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Pope Denounces Some Biotech as Affront to 'Human Dignity'
eldavojohn writes "Today in a speech the pope denounced human cloning, embryonic stem cell research and artificial insemination, citing them as a violation of 'human dignity.' That said, the pope did 'appreciate and encourage' research on stem cells from non-embryonic cells in the human body. The pope encouraged the Vatican to be a leading voice in the philosophy and discussion of bioethics. 'Church teaching certainly cannot and must not weigh in on every novelty of science, but it has the task to reiterate the great values which are on the line and to propose to faithful and all men of good will ethical-moral principles and direction for new, important questions,' Benedict said."
Please listen to what the Pope is saying!!! I'm Catholic and I strongly believe the Pope is right! He's always right! Humans shouldn't play God. Please listen to the Pope and just stop what you're doing!! :(
I gotta say: if this is the first, or second, or tenth issue that "is gonna cause some serious headaches for you at church", you aren't paying very close attention.
Cretin - a powerful and flexible CD reencoder
Far too many registered voters and politicians.
Ethics? We don't need no steenkin' ethics!
Well, it's not as if he had much of a choice of what to say, to maintain consistency with church doctrine. If he encouraged it, there would come some rather unpleasant questions as to what, exactly, would require baptism; if a cloned person has a cloned soul; whether you receive some of the soul of the fetus that gave the stem cells when, for whatever reason, you use said stem cells--all a bunch of nasty theological problems.
Frankly, is there anything else he -could- have said?
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree
Catholics who can't conceive are gonna be pissed too. Though I thought nowadays it was acceptable to simply ignore the pope when he makes an ass out of himself.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
I hereby excommunicate this very silly pope.
PS: Every man, woman, and child is a pope. Non serviam.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
What do the candidates say about these subjects?
... do you know?
US citizens
-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
We listen to engineers and scientists when they have demonstrated some expertise in their fields of expertise.
Considering how much scandal comes out of the religious leadership field, I'd say religious leaders are no more moral than ordinary people and have no better grasp of ethics than ordinary people.
Infuriate left and right
Well, some geek protestants had to change churches when the leadership all went creationist-crazy... I know I had to :(
No sig for the moment.
Though people in religious traditions might disagree with the pope, they nonetheless would express some opinion about his pronouncements, as opposed to Slashdot atheists, who think he says nothing of import for or against their own metaphysical views (or lack thereof).
If you don't like the research, refuse the treatments when you are sick in the hospital. Why do some religious types feel they need to impart their beliefs on everyone else?
Don't agree with or like abortion - fine - don't have one. Don't like what you hear on the radio or see on TV - fine also, change the channel.
Just don't tell me what to do - I have a brain in my skull and I know how to use it independently.
-ted
Not an option. He's the pope. He has to say something, and he has to remain consistent with earlier doctrine--unless he decides to do something other than what he's been doing his entire papacy and take a bold new stance.
John Paul II might have considered it, but Benedict is extremely conservative and is living up to the 'placeholder' assessment that most people had of him at the time of his election.
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree
In his defense, basically everyone was in Hitler Youth. It was the Boy Scouts for Good Germans. Most children didn't have a whole lot of choice regarding their participation.
Cretin - a powerful and flexible CD reencoder
Lets try a thought experiment: pretent that the Dalai Lama had spoken the Pope's words. Are those words more or less palatible based on who says them?
You don't even need to be religious to see that the commodization of human life, to say nothing of unfettered transhumanism, are not, on their face, good things. Call me a pesimist, but I'm more with Bill Joy than Ray Kurzweil.
A final thought: if there was the slightest chance that, by a snap of the fingers, I could remove all the harm to others attributed to the Roman Catholic Church, I'd do it - and I'm Catholic. Unfortunately, none of the evils attributed to Catholicism in particular or religion in general would disappear. So the cause must be elsewhere.
I think his point is that human beings shouldn't be made in labs, as if they were bacteria cultures or something like that.
No, that's not the problem. Cloned people have souls - look at twins, for instance.
Good point. You never hear the people who go ahead with an artificially induced pregnancy thanking medical science when they plop out a litter of 6 kids, just their wacky, pointless, god creature. Their god didn't want them to have babies in the first place, according to them, and the selfish pricks did it anyway, no thanks to the science that got them there. Give credit where credit is due.
This is the NSA, we're gonna geet U h@x0r5! Also, what is a h@x0r5?
I think that catholics who can't conceive were already quite pissed off by the fact that they couldn't conceive.
Hey, the guy quotes something God "said" in his sig. Maybe he's hearing voices.
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
I'm not too sure how an organization that spent decades hiding pedophiles has any business lecturing anyone on human dignity.
The only thing, apparently, more infinite than God is the human capacity for intense hypocrisy.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
we have had artificial insemination for a long time now. I don't recall any other popes calling it an affront to human dignity. Are test tube babies not allowed to be baptized because fertilization occurred outside the body? what about the natural children of test tube babies? Are they tainted as well?
"In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson
The "dignity of man" referenced by the Catholic Pope, regardless of modern religion, is the basis of the enlightenment and of all modern secular humanist societies and of the concept of human rights. Once the concept of innate human dignity is gone, you end up with societies where human beings are nothing more than raw material for the State machine. As the concept fades you see inhumane state practices appear such as denying health care to the obese in the UK or mandatory abortions in China. The needs of people can be ignored when they become inconvenient or expensive to the state if there is no innate dignity of man.
he has to remain consistent with earlier doctrine
When given a choice between remaining consistent with earlier doctrine and remaining consistent with reality, why should we choose the former?
>> let's just stipulate that there is no god and be done with the pope already?
Firstly let me make it clear that I personally do not follow any religion, so have no iterest in defending the christian church, however:
* There is no evidence that proves God doesn't exist. Until that is found your stipulation has no merit.
* His point seems to be that this stuff is an affront to human dignity, which has nothing to do with religion. E.g. I for example have dignity yet am not a follower of any religion.
Actually without reading more than the headline, I think the pope's point is very well made. Personally I feel scientists in some cases are definately going too far. I also have seen more than enough evidence to prove that most companies will do anything to make money for now, regardless of the ethics or wider implication of their actions.
As a scientist and agnostic, the most sensible delineation I've heard was outlined by Carl Sagan (though I don't know if it was originally his idea or not). At about sixth months, the fetus actually begins to think. There is a point where neural activity undergoes a significant change.
It seems reasonable to me that what most makes us human is our minds, and thus once a fetus has a human mind, it should be considered human.
It is odd, backwards thinking, and outright excessive for the vast majority of the posters who are stating the denouncement of artificial insemination is the only option for couples who can't have children.
In many countries across the globe, there are large legitimate orphanages with many orphans seeking new parents. I find it closed-minded the posters here choose not to recognize many of these orphanages are backed by religious organizations including the Catholic Church. It's not like the Church denounces abortion and artificial insemination... they actually "walk the talk" when funding the alternative.
In contrast to adoption, artificial insemination costs a lot of money and time. The procedure is not perfect, fails many times, and each time can cost in the tens of thousands of US dollars.
In other news: Science denounces some pope as 'irrelevant theorist'
Caesar si viveret, ad remum dareris.
Sounds exactly like religion to me!
Look, I don't even recognize the papacy; but the silly attacks on this Pope on Slashdot have got to stop. You aren't even using logic and reasoning in your arguments. You just made two disjointed statements. The fact that the Pope belives in God (obviously) does not imply that he thinks we should abandon Science and Technology. In fact he never attacked anything regarding science. He just made his and the Catholic Churches opinion about the moral-ethical debate surrounding certain research and procedures known. There is nothing wrong with that. Religious people are not the only people who see an ethical dilemna within certain research and procedures. Do you mean to imply that all research is acceptable including research on unwilling medical subjects?
I can't believe I am posting about this. I'm a Catholic, I'm a scientist, and my kids are the result of artificial insemination.
In my local Catholic community, these things are not discussed. Instead I hear mostly about practicing non-violent conflict resolution and a life time of charitable endeavors. That all works for me on the local level. Beyond that, the Catholic hierarchy can go pound sand. The pope and most of the clergy that rank high enough to wear silly hats tragically waste their energy on needlessly divisive issues. I'd rather they worked on poverty and resolving conflict without war.
This is what I love about slashdot. Every biotech article gets tagged "whatcouldpossiblygowrong", yet every article which mentions religious people saying the same, it's all "religion is all lies".
Newsflash: if there exist invisible super-beings, then there's no way to tell! If you get all holier-than-thou because you are so certain that unprovability is equal to nonexistance, you really need to read up on Gödel's incompleteness theorem. Your faith that there do not exist invisible super-beings is just as irrational as the Pope's faith that there are.
He's the fucking Pope. He defines reality.
Cretin - a powerful and flexible CD reencoder
He might mean humanity as a whole rather than an individual human. It's a somewhat abstract and foreign concept to most Americans(Mostly Christian protestant or post-Christian protestant). I think a crime against humanity doesn't imply that the victims are only those directly harmed by the crime, but humanity as a whole. So, it calls all of humanity to respond to the crime. Catholicism is, by definition, not individualistic. So the pope is in essence trying to act as a voice of caution in the human conscience.
I think his concern is that certain humans are being selected to die while others are being selected to live depending on their genetics. This is nearly identical to being opposed to genetic-screening during job interviews if you believe that a human embryo is a human life, except on even more ruthless terms(life and death). In other words genetic pre-screening during the interview for a 'job' as someones child.
I am not Catholic, but I can see why he is concerned.
Direct hit.
Cretin - a powerful and flexible CD reencoder
Should a church that profitted from the slave trade, collaborated with the nazis, hid the molestation of children, and is the main reason the US Constitution requires a seperation of church and state be condemning anything?
I don't recall any other popes calling it an affront to human dignity.
Perhaps not a pope, but the Congregation of the Doctrine of the faith did. Donum Vitae, Feb 22, 1987.
Are test tube babies not allowed to be baptized because fertilization occurred outside the body?
It's not the babies that are wrong, it's how they were conceived.
was in a emotional or financial situation where bringing a baby to term would cause her undue stress, resulting in a child she did not love, and all the psychological f***ups that accompany that, i would prefer that my mother not continue her pregnancy past the 3 month old part, and she would have done nothing wrong by my judgment
because before 3 months, what i was inside my mother was not me, and was not alive in any human sense
there is hamburger on my plate. i will eat it, and it will become the stuff of my organs and bones, it will become human life. so i should look at the hamburger on my plate with the spiritual and legal reverence of a human life?
pfffffffft
same observation applies to the blob inside a woman before 3 months
it's POTENTIAL human life. NOT human life. in any spiritual, intellectual, logical, moral, or legal consideration you can devise
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I'm not too sure how an organization that spent decades hiding pedophiles has any business lecturing anyone on human dignity. The only thing, apparently, more infinite than God is the human capacity for intense hypocrisy.
Your statement sounds nice and everything, but it's awfully flawed.
a) The Catholic Church has not hidden pedophiles. SOME PRIESTS AND BISHOPS have. By your standards, the United States should disappear from the face of the earth since they has decades abusing human rights. Right? RIGHT?
b) Usually the priests who lecture people on human dignity are NOT the ones hiding pedophiles. If you disagree, I challenge you to mention anything evil John Paul II has done, because he lectured A LOT about human dignity.
c) All catholics *ARE* the Catholic Church. If you want to say something bad about priests and bishops, don't say "Catholic Church". Say "the Clergy".
d) By generalizing, you make all the good priests look worse than the bad ones. Because it's the bad ones who are pedophiles, and the good priests are the ones fighting for human rights. Oh but since they're all catholic anyway, they're all part of the same corrupt organization and all should be labelled as hypocrites. Perhaps we should label Martin Luther King Jr. as a hypocrite too, since he endorsed christianity (he was a Lutheran pastor, after all) and Christianity is full of hypocrites?
I'm amazed how bashing and name calling granted you insightful. You'd be a wonderful Fox News reporter.
And I'm a scientist - so let's test that. I'll hold a piano over his head suspended by a pulley and a rope. The Pope can say that he declares gravity to be heresy. I'll let go of the rope.
If he really does define reality, he should be in no danger. I have a theory on how the test would end, though.
The short of it is these people should not be dictating to scientists. Why?
Read up on what they did to Galileo, for daring to suggest the Earth is not the center of the universe - which they just got around to forgiving him for, which took them until 1992 to fucking get around to.
There is no way these people should have any input whatsoever in a scientific context.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Wow, to go against reason AND God's decree, they must really hate embryonic stem cell a lot... or perhaps they just want to rake in some more donation from crazy people who want to blame ESC for the moral degeneration of our society.
You're truncating his argument to make it sound ridiculous. What's hated is the use of embryos. He's arguing that a human embryo has the same dignity the rest of us do. You may reject that -- and that rejection has its own moral danger -- but you shouldn't mis-state his argument.
Technically, you can prove something doesn't exist by proving that it is logically impossible for it to exist (and this is possible with the Judeo-Christian God - e.g. Theodicy Paradox). The point the GP was making was that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. That said, it doesn't really say anything of substance - the same argument can be made either way, ad infinitum. So the GP could have said just as much by saying nothing at all.
Actually, I think most of the problem is with his conservative stance--he's trying to stay still, as it were, rather than moving with the times.
And in some places, this works. Catholicism has been gaining a lot of ground in Africa and South America even as it loses influence in the 'richer' countries--leading to, amongst other things, rather amusing conflicts between hereditarily Catholic (but not actively participating) Quebecois and immigrants to Quebec who are 'taking over' the old Catholic churches.
JPII actually endorsed evolution at one point--though Benedict has made a few noises about that 'intelligent design' nonsense. (And I hear that Ben Stein's buying into that old fallacy with some movie that makes him look like he's trying to be the next Michael Moore--but I digress.)
As Christian churches go, though, the Catholic church really isn't that bad. Its main problems are its pre-eminence as the largest christian denomination and its two millenia (minus a couple hundred years, if you're counting from the Council of Nicea) of institutional inertia. Benedict does represent the inertial side of things, yes, but he's not forever--and the next pope, the way these things go, should be a bit more on the progressive side.
What you really have to watch out for are certain of the protestant denominations--they're the ones who're trumpeting creationism, setting up creationist museums, actively picketing abortion clinics, etc.
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree
Artificial Insemination is an interesting one. Basically it is using externam equipment to produce a fertilized egg and then insert it into a woman who otherwize cannot succeed through normal means. It is a well-known practice and can even, for the squeamish, be performed for a married couple using only their eggs and sperm, no external players are needed.
/.ers might scoff at the pope and in many countries even ones with large Catholic populations like the U.S. his claims don't carry the weight of law. But in modern democratic Italy he can still arrainge for consenting married couples who want to raise healthy children of their own to be denied it because the process is "an affront".
Interestingly this procedure, well-accepted in most western societies is banned in Italy even for married couples using their own genetic material thanks to the Church. The argument goes something along the lines of: "If god wanted them to have kids he would let them do it normally."
It is interesting because most
John Paul II might have considered it, but Benedict is extremely conservative and is living up to the 'placeholder' assessment that most people had of him at the time of his election.
JPII was a very conservative pope. He was just conservative with a smile. Honestly, I'd actually appreciate conservatism in religion as something to live up to. We should feel squeemish on some level about creating living things willy nilly, simply so that we can experiment with them. It doesn't even really matter if a human fetus is human or not. It is a life, and we are taking it, and not only for the most noble of reasons.
Ultimately, the Pope is on the right side of this issue. A few generations down the road, we will look back on what we have done with animal testing and embryonic testing, and realize that we are in fact barbaric.
This is my sig.
"* There is no evidence that proves God doesn't exist. Until that is found your stipulation has no merit." I propose my theory a giant ball of cream cheese is at the edge of the universe. Can you disprove that? No - well then until you can we should all assume the ball of cream cheese to be true.
Oil tycoons, and the auto industry were not very happy when scientists started saying that their products were hurting the earth. Of course, they kept on doing it and encouraging every one else to. And they can continue to now. However, there are long term consequences for doing the wrong thing, even if you disagree that its wrong. Rush Limbaugh can get together a bunch of people and have an anti global warming party, and they can feel all nice a fuzzy that its culturally acceptable to disbelieve in global warming and laugh at Al Gore and the Nobel committee. It still doesn't mean they are correct, or that there won't be severe consequences for everyone if we don't do something about it.
The Pope is speaking on similar moral truths. If allow ourselves to start restricting further and further the definition of life, it will become easier for us to eliminate everyone else that falls outside those boundaries. Humans can't be trusted to decide who lives and who dies.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
I'm no fan of any of these monotheisms but one correction regarding Women's Rights issues in Islam - They had them LONG before Christians did.
AT THE TIME when Islam started its teachings were the most progressive towards women of any of the monotheistic religions. Women were considered people, could own land and property _as_individuals_ , could not be forced to marry, were guaranteed support by their husbands, were guaranteed the equivalent or alimony if divorced, were allowed to work and own their own business, were allowed to decide if they wanted children, were guaranteed support for their children by the child's father even after divorce, and could divorce her husband if he did not sexually satisfy her. (I'm not making any of this up.)
Now mind you her testimony in "court" carried only the fraction of the weight of a man's and there are a whole bunch of other chauvinistic rubbish as well, but up until the 18th Century in western Civil Law an Islamic women had more rights than most women in the western world (in Theory).
Now in practice a lot of these rights were voided and ignored by those who called themselves Muslim but still practiced their own tribal cultures, but according to the Koran and the teachings of Mohammed she had them. MOST of the practices we find so abhorrent and attribute to "Islam" are also considered abhorrent by the actual teachings of the religion and condemned. They are cultural artifacts, not religious ones. Sadly, like the teachings of Christ, mean spirited, bigoted, hate mongering, power grabbing, control freaks have thouroughly confused most people about what those teachings are and twisted them into an evil that would horrify the original prophet/divinity.
The ridiculous Scenario you described is more shaming for you than the religion you are so ignorantly trying to insult. The actions you described would have _by_religious_law_ sentenced the Man to death.
SO now... Who looks like a fool?
I would never raise a daughter in Islam but I at least did the study to find out before making a jackass out of myself by spraying my bigotry around.
Is Christian Faith dangerous too? Hell yeah, and more so because while going to a fundamentalist Madrassa is considered a bad thing, going to a fundamentalist homeschool/bibleschool is a plus when running for US government office.
Many of the teachings are identical. Many of the ideas are equally terrifying for the future of humanity. Its like looking in a mirror. If your not looking its because your afraid of what you will see.
And the Pope - as a cover-up artist for internationally-organized pederasty? That's NOT a problem?
Some pole-smoker in a gold hat? Jesus would kick that Pharisee from the temple!
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
Mr100Percent says: Have you ever been in a mosque? It's a peaceful and relaxing place. Muhammed says: The best mosques for women are the inner parts of their houses. I'd thinking the guy with the 9-year-old bride has the more informative quote when it comes to how women are treated.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Unlike the common misconception that the Church does not like sex is strongly misguided, otherwise the Church would be doing God a great disservice to associate him so closely with sex. The Church just disagrees with the way that many people chose to express their sexuality.
For more or this teaching, look up the Theology of the Body, a phrase that refers to the sexual teachings of John Paul II.
Galileo picked on the Bible. Not only he said that the Earth is moving, but he wrote a pamphlet where three characters debated the issues and the one defending the point of the view was presented as being kind of ridiculous. Galileo did not resume himself to Astronomy, he ventured to Theology and drew theological conclusions from his work.
That may be the "official" reason, but the real reason is that he found an error in the Flawless Undisputed Work of God.
A quote:
In 1614 a Dominican priest filed charges at the Office of the Inquisition. Galileo was to respond by writing extraordinarily long letters which were circulated and became subject of debate. The most influential churchman of his age, Cardinal Bellamarine was to say of Galileo's theories: "a very dangerous thing, likely not only to irritate all scholastic philosophers and theologians, but also likely to harm the Holy Faith by rendering Holy Scripture false".
His actual crime was noticing that The Book has A Problem.
If you'd like to see an even better example of this, check out Giordano Bruno. His crimes were:
What did he say? Basically the same thing as Galileo - that the "heavens" are simply other stars like our sun, the comets weren't messengers from God, etc. Read it here.
Oh yeah, they burned his ass at the stake for that.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
The babies that are born through artificial insemination are great. The problem with it lies in all of the fertilized eggs that are discarded once a pregnancy occurs or that are lost during "handling". Catholics, myself included, believe that life begins at conception and so when you get rid of an embryo, anytime after fertilization, you are destroying a life.
THIS SPACE FOR RENT
That brings to mind two versions of an old joke.
----
A priest, a rabbi, and a lawyer are on the titanic when it strikes an iceberg.
The rabbi exclaims "save the children!"
The lawyer snarls "fuck the children!"
The priest exclaims "no time for that!"
----
A priest and a rabbi see a homeless child hudddled in a doorway shivering. The rabbi says "oh dear, what should we do for this poor child?"
The priest says "easy, take him home and fuck him!"
The rabbi says "out of what?"
----
PLEASE mod this disgusting comment down! Think of the children!
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
The Pope is a position granted by adherents of the Catholic Church. You can try to minimize its importance all you want but your declaration is irrelevant and immature.
I certainly would not want his position, I am not as firm in my beliefs as he is. As such I am also not as trapped either. The Pope of modern days must first respect his fellow Catholics and that means staying the course with little deviation. He walks a fine line in that while he does have a great amount of knowledge; don't fool yourself in believing him ignorant, while that may offer you solace in your belief he is far from it. In fact I figure he is well educated in this issue and its that education which puts a great difficulty before him. The Church can no longer afford to ignorant of science but it does not have to sit idly by and allow science to run over man.
The mission of the Church for some time has been directed to preserving the dignity of man. Yes we can dig up history and throw that in his face and the followers of any religion. The important issue is how it goes forward. What used to amaze me no longer does, people will flock to a politician offering a chicken in their pot, knowing full well its a lie, yet begrudge a man for holding to his principles. We will celebrate a whoring celebrity, a deceitful politician, and the almighty dollar, yet laugh at someone who is offers his beliefs to us.
What does it say about us? What does it say about him? The Church will be here long after many of us. It is through declarations like this that give us insight into how its going forward. While all religions have their radicals the leader of any stable religion can no longer afford such. Still they cannot stand still. He has opened a large door and taken a big step but here many are chastising him for not taking more steps. Give them time. They are monolithic and essentially eternal. They cannot he held to the same clock we hold ourselves. We make a decision and it usually affects us solely, the Church makes a decision and it affects tens of millions. As such their steps must be much more carefully thought out and delivered. I think he has made a great opening. He has relieve many Catholics who are in this line of research of many choices of faith that burdens them. He has given them freedom that many felt they may not have had. While he still have put barriers up he has shown some flexibility which allows the Church and its followers to go forward.
Rome was not built in a day, don't expect the Church to change in one either.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
The Catholic position is that human dignity and the value of human life are unconditional. Even if someone was conceived "wrongly", that still doesn't change. That's what unconditional means. This is the reason that the Church objects to the destruction of "surplus" IVF embryos, even while she opposes IVF.
DNA just wants to be free...
Since nobody has answered your questions...
Catholic teaching holds that life is good, and Human life is in the image of our creator in a unique way. This includes everything from how we come into being, through how we live, to how we die. The problem lies in the separation of the conjugal act from procreation, which is something that John Paul II harped on to no end... people just didn't get it.
As far as those who are the result of artificial insemination (or other fertility aids), they're not tainted. They're just as baptizable as anyone else, and their offspring as well.
The deeper understanding behind this is that sex isn't supposed an action of gratification for self, but it is a gift of self for the good of the other, and sex is such a profound gift of self (in the body) that through a direct act of God, it has the potential to create another. The ability to be a co-worker with God in His work of creation is a great gift; one that we need to use as is intended. For example, I don't think you would be too happy if you gave one of your kids a hammer as a gift and they decided to pound on the dog and not nails.
I guess thats all I have to say.
Such a comment just confirms what I've said before about Atheists.
Nice generalization. I'm an atheist, but just because I don't believe in that superstitious junk doesn't mean I give a damn whether you have an open mind (by my definition, or yours). I don't.
Well said lgw.
One might also point out, that Christianity reformed itself away from the corruptions of the Dark Ages quite some time ago. Indeed, Modern Christianity has been at the forefront of many of our most celebrated movements. These include the fight against Slavery (started by churches) and the Women's Suffrage in America (Started by Christian Women).
Meanwhile, Islam is still stuck in the 7th century, still talking about past glories, and still ignoring the horrifying state of it's own affairs. I'm sorry, but a "Religion of Peace" does NOT generate the Taliban, Al Quaeda, and the MILLIONS of other splinter terrorist groups that Islam has. These groups are indicative of a fundamental flaw in this religion, or a corruption of the original intent so massive and deep that it may not be reversible.
I do hope for Islam that it may yet return to the glory days of Sufism. Outspoken Muslim women like Hirsi Anan and other outspoken Muslims do give me hope. However when they are under threat from fatwas issued by supposedly "moderate" Muslim leaders, that hope is seriously shaken.
Official Heretic from the "Church of Global Warming". Proven right thanks to whistle blowers. AGW = Flat Earth Theory
I'd suggest that the vast majority of believers haven't honestly considered the possibility there is no god, or that they might've been raised to believe in the wrong one. Indeed, to deny the existence of the Abrahamic god is an unforgivable sin.
Indoctrination does not really lend itself to free choice; people are tremendously easy to manipulate. It's one of the oldest skills, and now one of the most perfected.
Yes, I am a smart ass; it's better than the alternative.
You can't take the sky from me...
> > "The Catholic position is that human dignity and the value of human life are unconditional."
Here, let me fix that for you " human dignity is unconditional - unless you're a heretic" - that really explains the Inquisition.
Also, seems to me that the Catholic position is in direct contradiction to the bible - the flood, the 7 plagues, genocide, slavery - hey, tell us how being a slave, or even owning slaves, is congruent with human dignity. And how torture is okay for the church. And how its all right for god to condemn people to starvation, disease, hell, etc because he refuses to lift a finger.
Kevin Smith on Prince
The issue wasn't just "some book" that said the earth was the center of the universe. Almost everybody was convinced that's what they were seeing when they looked up in the sky. It's pretty darn hard to take a glance and figure all that out for yourself. There's a reason it took all of humanity several thousand years to establish that fact. We're talking generations of really hardcore science nerds like Aristotle, Archymedes, and Da Vinci. Almost no one besides Galileo had seen what he had, and few even had the capacity to interpret that as a heliocentric system on their own, even if they did see it. It may seem simple to you or me, who have been taught it in increasingly thorough steps as long as we can remember, but you do disservice to their intellects by neglecting that point.
Galileo (who wasn't the first to suggest or even provide evidence of heliocentrism), happened to be the stubborn fool who got caught in the crosshairs of the debate over a dramatically shifting worldview. If you thought the bickering about whether Pluto is a planet was tiresome, just imagine trying to redefine the entire universe to a largely uneducated world. Heck, plenty of people were still claiming "turtles all the way down" into the 19th or 20th century.
The Church ended up involved largely as a matter of politics, which the Church was unfortunately overly involved in at the time. Galileo actually had a lot of support from the pope at the time until he (apparently accidentally) insulted Pope Urban in his book on the topic. At that point, their friendship ended and the vehemently geocentric half of society was able to sway the board of inquisitors in their favor. Over time the fallacy of geocentrism became increasingly obvious and quietly went away, although the protestants never tired of pointing out the Church's misstep. It only took 359 years for the apology to come out because most people simply saw it as a non-issue that scientific evidence had dealt with. John Paul II, however, wanted to address the lingering resentment. I might also mention that I just happened to read in the paper today that Australia's PM is issuing a formal apology for Australia's mistreatment of Aboriginees. In same tone as yours, do we really want this racist beauracracy clogging down the politics in Australia?
The Catholic Church's teaching on topics like artificial insemmination isn't some arbitrary whim. It's based on a very deeply founded theology of the creation and nature of human beings, and it's one that does not minimize the value of those who are sterile, for example. Obviously few non-Catholics genuinely understand the main points of the theology, but that does not change the reasoning behind it.
I am hardly able to see the Church as a solely medieval institution, as you put it, when it is in fact composed of hundreds of millions of modern day people, most of whom are quite capable of integrating history and the modern world in their lives. While we're at it, humanity is a pre-medieval institution. Where does that leave us?
Yes they were intertwined but only in so much as the state had a "recognized" religion. The idea of "Separation of Church and State" in the US was more an experiment in ensuring that every religion had equal opportunity under the law. That is, no one religion would usurp all others. True the Pope did wield quite a bit of power, again, when the monarchs so chose to go against the Papacy, they did so with ease more often than not. In fact, the Holy See was often under the thumb of state powers, particularly in having to "appoint" those hand picked individuals of the State to be ordained bishops and act as nuncios. Too often people make bold blanket statements with regards to the Catholic Church without much knowledge in history whatsoever. I'm not stating you are doing that, but you are certainly mistaken on a few points.
As for the "charges" brought against him, those listed were for his excommunication indeed, but after the "guilty" verdict, his excommunication was finalized. The secular authorities then burned him not because of his excommunication, nor by the request of the Inquisition but because of his practicing magic and divination. Reading Firpo among others will shed much light on this.
The point though that must be driven home is that the Catholic Church (as an entity) did not put people to death, secular institutions did. If in particular places examples exist where people who were Catholic and held power killed people (as in Spain for instance) this must be distinguished from claiming "The Catholic Church did it!" Because that is not the case. Rogue individuals or extremists in any organization act on their own in such matters. When discussing the horrors that went on during the Spanish Inquisition, the Pope was attempting to gain control of the rogue bishops and cardinals but was oftne thwarted by the Spanish monarchy at the time.
You wouldn't say you could rightly kill someone sleeping, in a coma, suspended animation, etc., simply because they had temporarily ceased their conscious thought. You would bring into consideration their potential to resume conscious thinking. So I think it's far from clear that the line of humanity is drawn once consciousness initiates. The fact that it *will* initiate, provided you make no intentionally destructive interventions, seems suspiciously like other cases where we intuitively feel that it is wrong to end life. I'm not saying it is necessarily the same. I feel that it is, quite possibly, impossible to know. But, the thing is, you don't demolish a building until you're sure it's been evacuated, and you don't kill someone or something on a 50/50 hope that it isn't actually murder.
When things get complex, multiply by the complex conjugate.
It is so surprising that Pope Benedict XVI would criticize the same thing, and on the same basis, that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith had previously criticized under its then-Prefect, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger.
"The issue is not the baby, but the method."
I don't think so. The method is what the church attacks, but it's only to have a tangible handle on the issue. The church's problem, I think, is that the closer science gets to understanding life and how to bring life about, the more it strips away divinity or metaphysics from life and birth. And *that* the church cannot allow - the shrinking of its domain.
Once the sun was a god, because we had no way of understanding what it was. Currently, conception still carries a lot of metaphysics about it. When that goes away, what will remain? The church will think of something, but they'll have to backpedal a lot, so they do what they can to avert it.
"Only the small secrets need to be protected. The big ones are kept secret by public incredulity." - Marshall McLuhan
One time I was at a boy scout event in Miami Beach and an old lady fondly said how we looked like the Hitler Youth in our uniforms.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
He says some good common sense, "scientific progress should not be accepted uncritically" and that he "wanted [scientific progress] based on 'ethical-moral principles.'" No problem. Not even controversial. But then we get to the nitty-gritty:
"Meant." See that word? Convert the verb to active voice, and look at the subject.
Aside from that..
That's a fine thing to say, but based on the premise that embryos are people. If you can't find any support for the premise and reject it, then you're left with 'something' being treated as 'something' -- and technology that isn't conflicting with anyone's ethical principles.
This doesn't mean he's wrong, but it does mean he's unpersuasive. Asserting that an ethical principle has been violated, without explaining that it is an ethical principle, says nothing.
But he can't go beyond that, and show that an embryo is a person, because there isn't any information to support that. No one has communicated with an embryo, so we've been left with looking at their rather lumplike behavior, which different people subjectively interpret in different ways. Without information, that leaves..
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
The problem lies in the separation of the conjugal act from procreation, which is something that John Paul II harped on to no end... people just didn't get it.
It's not that we don't get it. It's that we don't agree.
A while back, PayPal made a rather drastic change to its policies -- so drastic, that they made all their customers go to a page with the new policy. Underneath were two checkboxes, "I read and understand the new policy." and "I accept all of the changes above." If you checked the first box but not the second box, it threw an error. That reminds me a lot of the way Catholic doctrine has been handled: the assumption is always that if you don't agree, you can't possibly have understood. There's never any serious consideration of people who understand perfectly, but disagree on the basis of the rationale presented.
Oh, and it's also why I can't use PayPal anymore.
Awesomely Catholic post - brings me back to my Sunday school days, but without Mr. Rheingold telling me I was going to hell for arguing with my sister. You gave us the what (natural law) without the why ('what is natural law, even briefly and how is it relevant').
...They dissociate the sexual act from the procreative act. The act which brings the child into existence is no longer an act by which two persons give themselves to one another, but one that "entrusts the life and identity of the embryo into the power of doctors and biologists and establishes the domination of technology over the origin and destiny of the human person.
For interested readers, here is the relevant passage from the link provided:
QUOTE
Such a relationship of domination is in itself contrary to the dignity and equality that must be common to parents and children."
Under the moral aspect procreation is deprived of its proper perfection when it is not willed as the fruit of the conjugal act, that is to say, of the specific act of the spouses' union . . . . Only respect for the link between the meanings of the conjugal act and respect for the unity of the human being make possible procreation in conformity with the dignity of the person
END QUOTE
Did you get that? The conjugal act has intrinsic meaning, and if you get knocked up by any other method, the 'meaning' is not there, because the act itself has meaning that cannot be moved elsewhere, nor can any other act have that meaning. The church has bound a specific physical act (copulation between husband and wife) with a specific meaning and decreed that everyone must interpret this conglomeration their way.
So, even if you artificially conceive out of love, in a loving marriage, to raise beautiful children, sorry - 'natural law' says you can't, because the meanings the church has given cannot be changed, nor should they be. Nothing natural about it, actually...
Clearly, the Catholic Church does not have a 'humble' opinion. Must be nice to be right 100% of the time, whilst avoiding the sin of pride too.
You claim you have a problem with artificial insemination because eggs or embryos become discarded or are lost. What are your opinions on miscarriages? Is the mother wrong for having one? Has she committed a sin even if she is unaware of the miscarriage? Is she committing a sin if she smokes and she is unwittingly pregnant?
What about those who remain celibate or don't have children? They're wasting eggs and sperm, aren't they by their refusal to conceive a child causing life to be destroyed?
And if life is so sacred to god why does he allow so many women to miscarry? Why do something like 50% of conceptions fail to implant themselves in the uterus properly?
Your ideas on the surface at least seem as ludicrous as this song.
Life begins at conception, which presumably means the soul enters the zygote at the moment of conception. What happens when the zygote later divides, to form identical twins? Does God intervene and inject a new soul into the womb? What happens, in those rare cases, when two zygotes merge, to form a chimera? Does God intervene and pluck a soul from the womb? Where does it go?
To quote Sam Harris, "this arithmetic of souls simply does not make sense."
"How come God gets credit whenever something good happens? Where was he when her heart stopped?" — Dr. Gregory House
What happens when the zygote later divides, to form identical twins? Does God intervene and inject a new soul into the womb?
Nope. One out of every set of twins doesn't have a soul. Everybody knows that.
The zygote divides because God injected a second soul.
Sheesh.
Infuriate left and right
I mean seriously, while the Catholic church has the biggest following of any religion I know of (and the includes baptists, which while not a religion as opposed to a fanatic cult) I haven't seen the Church provide any guidance to anyone as of late... especially since the passing of JPII. I tend to find that if nothing else, the Church seems to put more effort into being heard than listened to.
In the modern world where religion has less and less impact on the operation of governments, corporations and educational institutions. During a time when people regularly openly mock Christians in general as being brain dead (if you haven't noticed it, you're not listening). In an era where people are actually turned down for jobs because they wear a cross around their neck, the Churches will need to now, more than ever show they're evolving with the times. More and more, their followers are the sheep of society, not the leaders.
If the Church genuinely wants to make a difference, they need to, instead of playing the "Moral grounds card", since most people working on the projects do see themselves on higher moral grounds than the Church, provide research to show it's not a good idea. Hire independant (non-religion, possibly atheist) scientists to research the topic as well and present good reasoning that would specifically back up their arguments.
If we go back, long before the Catholic church to the days of exodus, Kosher was presented to a weak people dieing from tape worm, food poisening and other such issues an uneducated population travelling in the desert would be forced to survive. The morals behind Kosher had deeper meaning than "You should not cook thine cattle in the milk of its mother". The problem was that Egyptians classically would baste their meat in milk overnight to cause it to be much more tender. The moral was in reality that deadly tiny little bacteria would form in the meat when it's left on a rock in the desert overnight.
If the Church genuinely feels they have out best interest in mind, remember, we're not a bunch of uneducated brick makers with families travelling in a desert. Do the research to tell us what in fact is morally wrong. Show us the actual answer, we are reasonable and rational people. If you can show that a certain form of scientific progress will has a very highly likelyhood of having a morally negative impact on humankind, we will listen... at least we'll alter our research to avoid the complication.
It is a large organization, but not one based on slavery (like the Borg) but one based on a personal choice. I personally thing that chanting psalms in community is awesome.
Actually, the analogy is quite apt: initially, adults resist assimilation, while kids are just born into the collective. But once assimulated, the community of the collective, the closeness of other minds, is something they value greatly. And then the drones go out and assimilate more pepole into the collective.
The Borg is an excellent metaphor for organizations like the Catholic church. And that's not an accident: after all, the Star Trek writers are not stupid, and they are using Star Trek to show us things about our own society.