long ago i had an on-going discussion with someone who declared themselves to be "very liberal" and also a proud "Catholic". almost every bit of received and current Catholic dogma was rejected outright by this person. she wouldn't accept anything from Rome and would ignore the pope when-ever it suited her (which was often). So i had to ask her: given that, what's a Catholic in your mind? her emphatic proud reply: "once a Catholic, always a Catholic!"
she was even willing to accept my snide suggestion that given that there was no requirement for a set of beliefs (on her part) that it amounted to a club entered by dint of hazing alone.
since then, i've tended to view those that declare themselves as Catholic to be members of a very large fraternity. even in the females.
I don't know why anyone would want to call themselves Catholic after the latest HBO doc: Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In The House of God. According to the Vatican, you can't criticize the church if you want to consider yourself a good Catholic - even when its priests are fucking little deaf children and even when the church spends a great amount of money and energy covering it up. They're so swept up in the belief of their own holiness that whatever they do can't be evil. That there is some real brainwashing.
I think there's the kernel of an idea here. We recruit a bunch of "suddenly enlightened" Tea Party members to run for Congress in 2014, they are Opus Dei Catholics or evangelicals or even Likudniks depending on the district (Goldy knows damn well which one he gets to play). We get them all elected in safe Republican districts and then, before the next Congress meets, they all declare themselves to be caucusing with the Democrats and establish voting records that would make Jim McDermott blush. Think what we could accomplish in the last two years of Obama's term.
Don't look at me. I got it the first time around. But for the record, I consider myself a "Cultural Catholic" (I got that from our dear Dan. I try to never have an original thought)
Care for a little cheese with that whine?
she was even willing to accept my snide suggestion that given that there was no requirement for a set of beliefs (on her part) that it amounted to a club entered by dint of hazing alone.
since then, i've tended to view those that declare themselves as Catholic to be members of a very large fraternity. even in the females.
Instead you have to suck it up while the traitorous pieces of garbage laugh in your face. Who's more civilized?
Once in, never out. Just like the Mafia.