The right and left should cooperate to resist islam

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One could reject the ideas that Islam embodies without being in favor of irresponsible wars or gitmo.
Yet, should jihad ever use force to subvert democracy in the West, it should be fought with the same vigor that America and Europe fought nazism. Since the government could seldom be trusted to protect all citizens or not to precipitate destruction, each individual would have to defend him/her self, which would not be an easy transition from the age of comfort.

Last edited by petitesouris on 13 Dec 2010, 11:37 am, edited 4 times in total.

Yes, but if you're not a Christian, adultery isn't on the same par as paedophilia. I should even think most Christians would find paedophilia worse.

I wouldn't even call adultery perversion. Immoral - often it is, not always. I don't see how having sex with a consenting adult is perverted, even if that adult is married.

That said, since most paedophilia is 'kept in the family' anyway - I can't see being allowed to marry helping much. It's more a problem with the Catholic Church of its clergy not being accountable enough and the Pope not caring.

Found it!

http://reason.com/blog/2010/12/09/lates ... elation-am

True.

As to it being a Christian thing--personally I prefer to think of all sins on the same level. Maybe it's just due to my aspie obsessiveness, but it's just like telling a lie. I always get the sensation that people can hear my thoughts and know immediately whether I'm being truthful. So as much as possible I make sure that what I say is accurate. For me, wrong is wrong, and pedophilia is as wrong as adultery. Geez, if you're a preacher, for cryin' out loud, you have to set a good example. Doin' tha nastee with the choir boys ain't the best way to go! Similarly, with protestants, keep your hands off the deacon's wives. I'm not gay-bashing here--but if you are even REMOTELY attracted to men, keep to yourself as much as possible. Nothing busts a congregation wide open than to have their minister outed.

In general most church congregations I've ever been involved with are pretty tight with their preacher qualifications: Just about every senior pastor I've ever known was married, and the only unmarried youth minister and unmarried pre-school minister I've ever known went in short order from dating to engaged to married to children within 2 to 3 years. Pretty much if you are unmarried, they don't want you. I've you've been divorced, and I mean if you have EVER been divorced, they don't want you. If you are EVER seen consuming alcohol, just go ahead and empty your desk NOW. The #1 rule is you live in a glass house, and I've heard of pastors getting run out of town for no other reason than a rumor got out, something that wasn't even true and only got started because the choir director didn't give someone's daughter the solo on a particular Sunday.

What's more, as silly as some of these people get, the qualifications are enough to exclude 3/4s of all seminary grads. Skeletons in your closet? Better move to the other end of the continent, because they will catch up with you. Some of the ones who DO make it are only the ones with a lot of great superficial qualifications and may be expert philosophers and apologetics, but deep down they just aren't good shepherds.

That doesn't apply to EVERYONE, of course. I've heard some wonderful preachers in my day. Some of those who got crapped on by their congregations didn't deserve it. The main thing to remember is that clergy, Catholic or non-Catholic, all have their faults in some form another. It's not the fault of the religion itself necessarily, but I do have to wonder where the Catholics are digging up all the pedophiles. Even though I'm not Catholic, it does disturb me that the Catholics seem to present themselves more often lately as easy targets, and possibly unfairly so. I agree that getting rid of celibacy requirements would fix a lot of problems, but it remains that there are other risks involved when acting as a religious leader. We Protestants know all too well how things can so quickly get out of hand.

Perhaps it's a matter of personal experience and attitude but to classify pedophilia with adultery looks to me to be widely out of line with a decent appreciation of morality.

Yeah that's a crazy comparison. Adultery is NOWHERE near as bad as pedophilia for obvious reasons...

Wrong is wrong, but even you must admit there are degrees of harm. I know the Bible sees sin in black and white, but life doesn't. I would argue the fact that Christianity puts adultery, paedophilia, bestiality, premarital sex (yes it includes that) and homosexuality all in the same category of 'sex crime' is a fundamental problem with how such religions oversimplify morality.

Just going off harm caused, whilst I'm not denying the huge amount of harm adultery can cause, especially if someone with the authority of a minister does it, I don't think it does the same amount of harm as child abuse. Adultery seriously disrupts the social order. Child abuse ruins someone else's life.

Also, adultery is a failing of the flesh. It's a sin that can be atoned for and not repeated. Paedophilia is an innate problem with someone's sexuality. It's much harder to get a guarantee that someone won't do the same thing again with paedophilia.

I personally like to think some things, like judging the differing value of sin, to be above my pay grade. Judging the nature and severity of a crime is another thing however, and therefor I place pedophilia and bestiality above adultery and premarital sex. This is due to the fact that the first two are actually crimes and the others are violations of social norms (from the perspective of the law).

This is why decent religious people are in a funny position. They have to make many moral judgements not dependent on scripture - by doing so they become more reasonable human beings, but at the expense of some of their piety.

The Catholic church places paedophilia in the same category of 'evil' as female priests. Many Catholics do not. Sorry if I offend you by saying this, but it seems like many Catholics are more reasonable than their Church.

I really don't think this works so much - no amount of euphemism will deter most Catholics (or most people in any given faith-based religionist) from being "offended". The mere act of "questioning" the faith is what they find offensive, as aptly displayed by the use of "doubting Thomas" as an term of derision.

91 is a reasonable person and I remember him saying he was denominationally Catholic.

For a lot of cradle Catholics, the Church is more of a cultural thing than an accurate representation of what they believe, anyway. They couldn't give up all ties to the Church because that would upset their relatives. Catholicism, more than all the other denominations (except maybe Episcopalianism), has the highest proportion of half-assed adherents who just happened to be born into it. This is quite funny when you contrast it to how clear Catholic dogma is and how adamant it is that people should think in line with its ideas. At least with Episcopalianism, you can blame the fact that the Church is unsure about what it stands for - not an option with Catholicism.

I used to be religious and doubting was something I saw as a requirement. I did it too much and ended up like I am now, though

If I took issue with every anti-Catholic statement, I would spend the rest of my life sifting through sand. Anti-Catholicism is pretty heavily entrenched in some places in the world. I was actually an adult before I ever encountered any of it and was deeply shocked at how deeply ingrained it was in some people.



Well this is not really the case, I don't have problem with people criticizing the Church; we have our fair share of sin and sinners. As to this contention, the fact that they are listed in the same book does not make the same in the eyes of the Church. 'There are two types of 'delicta graviora': those concerning the celebration of the sacraments, and those concerning morals. The two types are essentially different and their gravity is on different levels.' -Msgr Charles Scicluna, of the Vatican's doctrinal congregation.

All I really feel entitled to do when someone makes a statement I don't agree with is, if the situation is right for it (with AS this is difficult to judge at the best of times), I will probably explain where I think they were incorrect. I only really feel the need to be offended when it is plainly someones intention to offend.