Y’all, The Pope Is Going To Hell
Where the hell is all this “surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life” crap coming from? The Pope? Really? Mercy?
Pope Francis will give all priests discretion during the Roman Catholic Church’s upcoming Holy Year to formally forgive women who have had abortions, in the Argentine pontiff’s latest move towards a more open and inclusive church.
In the letter, Francis described the “existential and moral ordeal” faced by women who have terminated pregnancies and said he had “met so many women who bear in their heart the scar of this agonizing and painful decision.”
Y’all, I’m kinda getting concerned. Is the Pope Catholic?
Now I’m off to find a priest who will actually do this.
Thanks to everybody for the heads up.
Except that research shows the overwhelming majority of people who’ve had abortions do not regret their decision let alone have an existential crisis. So no matter what Frankie runs up the flagpole, I will not salute.
1I never thought I would see a Pope like this one. It’s enough to make me turn Catholic.
2I’m not sure about Catholic, but this Pope appears to be a true Christian. And not the fundamentalist kind that believes that all women should burn in Hell ’cause they have naughty girly parts that tempt noble, innocent men.
3I’m waiting to hear him endorse birth control, rather than condemn those of us who chose to space our children, choose the optimum time for childbearing and alleviate physical problems. I may be waiting a very long time.
4Pope Frankie is a man of science, too. We can hope he takes the next logical step to promote the fact that a woman’s health care is best left to her and her physician.
5Maryelle, that would be a true miracle but just having this pope is pretty darned close. He’s definitely a step in the right direction. We can only hope.
6Yeah, he’s an improvement, but he really needs to okay birth control, and so does the GOP. A lot of women’s (and children’s) lives would vastly improve, even though many don’t pay attention to him on that issue anyway. “Be fruitful and multiply” may have made sense if there were only two humans in the world, but it’s over seven billion now and rising every moment, so enough already!
7I’m with Cheryl on this one: I like that boy Frankie ’nuff to go to the Catholics. I won’t but I do.
8Well, quite frankly, this pisses me off. Who says a woman needs to ask any man for forgiveness for anything, especially a Catholic priest, given their horrible record on pedophilia? If a woman has decided to get an abortion, it is her right and her decision.
9As my daughter would say ‘Pope go f&*k Your D@mn self, you piece of bigoted S#$t pile! Who needs you or your silly religion based on cannibalism.’
10Okay, everybody, I hear you. It’s progress, not perfection. Plus, it beats the hell out of the Baptists.
11I agree that no woman should need a man’s forgiveness for her personal choices, but a woman who chooses to be Catholic may be comforted by formal church forgiveness. I’m an atheist myself, but for woman who do choose religion I think it’s good whenever that religion becomes more progressive. Not ideal–just good.
12This is shocking because, as a life-long Kumbaya Catholic, I did not even know that there was a specific exclusion on what a priest could forgive.
13This is exactly how the loathsome encyclical “Humanae Vitae” was eviscerated — by giving priests the power to absolve. Back in the day everyone knew who the “good priests” were. The more I find out about this Pope the better I like him. (And I’m not even Catholic…)
14I love the Pope, aNd I’m not Catholic. And my Catholic friends back in New York used birth control and made no apologies. That was about 30 years ago.
15Betcha I know two or three who will right here in my bucolic neck of the woods. Forgiveness is not “given” by the priest, it passes through him. It is good to hear someone’s voice tell you you are forgiven; ask any kid who has transgressed lately! And yes, very grave sins require a visit to the bishop. Active child molestation may be one of them (not one of my vices, happy to say) as opposed to pornography. Now I gotta go look it up 😀
16And for this Catholic, Francis is a major hurricane of fresh air! I mean, Paul Ryan, Christie, JEB?, Boener-damned Abbott too; it’s almost enough to make one run away screaming!
I’m pretty sure that when invoking a blessing upon Francis during the Mass, our own little Fr said, “together with our Pope, Saint Francis” which nearly made me laugh out: even my non cath spouse catches himself talking about what “Saint Francis” said; hope those are prophetic words, the RCC has much needed this good and thorough shakeup!
17I found this little interesting list on a Catholic Forum page:
“Uh, you can find them in the code of canon law starting at 1365 and going through about 1399. That range includes lots of other things, but that is where you would look to find them. Examples include taking a consecrated host and throwing it away, ordaining a bishop without the permission of the pope (and also being the one being ordained), a priest who absolves his partner in a sexual sin, a priest who directly violates the seal, attacking or killing the pope. Hmmm, I think these are most of the ones reserved to the Apostolic See.
There are other types, like a woman who gets an abortion. That is not so tough. That one is the local bishop. But I am given to understand that here in the USA, it is most likely that the priest has been given permission to deal with it directly. Oh, I suppose automatic excommunication is also from heresy, apostasy, or schism. I don’t know if that one is given over to the priest here in the USA.”
That sounds like a reasonable list!
18This gets better and better, but he’s got a ways to go.
If he starts ordaining women, wake me on Sunday.
19It sounded good when I first heard about it, but frankly, do not expect a tidal wave of penitent American women, we who work like a team of dogs and get paid only .71 cents to every dollar a man makes doing the same work, we who win Olympic medals, tennis tournaments, even run companies big and small and oh, yeah, even succeed at Army Ranger training. And thats just a start. I am still getting the distinct impression that the RCC thinks it owns women. Paco is a bit of fresh air but the entire institution has a long way to go, at least as far as any other “organized” religion. When women are ordained and one even makes the Papacy, let me know. I might still be around.
20Don’t know about priests, but from what I’ve read, back in the day a bishop or pope could forgive anything… for enough money. Maybe that’s changed, but being another atheist, I couldn’t give a flip.
21It’s nice that Francis forgives the women. But what about the impregnators? Do they deserve forgiveness for slutting around, then abandoning the children and mothers? Are the cheap floozies deserving of forgiveness if they sincerely repent and vow to sin no more?
Oh, silly me. I forgot. I’m talking about MALES here. This is only about the women because they became pregnant via Immaculate Conception. Does Jesus know he wasn’t the only one?
22Interestingly, Pope Frank used to be a selfish, stubborn priest himself. He was arrogant and a know it all. As a result, he was not well liked. Eventually, he was banished for a bit and sent to work among the poor. He returned awakened & renewed to serve the least of our brothers and sisters with deep humility.
I respect him more for learning from his mistakes, doing the work to change, and focusing on others rather than himself. That’s why he always asks us to pray for him: he knows he’s human and fallible, despite what Catholic Dogma says.
23@Lorraine in Spring
To paraphrase the great Oracle, Gene Roddenberry, “Perhaps to be a teer is to see in new ways.” Perhaps that applies to Popes as well.
24This has been very well received by Latin American, per today’s La Jornada. It really isn’t all that big a deal in places like the US where Catholics are a minority to begin with, but for women in traditional communities, feeling themselves re-connected with their culture is a BFD. I imagine some local priests are going to be jerks about it, but they can’t bump the forgiveness thing upstairs anymore, or just tell women to get out of their church.
25Theres also something else in the announcement Paco made today. It seems that there is a bunch of RCC dissidents called the Society of Pius X, whatever the hell that is. It is now OK of the dissidents of that order to patronize the priests of that order as confessors and even all of them will be forgiven. But mind you, this is only during Forgiveness Year which ends November, 2016. Silly me! Here I was thinking that God’s forgiveness was eternal!
26Ditto LynnN @3 and @12. Beautifully said, thanks!
27Debbo, you beat me to it. My son sent me the announcement this am, and I said, I bet those men will be lined up around the block asking for forgiveness. It is a start, and I like this guy. We need more Christians that don’t just know the theory, but know how to practice it.
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