Defending the Faith?

One of my evil pleasures is reading Fark.com. It is one of my favorite news sites/forums. However, for all the participants' tirades on inclusion and fairness, it is a bastion of intolerance in a lot of cases, especially when it comes to Catholicism. In this thread, I tried to reason it out with some of them. I think I lost. Here are some excerpts and my commentary.

Me: My faith is strong and impenetrable...
Gawdzila: I.e. blindly obstinate.

Why is it that, when someone has a solid faith in God, that they're blindly obstinate? People don't seem to understand that God transcends everything. I've said before that I don't buy off on *everything* the Church says, because I have a brain. I take responsibility for that though, and I'll probably have to have a wee chat with St. Peter at the end of my days. "See, Petey, it's like this..."

Me: And don't think that Law isn't doing his penance. ... And you can bet he's isolated. No contact with the world, no power as he had yielded, power that he loved and craved. You can bet that he is persona non grata. Not your idea or mine of "justice"...
Gawdzila: Exactly.

Later in the thread someone pointed out that Law didn't do the deed himself. I then replied later in the thread that Law is just as guilty and filthy as those he shielded. The Boston DA (a Catholic!) let this slide, big time, as did the Vatican. Worse punishment should be meted out. It just seems that people don't understand that there are punishments worse than Bubba in the jail cell to people who wielded certain power.

Persnickety (in response to another poster's snarky comment): What makes you think this is the Vatican's policy? Seems to me Law is the asshole who made the decision to move pedos around. If it happened in other dioceses, you go after the top dog there too. Again, why punish everyone when it is only a handful of morons who messed up?

I suspect Persnickety isn't Catholic, either, but he/she gets it. I had correlated that line of thought to teachers who get busted for dinking with the kids: the school doesn't get trashed, and neither do the offender's colleagues. Faulty logic, I suppose, but I never took philosophy and argument. It's no surprise I got reamed. Kiss me arse, I say.

Gawdzila, in response to Persnickety: Because the Vatican is aware of what is going on and they have the power to, at the very least, publicly demand that all responsible parties be kicked out of the church and allow legal proceedings to , continue against them. But they haven't, so they are complicit in allowing people like Law to continue doing what they are doing.

Do people understand how huge the Church is? The Vatican, while it has feelers everywhere, is not omniscient. In a church of this size, I imagine that it's very easy to play the coconut game. "What? I saw nothing." It wasn't until it became such a hot topic that the Vatican realized that there was a massive problem.

The Church may be guided by the Holy Spirit, but the men in red and white are still only human.

Is it me, or is the problem mostly in America?I have rarely run across such a problem in Europe or Australia... or maybe I'm just uninformed. Yeah, probably.

Gawdzila: If the church's leadership had simply excommunicated these priests for their actions and allowed the law to take its course, the church would not be the subject of such criticism.
Me: You'll not get an argument from me or any thinking Catholic on this statement. Right on the noggin.

Yes, my opponent was correct on this and I admitted it. This is what the Church *should* have done but didn't; irreparable damage was done to the Church's image. Bravo, Gawdzila.

Me: Sadly, some rotten apples spoil the whole shipment of barrels for a lot of you. It's hardly fair to lump the entire church because of a minority problem.

JestersTear: The problem is that it's the farking LEADERS OF THE CHURCH, dumbass!
***I never denied this, by the way. It was badly handled.

Pope John Paul, Pope Benedict, and their inner circle were aware of the events and condoned them through their actions and inaction.
***Condoned? Really? While I agree there was "inaction," the Church thinks in terms of eons, and not decades; things move slowly. It's getting there though.

Funny, JPII, the Pope of the Youth, John Paul the Great, is the evil character to this person. Interesting.

This wasn't "some rotten apples" on the fringe of the organization, this was the hierarchy of the organization comitting these crimes and / or discouraging the assaulted from filing police reports, and helping move the accused molestors to new crops of victims.

***Law would be considered "local" hierarchy, and, while a "leader," was not the Pope or part of the Cardinals' circle in Rome. Anyway, we all have to figure Law lied to the Vatican's face all that time and, in the absence of proof, Rome had to wait; that wait costs us. And it's true that the victims were intimidated by these foul persons: it happened here during O'Brien's tenure. It was wrong, so very wrong, but the work to fix the problem has been ignored by the people who will always insist that the Roman Catholic Church is evil--we'll never do anything right in their eyes.

This wasn't a recent happening. I'm 36, and I recall hearing about this crap happening when I was a child.
--"I recall hearing"? This person is relying on hearsay, which is not a good argument. His/her point is semi-valid, but hearing about it isn't the same as someone who *knows* someone who was traumatized.

Tell me, how is it that these people scream about child molestation (rightly!) but turn a blind eye to homosexuality?

I'm over it now: Seriously, corruption in Rome is nothing new. Anybody who is shocked by this simply hasn't paid attention for about 800 years or so. Not saying the Protestants have it all figured out either, just saying Rome has been corrupt for eons.

This is a person who still thinks the Borgias still run things. Wow.

Firelick: Why is it, that when someones picks on the heads of a religion, it automatically means that, that person is picking on the whole religion..?

Because they are, honey. Especially when it comes to the last acceptable form of bigotry, hating and trashing the Catholic Church.

Me: I'm sorry to see that anyone who has strong faith is automatically "blindly obstinate" in your book.
Gawdzilla: Well, the word "faith" in and of itself implies adherence to a belief, no matter the mountain of evidence against it or lack of evidence for it. That is pretty much the definition of 'blindly obstinate', isn't it?

No.
Blindly: without understanding, reservation, or objection
Obstinate: tenaciously unwilling or marked by tenacious unwillingness to yield
Therefore, no (see? I can has logic! heh). I understand what I am defending. I am not unwilling to discuss other views, as shown within the thread. I am a thinking animal. And as I believe in one God in light of the teachings of the holy Roman Catholic Church, I open myself to debate and flaming, I also will defend to the best of my abilities the tenets and reputation of my Faith and of my Church. My abilities may suck badly, but I will try until I'm physically and mentally unable to anymore.

Me: It makes my day when my religion comes up in otherwise pleasant conversations and I get a quip along the lines of 'you like child f*ckers, do you?' Not a misconception at all. Try being on the receiving end of such commentary and you'll get fed up too.
Gawdzila: Hm, I can see your point. I'd never make a comment like that, hell my grandma is still Catholic (though I admit that she is a pretty liberal one). I guess there are plenty of people who like to generalize on the basis of the actual molesters, but myself and many of the other non-mouth-breathers in this thread are more upset about the Church's response than the emergence of the problem in the first place.

See, this is a reasonable response. Dialogue is good. And, since this person had been reasonable, I wrote:

Me: Thanks for being considerate, Gawdzilla, even if you and I don't see eye to eye. Peace.

Which engendered the response from Gawdzilla:
Indeed. A few words uttered with reason and respect has more impact than an entire angry tirade. Peace, friend.

When you can argue and debate and end it on a respectful note, that's progress.