This is a spin-off from Insert slew of expletives! It's not quite a fit for "Spirituality *and* Polyamory," and although rather bloggish still not directly related to poly, so I am putting it here.
To wit, I was sitting on something until after Christmas was over, a handful of quotes by Pope Francis that should stir up trouble amongst my old Utah friends. The quotes were burning a hole in my text files, so I sent them out today.
Said friends and I were all raised Mormon (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints), in the sleepy farmlands (sleepy and farmlands no longer) north of BYU, so Catholic matters are technically of secondary concern to us. However, many of us have strayed from the strait-and-narrow Latter-day Saint path and so, non-LDS matters are of greater concern than they might have been.
In hopes of protecting the privacy of non-Polyamory.com persons (i.e. the whole gang except myself), I'll codify their names and summarize their emails in my own words.
It begins with the following:
---
From: kdt26417
To: the Gang (7 guys)
Sent: Thursday, December 26, 2013
Subject: Pope Francis
It would appear that Pope Francis is something of a flaming liberal ...
Your thoughts? Anyone ... anyone ...
While stirring up trouble here, there, and whereabouts,
Kevin.
---
From: Astronomer
To: kdt26417
Cc: the Rest of the Gang
Sent: Thursday, December 26, 2013
[In kdt26417's words:] Astronomer wondered what a Pope should do, considering the Pope is faced with a rather flawed Bible and primitive traditions, which have promoted the following:
So what role should the Pope play?
Pope Astronomer would draw up a list of great world evils, such as:
So how can a Pope make the most of his office? Gender orientation should be one of his least concerns.
[continued below]
To wit, I was sitting on something until after Christmas was over, a handful of quotes by Pope Francis that should stir up trouble amongst my old Utah friends. The quotes were burning a hole in my text files, so I sent them out today.
Said friends and I were all raised Mormon (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints), in the sleepy farmlands (sleepy and farmlands no longer) north of BYU, so Catholic matters are technically of secondary concern to us. However, many of us have strayed from the strait-and-narrow Latter-day Saint path and so, non-LDS matters are of greater concern than they might have been.
In hopes of protecting the privacy of non-Polyamory.com persons (i.e. the whole gang except myself), I'll codify their names and summarize their emails in my own words.
It begins with the following:
---
From: kdt26417
To: the Gang (7 guys)
Sent: Thursday, December 26, 2013
Subject: Pope Francis
It would appear that Pope Francis is something of a flaming liberal ...
"The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the Blood of Christ: all of us, not just Catholics. Everyone! 'Father, the atheists?' Even the atheists. Everyone! ... We must meet one another doing good. 'But I don't believe, Father, I am an atheist!' But do good: we will meet one another there."
-- Pope Francis, #13 @ http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/12/11/pope-francis-quotes/
"When we talk about the environment, about creation, my thoughts turn to the first pages of the Bible, the Book of Genesis, which states that God placed man and woman on earth to cultivate and care for it. And the question comes to my mind: What does cultivating and caring for the earth mean? Are we truly cultivating and caring for creation? or are we exploiting and neglecting it?"
-- Pope Francis, #15 @ http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/12/11/pope-francis-quotes/ (June 2013)
"Fighting poverty, both material and spiritual, building peace and constructing bridges: these, as it were, are the reference points for a journey that I want to invite each of the countries here represented to take up. But it is a difficult journey, if we do not learn to grow in love for this world of ours. Here too, it helps me to think of the name of Francis, who teaches us profound respect for the whole of creation and the protection of our environment, which all too often, instead of using for the good, we exploit greedily, to one another's detriment."
-- Pope Francis, #16 @ http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/12/11/pope-francis-quotes/ (March 2013)
"This is happening today. If investments in banks fall, it is a tragedy and people say, 'What are we going to do?' but if people die of hunger, have nothing to eat or suffer from poor health, that's nothing. This is our crisis today. A Church that is poor and for the poor has to fight this mentality."
-- Pope Francis, #18 @ http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/12/11/pope-francis-quotes/
"If a person is gay and seeks God and has goodwill, who am I to judge him? The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains this very well. It says they should not be marginalized because of this (orientation) but that they must be integrated into society. The problem is not having this orientation. We must be brothers."
-- Pope Francis, #10 @ http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/12/11/pope-francis-quotes/ (July 2013)
Your thoughts? Anyone ... anyone ...
While stirring up trouble here, there, and whereabouts,
Kevin.
---
From: Astronomer
To: kdt26417
Cc: the Rest of the Gang
Sent: Thursday, December 26, 2013
[In kdt26417's words:] Astronomer wondered what a Pope should do, considering the Pope is faced with a rather flawed Bible and primitive traditions, which have promoted the following:
- genocide,
- human sacrifice,
- incest,
- execution for innocent things like
- breaking the Sabbath,
- homosexuality,
- non-Hebrew membership,
- etc.
So what role should the Pope play?
Pope Astronomer would draw up a list of great world evils, such as:
- child abuse,
- sexual abuse,
- physical abuse,
- murder,
- torture,
- etc.
So how can a Pope make the most of his office? Gender orientation should be one of his least concerns.
[continued below]