associated extreme weather will reach unprecedented levels in our children’s life times and 40% of the world’s poor, who have a minimal role in generating global pollution, are likely to suffer the most. Industrial-scale agricultural practices are transforming landscapes around the world, disrupting ecosystems and threatening the diversity and survival of species on a planetary scale.”
http://www.casinapioiv.va/content/accademia/en/events/2014/sustainable/statement.html
The problem is deeper than the Vatican science panel. The Jesuit and other academic orders have been captured by the University culture in which they reside.
Soon people will be pointing out that the Catholic Church left them- they did not leave the Church.
Take time to read and ponder Catechism sections 1939 through 1948 – the Solidarity sections.
Now do the math to by adding up the number of Catholics in nations which are third world or whose government leaders either fully or partially support human caused climate change. It comes out to close to 100%, Canada and Australia notwithstanding.
Thus, for political, demographic, Doctrine, and simply sheer survival of the Church, no one should be at all surprised the Pope and the Church are embarking on the climate change bandwagon. And make no mistake, the majority of Cardinals fully support these moves. Only a relatively small group of “conservative” bishops have voiced concerns and look what the Chruch did to them. The Church is simply announcing that it, too, is as socialistic as the governments of the world.
So sad that the Pope has succumbed to the pop-sci view of the world- a man’s decisions are only as good as the advice he is given.
Still, he’s not the first major world leader to make an error this egregious. George W. Bush allowed his EPA to classify CO2 as a pollutant- and Bush, for the most part, is an OK guy. Yeah, he made some mistakes, but who here hasn’t?
Yeah, I used to lie, and I thought to myself: that’s one terrible liar.
I am dismayed by this issue expanding from a political one into a religious one. With the Pope on the left and evangelicals on the right, what hope is there of reason? It was bad enough when it was Bush vs Gore, Abbott vs Gillard and Rudd. This was never about science!
I am dismayed by this issue expanding from a political one into a religious one. With the Pope on the left and evangelicals on the right, what hope is there of reason? It was bad enough when it was Bush vs Gore, Abbott vs Gillard and Rudd. This was never about science!
Yes, but the Pope himself did it. Deal with that irrefutable fact.
Isn’t there something called “Papal Bull”?.
By the way, from work experience in 3rd world countries, very often the local religious authorities side with anti-development NGOs, largely because they don’t want their populace to get more educated and to learn to think for themselves.
Long ago when I was a kid in catechism class, the Church was all about avoiding excessive warming in the next life. Now I see it has switched to worrying about heat in this one.
IMHO, once again Mark Steyn has nailed it:
Yes. Steyn frames the issue well. Pope Francis is making historical and foolish errors.
I stopped taking orders from Popes a long time ago. When I was about four years old, actually. But my parents are still practising Catholics and they too have spotted the very obvious holes and contradictions that this pope has not spotted.
I think the Investor’s Business Daily is probably right, and this particular Argentinian should leave the entertainment to Lionel Messi.
Reblogged this on .
“Pope’s moral compass”
As a laybody ,the church is only going with the scientific evidence as it has with geology, astronomy, biology ,etc . Even with its dogma hindering other issues the Catholic church endorses evolution ,tempting as it would be to support the denialist evidence against it. However, uniquely with climate science , the terminal sceptics claim the evidence is corrupted , there’s not 2 kinds of science.
Just publish your evidence for peer review, even Monckton tries to do that.
Frank,
You are working so hard to compress so many fallacies into one post. Keep up the good work. It clearly beats thinking on your part
hunter,
Explain the fallacy contained in:
“Just publish your evidence for peer review, even Monckton tries to do that.”
All this slam dunk evidence is wasted here in blogworld, just get out of the sheltered workshop and submit it.
Frank
Gee, who are the anonymous all-knowing so-called “peers” who control all scientific data and papers? What are THEIR credentials and THEIR biases and who controls THEIR salaries and papers and THEIR research? You claim anonymous “peer-review” as the absolute first step, and final and absolute last step, and every-edited-step-in-between between a new idea and “the truth” … Yet I can read absolute evidence that both editors and peer-preview and the “consensus science” of delays and editing interferences and peer-review selection IS corrupt and itself designed to prevent unpopular ideas and calculations from coming forth.
Do you believe a Washington that claims “global warming” the most serious threat the world faces would support and actually fund ANYONE or ANY TYPE of contrary evidence in its religion and its halls of hypocrisy?
RAC,
So a global conspiracy is your strongest explanation for the constant rejection of your evidence.
Using Ockham’s Razor ,I think by far the most likely explanation is that the climate scientists are doing their job.
“So a global conspiracy is your strongest explanation . . . .”
They aren’t plotting together, as the word implies, but they are “breathing together.”
Frank, Try IPCC AR5. Box 9.2.
It show that the models were wrong – systematically wrong. As the climate models are the AGW hypothesis then the hypothesis is wrong.
Published by the IPCC.
For the religious, either God will allow us to destroy ourselves via global warming as punishment for our live style or God won’t. Either way there is nothing we can do about it if it is God’s will.
These “guys” were fighting God’s will, a few of them decided it was best to fight another day:
They were all demonstration flights weren’t they ?
Oh well, poetry in motion still.
Terrible theology, great video 🙂
Was that at BHX?
Just watched it again…it is BHX…thought it looked familiar.
The rise of the climate obsessed movement is clearly analogous to cult like behavior and popular delusions. That this Pope has fallen prey to the movement to this extent speaks badly about his judgement and the health of the Vatican that advises him. As a Catholic I sincerely hope Pope Francis does not further aggravate his error by abusing this and declaring it a doctrinal issue.
hunter,
As a theist you are hardly in a position to claim that others are not following the scientific method. A little self analysis might highlight the duality of your thinking. If you are able to believe in a God then it won’t take much to follow some other form of wishful thinking.
Wow, I guess Newton should not be considered a scientist either!
I wish people would get it into their heads that belief in God does not negate ability to reason or think, or to separate fact and fantasy. Unlike belief in global warming, which in the general population – and especially among the left-leaning intelligentsia – is largely a result of propaganda telling us that scientists have discovered it to be real, a belief in the Christian God involves a difficult act of will.
It also recognizes that to act on this belief will involve sacrifice and self-denial, since we must put the needs of others first, strive to do the right thing, and to forgive those who hurt us, which is one of the hardest things of all to do in life. It also means, in our modern era, being subject to vicious intellectual mockery by those who are ignorant of Christianity and its real history (i.e. not the hatred purveyed in the form of half-truths, innuendo and lies by the mainstream media). Living a truly Christian life is hardly an exercise in wishful thinking.
VFish,
If you require “a difficult act of will ” to overide reasoning then you certainly at home here.
Good morals are not held in a monopoly by the religious
Such as atheism for which there is equal evidence, presumably?
However, we do have evidence that religious faith is compatible with practicing good science; Newton, Faraday, Buckland, Mendel etc…
On the other hand, there is very little reason to think that atheism is compatible with practicing good science. Atheism’s lack of reason for there being any real patterns in nature – our sense are deceivers , after all – means that nothing passes muster for investigation. It is too sceptical.
Frank,
I am open in my duality. There is a balance of faith and reason and like all balaancing acts, a challenge. Since we see aggressively non-theist people falling for the climate obsession in clearly religious ways, I think you could think about this a little bit deeper and perhaps discover something better than a soundbite response.
Even before the time of Galileo Galilei, the “Western Church” has a very noted track record of making bad decisions.
An example from our recent times:
Pope Pius XII smuggled 26,000 people out of Europe, most of whom were jewish. All while Hitler was killing priests and catholics and jews, and anyone else who stood in his way.Pope Pius’ efforts to protect the Church, its people and many jews in the middle of the worst human conflict in history was a miracle
And…What about the fall of communism in Poland…?.
The irony is that a very large and growing contingent of the Left that supports CAGW are also very anti-theistic in general, and very anti-Catholic in particular.
Accordingly, the Pope’s advocacy of CAGW is inadvertently supporting the Left’s attack on Christianity.
Being Machiavellian, the Left has absolutely no qualms in propagandizing the Pope’s CAGW support as it’s simply fits their tenet of, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend”…
Another bit of irony is that the Catholic church has a long (and often justified) reputation of being anti-science. As the CAGW hypothesis is on the cusp of official disconfirmation, the Pope’s advocacy of CAGW simply reinforces this reputation as being an anti-science institution….
“…The idea is to convene a meeting with leaders of the main religions to make all people aware of the state of our climate and the tragedy of social exclusion…”
———————
Kyrie Elaison
Lord, have mercy.
CAGW / Green zelots …&… Catholics (& most other god based theologies)
So we have 2 faith based religions that ignore facts, make false prophecy’s, give indulgences, work from a consensus document, attempt to change fact to suit the belief, both engage in cover-ups to hide criminal activity, both stifle opposing views, both say they want to release people from poverty BUT both like to sit in the middle & take a hefty rake off, both have elites who aren’t subject to the restraints or poverty of the people thy lead, both use fear to control, both have falling congregations….. so a merger makes good business sense.
Al Gore et al. & the pope et al. sing from the same hymn sheet, control & cash.
Both are (rich) hypocrites & history shows that both of their beliefs are flawed.
The pope, as noted in the post, is likely following the advice of the Vatican Pontifical Academy of Sciences. The Vatican Pontifical Academy of Sciences has come to the same conclusion that the National Academy of Sciences and the analogous bodies in all the G8+5 countries have come to in regards to climate change.
Given this, I wonder who the author of this post thinks the pope should consult with in regards to the science of climate change (and, similar, who policymakers should consult with). Hopefully, you will come up with a consistent answer that could be applied to any number of scientific issues, rather than just an answer akin to, “He should consult with the few scientists who happen to agree with me.” [Judging from the two sources cited in the article, the author seems to think that he should follow the advice of far-right-wing editor pages (such as those of CNS News or Investor’s Business Daily.]
Ideally, the Pope, and policy makers, would rely on Science based on the Scientific Method, which Climate Science ignores, but we both know that is incredibly unlikely.
It’s not that complicated, and It has nothing to with politics. If you can show me the Science, one that is robust, open, accurate, verifiable and has predictive value, I would gladly agree with you. Can you?
It’s really that simple. That’s the consistent answer that you seek, that can be applied to any number of scientific issues.
All major scientific bodies agree that they are relying on science based on the scientific method. I think they may be a better judge of that than you..
joeldshore
Cute comment, but it ignores about 2000 years of the church’s demonstrated inability to handle science. It has other fish to fry, so to speak.
joelshore says:
All major scientific bodies agree…
That is just another scientifically worthless appeal to authority fallacy. It is no different from the Pope’s authority [which does not go beyond faith and morals]. Oh, wait. Faith applies to global warming, no?
Shore continues with his usual bloviating on politics:
…the author seems to think that he should follow the advice of far-right-wing editor pages…
joelshore seems to think that everyone not of the far Left must be a part of his far right conspiracy. I don’t know much about CNSNews, but IBD must see reality as it is. Otherwise they will give bad advice, subscribers will lose money, and IBD will go out of business.
So rather than being “far right”, IBD is ipso facto right in the middle. They are neither left nor right, but rather, they are reality based. Therefore, it follows that joelshore is way out in left field, and as usual he is trying to make science conform to his nutty far-Left politics.
I plan on ignoring the Pope too. Oh, wait, I always do anyway. Hm. Carry on.
The parallels between Christian Creationists and Climate Alarmists are quite apparent and numerous. Both begin with a preordained conclusion. Both are only interested in evidence that supports their position and will vehemently attack anyone or anything that does not agree with their viewpoint. Both are also motivated to mold young, impressionable minds.
The pope, while making some progress, has yet to comprehensively respond to his organization’s long-standing facilitation of child sex abuse, but he has enough time to get involved (yet again) in science.
The church’s history of sending tens of thousands of people to the inquisitions not withstanding, the thought of priests sitting around “divining” the answer to science questions is funny.
I’m comfortable with my belief in God, but this is yet another example of why I’m uncomfortable with organized religion (they spend too much time building pretty buildings and collecting art).
I wonder what Galileo would think…
1) The Child sex abuse scandal is a canard and has in fact been addressed. 9 credible accusations in 2013 for 60,000 priests while 1 in 8 kids are still be abused by secular teachers in public schools, while the liberal left and Hollywood promote it as an alternative sexual orientation.
2) 3000 people were executed in 310 years of Inquisitions by secular authority mostly (10 per year) while 262,000,000 people were killed by secular “enlightened” government since 1900 while you have been alive. 2.6 Million killed per year. That is MUCH more offensive, if not by scale alone.
3) The big bang was invented by Fr. Georges Henri Lemaitre, a Belgian priest and physicist, who sat around reading Einstein’s relativity and divined that since everything was moving, it must have come from a “Primeval egg”. I think the fact that you claim some scientific high ground and didn’t know that simple fact is, as you put it, funny.
4) I doubt you know anything about Galileo, actually. Only the modern cartoon scripts notes.
Paul
We can quibble all night about you numbers (in 2014, your church claims 38,000 USA priests and about 400,000 world wide); the sex abuse problem is world wide, not just a “canard” in the USA (at least the Irish and Brazilians think so). We can also argue about how much a Ga Tech physicist knows about Galileo, but that’s just silly. I said nothing about the big bang (or Fr Lemaitre), so those gratuitous comments mystify me, and I suspect “mystic” stuff is your preferred form of argument.
I’m not changing my point, which is: despite a few points of light, the church has a demonstrated history of incompetence with science (it gets wrapped up in its dogma); no where in the Bible does God say he’s looking to Peter to get the atmospheric physics correct, or invent the slide rule.
Chip, While ignoring the thrust of this article, you dredge up fake stats and troll out BS that is out of context.
So what are your high and mighty motives?
You said, “has yet to comprehensively respond”. In the USA, only 6 credible accusation in 40,000 priests last year. (the ratio is the same despite my errant number) But that doesn’t change the fact that 1 in 8 kids in public schools are sexually assaulted. (that is where the “enlightened” work, you know, secular schools…what about the response to that?) By comparison the Church is doing quite well on the issue. But you’d never admit that anyway hey Chip.
I doubt you’d know a single actual fact about what the Church vs Galileo controversy was actually about. Where would a hostile GA Tech Physicists actually learn that? If you did you would have modified your fact-less crack. A cartoon notion of history is all a modern GA Tech physicist needs to be popular at physicist parties.
Thinking and “divining” is what the father of the big bang did. He was a priest. Father LeMaitre is smarter than you. You see, your knowledge of science is so thin and selective, based on anti-religion, you miss the obvious. The scientific method in western world is attributed to Roger Bacon, yet another catholic monk~1200 AD. I guess you missed that physics class too. Here is something by the catholic monk, inventor of science that you can pretend to be your idea:
From Bacon in his Opus Majus:
Four obstacles to real wisdom and truth, viz. errors and their sources (the four general causes of human ignorance):
1)the example of weak and unreliable authority;
2)continuance of custom,
3)regard to the opinion of the unlearned, and
4)concealing one’s own ignorance, together with the exhibition of apparent wisdom.
You are in the 1,2,4 set.
You don’t do this well ole chip. You simply don’t know enough, and haven’t taken an interest in the development of science because you have a closed, hostile mind. Western Science is the product of the Roman Catholic mind. It would never have happened otherwise. In fact, it didn’t.
When I lived in Waterford, Ireland, I used to go to a Christian Brothers (CB) school called St. Lawrence. Many years later, one of the CB’s was convicted and jailed for sexual abuse on young boys. Fortunately he never managed to “get” to my brother and I, even though we were very vulnerable at that time (1970’s)Should have happend years earlier however, the church going community, even my grandmother, simply turned a blind eye to his behaviour. I am convinced that there were/are more like him who have slipped under the radar of Police investigations. Victims feel very pressured to remain silent for fear of being scorned by the community. We have the same issue here in Australia.
But I agree with statements that the Pope should focus on cleaning up the sexual predators that infest the Church (A real problem) and leave global warming (A non-problem) well alone.
The Lollards of 14th century England was an early reformist movement concerning the Church.
One of their complaints ” a celibate priesthood which engendered unnatural vices” (such were the morals of the times).
They were effectively stamped out but not before the movement had taken root. It lingered as a secret movement for decades after the leaders were burned/executed/ imprisoned.
So it is a very old problem.
Geeze, Paul, you are a wheeze
You froth at the mouth castigating me about incorrect numbers (I only stated tens of thousands as victims for the inquisition; the accepted number is over 150,000); meanwhile:
o you got the number of USA priests wrong by 100% (32k vs 60k);
o you got the inquisition victims wrong by a whopping 5,000% (3,000 vs 150,000);
o you stared the inquisition “only” lasted 310 years – you’re wrong by about 75% (started about 1250; ended roughly 1800) – you do the math, if you can)
o You imply the inquisition wasn’t really so bad because it only killed 3,000.
o You seem to think child abuse by priests is ok because (you say) public school abuse is worse (note to Paul: public teachers are not priests).
Your ad hominem attacks (I particularly enjoyed “hostile Ga Tech physicist”; however, I prefer “rambling wreck”) don’t really address my initial (and still unrelated statement) “The church’s history of sending tens of thousands of people to the inquisitions not withstanding, the thought of priests sitting around “divining” the answer to science questions is funny.” (note I never claimed 100% of priests are scientifically literate).
The irony here is you are the almost perfect embodiment of church-science logic; you’re so tied up in dogma that you can’t see straight.
I think the problem was not child sex abuse per se, but the active cover-up of it that was perpetrated by Church. There are might be only relatively few pedophile priests, but there were lot more higher-up priests who actively covered for them and (by moving them to different unsuspecting parishes) enabled them to continue.
Chip,
You have no basis to promote the popular lie that more than about 3000 people were killed during the 300 years of the inquisition. Your number is simply made up. What can I say. You just repeated something that you don’t have any direct knowledge.
Let’s face it. You are not a scientist. You are a populist.
By comparison the inquisition (which was morally wrong) was mild compared to modern secular democide that has killed 262,000,000 people. To carp about 3000 in the literal ocean of blood spilled in the last 100 years is absurd and laughable. Any reasonable person would see 262,000,000 murders worse than 3000.
Chip I did not say that that the abuse scandal was ok. That is another lie by you. I said the Church cleaned up its act to the extent that only 6 priests in 40,000 in 2012 were accused of anything while in public schools 1 in 8 kids are abused by a teacher. If child sex abuse is so bad then the public schools ought to implement policies like the RC Church did to irradiate it. See “Educator Sexual Misconduct: A Synthesis of Existing Literature, by Carol Shakeshaft, professor of educational administration at Hofstra University. It is 100 X worse in public schools. Where the “enlightened” reside.
What about Galileo? Have you no insight as to the actual proceedings of his 2 trials? No you don’t because you are an ignoramus. You’d actually have to read his letters, the record of the trials, the letters of Johannes Kepler, translated since they are all in latin, You don’t know that the Church adopted Copernican explanation long before Galileo. You do not know the substance of what the trials were about. You didn’t know there was 2 trials. I know. You don’t. You are an ignorant bomb thrower who fakes knowledge to appear clever. You aren’t clever. You fake knowing things. Open a book.
I am certain that closed minds such as yours will yield no insight for science or the humanities. So keep ignorant of the history of science.
The Big Bang was invented by a priest. Clowns like you suppressed that key revelation for 40 years. And now we know it was suppressed by narrow minded agenda driven posers who had an ax to grind. Like you.
Every single utterance by you is false. So much for your “degree”.
Chip says:
…despite a few points of light, the church has a demonstrated history of incompetence with science…
Can I help with some perspective? Thank you:
…despite a few points of light,
the churchgovernments, and in fact everyone in general, has a demonstrated history of incompetence with science…That’s how I see it. It isn’t just the church, it is society.
The church was a product of its times, just like every other institution. The Catholic church was one of the biggest around, so they are singled out. But they reflected contemporary thinking and beliefs.
I’m not an organized religion type of guy [although that’s how I was raised], so I hope I can view this with a little objectivity.
The priest sex scandals were a major blunder, which were not addressed nearly fast enough. But the other side of the coin is that when you take some folks who, for whatever reason, either hate the church, or who get dollar signs in their eyes, and mix them in with the basic problem [not allowing priests to marry], this is probably the expected outcome.
There isn’t much evidence aside from people making accusations, so we cannot judge who is telling the truth, who is lying, and who is embelleshing. Or, for that matter, who was doing the seducing, if anyone was. When thoughts of big money are involved, I look at their claims with a jaundiced eye — just like the claims of the climate alarmist set.
They all seem to be very self-serving. Their comments, accusations, and everything else is directed toward scoring a lucrative financial payoff. Truth is lost in the process. In this particular instance, we just do not know what the truth is, and what is fabricated. All we know is that one side has money, and the other side wants it. May the best lawyer win.
On net balance, Western religions are a good thing. They teach morals [the Ten Commandments, etc]. I would much prefer living next to a Catholic, Mormon, or Amish family than next to a non-religious one — looking at the kind of people who are always trying to demonize or shake down organized religions, I see a clear distinction. Give me neighbors with good morals any time.
I’ve said it before, the churches are raising up these alarmists and their super-computers like the children of Israel raised up the prophets of Baal.
Please don’t disparage Pagan as some kind of lesser soul. I know it was just quoting IBD, but it is offensive to those of us who have a Pagan bent (and it’s not what most folks think it is…)
For any Catholics about to worry for my immortal soul: My spouse, mother, and father are all Catholics and I attend mass from time to time. I was baptized Baptist, and have a better religious education than most including researching discrepancies between Bible versions, the Gnostic texts, the Koran, and more. And no, I’m not rebelling against anything.
It is just that having looked into Pagan history and religion, it’s not that far removed… Besides, the term covers several different religions and is vague. Lumping the Roman style dozen or so gods in with the Celtic Druid system ( my preferred – that was more a system of natural knowledge than belief in a guy in the sky with a spear of lightning…) BTW, the Christmas Tree and the Easter Bunny are directly lifted from Pagan traditions… you will not find them in the Bible.
Now, per the Pope:
Hey, cut him some slack. It’s not like he is expected to actually know anything about science…
OTOH…
I guess it’s good they let go of the doctrine of Papal Infallibility…
The words of Christ were spread the furthest by converted pagans, Constantine for example.
“I guess it’s good they let go of the doctrine of Papal Infallibility”
Infallibilty is only claimed on issues of dogma. There are very few of these. A good example would be the Trinity, which is Church dogma and there Infallibility is still claimed.
All have sinned and fallen short of the glory…..
Pope’s are no exception, regardless of how ‘pious’ they appear.
Pope’s what? Oh, popes.