Pope Benedict XVI 'is to resign'

[Drakken]

Catholicism has shown that it can be endlessly flexible.  There's the theology and doctrine, of course (and by the way the evangelicals do have those as well), but there's also how it is presented.

I don't think the RCC will get more adherents by being more liberal is all I'm saying.

What you don't get, is that once you are Catholic you are always a Catholic, even if lapsed. We've learned the catechism and made most of the sacraments when we were kids. We've grown with and inside the Church.

Most still have some threads left with the Catholic Church, even when steadfast in disagreement around it. Most Catholics become lasped because they feel either kicked out of the Church, out of touch, or without understanding inside the Church because of their secularism.

[Barrister]

Catholicism has shown that it can be endlessly flexible.  There's the theology and doctrine, of course (and by the way the evangelicals do have those as well), but there's also how it is presented.

I don't think the RCC will get more adherents by being more liberal is all I'm saying.

What you don't get, is that once you are Catholic you are always a Catholic, even if lapsed. We've learned the catechism and  made most of the sacraments when we were kids.

Most still have some threads left with the Catholic Church, even when steadfast in disagreement around it. Most Catholics become lasped because they feel kicked out of the Church because of their secularism.

Drakken, I "get that".  I dare say my jesuit education gives me some idea how the RCC works.

[Iormlund]

By the way, a lot of people call themselves Catholic. The problem for the Church is few of those truly are.

Yes, it's the attitude of "picking and choosing" what doctrine we'd like to follow, from many lapsed Catholics myself included, that turns off even the Catholic Church from even trying in the first place.

I was aiming along Zanza's "don't give a fuck" rather than "picking and choosing". In my experience the only time anyone my age visits a church is on weddings, funerals and the like. I've had a grand total of two conversations about religion with my friends. Religion is just irrelevant. Which might be why I find Atheist vs Religious flame wars so amusing. It's something nobody cares about here.

[Viking]

By the way, a lot of people call themselves Catholic. The problem for the Church is few of those truly are.

Yes, it's the attitude of "picking and choosing" what doctrine we'd like to follow, from many lapsed Catholics myself included, that turns off even the Catholic Church from even trying in the first place.

I was aiming along Zanza's "don't give a fuck" rather than "picking and choosing". In my experience the only time anyone my age visits a church is on weddings, funerals and the like. I've had a grand total of two conversations about religion with my friends. Religion is just irrelevant. Which might be why I find Atheist vs Religious flame wars so amusing. It's something nobody cares about here.

[garbon]

Which might be why I find Atheist vs Religious flame wars so amusing. It's something nobody cares about here.

They are funny because they are irrelevant to you?

[Zanza]

Which might be why I find Atheist vs Religious flame wars so amusing. It's something nobody cares about here.

They are funny because they are irrelevant to you?

I wouldn't call it amusing or funny, but it sure is interesting to see that religion causes so much controversy and emotion in debates elsewhere when your own position is and that of the society you live in mostly seems to be indifference.

[Iormlund]

Exactly. One of the things that got to me when I first ventured on the Interwebs was how Americans would constantly define people by their religious denomination. It was so very alien.

[Valmy]

Exactly. One of the things that got to me when I first ventured on the Interwebs was how Americans would constantly define people by their religious denomination. It was so very alien.

In what sense?  Unless somebody is super religious, like old school Fahdiz, I do not really think we do this.

[Josephus]

By the way, a lot of people call themselves Catholic. The problem for the Church is few of those truly are.

Yes, it's the attitude of "picking and choosing" what doctrine we'd like to follow, from many lapsed Catholics myself included, that turns off even the Catholic Church from even trying in the first place.

With the Catholic Church, either you believe the full dogma, or you don't. If you don't believe in miracles, or the resurrection of Christ, or Transubstantation, or that every sperm is sacred, or that salvation comes through both grace and works, or that one mortal sin left is enough to leave you suffering in Hell in the total absence from God, then you are lapsed.

As a Catholic myself, I say that makes sense. If you don't believe resurrection of Christ or whatever then pick a church that does.

[Viking]

By the way, a lot of people call themselves Catholic. The problem for the Church is few of those truly are.

Yes, it's the attitude of "picking and choosing" what doctrine we'd like to follow, from many lapsed Catholics myself included, that turns off even the Catholic Church from even trying in the first place.

With the Catholic Church, either you believe the full dogma, or you don't. If you don't believe in miracles, or the resurrection of Christ, or Transubstantation, or that every sperm is sacred, or that salvation comes through both grace and works, or that one mortal sin left is enough to leave you suffering in Hell in the total absence from God, then you are lapsed.

As a Catholic myself, I say that makes sense. If you don't believe resurrection of Christ or whatever then pick a church that does.

I gotta say that if you don't believe in the resurrection of Christ you can hardly call yourself a christian today.

[Valmy]

I gotta say that if you don't believe in the resurrection of Christ you can hardly call yourself a christian today.

[derspiess]

In what sense?  Unless somebody is super religious, like old school Fahdiz, I do not really think we do this.

Yeah, I don't really see that either.  Athiests really seem to like to stake out their positions here on Languish, but most of the ones I've known in real life haven't been quite as talkative about it.

[Viking]

I gotta say that if you don't believe in the resurrection of Christ you can hardly call yourself a christian today.

That bit about him being sacrificed for our salvation and returning to life is sort of the entire point of the religion. It's actually the only bit you can't leave out.

[Iormlund]

Exactly. One of the things that got to me when I first ventured on the Interwebs was how Americans would constantly define people by their religious denomination. It was so very alien.

In what sense?  Unless somebody is super religious, like old school Fahdiz, I do not really think we do this.

Yes you do (maybe not you personally). Quite a few times I see people described as Catholics, Mormons, Jews, Baptists and so on. You probably don't notice. I know don't anymore. But back then it was something that sounded strange.

To put it into perspective, I have been at this job for five years and I don't know whether anyone at the place is religious at all. It hasn't come up even once.

[Martinus]

I'm hearing talk about the Cardinal Ouellet of Quebec and previous "primate of Canada" / Archbishop of Quebec as an early frontrunner, though.

You know the saying, who enters a conclave as Pope usually gets out as Cardinal.

But who knows. "Poor Canada", as John Paul II is told to have said when he was told the third secret of Fatima. So maybe the election of Ouellet as last Pope was foretold by the prophecies 

Any speculation what the secret was?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Secrets_of_F%C3%A1tima#Third_secret

J.M.J.

The third part of the secret revealed at the Cova da Iria-Fátima, on 13 May 1917.

I write in obedience to you, my God, who command me to do so through his Excellency the Bishop of Leiria and through your Most Holy Mother and mine.

After the two parts which I have already explained, at the left of Our Lady and a little above, we saw an Angel with a flaming sword in his left hand; flashing, it gave out flames that looked as though they would set the world on fire; but they died out in contact with the splendour that Our Lady radiated towards him from her right hand: pointing to the earth with his right hand, the Angel cried out in a loud voice: 'Penance, Penance, Penance!'. And we saw in an immense light that is God: 'something similar to how people appear in a mirror when they pass in front of it' a Bishop dressed in White 'we had the impression that it was the Holy Father'. Other Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious going up a steep mountain, at the top of which there was a big Cross of rough-hewn trunks as of a cork-tree with the bark; before reaching there the Holy Father passed through a big city half in ruins and half trembling with halting step, afflicted with pain and sorrow, he prayed for the souls of the corpses he met on his way; having reached the top of the mountain, on his knees at the foot of the big Cross he was killed by a group of soldiers who fired bullets and arrows at him, and in the same way there died one after another the other Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious, and various lay people of different ranks and positions. Beneath the two arms of the Cross there were two Angels each with a crystal aspersorium in his hand, in which they gathered up the blood of the Martyrs and with it sprinkled the souls that were making their way to God.

Well, that's pretty clear.