Over the years, I have become truly disillusioned with the Church as I felt their views on abortion and gay people were at odds with their own teachings. Nowhere in the Bible does the word "abortion" appear and neither does any passage have to do with "Life beginning at conception." As a matter of fact, according to several books in the Bible, life begins at breath or when the baby is born. How does that jibe with this idiotic, non-contraception, no abortion, end of the world crap the Vatican has been screaming about for years? The result of this has made me leave the Church as I felt they no longer lived up to the very values Jesus himself has said.
But now we have a new pope, one that I hope will continue on his path without coming to some mysterious end like Pope John Paul 1, who died under suspicion after he threatened to change the corrupt Vatican bank. Pope Francis is a Jesuit who shockingly seems to have read the Bible and is actually following the words of Christ. Considering he was following in the steps of our first Nazi pope, Benedict the XVI, he had no where to go but up. But even I am stunned at the humility, sensibility and intelligence of the latest pope who, because of his beliefs, is now under fire from the religious right for daring to call them out as traitors to the religion.
The pope released his latest document called the Evangelii Gadium, or Joy of the Gospel, which attacks current capitalism as an affront to the poor and says inequality is getting out of control by a greedy few. Holy crap! Literally. He went on to say that this flow of money to the rich only is causing society to fall apart and mentioned that healthcare is a right not a privilege, which was almost certainly a dig at the GOP in this country for failing on that topic for far too long.
Here what he had to say about Ronald Regan and trickle down economics:
“Some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world,” Pope Francis wrote. “This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naïve trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system."
“We have created new idols. The worship of the ancient golden calf has returned in a new and ruthless guise in the idolatry of money and the dictatorship of an impersonal economy lacking a truly human purpose. The worldwide crisis affecting finance and the economy lays bare their imbalances and, above all, their lack of real concern for human beings; man is reduced to one of his needs alone: consumption.”
“Such an economy kills. How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points? This is a case of exclusion. Can we continue to stand by when food is thrown away while people are starving? This is a case of inequality. Today everything comes under the laws of competition and the survival of the fittest, where the powerful feed upon the powerless. As a consequence, masses of people find themselves excluded and marginalized: without work, without possibilities, without any means of escape."
“It is no longer simply about exploitation and oppression, but something new,” Pope Francis wrote. “Exclusion ultimately has to do with what it means to be a part of the society in which we live; those excluded are no longer society’s underside or its fringes or its disenfranchised – they are no longer even a part of it. The excluded are not the ‘exploited’ but the outcast, the ‘leftovers.’”
Ouch. That's gotta hurt.
As expected, many conservatives are calling him a "false pope," as he has the audacity to actually follow the words of Christ and has stopped piling on idiotic topics like anti-gay bigotry and anti-abortion nonsense. What these mouthbreathers don't get is the world is passing them by. More and more people are becoming decidedly less bigoted toward gay people, especially younger people regardless of party affiliation. This spells doom for the GOP if they continue down this path and more and more young people vote blue specifically because of this bias. Abortion still continues to be a pariah for people of all ages, but support for that has shown to be decidedly less important as voters have turned up en masse in every state to vote down many anti-abortion laws. State like Texas have circumvented that by passing laws without public approval, which kind of flies in the face of those state rights they keep complaining about. That is tyranny, not voter approval dumb asses.
Some like Sarah Palin have publicly denounced the current pope and then backtracked quickly after calling him a "liberal," like that was some sort of dirty word. Meanwhile assholes like Bill Donahue wants Bill Maher fired for having gay activist Dan Savage slam the Church during his last show on Real Time. Seems some Catholic Bishops were fighting against gay couples adopting as they allegedly commit suicide more than others (which is not true by the way) and Savage made the perfectly reasonable comment that the Church has no moral authority to say anything about children as they still haven't completely stopped the mass kiddie rape that seems to go within their walls. This is more sound and fury signifying nothing.
This country is filled with so called Catholics who seem to have no problem pissing on the poor and doing everything they can to make them poorer. Considering all of this comes from the religious right I am thankful we finally have a Pope who understands Catholicism and is trying to revive it. Jesus never said rich people get to go heaven before all and poor people should starve, which is the current GOP strategy. The hypocrisy is thick with these assholes and one of the main reasons I hate the Republican party. Thank God we have a Pope who is looking out for the little guy, talking about the true ills of the world and because of this, will probably be dead before I finish this article. Here's hoping he's Pope for a very long time.
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