For anyone who likes Pope Francis

[Aisha]

I would not believe for a second that he is any better than his predecessors. It is still the same religion and he would not have gotten the job if he disagreed with any of this stuff.

I do think that he is marketed out there as a good guy, and unfortunately it is working.

I think he said at one point that "Atheists can go to heaven too", and people were going mental over this, being all happy about how supportive he was.
Yet, what he actually said was: "Atheists can go to heaven too, as soon as they accept Jesus." There was one more catch: you have to do "good".

So basically, if you accept Jesus AND you do good, you can go to heaven. If you don't care about heaven or Jesus, but still do good, you're fucked.
And of course, I assume that doing good means something completely different to us than to him.

[vorlon13]

Some Mormons think God and Adam are the same person.

Really.

And Mary conceived via a totally natural process (yeppers) so the birth wasn't 'virgin' by any stretch of the imagination. So Jesus is Adam's son, and Mary is another of Adam's wives.

Brigham Young come up with this, and LDS admin isn't eager to advertise it, or curiously, repudiate it either.


Gotta wonder what the Pope thinks of all that !!

hock:

[robvalue]

It's all already so far past the line of stupidity that it really doesn't matter what they say. They can say Moses fucked the Holy Ghost to destroy King David. It's just more drivel for the pile.

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Does anyone like Pope Francis?

I suppose all the theists do, since all the terrorist sympathising and faith special pleading bollocks.

I'd prefer a cardboard cut out for the pope. Of anyone. At least it wouldn't say such harmful things.

[AFTT47]

I like that he has acknowledged man-made climate change. One of the biggest issues I have with the Catholic church is their prohibition of birth control. That does a lot of harm and this Pope is no better on that score. He did come out recently and tell the flock not to multiply like rabbits but a lot of good that is without birth control!

[FatAndFaithless]

I like that he has acknowledged man-made climate change.

The Vatican has been talking about man-made climate change for a while.

http://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/20...te-change/

They have kooky reasoning behind it, but the Vatican already accepted that man is changing the climate, which is bad.

Hell, even Ratzinger the easiest-ever-punching-bag talked about it.

[Minimalist]

And of course, I assume that doing good means something completely different to us than to him.

It seems to include molesting children.

[Homeless Nutter]

Even the nicest Pope is still a leader of a crime syndicate. Not to mention that he's really only a puppet, while a clique of cardinals in Vatican actually "runs" the Church and decides upon policies. John Paul II was paraded all over the world for years, after it became obvious, he was incapable of running anything, due to old age and illness.

Ratzinger used to be one of those cardinals during JP II's papacy (he was for example directing Church's responses to the wave of child-rape accusations, aimed at priests in the 90's and early 00's, sending letters to bishops, advising them to keep the matters from authorities and the public, to protect the organization, before anything else). No wonder he quit early - he knew what was coming and didn't want to spend his retirement as a living relic, shown like a freak, in a fish-tank, for the amusement of poor people.

I'm betting this Pope-retiring-thing will become the norm. At least that way, once a Pope has said and done enough stupid and unpopular things to annoy the general public - they'll get a shiny new one, which will placate them for a bit, while their organization keeps operating in exactly the same way as before. Meet the new boss - same as the old boss.