Pope says 'backward' US conservatives replaced faith with ideology

Pope Francis condemned the “very strong, organised, reactionary attitude” in the US church and said Catholic doctrine allows for change over time.

Pope Francis has blasted the “backwardness” of some conservatives in the US Catholic Church, saying they have replaced faith with ideology and that a correct understanding of Catholic doctrine allows for change over time.

Francis’ comments were an acknowledgment of the divisions in the US Catholic Church, which has been split between progressives and conservatives who long found support in the doctrinaire papacies of St John Paul II and Benedict XVI, particularly on issues of abortion and same-sex marriage.

WorldWideLem,

This is the fruits of the GOP strategy that’s been going on for decades to strengthen their support through Christian believers. The Pope is just recognizing the impact of that from the religious side, whereas Barry Goldwater warned of it’s impact from the political side.

Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they’re sure trying to do so, it’s going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can’t and won’t compromise. I know, I’ve tried to deal with them.

It certainly is a terrible damn problem, and we’re knee deep in the shit right now.

jayrhacker,
jayrhacker avatar

Separation of Church and State: Good for the Church, Good for the State.

ZombieZookeeper,

Now the pos conservatives are gonna start calling the pope woke. 🤣🤣🤣

zib,
zib avatar

You know you fucked up bad when even the Pope is saying, "Whoa, slow it down there with the fascism, bud".

abraxas,

American Catholics have largely voted Democrat for much of the last century. This flip-flop to voting Republican is relatively recent.

It seems to me to be a bit of a religio-coup. Bishops have some autonomy, and Priests some as well. It’s become increasingly common that both are in opposition to Rome on certain behaviors related to politics, and exactly how strongly they should be pushing people to vote and for what reasons. The dehumanization of Biden (publicly refusing him Eucharist) for his nuanced pro-choice views is in direct contradiction of papal behavior going back at least to the turn of the 20th century. Telling people that in voting, any sin is forgivable except being pro-choice… well, there’s no basis in Canon Law for that attitude.

I live in a very Catholic area, and have a lot of Catholic family. Talking to them, they mention their priests say “you can vote for either party, as long as they’re pro-life”. The Abortion issue is not the only or greatest issue to Rome. It is AN issue, but disagreeing with the Church is generally not going to earn their full enmity unless you are preaching your disagreement. Biden (the target of that local church smear campaign) is absolutely not preaching pro-choice to anyone.

Pope Francis is right to be saying that because American Catholic Leadership has gone WAY astray from what Catholicism allows or mandates of them.

DarkThoughts,

Didn't they recently called Jesus / Christianity woke?

SomeAmateur, (edited )

Conservatives are mostly christian, but if they aren’t catholic the pope has little sway over what they do. And they love dissing catholics so yes they will more than they have been already.

postmateDumbass,

Time for a reality check on the history of Popeing

youtu.be/6TxjrHPHypA

Kerred,

If you have a throwaway email to see comments on the Newsmax site, it is Catholics and whatnot saying the Pope isn’t the real part of the religion anymore.

30mag,

It sounds like they’ve already been doing that according to this article.

Many conservatives have blasted Francis’ emphasis instead on social justice issues such as the environment and the poor, while also branding as heretical his opening to letting divorced and civilly remarried Catholics receive the sacraments.

rambaroo,

Even the most minimal amount of compassion is a sin to these people. They’re just straight up evil at this point.

RGB3x3,

They’re already doing that, have been for a long time. I have a Baptist coworker who thinks Catholicism isn’t real Christianity…

Ghostalmedia,
@Ghostalmedia@lemmy.world avatar

To be fair, even the super conservative Catholics aren’t into this pope. Benedict was their jam.

dartos,

I think all religions are just fake copycats of the one true god.

Praise be Flying Spaghetti Monster

CmdrShepard,

Ramen

Gee2oo40,

Pork Belly

CADmonkey,

Baptist coworker who thinks Catholicism isn’t real Christianity…

I’ve seen a lot of that and not just recently.

Iamdanno,

All religions think all other religions are not “real”, because of their “There can be only one!” Highlander shit.

Lurk99777,

media.tenor.com/…/creed-bratton-the-office.gif

njm1314,

Not for nothing but that claim is hardly new. Goes back to the Reformation.

root_beer,

Conservative Protestants have been saying that for a very long time though. The attitude is so pervasive that my wife, who grew up Catholic (but has not been one for decades), has to be reminded that Catholics are Christians.

NotYourSocialWorker,

I mean, most protestant Christians dislike Catholicism, that’s why they are called protestants after all.

The new part is American evangelicals and other extremists thinking that catholicism not being conservative enough…

Cerbero,

I wonder where do they think it all comes from?

atempuser23,

It’s hard to imagine now , but Catholics were not considered Christians and it was ok to openly discriminate against them. I know of people fired for that. People still try and convert me to ‘Christianity’ and claim all sorts of stuff.

The KKK and Nixon were vocally against’Papists’

afraid_of_zombies,

Even when I was one I had zero interest in that game.

Sicktatties,

To be fair, it isnt; but then neither is Evangelicism or Mormonism or any of these other wackadoo cults within which these assholes conflate their hatred and fear with faith.

NOT_RICK,
@NOT_RICK@lemmy.world avatar

What makes Catholicism fake Christianity in your view? Any faith that believes Jesus Christ is the Son of God that died for the sins of humankind meets the threshold, imo. The Catholic Church fits comfortably within that definition.

Bdtrngl,

Well there is all that child sex abuse.

cloudpunk,

Well then you can include baptists in that too.

HubertManne,
HubertManne avatar

the only difference between the priests and pastures is the "born again" churches do not have a central structure to follow up on it so they are all just one offs.

rambaroo,

There’s a ton of it in protestant churches too. The national Baptist church is under federal investigation for it right now. The US has always had an easier time hating Catholics.

NOT_RICK,
@NOT_RICK@lemmy.world avatar

That is an institutional failing of the Catholic Church, it was never endorsed as a part of the Church’s dogma. While I would encourage any Catholic to ask themselves if they really should continue to support an organization that hasn’t done even close to enough to reckon with their many sins over the past two millennia, I still think it’s silly to act like they’re not Christian.

Bdtrngl,

Fucking kids ≠ following the teachings of Jesus in my book.

SCB,

This is also how the Catholic Church sees it.

Sicktatties, (edited )

If I were being charitable I’d label these heretical creeds as Paulity. They have very little to do with the words and deeds of Christ, or living up to them, and far more to do with how Saul of Tarsus interpreted them.

You may recall the Catholic Church was born out of the first Nicaean Council, where they canonized the four gospels that best reinforced the idea of the supremacy of the Roman state, and burned the hundreds of other so-called “gnostic” gospels, which (judging by the content of the few that survived) far better encapsulate what I would consider “real Christianity”.

That said, the whole “No True Scotsman” fallacy really isn’t worth pursuing. It’s been this way since 325 CE, and there really is no painting a happy face on one of the most destructive and inhumane ideologies history has to offer. No matter what my opinion may be, you are correct in pointing out that the Paulity is the institution that is currently regarded as “Real Christianity”, as sick and anti-Christian as it may be.

severien,

All Christians use some interpretation of Bible and Christ.

From the outsiders it’s a bit funny to observe these squabbles and the heretic accusations.

afraid_of_zombies,

You may recall the Catholic Church was born out of the first Nicaean Council, where they canonized the four gospels that best reinforced the idea of the supremacy of the Roman state, and burned the hundreds of other so-called “gnostic” gospels, which (judging by the content of the few that survived) far better encapsulate what I would consider “real Christianity”.

I believe you are mistaken. That was next big council. The 27 books were finalized by a man who attended the Nicaean Council. When he got back he wrote a letter stating which books he considered to be canon.

iHUNTcriminals,

There a whole YouTube channel by some ex fox host called church militant… It’s all about hating gays and lesser religions. They talk shit about the Pope all the time.

It’s like everything in America is just power struggles, selfishness, greed, and crime. There’s no God or respect for life here. The “good guys” don’t even go after the “bad guys” because the bad guys are ahead now. People are so naive here they think heartless crimes are not happening when it’s right under their nose. Sometimes the good guys even get used in the plot. Just look at all the old politicians and Americans that got roped in Rogers stones mob puppeting of Trump. America had a mob affiliate for president. I think that puts in stone… Americas bullshit. It’s going to take decades to get trust and genuine patriotism back.

AbouBenAdhem,

I had a Catholic coworker who said some of her Catholic relatives were becoming “Christians”, which turned out to mean Evangelicals.

Pat12,

I had a Catholic coworker who said some of her Catholic relatives were becoming “Christians”, which turned out to mean Evangelicals.

in the US they refer to Protestants as “Christians”, mainstream Christianity is made up of Catholics, Orthodox, and Protestants

AbouBenAdhem, (edited )

Right—my point is that my coworker (like the previously-mentioned Baptist) was implying that Catholics were distinct from Christians, in spite of being Catholic herself.

klemptor,

I was raised Catholic and the distinction was always made between Catholics and Christians. I didn’t really understand that Catholics were a subtype of Christians until someone pointed it out to me when I was a teenager - I just thought Christians was a catch-all term for non-Catholics that believed in jesus.

bluebooby,

What country were you raised in? I was raised Catholic in the Philippines and in the US and it was made explicitly clear in my education that Catholics are Christian.

eestileib,

My father made that exact distinction and he grew up in Iowa.

bluebooby,

In the US I grew up in LA, California so I think I’m understanding the pattern now.

klemptor,

I’m from New Jersey

SCB,

I’m from Ohio and there is a massive Catholic community in my hometown and “Christian” as a term was always used as a throwaway term for the various non-denominational evangelical sects.

Catholics and Protestants do not get along, even today. When I went to college and people thought I grew up Catholic, they would try to “convert” me away from “ancestor worship and idolatry.”

bluebooby,

Thanks for the insight. Honestly the nerve of some people…

fer0n, (edited )

Being called “backwards” by the head of the catholic church is quite something

Mr_Blott,

Fuckin hell America, you annoyed the fuckin Pope?

That’s usually reserved for genocidal maniacs 😂

Syrc,

…or for satirical newspapers.

Szymon,

These christians will drop their Pope before they drop their politics

brihuang95,
@brihuang95@sopuli.xyz avatar

does anyone know off the top of their head how/when Christianity became so tightly associated with the Republican party? No way it was always so extreme in US history

regular_human,

1979: en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_Majority

sndmn,

My favourite bumper sticker ever said: The moral majority is neither

atempuser23,

Having lived though it in the 1990’s there was a marked turn in the politicizing of Christianity. There was a rise of mega churches and politicians who worked to make churches align to the Republican Party for government assistance. The money for what was welfare was shuffled to churches to take up services that once were secular.

The whole tenor of conversion changed. It just got mean and only got worse from there.

brihuang95,
@brihuang95@sopuli.xyz avatar

Interesting, I’m assuming that politicians who bought into this evangelical pandering benefited from this by getting votes/support?

atempuser23,

Over time. It was more of a mutual benefit the government gives money to the church and the politicians got votes from the churches. At one time there were a lot more social services, not enough, but much more.

bitsplease,

That ship has already sailed - I was just with my conservative uncle this last weekend when he complained that the current pope is “woke”

To these people, their political ideology is their religion

agent_flounder,

Absolutely agree. I am certain ifwe’re real and appeared in person and spouted half the stuff attributed to him in the gospel they would call him “woke” too.

bitsplease,

Absolutely no doubt. Kind of surprised no one has done a video series where you anonomize Jesus’s teachings, then read them back to conservative Christians and ask what they think about them

The results would be hilarious, no doubt

Archer,

Probably because they don’t want Tucker Carlson siccing a mob on them

match,
@match@pawb.social avatar

The pope? They’ll drop Jesus Himself if it suits them

NotYourSocialWorker,

They already have. Been reports of congregations who have complained the the words of Jesus are too woke and weak…

joel_feila,
@joel_feila@lemmy.world avatar

yout are not wrong given survey data

AllonzeeLV,

They dropped the Jesus Christ of the New Testament half a century ago, and even then they pretended he was somehow as white as mayonnaise, so why not drop his earthly mouthpiece?

_Sc00ter,

Honestly, I consider that a win. A huge reason I left the catholic faith wasn’t because of the religion itself, but because of the people who claimed to follow Jesus but in practice did nothing like Jesus.

ImplyingImplications,

They already have. Only Roman Catholics really care what the Pope has to say. There are far more Baptist, Methodist, Evangelical, Pentecostal, and Presbyterian in the US than Catholics.

TWeaK,

The Pope is the head of the Roman Catholic church, it’s always been the case that only Catholics really care about what he says.

gowan,

*Roman Catholics as multiple churches claim catholicity that are not associated with The Vatican. For example the Anglican Church claims catholicity.

TWeaK,

The Anglican Church is Protestant. Pretty sure they don’t like being called Catholic, they had a whole thing about that.

ProfessorZhu,

Just a minor tiff really, just some spilled tea and crumbled crumpets really

gowan,

Catholicity is unrelated to Protestantism. Catholicity means the church claims an unbroken line from the apostle Peter meaning they are the “real” church

laylawashere44,

No, Catholic just means universal. This most Christian denominations claim to the the Catholic, aka, Universal Church. In other words, they mean to say they are the correct denomination.

severien,

In normal conversation, Catholic Church equals Roman Catholic Church.

See e.g. wiki:

The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, …

laylawashere44,

That doesn’t change the fact that the Anglican Church also considers itself the Catholic Church.

The Act of Supremacy 1558 renewed the breach, and the Elizabethan Settlement charted a course enabling the English church to describe itself as both Reformed and Catholic.

_Sc00ter,

*catholicism

kent_eh,

For reasons I can’t explain, many of those denominations don’t even recognize the catholic church as being Christian.

gaiussabinus,

The problem is much more fundamental than this. I have repeatedly had to explain to adults, in many different contexts the subset/superset relationship. People do not know that you can be part of a superset that describes all things in a subset. For some reason you are able to graduate high school without every actually figuring this out

MotoAsh,

No Child Left Behind really did give out a lot of diplomas to dummies…

deadbeef79000,

That’s always boggled my mind.

I had many childhood baptist friends who claimed with disgust that the Catholic Church isn’t Christian.

I just can’t see the reason (there isn’t any) other than needing a conservative out group.

abraxas, (edited )

I just can’t see the reason (there isn’t any) other than needing a conservative out group.

The reason is simple, actually. The Protestant revolution was ostensibly started with Martin Luther advertising that the pope was the antichrist.

Protestantism was basically the practice of declaring Catholicism to be a false Church. Then it evolved and they got more cordial. After 300 years of bloodshed

jarfil,

Technically, at the time of Martin Luther, the Roman Church was corrupt AF, so he wasn’t totally wrong. It kind of still is, but hey, who’s counting.

deadbeef79000,

I just didn’t think it was any more or less corrupt as any other Church.

It all seems like an unironic no-true-yorkshirrman comedy sketch.

When I was in the Catholic Church they abused us 17 hours a day!

That’s nothing! When I was in the Protestant Church they abused us 27 hours a day and killed us before bed time.

Etc.

jarfil,

I feel like Martin Luther was an idealist, an innocent “true believer” who got shocked when he saw the harsh reality of what was going on in Rome.

Then he got his reform, established a new Church… and that’s where he went wrong, because sooner or later Churches gonna Church.

abraxas,

This is a true statement. But glass houses and stones. Let’s not forget he wrote the infamous “On the Jews and Their Lies”, and started supporting their persecution and outright murder. Many believe that his rhetoric directly caused the antisemitic attitudes of the Nazi Party. The aforementioned book was incredibly popular among Nazis.

And the Lutherans are smart to denounce that book. Catholics could learn from a religion deciding it actually did stupid things and fixing itself.

deadbeef79000,

TY! All those names are familiar but the events are not.

TIL.

agent_flounder,

I’m pretty sure the reverse is true.

There are some differences in the details of each denominations beliefs enough to mark some Christians as not real Christians. If only God could just make an announcement over the PA to clear things up…

Related: How many denominations only allow their own denomination to take Communion?

ButtholeSpiders,
@ButtholeSpiders@startrek.website avatar

https://i.imgur.com/oESyRU8.jpg

joel_feila,
@joel_feila@lemmy.world avatar

my god that is the best meme ever

ButtholeSpiders,
@ButtholeSpiders@startrek.website avatar

Happy to share!

prole,

Thanks, ButtholeSpiders!

downpunxx,
downpunxx avatar

The Catholic Church has actively ran the longest largest worldwide Pedophile ring in human history. For the past 1800 years the Catholic Church recruited, supported, obfuscated, defended, and excused pedophilia, which continues to this day. The fact the Catholic Church still allowed to operate, in any way shape or form, with youth of any kind, in any country, anywhere, means we've all purposefully lost the thread.

Beside the Catholic Church being outwardly obviously criminal, and only an extension of the Roman Senate two thousand years on, it's only shown how very little adults care about the systematic raping of children. Like, at all.

Fuck The Catholic Church. Fuck The Pope.

Sicktatties,

Ding ding ding! Correct!

baruchin, (edited )
@baruchin@lemmy.world avatar

You really have a point here, but I don’t think Catholic church is the only one in which these gross events happen, the thing is that being one of the largest religion along with Islam they get the most attention and media coverage around the world. It’s just common sense. So yes, there are serious problems in that church, but I bet my ass that they’re not the only ones doing that. Take the blindfold from your eyes, every religion has leaders that abuse the power they have upon its followers to commit deplorable acts.

Sicktatties,

Calling out the Catholic Church on this does not negate the fact that other institutions are also guilty.

plebonix,

Both parties are completely bed with and owned by corporations and they don’t give a fuck about regular people. That’s the actual problem with them.

Fedizen,

I think the wedding of capitalism and religion is an unholy one. As soon as people get tax breaks and shit for religion it becomes a scam fest.

John brown used religion to justify blasting some slavers at harper’s ferry and I can’t think we don’t need more of that good spice today.

There are certain people that need some kind of easing of burden that religion can bring, but prosperity gospel and similar are essentially a type of necromancy where you steal as much power as you can from living humans to power your divine money machine.

LetterboxPancake,

I mean he’s right, but maybe he wants to add his institution to that list as well.

Lt_Cdr_Data,

Dude alienates the last devoted members his org has left. Religion cant change; they got their statues laid out in an unchangeable text.

The hostile takeover of islam is gonna accelerate even more in the coming years and our last bastion is helping that process.

Chunk,

There is no hostile takeover of Islam because there is no centralized figure in Islam. The Muslims saw how politicized the early Roman Church became and intentionally took steps to prevent that. There is no pope. There are no bishops, archbishops, or any of that. Islam is intentionally fractured more so than Christianity.

Anyone can become an Imam (priest) and set up shop and start preaching. Clergy in a nation like Saudi Arabia maintain their religious authority through the government and social attitudes, not through a divine mandate (like the pope).

wearling0600,

You’re flat out wrong when it comes to the Roman Catholic Church - I don’t know enough about Islam to say whether you’re right about that.

In church doctrine, Matthew 16:18 and 16:19, and again in Matthew 18:18, give ultimate authority to St Peter (the first Pope) and all the Popes that followed him.

Essentially the Pope can decide whatever, and it just is. Tomorrow the Pope could decide that gay marriage and abortion are a-okay, and they would be a-okay as far as heaven is concerned.

He might get lynched and the next Pope reverses it, but that mechanism for change exists, and has been used many times in the past - one notable recent one was when the Pope decided dogs go to heaven, so now dogs go to heaven.

Source: ex-Christian who was very involved within the Church institution.

SpiderShoeCult,

It (the infailibility of the pope) is also the reason of the great schism of 1054, when orthodoxy split from catholicism, officialy naming themselves ‘the orthodox catholic church’ (meaning basically the catholic church that has the right dogma; people mostly drop the ‘catholic’ from conversation nowadays though).

In the grand scheme of things, it didn’t do much good, eastern orthodoxy is just as corrupt and power-hungry as catholicism.

MenacingPerson,

How did sevitavresnoc SU-s replace faith with ideology? I’ve never even heard of that group before

Grant_M, (edited )
@Grant_M@lemmy.ca avatar

Pope is 100% correct on this one. But on terrorist state ruzzia, he misses the mark by a mile www.youtube.com/watch?v=qirI4eSTNag

afraid_of_zombies,

Pot meet kettle

Corran1138,

Ironic… he could see the problems in others… But not himself.

BKXcY86CHs2k8Coz,

Didn’t this guy pay a personal visit to the christofascist who refused to grant a gay marriage license September 2015? Guy wore a similar hat anyway.

LillyPip,

Has he met the Catholic Church?

Inquisitions? Witch burning? Who does he think did extremism biggest and best?

Sure, now they mostly just coverup for paedophiles and rampant baby murder at orphanages, but they were the OG extremists, let’s not kid ourselves.

HiddenLayer5,

They were also a huge player in the residential “schools” of North America, which was one of the major ways the Indigenous genocide was conducted.

pleasemakesense,
@pleasemakesense@lemmy.world avatar

Did you… even read the text outside of the title?

Soulg,

The pope: “maintaining rigid and unchanging ideology is bad and room for change and growth must be allowed”

You: “um excuse me but hundreds of years ago the church killed people”

The church sucks ass but this is the absolute worst take regarding this specific post.

LillyPip, (edited )

Not hundreds of years ago. Maybe my sarcasm didn’t come across through text, but their atrocities are still being uncovered from only a couple of decades ago, and they’re still committing atrocities on a slightly smaller scale today (though I’m sure their victims – still alive today – would argue they’re not lesser).

The Catholic Church doesn’t have a leg to stand on here, and it’s gross that they’re pretending they do.

e: didn’t close my brackets

SCB,

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Vatican_Council

He’s telling people to have this same level of introspection. It’s really not complex or hypocritical.

This Pope has also tried a number of serious reforms within the Catholic Church so trying to paint him as hypocritical is pretty tough

ncronline.org/…/pope-francis-new-vatican-doctrina…

QHC,

My conservative Catholic family thinks the current Pope is a plant by the liberals, so he must be doing something right in my book.

MeanEYE,
@MeanEYE@lemmy.world avatar

They changed nothing. It was all sweet-talk and no changes. There is still no prosecution for child molesters, still no action for all atrocities. He’s just PR man they put in place to stop the dumpster fire previous one was.

SCB,

Lmao.

Seriously imagine thinking the Catholic Church elected a PR man as pope.

That’s fucking adorable. Like just look at the comment right below mine

MeanEYE,
@MeanEYE@lemmy.world avatar

Okay, let’s play a different game then. What has changed with catholic church since he was elected. Mind you, not what he said will change, but actually changed?

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