-
WAR OF IDEAS
Has the U.S. Reached Peak Car?
-
KILLER APPS
Cyberspies Are Using PRISM for Spearphishing
-
PASSPORT
Remembering Michael Hastings
Posted By David Rothkopf
Friday, March 20, 2009 - 5:52 PM
Share
If there's one thing you've got to love about tough times is: they're tough on everyone. These days, it's not easy even for those who have taken historically proven paths to amassing wealth, fame, power, social acceptance and happiness -- like becoming a billionaire or pope or U.S. Treasury secretary or an Austrian sadist. Admittedly, it's hard to work up too much sympathy for most of these mighty who have fallen, but sympathy is not the only reason to reflect on their fates. There are also the cautionary lessons offered up by their Icarus-like descents. Nah, who are we kidding? That's for some other blog. There are only two real reasons to revisit these stories. It's fun to watch the bastards squirm. And because recently the headlines have been filled with so many prominent people who for one reason or another are royally screwed, we want to know: Who's the most screwed? Which of these figures who have chosen a well-worn path to the limelight, has done the most damage to their own reputations and the lives of those around them?
Here are thirteen choices from this month's headlines ranked by just how little sympathy we should have for them:
13.) Edward Liddy
The only reason this guy is on the list is that his career is probably finished simply because most people will forever associate him with A.I.G. But while the company has already joined Enron, Long Term Capital Management, Drexel Burnham Lambert and Blue Horseshoe in Wall Street's Hall of Infamy, Liddy himself is something like a hero, coming to work for a dollar a year as a public service in the most thankless job in the global business community. (And what is Blue Horseshoe? Hint: "Blue Horseshoe loves Anacot Steel.")
According to Forbes, the official magazine of Wall Street greed, the world's billionaires managed to misplace $1.4 trillion in the past year, their ranks thinning from 1125 to 793. Their average net worth has fallen by almost a quarter to only $3 billion. Both Warren Buffet and Carlos Slim each lost $25 billion. One, Adolf Merckle, ended up killing himself. Former Wall Street titans like Hank Greenberg and Sandy Weill fell completely off the list as did Facebook wunderkind Mark Zuckerberg. But Zuckerberg is only 25 and still has $900 million left. So as far as sympathy goes this is pretty much a mixed bag. The reality is that these days even a few hundred million gets you pretty far so let's not lose too much sleep over them. (The reason they are this low on the list is not because I feel sympathy for them... it's because I feel considerably less for everyone else on the list.)
11.) Eliot Spitzer
Poor Eliot. If only he had kept it in his pants, this would have been his moment. One can hardly imagine what is making his life worse right now, the fact that the A.I.G. scandal and the collapse of Wall Street could have been his apotheosis, the moment the howling dogs of ambition in his breast might have finally gotten enough red meat of press exposure... or the fact that his wife Silda has stood by him and thus will have the moral high ground in his marriage until he dies. Admittedly, while Spitzer unzipped his own career, his worst violation did not come against the public but against his family.
10.) Gordon Brown
It's hard to hate Gordon Brown. In fact, it's hard not to feel bad for the guy. This is due in part to the fact that he is Britain's first prime minister who is also part basset hound. Also, he had to follow Tony Blair who was quite telegenic and appealing, particularly in that phase of his career when he was being played by Michael Sheen. (Less so later when he was being played by one of George W. Bush's hand-puppets.) Still, Gordon did accept the job of PM, did screw it up to a fare-thee-well and now is on the verge of blowing his last big moment on the public stage as he prepares to host a G20 Summit that is very likely to realize somewhere between zero and few of his grand ambitions for it.
9.) Bibi Netanyahu
The fact that a man President Clinton's White House spokesman once called "one of the most obnoxious individuals you're going to come into -- just a liar and a cheat" has managed to bring himself to the verge of returning as Israel's prime minister is something of an amazing feat. Although perhaps not so much if you are familiar with what people in Israel euphemistically call politics. But Netanyahu assured that he was lost before he even took office by teaming up with racist boor Avigdor Lieberman. Together the two may fight so hard to protect Israel that they irreversibly weaken it.
8.) A.I.G. Bonus Babies
The NY Times writes, "Residents who had been pillars of Connecticut towns are finding themselves the focus of populist rage." But shouldn't we have hated them already for even wanting to be pillars of Connecticut towns? I mean, these people actually chose to become insurance executives and live in John Cheever hell just to become wealthy? Didn't they see The Ice Storm. Oh, the humanity! I hate them for their stale dreams more than I do the fact they squandered one of the great names of Wall Street while gaming both global financial markets and the American taxpayer.
7.) Ben Bernanke
In ancient societies, dark uncontrollable forces were placated by throwing virgins into volcanoes. In Washington, the ritual involves throwing officials under the bus. (The bus is implacable but near-sighted. As it approaches one victim, it will be at least temporarily satisfied if that victim throws someone else in its path.) Edward Liddy was in front of the bus this week during Congressional hearings and at the last minute, threw Bernanke in its path by saying the Fed knew everything A.I.G. was doing re: bonuses. But later the bus claimed other more delicious victims and Bernanke escaped... then he announced the U.S. government was going to print a trillion dollars in monopoly money to stem the crisis. Inflation was a near certainty before... now it will be Bernanke's inflation. No one will even remember he had anything to do with A.I.G. ... and that won't be a good thing.
6.) Tim Geithner
Sadly for Tim Geithner, he even looks like a sacrificial lamb. Earnest, brilliant, trying his best, he will never be able to escape the fact that he is one of the few who will get the blame for both the misguided Bush era bailouts and the false-starts of the Obama administration. Every time there is a mistake, the bus will head in his direction. Obama says he has confidence in Geithner. That is exactly what they said about Tom Daschle before they pulled the plug on him. Heck, Obama said he would no sooner disown Jeremiah Wright than his own grandmother shortly before he disowned him, as they say, with prejudice. Geithner might survive, but he has been wounded. The good news for the economy: sometimes they say people who have been through near death experiences actually develop psychic powers.
5.) Asif Ali Zardari
Zardari was known to be a bad guy long before he became Pakistan's president. Many of the closest friends of his late wife, Benazir Bhutto, could not stand him. Now, as it turns out, neither can most of the Pakistani people. Locked in a bitter struggle with opposition leader Nawaz Sharif, Zardari showed his weakness by capitulating to demands to reinstate Pakistan's former Chief Justice per Sharif's demands. Now in a desperate attempt to reassert control of his own party he may be plotting the ouster of his Prime Minister according to Indian press reports. He's on the ropes, his opposition is gaining strength, and meanwhile fraught, dangerous, complex Pakistan is hardly being governed at all.
4.) Chris Dodd
The Nutmeg State's longest-serving senator got his job the old-fashioned way, he [effectively] inherited it from his father, Sen. Thomas Dodd. He is also now virtually certain to lose it the old-fashioned way, as a result of a combination of arrogance, corruption, lying, and misreading the mood of the times. From his questionable home-mortgage finances to the comedy of errors this week when he denied having anything to do with legislative provisions allowing the A.I.G. bonus then blamed it on his staff then blamed it on the Treasury, Dodd is serving himself up on a silver platter to his opponents. And none of that even addresses the issue that as chairman of the Senate Banking Committee he was at the center of a fat-donations-from-Wall Street-equals-zero-oversight-from-Congress culture that helped get the world into this mess in the first place.
3.) Bernie Madoff
What more can you say about Bernie? For a decade and a half he went to bed every night knowing that he was lying, cheating, faking trades, committing fraud, and putting his and countless other families at grievous risk. And yet he lived his life like a king, like the former chairman of the National Association of Securities Dealers that he was, with yachts and mansions in the Hamptons and Mayfair. In fact, noted judge of character and bankruptcy-addict Donald Trump said "he was a pretty respected guy." That says it all.
2.) The pope
To non-believers he may be just a creepy old ex-Hitler Youth member who wears funny clothes and has appalling values, but to Catholics he is so much more than that. For example, according to one Vatican insider quoted in the U.K.'s Daily Telegraph newspaper, "he's out of touch with the real world" and his papacy is "a disaster." Another is reported to have said he "is isolated and fails to adequately consult his advisors." At least. His Africa trip pronouncement that condoms not only don't help the fight against AIDS but that their distribution actually "aggravates the problems" is not just a PR nightmare for the Holy See; delivered on the continent where both AIDS is most rampant and the Church is growing fastest, it is a formula for massive death and suffering.
1.) Josef Fritzl
Back in the good old days, when Joseph Alois Ratzinger was a little boy, being an Austrian sadist was a surefire path to the top, it could lead anywhere, perhaps even to world domination. But today, Austrians are outraged that one of their own could have locked his daughter in the basement, made her his sex slave, and killed one of the seven children he had with her. Which is really bad. Austria has changed, you see. There is no tolerance for twisted brutality there anymore. Well, less. In fact, fewer than a third of Austrians voted for the hate-spewing, neo-fascist extreme right parties like the Freedom Party and the Alliance for the Future. And while cynics (Jews or Muslims) might point out that this was the same proportion of the population who voted for Austria's leading party, the Social Democrats, their point is undercut by the fact that it was only a relatively few Austrians who honor Nazi heroes in public ceremonies on the anniversary of Kristalnacht or who have participated in nasty little rituals like the recent unfurling of a Nazi flag in Hitler's hometown of Braunau. No, there is no place for a Fritzl in modern Austria and so he will be sent to a psychiatric prison for the rest of his life. But one must wonder, is the outrage because of his crimes, because they were against fellow Austrians or because he thought so small?
This post has been modified since posting.
TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP/Getty Images; ISSOUF SANOGO/AFP/Getty Images; Mario Tama/Getty Images; Chris Hondros/Getty Images
EXPLORE:FINANCIAL CRISIS, ISRAEL/PALESTINE, MEDIA, OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, PAKISTAN, U.S. FOREIGN POLICY 
I nominate David Rothkopf for last week's ridiculous and childish rant against Walt and Mearsheimer.
How someone of Rothkopf's standing can still dispute the influence of the Israel Lobby is bizarre. He still talks about the "PERCEIVED influence of an 'Israel Lobby'" Seriously now.
Jerry Slater devastatingly reduces Rothkopf's rant to a steaming pile of.....
http://www.philipweiss.org/mondoweiss/2009/03/in-the-year-and-a-half-since-the-publication-of-john-mearsheimers-and-stephen-walts-israel-lobby-the-at.html
The fact that a man President Clinton's White House spokesman once called "one of the most obnoxious individuals you're going to come into -- just a liar and a cheat" ...
Coming from Clinton's WH spokesman, that's really saying something!
Dodd did not inherit his office.
Dodd's father was defeated for re-election by Lowell Weicker.
I have to say this piece was poorly edited and even more poorly researched.
1. Elliot Spitzer was neither charged nor convicted of any crime. He stepped down from office after his transgressions were made public, but he was never charged.
2. As previously mentioned, Chris Dodd did not inherit his seat from his father (he assumed office 10 years after his father left the Senate).
Both of these errors could have easily been avoided with a simple search of Wikipedia.
Also, the following sentence is missing the pronoun "it."
"The Nutmeg State's longest-serving senator got his job the old-fashioned way, he inherited from his father, Sen. Thomas Dodd."
I appreciate the helpful observations. Re: the Spitzer point, you're absolutely right. Don't blame the editors. I just was writing carelessly and will make sure it is fixed. As for Dodd...I hear you but think it's a technicality. I guess my sense is that he won the seat in part due to his name and that qualifies. We could quibble over it. But there are plenty of political dynasties in which seats are not directly handed off but there is a lineage that is traceable over time within a family and one or more high offices. As for the missing "it"..."it" will be reinstated as soon as someone who knows how to work all that fancy Internet technology is in a position to do so. As you can see, I can barely operate a keyboard.
Dear Sir, on entry number 5, shouldn't the first word be "Zardari", instead of "Sharif"?
http://www.philipweiss.org/mondoweiss/2009/03/in-the-year-and-a-half-since-the-publication-of-john-mearsheimers-and-stephen-walts-israel-lobby-the-at.html
...as previously suggested, I see!
I did not read prior comments before posting (my apologies!). It seems a dominant view of Mr. Rothkopf's recent commentary is emerging.
Poor Gordon Brown. Anyone remember when he was being hailed as a hero last year for doing the Right Thing on financial issues as opposed to the Paulsonian way here in the US? Now here he is, getting lame presents from his American counterpart that don't work, and at risk of Cameron's Conservatives knocking him off in elections come next year.
10th place is too lenient for Gordon Brown
Not really. The only thing I remember GB getting praised for at the time was the shotgun merger he arranged between Lloyds and HBOS, and now that hasty decision may bring them both down!
Otherwise his VAT cut has been a total waste of money, the Americans are peeved that he's constantly blaming the crisis on them (when the AIG FP operation was based in London), and Europe isn't listening to him at all.
And now he and Darling are selfishly trying to re-inflate the housing bubble before next year's election (90% loans anyone?).
His incompetent time as Chancellor allowed this mess to happen, and now his incompetent response as PM is making it worse.
He's totally useless.
I was with you, mostly, until you picked Josef Fritzl (who is doubtless a demon) as the most "delicious victim" under your bus. This evil crackpot is the most pathetic loser of the month, no question.
But then you went on to expand your outrage to all of Austria and its neo-fascist tendencies, because less than a third voted for the FPÖ. While this is a disgusting party, and the fewer seats in parliament, the better, they hardly represent the Austrian political mainstream. You may note that "hate-spewing, neo-facist extreme right parties" have, terrifyingly, enjoyed a bit of a renaissance lately, and reasonable citizens in all affected countries are rightly worried it. The "racist boor" Lieberman is also a hate-spewing member of the extreme right, who may have it in him to go for a lot of fear-mongering and maybe even ethnic cleansing-- yet you (rightly) didn't lampoon the entire Israeli "national character", as if such a thing exists.
It is dangerous to say that a whole population suffer the same incurable neurosis.
Also, its odd that you would source your statement to the Daily Mail. It's the DAILY MAIL. Hyperventilating should be left to the tabloids.
Surely he qualifies after the interview last week on CNN where he argues that policies such as Guantanamo and the Iraq invasion have led to America being "safer" under the Bush Administration?
Now regardless whether you were for or against Iraq, the Patriot Act, Enemy Combatants etc, you cannot deny the incompetent execution of these policies has done irreparable damage to America's image abroad. The policies may have been right - but they were implemented in a way that made Bush/Cheney/co look like the stereotypical bully on the beach kicking sand in everyone's faces.
Anyone who needs proof of this only needs to witness Obama's global popularity - a man who no-one knows anything about, except that he was not Republican.
America now receives up to 90% disapproval amongst moderate Arabs. These are the wealthy middle class kind, not the head-cutting kind, most of who used look to America for inspiration but now look at America with disappointment.
The danger now is that some of these 90% will now become the head-cutting kind.
Any anyone who argues that this will make America safer deserves the title of Loser.
Its unfortunate and at the same time is a sign of how modern world is moving away from values and religious sentiments that Pope had to be declared a "big loser. The reason why Pope is the biggest loser is that the Holy Father is just doing his job of - Making people acceptable to God and not making God aceptable to people". And in doing so he would surely be a loser as today the world has lost God somewhere somehow. If we feel Pope is away from the reality then a question remains - how real is ones faith in the teachings of Christ. If Pope intends to make people acceptable to God by dissuading use of Condoms - thereby moving people away from sin, I think there is nothing wrong as today the support to use condoms has demeaned the gravity of adultry but encouraged the the inclinition towards safe unlimited means of falling to adultry....Therefore the very reason that we stil have a huge divorce rate in the world only stands as a testimony that we have reached no where by encourging safer sin....
These views may sound old fashioned...but reality is what we should look at in the real sense and decide - Are we moving to be a loser or a gainer....A gainer of love and not passion...a gainer of oUr souls and not a loser
Although this piece is amusing in parts, your section on the pope is exceptionally harsh and biased, amounting to little more than poorly researched, nasty slander.
Have you any convincing evidence that the Church's position "is a formula for massive death and suffering"? Or was that just reactionary bile?
http://rossdouthat.theatlantic.com/archives/2009/03/the_aids_libel.php
Perhaps Mr. Rothkopf would have a bit more credibility if he would research his subject material for facts instead of relying on biased opinions from anonymous sources. Nothing this pope has said or done is at odds with Catholic Church teachings or beliefs. In fact, Mr. Rothkopf chooses to personally discredit the pope ("creepy old ex-Hitler youth with appalling values")as a way to attack the Catholic Church. I didn't notice any Islamic terrorists on his list. Mr. Rothkopf is a perfect example of arrogant liberals who have contempt for all values but their own. So much for honest journalism.
Rothkopf is at least half-right about the Pope
Douthat's two points about the Pope-- that Catholic hosptials do lots of great work, and that nobody can measure for sure the number of people who are affected by the Pope's awful messages on sex and gender-- are quite true.
Nonetheless, Douthat misses the bigger picture. He says "I'd prefer to be spared the lectures on how the Pope is responsible for "massive death and suffering" among populations for whom Catholic institutions have provided lifelines beyond counting over the years, just because he isn't willing to to use his pulpit to preach the importance of playing it as safe as possible, health-wise, while you're committing what the Church considers mortal sin."
But how does it get the Pope off the hook that the Church considers a harmless and beneficial activity, the use of a condom, to be mortal sin? That's the whole POINT of the criticism of the Pope, i.e., that these guys are so obsessed with not admitting that they are are wrong about birth control that they will actually tell a woman with an HIV positive husband that: (1) you can't get a divorce and (2) you can't insist on a condom. What kind of a moral monster would advocate such a thing?
Earth to the Pope-- since you believe that God is benevolent, you might want to consider that a benevolent God wouldn't put a poor African woman to such a Hobson's choice. When your doctrine leads to stupid, indefensible, and evil results, its time to change the doctrine. And saying "well, we do all this other good work" is like defending the Black Panthers based on the breakfast program that they ran.
Now it is true that, in the end, we don't know how many people really follow the Church's advice and therefore how many Africans the Pope has killed with his message. But that's like arguing that a pastor standing outside a burning building telling his flock to go back inside because God wants them inside the building isn't doing anything wrong because his flock isn't following his instructions.
Mr. Rothkopf forgot to mention the biggest loser of all: Foreignpolicy.com, which has the gall to list the Pope in the same group as the likes of Chris Dodd and Bernie Madoff, et alia. As far as I'm concerned, this web site now has zero credibility.
If Rothkopf had any sense at all, he'd think about what makes a real loser and what doesn't. Speaking the truth when the majority of the world is against you doesn't make you a loser. It makes you courageous. And if he'd done his homework, he'd know that there is strong scientific evidence (studies) that show the Pope to be right in his statement. He is backed up by no less than the head AIDS researcher at Harvard University, Dr. Edward Green, for example.
Also, if Mr. Rothkopf had cared about any objective coverage of this event, he would have pointed out that the real loser in this is the media, which has once again shown itself to be absolutely biased and even worse, incompetent. In story after story, they made it look like the Pope was denying the efficacy of condoms as material barriers to the disease. That, of course, to anyone who read his words, is not at all what he was saying.
The Pope clearly was speaking about the overall epidemic, which isn't going to be solved by handing out condoms, which encourage people to engage in even riskier behavior. It will ultimately be cured by putting sex in its proper human context, and to stop thinking of everything in the merely material terminology of the U.N. and Planned Parenthood- to see the man as a body and a soul, where sex is a beautiful expression of love between two partners in the institution of marriage. Of course if everyone viewed the world that way, AIDS would be far less of a problem.
"But the Pope doesn't live in the practical world," is the charge. Yet he is the spokesman for the Man/God Who said: "My kingdom is not of this world" and "My peace I give you, not as the world gives...", etc. So where does Rothkopf get off in calling the Pope a "loser" when it's Rothkopf who has forgotten what the Pope's job description is and who his boss is? Shame!
Jlayne, how convenient that the "science" just happens to coincide with your and the Pope's preexisting beliefs (in the Pope's case, completely conjured from nothing as he ostensibly hasn't even experienced sex, so how is he supposed to know?) about sex and gender!
Meanwhile, I will repeat my point above-- if you have a poor married African woman whose husband has contracted HIV from a dalliance with a prostitute, the Pope's position is that (1) she cannot have a divorce, and (2) she cannot insist that he use a condom when he has intercourse with her. You can babble on about the "proper human context of sex" or whatever other florid and meaningless language you want to use to describe Catholic doctrine, but where the rubber meets the road (pardon the pun), actually obeying what the Pope says would kill an innocent woman in that situation. Whereas ignoring him might save her life.
That's what the Pope does here. He takes refuge in transcendent language about the supposed purposes of sex, and uses that as an excuse to ignore the reality that he has nothing but bad (indeed, immoral and reckless) advice for African women in the actual situations that many of them face.
Dilan, thanks for your reply. First of all, it makes no sense at all to think that someone who doesn't have sex has no ability to make an informed statement on it. Scientists make "informed" statements all of the time, and so do all of us, without "experience" of the thing we're speaking of. Wasn't George Washington the first President? I never experienced it, but I can say it with confidence. Is there such a thing as a black hole? I've never experienced it, but does that mean I can't have an opinion on it? What you say makes no sense at all. It's merely an ad hominem attack upon the Pope, and we all know, or at least should know, that such arguments are logically worthless. Your comment that the Pope hasn't experienced "sex" and therefore doesn't know about "gender" is even stranger.
Your next paragraph about the husband who has contracted AIDS from a Prostitute uses a more extreme example. In this example, the relations are per se moral, that is, they are inside marriage, and so there is a legitimate moral reason to have sexual relations. As far as I know, this question is not settled in the Church. The moral principle of "double effect" may very well apply here. In such a case, the condom use would not be for contraceptive purposes. It would be only for disease prevention. The couple would be open to the transmission of life, and the condom would make the marital act (sex) possible.
Double effect is an important principle, and it explains how we may, for example, use deadly force to defend against an attacker (intending to stop him but not to kill him, even though death results). In double effect, two effects come about because of an action, the intended one being morally licit. The other effect is not intended but comes about, even inevitably. So, for example, a woman has cancer on the umbilical chord, and an operation is required to take out the cancer, otherwise the mother and child will die. However, if the operation is performed, the baby will die because the umbilical chord must be cut. Applying "double effect" to this, the intention of the surgeon is to remove the cancer. It is therefore morally licit for the surgery to proceed even though the death of an innocent child results, because the death is not "intended" and everything possible would be done to prevent it. It is an unintended effect, whereas the elimination of the cancer is the intended one. In the case of condom use in marriage, where one spouse has AIDS, the intention would be to prevent the transmission of AIDS and NOT to prevent the transmission of life. This is a question that is fascinating, but the Church as moral teacher will have to finally determine whether this argument is valid.
The question would be then whether or not there is something intrinsically immoral about condom use, regardless of the situation. And of course, I submit my judgment to the final determination of the Church.
I urge you to look up the teaching on "double effect" and try to realize how complicated the matter is, rather than over-simplifying it. As for divorce, that's not an option for the Catholic, not simply because the Pope said so but because Jesus Christ said so (which is why the Pope says so). If you have an issue with that, take it up with God.
There is nothing "immoral and reckless" in the Pope's comments. It's ironic that those who overall argue for the "right" of people to engage in all sorts of rampant sexual acts would argue that the Pope, who advocates purity and chastity, is immoral. It only goes to show the confusion of the age.
Dilan,This has nothing to do with obeying the Pope. The Holy Father is simply the messenger. There are plenty of options for the poor woman. I don't know where you get your information but divorce is a possibility so long as niether remarries. Separation is another. If the hypothetical couple really loves one another and takes thier vows seriously, they would not knowingly put the other in jeopardy of any potentially fatal situation. Using a condom certainly falls into that category, as I have yet to see a study of any kind which states condoms 100% effective in preveventing AIDS. By what logic then do you conclude then that obeying the Pope would kill an innocent woman? Don't say it is not reasonable to be celibate for good, holy or necessary reasons. It's been done before, is done now and will be in the future by those with appropriate reasons for doing so.
Your other hypothetical referring to the Pope not experiencing sex, is also severly flawed. I have never been murdered, been addicted to drugs, had cancer, etc.,etc. You get the point I'm trying to make I'm sure. We don't have to experience everything to know something about it. Many times simple observation suffices.
The Pope is not a loser. Society in general has become the biggest loser.
There is no such thing as "divorce" as recognized by the Church. Civil "divorce" is only recognized as a legal question. That can sometimes be tolerated, when the two can no longer live together, but it is for legal purposes of dividing up the estate, etc. The marriage sacramentally cannot be broken.
I agree with your comments, but I wanted to just make this clarification so that people didn't think that the Catholic Church in any way sees "divorce" as a thing that makes the man and woman "un-married."
1. "Divorce is a possibility as long as neither remarries."
So, her option is to give up sex for the rest of her life? All because her HUSBAND went and cheated on her? That's no option at all.
2. "If the hypothetical couple really loves one another and takes their vows seriously, they would not knowingly put the other in jeopardy...."
Life isn't that simple. People get married, they are often young, they have raging hormones. (Catholic moral doctrine encourages young marriage, too, by forbidding all premarital sex.) They have children together. (Catholic moral doctrine forbids most forms of birth control and all abortions.) And then the husband cheats. Which is ridiculously common.
It seems to me that you are seriously venturing into blaming the victim territory here. The Pope sets up a sex-and-gender doctrine that's almost guaranteed to lead to lots of sexual and marital frustration and eventual cheating, and then when the guy actually cheats, the position is "well, if you really loved each other this wouldn't have happened". Again, sorry, no dice. If the Pope wants to be willfully ignorant of reality, that's his right. But when reality bites, it isn't nearly enough to say "well in my fantasy world this wouldn't have happened". You might as well say that in your fantasy world, these African women wouldn't be poor and wouldn't be economically dependent on their husbands. Maybe so. But in the real world, these women are poor. And they are economically dependent on their husbands. And many of their husbands do cheat. And the Pope offers them no good choices.
3. "Using a condom certainly falls into that category, as I have yet to see a study of any kind which states condoms 100% effective in preventing AIDS."
Nothing is 100 percent effective in preventing AIDS. Not even abstinence, because HIV can be transmitted by rape.
The point is, what do you do for that woman in that marriage, with that cheating husband. Tell her that she can't use a condom? Or tell her that she can? Tell her that she can't get a divorce unless she wants to give up sex for the rest of her life? Or tell her that she can?
That condom quite possibly may save her life. Yes, it won't be 100 percent effective. But it's close to it, if properly used. Meanwhile, the Pope offers the woman a bunch of non-options.
And why? Well, I'll tell you why. Because the Pope would rather not admit that he and his predecessors are wrong about sex and gender. There's a lot of ego invested in it. A lot of meaningless, florid, lofty words. Better to let that African woman die of HIV/AIDS than admit that the Church got a big issue totally wrong. (Especially since giving up on the condom issue would mean calling the entire Church theology on sex and gender into question.)
4. "Your other hypothetical referring to the Pope not experiencing sex, is also severly flawed. I have never been murdered, been addicted to drugs, had cancer, etc.,etc."
I understand that on one level, but on the other hand, cancer survivors groups, crime victims support groups, etc., exist to give useful advice and the kind of sympathy that nobody else can really muster. Meanwhile, we have a guy handing out not only advice, but hard and fast rules and a detailed THEORY of sex and its purposes, who doesn't know the first thing about the subject. The better analogy would be to a guy who writes 15 books on automobile repair who has never fixed a car or even driven one.
And finally I come to this:
5. "The Holy Father is simply the messenger."
First of all, he's a virgin. He isn't a "father" to anyone, unless he's been doing things that we don't know about. Nor is he "holy". God doesn't love him more than God loves anyone else. He's just a man. He's my equal, my brother, not my father. So stop making this guy sound like some person entitled to undue respect. He's just a fallible man who makes lots of errors and has the same human failings as all the rest of us.
And he is not a messenger, except in the sense that he conveys the decisions of his Church's hierarchy to the public. The Church has all sorts of reasons for its doctrines on sex and gender. Part of it is that it is run by male virgins who don't know anything about sex. Part of it is tradition from a patriarchal past. Part of it was social control. Part of it is the sexist beliefs of past Church elders. Part of it is social conservativism. And a lot of it the refusal to admit that it is wrong.
But the point is, a bunch of human beings, a bunch of wealthy male virgins who live cloistered lives, came up with a doctrine about sex that bears no relationship to reality. It didn't come from God. God doesn't speak through a rich male virgin in Rome. Certainly not about sex and gender issues.
Saying that the Pope is the "messenger" is thus the ultimate cop-out. Anyone can say they talk to God. Heck, anyone can even hallucinate that they really do. But we call most of these people charlatans or people with very active imaginations. You don't get a pass for lousy ideas, ideas that are divorced from reality, by saying that you are just a messenger. Heck, the more divorced ideas are from reality, the less likely they could have possibly come from God. An omniscient God would surely know and understand HIV and would not oppose a way to provide protection to poor married women in Africa when their husbands stray (and poor married men in Africa when their wives are raped).
You see, when the Pope says something stupid and harmful, and his defenders say "he's just the messenger", they just make their religion look less plausible. If you'd just say "sometimes the Pope gets things wrong and misinterprets God's word", it would give Catholicism a lot more credibility. Apparently, though, people aren't able to say that.
But certainly that's no reason for those of us who are horrified that someone would tell an African woman whose husband has the HIV virus that her only option is to give up sex for the rest of life to think the Pope comes out of this looking like an angel.
What point is there in being a Christian if one isn't willing to follow Christ's teachings? Divorce, sex, all of that, is within the competence of the Church founded by Jesus Christ to teach, and NOT within your competence as a private individual. You were not promised the authority to teach Christ's doctrines. The Church was.
Of course these teachings are going to be hard to live up to. Even his disciples were known from time to time to say to Him, "this is a hard saying."
So why do you get all worked up when the Pope's teachings seem too hard to live up to? This is how the wheat is separated from the chaff.
Your arguments about the Pope not having sex and so being incompetent to speak on the moral issues involved make no sense at all. This isn't car repair. It's morality. He isn't trying to tell you how to have better sex with your wife. He's trying to point out what's moral and what isn't, and that's a question of 1) moral theology, insofar as it involves a principle of Divine Revelation and 2) Philosophy, which is able to come to moral determinations from the viewpoint of natural ethics. (No theology involved.)
Neither of those requires experience of sex.
Your comments are nothing but a slanderous attack on the Pope. They don't really make any sense.
The Pope and Christians have a view of life that goes beyond the bedroom. The ultimate goal of all is to get to heaven, and to be in God's Presence forever. That's more important than "getting off" (excuse the directness.) If you don't look at it from that perspective, where following Christ's commands is crucially important to reaching the ultimate goal of your existence, then you won't understand a word that the Pope is saying, or for that matter, what any of us are saying.
I understand it perfectly well
What point is there in being a Christian if one isn't willing to follow Christ's teachings? Divorce, sex, all of that, is within the competence of the Church founded by Jesus Christ to teach, and NOT within your competence as a private individual. You were not promised the authority to teach Christ's doctrines. The Church was.
I don't claim to be an authority on this, but certainly the vast majority of Christians-- including most American Catholics-- reject the Church's teachings on birth control. And at best very little of those teachings are in any way traceable to things Jesus actually is alleged to have said. Thus, without some claim that what the Pope says is more important than what is actually in the New Testament or what believers actually believe, this argument doesn't get anywhere.
So I agree with you that Papal authority is kind of at the root of the issue. But that makes the Pope more responsible for any errors, not less. If one believes that Jesus really did entrust his message to the corporate entity that became the Roman Catholic Church, then it should outrage you more, not less, that an organization purporting to speak in God's name is telling African women and men whose spouses contract HIV that they have to either give up sex or die as their only moral options. It's bad enough to say that. It's worse to say it in God's name.
Your arguments about the Pope not having sex and so being incompetent to speak on the moral issues involved make no sense at all. This isn't car repair. It's morality.
It isn't just morality. The Pope actually makes factual claims about sex, not just moral ones. Benedict XVI and John Paul II both have waxed poetically about the purpose of sex, about the place of sex in our lives, about how unhealthy sex can be when taken out of that particular context, about how unhealthy masturbation can be. These are things that the Pope knows nothing at all about.
He has no idea about, say, the place that sex holds in the life of a young working woman in Manhattan who has a serious boyfriend but who is not ready to marry or have children because it may derail her career to do so. How could he? The man has never even experienced sex.
He has no idea what it is like to be gay. He has no idea what it is like to be bisexual. He has no idea what it is like to be a man with a disabled spouse who wants to masturbate because his wife can no longer perform. He has no idea about all sorts of diverse aspects of sexuality. He has voluntarily chosen to abstain from an activity that many of us find extremely important and rewarding. Fine. But then don't tell us what the "proper" or "fulfilling" way to have sex is. He can't know. He doesn't know.
Your comments are nothing but a slanderous attack on the Pope.
I think you mean "libelous" (slander is oral), but it isn't slander to make true factual statements and statements of opinion. It is true that the Pope claims to be celibate. It is true that he is wealthy. It is true that his philosophy is blind to the actual sex lives of millions of people. It is true that he forbids both divorce and condom use.
There was no false statement of fact anywhere in here.
And seriously, those who defend the Pope need to learn the difference between criticism-- including harsh criticism and even insult-- and defamation. The fact is, as a world leader of some importance, the Pope is subject to criticism and insult. He's a big boy. He can take it. And again, if he really were God's representative on earth, I don't think his followers would be so insistent on protecting him from any criticism, because they would be confident that eternal justice would eventually right the scales. This kind of response certainly implies that people are NOT in fact secure in their faith, that they in fact may know in the back of their mind that it's all an artifice, and they feel uncomfortable when people point out facts that might undermine their faith.
The Pope and Christians have a view of life that goes beyond the bedroom. The ultimate goal of all is to get to heaven, and to be in God's Presence forever. That's more important than "getting off" (excuse the directness.)
If you took this point to its logical conclusion, there would be no reason for the Pope to take the stands he does on abortion, capital punishment, or war. Because in each case, one could say that death doesn't matter, that the ultimate goal of life is to get to heaven and be in "God's Presence forever".
Obviously, the Pope doesn't really believe this. Nobody does. Human life is important. So back to our African woman, who is left with no good options by the Pope. And you can't, in her context, talk about sex as simply a matter of "getting off". She is married. Sex with her husband is expressly claimed by the Pope to NOT simply be about "getting off". And yet the Pope says her only choices are to give that up or to die a horrible death.
There is a logical contradiction here. If human life is as important as the Pope is always claiming, and sex within marriage is as important as the Pope is always claiming, allowing the use of that condom is a no brainer. But if the true paramount value is to avoid ever having to admit the Pope was wrong, then his position makes perfect sense.
I don't claim to be an authority on this, but certainly the vast majority of Christians-- including most American Catholics-- reject the Church's teachings on birth control.
Sorry, but this isn't a logical way to argue. It's a very democratic way to argue, as if truth were determined by who gets the majority of votes. Thank heavens, however, that the Church is not a democracy. Truth is not subject to a majority vote.
The next statement could have many books written on it to help you understand it, but I'll allow this to suffice: The Catholic Church traces back to Christ, who in the New Testament said, "He who heareth you, heareth me" and "the Gates of hell shall not prevail against it," and "I am with you all days until the end of the world." Without going too deeply into Catholic apologetics, let's just give a hypothetical principle, which you as a nonbeliever won't accept, but which you can't fault Catholics for following to its logical conclusions, and that point is this:
The Catholic Church is not a "sola Scriptura" Church. If that's what you want, go to the protestants. It makes no logical sense, and it is self-defeating as a claim, since it isn't in Scripture. The Catholic Church, instead, is a divinely appointed teacher referred to in Scripture, as I referenced above, and historically traceable to the hand of Jesus Christ Himself. So only that Church has the competence to teach Christ's doctrines which has a reasonable claim to be the one He established while alive. Nor does that Church need explicit warrant of Scripture if those teachings are contained in the constant moral teaching of the Church, as expressed either in Scripture, Tradition, or the Church's Councils, etc, as guided by the Holy Spirit. The Church, as guardian of Divine Revelation, is also competent to teach upon matters of natural philosophy, insofar as this relates to Divine Revelation. Right moral conduct, since it is essential to salvation, is thus in the scope of the Church's authority and competence. The visible head of the Church is the Pope. Thus it is within his competence, etc. Need I elaborate?
Next, you wrote:
If one believes that Jesus really did entrust his message to the corporate entity that became the Roman Catholic Church, then it should outrage you more, not less, that an organization purporting to speak in God's name is telling African women and men whose spouses contract HIV that they have to either give up sex or die as their only moral options. It's bad enough to say that. It's worse to say it in God's name.
You assume there that the Pope is wrong. You're going to have to reach that point by argument from science. The Pope made a claim, which is that handing out condoms actually makes the epidimic of AIDS worse. First of all, considering the Pope is speaking of man and his soul, and since sexual immorality can and will lead to eternal damnation in the unrepentant, it is no doubt worse, according to the Pope's own principles, to use condoms than not to, even without considering the material implications of disease. However, the Pope's claim is even more specific than that, as you rightly point out. The epidimic itself is made worse by condom use.
Harvard researcher, Dr. Edward Green, had a fascinating thing to say about the facts of condom use, and gives a specific example to back up the research:
One country, Uganda, recognized these issues and said, “Listen, if you have multiple sex partners, you are going to get AIDS.” What worked in Uganda, a country that has seen a decline by as much as 2/3 in AIDS infections, was that officials realized that even aside from religious and cultural reasons, “no one likes condoms.” Instead of waiting for “American and European advisors to arrive,” Ugandan officials reacted and developed a program that fit their culture; their main message being “stick to one partner or love faithfully.” However, in 2004, Uganda’s AIDS infection rates began to increase once again, due to an influx of condoms and Western “advice”, Green recalled. Western donors also came to Uganda and said behavioral change doesn’t work and that, “most infections nowadays are among married people.” Green said these claims are “misleading,” pointing out that “married people always have lower HIV infection rates than single or divorced people of the same age group.”
[Source: http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=15445]
So there is research on the issue, one of the world's leading experts (himself a liberal), and a specific example. You're going to have to do more to counter that claim than to assert otherwise. Show it. At the very least, the material considerations are very complicated, and science may not know for sure whether condoms increase the spread of the epidemic because of "risk compensation." Either way, there's nothing wrong or unreasonable about the Pope repeating the teaching that sex belongs in marriage, and use of condoms encourages sex outside of marriage. That's a fact. Abstinence works better than condoms. Even if condoms only fail 1% of the time, abstinence never fails. (If there is rape, materially there is not abstinence, so don't go there. We're obviously talking about willful abstinence, not force.)
It isn't just morality. The Pope actually makes factual claims about sex, not just moral ones. Benedict XVI and John Paul II both have waxed poetically about the purpose of sex, about the place of sex in our lives, about how unhealthy sex can be when taken out of that particular context, about how unhealthy masturbation can be. These are things that the Pope knows nothing at all about.
This makes no sense. Psychologists have opinions about masturbation, whether or not they masturbate. I have an opinion on which symphony is Mozart's best, but I've never written a symphony. I find your idea that you have to have experience of something in order to have a judgment of it to be patently absurd.
Masturbation clearly takes the sexual act, which would otherwise be reproductive (ejaculation of semen) and takes it not only outside of marriage but also outside of any sexual relation between two persons. As such, the natural end of ejaculation is frustrated, just looking at nature. Forget theology. You don't even have to consider it. I just said what I said about masturbation without masturbating! Isn't that interesting? I can have an intelligent opinion on an act without doing the act. I've never murdered anyone, but I know it's wrong. Your "argument" doesn't make any sense at all. It's simply not true that people know "absolutely nothing" about moral acts that they don't engage in themselves. If this were so, we would have to shut down the courts and turn all of the heinous criminals free because we've never committed the same crimes that they have.
The fact is, as a world leader of some importance, the Pope is subject to criticism and insult. He's a big boy. He can take it. And again, if he really were God's representative on earth, I don't think his followers would be so insistent on protecting him from any criticism, because they would be confident that eternal justice would eventually right the scales. This kind of response certainly implies that people are NOT in fact secure in their faith
Excuse me, but it is you who claimed that the Pope is responsible for a teaching that will lead to the deaths of innocent men and women, that the Pope has no right to express an opinion on sex because he doesn't engage in it, etc. You also said, "...in the Pope's case, completely conjured from nothing as he ostensibly hasn't even experienced sex, so how is he supposed to know?) about sex and gender!" How is it that repeating Catholic teaching is just "conjuring" something? That's a lie. He isn't making things up as he goes along. (strangely enough, you refer later that he is repeating the teachings of his predecessors. It's hard to see how one can "conjure up" a teaching that is a repetition of what one's predecessors said.)
You then insinuate that the Pope believes Catholic teaching to be wrong, but he still teaches it in order to not make the Church look bad: "Better to let that African woman die of HIV/AIDS than admit that the Church got a big issue totally wrong." Etc.. If that's not slander, or libel, or defamation, or whatever you want to call it, then I don't know what is. Further, it is silly to insinuate that those who defend the Pope do so because they are "insecure in their faith." Not so. Catholics have a moral obligation to defend the truth to the best of their abilities, especially when it is publicly called into question. Yes, Divine Justice will one day call you to account for this public attack on the Pope. Yet that Divine Justice may just as easily call me into account one day if I do not act within my ability to correct you in charity. I do because I care for your soul and for your own salvation, as well as the salvation of those who read your words.
Sex outside of marriage is a sin. That's Catholic teaching. So it follows that condom use outside of marriage is a sin. No brainer.
Sex inside marriage is a moral good, and since the primary end of marriage is the procreation of children (which is biologically and otherwise the end of sex), the use of a condom in marriage is unnatural, because it interferes in the very end for which marriage is instituted. It also serves to make the woman into an object of the lust of the man. Talk about degradation of women! In the few cases where there is some moral question, such as one partner having AIDS within marriage, there is still debate going on. Some see "double effect" coming in. Some don't. Perhaps the Church will definitively settle the matter. But it's silly to criticize the Church for stating what is the logical conclusion of its own fundamental teachings on sexuality, which are based upon the natural law and Divine Revelation.
If you took this point to its logical conclusion, there would be no reason for the Pope to take the stands he does on abortion, capital punishment, or war. Because in each case, one could say that death doesn't matter, that the ultimate goal of life is to get to heaven and be in "God's Presence forever".
Sorry, that does not follow. A simple philosophical consideration will show you that doesn't follow. When there is an end (a final cause as it's referred to), there are means that are proportionate to the attainment of that end. In the case of eternal salvation, the means assigned by God to reach this end are primarily the sacraments, and these enable one to live a life of grace. Nevertheless, grace builds upon nature. It doesn't not destroy our nature. The nature of all living things is to seek for the preservation of one's life. This is especially true for the man on account of his rational nature. A natural end for him is the contemplation of truth. This takes many years. Wisdom is often not accomplished until old age. And yet, as reasonable, he may engage in activities that could limit his lifespan, such as war or even martyrdom for the Faith, where those are most proportionate to the attainment of either his natural end or his further supernatural end (the Beatific Vision). There is also the Revealed teaching on merit, wherein our closeness to God in the Beatific Vision is determined by our Love of God. The more we love Him, the closer we will be to Him through all eternity. This is another reason that death is not to be sought simply speaking, even by the Christian. Further, it doesn't follow that those killed by war, abortion, etc. go to heaven. That confuses nature and grace, which I won't go into. So by nature and by Revelation, we see that you are wrong.
It does not follow that life isn't important because the ultimate supernatural end of man is to reach heaven. This is, as I showed very sketchily, because life is a means to the attainment of heaven. The means are important, even if the end is more important. It doesn't not, as you suggest, follow that the means are unimportant because the end is ultimately important.
You then go back to the example of the woman whose husband has contracted AIDS by adultery, and whether or not a condom may then be licitly used:
Sex with her husband is expressly claimed by the Pope to NOT simply be about "getting off". And yet the Pope says her only choices are to give that up or to die a horrible death. There is a logical contradiction here. If human life is as important as the Pope is always claiming, and sex within marriage is as important as the Pope is always claiming, allowing the use of that condom is a no brainer.
You're correct that sex in this case isn't about "getting off." It is a legitimate and even praiseworthy moral act. Why is this? Because it's context is marriage, which has as its primary end the propagation of children. Now I had just talked about "double effect" to show the argument that condom use may be licit in this example, but it is not a simple question morally. Condom use interferes in the primary end of marriage, which I just gave. The marital act contains two ends, one primary and one secondary: The first is procreative, and I just mentioned that. The second is unitive, that is, the unity of the two spouses in a bond of love that represents the unity of Christ and His Church. Now double effect reasoning does not say that an evil act may be done to bring about a good result. You are not able to say, for example, that you may kill someone to bring about a greater good. That's because killing an innocent person is intrinsically evil. So with condom use, the question is whether the design of the condom, since it always interferes with the transmission of life, the very end of the marriage, is intrinsically evil, even in marriage. If so, it cannot be done, even to bring about the good, which is the secondary purpose of the marital act, the unitive aspect.
Now all of this presupposes a whole understanding of matter, form, soul, the parts of the soul, the natural law, etc. There is a whole body of carefully thought out philosophy that is being rejected when one thinks as you do. The Catholic Church cares about the integrity of the whole body of teaching. You apparently want her to make a determination "ad hoc" based upon an apparent feeling you have of injustice at such a restriction upon the marital partners. Sorry, but that's not how the Catholic Church, the Church founded by Jesus Christ and entrusted by Him as guardian of the truths of Salvation, behaves. No public pressure will ever make her behave in such an unreasonable and hasty way. These matters will be carefully thought out, within the whole body of teaching and thought that is the very richness of Catholicism.
So only that Church has the competence to teach Christ's doctrines which has a reasonable claim to be the one He established while alive.
I fully understand that this is what the Church claims. But I think you miss my point. The Church is run by men. Imperfect men. Imperfect men who are no better than I am. Imperfect men who are no better than I am and who also know nothing about sex, I might add.
The point is, unless you want to actually claim that everything that every Pope ever did is the actual word of God (a claim that, as I understand it, not even the Vatican makes), then you're going to be in the business of determining whether the Pope's teaching on a particular subject is correct or not. And once you're in that business, you're actually in the same boat as the Protestants, or agnostics or atheists, for that matter.
Further, authority can be abused. Even if you fervently believe that the Church's authority derives from Jesus, that doesn't justify, e.g., the sex abuse scandal. If I am right and the Pope is giving terrible advice to married African women with HIV-positive husbands, it seems to me that would qualify as an abuse of his authority, even if you believe he has such authority.
But more importantly, bear in mind that Rothkopf wasn't calling the Pope a loser based on religious criteria. He was evaluating his message on a secular level. And it seems to me the Pope doesn't escape secular criticism by claiming he is God's messenger. Loads of people claim to be God's messenger in this world. Yet we still criticize them when they advocate bad or stupid things. The Pope doesn't get a free pass.
First of all, considering the Pope is speaking of man and his soul, and since sexual immorality can and will lead to eternal damnation in the unrepentant, it is no doubt worse, according to the Pope's own principles, to use condoms than not to, even without considering the material implications of disease.
If that's the argument, though, I don't want to hear any more claims that the Pope is "pro-life". What you are essentially saying is that it is OK for African women to die because your religion says they may be saved. You could justify any human suffering under that theory.
So there is research on the issue, one of the world's leading experts (himself a liberal), and a specific example.
I have stayed away from the science of whether condom DISTRIBUTION programs work. Suffice to say, it's a lot more complicated than the "Catholic News Agency" (surely an unbiased source-- do you think they would EVER print an article there that showed the Pope was full of it?) says it is.
But I was speaking more specifically. The Pope's advice is immoral in a specific situation-- a married African whose spouse has contracted the HIV virus. Because the Pope gives that person only two options-- have sex with the spouse without a condom and die a horrible death of AIDS, or suffer the rest of your life without ever again having sex.
In other words, my point wasn't about the science of condom programs. It was about the utter indefensibility and cluelessness of the Pope's moral and factual contentions about condom use. Whatever one might say about the efficacy of DISTRIBUTING condoms in Uganda, that doesn't in any way refute the fact that the Pope contends that something that is the OBVIOUS moral choice in a particular situation (a condom) is in fact some spectacularly sinful act.
Masturbation clearly takes the sexual act, which would otherwise be reproductive (ejaculation of semen) and takes it not only outside of marriage but also outside of any sexual relation between two persons. As such, the natural end of ejaculation is frustrated, just looking at nature.
Without getting too far into the weeds here, this is based entirely on a circular assumption as to what the "natural end" of ejaculation is. Most people would observe that masturbation is just as natural an act as intercourse is, and there's nothing unnatural about spilling one's seed other than in a vagina, as lots of seed gets spilled by lots of creatures.
In other words, the Pope (and you) take the outcome you want, declare it "natural", and therefore assume that every other outcome is bad.
I assume that if the Pope were actually God's messenger on earth, he would not use reasoning whose logic could be utterly demolished by your average fourth grader.
I've never murdered anyone, but I know it's wrong.
The difference, though, is that sex is actually a highly technical set of procedures with profound and complex effects on humanity, and one that (unlike murder) everyone agrees is proper in at least certain circumstances.
Indeed, the Pope would totally agree with that description of sex.
So what you have is a very complex subject, a subject that has vexed the smartest philosophers, a subject that most people deal with on an intimate level throughout their adult lives, and the person with the greatest expertise on that subject is one who has never experienced it? Do you seriously believe this??!?!???
Excuse me, but it is you who claimed that the Pope is responsible for a teaching that will lead to the deaths of innocent men and women, that the Pope has no right to express an opinion on sex because he doesn't engage in it, etc.
For the record, I didn't say that the Pope has no right to talk about sex. I said he shouldn't talk about it because he doesn't know diddly about the subject. But he has the right to make a fool of himself if he wishes to, and he certainly has.
Yes, Divine Justice will one day call you to account for this public attack on the Pope.
How sad that you can possibly believe this. How pitiful. You really think that God is your little plaything (or the Pope's) to be thrown around as a method of getting petty vengeance against those who criticize your beliefs?
You are treating God as your big brother who is going to come to school the next day and beat up the bully who is terrorizing you on the playground. And you wonder why people mock religious beliefs?
It also serves to make the woman into an object of the lust of the man. Talk about degradation of women!
You have a view of sex that, shall we say, is inconsistent with the lived experience of vast numbers of women (and men).
Talk about degradation of women! In the few cases where there is some moral question, such as one partner having AIDS within marriage, there is still debate going on. Some see "double effect" coming in. Some don't. Perhaps the Church will definitively settle the matter.
But this sort of proves my point. The condom use in that situation is a no brainer, because it prevents greater harm, saves lives, and you certainly can justify it under the principle of double effect (though for the record, the principle of double effect is itself utter BS and is just an artifice that allows the Catholic Church to deny the more loony and outrageous implications of its doctrines).
So why doesn't the Pope come out and say it? The only possible explanation is they have a lot invested in this whole birth control issue (which, don't forget, almost caused a schism in the Church in the late 1960's) and don't want to admit that they got it wrong.
No public pressure will ever make her behave in such an unreasonable and hasty way.
Of all the claims you make, this is the most ridiculous. The Catholic Church no longer claims the Jews killed Christ because of public pressure. It no longer requires adherents to abstain from meat one day a week due to public pressure. It no longer (in most churches) conducts the Tridentine mass due to public pressure. It admitted (500 years too late) to its complicity in the persecution of Galileo because of public pressure. It stopped selling indulgences due to public pressure.
And Cardinal Bernard Law is no longer the Archbishop of Boston due to extreme public pressure. Indeed, the Church completely flip-flopped on the sex abuse scandal, from declaring it a non-problem and an internal matter and blithely transferring pedophiles to other churches without telling anyone so they could go ahead and abuse more children to adopting a zero tolerance policy and turning them in to authorities, all because of public pressure.
You seem to worship an idealized Catholic Church headed by an ideal Pope, which is nothing more than a pipeline to God. But that's not what the Roman Catholic Church is. They are a political institution run by flawed humans, no better or worse than you or I, and with no greater insight into God's will.
Hopefully, eventually, they will respond to public pressure and change their teaching on condoms in Africa. But I wouldn't hold my breath waiting.
We're going back and forth, and it's clear to anyone who reads this that you're not willing to argue reasonably. You constantly try to restate my position without stating it accurately. You constantly engage in ad hominem attacks. (You continue to state your absurd position that the Pope knows "nothing" about sex because he doesn't have sex. Anyone can see how strange and absurd that position is, and yet you've repeated it now several times.) I'd be happy to answer you point by point, but it almost certainly wouldn't do any good. You obviously have an axe to grind, so grind it.
However, your whole tirade on the Catholic Church caving to "public pressure" on so many things is so ridiculous I can't pass commenting upon it.
1) The Catholic Church didn't change any teaching regarding the "Jews" killing Christ. It made clear that the Jews of today did not do so, and cannot be held responsible for it. Previously, some people accused the Jews of "deicide". That was never official teaching.
2) It's blatantly false that the Church changed its DISCIPLINE on meatless Fridays because of public pressure. That had nothing to do with it. There was an overall move after Vatican II toward more lay initiative, in fasting or in Church ministries, etc. The thought was that Catholics would choose penances to replace this one, or continue to abstain on Fridays. But the point was that this would be a personal choice and not legislated. There was no outcry against abstinence from meat on Fridays. Where do you get this stuff? Prove it.
3) There was NO outcry to get rid of the Tridentine Mass. As a matter of fact, a strong majority of the Bishops at the Council voted against even considering a change to the Mass. Pope Paul VI imposed this, remarkably, without any notable public pressure to do so. Frankly, it shocked the public and still has damaging effects. But that's for another article.
4) The Church never condemned Galileo for saying that the earth goes around the Sun. The Church often sponsored scientists who were at the cutting edge of discovery. Galileo was arrested and "persecuted" because he had no respect for authority and constantly fought against that authority. It wouldn't have mattered what his "crime" was. In that age, such a thing was not going to be tolerated. Pope John Paul II's "apology" for this, along with many other matters, did not come because of an outcry of public pressure. Do you really believe that there was a groundswell of anger and irresistible public pressure over Galileo's imprisonment, 500 years after the fact??? The Church could not resist this pressure, but is able to resist the immense public pressure on birth control? Nonsense.
5) The Church never sold indulgences. There were always a number of ways to obtain indulgences, one of which was a donation for the building of a Church, in the case you refer to, St. Peters. A perfect act of charity accomplishes the same thing according to Catholic teaching, remitting both the sin and the temporal debt of the sin (which is what an indulgence remits, either in part or in whole). The Church did put a stop to a donation being one way of getting an indulgence in order to prevent even an appearance of scandal in the matter.
6) When there is public pressure in the case of a Bishop, this can be a just reason to remove the Bishop. The Bishop is a leader of a diocese, so it makes sense that when his ability to lead is undermined, he is removed. What does this prove? Nothing. It's just another example of you confusing disciplinary and doctrinal Church issues.
7) Never has the molestation of children been a "non-problem". When did the Church ever say that? It didn't. You're making it up out of thin air. What the Church CAN point out, however, is that its ministers are no more likely than others to commit horrible crimes like this. Individual Bishops in some cases made the horrible choice of transferring pedophiles to other parishes. This is despicable, and the Church rightly condemned that. How is this an example of the Church changing her teaching because of public pressure? It isn't.
I'm really rather silly for even taking the time to write what I have. Your style of argumentation is so obviously off that I don't need to point it out. However, I'll offer one more example of your style:
". . . the principle of double effect is itself utter BS and is just an artifice that allows the Catholic Church to deny the more loony and outrageous implications of its doctrines."
How very childish. You don't agree with something, but rather than giving the reason, you just call it a name. And in public? Didn't your mother teach you not to do that?
1) Without using Google, can you state for me what the principle of double effect is and how it came to be determined? What moral issues are involved?
2) Again, without rehashing arguments online, tell me why YOU think double effect reasoning is "BS".
I'll be interested in seeing whether you can string together a coherent argument to back you up or whether you are guilty of exactly what you accuse double effect reasoning of being... need I supply the initials?
You wrote:
"you certainly can justify it under the principle of double effect."
I spoke with a friend about this, and he has studied double effect more recently and probably more comprehensively than I. He says that the principle of double effect would not work in this case. So I don't think it's as obvious as you make it out to be. As I indicated in my posts, the Church will ultimately decide whether or not the principle applies.
David Rothkopf is the CEO and Editor-at-Large of Foreign Policy. His new book, "Power, Inc.: The Epic Rivalry Between Big Business and Government and the Reckoning that Lies Ahead" is due out from Farrar, Straus & Giroux on March 1.
Read More
May/June 2013
-
Profile
-
FP Power Map
-
Think Again
Follow us on Twitter | Visit us on Facebook | Follow us on RSS | Subscribe to Foreign Policy
About FP | Meet the Staff | Foreign Editions | Reprint Permissions | Advertising | Writers’ Guidelines | Press Room | Work at FP
Services:Subscription Services | Academic Program | FP Archive | Reprint Permissions | FP Reports and Merchandise | Special Reports | Buy Back Issues
Privacy Policy | Disclaimer | Contact Us
11 DUPONT CIRCLE NW, SUITE 600 | WASHINGTON, DC 20036 | Phone: 202-728-7300 | Fax: 202-728-7342
FOREIGN POLICY is published by the FP Group, a division of The Washington Post Company
All contents ©2013 The Foreign Policy Group, LLC. All rights reserved.
(30)
HIDE COMMENTS LOGIN OR REGISTER REPORT ABUSE