Posted: Thu Oct 25, 2018 2:17 pm
I'd still like to know what are the "contributions to humanity" the Catholic Church can be credited with.
Official Discussion Forum for the works of Stephen R. Donaldson
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they made the roman legions run on time?????wayfriend wrote:I'd still like to know what are the "contributions to humanity" the Catholic Church can be credited with.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Role_of_C ... vilizationwayfriend wrote:What facts back up that argument? What list of accomplishments outweighs the long, long list of atrocities?peter wrote:None of which negates the argument that over the course of it's history, the church's sum contribution to humanity might be seen as positive rather than negative.
Does stability under a feudal dictator counterbalance religious wars?
Does preservation of the written word counterbalance misogyny spread through the written word?
Do good deeds done out of fear of God outweigh spreading fear of God?
The cultural influence of the Church has been vast. Church scholars preserved literacy in Western Europe following the Fall of the Western Roman Empire.[1] During the Middle Ages, the Church rose to replace the Roman Empire as the unifying force in Europe. The cathedrals of that age remain among the most iconic feats of architecture produced by Western civilization. Many of Europe's universities were also founded by the church at that time. Many historians state that universities and cathedral schools were a continuation of the interest in learning promoted by monasteries.[2] The university is generally regarded[3][4] as an institution that has its origin in the Medieval Christian setting, born from Cathedral schools.[5] The Reformation brought an end to religious unity in the West, but the Renaissance masterpieces produced by Catholic artists like Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Raphael at that time remain among the most celebrated works of art ever produced. Similarly, Christian sacred music by composers like Pachelbel, Vivaldi, Bach, Handel, Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Liszt, and Verdi is among the most admired classical music in the Western canon.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_C ... technologyThe Bible and Christian theology have also strongly influenced Western philosophers and political activists. The teachings of Jesus, such as the Parable of the Good Samaritan, are among the important sources for modern notions of Human Rights and the welfare measures commonly provided by governments in the West. Long held Christian teachings on sexuality and marriage and family life have also been both influential and (in recent times) controversial. Christianity played a role in ending practices such as human sacrifice, slavery,[6] infanticide and polygamy.[
Pope Francis meets with indigenous people and communities during his penitential piligrimage to Canada in July 2022 (2022 Getty Images)
A “Joint Statement” from the Dicastery for Culture and the Dicastery for Integral Human Development formally repudiates "those concepts that fail to recognize the inherent human rights of indigenous peoples, including what has become known as the legal and political ‘doctrine of discovery’."
Thanks to dialogue with indigenous peoples, “the Church has acquired a greater awareness of their sufferings, past and present, due to the expropriation of their lands … as well as the policies of forced assimilation, promoted by the governmental authorities of the time, intended to eliminate their indigenous cultures,” according to a “Joint Statement” issued by the Dicastery for Culture and Education and the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, and published on Thursday.
The document states that the “Doctrine of Discovery” — a theory that served to justify the expropriation by sovereign colonizers of indigenous lands from their rightful owners — “is not a part of the teaching of the Catholic Church.” It further affirms that the papal bulls that granted such “rights” to colonizing sovereigns have never been a part of the Church’s Magisterium.
This important text, coming eight months after Pope Francis' penitential journey to Canada, clearly reaffirms the Catholic Church's rejection of the colonizing mentality. “In the course of history,” the document recalls, “the Popes have condemned acts of violence, oppression, social injustice, and slavery, including those committed against indigenous peoples.” It also notes the numerous examples of bishops, priests, women and men religious and lay faithful who gave their lives in defense of the dignity of those peoples.” At the same time, it acknowledges that “many Christians have committed evil acts against indigenous peoples for which recent Popes have asked forgiveness on numerous occasions.”
Regarding the so-called “Doctrine of Discovery", the Statement explains: “The legal concept of ‘discovery’ was debated by colonial powers from the sixteenth century onward and found particular expression in the nineteenth-century jurisprudence of courts in several countries, according to which the discovery of lands by settlers granted an exclusive right to extinguish, either by purchase or conquest, the title to or possession of those lands by indigenous peoples.” According to some scholars, this “doctrine” found its basis in several papal documents, specifically two bulls of Nicholas V, Dum Diversas (1452) and Romanus Pontifex (1455); and Alexander VI’s bull Inter Caetera (1493). These are legal acts by which these two Pontiffs authorized the Portuguese and Spanish sovereigns to seize property in colonized lands by subjugating the original populations.
“Historical research clearly demonstrates that the papal documents in question, written in a specific historical period and linked to political questions, have never been considered expressions of the Catholic faith,” the Statement declares. Nonetheless, “the Church acknowledges that these papal bulls did not adequately reflect the equal dignity and rights of indigenous peoples.” The Statement goes on to say that “ It adds that “the contents of these documents were manipulated for political purposes by competing colonial powers in order to justify immoral acts against indigenous peoples that were carried out, at times, without opposition from ecclesiastical authorities.” The two Dicasteries, therefore, affirm, “It is only just to recognize these errors, acknowledge the terrible effects of the assimilation policies and the pain experienced by indigenous peoples, and ask for pardon.”
The Statement then quotes the words of Pope Francis: “Never again can the Christian community allow itself to be infected by the idea that one culture is superior to others, or that it is legitimate to employ ways of coercing others.” The Statement goes on to say that, “in no uncertain terms, the Church’s Magisterium upholds the respect due to every human being,” and concludes, “The Catholic Church therefore repudiates those concepts that fail to recognize the inherent human rights of indigenous peoples, including what has become known as the legal and political ‘doctrine of discovery’.”
The Statement recalls the “numerous and repeated” declarations of the Church and the Popes in favour of the rights of indigenous peoples, beginning with the 1537 bull Sublimis Deus of Paul III, which solemnly declared that indigenous peoples “are by no means to be deprived of their liberty or the possession of their property, even though they be outside the Christian faith; and that they may and should, freely and legitimately, enjoy their liberty and possession of their property; nor should they be in any way enslaved; should the contrary happen, it shall be null and have no effect.”The Catholic Church therefore repudiates those concepts that fail to recognize the inherent human rights of indigenous peoples, including what has become known as the legal and political ‘doctrine of discovery’.
Concluding, the Statement notes that, more recently, “the Church’s solidarity with indigenous peoples has given rise to the Holy See’s strong support for the principles contained in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.” It adds, “the implementation of those principles would improve the living conditions and help protect the rights of indigenous peoples as well as facilitate their development in a way that respects their identity, language, and culture.”
Good to see ~ let’s hope it leads to affirmative action in support of indigenous peoples claim to ancestral lands.The Statement then quotes the words of Pope Francis: “Never again can the Christian community allow itself to be infected by the idea that one culture is superior to others, or that it is legitimate to employ ways of coercing others.”
Pope Francis at Nakasuk Elementary School Square in Iqaluit, Canada, on July 29, 2022. (Credit: Gregorio Borgia/AP)
ROME — Though it was, in a sense, 530 years in the making, required two separate departments of the Roman Curia to address, and came a full eight months after demands burst into full public view during a high-profile papal trip to the New World, Thursday’s repudiation of the “Doctrine of Discovery” by the Vatican may turn out to have been the easy part.
To be clear, what the Vatican formally disowned yesterday [Thur, Mar 30] is a legal and political concept, not a theological tenet.
[…]
Part of the design for the joint statement was to craft it as an historical and politico-social declaration, without any theological import — it’s telling, in that regard, that the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith was not among its signatories.
Yet no matter how hard the Vatican may try, it seems unlikely that the theological underpinnings of what came to be known as the “Doctrine of Discovery” can be avoided indefinitely. Indeed, the issuance of Thursday’s statement seems likely to embolden forces seeking a theological reevaluation too.
Philip P. Arnold, a professor of religious studies at Syracuse University and the director of an Iroquois cultural center, told the New York Times that yesterday’s repudiation was only a “first step.”
The Vatican needs to address the “worldview” underlying the Doctrine of Discovery, Arnold said, including the idea that Christianity is superior to other religions.
And therein lies the rub.
When Pope Alexander VI granted King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella I sovereignty over a broad swath of the “New World” in Inter Caetera, he may well have been issuing a political decree that was not, in itself, de fide. Yet there’s no denying that the underlying justification was theological, rooted in the inherently missionary nature of Christianity.
“Among other works well pleasing to the Divine Majesty and cherished of our heart, this assuredly ranks highest, that in our times especially the Catholic faith and the Christian religion be exalted and be everywhere increased and spread,” Alexander VI told the Spanish monarchs.
One of thorniest doctrinal dilemmas unleashed by the Second Vatican Council, though never resolved by it, was how to reconcile two core teachings: First, the missionary nature of the church, expressed in the final command of Christ on earth to “make disciples of all nations”; and second, the idea that non-Christian religions nevertheless contain “seeds of the word” and “often reflect a ray of that truth which enlightens all men.”
The practical question which presents itself, in light of that tension, is whether the Catholic Church should still be trying to convert followers of other religions or not.
In the 1990s and 2000s, it seemed that issue was destined to become the titanic theological contest of the era. A spate of Catholic theologians working on what became known as the “theology of religious pluralism,” including the late Belgian Jesuit Father Jacques Dupuis, Indian Jesuit Father Michael Amaladoss, the late Spanish and Indian Father Raimundo Panikkar, Sri Lankan Jesuit Aloysius Pieris and the American Jesuit Roger Haight, were all investigated and/or sanctioned at one point or another.
In general terms, the “theology of religious pluralism” holds that the diversity of the world’s religions is not simply a byproduct of original sin, but rather a positive good willed by God, and non-Christian religions can be vehicles of salvation in their own right. Christianity’s missionary instinct, therefore, has to be reimagined in terms of dialogue, outreach and mutual respect, rather than bringing souls to the faith so they don’t burn in hell.
Critics of the theology of religious pluralism argue that while respect and dialogue with other faiths are good things, it would be a betrayal of the core of Christianity to suggest that Christ is somehow inessential to salvation, or that anyone’s life would not be enriched by explicitly embracing Christian faith and practice.
Tensions reached a high-water mark in 2000, when the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith under then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict XVI, issued a document titled Dominus Iesus. It declared that whatever the Holy Spirit brings about in other religions “serves as a preparation for the gospel, and can only be understood in reference to Christ,” and insisted that Catholics must be committed to “announcing the necessity of conversion to Jesus Christ.”
Yet as suddenly as the storm had broken, it seemed to dissipate.
As pope, Benedict XVI had other fish to fry, and without his leadership the Vatican’s doctrinal office didn’t seem inclined to press the issue. At the beginning of the Francis papacy, German Cardinal Gerhard Müller, a Ratzinger protégé, tried to launch another investigation of Amaladoss, but the pope welcomed his fellow Jesuit to his morning Mass and declared him a “good theologian,” effectively ending any threat of censure.
It’s possible — indeed, it seems, likely — that as reaction to Thursday’s joint statement continues to unfold, activists and thinkers inside and outside the church may press to reopen the theological issues they see as underlying the “Doctrine of Discovery.”
If so, Vatican officials may end up feeling as if, in the effort to cure one headache, they’ve inadvertently created many more.
A report from Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown released Wednesday alleges 156 Catholic clergy members and others abused at least 600 children over the course of more than six decades.
“From the 1940s through 2002, over a hundred priests and other Archdiocese personnel engaged in horrific and repeated abuse of the most vulnerable children in their communities while Archdiocese leadership looked the other way,” the report reads. “Time and again, members of the Church’s hierarchy resolutely refused to acknowledge allegations of child sexual abuse for as long as possible.”
The report lists descriptions of graphic sexual and physical abuse allegations: It includes stories of how some alleged abusers provided victims with alcohol and drugs and describes in vivid detail how they coerced and forced victims to perform sexual acts.
The report’s list of abusers includes clergy members, seminarians, deacons, teachers and other employees of the Archdiocese.
Forty-three priests who “served in some capacity or resided within the Archdiocese of Baltimore” committed sexual abuse in locations outside Maryland, the report alleged. Of these 43 priests, 40 of them allegedly committed sexual abuse in only one other location, while the other three allegedly committed sexual abuse in two other locations outside Maryland, the report says.
I participate in a group that discusses theology ~ even though I consider myself an A-theist … I was a Christian for many decades and still very much love the character of Jesus (whether a fictional character or actual).… and non-Christian religions can be vehicles of salvation in their own right.
Now lets multiply by 100 because of unreported cases.Obi-Wan Nihilo wrote: ↑ https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/05/us/archd ... index.html
A report from Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown released Wednesday alleges 156 Catholic clergy members and others abused at least 600 children over the course of more than six decades.
Absolutely. Which is why I walked away from the church, and have nothing but contempt for those who willfully belong to and contribute money to such a reprehensible organization.High Lord Tolkien wrote: ↑Now lets multiply by 100 because of unreported cases.Obi-Wan Nihilo wrote: ↑ https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/05/us/archd ... index.html
A report from Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown released Wednesday alleges 156 Catholic clergy members and others abused at least 600 children over the course of more than six decades.
I'm not saying that each and every catholic priest in the whole world is a child raping monster but because of the massive worldwide coverup...there no way to be sure.
They already do that. Political candidates make pilgrimages to this church or that church.