Stephen Fry on the Catholic Church

Discussion in 'Off Topic Area' started by Talyn, Sep 21, 2010.

  1. Talyn

    Talyn Reality Hacker

  2. Knight_Errant

    Knight_Errant Banned Banned

    Look guys, I mean I know the catholic church aren't exactly angels, but some of this stuff is starting to look like discrimination. Seriously.
     
  3. Simon

    Simon Administrator Admin Supporter MAP 2017 Koyo Award

    Talyn, great find, thank you.

    Wow, I listened to the entire 20 minute lecture, which I found to be intelligent, informed, thoughtful, witty in parts and food for thought.

    I am a Fry fan and a complete athiest, so maybe I was in agreement from the start. I would certainly like to hear a responce from a catholic.
     
  4. Simon

    Simon Administrator Admin Supporter MAP 2017 Koyo Award

    KE, did you listen to the entire lecture. Fry did talk about discrimination, especially from the church.
     
  5. Knight_Errant

    Knight_Errant Banned Banned

    Not the whole thing, no. OK, fair enough.
     
  6. Hatamoto

    Hatamoto Beardy Man Kenobi Supporter

    lol the video opened with an advert for Disneyland. How appropriate xD
     
  7. Moi

    Moi Warriors live forever x

    Oh I have good reason to hate the catholic Church. Hypocritical, lying, theiving peadophiles.
     
  8. Knight_Errant

    Knight_Errant Banned Banned

    I don't have a problem with individual catholics though- my great grandmother's family were catholics, and I won't say a word against her. Mind you, they wouldn't marry her to a protestant. Not in those days. She had to tell them to sod off- my lot have never taken religion overly seriously.
     
  9. AZeitung

    AZeitung The power of Grayskull

    The most obviously misleading thing that Stephen Fry said was about Thomas More. From Wikipedia:

    Additionally, More's objection to the English bibles was not that they were legible by the masses but that they contained what he considered to be theologically incorrect information designed to bring people away from the Catholic church to protestantism. The objection to the bibles was more that they were a tool of protestantism than some sort of a Machiavellian grab at power by keeping the masses ignorant. And if it seems unreasonable of the church to try to protestantism from taking hold in England, keep in mind that civil wars are fought when pieces of countries try to secede.

    Let's not forget that when the church was first formed, Latin was the most accessible and universally comprehensible language in the west and that Rome, the center of the church, was also the center of the Latin language. As time went on although Latin became spoken less and less, it also became more and more steeped in tradition. All the prayers were written in Latin, the bibles were in Latin, Latin had always been used, and it the language was a big part of the church, even if it wasn't all that understandable outside the church and educated circles anymore--although it was (possibly along with Greek) really the only language that could be considered "universal" in any sense inside Europe. Maybe that didn't make using Latin a good decision, but long standing traditions are hard to change. Doesn't this, rather than the deliberate use of Latin as some sort of tool of oppression make more sense?

    I do have to love his hypothetical condemnation of the hypothetical way that his hypothetical priest would hypothetically gloss over all the issues that he talked about if he were to hypothetically talk to him, though.
     
    Last edited: Sep 26, 2010
  10. CosmicFish

    CosmicFish Aleprechaunist

    I just watched the whole debate right through. It's well worth watching if you have a spare 45 mins. Here are the links for anyone who is interested:

    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kuzYwzGoXw"]YouTube - Part 1/5 - The Intelligence Squared Debate Christopher Hitchens[/ame]
    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AloG_pu1zmc"]YouTube - Part 2/5 - The Intelligence Squared Debate Christopher Hitchens[/ame]
    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRpuFfGvEIc"]YouTube - Part 3/5 - The Intelligence Squared Debate Christopher Hitchens[/ame]
    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEgdTfKZeME"]YouTube - Part 4/5 - The Intelligence Squared Debate Christopher Hitchens[/ame]
    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnerPDY87mM"]YouTube - Part 5/5 - The Intelligence Squared Debate Christopher Hitchens[/ame]
     
  11. AZeitung

    AZeitung The power of Grayskull

    I watched about 3 minutes of the first video and 3 minutes of the second. I had already watched the full video that was posted at the top of the thread and you can read my comments on one part, above--although the statements about St. Thomas Moore were not the only egregiously misleading part of that video.

    As for the parts that I watched just now
    1) They couldn't find someone who spoke English as a first language to argue in support of the church?
    2) Taking "they need to be treated with the most loving pastoral care" as a euphamism for rape? Really?
    4) All of the church's charity being dismissed as being "occasional"? That's like saying "you're going to condemn the whole church because of the occasional sex abuse"--except that percentage wise, sexual abuse does actually occur far, far less frequently than charity. Either way, it's not an argument.


    And finally, I can't find any reference to anti-semetism being preached as an official doctrine of the church--let alone up to 1964 as Christopher Hitchens claims. Unless you consider anti-semitism being a doctrine of the church because this person was made a saint in the late 1400s: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_of_Trent and his "cultus was suppressed in 1965". I hardly think that qualifies as an official doctrine of anti-semitism until 1964, though.
     
    Last edited: Nov 1, 2010
  12. CanuckMA

    CanuckMA Valued Member

    Official Church doctrine and teachings until then was that the Jews killed Jesus. The prtrayal of the 'money changers' without historical context also gave a very negative views of Jews.

    Trust me, I grew up in Montreal in the 60s. Going to public school in French meant going to Catholic school. I had to hide the fact that I was Jewish because around Easter was not a pleasant time. And it took a while after 64 for those teachings to stop everywhere.
     
  13. CosmicFish

    CosmicFish Aleprechaunist

    I can't comment on Thomas Moore as I don't know anything about him. I also could not find anything to support anti-semitism as an official doctrine. Consequently, I'll concede the point that Fry and Hitchens may not have been 100% accurate in everything they said. However, I do believe they were accurate on the points that mattered. To name a few: the church's stance on condoms, the covering up of the child rape, how it has retarded scientific advancement, its blatantly anti-semitic stance - irrespective of whether it was ever an official doctrine or not.

    1) IMO, Archbishop Onaiyekan was actually far less of a liability that Ann Widdecombe was, and he didn't seem to be struggling too badly with the language. Also, that kind of disadvantage is lessened by the format of this kind of debate where interruptions and shouting over opponents is not tolerated, so I don't think that's really a big deal at all. In any case, he came across as a gentle and sincere individual (at least, that's the impression he made on me). Widdecombe, on the other hand, came across as a shrill, bitter, angry and aggressively defensive. Onaiyekan at least attempted to report on the good the church had done by quoting some statistics in his speech. Widdecombe's entire strategy seemed to be asserting that the Catholic Church was a force of good "because she said so" whilst moaning about the points her opponents brought up; "Oh they would mention condoms and child abuse wouldn't they". As Stephen Fry put it, that's a bit like a criminal in court saying "Oh you would bring that burglary up, and you would mention that manslaughter. Why don't you take account of the fact that I buy my dad a Christmas present every year?"

    2) My understanding of Hitchen's point wasn't so much that he was taking "they need to be treated with the most loving pastoral care" as a euphemism for rape. Rather that he was pointing out that an organisation that had committed so much child abuse and then gone on to compound it by hushing it up and protecting the abusers shouldn't be offering to help resolve the problem by looking after the children themselves. If a babysitter had been found guilty of paedophilia, would you trust them with your kids if they said "I admit I did wrong. I'd like the opportunity to put things right - please allow me access to your kids again"?

    3) Where did point three go?

    4) I don't think that any amount of charity can excuse child rape. And I very strongly don't believe that any amount of charity can excuse covering it up and protecting the perpetrators. Would you consider a paedophile to be a decent person if, when not abusing kids, he or she donated large amounts of their cash to charity? Also, the point was raised that much of the aid that the Catholic church gives is dependant upon the recipient agreeing to certain stipulations, such as not using condoms. Charity is less charitable when it's used as a lever to force your dogma upon the needy.
     
  14. AZeitung

    AZeitung The power of Grayskull

    Even without arguing about whether what you experienced was official church doctrine (and Jews killed Jesus was not official church doctrine, even in the 60s), what do YOU think the significance of 1964 was in Christopher Hitchens' speech, then? It seems to me that Saint Simon is the only thing he could have been referring to.

    But a lot of the attacks were even more totally flawed than this one (because yes, there was a lot of anti-semitism in the church and outside of it even into the second half of the 20th century, even if it wasn't official doctrine)--e.g. see my post about Thomas Moore.
     
    Last edited: Nov 1, 2010
  15. AZeitung

    AZeitung The power of Grayskull

    I looked her up, since I had never heard this name before. Why, exactly should she be considered an official spokesperson of the church, in any capacity?

    Yes, he did come across as gentle and sincere, but not particularly well spoken--and even if he was knowledgeable, it didn't come across all that well. I personally know people who could have done a lot better, but the lack of eloquence of a non-native speaker really does make a big difference in a debate.

    So, the church should ignore them at this point?

    If the parents are leaving those children in the care of the church, then it is still the church's responsibility to look after them. And if they're not, shouldn't it still be the responsibility of the church--although not the individuals that committed the acts--to give them some form of support, or at the very least, acknowledge that they're in need?


    I think I meant to insert the last point into the middle.

    The point was actually not that charity excuses child rape, but that dismissing all of the church's charity as "the occasional minor charitable acts" (or whatever he said) is like dismissing child rape as "a few minor indescretions", except for the fact that the pedophilia is actually proportionally occasional.
     
    Last edited: Nov 1, 2010
  16. CosmicFish

    CosmicFish Aleprechaunist

    I honestly have no idea why they picked the individuals they did. If I were to speculate, I'd guess that they picked Onaiyekan because he is high ranking and would garner some sympathy on account of his gentle sincerity. Widdecombe probably wasn't picked at all. My guess would be that they originally picked an English Bishop, but she tackled him to the ground on the way in, beat him unconscious, dumped him in a skip, broke down the doors with her handbag and defied anyone to evict her.

    I'm not presuming to know how to best resolve the problem. I'm just pointing out that Hitchen's point seemed to me to be that an organisation with such a poor track record on child abuse offering to look after said children is a little ironic, to say the least.

    If you're after my opinion, perhaps church bodies that do work with children should be required to work to guidelines sufficient to greatly minimise the chances of these things happening in the future. Also that regular checks are made to ensure that these guidelines are being adhered to. The church could also show willing by voluntarily working far more closely with regional authorities in child abuse cases, rather than hushing things up and quietly moving paedophile priests on to other parishes.

    If it is the church's responsibility to look after them then why aren't they taking more steps to prevent this now that they know it's a problem? They seem to be making more of an effort to cover it up than anything else. Given how widespread this is, if the church really does want to help then it would seem sensible to put some kind of safeguards in place to ensure that this sort of thing isn't repeated.

    Fair enough, point taken. I'll also take your point that it's a few individuals committing the child abuse and not the organisation as a whole. However, the point still remains that Catholic aid is often conditional. Millions of pounds or dollars of aid is less helpful than it would otherwise be if it comes with the condition that the recipients must not use condoms and this advice facilitates the spread of AIDS around a population.

    Also, consider this with regards to your assertion that paedophilia is proportionally occasional: given that there has been a great deal of effort to cover it up, isn't it likely that the amount we are aware of is only the tip of the iceberg? I can't prove this, but, given that there has been much covering up, given also that enforced celibacy is an incredibly unnatural state of affairs, isn't it likely that there is more paedophilia than we're currently aware of?
     
  17. AZeitung

    AZeitung The power of Grayskull

    lol

    To me it sounded like an apology, advice to the rest of the church, and an acknowledgment that these people were victims. His argument against it seemed to be by interpreting the phrasing in a sarcastic manner.

    Can you give me some examples of what's currently being done to cover this up? This isn't an issue that I've put all that much effort into researching, so I don't know what is or isn't being done, either to cover it up or assist the victims.

    Such as?

    Exactly how is this requirement enforced--aside from the church not explicitly providing condoms?

    I don't think so, since there have been a lot of other studies done that show that a very small percentage of priests have been involved in molestation. Regardless, it still has to be proportionally significantly smaller than the amount of charity that the church provides, since every single Catholic church is involved in charity--many of which the lay people of the church help with, like soup kitchens, gathering canned goods for homeless people, etc. when not every church is involved in molestation, and certainly not every church is involved in *multiple* counts of molestation.

    Interestingly enough, I heard from a psychologist on the radio (NPR) that pedophilia, like homosexuality, can't be cured, because it is a part of a person's sexuality. If that's the case, does it seem reasonable to believe that enforcing celibacy (in a completely voluntary way, BTW, since nobody has to become a priest) could CAUSE the condition in an otherwise healthy individual?
     
  18. CanuckMA

    CanuckMA Valued Member

    Jews being blamed for killing Jesus was official doctrine until Nostra Aetate (actually fall 1965). The revision did not make it's way down to parishes until later.

    Anyway, to me Hitchens making statement like that is more akin to the broken clock thing.
     
  19. AZeitung

    AZeitung The power of Grayskull

    Part of Nostra Aetate, which defined the relationship of the Catholic church with other religions (not just Jews) condemns anti-semitism and the idea that Jews killed Jesus, but the idea that Jews killed Jesus--while I have no doubt that there were priests who preached that--was not as far as I know, part of actual church doctrine. That is, there might not have been any condemnation of those who preached it, but I don't think it was required or recommended teaching, or part of the catechism, etc.
     

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