Old Habits

[jchrisobrien]

Vatican says AIDS can slip through a condom

(I can't send any mail today, so I'm talking about this here).

I don't know why I get so bent out of shape when people knock the Church. In the Church's eyes, I'm not a good Catholic at all. I disagree with a lot of the proclamations of the Church, but I still think I follow the teachings in the Bible. The moment I hear people slamming the Church however, my hackles raise. The question is, why?

Part of that no doubt stems from my old beliefs about the Church. I was very devout all through high school. I actually liked reading the Bible (okay, mainly Revelations). I had a very active imagination, and love thinking about the angels and the War in Heaven and the Nephilim. The Old Testament can totally read like a fantasy novel (some would say that it is. ha ha ha.). I really believed in Good and Evil, and the Church and the angels were on the side of Good.

After reading lots of history, and growing more exposed to life, I came to see that the Church was made of people, who are good and bad. The Church became an institution, and fell prey to corruption and greed and all the things you'd associate with any organization. I thought that the priests would follow their beliefs and since they were the examples for the rest of us, they would follow their own rules. Some of them did. Some of them didn't.

The other thing that bugs me, is the double standard. A lot of faiths believe in abstinence, and find promiscuity a sin. It's not purely a Christian or Catholic thing. Other faiths are just as puritanical, some even more so. But GOD FORBID you say anything bad about Judaism or Islam w/out being labeled a bigot. Why is it okay to talk shit about the Catholic church and not Islam, or Buddhist monks, or Judaism? Oh, the Vatican is evil, they have done horrible things, they should be locked away. No one bats an eye. Now change the Vatican to a sect of Judaism, or the ruling body there. See how quickly you get called a bigot or racist.

The quick and easy answer is to not let it get to me. I am not the Vatican, I do think that telling people not to use condoms because they don't stop AIDS is irresponsible. (*) An attack on Catholicism is not an attack on the people who practice it.

Or is it?

(*) The Church could have avoided a lot of misrepresentation if they had said, condoms reduce the risk of getting AIDS, but they don't prevent it all together. If you want to avoid getting AIDS, don't have sex period. But instead, they make a stupid statement making them look like idiots.

Comments

[atalanta.livejournal.com]

If they mounted a massive campaign saying "look, condoms are only 90% effective (the WHO stat), so do you really want to take that chance? abstinence is the only way to be certain!" I would have nothing but respect for them. The state health officials should already be making this stuff more widely known.

[damiel.livejournal.com]

The other thing that bugs me, is the double standard. A lot of faiths believe in abstinence, and find promiscuity a sin. It's not purely a Christian or Catholic thing. Other faiths are just as puritanical, some even more so. But GOD FORBID you say anything bad about Judaism or Islam w/out being labeled a bigot. Why is it okay to talk shit about the Catholic church and not Islam, or Buddhist monks, or Judaism?

I think one can disagree (not sure what you have in mind by "talk shit") with the teachings of any doctrine or philosophy without being a bigot. It certainly does not make you one. But a point more pertinent to the quote above: The Catholic Church is not a doctrine, and hence should not be on the same tier as Judaism or Islam. It is an institution that regulates much about that doctrine (i.e., Catholicism), but it is not the doctrine itself. The Catholic Church does not equal Catholicism. I understand that in discussion they often get mixed together, and that can certainly be a source of confusion and disagreement.

[couplingchaos.livejournal.com]

I think people (in my experience) rag on the Catholic Church more openly than they do other religions/races/etc. because it's closer to their own and generally considered more dominant. The Church hasn't been a persecuted minority in the same way that Jews or blacks have been, for example, and it carries a lot of clout worldwide (and is therefore open to more public scrutiny). Many of us come from some sort of Christian background, so we bitch about what we consider to be perversions or general diversions from our own beliefs or practices.

[eeyrg.livejournal.com]

Both buddhist and judaic religions are also not established as a Higher Than Government Power that is widely accepted throughout the world. Certainly buddhists and jews are NOT keeping clergy who are guilty of crime out of jail nor are they paying off the victims. Neither are they publishing in the media about sexuality, abortion, or just in general what the 'sin of the moment' is. That article is careless and irresponsible. They are a huge ruling body. I'm sorry but I don't see that as religion, I see that as dictating and instilling fear into people. the church is the center of media attention for lots of reasons, sadly, most of the reasons are not good ones.

as for the difference between the attack on people vs attack on church...

i think this is why i said if i ever had children i'd like them to grow up and choose their own religion, should they choose to have one. i think perhaps choosing a religion is much like picking a name brand of a product you use. it's all in how it suits you, if it suits you at all...

i don't fault you or anyone else for being catholic or any other religion. i fault the way the church represents itself and truthfully, i would question you if you lived your life exactly they told you to, if you did. i'd simply want to know if you yourself believed your guidance or if you were merely following the rules out of a sense of obligation.

[pyrric.livejournal.com]

Two issues here, I think.

#1. Talking shit about anything is reductive and stupid. That said, we all do it from time to time about a lot of different things. When people say, "That's retarded," I flinch and cringe. I grew up around too many retarded people to be comfortable with that usage. Do I think that everyone who uses it is a bigoted asshole who really hates retarded people? Not even close. Same goes for people who say things about the Catholic Church; it doesn't mean they think every Catholic is a tool.

#2. No other religion with the world-wide power of Catholicism (which I think includes only non-Catholic Christianity, Hinduism [although not really a religion, it is often lumped in with them], and Buddhism) actively advocates for behaviors among their flock that will kill both them and the people with whom they interact. This goes far beyond a religion establishing behaviors in accordance to faith. This is flagrantly perpetrating and worsening the direst public health crisis in human history[1]. If that doesn't justify an indictment for crimes against humanity, I'm not sure what does.

[1] If you think I'm exaggerating, do a quick google for how many people in Africa alone are going to be dead within 10 years. AIDS will kill more people than the Holocaust, and to actively campaign against the one thing that will slow the death rate is at best turning a blind eye to the extermination of millions of people. At worst, it's murdering them.