Why are the media so utterly hostile to the Pope?

Looking at that picture, it's like Caitlin Moran is separated at birth from Cruella De Ville.

This is where wearing a cross could cost you your job. Where the mere intention of praying for someone is regarded in the same way as an obscene gesture. Where an individual too bladdered with cheap booze and very little in the brain department urinates on a war memorial dedicated to selfless men and women who died for our tomorrows, including theirs! Where a middle aged woman can first stroke an innocent cat then coldly take it by the scruff of the neck and dump it in a wheelie bin to world revulsion; where the same thing happens to aborted babies every day and nobody is allowed to see it on the evening news. Where Catholic adoption agencies are forced to close because what the previous Government signed into law was against the agency's conscience and faith - by not allowing same-sex couples to adopt children. Where the kind of things that are said against the Roman Catholic Church cross the threshold of journalistic balance and impartiality too, too far and - if it was said about anyone else in similar tones - would find the Press Complaints Commission, legal writs and the High Court breaking down the door of those responsible followed a published, public apology.

Welcome, Holy Father.

Anti-Catholic abuse, hatred and discrimination is almost the last hatred that is allowed full vent in society. Cailin has a good point, but I would like to add another - it is that the Chruch and its poeple say 'no'. This word is not be to uttered to anyone these days and they take offence at being told 'no'.

Our stance against the 'commodification of human life' enrages them. Our support for family life, and our warnings about the consequences both socially and personally to people who abandon wives, husbands and children often for very poor reasons and selfish desires, enrages them too.Our stand against the callous and dreadful treatment of the poor both at home and in the third world, and our criticsm of the worst excesses of uncontrolled capitalism, are met with hostility.

In the person of our Pope all these things are represented, and thus the irrational hatred and anger felt by many against him. He dares to say the one word people these days don't want to hear - 'no'.

Well, musicmum, don't say "no" in the poll on the CT website asking if Caitlin Whatshername should be censured. Vote YES! http://www.catholictruthscotland.com/papalvisit.html

It's absolutely disgraceful that such comments have gone unchecked, whereas, and I know we all know this by now, if she'd been similarly insulting about a leader of, say Islam, she'd probably have been sacked.

I also dont get what this hullabaloo is all abt. Its not the first tym a Pope is visiting a country...but this trip is getting out of hand,: from money, sex, tickets...whats going on u Britons? why did u invite him for starters? Good Gd!

What we are seeing is a move from mere anti-Catholicism to the promotion of lies, libels and hatreds against the Church. We are seeing a pre-persecution situation.

Every aspect of the Church is being systematically lied about and distorted, from its history to modern policies. How many people realise that child abuse actually occurs to a LESSER extent in the Church than among other groups? Very few, because the media constantly emphasize decades old cases in the Church while ignoring modern-day profusions elsewhere. Did the Church act any differently in dealing with abusers than most secular organisations until very recently, (deal with it internally, and reassign abusers declared safe to doso) No. But media coverage draws the false impression that Catholics were alone in doing this. How many people howling against the Church realise that the Papacy was the leading protector of Jews under Hitler, and that its policies on AIDS save more lives than those pushing condoms and lying that this constitutes "safe sex"?

What we are seeing is willful distortion of Catholicism, some of it done knowingly by people in the full knowledge they are purveying falsehoods, some of it repeated by those who have swallowed the hate-campaign and will now believe anything evil said about the Church. As Rabbi Dalin said in his book defending Pope Pius 12th, the campaign is driven by those who hate the Church's opposition to Abortion, Euthanasia, and hedonist culture, and will do anything to discredit the Church's moral authority.

What we CAN do is fight this. Stop apologising for existing. Spend more on actively telling the truth. Challenge the BBC to obey its charter and report factually and even-handedly. There should be no automatic linking of the Church with pedophilia any more than with any other body or faith-group. Ensure that any "drama" attempting to smear the Pope by association, is not aired. WE pay the license fee, and it is not there to be used by special interest groups to libel and slander the Church. If necessary every Catholic in the UK should stop paying the license fee until major reforms are introduced. And if anti-Catholics use television to attack the Church, we should demand a terrestrial TV channel to broadcast the truth. The restriction on television broadcasting by Churches was introduced on the quid-pro-quo of FAIR coverage by the national stations. If that is torn up by biased coverage, then we have a right to have a terrestrial Catholic TV channel.

Make no mistake these people are launching a war against the Church, and if we do not fight back against this campaign of hatred and vilification, we will face grave consequences.

Amen.

This article is wrong - the Church did cover up child abuse... rather than simply denying this it would be more helpful to look at the reasons why and then try to learn from these lessons and change.

I could give an intellectual answer to this post but I think we are now at the point now were the journalists that are attacking the Catholic Church are really just working class, ill-educated and ill mannered people who only just managed to scrape through the 'dumbed down' UK education system. Atheists, agnostics, Peter Tatchell and all these pathetic, uncouth and ill-educated 'empty vessels' in Britain need to stop worrying about the Pope and worry about their own sad and pathetic lives.

So only educated, middle-class people can be christians - is that what Jesus taught?

To be honest I was primarily referring (accurately) to Caitlin Moran's (and other two-bit journalist's) vile attack on the Catholic Church. It is absolutely beyond believe that Catholics let them get away with it. After all we are not going to be burned at the stake nowadays! I have recently started challenging these idiots on Twitter. I don't suppose it will work but if it makes them think twice before saying these vile things it is worth it. I don't suppose it will work though, but at least I'm having a go.

Why?

The answer is easy; people are turning away of the vatican institute, the last desperate hold to continue the power and splendour of ancient rome. Ratzinger sees himself as the direct follower of the ancient Roman Emperors and just wants his earthly power restored, so all the world may bow to him and continue to serve him.

You have to hand it to him, he realy has done everything possible to become immortal in his own way, he used every trickery possible to become " pope" & probably hopes to become a saint after death, so he will never be forgotten, at least to that diminishing group of vatican lovers.

World war I brought about the collapse of the Romanov, Habsburg and Hohenzollern dynasties, because they held on to the past and lost glory. They weren't possible to respond to the chancing times and the same goes for the vatican. The end is here, after centuries of stealing, lying and commiting every sin (according to their holy bible), the jury is in and the verdict is guilty.

You sir, are living in your own little world. ; )

It takes one, to know one.

You are right. I used to fall for the popular media opinions and some conspiracy theories myself. That is, until I began to see unbiased sources supporting the Vatican's statements about its history and its activity.

Unbiased sources? Whow, that's a good one. Was already a while since I had a good laugh.

Unbiased sources don't exist, not pro or contra the vatican or anything else, it all comes down to our point of view and what we want to accept. As for me religion is invented by man, nothing supernatural or so, just to control his fellow beings.

You don't agree with that? Ok, that's your good right. I have no problem with that, but don't start a silly try to convert me, because that's the path you are taking. I have seen the filfth of the church from the inside and am glad that I have closed that door forgood.

My present point of view is made most clear by a quote:

"The clergy damage the people the most, as they bind them to superstistions and keep them overpious, to make it easier to supress and misuse them" Rudolf of Austria-Hungary December 26 1873

And with that I close of my participation in this debate, we could go on for ever and ever, but don't think that is realy the purpose of this site. All the best!

It is only by showing love that love can exist in this world. The founder of our church stated very clearly that the only commandment was love. The Church has been far from love on a number of issues and it is now reaping what it has sown. Stop and think before we go hunting for scalps. Are those who are attacking the Church in pain because the Church failed to show them love.

What many are looking for is love and they don’t need some who hasn’t been there to preach about hell. I been there and all I am looking for his Church of love that He preached about! Are you part of the problem or part of the solution??

Love is important. But truth is as well. The Church has done more to protect its people from abuse than any other denomination. Other denominations have more cases of abuse than Catholicism and yet all of the attention has been drawn to the Church and the Vatican. Can you guess why? Read the facts, the popular media only feeds on what is popular. It won't take the side of the underdog whether or not it has truth on its side because it needs paychecks from readers who want to hear what they already ignorantly believe.

The Church also stands firm on it's position on gay marriage, abortion, and other controversial issues that other denominations shy away from. Any progressive group that disagrees with the Church's age old positions must find a way to discredit it to weaken its influence and unity. This is one.

England has a problem with radical Islamists. It has made people afraid. Because Islam is in many ways un-able to be confronted and criticised, a lot of the fear, anger and hatred towards 'religious zealots' has been directed instead to a soft target: Catholicism. The Pope's visit to England will be a blessing that the depressed, dour, hopeless secularists of England desperately need. In many ways they don't deserve it. The sexual abuse issue is being dealt with... the hatred being expressed has far deeper roots than this issue. I believe that the Pope will bring a blessing to a nation that desperately needs it. We must pray for him.

The three sentences are certainly true; the rest is the usual nonsense

Sir, I can't understand why The Tmes would be attacking The Church and The Pope as the mother of the present owner and his father's previous wife is a Scottish Catholic. Why would he be allowing these insults to be printed and his Catholic relatives to read them?

I have a theory that perhaps Milo and readers would like to discuss.

Up to about 4 years ago, when the metropolitan elites thought about religion at all, they thought about the Church of England. Old, fuddy-duddy Anglicanism was no threat to them. After all, aren't bishops appointed by the Prime Minister. Roman Catholics? A small minority and an irrelevance in a secular, post-Christian society.

Then, one day, Alan Johnson (Labour Education Secretary) has his education bill torn to pieces within a 24 hour period, not by a coalition of religions, but by the Roman Catholic Church (almost) by itself, the Church of England having lamely capitulated earlier.

That such a completely independent and ethnicly diverse organisation in England could achieve such a thing in the teeth of a long and concerted media campaign came as a profound such shock to the almost wholly non-religious and Anglo-Saxon media elite. Worse, it showed how powerless they really were against an organisation with such an intimate and lifelong relationship with its members, far more intimate than a newspaper and its readers, for instance.

So, next time you see the usual anti-catholic bile, take it as a back-handed compliment. We are now worth their while attacking and I regard it as the price of successfully resisting secularisation in this country.

Because they deserve it!

Really? on what grounds does the CC deserve it?... The Church has worked harder than any institution or government to stop injustices EVER. The child abuse within the church has been addressed and acknolwged ... but instead of just looking at church why dosnt the meda turn to other places that sexual abuse occurs, clergy fall into the 2% of unknown offenders, which is shared by other types of people, e.g. strangers.....

I am a proud young catholic woman and thank God I belong to the only church that teaches truth and holds the highest moral and values.

so i do think that to say "they" that is all catholic deserve to be so mistreated is wrong. I am sure if the church accepted the dirty lack of morals people have accepted as a norm in todays society there would be more lives destroyed and lost.

and in regard to the article i think that people are just uneducated in the sense that they do not understand what the Church teaches ....

May God protect his beloved Church always and lead all the clergy and lay to walk the path of love, hope and faith!

Some perspective needs to be maintained, though. We should lose sleep over "critics" such as a tweeter who also scribbles for a paper almost no one now reads online? An Indy columnist whose employer can't produce a front page without a question mark and who sells so few papers it may not be in business next year, and after years on the payroll he still writes like he's penning pieces for a student newspaper? And the state broadcaster which ultimately believes in nothing morally, save for always securing its own perpetual funding?

You call those critics? Ha! They're amateurs.

Diocletian. Luther. Henry VIII. Even Marx. Now, THOSE are critics!

Its glaringly obvious. The media hate The Church because it still attracts people and therefor has some temporal power. The media want all the power for themselves, to create their kind of society. Something they have been quite successfull at so far. But The Catholic Church is their last great enemy, the rest having fallen prey to secular (and evil) forces some time ago.

The Catholic Church, which I love, does not help itself, with its silly press releases which the press sensationalises.The sexual hypocrisy of clergy antagonises an already indifferent society.Ther are big issues of justice and peace, poverty, the environment, we 're obsessed with declaring that sex is within marriage only, condoms may not be used, gay relations are wrong - but among the clergy - they do n't walk the talk!!!
We need a return to holiness
A life based on prayer
A slimmed down Curia
Married priests.
A sense of proportion
Better educated clergy

The sinful acts of a few clergymen does not reflect the Church well just the way any other tiny minority of deviants do not represent their organizations well. A "Better educated clergy" in what way? To be educated in progressive social ideas?

The Church is renown for having great intellects. But priests do not specialize in interpreting the Bible or making judgments about controversial issues alone. Such ideas led to catastrophes like Martin Luther and the birth of thousands of sects. The Church is united.

How is the life of the clergy not based on prayer? Have you seen how they live?
Perhaps you mean more prayer for lay people, which I would agree with.

The Church has fewer cases of abuse than comparable Protestant denominations so the conclusion that lack of marriage for Catholic clergy is a problem, is a great mistake. Based on that assumption Protestant denominations should not allow their clergy to marry. ; )

Unlike the previous posters, you are part of the problem - other than "a life base on prayer" the rest of your suggestions are part of the post - Vatican 2 thinking : "I don't need those old men in robes interfering in my life!" The previous posters are spot on. All who truly hate the Catholic Church either don't undestand it (better catechesis) or they are mired in sin they don't want to face. Remember, they put Jesus to death for speaking TRUTH. THe fact that the apostles and so many martyrs have gone to their deaths for refusing to deny that same truth tells you everything you need to know.

Need we really ask this question? If they persecuted Me - they will persecute you! (Jesus Christ).

They don't like the Pope - because he tells the Truth. And atheists want their own special truth - a nice one that complements them. That's why the don't like the Pope!

All of this speculation and suggestions of hatred could be swept aside by just one miracle. If your church can turn a simple piece of bread into the body of christ and wine into his blood on a weekly basis. then all it would take is to let your pope go to one of the many areas of the world where people are starving, armed with a few fish and a couple of loaves of bread and see what happens. Did your christ not say that anyone can do what he does if they have enough faith. If a miracle happened this would fill the churches to the rafters, all previous iffy looking miracles would be proven, this would shut up the atheists like me and Richard Dawkins ( Don't hold yor breath)

The Church is busy out there in the poorest countries feeding the poor, dressing the wounded, nursing the sick (especially those who have HIV AIDS and other diseases), counselling those who have been hurt by abortion, divorce, bereavement and desertion as well as to the lonely, neglected and marginalised in our neighbourhoods. Successive popes have enabled many organisations to do these good things by approving the constitutions of religious and lay orders to go out there in the world as well as into our neighbourhoods. They are miracles of the kind you and Richard Dawkins et all will either refuse to understand or, quite simply, NEVER.

God is content with the small things we do with great kindness, not the other way round.


The devil tempted Jesus in the desert with similarly expressed tasks you are challenging the Pope to do. Christ told the devil to go away in no uncertain terms. The Pope is not Christ but his Vicar on earth.

There is a big difference between Jesus and the average person; Jesus knew God existed because he was His son.

It's less obvious for the rest of us. It takes a leap of faith like it does for an atheist to believe that life occurred from chaos that had a curious universal beginning. You didn't see it occur, but you have faith that your atheist professors know something your common sense initially rejects, like Catholics do their theologians.

At least there's one book that has stood the test of time, and no it's definitely not your science text book which gets flipped on its head every so often, as fast as Protestants reinterpret the Bible for their convenience. Oops, gravity is not universal for different sized objects. Oops, an ice age isn't coming, more like a heat wave. What's next? Maybe they will realize a flagellum can't be evolved from anything smaller. Maybe they'll realize that Einstein was right, it is more likely that there is a creator. Too bad he didn't figure out that there is a one very likely, and that He established the Church.

For almost two thousand years, the Church has stuck to one book, one basic theology. There is no way a group of men could have conceived a book so consistent with each others writings and constantly relevant in the future, no more than professors can write a textbook that will have no fundamental flaws in two millennium down the line.

As I thought the pope is an average person (no miracle then) and no surprise. The book you speak of has only stood the test of time because already indoctrinated people allow their children to be subjected to the same drivel (show me the boy of 7 and i'll show you the man). Your pope said that a priest is a gift to the world, he said this on the same day bishops were getting shot of three of them in Italy for the usual reason. Wake up look around, theres a great world out there for the understanding. People will say that their gods are wonderful, magnificent and many other adjectives, he is also beyond the understanding of mere mortals like you and me, but they always seem to know exactly what he wants, what you can eat, when you can eat it, who you can have sex with and who you can't, hows that for control. Look at history to see what a controlling force this has been based on fear of retribution. At least it will be some time now before any menber of the church asks me again where one gets one's morality from when they don't have religeon Here endeth the lesson

"because already indoctrinated people allow their children to be subjected to the same drivel"
You mean like atheists make religion look like a joke to theirs when they read Dawkins and Hitchens to them? You mean like how our public schools are filled with open atheists who mock religion? The religious are made fun of when they speak openly, how is that for freedom?

Do you know how many priests died in concentration camps during WWII, or under communism, during the French revolution? Can you guess why they were targeted? There is no tangible morality to reject horrific acts without religion. There is no reason why why Hitler and Stalin shouldn't have killed million of people in the name of progress.

The Pope and the Vatican have no say in who you, let alone Catholics have sex with. God does. They only give us the hints according to the centuries of study of our own theology. There is nothing wrong with spiritual direction.

Something atheists don't understand is the appreciation Christians have for the guidance of their leaders.
Western Civilization has benefited from its morality. Corruption, sexuality and deviancy get out of hand when morality fades away, like now, when atheism is the new chic. I bet your children feel the peer pressure to avoid looking at religion favorably. How could they? Their parents, friends and the media all seem to have an aversion to it. That much for freedom of choice.

When you believe you are all that's out there, life becomes a race to please yourself because you only have one life. Anything or anyone who gets in your way becomes your enemy, and THAT is why the Church is under attack. That is why the Romans hated it, the Nazis hated it, Communism hated it, and that is why you hate it.

If you are interested in WW2 read the reichskonkordat and see what agreement RCC had with the Nazis-very interesting.
I am pleased to read that we agree with each other on the matters of morality,sexual deviance and corruption getting out of hand when morality fades.
With paedophile priests abusing our trust in order to carry out their perfideous barbarities on our chidren and the machinations of a corrupt heigherarchy moving them around to avoid any meaningful justice, which of course any right minded person would find despicable, whatever their religious beliefs. This is the sort of thing that makes it an absurdly difficult task to claim the moral high ground over other faiths of atheism. You mention Stalin and others who had no religion but commited evil acts,well sit down with a piece of paper and list all the evil deeds you can think of that were committed "in the name of atheism" and then list all the evils that have been committed "in the name of religion" begin to see what I mean.
However we can take comfort inthe fact there is common ground between us, If a theist is someone who believes in a god, and an atheist is someone who does not, and an agnostic is someone who cant prove it either way, then we are all agnostic. Thank you for debating with me sadly I will not be able to continue as I am leaving the country today to work abroad. May your god bless you.

The interesting thing is that the Church has been a target of that argument when they were more active then real military powers against Hitler for their position.

Britain and France did nothing when Poland was overrun. America the same for years. But they weren't located in the middle of a fascist country now were they? Think about the location of the Vatican and who was in control of the country that completely surrounds them. The Vatican signed a agreement with the Nazis which protected the voices of their priests (not completely but enough to denounce Nazism in Germany and elsewhere). The Vatican also helped save thousands of Jews itself. Can't say the same of the Allies who knew about the camps much earlier and did nothing.

The percent of those priests is insignificant to the percent of such deviants in other organizations. The solution to this problem is not less Catholicism, but more.

Perhaps you should watch the debates between Hitchens and D'Souza. That should enlighten you about the real numbers of history and what modernism without God led to.

I don't know where you got the impression that I'm agnostic. It's clear to me that there is and must be one.

Anyway, enjoy your new job. May God bless you. :)

on the subject of morality Fred, these clergy that had sex with children are probably the same clergy telling africans dying from aids that it is a sin to use a condom. So what i want to know is, when they had sex with the kids is more of a sin if they wore a condom than if they didn't

The best way to avoid AIDs is to not have promiscuous sex. Ever thought of that solution?

Condoms are an excuse for people to have sex promiscuously because they believe they become immune to STDs when they use them. So taking the idea of condoms out of a culture brings it back to to the reality that sex shouldn't be promiscuous and perhaps has a bigger purpose.

The Church believes, like many other religions, that sex is a holy act with the purpose to create children. Another reason why it agrees with the Bible that bestiality and homosexuality are deviant and disruptive to society like it was in Rome.

How interesting that you put religions,sex and children in the same sentence, very topical.

How interesting that you completely avoided the argument, very topical. ;)

The Church usually has many reasons for its positions. It tends to look at the bigger picture for its decisions and is very careful about staying true to its theology.

The church does not have many reasons just one. As we developed as through the ages people developed a higher mental capacity and starting asking questions about our world, like what are we doing here, where do we go and what's life all about. The more cunning among man came forward with the answers for a price. He said come into my cave accept these dogmas, and when you die you will get this ticket that will take you into heaven. But if you dont you will burn forever in this place called hell. This grasped the reasoning faculty of their newly developing mind, and created a fear of death. This has been capitalized on ever since and has been built into a multi-billion dollar business. They will tell you on the one hand that this god is so beyond anyones understanding, yet their is allways someone on hand to tell you exactly what she wants (sorry he, no women-not allowed) Even though they may have paedophile clergy, abusing peoples trust so that they can carry out their perfideous barbarities on our children, and a corrupt heigherarchy moving them around to avoid any meaningful justice (this of course is despicable to any right minded person whatever their faith). Despite all that happens like iffy miracles that never happen under scrutiny, All based on a totally unprovable mythology, people still pass this dogma on to their innocent little children instead of letting them have an open mind and see the world in all its beauty without surrounding it with fairy stories

There are some sects that may act like businesses, but certainly not Catholicism. If it were run more like a business, it would have launched a massive counter campaign against the 'tolerant' atheist anti-Catholic media. But it hasn't because it won't bring itself to such a low and it doesn't have that kind of money because - it's not a business.

According to the same logic you appeal to, perhaps humans realized that tangible morality without something above was impossible. To claim tolerance and open-mindedness while at the same time indoctrinating the youth's minds with anti-religious thought through the media and the public educational system surely is a new intellectual pinnacle. It's almost as believable as Hitler claiming he was a Catholic while murdering 3 million of them in the Holocaust. He killed the same number of Jews, but at least he didn't claim to be one. Saying you are tolerant while bashing the Church should have caused you to pause and notice the irony. But you didn't. Just like the media and your friends, Church bashing is so normal, you can do it without second thought. It's like making fun of the Jews before Hitler decided to do something about it.

And you don't even need to be Christian to know there is no universal morality without God. If you do believe there is, explain your 'morality' to the cannibalistic and human sacrificing societies the Church transformed. I bet they would follow your ideas on a whim.

Mr. Grosvenor, you are so intolerant and full of bull I don't even know where to begin.

The Catholic Church was not founded so it could get money off of people by telling them they are gonna be condemned unless they pay. That is a LIE, and you know it.

The Catholic Church was not founded so that it could facilitate the molesting of children by pedophilic priests. That is a LIE, and you know that too.

The Catholic Church was certainly not founded to halt scientific progress. I can't even begin to count the number of scientists and ideas that came from the Church. Genetics was founded by Father Gregor Mendel. The Big Bang Theory was first proposed by Father Lemaitre. St. Thomas Aquinas supported the idea of a round earth in the Summa Theologica, and the Catholic Galileo was a supporter of heliocentrism. While the Church has done some pretty terrible things in terms of persecutions and such, you have to remember it is not perfect. In fact, Pope John Paul II gave an apology to Galileo in 1995, if memory serves.

Furthermore, the farther through your argument I got, the more preposterous your claims became, until it was obvious you were just spouting nonsense and weren't going to bother even being nice, much less fair. You say the miracles are "iffy," no matter how many people see them or document them (face it, the evidence for miracles will never be empirical -- either you believe it or not, and you can tell I've made my choice). You claim all of our beliefs are based on "unprovable mythology," but you omit, whether deliberately or not, that it is pretty obviously faith-based and that's sorta how faith works. See, I could easily say that I have faith your real name is John Grosvenor, since that's what you put, but then, I could also easily say that you could be lying, and probably are, since most of what you just said is lies. And since it's "unprovable," should I assume that you are lying, since that's a "reasonable" conclusion?

You would say no, but because of your malice toward faith, that's a pretty "unlogical" thing to say.

It's not just the media - the whole world (in the theological, Johannine sense) is utterly opposed to, frightened of, and habitually hostile to the truth. It makes sinners feel shame - which is good, though not according to the secularists.

When Christ came, his own did not receive him. Parties that would otherwise have been fighting each other (the Jews and Romans) united in a coalition against his message. Why? Because it takes a LOT of humility to accept that one might be wrong, and the world does not have that capacity. Also, the major crisis that develops when one is confronted with the truth, and the need to change, is just too much for most poor souls.



I offered my own reflection on the issue of the anti-Pope coalition (press, religions, the media, society at large, gays, atheists, and so on) on my blog a couple of days days ago: http://areluctantsinner.blogspot.com/2010/07/mu...

Why? It is simple: they hate the Catholic Church. Now, yersteday and forever. In the future Catholics will have to hide back to the catacumbs to survive. Yes, we made mistakes, we sinned. If this is the penance, let it hapen.

I am no theologian nor intellect, however, the answer is obvious to me. What does the Catholic Church teach? The answer to this question will assist us analyze the answer as to why so much hatred campaign in the media left toward the CC., perpertrated by those who know very little or nothing at all about the Church's teaching, or propably choose to be ignorance of them. The Church's teachings are often misunderstood and rejected because those very rules "confine" individuals. Basically, the teachings are labeled as outdated, too disciplinary, too strict, or discriminatory. The CC's resistance to "change" or give in to these people, the so called progessive left, extreme radical who are a working force to impose their narrow minded ideal on other people through their infiltration into the legal system and change law against the will of the majority of people. However, let we sit back and examine this. Let me quote Cardinal Pell of Sydney, Australia.

"Christ himself was rejected. We do not do focus polling to find out which Christian teachings are popular and acceptable across the community and then only teach them. The Cross is a sign of contradiction and there is a significant element in Catholic teaching which contradicts many human desires and accepted practices. The reflexes of our society are still heavily influenced by Christianity, so calls to faith and hope and love in many ways are congenial to Australian society, as is our call for social justice.

In morals, as well as in coping with human weakness, we have the wonderful Christian teaching on forgiveness. If there are blind spots in society, one of the roles of the Church is to point those out. In our pansexual and permissive society there are many blind spots around marriage and family and sexuality and life. The Church is called to throw Christian light on these murky situations."

So there you have it!!

"A church that never went right would be quite as miraculous as a church that never went wrong," G.K. Chesterton in Orthodoxy.

God Bless!!!!

When it comes to new atheism/ secularism, child abuse claims, apologetics etc, the clergy are useless
I've heard them described as "old men out of touch with reality"- not far of the mark and I'm a practicing Catholic!

Much of our wrath has to be reserved for our English Bishops and for a Cadre of “Leading Catholic Commentators” in the National and Religious Press.

Dating back to the conclave, Cardinal Ratzinger/Pope Benedict has faced a reaction ranging from Passive Resistance to Active Hostility.

Few of our leading figureheads provide the active support and the administrative competence that our Pontiff deserves.

How many nations in Catholic Europe would banish Holy Days of Obligation to a Sunday - when none of us asked for this?

It’s time for our Bishops to move on gracefully and for those catholics with media access to be more vocal in their support of Benedict XVI.

Let the Vatican's PR department take due responsibility. Aligning the ordination of women bishops as a grave sin equivalent to child abuse was hardly going to spread the love.

This is a absolutely not true. Where did you get your information? Do you read papal encyclicals, exhortations, and Vatican reports etc. etc? I think not otherwise you would not be thinking this. Read what Catholic papers have to say, as it is easier to read a precis of an article from a truthful source in your own language.

The Vatican never said that the ordination of women was equivalent to child abuse. The document was about issues that would be considered as crimes against the Church. You're misreading the document and drawing the wrong conclusions.

There really is only one answer. The people, and they all have a name, who are attacking the Pope are all in a very serious state of sin, be it homosexual, adultery, divorced, re-married, Wicca witch networks, satanists, free-masons etc. That's all. They don't like the truth. It hurts. They are like spoilt brats who want their own way, and when anyone disagrees peacefully, they want his blood, some literally. They love the liberal political parties because they tell them, "There, there, of course you can do what you like". When a government allows animal-human hybrids, you can be sure there is something satanic behind it. Believe it or not. England is not just post-Christian, it's anti-Christian. Simple. And finally, there are also those who 'shout the loudest', it's not uncommon for a (secret) paedophile to attack the Pope.

Cailin, you need to see a psychiatrist.

Pimpoo, if you can't see the truth in Cailin's comment, You need to see an optician...