Do you think the Pope should resign?

Any number that might come close to 5% is just enormous, you know. I mean, if each only molested one child, that is still a huge percentage.

Going down the path is not getting to the gate at the end of it and going through it and banging it closed behind. Not by a long way.

It's easy going down the path but as the gate looms into view more questions are raised about the wisdom of passing through with no prospect of return. The rejected "fairy tale" is lost forever. Along with the moral lessons the fable inculcates.

You are indulging a twee conceit Bill I'm afraid. You can maintain your position without actually having it tested. The true mark of the unimportant. If everybody took the position, as you are intellectually required to want, otherwise your arguments are like are dross, do you really think society would be recognisable to you.

A bit like the "Teaser" who enjoys having her drinks bought and being the centre of attention with her short skirt and plunging neckline and face paint but as midnight approaches starts getting nervous about swapping her position on the bar stool for being spreadeagled on a bed.

You're flirting Bill.

And whose commonsense are you talking about? Just give us an idea of how a government of atheists over atheists will conduct itself using its commonsense. Wouldn't eugenics be commonsense? Wouldn't selective curfews be in order? Would market forces cease to operate? Would opposition be allowed? All those would be commonsense to the government. They have been to the atheist governments we have seen. The "fairy tale" won't lie down. It will need crushing. Exterminating. George Orwell. The end of history because history will be written by the government. The end of art. Art will be what the government says it is.

One is unacceptable. A recruitment problem. 5% is gross incompetence.

I am somewhat confuse as how is believing in the supernatural an aid to governing anything?

What connection to governing does believing in nonsense of some form of a god or not believing in nonsense have?

Why would a society that had seen the light of reason concerning a fairy tale god be all that difference then one who still sadly give at least lip serve to the nonsense as far as it day to day government is concern?

Given that a large percent of the major US foundering fathers was not Christians but at most Deists your position seem to make no sense at all.

A Freudian slip?

Possibly not. We'll see.

That's the accusation now. Concealing criminal acts.

given that the last 2-3 popes have been more interested in forcing out those who will not support a fanatically conservative doctrine than they are in anything else, to include abuse, just how many people do you figure we could find in the College of Cardinals at this point who don't have their hands dirty? For decades abusers have been A OK so long as they taught the right things, that is the untra conservative doctrine supported by the Popes.

It is said that the current College of Cardinals is the most dumb and corrupt that has been seen in many hundreds of years.

Although I think the church has always been corrupt....that absolute power thing.....the prevailing attitude now is not the welfare of the children, but saving the church from scandal. Seems that little ship has already sailed. Maybe it will implode.

that ship sailed with the backlash to Vatican 2 that put in power conservatives who were more interested in protecting their pet theories then they were doing good work.

The problem was set up by the liberals over reaching with Vatican 2 however. While we can't blame the liberals for the corruption that has incapacitated the Church for the last 40 years their stupidity did them in, and thus killed any chance for reform.

The normal response to being confused Bill is to do one of two things. Either give up bothering about the matter or seek to become unconfused by study.

But this is a mighty subject about which most of us are confused. Professors are confused. It is a conumdrum. And I am not confident I can explain it. But I am very wary of those who seem confident that they can in a few easy words. I assume that they are fearful of confusion and need to deceive themselves that there is no confusion.

But we have a system that has worked its way to where we are and the "nonsense", as you like to call it, implying you know what sense is, has been, and still is, an integral part of it. The importance of that part can be judged by its appearance in buildings, ceremonials, institutions and the whole paraphernalia it embraces. The idea that all that has been a complete waste of time and effort is just so ridiculous that I shudder to think of an analogy which would make just how ridiculous it is clear.

But it is a brave and necessary step to admit you are confused.

Imagine you have an optical illusion which creates what we have created and you dispense with it because it is an optical illusion and your pride demands that you are not the sort of person who is taken in by optical illusions and you can't predict what will happen if you do dispense with it.

For example, the female beautification industry. That is an optical illusion but just imagine getting rid of it. Just for a second. That should be long enough for anybody. Movies are an optical illusion. Weekends. Table manners. Etiquette.

Evolutionary determinants will see religion off if it becomes advantageous that it is seen off.

It might resolve itself into either being satisfied with that system, as I am, or otherwise. I am so satisfied with it that when I look at the history of the human race, and the nightmare of it. I think of my self as one of the most fortunate people who ever lived.

But it is Saturday night and the pub is a jumping joint on Saturday and I must prepare myself for it now.

Bob Dylan said--"You either got faith or you got unbelief--there ain't no neutral ground."

I have faith that the things the Church tells us to do are good for us. And some wayward priests, who disgust me just as much they do anybody, are way, way insufficient to shake that. The Church has a lot of experience in dealing with human behaviour. A great lot.

Eleven paragraphs to say you just take it on faith?

Less see what churches/faiths are we talking about that are telling us what is good for us and that we should listen to without engaging our minds?

Should we go with the Muslims and begin to enforce their religion laws and if not why not as following religions, directions are good for us is it not?

Do you mean all churches/faiths/religion cults or just all Christian churches/cults or just the Catholic Church?

How about the Mormon faith who membership control one state in the US?

What happen in the cases where the churches do not agree with each other then what do we do? In that case, do we get to use our minds?

Hell, should we begin to kill children who talk back to their parents and those who dare to work on Sunday and all men who have sex with other men as the bible the backbone of the Christian faith demand?

Once more, you need a little bit more explaining as your wording seem to imply that we should all follow the Catholic church teaching alone correct?

Bill, you are talking about Spedi's words, not mine.

Sorry I do not know how I made that error in posting a reply directed at our friend under a posting of your.

I would say you didn't understand what I said rog.

You would be correct.

Go for it chaps.

Get the Pope in a cell at The Hague. He's a big time crim. Mac said so. He read it in The Independent which has just been bought by a Russian "Oligarch" for a quid. Or The Evening Standard which is a free sheet.

The Cardinals into Gitmo. Good enough for 'em.

The Archbishops can be dispersed around the high security prisons. The Bishops in the "holiday camps" and the priests fixing the potholes in the roads caused be the recent inclement weather. Nuns are easily dealt with and the congregations rounded up and giving a quick course in farmerman's "re-education camps". Just because they haven't been caught yet doesn't mean that they they are not guilty as hell.

The homosexuals can be given parts in blockbuster movies or, if they can't act so good, be allowed to be top of the charts, Chief Whips or judges on Amateur Nite Dancing on Ice.

Bill can be put to deal with kids who get $$$$$ spent on their Christmas presents after thrumming with indignation and having tantrums and who can't be told their homework is shite in case they are traumatised.

hawk can explain Vatican 1, 2,3,4,5 and 6 in a few sentences which even a turnip can understand and farmerman's douchebags can be efficiently put to use as--well--douchebags.

Get on with it. I can hardly wait. What's holding you back. You look to have at least a 90% approval rating and you have a president operating (ahem) with a measly 48%.

You could sell the marble to the bankers for their swimming pools and the paintings for target practice in paint ball war games. Set fire to the rest.

Make a clean start. Get Dawkins in. He knows what to do. He's been married three times.

Come on--raise you game. We are obviously fucked if you hide away being cute and playing hard to get. We need you.

did you miss a dose of your medication? You are literally frothing at the mouth. Any hope of rational, reasonably civil discussion is impossible

I'm not Catholic and never have been, so though I thought I probably knew what the role of the pope in the Catholic church is, I thought I better look it up to make sure and this is what I found:


From what I've been reading, it doesn't sound as if this pope fulfilled his duties in terms of 'safeguarding' vulnerable Catholic children in or with the truth, even though he had it within his power to do that.

Maybe it could be looked at from the point of view that if he loved his church, and didn't want it to implode from the inside, he could admit the truth now, which actually might work to strengthen the church and its impact and image...although he himself would no longer get to be called the pope.