'A step back in time': America's Catholic Church sees immense shift twd the old ways
“Generations of Catholics who embraced modernizing tide sparked in 1960s by Vatican II are increasingly giving way to religious conservatives who believe church has been twisted by change…
@GottaLaff Well, doesn't surprise me, conservatives tend to be behind the times. Although, as long as they aren't mega extreme, (fascists meaning) they have some sanity
Albeit, not as much as they could if they would ditch right wing thinking.
Honestly, the current pope is the pope the world has needed for a while.
He is humble... which is why conservatives don't like him.
They think winning is most important, Francis considers humility and love most important.
@GottaLaff
My take is that they’re seeing how successful (in monetary and membership growth terms) all the various fundamentalist sects have been, and they’re missing out. Just as everywhere else, it’s all about the likes and especially the $. In scary times, certainty is comforting, change is not. They want to stop all this change stuff and keep things the way they were.
@GottaLaff I am surprised that American Catholics haven't yet broken off and formed their own church with an Ameripope and denounced the rest of the Catholic Church for being "too liberal."
@GottaLaff A minor point in a near-future book I wrote ~10 years ago is that a traditionalist sect, angry at Francis, split off from the main Church. I now wonder if that might actually happen. Or worse, that they might actually overthrow him and install another Pope Rat.
@GottaLaff I witnessed the change of the Catholic church. In the 1980's I had a job where I moved a lot & went to mass in different towns. Every church was different, localized. But as the human rights orientated clergy that were present for the abuse scandals left, & the new bishops appointed by John Paul II were all arch-conservatives, & that led to the stories in this article. Then the Steve Bannon type conservatives purposely made the church unwelcoming for Human Rights supporters.
@GottaLaff And yet another group arises that fails to see the similarities between themselves and the Pharisees of long ago. Not to mention the legal Textualists of the current day. These groups see themselves as more ‘pure’ and spiritual than others of the tribe. They conveniently ignore the living, breathing nature of both religion and the law, and the need for the spirit of both to allow adaptation to the modern world. This is not the world of 200 or 2,000 years ago.
@GottaLaff
I think they are wrong. It's the sexual abuse and the fact that abusive priests are moved to different parishes, shielded by the church, that is making people turn away.
I know of many people who left the chuch for that reason.
@GottaLaff Jesus is love, Vatican 2 says we can follow Christ and help the poor, be kinder and less hateful and still be catholic.
"But what if I want to hate everyone who's different and support a religious monarchy where the brainwashed give all of their money to a guy with a private jet?" - rural America