Replies

Repeating the other poster's screen name repeatedly in the title you've given him is making the thread "about" him. It is "making it personal."

It is enough to state once that you believe that he is his own Pope and thereafter use a title that would apply to any person so situation, e.g. "self-Pope". That would not be "making it personal."

Religion Moderators do not reveal their own religious memberships.

If you are offended when posters insult your Church, beliefs, religious authorities and so on then you should IGNORE "open" Religion Forum threads altogether. They are in a town square format, thick-skin is required.

Thank you for your reply:

As I understand your reply. I can refer to members of the swampfox armchair church as that is the only possible way to identify swampfox-armchair-church from the other ‘self-churches’ in the world.

Example: Many Churches in the world use a modifier to distinguish their church from other churches with the same name = Baptist, free-will Baptist, Southern Baptist.

Self-pope can be numerous people. & I do not see in freerepublic guidelines where using a person’s name is prohibited = especially when that person is addressed with an honorable title of pope.

I do believe, freerepublic should encourage clarity of thought as one of its goals. Self-pope in a series of comments does not lead to ‘clarity’ when addressing a particular church such as swampfox’s ‘self-pope armchair church.’

The Religion Moderator has mentioned to >me specifically about being offended with insults to my Church.
To set the record straight: I would like the >same latitude to address the pope-name people of other churches.

As I have said before: There seems to be an animosity towards the Catholic Church & >Catholics which allows >hate mongers to hate >Catholics with impunity.

I also suspect that >swampfox was the true >crybaby in this discussion about >pope-swampfox’s armchair church. Pope-swampfox was not here to discuss any religion dispute. I personally thought pope-swampfox was here to >hate.

The standards the Religion Moderator has set in this thread are NOT completely set out in the guidelines. Do the Religion Moderators have a >separate guideline sheet or do the Religion Moderators ‘make things up’ as they go along with specific general items set by the guidelines.

I ask because there does seem to be a general tolerance for hate mongering against >Catholics with supposedly >prohibited pronouns. BUT, when a Catholic uses the same pronoun against a hate-monger, the moderator steps in to the thread.

Please compared post #130 with the comment I was admonished about.

Please refer to post #147 & #148. I personally interpreted those two posts as a >gloating comments as though >swampfox considered the Religion Moderator to be choosing his side in a dispute against a >Catholic.

The comment ‘who’s crying...’ leads me to think >swampfox was the crybaby in this dispute.

+ Rather than a long comment where I use swampfox’s name, it appears I can make short ‘snarky’ comments based on your guidelines & what is permitted to >Catholic haters.

For instance:
I could simple address the comment to >swampfox & then in the body of the comment say,
Self pope of a church that despises Jesus.

Since swampfox was allowed to post such a comment without admonishment in #130, let me demonstrate it for you.

Religion Moderator, you have permission to look at >all my comments on freerepublic.

I don’t typically address comments such as is found in #158.

I don’t know with certainty swampfox’s opinion of Jesus Christ. It’s for God to look into swampfox’s heart.

The comment was >not offered to offend >But to make a needed point.

In Catholic Church & much of Christianity = The Church is considered the Body of Jesus Christ. & To insult the Church is to insult Jesus Christ.

This comment for the Religion Moderators is NOT NOT alluding to anyone in this thread. It is a general observation I’m making about people that attack or mock the Roman Catholic Church.

It seems some people are posting on a >Catholic thread out of sheer >Malice. There is NO NO NO attempt to have a religious dialogue.

Let me quote a Jesuit Priest from a Catechism, the Priest wrote himself. (The Priest wrote a number of books & articles)
>In part, “Pastoral Psychologists...have also connected homosexuality with disoriented relations between child and parents, and with imbalance sense of guilt, >exorbitant >malice, and inner depression.”

The Roman Catholic Church has 1.2 billion people alive today that have been given a ‘Catholic Baptism formally.’ The Catholic Church has a problem with homosexual activity by people in the Church. (It’s in the news.)

The Roman Catholic Church teaches that God loves >everyone & homosexuals can enter Heaven too. The sin is in homosexual activity NOT NOT with being a homosexual.

The old chestnut: God loves the sinner and hates the sin.

At the moment in the USA, homosexuals are attacking the institutions in our society. The Roman Catholic Church as representing Jesus Christ has repeated pointed out that homosexual activity is a sin.

There are numerous places where the Catholic Church is being >attacked for its Biblical opposition to homosexual activity.
It’s in the news that homosexuals are continually attacking & mocking the Catholic Church.

1. Do the Religion Moderators actually look for >malice in any comments that >attack & mock the Catholic Church?

The ‘thick skin’ policy on open forums seem to apply to ‘The Catholics Only.’ BUT, Exorbitant Malice seems to be in a number of the anti-Catholic postings as there is just mocking & hatred with NO NO intent to dialogue about religious beliefs.

2. Does freerepublic permit >malice in the comments posted on any of the threads?

This is a question about the guidelines on freerepublic for Religion Moderators:

1. Is it permissible to ask for another persons’ qualifications to make ‘pope like’ pronouncements about the Christian scriptures?

2. There many people in the world who are not schooled in a religious institution. They are actually just >self appointed experts.
Harold Camping is a perfect example of such a person.
There is a long list of public figures both famous & infamous, who work as Protestant ministers or have pretended to be Protestant ministers, yet have NO NO special education concerning the Bible or religion.

I bought a $1 Bible at the OneBuck&noMo’ store. It’s a Protestant NIV Bible. Amazing price & I bought it to carry in my work truck as I didn’t want to risk ruining a more expensive Catholic Bible. (It’s always good to be able to ‘study on the word’ when you can.)

The point of the points 1 & 2 is: For one dollar someone can buy a Bible & pretend to be a ‘Biblical-scholar’ just by quoting scripture. Anyone that has read the Bible can see in anti-Catholic comments that many people posting have >NO NO understanding of the Bible.

3. Have the Religion Moderators considered allowing Roman Catholics to be able to specifically ask anti-Catholic posters their specific qualifications?
Looking over numerous anti-Catholic comments it is possible to see that someone can spout complete anti-Catholic nonsense & claim scripture as its basis.

4. It’s bogus & deceitful for freerepublic to allow such nonsense to occur without allowing Roman Catholics to ask for ‘qualifications’ & to ‘specifically’ point out, what the poster is saying is complete nonsense.

5. The point being: ‘Someone for $1 can buy a Bible, quote scripture, pose as a Bible-believing Christian, spout complete nonsense & post anti-Catholic comments on freerepublic.
Roman Catholics are not allowed to actually question the ‘posers that be posing.’

6. As a Roman Catholic it does not seem to be very equitable to me. After all, Roman Catholics have a >visible Church that has been in existence for >2,000 years, have >actually written the Bible as inspired by the Holy Spirit & has a gazillion (at least) books & articles explaining Catholic teachings.

7. There seems to be a difference between a ‘poser’ with a $1 Bible. & The visible = 2,000 year old Church with 1.2 BILLION people formally Baptized into it.
The Roman Catholic is obligated to post authentic teaching. The poser with a $1 Bible can post whatever suits his fancy that day & use scripture inappropriately to write anti-Catholic comments.

8. Being able to ask questions of anti-Catholic commentators may shine the True Light of Eternal Truth onto the comment section of freerepublic threads.