Secularism

I'm sorry, but I can in no way respect the Catholic Church. They have a ridiculously long list of atrocities including the Inquisition, Crusades, the persecution of the Jewish community, forced conversion of many people, subjugation towards women, impeding on scientific advancements, the rape and torture of orphans, and disregard of sexual safety in third world countries. They also are most certainly not non-profit. The reason they are the largest charity is because so many people are willing to give them money. These charities could be run in a much more efficient, and non-religious way. Most Catholic Churches look like a castle, not considering the Vatican which is estimated to be worth between 10$ and 15$ billion dollars. I'm sure a lot of that money could have been a huge help in their charity investments.

the inquisition was only in Spain so that's not the church's fault, the Crusades in actuality were about money and land more than religion, many other people in history persecuted Jews, women had very few rights anywhere, we wouldn't really be that advanced i mean the Islamic world and China kept studying so its not like science was at a standstill, I'm pretty sure that orphans in the slave trade were also raped and tortured, lots of places don't care about sexual safety in third world countries this is because countries generally look out for themselves, the charities could but less people would feel obligated to donate money, most catholic churches look like that because they were built hundreds of years ago by the goths who wanted the churches to seem immensely huge to represent the power of god, and yes the Vatican is worth all of that money but really what do you expect it has been around for a while so it collects wealth over years. I mean do you expect the church to just sell the Vatican? My rant is over now and I respect any rebuttals you may have.

Thank you for handling this so well and not resorting to insults. It's nice to have a normal debate. The Inquisition was initiated by several institutions of the justice system of the Roman Catholic Church, and the location really has no bearing. The Crusades may have been for money, but religion was the tool that they used to initiate the slaughter. Jews have been persecuted throughout history, however Catholicism has been one of, if not the largest, contributor to this. Catholicism also contributed to the subjugation of women, the Bible has many examples showing how women are property and do not hold the same rights as men, and those views were held by the church for quite a long time, and some of the less extreme ideas are still held today such as not allowing a woman to teach. The church has many examples of impeding scientific advancements, and refusing to accept the advances as well which in turn causes many of it's followers to refuse to accept them as well. The largest examples include the world being round and evolution, which about 43% of the United States refuse to accept, despite it being a cornerstone of biological studies in medicine. Orphans being raped and tortured in slave caravans gives the church the right to do the same? Shouldn't the high ranking members of a church show good morality and judgement. The fact that this happened across the world, and that it wasn't an isolated event shows a bit of a problem with their process of allowing these men to become leaders or even a higher rank. There are many Catholic Churches based in Africa which is where the propaganda against condoms was based. In fact, Africa has one of the largest density of active Catholic Churches. Even despite those facts, the fact that the church went out of it's way to go against, instead of ignoring in general, sexually safety in Africa is concerning. I'm running out of characters, so please excuse my second comment to yours.

Very well put. I have to admit that while I see your point in disliking the Catholic church I think that completely losing respect for it is a little extreme. I mean yeah it's messed up a lot of things but it has also made some pretty important contributions. Either way to each his own.

On a slightly unrelated note why does history hate Jewish people? I mean it seems like every time things start to get really bad people persecute Jews.

To be honest, I'm against organized religion in general. I could go on for hours about it, but I doubt many people would care, so I usually leave it to on topic responses. The persecution of Jews has been due to other major religions. There's one case that I can think of that's different, and that's during Stalin's reign in the Soviet Union.

I don't expect them to sell the Vatican, but many of the vain items could be. The pope also lives in a very luxurious lifestyle. Shouldn't an organization that claims to care so much about other humans use any spare collected wealth to further aid in their charity? They could easily sell many of the things inside the Vatican that are worth so much to further increase their charity. For example the golden throne the pope sits on, his golden staff, or even his expensive robes. Many of the relics in the Vatican could be sold for quite a large sum as well to a proper museum perhaps. The Catholic Church also continues to construct expensive buildings to be used as churches, when they could easily do with cheaper versions of the same version.

The first part is right actually there's nothing I could debate to tell you the inquisition wasn't the Church's fault and an example of human atrocity. The second you forget that there are still religious wars over the holy land carrying on today by different religions, and also that the religious soldiers that fought in the crusades while some pillaged and plundered most were fighting for what they believed in like me fighting for my country. The third no offense but is completely false the poor poor jewboys and girls have been persecuted throughout history from the diaspora and the Egyptians to the Nazis ( who were atheist ) and the holocaust. The bible does talk much about the subjugation of women but that's the way of life back then and in the bible it also talks about the achievements of women and the women saints. The science part isn't very flattering for them either no way to justify that. The orphan part people in every faith or no faith at all do it it's a question of the person and not the whole religion. Didn't know that about the Africa part. Good point. The relics and the throne and staff and robes are part of the catholic culture and I wouldn't agree them to sell them they show the history of the religion good and bad. I'm actually baptist so only join in the belief of Jesus but I'm tired of waking up everyday and hearing about how dumb I am for believing in what I believe in. I don't go overboard with it protesting gay rights parades but I don't make movies about how stupid it is to be an attheist. That is my view.

First off, I would like to say that I never once said anyone was stupid for their belief. I simply said that I have no respect for the organization of the Catholic Church. Now on to your points. Firstly, just because there are still religious wars in no way justifies them. Their religion was being used as a tool to execute a slaughter, the reason behind it isn't very relevent, the point is that religion was used to either try to justify it, or to recruit additional soldiers. During the middle ages, many members of the Catholic church, including the clergy, held the Jews responsible for the death of Jesus. The Nazi's were actually Christian, they had the words "god with us" inscribed on their belts, and Hitler references the Christian god in many of his speeches and in his book "Mein Kampf". The times is no justification for the subjugation of women, which by the way is still happening today due to Catholic dogma. The times are no justification because the church should strive to push general morality further, when in fact they often held it back. The rape and torture of children is a bit more broad subject, so I'll go into that one a bit further. There are many reasons that the Catholic Church is to blame for their part. First of all, in most of the cases, the ones doing the crime were higher ranking members of the clergy. There should have been a process for these people to go through to prove that they are trustworthy, which they clearly were not. These were supposed to be people that others could trust their children with, yet in various countries across the world, these men could still do these things, and often get away with it or have it covered up because of their standing in the church. I agree about the culture part being important, however these relics could be sold to museums that would treat them well. I would also argue, which is more important, improving the world, or culture?

Thanks man I never said it was you calling me stupid I was just giving a reason for defending a religion I don't believe in still your words were nice. I never said they were justified but the crusades aren't something I would use to compare to the atrocities of the church it was like nationalist beliefs leading to the unification of the US into a country or the German states into Germany. They were just fighting for what they believed they had the right for they weren't torturing people for their beliefs a much more valid point. They did hold the jewish responsible for the death of Jesus but besides the inquisition there were no major attempts at antisemitism that was more other peoples faults. Hitler may have talked about god often in his book but towards the end of the war he wasn't exactly a church-goer and many of his Nazis were atheists. I use money with references to god everyday but that doesn't mean I'm christian. The times weren't justification but it was how society worked. If it wasn't that way and only the catholic church was keeping women without rights then it'd be a valid point. There are also many elected officials we can look into all we like who take part in the same things the church officials do people of every faith do it not just the church background checks might not have brought up the darkest secrets or they just may have never suspected it. I think if they knew they wouldn't have been officials at all. Even if the officials did corruption happens in all places sadly. Most museums take donations and will not buy relics. Especially the priceless ones the church keeps safer where they belong speaking on their own behalf. When it comes down to it the church is where people who share faiths can gather to worship or share their beliefs. The church also does much more good than bad it's still unfortunate their's any bad at all but to deny it's good overall with the acts of a few bad from a few people or to say the bad outweighs is very cynical

The entire goal behind the Crusades wasn't unification. The reason behind the crusades was to restore Christian access to what they considered holy lands. I will admit that it wasn't right to restrict their access to these places, but a war is not at all a moral way to go about things. They never tortured anyone in the Crusades to my knowledge, but killing someone over a belief is a horrible thing, and killing that many is in no way justifiable. There was in fact a huge antisemitism move during the middle ages, and I'll try to link a reference for you if I can get the link to work on Funnyjunk, I always have trouble. Hitler wasn't an active church goer during the second world war because of many issues. Most were related to his safety, but he was a Christian until the day he died. He believed that he was a necessary evil, and was working as a force of god. Most of the Nazi party was also associated with Christianity, however I will argue that I believe their actions were based more on political rather than religious affairs. There were still many other occasions of Jewish persecution due to the Catholic Church, mainly during the middle ages. What progress is the church making if they just follow the morals of the time? Shouldn't they be trying to improve the human standard, not just going with how the times worked? Their holy book only increased the amount of subjugation towards women, which again, still happens today. Many people will not allow women to teach because of their Catholic affiliation. You're correct that they wouldn't place the clergymen into their position if they knew how they would act, however the amount of situations that the rape occurred in, and the huge range of locations only shows a gigantic flaw in their dogma and ranking system. It didn't help that many occurrences were covered by the churches and many of the offending clergymen still hold their positions. I always take too much on the character limit, so please excuse my second comment.

There are many museums that make offers for various religious relics, and the offers usually are fairly high. I would still like to argue that improving the quality of life is much more important than the culture of the church. There would still be a place to gather and worship together, that shouldn't be removed at all, but many of the unused relics or overly vain relics could be sold to be used to improve their charity. I think it's completely pointless for the pope to sit on a golden throne, with his golden staff, his expensive clothing, and his very luxurious lifestyle when there are people starving, dieing of curable diseases, research that could be done to find more cures to other diseases, and low levels of education that could help people improve their own standard of living. If it were just a few bad things, it would be cynical to see them as a bad organization, but considering that they caused, or at least have been used to justify, so much death, pain, and generally lower the standard of living for so many people, I see no way to view them as a positive force in the world.
http://en . wikipedia . org/wiki/PersecutionofJews#Christian_antisemitism
remove the spaces next to each dot, hopefully the link worked. If not you could easily search Catholic antisemitism and find a large variety of sources.

Yeah I gotcha my man. Thanks for the debate and keeping it chill. You got good points and actually changed my views a bit. I think the hierarchy of the Catholic church is pretty corrupt but the churches you find in your neighborhood tend to just be nice people. It's the officials that are corrupt not necessarily the idea or the church in itself. Humans are humans and commit crimes and atrocities. I still don't believe you can't trust your neighborhood priest because of a few corrupt officials. I understand your views about the relics too it does seem unnecessary with all the wealth the pope is surrounded by he's treated like a king, but I stand by that most of the catholic relics are sacred to the catholic religion and can motivate people to give more to the church

Lastly, I'd like to restate that I in no way think that your beliefs make you stupid, or any worse of a person. You fully have the right to believe what you want, and if it came to it, I would gladly fight for any religions right to hold their belief, with the prerequisite that their beliefs don't negatively effect others. I don't think thumbs are important in any way, but some people do, so I will thumb you back to neutral.

Who were also Christian, or at the very least tried to use it as a means of recruitment and justification, and the some sects of the Catholic Church supported them. Every Nazi belt had the words "god with us" inscribed on them in German. Hitler references god in many of his speeches, and in his book "Mein Kampf" and explains how he believes that he was doing gods work.

I have no idea who thumbed you down or why, but you raised a good point. If they were truly just used by higher ranking members, they would not have had such an effect. If this was considered such a bad thing by the majority, people would have stood against it saying "No, this is wrong" but it wasn't like that. They were slaughters to increase the amount of believers. Whether it be for their own self assurance, the controlling wording of the bible, or for profit their means of starting this was by the use of religion. There are also many recent slaughters, which were similarly devastating. Notable examples are the Rwana slaughter and WWII.

Would you look at that. An argument about religion on the internet.

Would you rather it have been a debate that consisted of insults, or a debate that consists of intelligent conversation? I don't see why people have such a problem with a debate of this kind. It's basically just two people with differing opinions having a conversation about their differing opinions.

You really mean to tell me that your sense of humor has been so desensitized that you really can't find a joke teasing the archtype of internet debate unfunny?

*archetype

Considering how Funnyjunk usually handles even the slightest amount of conflict, I didn't think this was a joke. Also, even if I did know it was a joke, the possibility of differing senses of humor is always available. As a side note, I thought Zaxplab's comment was hilarious, probably because I always laugh at that .gif.

It actually stems from saecularis, meaning of an age or of a generation, pertaining to things not involved with any religion such as eating, washing, hunting, etc. While certain religious rights do involve these traits, they are considered endemic to human nature and therefore are secular when taken for what they are.
Sorry anon, at least you tried.
>pic unrelated

good response. even better picture.

You're basically trying to argue that belief in Christianity is not necessarily part of a religion.

no, im not. there are plenty of monks and such that stay in monasteries and things like that. but there are pastors and priests like mine who go wherever they are needed. instead of staying in one area they move wherever there is a need for priests. im not saying they change denominations or anything that would be changing religions. just diocese.

To make it more simple, anything that invokes God's name is not secular. How can you argue against that? I don't understand.

secular has different definitions. the one that is used in the comic is one but there is also other definitions its like the word set. it has a bunch of definitions.

I like the traditional rasta garb in your profile picture by the way. I started the Stoner Humor channel you know.

haha why thank you and right on brother, one of my favorite channels

It's awesome aint it?