The death of Catholicism.

[Foxaèr]

Many mythologies shall remain, but true believers shall continue to dwindle.

[Wyrd of Gawd]

The Holocaust had much more to do with the idea of Eugenics and German nationalism, surfacing in the late 19th century than it had with the old clerical antisemitism. It had absolutely nothing to do with religion. In fact, the people calling the shots, went to great lengths to make it look a biological necessity. Bullshit, of course, but not rleigious bullshit.

True enough. Nazism was not a religious phenomena, even if it had religious people in it.

My point is that even if the RCC wasn't responsible for the holocaust, and even if Priests and nuns tried to hide Jewish refugees, the Church (and Christianity generally) helped pave the way for it by dehumanizing Jews for so long.

Even if the Nazi/eugenics ideology wasn't clerical, the clerical antisemitism helped Germans and others "Get on board" with it IMO.

The Germans had a legitimate concern about the Jews being their domestic enemies.  The Jews had been trying for decades to overthrow the German government.  Guys like Herzl only gave them more reason to not trust them.  They wanted to install communism and when that slipped they did it in Russia, which led to subsequent decades of conflict with the West.  They continually urged the West to attack Germany, even going so far as to blackmail Wilson to declare war on Germany.  

Prior to WWII they instigated a world-wide boycott against German goods and services.  They wanted to wreck the German economy.  The Nazis wanted to deport all of them but some wouldn't  leave.  So the Nazis treated them as legitimate domestic enemies.    

As far as religion is concerned, remember what it says in 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?se...ersion=CEV

[Thumpalumpacus]

Oh, dear.

[*Deidre*]

A lot of people are getting away from the Roman Catholic Church, and gravitating to other rites. But, yea...I see it not being able to hold the numbers it has in the past, because it takes money to keep parishes open, and they're losing money, because they're losing members. The new Pope doesn't even sound like he is pro-Catholicism. lol That could be a problem.

[GUBU]

Considering that the Catholic Church condemned the "sin of Sodom" for over 2 millennia, how can the Church now embrace "gay love" without folks coming along and saying that the Church is contradicting itself?  And, if the Church contradicts itself (which, of course, it does and has), is not such evidence that it is just another man-made institution and not one founded upon any sort of divine "revelation"; and if so, why bother with it?  Speaking from a "person in the pew" perspective here.  As an atheist, I am definitively not trying to "defend" it; only surmising why Catholics may abandon it entirely and their reasons for doing so.

Considering that the church has had at least eight known positions on abortion, it is very adept at contradicting itself. And as Orwell outlined in Nineteen Eighty-Four it's not all that hard for people to suddenly veer 180 degrees away from their previous thoughts if they follow an organisation devoutly enough and the organisation has sufficient control and ruthlessness.

Also, I knew you weren't trying to defend the rcc in the thread, I was just putting my two cents in that Bergoglio's western face is much different to the reality of his views. Personally, I'm of the opinion that the rcc is becoming increasingly Afrocentric and fundamentalist, which will strike it's death knell. Even in countries like Poland which saw a catholic resurgence in recent years, the youth never really turned back to the church, and even many of the older people only had a superficial reconciliation based on the church's assumption of the leading light in the anti-communist "crusade" (while in substance managing to accomodate itself to the communist regimes quite easily in most cases. It did the same with the independence movement in Ireland, managing to hijack the movement almost on the point of victory while having spent the most of the previous two and a half centuries ingratiating itself to British rule).

[Minimalist]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/natio.../28442069/

In the early 1960s, there were more than 5.2 million students in nearly 13,000 Catholic schools in the U.S., according to the National Catholic Educational Association. Today, that number is down to 1.9 million students.

They have lost their stranglehold on education.  If they can't get them young they won't get them.

As the Jesuit motto used to be:  'Give me the child for his first seven years, and I'll give you the man.'

Granted, given the pedo-priest scandal that sounds pretty creepy now.

[Jehanne]

As the Jesuit motto used to be:  'Give me the child for his first seven years, and I'll give you the man.'

They admit that Dawkins was right with his idea of "religion being a meme" centuries before he proposed it.

[SofaKingHigh]

True enough. Nazism was not a religious phenomena, even if it had religious people in it.

My point is that even if the RCC wasn't responsible for the holocaust, and even if Priests and nuns tried to hide Jewish refugees, the Church (and Christianity generally) helped pave the way for it by dehumanizing Jews for so long.

Even if the Nazi/eugenics ideology wasn't clerical, the clerical antisemitism helped Germans and others "Get on board" with it IMO.

The Germans had a legitimate concern about the Jews being their domestic enemies.  The Jews had been trying for decades to overthrow the German government.  Guys like Herzl only gave them more reason to not trust them.  They wanted to install communism and when that slipped they did it in Russia, which led to subsequent decades of conflict with the West.  They continually urged the West to attack Germany, even going so far as to blackmail Wilson to declare war on Germany.  

Prior to WWII they instigated a world-wide boycott against German goods and services.  They wanted to wreck the German economy.  The Nazis wanted to deport all of them but some wouldn't  leave.  So the Nazis treated them as legitimate domestic enemies.    

As far as religion is concerned, remember what it says in 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?se...ersion=CEV

The Jewish community boycotting German goods was in reaction to the Nazi's coming into power and their subsequent policies towards Jews, read up on your history.

"Install communism" - Do you have the installation instructions at all?

You sound dangerously like a holocaust denier.

[Wyrd of Gawd]

The Germans had a legitimate concern about the Jews being their domestic enemies.  The Jews had been trying for decades to overthrow the German government.  Guys like Herzl only gave them more reason to not trust them.  They wanted to install communism and when that slipped they did it in Russia, which led to subsequent decades of conflict with the West.  They continually urged the West to attack Germany, even going so far as to blackmail Wilson to declare war on Germany.  

Prior to WWII they instigated a world-wide boycott against German goods and services.  They wanted to wreck the German economy.  The Nazis wanted to deport all of them but some wouldn't  leave.  So the Nazis treated them as legitimate domestic enemies.    

As far as religion is concerned, remember what it says in 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?se...ersion=CEV

The Jewish community boycotting German goods was in reaction to the Nazi's coming into power and their subsequent policies towards Jews, read up on your history.

"Install communism" - Do you have the installation instructions at all?

You sound dangerously like a holocaust denier.

King Leopold II of Belgium killed a couple times more black Africans in the Congo than Hitler thought about killing white Jews in Europe.  So where's your concern for the Congolese victims?  Besides, The Jews boast about the genocides they committed against people in the Old Testament.  And the God character said that they would pay for their sins.  He still has to kill everyone in Israel as he said he would do in the book of Zephaniah.  Is he going to wimp out?

You do know that communism was started by the Jews, don't you?   http://www.thebricktestament.com/acts_of...34-35.html

[Edwardo Piet]

Hitler was a cunt.

/thread