Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5


Catholic speakers sure weaved around some issues....

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It's Anti-Catholic week....

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"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"-FDR

http://jeffersonblog.history.org/doe...ecision-making

Christopher Hitchens...

What?...Noam Chomsky and Hugo Chavez wasn't available?...

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"You get the respect that you give" - cnredd

It seems that way. It's been on a lot of other forums as it is something that has just occurred recently, and I didn't see it here yet, so I thought I'd post it.

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And Cnredd, you're right, Hitchens is pretty extreme and is actually pretty hateful, but Stephen Fry is not.

John was very poor at defending Catholicism--I think it's a shame they didn't choose someone better at debating.

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I thought the Archbishop and lady proved their case.
Hutchins is a humorous speaker. Fry is a sympathetic figure. I guess that swayed the audience.
Good post!
Thanks!

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I did not win the Powerball again!


"When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him."
--Jonathan Swift

I'm sure it has been in other forums and when members and clergy stray away from Papal teaching I want to know about it. Anyway...some would debate if "any" church is a force for good.Mistakes are made by mortal men but collectively...I believe the church to be a force for good.I have issues with some members of clergy and some of the church's teaching but then again.. I have issues with every denomination,especially when they will not remove members of their clergy who violate God's law.

The example of Peter's denial of Christ illustrates for all of us that Christians are not perfect but they are forgiven...

Is the Catholic Church a force for good? It depends on how you look at the history of the Catholic Church. In my own life, as someone who benefited from Catholic school and was raised Catholic, it was both, a mix of good and bad.

It's kind of a reflection of society in general. Christ was often "frustrated" with his own apostles and one even denied him three times and he made him head of the church! The RCC is a very old institution that clings to "tradition" and Christ is still frustrated with them but the gates of hell will not prevail against the church.I was also raised Catholic and attended Catholic schools.I have many fond memories but also some emotional scars. I am left handed and a nun used to slap my left hand with a ruler trying to make me stop using it. Thanks to her superstition, I am now ambidextrous....

Think Positive..many denominations have benefited greatly from lessons we Catholics,over time.. learned the hard way..

Hi Spence

I once co-facilitated a group for women who had been raised Catholic who raised issues of whether the Catholic Church was a force for good or bad. The goal of the group was for members to either reconcile with the Church or move on.

I find the very question insulting and insisting upon summary judgment, ignoring the fact that it can be both.
The first speaker gave some strong points on how it is a force for good.
Hitchens pointed to some items on how the CC has not been a force for good.

(Although in some ways, Hitchens reminded me of a couples squabble where one spouse starts dragging up ancient history that should be gone and resolved. The caveat to that being that if the Catholic Church is still repeating those practices, then it deserves scrutiny on the issue.)


I agree whole-heartedly on this.

Bizarrely enough, the female speaker got me very irritated for an aspect of this issue that I think is more to the heart of a problem.
And that is when a blind insistence on unchanging religious rules / authority does damage.

If a religious authority is simply advocating something that society would be perpetuating at that stage in history anyways, it's not really (IMO) the "church" that is flawed by humanity itself.
When religion overcomes humanity's flaws, then it deserves praise.

But my problem is in how sometimes the church insists on stagnation. Instead of advancing and recognizing a truth or questioning a morality, the church holds back "progress".

And that is not a fault exclusively of the church, but I think that religious authorities need to recognize that the "truths" spoken by barbaric goat-herders a few thousand years ago may not necessarily be justified in automatic assumption that they are divine, and sticking to them without question.

That is one aspect of organized religion (that focuses on following the words of others who lived millenia ago) in often refusing to question those words and admit their invalidation that I see as a problem.
In some ways (as opposed to other religions) its interesting how the Catholic Church has created a way for the religion to live through modern representation. For other religions, they simply repeat the words of people long dead.


But these comments should not be taken as a justification for a conclusion on the original question of "is it one or the other, a force for good or a force for bad".
Both pro-Catholic commentators gave clear examples of how it DOES act as a strong force for good.

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"When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint.
When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a Communist."
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