I can see now why the Catholic Church and many Protestant Christian leaders are in support of social conservatives. They are losing control. Many parishioners do not support abusing a child for sexual orientation or gender dysphoria. Regardless of what Christian leaders preach.
Congregations with critical thinking skills and long exposure to Christian teachings of love, compassion and kindness have been provided the opportunity to reject central tenets of the Catholic Church and admit papal fallibility. cruxnow.com/church/2015/07…
Faced with rejecting their child and adhering to their faith, or rejecting the abusive nature of faith based conversion therapy and supporting their child, many are choosing their child. Not unexpected since every sermon used to be about love, compassion and helping the stranger.
Not anymore. A sharp change of course has occurred in the Catholic Church & corresponding Protestant faiths.
Sermons now are about obedience, respecting the word of god and ministering one’s faith to the poor in spirit.
My father in law passed away last week. He was a traditional Catholic. I am a modern Catholic. In the early years when my husband and I dated, we clashed a lot. We debated about every social issue possible and frequently had opposing views.
Once, at a large family gathering, he introduced me as his son’s radical feminist girlfriend.
But we grew to care for one another. When my boyfriend (now husband) moved in together, he did not admonish us. He took his son aside and counselled him on the rhythm method.
When we announced our engagement 10 years into our relationship, he was overjoyed for us both. By then my father in law & I were prone to long conversations about politics and social issues. We’d debate the merits of our respective ideology and listen earnestly to each other.
We wanted to get along. We wanted to understand each other’s beliefs & values. We wanted to connect. Our motivation? We both shared a mutual love of politics as well as love and affection for the man who brought us together; his son, my husband.
We both loved reading non-fiction. We both loved documentaries. Intellectually we had much in common. So we always had much to debate.
I truly respected that man. He opened my eyes to see they world from a different perspective. I believe I did the same for him.
He was kind, loving (in a jovial traditional conservative dad way), honest, generous, thoughtful & gracious. Every time we visited he kissed me on the head. My husband & children too. At first I thought it was condescending, but grew to appreciate his demonstration of affection.
Once we debated religion. He fiercely defended adherence to traditional Catholic dogma. I stumped him towards the end of the conversation. I argued god didn’t expect to have the same relationship with every person. My father in law had 3 children.
His relationship wasn’t exactly the same with each child. Each child was different, & there were differences in their relationship to him & his relationship to each child. Each relationship was unique. How could god expect every person to be homogenous when each person is unique?
We never discussed religion again. It wasn’t a crisis of faith, but he was perplexed by his belief and that revelation.
I grew to be very fond of my father in law. And he grew very fond of me. We cared deeply for one another. And I will miss him dearly.
My point in relating my experience with my very staunch Catholic father in law is to point out his kindness. Many believe conservatives have no compassion or love for anyone but themselves. I was one of those people. My father in law taught me I was wrong, by example.
We weren’t that different. Raised on the same liturgy, we had similar compassion for our fellow human beings. Different ideas on how to address problems, but we agreed on the nature of most issues.
That’s no longer what is taught in the Catholic faith.
All Alberta Archbishops were displeased about LGBTQ rights being brought to Catholic schools. No longer were they the sole directors of Catholic faith. After the worldwide child sexual abuse revelations, you’d think Church leaders would refrain from promoting conversion therapy.
But no, they’ve doubled down.
The Church, not the compassion & love it represents, was losing relevance and power because of those past abuses and the coverups. Rather than learn from their mistakes, Church leaders choose to continue to promote the abuse of the most vulnerable.
God only knows why. It’s the same as when the priest told my paternal grandmother to stay with her physically abusive husband. Then shunned her when she didn’t. She wasn’t obedient. God had chosen those trials for her to endure. What right did she as a mere woman have to disobey?
It’s not the scriptures that reflect love and compassion that are the problem. It’s the individuals who use the bible to gain, wield power & force obedience on those who have faith.
Personally, I’d rather go to hell, than abuse a child. Threaten all you want Archbishop Smith.
I will never obey the Church’s command to abuse LGBTQ children or adults, or shun them, or shame them.
If god created LGBTQ, maybe it’s a trial for the faithful to love and show compassion or to blindly obey a command to hate.
I choose love. I know I’m not the only one.
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This is why liberals and lefties should stop pointing fingers. The left is not very good at it. But the right excels at double standards and hypocrisy.
Yesterday, PMJT revealed that CPC is led by a man courting white supremacists.
But today, people are repeating the word “whacko” in relation to the PM and BC drug policy and debating whose leader was more ethical.
No one is discussing white supremacy being given legitimacy by PP this past weekend.
Who gives a crap about decorum & process in QP?
Apparently it’s more important to focus on the process and decorum than the fact the attack on the Speaker was a coordinated event by CPC & perfectly demonstrates that CPC IS courting white supremacists and attacking the first Canadian black Speaker for doing his job.
Weak leadership of Nicholas II & an uninterrupted feudal system were inadequate to provide for the whims of the elite and the sustenance of the poor. He became untenable in an time when rigid social status was being challenged by liberalism.
Marxism is a 19th century Enlightenment influenced theory of social organization and economics that is an ideal, not reality. For all the effort Marx made to emphasize his ideas be brought to fruition through revolution, the public often confuses Marxism with anarchism.
Our social and political systems legitimize devaluation of the poor, PWD, seniors and children because they do not produce profits, rather they consume resources.
Society would need to reconsider the premise of its systemic foundations to alter this reality.
The premise that most human beings are just capital that can either produce or consume goods and services became reality at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution. A product of feudalist social strata.
Why people fail to recognize these beliefs is unknown, they surround us.
It’s the same strategy that was used for Old Age Security and Guaranteed Income Supplements for citizens over age 65.
Benefits for seniors is actually the province’s jurisdiction as listed in the BNA 1867.
After industrialization in Canada and people began moving to cities and towns, seniors were dying in abject poverty. So the feds stepped in. But not without some constitutional manoeuvring first.
People forget, retirement is a 20th century concept.
Cascading series of failures means individuals are unable to address all the problems. Frankly, I’d be surprised if people were aware of all the failures occurring simultaneously.
This is a strategy.
Multiple serious problems means the electorate is divided in attention.
Some will focus on strip mining at headwaters for most of Alberta’s fresh water supply.
Some will focus on drought and access to water.
Some will focus on NICU imminent collapse.
What few will do because these catastrophic failures are emotionally overwhelming on their own, is to recognize there is one source for all of these problems.
No, it’s not Danielle Smith. She’s just a figurehead.
I always remember Art Finkelstein was a man of Jewish descent who manipulated voter perception ruthlessly to elect some very antisemitic people. Because it made him wealthy and in high demand by the far right.