Well, there goes the Catholic Church. . .

[xiphias]

So, we went from a Pope who, in WWII helped a Jewish refugee, to a Pope who, in WWII, was a Hitler youth.

Any bets how long until the majority of American Catholics form a schismatic church and just get away from Rome?

My money's on fifteen minutes.

Comments

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

He was a German kid, weren't they required to be Hitler Youth? (I don't like that he didn't protest it, but kids aren't always very morally driven.)

[whuffle.livejournal.com]

Yeah, make sure your passport is up to date. And consider having all the legal paperwork on hand to file for assailum on short notice.

[vuurvasthouden.livejournal.com]

THAT is what it was I'd temporarily forgotten about him.

Well, that's good then--maybe people will start to re-think something about Catholicism, especially with his writings and stuff. Can't really say that that's all "the past", considering that the papers damning all other non-Christian/Catholic religions came out in what...2000?

[lietya.livejournal.com]

If I were still Catholic, I'd be headed for the hills now. (And considering it was JP II's policies that sent me away, and that Ratzinger is unlikely to be *less* conservative.... yeah.)

[griffen.livejournal.com]

If I were still a Catholic, I'd be leaving the church now.

Fortunately, I decided that long before the death of JPII.

Sickening. Truly sickening.

[sethg]

1. Why would American Catholics be motivated to make the effort to form a new church instead of doing what they've been doing for the past generation, i.e., continue to attend church and label themselves "Catholic" but ignore those parts of doctrine they find inconvenient?
   
2. If the American Catholics did "get away from Rome", would Rome care?
   

[sethg]

I should also note that when [insert JP2's original name] "helped a Jewish refugee", he was merely following canon law, which stated that since a child does not have enough judgment to choose to convert, unbaptized children should be returned to their parents.

Canon law also holds that when a child is baptized, even in error, he or she is under the guardianship of the Church, not the heathen parents. Thus, Edgardo Montara, a Jewish child who was baptized by a Catholic servant, was taken away from his Jewish parents, and Pope Pius IX rebuffed appeals to return the child. Pius IX was later beatified by...drum roll please...Pope John Paul II.

[mattblum.livejournal.com]

The fact that Ratzinger was a Hitler Youth isn't that disturbing, I think, because all German boys were required to be, and it isn't his fault that he was a boy in Germany at that time. Many people who were Hitler Youths went on to be vocal opponents of the Nazis. The fact that Ratzinger also served in the German army during the war is more disturbing, though he was evidently in an anti-aircraft unit and therefore almost certainly not involved in any atrocities.

Ratzinger's status as an ultra-conservative Catholic is much more disturbing to most people, I think. I mean, seriously--Catholics are generally much more concerned with how the Church deals with Catholics than how it deals with Jews, and that's hardly surprising. I think Ratzinger is going to have a lot of work to do if he expects to receive the same kind of respect from the Jews that his predecessor did, but that would be true even if he weren't German and an ex-Hitler Youth.

[mattblum.livejournal.com]

Keep in mind, too, that Ratzinger--excuse me, Pope Benedict XVI--is 78 years old, so it's not as though he's likely to be Pope for that long a time. 27 years would seem to be pretty much out of the question.

[(Anonymous)]

For those who want a very short bio of the new pope, CNN.com has this:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/europe/04/19/ratzinger.profile.ap/index.html

As for the whole "American Catholic Church" thing... Well, that will take more than 15 minutes. If it happens at all, it'll probably be a couple of years. Most Roman Catholics in this country will wait to see what Pope Benedict XVI actually says and does, now that he's pope. Being elevated to that post has been know to change attitudes, sometimes dramatically.

Just to be clear, I use the term "Roman Catholic" to distinguish between the members of that church and the members of other churches which are Catholic, but not Roman Catholic. Another discussion for another time. I alo use the term Roman Catholic to refer to those who actually are practicing Roman Catholicism at this time, as distinguished from those who were raised Roman Catholic, or otherwise were Roman Catholic at one time, but who are not now actually practicing that faith. "Practicing that faith" involves regular attendence at Sunday Mass AND participating in the life of a church community. I intend no criticsm of those who aren't doing this; I just want to be clear about the group of people to which I refer. As for agreement on principles... well, the real rules about that are a lot more complicated than I have time to go into now.

From what I read in the papers, a lot of folks who describe themselves as "Catholic" don't fit the description of what the Roman Catholic Church recognizes as "Catholic", so the Church won't care one way or the other what those folks do. Then there's the group of practicing Roman Catholics who are really upset with the way the teachings of Christ and the Church are being interpreted by the hierarchy of the Church. We usually think these folks are the ones seeking liberalization of the Church, but there also are a good chunk of folks who want the Church to become even more conservative.

Those practicing members of the Roman Catholic Church in America who favor liberalizing the Church are the folks most people think of when they talk about the possibility of an "American Catholic Church". One frequent misconception is that these more liberal Roman Catholics represent the opinion of the majority of Roman Catholics, both in this country and world-wide. In this country....maybe. World-wide? No way. Most practicing Roman Catholics world-wide are much more in agreement with the hierarchy than those in this country. And there are significant numbers of practicing Roman Catholics in this country who don't agree with the more liberal members.

What would happen if the more liberal members of the Roman Catholic Church in America decided to "vote with their feet"? Probably some temporary upheaval, a number more of parishes closing, then relative calm. There have been such divisions many times before in the history of Christianity, and although there's usually a fair amount of acrimony involved, all parties generally survive quite nicely without one another.

If the departing members decided to form a church called the American Catholic Church, that would be up to them, but it's unlikely in the extreme that such a church would have any relationship at all to the Roman Catholic Church. We'd have an old-fashioned schism on our hands. (Might be exciting...)

Personally, I don't see why anyone would want to go to the trouble of starting a whole new church from scratch. The changes that the more liberal Roman Catholics are seeking have already been made in the Episcopal Church, so it seems like it'd be easier just to change affiliations. But it may be that some people wouldn't feel comfortable "converting" in that way.

As for me, well, I have this whole thing about the REAL teachings of the Church as opposed to the teachings of what I term the "folk Catholic church" that most people in this country think are the real thing. The REAL teachings of the Church aren't nearly as narrow-minded as many might think, including some of the Church hierarchy. Another long discussion for another time. - Felis Sidus

[alaria-lyon.livejournal.com]

Please see the article I posted from the Jerusalem Post.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

Well, my one devoutly Catholic close friend has already said that the Congregationalists are looking real good to her as an alternative right now.

[copperpoint.livejournal.com]

I keep hearing two things:
1) He was in the hitler youth.
2) It was mandatory at the time.

Of course the people who keep pointing out that it was mandatory and how little he enjoyed it are himself and the people who elected him pope. I know normally I'm pretty cynical, but I don't think he's spent years hiding his anti-semitism just to reveal it now that he's pope.

[temima.livejournal.com]

Apparently, I am not the only one wondering if there will be a repeat of the Anti-Pope (as in different people elect as pope and not agreeing).

[anhelometuo.livejournal.com]

Wait until the media gets ahold of it...then I'd say close to five minutes, followed by 60 days of endless news coverage...erm, in addition to the news coverage that has been going on. Thankfully, I don't have a TV!!! :)

Completely unrelated, I plan on writing a gurps character generator program (when I have the free time). If you are interested, let me know. The first design will be in C++, and will be Command Prompt (don't care to spend 20 weeks learning graphics right now...will wait for the summer for that, maybe), the second design will be in java, and *will* have a GUI.