Conclave

[Brundlefly]

Re: Conclave

Originally posted by DanS
OK, we haven't buried JP yet, but it's an interesting subject. Who will be the next pope?

The cardinals have hired Tyler Durden as a consultant to help them elect the next pope. Today they have locked themselves in the Sistine Chapel at Tyler's request. God only knows what is going on inside there now. My guess is the last cardinal left standing becomes the pope..

[Heresson]

Originally posted by Odin
I have never figured out WHY is the US more religious than other western nations.

I don't think the difference is between US and "the rest" the rest is between several European states and the rest. Is Guatemala, Poland, Brazil, Portugal or Italy as Godless as France or Sweden?
France, Germany, Benelux, Scandinavia and UK do not make The West, not Europe even.

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly


And since Paul never had any contact with Christ, we assume he's quoting accurately...why?

My favorite scene in The Last Temptation of Christ -- one of my favorite movies -- is the scene scene within Christ's "temptation," when he meets Paul (played with a fundie-preacher accent by Harry Dean Stanton). As Paul extols teh wonder of the resurrected Christ, Christ protests that he's still alive, to which Paul says, in effect, "I've got the powerful story; I don't actually need you."

Well, exactly.

Such films perhaps should be allowed, but with great sign "contains historical lies and baseless propaganda" on every scene.
A shame Gabriel made music for it.

Originally posted by Brent
America is the cradle of religious freedom.

Poland is.

Originally posted by Donegeal
Not sure if this has been covered (as there are alot of posts in this thread and I'm too lazy to read them all), but what are the general feelings about how the Pope is elected? I mean, there are only 117 votes, but almost (or over) a billion Catholics. Where is the leftist liberal protests about how people don't have an equal voice? Where's the "I'm a Catholic, why don't I get a say in who my leader is?"?

If you ask me, the entire process of electing a new pope is very similar to Heinlien's theroy of World Government in his book Starship Troopers.

Church is not a democracy nor should it be.
I imagine some crowd electing drag queen, just for fun...
No. Pope must be someone competent and with apostolic succession.
And there are 1,1 billion Catholics.

[Elok]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov


A highly fictionalized myth that drew inspiration from Sumerian (and other cultures) tales about the flooding of the Black Sea basin c. 8,000 BC.

I don't want to get into a whole big argument about this, but there's something strange about saying "several other accounts of this event or a very similar one exist, ergo this one account is ripped off from those. They're all false, but this one happens to be plagiarized from the other falsehoods." Usually multiple records of an event are judged to strengthen the argument for its existence...at the very least, they do nothing to weaken it. I'm not really a biblical literalist as such, mind you, I just don't like snobbery based on revisionist archaeology.

Anyway, I predict the next Pope will be an elderly Catholic man that I've probably never heard of. I've heard of Ratzinger before, the rest of the rumored possibles are unknown to me. The only one who really stood out from the list to me was a Cardinal from somewhere in South America. I'm not Catholic, but I don't know that you can go wrong with a leader who insists on riding the bus with his flock instead of being chauffered around in a limo. Yay for apparently genuine humility.

[Heresson]

Oh, forgot to mention. I was suprised to see that Japan has 2 cardinals. Pretty much for 1% Christian state.
Also, there's cardinal-archbishop of Djakarta, and cardinal-archbishop of Chartum.
Perhaps the Chineese in Indonesian capital are catholic by some part? And Chartum guy surely has a big flock of the refugees of south Sudan

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Wernazuma III
Come back when the Post finds out that Ratzinger was member of the SS and took an active role in war crimes.

Don't shoot the messenger. I was just relaying what the Post reported. And of course it's mud--it's the Post, after all.

April 17, 2005 -- A "fuhrer" furor is dogging the papal candidacy of Germany's top Roman Catholic cleric — over revelations he was a member of the Hitler Youth.
Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger — a favorite to become the next pontiff — joined the Nazi children's corps in 1941 as a 14-year-old and was later an anti-aircraft gunner.

At one point, he guarded a factory where slaves from a concentration camp were forced to work. He was later shipped to Hungary, where he reportedly saw Jews persecuted.

Ratzinger, a staunch conservative dubbed "God's Rottweiler," has said he joined the Hitler Youth when membership became compulsory. He and his brother were later drafted but deserted. The cardinal claims he never fired a shot and that resistance would have meant death.

Not so, Germans from his hometown of Traunstein told The Times of London.

"It was possible to resist, and those people set an example for others," recalled Elizabeth Lohner, 84. "The Ratzingers were young — and they had made a different choice."

It's a decidedly vague article, indeed. I would be curious to know more about when he was a guard.

It must be said that many claims of "resistance=death" for Germans aren't true. The Nazi regime wasn't quite so compulsory as some would have you believe. People were exempted from military service as conscientious objectors without retributions (esp. Jehovah's Witnesses).

Didn't he end up deserting from the army, though?

In the spring of 1945, it seems. He and tens of thousands of other German soldiers. Writing had been on the wall for some time.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Elok
I don't want to get into a whole big argument about this, but there's something strange about saying "several other accounts of this event or a very similar one exist, ergo this one account is ripped off from those. They're all false, but this one happens to be plagiarized from the other falsehoods." Usually multiple records of an event are judged to strengthen the argument for its existence...at the very least, they do nothing to weaken it. I'm not really a biblical literalist as such, mind you, I just don't like snobbery based on revisionist archaeology.

I'm not quite sure what you're on about. I never said a big flood didn't happen--in fact, I said the basis was true, just that the accounts from various sources are highly mythologized. That the Genesis Flood myth relied heavily on the previous sources I mentioned is not really disputed by historians. The earliest texts we have are from the Sumerians, and the inspiration for the Flood myth is quite apparents, especially since Abraham himself was refugee from that culture. It makes total sense that he would carry that story with him.

I'm curious as to what "revisionist archaeology" you're referring to. Do tell.

[Japher]

About the conclave;

I was reading a Newsweek article on this and was reading over the potential popehat holders. I was taken back by the comments they made for the candidates. For one (from Brazil I think), they commented that he spoke 8 languages but some feared that he was too young... he is 61. Right next to him was some dude (white) and they made no such comment about his age and he was 62! WTF!

I'm still shocked that they would think 61 is too young! IMO, I would rather have a pope be pope for longer than have to go throw this whole mess every 10 years because they keep electing ancient, half-dead popes!

[Boris Godunov]

Older popes are often elected as "place holders" for when the cardinals have difficulty coming to a consensus. In such a case, they may pick a compromise candidate who is long in the tooth. It is, in effect, putting the papal election "on hold" with a fill-in candidate that everyone can hold their nose and agree on.

[Elok]

Perhaps I am using the wrong word. I mean that you're listing a bunch of speculation that could explain the actual evidence, and then calling it evidence. That Abraham came from a culture that had a record of the event has nothing to do with the veracity of the Hebrew account of it. That the concept has a heritage in the area is evident, though even that doesn't mean that the idea was necessarily directly taken. An historical event of sufficient magnitude would be known in many places, and while the details seem absurd, that's a double-edged sword. I don't remember the exact details of the Sumerian legends, as it's been a while, but assuming it bears some serious similarities to the biblical version that's some weird stuff to just make up.

Specifically, the animals. Why on earth would a man of those times bother preserving EVERY animal known? This was decidedly pre-Greenpeace, the animals that couldn't be eaten or otherwise used would not have had innate value. Even from the perspective that these details about divine commands are later reflections on the prevailing cultural attitudes and so on raises the question of why their culture placed an emphasis on preserving the pests that ate their grain at considerable personal expense.

I'm not saying the Flood account in the Bible is literally true; like I said, I'm not fundamentalist. I view the whole story as figurative on some level. But I don't see why you dismiss the entire story with contempt precisely because it seems to be ultimately based on a real event and is mentioned by other sources. The life of George Washington is "mythologized" after roughly two centuries have passed. That doesn't mean the man never existed. An event that occured around the dawn of civilization will be "mythologized" by the intervening years no matter who tells the story. Especially when we only know it from the written records of two extinct civilizations.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Odin
If Ratzinger becomes Pope, the Anglicans and Lutherans better prepare for the influx of liberal catholics in Europe and the US converting; because Ratzinger is extremely conservative.

We'll manage somehow.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Elok

Anyway, I predict the next Pope will be an elderly Catholic man.

Well, yes, and I predict that members of the genus Ursa will relieve themselves in forested areas. Golly, wouldn't we be pleasently surprised if they elected a Japanese girl of the Buddhist persuasion?

Sorry, it just begged to be said.

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov

It must be said that many claims of "resistance=death" for Germans aren't true. The Nazi regime wasn't quite so compulsory as some would have you believe. People were exempted from military service as conscientious objectors without retributions (esp. Jehovah's Witnesses).

A negligible number of people were exempted.
Probably it's been the love of the Nazis that brought thousands of Jehova's witnesses to German CCs as the movement was considered parasitarian because they were consentious objectors...
Desertion (and objecting to go to the military was considered as such exclusively) meant a life in the underground or death.
Active resistance of all kinds meant extreme danger.

Possible, not so dangerous forms of resistance were not entering the party, using one's position to help people or making a bad job/ work slowly . Basically points 1 and 3 (on purpose!) are what one of my grandfathers did. Even this light unwillingness to join in was paid by being sent to the Russian front as ordinary soldier instead of the possibility to make career in the bureocracy.

In the spring of 1945, it seems. He and tens of thousands of other German soldiers. Writing had been on the wall for some time.

But still it was highly dangerous, so you can't say, bah, this doesn't need any courage. In my region, in the last weeks of the war, a few hundred of those deserters were executed.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Heresson

Church is not a democracy nor should it be.

Hey it works for us. Think of it as a challenge to spread the divine inspiration around, sharing it with the laity.

I imagine some crowd electing drag queen, just for fun...

Hasn't happened to us yet, and probably never will. OTOH, if I recall some of the "historical filth" threads there have been some rather questionable Popes and bishops throughout history?

No. Pope must be someone competent and with apostolic succession.

You guys do DNA testing to ensure that the Pope is a genuine descendant of the apostles?

And there are 1,1 billion Catholics.

Just like the Chinese. So you're saying that when an organization exceeds the one billion mark it should just forget about representation?

[Heresson]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
Hey it works for us. Think of it as a challenge to spread the divine inspiration around, sharing it with the laity.

Laity most often hasn't even read Bible or catechism, and in several European states it acts as if God did not exist.

Hasn't happened to us yet, and probably never will.

Because no-one cares about elections of pastors or parish priests.
Also, in result protestant churches do just what the flock wants. It is taught by it instead of teaching it.

OTOH, if I recall some of the "historical filth" threads there have been some rather questionable Popes and bishops throughout history?

Mostly because of political pressure on the clergy.
Of the ones of XX century, after the church got free from foreign interventions in it, none was bad.

You guys do DNA testing to ensure that the Pope is a genuine descendant of the apostles?

yawn

Just like the Chinese. So you're saying that when an organization exceeds the one billion mark it should just forget about representation?

If You read post I was replying to, You'd know that the author of it hesitates about the number of catholics worldwide. I wanted to precise it.

[Alexander's Horse]

I want a reforming Pope or an old conservative who will die quickly.