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| Tuesday, May 02, 2006 |
| Whoop De Do |
Here's what I don't like about the Catholic Church... when they recognize that the world is changing and that some long-held tenet needs to be modified or abandoned, they make the change in a serious of tiny, unimportant, quarter-steps forward that ends up condemning progress to an interminably slow march.
Take the condom ban. It's totally absurd, dates from when people didn't understand biology, and needs to be changed. I believe even the ultra right-wing pope understands that. But rather than taking the bold step of saying condoms are often the wise solution, the Pope instead decides to consider relaxing the ban on married couples' use of condoms when one partner has AIDS.
The ludicracy of this is: does the Pope really think there are actual people in the world for whom this ban matters? Married couples, one with AIDS, who aren't having sex because they can't use condoms, or who are having unprotected sex and resigning themsevles to both getting AIDS because the Pope says condoms are bad? What the hell is the point of this intermittent step???
I've become convinced that we need to put political pressure on the Vatican to reform the way the Pope is elected. Right now a Pope can name whatever Cardinals he wants, even if they don't match the populice. That should be amended so that Cardinals for various places much match the makeup of parishioners. So if Latin America really is where the most Catholics are these days, they should get the most Cardinals. |
posted by CB @ 9:23 AM   |
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| 1 Comments: |
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I think the idea is that the Pope's possible incremental shift is symbolic. It's sort of like when they raised the speed limit in the '80s - lawmakers knew people were speeding anyway, but by making the allowable speed higher, they were letting people drive even faster. The Pope must know that most of his religion's followers aren't abiding strictly by his doctrine, but he's bound, as the NYT article points out, by ultra-conservative followers who are putting pressure on him to hold on to this (absurd) tenet of Catholic faith.
For an even better article about condoms and abortion and hypocritical dogma, check out Kristof's column today.
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I think the idea is that the Pope's possible incremental shift is symbolic. It's sort of like when they raised the speed limit in the '80s - lawmakers knew people were speeding anyway, but by making the allowable speed higher, they were letting people drive even faster. The Pope must know that most of his religion's followers aren't abiding strictly by his doctrine, but he's bound, as the NYT article points out, by ultra-conservative followers who are putting pressure on him to hold on to this (absurd) tenet of Catholic faith.
For an even better article about condoms and abortion and hypocritical dogma, check out Kristof's column today.