Do Catholics, like Muslims, merit their very own ‘ophobia?

Should Catholic-ophobia stand alongside Islam-ophobia as a “prejudice” that all right thinking people need to combat?

And if not, why not?

Full disclosure. I detest the Catholic Church.

With that out of the way let’s compare Catholicism and Islam.

The Church abused children on a vast scale and then covered up.

True. But at least they’re dealing with it now. And what the Catholics did probably does not compare in scale to the abuse of children in Madrassahs all across the world. Two examples:

http://www.muslimparliament.org.uk/Childprotect_MuslimWeekly.html

http://www.insaf.pk/Forum/tabid/53/forumid/1/tpage/1/view/topic/postid/61478/Default.aspx#61478

These links deal with sexual abuse. But denying children a secular education and preparing them to become suicide bombers is also child abuse of a particularly vicious form.

At best it’s a draw on the child abuse front.

The Catholic Church perpetrated hatred of Jews.

Yep. Look at Chrysostom’s eight homilies against the Jews.

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/chrysostom-jews6.html

On the other hand, whatever may have been the case in the past, nothing I‘ve seen in the present-day Catholic Church matches the venomous hatred directed against Jews that permeates the Muslim world. And, yes, it’s hatred directed against Jews, not Israelis or “Zionists” and it pre-dates the establishment of Israel.

The Catholic Church has been involved in some pretty awful regimes. However nothing the present day Catholics do equals the sheer brutality, misogyny and homophobia of many Muslim regimes. Denying gays the Eucharist is not the same as executing them. Denying women the right to become priests is not the same as subjecting them to the kind of servitude they suffer in even post-Taliban Afghanistan or the tribal areas of Pakistan.

Overall if appears to me that if Islam has its own ‘ophobia then so should Catholicism.

Pelican, 579, Ho Hum and Ozymandias,

You are obviously Catholic-ophobes.

Tut, tut, naughty naughty.

I REALLY enjoyed writing that ;-)

This is a fun thread.

The question is now and always has been: Does God ,or any other supernatural phenomenon, exist outside the human brain? Thomas Aquinas once said that if God's existence could not be proved then nothing more needed to be said. Aquinas did not, could not, prove it but the empty discussion still goes on by "believers" who were taught to believe as little children and are unable to recognise that their belief is no more than an implanted imaginary image. Although I do it I do agree with Aquinas and should stop.

Surprisingly enough stevenlmeyer I agree with you on this one.

But consider this, is anyone asking for Catholics to be barred from immigration into this country on the basis that they might encourage paedophilia? No, that would be stupid.

But for the very same reason, people wish to bar a whole group of people for the very fact that they were born into a particular religion.

I detest what these religions do to people but at the end of the day, they are still people.

heh heh stevenmeyer.
As Bugsy implied, the difference is that the actions of a few should not tarnish the greater majority. Not all Muslims are terrorists nor are all Catholics pedophiles. Many even use contraception. :)

Paul

Good article, although your last line is a little contradictory with the rest of your piece. With the likes of Dawkins, Robertson and Hitchens and the blog posts you quote, it is hard not to see a wave of aggressive atheism sweeping through Britain. Not to say I agree with Cardinal Kasper's 3rd world comment.

Ho Hum, it's hard to see that you might be striving for a factual understanding of history if you are feeding your mind on the utter rubbish that you posted re Hitler and the Catholic Church. The corruption of Hitler to include Church elements in his private and public life says nothing about the Church and a lot about Hitler's corruption and hypocrisy, and seeking acceptance from the broader German society.

Church officials will always communicate with the political leaders. That does not mean they don't condemn them. Have an honest read of the history so you can be freed a little from your prejudice.

Read Pius XI's encyclical Mit Brenender Sorge (With burning anxiety), read the countless stories of people within the Church who risked their lives to save Jews, such as Monsignor Hugh O'Flaherty in Italy. Read Rabbi David Dalin's work on Pius XII. The difference between the site at the link below and your one is that there are references, coherent arguments and facts, not prejudiced assumptions, photos without dates, photos of Hitler in front of a Church (what on earth does that show?!) etc.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/woods/woods48.html

Thanks for contradicting yourself re universal. Yes the Catholic Church is universal in a couple of ways.
Cont…

Universal in geography. Yes it spread firstly with the aid of the Roman empire and then with the missionary work of thousands of martyrs and selfless saints that travelled over the globe to relieve poverty, bring aid and healing to a range of people. Britain received Christianity thanks to Pope Gregory the Great sending St Augustine of Canterbury late in the 6th century. This missionary work of Catholics is still ongoing in much of the developing world and anti-Christians like yourself have the hide to write that off as some sort of paternalistic brainwashing of minds; that missionaries exchange plates of food to starving people in exchange to them adopting the Catholic faith.

It is more correctly universal in the sense that the Catholic faith is distinguished from other Christian faiths in that it has the universal beliefs - the beliefs that were taught by Jesus Christ, entrusted to the apostles and passed down uncontaminated through apostolic succession to today. All schisms and breakaway groups have done so in disagreement with one or several aspects of Catholic doctrine, such as the Church of England which parted with the Church’s teaching on divorce, the primacy of the Pope and later, the real presence of the Eucharist and many other teachings. So the Catholic Church is universal in the sense of having all articles of faith.

cont...