Catholicism
Posted: Sun Feb 23, 2025 8:47 am
It looks like the Papal succession circus will be back in town soon. We will see a lot of reporting about the political shenanigans involved. Much of it will be based on struggles between "reformers" and "conservatives". This is illusory. The pope is always a conservative, even the current one whose health is in such peril right now. He is a showman, and every "progressive" soundbite he has thrown out has been a carefully calculated bait, couched in long and brutal reaffirmations of the cruelty and prejudice at the core of Catholic doctrine.
The political jockeying is as cynical and dirty as political games everywhere. Then you have the parallel reporting of the faithful, getting all emotional and praying for the dying pope. It's very dissonant, this credulous spiritual passion next to the harshly secular business of electing a successor.
As an ex-Catholic atheist, it makes me reflect on my own childhood abandonment of the religion. It was firstly a logical rejection of unbelievable, intellectually demeaning supernatural claims which the religion imposed on its adherents. But there was also a strong feeling of anti-clericalism in my rebellious 14-year-old brain. At that stage, Catholic gender apartheid had kicked in. Primary school had featured 100% nuns. In high school it was strictly men only. The many priests and brothers I knew were such an unimpressive lot. They were a bunch of mediocre, insecure weirdos and bullies, many of whom displayed threatening sexual behaviour which was later confirmed to be the surface of institutionally-entrenched systemic criminal sexual abuse. The pope is at the top of that pyramid.
We were taught that the Church is not the building, it is the people, the broad community who call themselves "Catholic". That's partly true, and I feel a lot of affection for the unruly, multicultural, working class mob of "cultural" Catholics which I am still bonded to. But the clerical leadership with its misogynistic hierarchy doesn't respect the people, they act as if THEY, the clerics, are the church. They are also the enemy in my opinion.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g0x3p1kglo
The political jockeying is as cynical and dirty as political games everywhere. Then you have the parallel reporting of the faithful, getting all emotional and praying for the dying pope. It's very dissonant, this credulous spiritual passion next to the harshly secular business of electing a successor.
As an ex-Catholic atheist, it makes me reflect on my own childhood abandonment of the religion. It was firstly a logical rejection of unbelievable, intellectually demeaning supernatural claims which the religion imposed on its adherents. But there was also a strong feeling of anti-clericalism in my rebellious 14-year-old brain. At that stage, Catholic gender apartheid had kicked in. Primary school had featured 100% nuns. In high school it was strictly men only. The many priests and brothers I knew were such an unimpressive lot. They were a bunch of mediocre, insecure weirdos and bullies, many of whom displayed threatening sexual behaviour which was later confirmed to be the surface of institutionally-entrenched systemic criminal sexual abuse. The pope is at the top of that pyramid.
We were taught that the Church is not the building, it is the people, the broad community who call themselves "Catholic". That's partly true, and I feel a lot of affection for the unruly, multicultural, working class mob of "cultural" Catholics which I am still bonded to. But the clerical leadership with its misogynistic hierarchy doesn't respect the people, they act as if THEY, the clerics, are the church. They are also the enemy in my opinion.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g0x3p1kglo