POPE CONDEMNS MARRIAGE EQUALITY IN SPEECH TO U.S. BISHOPS
In a Friday Vatican address to visiting American bishops, Pope Benedict XVI condemned the growing push for marriage equality in the United States, AFP reports.
“Sexual differences cannot be dismissed as irrelevant to the definition of marriage,” said Pope Benedict, who warned of “the powerful political and cultural currents seeking to alter the legal definition of marriage.”
The pope’s comments come one week after Maryland became the eighth state to approve marriage rights for same-sex couples, though the bill signed by Gov. Martin O’Malley does not go into effect until January and likely faces a voter referendum this fall.
In meeting with the group of bishops from three Midwestern states, the pope echoed American election-year rhetoric against the Obama administration, decrying “threats to freedom of conscience, religion, and worship which need to be addressed urgently so that all men and women of faith, and the institutions they inspire, can act in accordance with their deepest moral convictions.”
http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2012/03/09/Pope_Blasts_Marriage_Equality_in_Speech_to_US_Bishops/
This is an unmarried, supposedly-chaste individual who pontificates on human relationships as early as 1988, terming same-sex relationships “intrinsically evil.” And he’s believed to be speaking for some invisible god, or at least some of the gullible and vulnerable think so. -HFS
(via divineirony)
Catholic Church apologizes for 150,000 forced adoptions.
It is believed at least 150,000 Australian women had their babies taken against their will by some churches and adoption agencies between the 1950s and 1970s.
Psychiatrist Geoff Rickarby has treated scores of affected women, and says it is a stain on Australia’s history.
“It sounds like some totalitarian country somewhere hundreds of years ago, but in fact it’s Australia only 35, 40 years ago,” Dr Rickarby said.
The chief executive of Catholic Health Australia, Martin Laverty, says he is sorry for what happened.
…
Juliette Clough is one of the women who says she was forced to give up her baby at a Catholic-run hospital in Newcastle in 1970.
She was 16 at the time and says she was alone, afraid and desperate.
“My ankles were strapped to the bed, they were in stirrups and I was gassed, I had plenty of gas and they just snatched away the baby,” Ms Clough said.
“You weren’t allowed to see him or touch him, anything like that, or hold him and it was just like a piece of my soul had died. And it’s still dead”
Margaret had a similar experience when her son was taken against her will in 1975, when she was 17.
“Straight away he was taken out of the labour ward. By the records it only took 13 minutes to transfer him from the labour ward to the nursery, so he was gone,” she said
The women claim they were not told about single parent benefits or their rights to revoke consent for adoption.
…
“Women have told stories about going into hospital not realising that they were going to have to give up their babies, but that pillows were put over their faces, that curtains were put up so they couldn’t see the baby,” Senator Siewert said.
Women have also told the ABC they were given milk suppressing drugs that have now been linked to cancer, as well as barbiturates that caused sedation and in some cases delirium.
Mr Laverty says it is not a period to be proud of.
When are people going to wake up and see that the Catholic Church is ran by absolutely despicable people?
Somehow I doubt saying, “Whoops. Sorry!” is going to make-up for the bullshit these women were put through.
This has been your fucked up catholic bullshit of the day.
![fuckyeahatheism-:
[Image, poster style, left half is the Pope sitting on an ornate gold throne, the very image of wealth - right half is black children of African descent and indeterminate gender, both obviously extremely starved, the youngest child’s bones clearly visible. Text reads: “Go, sell everything you have… …and give it to the poor” (mark 10:21) I’m quite sure he could sell that golden throne at a very good price.]
this is just so so sad and breaks my heart. fucking Catholics have been raking in the cash and raising funds for supposed charitable causes since the dawn of time yet rarely do i ever see them actually taking those billions and applying them and using them as they say they will and using them to help these starving helpless people who so obviously need it… the only fucking thing i can see that they have done with the billions of dollars they take in is keep it all for themselves and buy ridiculously lavish and expensive things such as that ridiculous throne that fucking nazi in the picture is sitting his despicable ass on… who would have thought that people who take vows and are supposed to live a life of poverty would need such grand furnishings or expensive palaces. Catholicism is nothing more than a piece of shit racket and a convenient way for these pervert pedophile fucks to surround themselves with fresh children to fuck and control the masses and profit off the ignorance of misguided people stupid enough to buy into it. it’s fucking sick!!](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_logshwwEG31qdvd6ro1_500.jpg)
[Image, poster style, left half is the Pope sitting on an ornate gold throne, the very image of wealth - right half is black children of African descent and indeterminate gender, both obviously extremely starved, the youngest child’s bones clearly visible. Text reads: “Go, sell everything you have… …and give it to the poor” (mark 10:21) I’m quite sure he could sell that golden throne at a very good price.]
this is just so so sad and breaks my heart. fucking Catholics have been raking in the cash and raising funds for supposed charitable causes since the dawn of time yet rarely do i ever see them actually taking those billions and applying them and using them as they say they will and using them to help these starving helpless people who so obviously need it… the only fucking thing i can see that they have done with the billions of dollars they take in is keep it all for themselves and buy ridiculously lavish and expensive things such as that ridiculous throne that fucking nazi in the picture is sitting his despicable ass on… who would have thought that people who take vows and are supposed to live a life of poverty would need such grand furnishings or expensive palaces. Catholicism is nothing more than a piece of shit racket and a convenient way for these pervert pedophile fucks to surround themselves with fresh children to fuck and control the masses and profit off the ignorance of misguided people stupid enough to buy into it. it’s fucking sick!!
(via atheismfuckyeah)
Atheist Ex-Priest on Religion
