Catholic Answers Live

I was flipping through stations last weekend on Sirius, and started listening to a show on EWTN Radio called "Catholic Answers Live." I only listened because Grateful Dead Radio was playing a concert that I've heard numerous times. Anyway, it's basically a call-in program for people to ask questions of guests regarding Catholicism. Their guest was a woman who wrote a book about the evils of the New Age movement. A caller explained that he has a lot of family members that are into New Age, and every time he asks a priest what he can do to get them to "see the light," he just is told, "Pray for them. There's not much else you can do." This woman told the guy to take some table salt to the priest and have him bless it, then invite these relatives to dinner and use the salt. She said that the salt will help them to be enlightened to the error of their ways and bring them back to the Catholic Church. The guy seemed to have bought it.

WTF??? This is nothing more than pitching iodized pixie dust.

Then the other night I see that Pope John Paul II is credited with curing some nun who had Parkinson's Disease AFTER he died.

WTF???

Does anyone on here really believe this shit?

One thing that I like about catholics is that they ain't scared of blatant supersticious mumbo-jumbo. Whereas protestants these days- particularly the type I grew up among- are forever trying to squeeze their ridiculous views INTO science and history. These people make websites, write books and spend LIFETIMES trying to prove the the earth is only 6000 years old, and that Noah had two T-rex's on the ark- just because their ridiculous book says so.

Whereas the catholics implicitly admit that this shit ain't gonna make sense unless you already have 'faith'. And plenty of it.

The whole 'spirituality' thing doesn't work for me. Don't know if that means I'm too goddamned brilliant (probably), or developmentally stunted. But best I can tell, "having faith" in something, and "knowing" something are NOT the same thing by a long shot. And in some ways I gotta give the catholics props for making that distinction.

If you've ever been around hard-core protestants (I'm talking about pentecostals, church of gawd, wesleyans, JoHos, seventh-day-adventists, and the like), then you'll know that lots of them are bat-shit crazy. The more intelligent they are, the harder the congnitive dissonance is on their mind- and the more tenuous their grip on sanity will be. But that isn't necessarily true of the catholics I've met. That's not to say that catholicism is any more 'true' (it's all hogwash as far as I'm concerned). But the structure of the catholic version of that mental computer-virus we call christianity is more conducive to compartmentalization (holy salt? really?).

So if spirituality and jesus are what floats your boat, this atheist reccommends that you look into catholicism. IMO you'll have a much better shot at maintaining your sanity.




Goddamn school computers. Now ya'll can all see just how dependant I am on spell-check.

Some of the biggest problems I have with Catholicism have to do with the mystical things, though. For example, they teach that the bread and wine at communion actually turns into the flesh and blood of Jesus, which in any other setting would amount to cannibalism. The idea that you can do whatever you want and you'll be okay as long as you admit it to a priest before you kick off is just a convenient way to make sure families are "allowed" to "make donations" to the church when they have a funeral to hold. And their divorce doctrine - you're not allowed to divorce, but it's okay if you get an annulment (for a fee, of course) - is blatantly ridiculous.

Not that Protestants who pull one line from one book of the Bible and base an entire sect on it are any more sane.

Click here.

Quote :

...is blatantly ridiculous.

You'll get no argument from me on that point. But IMO the whole concept of christianity is blatantly ridiculous. In a nutshell:

Gawd sacrificed himself to himself so that he wouldn't have to be so pissed off and kick the asses of a bunch of imperfect critters (that he created) for being imperfect (as he created them). But that jedi-mindtrick of appeasing yourself by sacrificing yourself to yourself only works if said imperfect critters (us) BELIEVE said nonsense. And practice some hokey rituals.


So I guess what I'm saying is that while I agree that all those catholic practices ARE ludicrous- they're no MORE ludicrous than the whole belief system that it's all based on. And by bringing their supersticious nonsense out into the open- inviting their people to openly engage in fantasy- they are effectively separating these religious concepts from more realistic concepts (like the kind of stuff that we investigate with science). That beats the hell out of the fundamentalist/evangelical protestant approach of willful ignorance- trying to make science and history fit their silly religion. IMO, catholics are better at separating religion from reality... whether or not they'd realize or admit that.

Bighead wrote:

Quote :

...is blatantly ridiculous.

You'll get no argument from me on that point. But IMO the whole concept of christianity is blatantly ridiculous. In a nutshell:

Gawd sacrificed himself to himself so that he wouldn't have to be so pissed off and kick the asses of a bunch of imperfect critters (that he created) for being imperfect (as he created them). But that jedi-mindtrick of appeasing yourself by sacrificing yourself to yourself only works if said imperfect critters (us) BELIEVE said nonsense. And practice some hokey rituals.


So I guess what I'm saying is that while I agree that all those catholic practices ARE ludicrous- they're no MORE ludicrous than the whole belief system that it's all based on. And by bringing their supersticious nonsense out into the open- inviting their people to openly engage in fantasy- they are effectively separating these religious concepts from more realistic concepts (like the kind of stuff that we investigate with science). That beats the hell out of the fundamentalist/evangelical protestant approach of willful ignorance- trying to make science and history fit their silly religion. IMO, catholics are better at separating religion from reality... whether or not they'd realize or admit that.

It's all about the money. Especially if they tell you that it's not about the money.

You forgot coercion by guilt. Not to mention too much work.

Sit, stand, sit, neal, stand, bob, wave, sing, sit, neal, sit, sing, and pay.

Remember gentlemen. Show respect. Dis here is a Hace form fer us here liffin in Alice Cowndy. In Hace dey are calt Catlicks. Same applies to Muncher, Catrin, Wictoria, Chenchin, and Antanina.

When I was a kid I wasn't raised in any church. I heard the typical phrases uttered by everyone around me but hadn't gone through their weekly routines. When I first recall being in a church I felt seriously uncomfortable. I may have been 5 or so and it took many years before I could even go in a church without feeling uneasy.

Recalling all the "God'll get you for that." "You'll be struck by lightning for that." "You'll go blind" "You'll burn forever in hell" speeches I'd heard, I had already made my mind up that I wanted nothing to do with such an omnipotent jackass.

And not that anyone cared, but I felt really strange saying the "under God" thing in the Pledge even in kindergarten. I had zero Athiest influence at that age, so I can't say for sure why it creeped me out, but something about it did exactly that. It made me feel creepy.

Amazing. Ya know boys, not all of us Catholics are the zealots you make us out to be. Sheesh

Most Catlicks are tolerable. Might be that half of everyone I know are Catlicks and I'm related to several. And several of my closest friends over the years have been members of the cult.