When dogma outstrips morality and equity...

[mousme]

See, it's during moments like these that I have to make great efforts to remind myself that it is the institution and not the religion itself that is at fault.

Moments of great doubt when I wonder whether it's not all a large crock of shit.

Read this article to know what I'm talking about. The Vatican rejected the U.S. Roman Catholic Church's new sexual abuse policy Friday, saying the sweeping zero-tolerance crackdown needed to be revised because elements conflict with universal church law.

I'm a pretty devout Catholic, but there's a reason I didn't practise for so many years other than apathy. I still have many, many issues with dogma and doctrine that I have come to understand have nothing to do with catholicism and everything to do with an archaic and top-heavy religious institution.

There is a reason for the separation of church and state, and that is so that no man -regardless of his supposed relationship with God- should be above the law prescribed by his own state. How the Church can condone actions which surely make God sick to His stomach is beyond me. Having such individuals retain positions of power and influence undermines the credibility and holiness of the church and basically destroys everything that Christ suffered and died for.

Bah.

Humanity sucks sometimes.

Comments

It's all politics

[dgwyn.livejournal.com]

As great as the central message of Christianity is, the fact is the Catholic church is neither wholly religion nor state. While we have nominal separation of church and state, the Catholic church occupies a grey area in many respects. Moreover, my impression is that the Vatican's rejection of the U.S. policy had much to do with the fact that the U.S. policy had been hurriedly clobbled together in response to heavy pressure.

With regards to the greater issue, take a step back and see how far Western society as whole has come in the last fifty years in dealing with such issues. Then remember that the Catholic church is very large and by nature conservative institution. Such bodies change very slowly. Not only that, but the Catholic church also represents a great number of less advanced areas of the World. Change will come. Slowly, over-cautiously, but it will come.