Catholic bishops: Shun lawmakers who voted for NY same-sex marriage {Ecumenical thread}

but if you think that somehow the very basis of the founding of this country, which was a completely new declaration of independence from tyranny - including religious tyranny, was not blessed by Almighty God, then you have not studied much of this country's early years

Do you call this a blessing?

;

I do understand the early history and am aware there is much enlightenment ideals and masonic influence that can not be ignored.

Here is one more example of that influence Pope Leo XIII was aware of.. From Leo XIII;s Encyclical HUMANUM GENUS on Freemasonry

http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/leo_xiii/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_18840420_humanum-genus_en.html

In those matters which regard religion let it be seen how the sect of the Freemasons acts, especially where it is more free to act without restraint, and then let any one judge whether in fact it does not wish to carry out the policy of the naturalists. By a long and persevering labor, they endeavor to bring about this result - namely, that the teaching office and authority of the Church may become of no account in the civil State; and for this same reason they declare to the people and contend that Church and State ought to be altogether disunited. By this means they reject from the laws and from the commonwealth the wholesome influence of the Catholic religion; and they consequently imagine that States ought to be constituted without any regard for the laws and precepts of the Church.

Louis Veuillo-The great Catholic Journalist of La Civiltà Cattolica, from the 19h century had great insight into what these Enlightenment principles do to a society From Louis Veuillo ,La Civiltà Cattolica..... This people does not cry for its dead. It only knows how to cry for money. Fire can grip its cities, but it devours in them neither a monument nor an art object, nor a memory, and the money melted is not money lost at all. One draws it from the ruins; it is often even good business. (Ibid., xi, 34).

BB, The point is that in order to even begin to fix something one must look and see the flaws at the beginning. This country has corrected some of them like slavery but there is much more work to be done

To say the DOI and The Constitution are completely Divine documents on par with Scripture and the Church is ignorant.

But dear brother in Christ, I have never said that. Nor do I believe that.

Christ Himself told us to "render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and unto God what is God's." Obviously, and quite clearly, Caesar and God are not equivalent in any sense.

For "Caesar" is not divine. "Caesar," of course, refers to the State, or the government. If the State were a theocracy — which I gather you believe it ought to be — the dynamics of unopposed, virtually unlimited and unchecked power would render it as corrupt as any secular government. To "marry" Church and State is precisely the goal of militant, irredentist Islam. It's strange to hear a Catholic American suggest that such a thing is appealing....

The DoI was inspired by the Judeo-Christian cultural legacy which all the signers inherited, and to which they firmly belonged. It seems strange to hear it suggested that whatever good parts it has are somehow specifically Catholic, and the rest total trash.

Again, the Constitution is not a directive of how people should live; it is a directive to the State as to what it is forbidden to do. In short, it is forbidden to do anything outside the express charter it received from We the People, who conferred only very limited powers to the federal government, all other powers being expressly reserved to the several states or the people.

You wrote,

A good example of something flawed because morality is not defined enough is Freedom of the press.

The problem here is, who's going to define the morality? The State has no role here — by design of the Framers. They trusted that a people under God already knew the moral law; they didn't need the State to tell them what it was.

If the society has become morally corrupt, the cause is not to be found in the design of the Constitution; it is to be found in the "God is dead" ideology as promulgated by the foes of God and human liberty that has poisoned the American cultural consensus in modern times, which historically has been God-fearing and God-loving.

Even the Churches have been infected with this disease.

Beware of Left Progressives, dear brother, especially those within the churches! For they definitely do want to define "morality" for you, and to sanction you if you don't agree with their definition of it.

To a President Obama, "morality" is that which leads to social leveling, on the pretext of a "preferential option for the poor." All men are then truly "equal" — equal in their unrelieved and unrelievable material poverty. This kind of "morality" only makes everybody "poor" in the end. And I suspect Obama knows this.

But what's important to him is the expansion of the omni-competent State to the detriment of the People. The more desperate and fearful the people become, the more power the State has over them.

This is not "moral"; this is vicious....

Go read the Constitution again. Perhaps if you do you'll recognize that this Charter of American liberty is about the proper order of the federal government, not about the proper order of American souls.

Reasonable people can all see the "dangers" that Pope Leo is referring to — i.e., the abuses of "free speech." And of course I agree wholeheartedly with his observation that "Liberty is a power perfecting man, and hence should have truth and goodness for its object. But the character of goodness and truth cannot be changed at option. These remain ever one and the same, and are no less unchangeable than nature itself."

I imagine the Framers would have agreed with that insight. And they above all feared that the unrestrained consolidation of State power would leave the people defenseless against any arbitrary redefinition of what constitutes "truth and goodness."

Which is why they wanted to constrain the powers of government, to prevent it from "overreach" into the human moral sphere....

Which is why I firmly, passionately believe that there should never be any identification of Caesar with God. Which, of course, is the heart's desire of Left Progressives everywhere, whether inside or outside of the Church.

And there are too many such inside the Church nowadays — and I don't mean just the Roman Catholic Church. And, analyzing your arguments, I think you may have been listening to folks of this type....

Just some thoughts, FWIW.

Thank you for writing, dear brother in Christ!

One of the key principles of Catholic social thought is known as the principle of subsidiarity. This tenet holds that nothing should be done by a larger and more complex organization which can be done as well by a smaller and simpler organization. In other words, any activity which can be performed by a more decentralized entity should be. This principle is a bulwark of limited government and personal freedom. It conflicts with the passion for centralization and bureaucracy characteristic of the Welfare State.

Excellent! On this point, it appears to me this fundamental insight of Catholic thought and the U.S. Constitution are entirely compatible.

I don't know whether to laugh, or to cry, to see how some Catholics (and other Christians) have (seemingly deliberately) mis-construed what, to me, is the plain language of Caritas in Veritate....

Perhaps it's an oversimplification; but to me, the irreconcilable difference between socialism and Catholic (Christian) social thought is that the former always deals in abstract "groups," in "collectives," while the latter ever focuses on the human individual and his responsibilities under God....

Thank you so very much, dear brother in Christ, for this outstanding essay/post!

To denigrate the founding of this country because freedom was not "morally" defined, ignores that the ten commandments were the guidelines for our laws as well as most other countries.... There were already laws in place in this country that were "natural" laws such as those against stealing and murder and false witness.... Granted, society today has veered far from the statutes of God, but I don't see how that can be blamed on the founding of this country. Even the laws we have today are not enough to constrain those whose hearts are evil. And only until Christ rules and reigns upon this earth will we truly have a world wherein righteousness dwells. America is still the best country in the entire world and I AM blessed and would choose to live nowhere else.

These "natural" moral laws are the very ones that God endued in each and every human soul, and gave man reason and free will by which they can be understood and reified in personal human action....

RE: the foundational moral law collectively known as the Ten Commandments: They are totally implicit in Western legal theory, which is based on the Judeo-Christian moral code. If this were not so, then we wouldn't be seeing the ideologically-driven movement to remove the Ten Commandments from courthouses throughout America, where they are often prominently displayed.

Persons wishing to renovate the world in ways more congenial to their own personal ideological liking and tastes must first tear down the basis of moral authority in the world in which we live, to "consign it to the dustbin of history".... They seek to "rebuild" a "better" world in the form of a man-made utopia on the razed ground of what they plan to destroy.

Liberty is liberty. American liberty is not any kind of "new" liberty. Rather the genius of the DoI and the Constitution consists in giving a "new" scope to the God-given (thus unalienable) liberty that man already has; for this was endued in him by God from the beginning....

You wrote,

Granted, society today has veered far from the statutes of God, but I don't see how that can be blamed on the founding of this country. Even the laws we have today are not enough to constrain those whose hearts are evil. And only until Christ rules and reigns upon this earth will we truly have a world wherein righteousness dwells. America is still the best country in the entire world and I AM blessed and would choose to live nowhere else.

Beautifully said, dearest sister in Christ! I so agree.

To my dear brother in Christ stfassisi: Do not look for "perfection" in this world. God made it "good," not "perfect."

As Winston Churchill once quipped, "democracy is the worst form of government except all the other forms that have been tried."

In its essence, the form (Constitution) of our American democratic republic seeks to restrain Caesar, not God. Only then can God-given human liberty truly thrive.

Thank you ever so much, dear sister in Christ, for your beautiful and eloquent essay/post!

The DoI was inspired by the Judeo-Christian cultural legacy which all the signers inherited

...Along with enlightenment and reformation legacy combined with non Judeo-Christian inspired -which was also inherited

It seems strange to hear it suggested that whatever good parts it has are somehow specifically Catholic, and the rest total trash.

I do believe you're trying to be manipulative by twisting what I wrote

To "marry" Church and State is precisely the goal of militant, irredentist Islam. It's strange to hear a Catholic American suggest that such a thing is appealing

Strange choice of words? Are you suggesting that catholic teaching on matters of faith and morals is somehow equal to militant Islam?

Do you also realize that Separation Of Church and State is an anathema by Catholic teaching and dogmatic-which means this teaching comes to us from Christ

Here is a few clips from something I posted before..

Pope St. Pius X taught that no society would long remain stable and free if the Catholic Church was not acknowledged by the State and her teachings given their due place in the life of the State:

The same thesis also upsets the order providentially established by God in the world, which demands a harmonious agreement between the two societies. . . . Remove the agreement between Church and State, and the result will be that from these common matters will spring the seeds of disputes which will become acute on both sides; it will become more difficult to see where the truth lies, and great confusion is certain to arise. Finally, this thesis inflicts great injury on society itself, for it cannot either prosper or last long when due place is not left for religion, which is the supreme rule and the sovereign mistress in all questions touching the rights and the duties of men.

In 1832, Pope Gregory XVI recalled how greatly the peace of both Church and society was disturbed by various rebellious sects, "the Waldensians, the Beghards, the Wycliffites, and other such sons of Belial, who were the sores and disgrace of the human race." He insisted that the modern clamor for the separation of Church and State would fare no better:

Nor can We predict happier times for religion and government from the plans of those who desire vehemently to separate the Church from the state, and to break the mutual concord between temporal authority and the priesthood. It is certain that that concord which always was favorable and beneficial for the sacred and the civil order is feared by the shameless lovers of liberty

And there are too many such inside the Church nowadays — and I don't mean just the Roman Catholic Church. And, analyzing your arguments, I think you may have been listening to folks of this type

Actually ,dear sister, I do not listen to those type at all considering I am a traditional Orthodox leaning Catholic who realizes that Christ is the answer and He speaks through his church in matters of Faith and Morals, and not through american conservative thinking when it is at odds with Church teaching. I especially do not listen to progressive liberal thinking at all!

I also will not agree with your so- called conservative view of separation of Church and State because it is actually liberal thinking opposed to Catholic dogma

I wish you a blessed evening!

“”Socialism is a morality: the worship of human beings as the ultimate arbiters of human destiny.””

You’re being too kind to them ,dear friend.:)

Pope Leo XIII Wrote the following about the socialists...
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Leo13/l13apost.htm

“Surely these are they who, as the sacred Scriptures testify, “Defile the flesh, despise dominion and blaspheme majesty.” They leave nothing untouched or whole which by both human and divine laws has been wisely decreed for the health and beauty of life. They refuse obedience to the higher powers, to whom, according to the admonition of the Apostle, every soul ought to be subject, and who derive the right of governing from God; and they proclaim the absolute equality of all men in rights and duties. They debase the natural union of man and woman, which is held sacred even among barbarous peoples; and its bond, by which the family is chiefly held together, they weaken, or even deliver up to lust. Lured, in fine, by the greed of present goods, which is “the root of all evils which some coveting have erred from the faith,”[3] they assail the right of property sanctioned by natural law; and by a scheme of horrible wickedness, while they seem desirous of caring for the needs and satisfying the desires of all men, they strive to seize and hold in common whatever has been acquired either by title of lawful inheritance, or by labor of brain and hands, or by thrift in one’s mode of life. These are the startling theories they utter in their meetings, set forth in their pamphlets, and scatter abroad in a cloud of journals and tracts. Wherefore, the revered majesty and power of kings has won such fierce hatred from their seditious people that disloyal traitors, impatient of all restraint, have more than once within a short period raised their arms in impious attempt against the lives of their own sovereigns.....

But the boldness of these bad men, which day by day more and more threatens civil society with destruction, and strikes the souls of all with anxiety and fear, finds its cause and origin in those poisonous doctrines which, spread abroad in former times among the people, like evil seed bore in due time such fatal fruit.”

I heard many protestants tell me they drive their ministers out of their churches quite often because they don't like the theology.

I've heard that too, dear brother in Christ. Plus I know of an up-close-and-personal example. My husband's then church (in Massachusetts) — B is an Elder of the Methodist Church, who is now unchurched like me — kicked out its pastor. I gather the congregation considered him to be not up to their cultural level and sophistication. He came across to them as too "old-timey" in his religious stance and admonitions for their taste. That is, too "biblical," too "orthodox." [Plus you can't say "bad things" about gay people!!!]

So out he went.

The important thing to note here (IMHO) is the Reformed Church is thoroughly "democratic" institutionally, whereas the Roman Catholic Church is hierarchical and authoritative in its basic institutions. A Reform church can expel a pastor on majority vote. But no layman nor group of laymen have the power to expel a priest. Only his Bishop can do that.

If there "seems to be many versions of [social justice] depending on certain political agendas, even certain faiths," then that probably indicates we do not agree about what "social justice" is.

Personally, I find the state-of-the-art definition in Pope Benedict XVI's magnificent Caritas in Veritate....

I'm sure our ersatz president has different ideas entirely....

A Marxist cannot "change or add any new dogmatic teaching. Impossible!" I agree. But what he can do is take a given teaching and distort it by changing its meaning, conforming it to the requirements of a pre-existing ideological commitment in his mind. I do not think you appreciate how very much Left Progressives appreciate the magical power of words. They go so far as to expect that their constructions of rhetoric will be magically clothed in the substance of reality if they can just charm enough people into believing their fairy stories....

Oh dear stfassisi! Thank you so very much for your graceful, gracious close — and your prayers! Being outside the Holy Sacraments — most especially the Eucharist — is a regrettable state of affairs.

Thank you so much for writing, dear brother in Christ!

Note -- that is/was/is always Catholic thought. It has not changed

It is in this changelessness that the timeless beauty and truth of Catholic thought inheres. The Word of God does not change.

Not to mention that, IMHO, some of the greatest thinkers in all of human history were Christian and Catholic: the great saints and doctors of the church, such as Augustine, Aquinas, and Anselm; plus the extraordinary spiritual personalities, such as the saints Francis of Assisi, Theresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, et al.

Cronos, I was very disturbed by Vatican II at the time, and still am. I was then an "outsider" to Catholicism, not having been confirmed in the Church. (Still am not.)

All the same, I was appalled by the systematic "undermining" of Catholic orthodoxy that I perceived (FWIW) was going on at the time. Timeless Truth was no longer good enough. The Church must be made "relevant" to the people of the time, so as to fill the pews.... In short, I thought the Church was accommodating herself to the Zeitgeist, to the Spirit of the Age....

John Paul II was instrumental in undermining Communism in Poland not because he was a skillful politician. but because he could appeal to the genuine spiritual longings of the suffering Poles, and remind them that God's Spirit would bear them up in His Truth and Mercy through all that was to come. And when the proper time came, God "delivered" on this promise....

Communism always had to fall. It's just a matter of time with all such "false gods." They are built on shifting sand, and thus cannot stand for very long.

But as with Satan, they'll take down with them "into the pit" as many humans as possible, just for spite....

One can look at North America and the direction in which it is headed: its rapid progress, owed to the most brutalizing work, has fascinated Europe: but already the true results of this exclusively material progress appear. Barbarism, wicked behavior, bankruptcy, systematic destruction of the natives, imbecilic slavery of the victors, devoted to the most harsh and nauseating life under the yoke of their own machines.(Ibid., xii, 359-360).

BB, The point is that in order to even begin to fix something one must look and see the flaws at the beginning. This country has corrected some of them like slavery but there is much more work to be done

Okay, I was not born yesterday off a turnip truck. :o)

Slavery was going on long, long before America was even a dream in someones collective heads(s). So, I do not hold that against the founders. Certainly, they saw the wrong in it and abolished the practice. I wonder where the Roman Catholic Church was when slavery was going on throughout Europe and the world for millenia and what it has done about slavery that is STILL going on in parts of the Middle East and Africa?

I just do not agree that separating the church from the state was a bad thing. I do not for one minute believe Jesus advocated for a church state. The reigns of power that the Roman Church assumed never had a result that proved good for it or for mankind. Unless there is freedom to choose our preferences in worship - or even to not worship - then there can be no true inward heart-change to live lives that honor and glorify God. The Catholic Church had no business becoming entangled with secular powers and, when they did so, that was when they began to decline in their clarity of the Gospel message. With their lust for riches and status and their persecution of fellow humans for the sake of holding onto that power, they lost the spiritual argument for holding forth the banner of the body of Christ. This world is NOT the kingdom of God and, in its current state, can never be.

...the order providentially established by God in the world, which demands a harmonious agreement between the two societies. . . . Remove the agreement between Church and State, and the result will be that from these common matters will spring the seeds of disputes which will become acute on both sides; it will become more difficult to see where the truth lies, and great confusion is certain to arise. Finally, this thesis [i.e., "separation of church and state"] inflicts great injury on society itself, for [a society] cannot either prosper or last long when due place is not left for religion, which is the supreme rule and the sovereign mistress in all questions touching the rights and the duties of men.

Well of course Pope Leo is right about all this — at the level of diagnosis and probable course of the disease. (IMHO)

But he does not actually propose a practical remedy.

His analysis is spot-on. He is describing a "broken" world — the world we humans live in, ever since the Fall of Adam....

But I do not see Pope Leo prescribe any practical remedy. For there is no way to repair the brokenness of this world — this brokenness of man owing to the eternally inheritable original sin of the first man — from within this world....

It seems to me whenever the Church has gotten involved with political affairs or affairs of state, bad stuff has usually followed. So why should I believe that a theocratic State could achieve any better result than what we have now, in our currently degraded American society?

As for ameliorating the degraded conditions, why not reinstitute the ancient practice of shunning? :^)

For the record, the shunning of reprobate Catholic politicians by the Catholic and Christian public — the theme of the article at the top — falls squarely within the First Amendment protections of the Constitution. Personally, I favor such.

Yet it seems the social practice of "shunning" has become a lost art. :^) But heaven (and history) knows, it can be very effective. It's not a "political act" per se; it's a social act, wherein "inhabitants" who detect a nefarious presence, propensity, or act within their community relentlessly point it out to their neighbors.

I would like to ask Pope Leo, when in human history has there ever been any "mutual concord between temporal authority and the priesthood" that did not include identifying "outsiders," and eventually persecuting them, or making war on them?

The U.S. Constitution defends the rights of minorities. For they are God's children, too, and possess the equal rights of all God's children.

Anyhoot, Christ will come, set matters straight, and then human beings can live in the New Jerusalem, under Christ our King; and the State will then dissolve into God's Law of Truth, Justice, and Goodness in a reign of Peace. Then you will have the "ideal" you evidently crave, an ideal I myself have great desire to see realized....

I just think your ideal is "beyond" this world, and cannot be realized until Christ comes again.

Meanwhile, we just have to do the best we can — to live in the Lord, to be instruments of His Peace:

Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace —
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is sadness, joy;
Where there is darkness, light.
Oh divine Master! Grant
That I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console.
Not so much to be understood, as to understand.
Not so much to be loved, as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
It is in dying that we are born again
Unto eternal life. Amen. — St. Francis Assisi

I am a realist. And so I do not believe that what you seek is achievable in this broken world. But I am confident it can be achieved in the next, upon the Second Coming of Christ, Who this next time comes in Judgment, "with a flaming sword."

And meanwhile we can always take reliable direction from St. Francis....

May Christ's love, light, and peace ever be with you, dear brother in Him!

“”I wonder where the Roman Catholic Church was when slavery was going on throughout Europe and the world for millenia and what it has done about slavery that is STILL going on in parts of the Middle East and Africa?””

Lets take a tour through history...

Sublimus Dei 1537 by Pope Paul III
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Paul03/p3subli.htm

We, who, though unworthy, exercise on earth the power of our Lord and seek with all our might to bring those sheep of His flock who are outside into the fold committed to our charge, consider, however, that the Indians are truly men and that they are not only capable of understanding the Catholic Faith but, according to our information, they desire exceedingly to receive it. Desiring to provide ample remedy for these evils, We define and declare by these Our letters, or by any translation thereof signed by any notary public and sealed with the seal of any ecclesiastical dignitary, to which the same credit shall be given as to the originals, that, notwithstanding whatever may have been or may be said to the contrary, the said Indians and all other people who may later be discovered by Christians, are by no means to be deprived of their liberty or the possession of their property, even though they be outside the faith of Jesus Christ; and that they may and should, freely and legitimately, enjoy their liberty and the possession of their property; nor should they be in any way enslaved; should the contrary happen, it shall be null and have no effect.

Sicut Dudum written in 1435

Pope Eugene IV Against the Enslaving of Black Natives
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Eugene04/eugene04sicut.htm
They have deprived the natives of their property or turned it to their own use, and have subjected some of the inhabitants of said islands to perpetual slavery (subdiderunt perpetuae servituti), sold then to other persons and committed other various illicit and evil deeds against them . . . Therefore We ... exhort, through the sprinkling of the Blood of Jesus Christ shed for their sins, one and all, temporal princes, lords, captains, armed men, barons, soldiers, nobles, communities and all others of every kind among the Christian faithful of whatever state, grade or condition, that they themselves desist from the aforementioned deeds, cause those subject to them to desist from them, and restrain them rigorously. And no less do We order and command all and each of the faithful of each sex that, within the space of fifteen days of the publication of these letters in the place where they live, that they restore to their pristine liberty

Gregory XVI, In Supremo, December 3, 1839

There were to be found subsequently among the faithful some who, shamefully blinded by the desire of sordid gain, in lonely and distant countries did not hesitate to reduce to slavery (in servitutem redigere) Indians, Blacks and other unfortunate peoples, or else, by instituting or expanding the trade in those who had been made slaves by others, aided the crime of others. Certainly many Roman Pontiffs of glorious memory, Our Predecessors, did not fail, according to the duties of their office, to blame severely this way of acting as dangerous for the spiritual welfare of those who did such things and a shame to the Christian name.....

The slave trade, although it has been somewhat diminished, is still carried on by numerous Christians. Therefore, desiring to remove such a great shame from all Christian peoples . . . and walking in the footsteps of Our Predecessors, We, by apostolic authority, warn and strongly exhort in the Lord faithful Christians of every condition that no one in the future dare to bother unjustly, despoil of their possessions, or reduce to slavery (in servitutem redigere) Indians, Blacks or other such peoples. Nor are they to lend aid and favor to those who give themselves up to these practices, or exercise that inhuman traffic by which the Blacks, as if they were not humans but rather mere animals, having been brought into slavery in no matter what way, are, without any distinction and contrary to the rights of justice and humanity, bought, sold and sometimes given over to the hardest labor.

IN PLURIMIS (On the Abolition of Slavery)
Pope Leo XIII promulgated on 5 May 1888.
http://www.ewtn.com/library/encyc/l13abl.htm

Whoever compare the pagan and the Christian attitude toward slavery will easily come to the conclusion that the one was marked by great cruelty and wickedness, and the other by great gentleness and humanity, nor will it be possible to deprive the Church of the credit due to her as the instrument of this happy change. And this becomes still more apparent when we consider carefully how tenderly and with what prudence the Church has cut out and destroyed this dreadful curse of slavery. She has deprecated any precipitate action in securing the manumission and liberation of the slaves, because that would have entailed tumults and wrought injury, as well to the slaves themselves as to the commonwealth, but with singular wisdom she has seen that the minds of the slaves should be instructed through her discipline in the Christian faith, and with baptism should acquire habits suitable to the Christian life. Therefore, when, amid the slave multitude whom she has numbered among her children, some, led astray by some hope of liberty, have had recourse to violence and sedition, the Church has always condemned these unlawful efforts and opposed them, and through her ministers has applied the remedy of patience.

BB-””I just do not agree that separating the church from the state was a bad thing. I do not for one minute believe Jesus advocated for a church state””

Without the Church being involved you get to have legal abortion-which has killed far more innocent people than hitlar,stalin and mao....You get legal pornography,gay marriage etc...

But hey, you say it’s not such a bad thing

BB””With their lust for riches and status and their persecution of fellow humans””

There was NEVER Catholic teaching that ever condoned this behavior,it was only those who did not follow the faith,therefore the Church is spotless as it has always been

It would do you well to really study what the teaching of the Catholic Church is rather than blaming her for the actions of a few,dear sister

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