Pope: Only Catholics are Christians

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Personally, I am not officially Christian, yet. I believe in God myself, and likely will be able to accept Jesus someday, but I know that time is not yet. No matter.

I was starting to like the catholic faith under the old pope. The catholic churches' standpoint on spiritual truth in all religions was very impressive to me. Nothing turns me more off a religions saying "Hey, if you don't believe in it exactly like we do, you're going to hell." Though I'm fine with people going, "If you don't believe in Jesus, you won't be saved' because that's their core belief, and they're not doing it for control - they honestly believe it and want you to be saved too, right?

Now, it seems all the good of the catholic church is seeping away. It's not really a surprise - a lot of people in my group of friends predicted the new pope was satanic in action if not intention.

Why did they elect him anyways? Why choose a pope that went contrary to the previous pope who was well loved, and caused the numbers to increase?

Look, again, the RC belief is not "all non-Catholics are going to Hell." Those beliefs have varied over the years but they started changing before the end of the first millennium (to different degrees).

Why does people's beliefs about the afterlife bug people so much anyway? I mean unless people believe they can kill innocent people and be rewarded sexually I don't know what the big problem is.



Oh my God, a religious conservative (whatever that means)! He must be satanic!



He was Pope John Paul II's chief deputy and was widely expected to be elected Pope. He was widely respected inside the Church for his extensive writings on theology and other matters. The church picked him partially because while JPII generated a strong magnetism, he also had major weaknesses (notably in administrative affairs). He was also criticized in conservative Church circles (theological, rather then politically speaking) for perhaps being too far in the effort for interfaith relations. Of course, Benedict XVI has also been criticized for this as well (perhaps rightly, although I am looking at it more politically then anything else).

Whoops, that definately came out wrong. Wrong usage of the word I guess. I meant like "Not necessarily out for the common good, possibly power hungry in his own right, and seeking control. May cause eventual loss of followers due to service of his own beliefs rather than his own religion."

Not that he was inherent evil, demonic or anything, just that his actions seem to cause more harm than good.

All a matter of definitions.
Look, the stage that Islam is
in right now, roughly corresponds
to Christianity around the time of
the discovery of the western hemisphere.
Frankly, such people as the followers of
Bin Laden seem far more restrained than
say, Pizarro.

Not precisely (about Christianity and Islam, not Pizarro). Islam was once very much in the forefront of the world and indeed Islamic civilization could claim to have passed Christiandom in many ways. However, for different reasons, like Chinese civilization and Indian civilization, it was left in the wind by Christian Europe. Christianity may be older, but Buddhism and Hinduism are older still.

This is not to say that Christianity has a monopoly on great civilization, it certainly doesn't, but I don't think it is an issue of age (although there are explanations, I don't think I need to offer one here though). One has to explain why Christianity took so long to reach it's ascendancy while Islam so quickly reached it's golden age.

A secular human such as myself, is not surprised at Pope Sidious's current actions. Religion tends to be crazy anyways.

The Catholic Church as an organization has the right to determine what constitutes a Catholic, and I don't understand the big todo about it. Why do Babtists or Lutherans care? As groups they have the right to believe as they do.

And the Catholics were scarcely the only group to be anti-Semitic.

Also, homosexuals are those people attracted to people of their own sex--not to children. The thing that keeps getting missed is that while everyone is screaming about boys being abused (by a small minority of priests), no-one is screaming about the girls being abused. Apparently that is not as important.

The antichrist would say that, wouldn't he

http://www.escapeallthesethings.com/pop ... rophet.htm

- lol - don't anyone take this seriously, please

PS - just to make sure there is no ambiguity, I'm not suggesting that Ragtime is the antichrist

It's fun watching Pope Neo Nazi I dig his own grave.

Why'd you change the word "Christian" to "Catholic"? Their position is, and has been, that non-Catholics as Catholic leaders define them aren't Christians. When, if they'd read the Bible, they'd see that many Catholics aren't Christians, because they don't trust in Christ alone to save them. They trust in bread, wine, Mary, and various works that the pope tells them to do in order to cleanse their sins. It's its own spin-off religion.

Certainly. You're right about that.

I wonder why that is. The news almost never reports abuse of girls in the church, or in the world. It most often seems to be the boys who are getting abused, if you go by the news outlets. And usually it's by a man, making it a gay crime, which raises my eyebrows about homosexuality -- that most child abuse I hear about is gay.

Not this again...

I know. I wish they'd stop!

Agreed. For whatever reason, the media
just doesn't make as big a deal out of the
abuse of girls. I'm not sure why. Some sort
of bias against gays, I'd suspect. I've known
a number of people who were abused as children.

Only one was male. He was 'fondled' by a computer
geek. On the other hand, the females were mostly
raped. One as young as 4 years old.

There is only one thing worse than a Pope, and that is a left wing & gay hating, warmongering, President of the USA. Ragtime, I find the spirit and your motives underpinning your comments leaves a lot to be desired.

As a Catholic and as a Spiritual Director, working with the poor and marginalized in London, my work brings me in touch with many people who struggle with personal problems and addictions. Sadly most of them were brought up in Conservative Christian homes as children and have great problems with their sexuality and the use of pornography.

However, the humility and courage it takes to admit our wrongs, be they religious, sexual or otherwise, is a mark of humility and from such courage real hope is born. To be hopeful, I feel we have to do hopeful things.

We are all in this together and as people with AS we know more than most what it means to be marginalized. For me it is a distraction to focus on what flag a person flys under, rather we measure one's worth by the love we give.

I wish you well though and I am glad we have a very diverse mix of members.

cx

Wait, criss, you're a Catholic,
and you think that Bush is
the ONLY thing worse than
the Vicar of Christ?

You should probably consider
a different religion.

You must be having trouble sensing my motives and spirit. Psychic powers a little weak today?