Posted on 10/01/2013 2:30:42 PM PDT by NYer
Ping!
God help us.
kind of boring...
Some people think that abortion and anal sex are good, and we have to encourage them to move towards it?
“”You know what I think about this? Heads of the Church have often been narcissists,...”
My experience is that I haven’t personally met any clerics at all who weren’t unusually narcissistic. I suspect this pope isn’t much different.
A while back, I met the Vicar General to my bishop. During our brief conversation, he pumped himself up and boasted that he had 'worked at the Vatican'. He was all about protocol and proper attire, especially vestments. The bishop, OTOH, is a simple and quite humble man, with a truly sincere heart. Afterwards, I played the fly on the wall, observing which parishioners were drawn to each of the two prelates. The Monsignor was truly a "vaticanista", whereas the bishop is a man of the people.
Important analysis of the heresy in this interview.
“The bishop, OTOH, is a simple and quite humble man, with a truly sincere heart.”
Likely, you wouldn’t need to scratch the bishop very hard to find the narcissist underneath.
God’s helped us!!!!
What a pick!
Just when the world seems like it’s going to hell, with evidence, this guy is brought to the forefront.
It’s like there really is a God.
Yup, pure Arrupian Jesuit. Really, in the time frame and location he rose through the ranks, it goes without saying. It’s kind of scary when you consider Father General Pedro Arrupe wasn’t a believer. I’m sure there’s a lot of these mega “church” leaders that aren’t Christians either but the moolah and the power is something they can all believe in.
The Bible tells of a great falling away so and you don’t even have to be that old to have witnessed it first-hand. We live in interesting times.
I guess Jesus and his Apostles went about it all wrong.
"I don't like the word narcissism", the Pope said, "it indicates an excessive love for oneself and this is not good, ...
Yet the Pope goes on to say;
I have the humility and ambition to want to do something."
Sounds narcissistic to me.
End times president: Check.
End times pontiff: Check.
Emphasis added.
The emphasized words are lost on the hard of heart: the greedy, the indifferent, those convinced they are "right". The same people who believe truly in their heart they have nothing to learn from other fellow human beings, and therefore reject one of the very meanings of Christ's Church on Earth.
It's already happened on this thread; and probably more still are thinking it now, reading what the Holy Father has has said, saying to themselves he has nothing of consequence to say here, that he doesn't know what "evangelism" really means, all the while, such people couldn't me more wrong.
So be it. I have no more ability (at this time), to attempt a counter towards such willful obstinacy. I can only hope and pray such people come to realize the true needs of all humanity (which are infinite needs for justice, beauty, and love, the "evidence" of which is in everyone's own experience, if one is honest, if one is poor in spirit). Their own needs. Needs only met through Christ. Needs only met through the Incarnation.
I pray this not "for the sake of all humanity", but for the sake of those who everyone claims to "love" (including themselves).
That is what you think is good and true. Another may think those needs are met through drug use and indiscriminate sex. And who are we to judge? Each individual must find his own vision of good and evil, right?
“There’s too much centralism in the Church, we need to follow in the footsteps of the Council” (Scalfari)
Vatican Insider - 10/ 1/2013
http://vaticaninsider.lastampa.it/en/the-vatican/detail/articolo/papa-pope-el-papa-28256/
Francis: “The Church does not grow through proselytism but through witness”
Vatican Insider - 10/ 1/2013
http://vaticaninsider.lastampa.it/en/the-vatican/detail/articolo/santa-marta-28258/
http://biblehub.com/matthew/28-19.htm
The pope doesn’t believe in proselytizing. The Muslims proselytize via the sword. Who will win, at least temporarily?
The concept of "End Times" is fascinating. But who is to say the length of such a time period. Against the backdrop of our universe and its own lengthy age, the "End Times" could be a 10-year period, or it could be a 500-year period. Who's to say? Why worry? Looking at human history, with Hitler seizing country after country and concentration camps opened, one would be right to get on ones knees and believe in one's heart that it was the End Times. As the unspeakable pandemic terror of The Black Plague eviscerated Europe in the mid-14th century, many people must have sincerely, and genuinely thought "this is the end. Here comes Christ Jesus!". In 1906, in Ecuador, with an 8.8Mag quake and massive death, surely the people shouted to the skies, "the end is here!".
One's own "end times" in fact could come tomorrow in a high speed head-on collision by a careless truck driver in the opposite lane, you with a spotless driving record for 40 years.
What is important is to consider any time "the End Times" and be spiritually committed to God and prepared and ready to "go" at a moment's notice, in the wink of an eye, in the flash of a meteorite. (Being "right with God.")
That is what you think is good and true. Another may think those needs are met through drug use and indiscriminate sex. And who are we to judge? Each individual must find his own vision of good and evil, right?
What does your own experience tell you? Your own experience unclouded by bias? Your own experience in your own life, examined with a sincere desire for Truth, no matter where that Truth may lead? Experience led by a love for Truth, beyond a perverse "love" for oneself?
I know by my own such experience what you ask doesn't truly satisfy me. Are you honestly going to tell me yours is different? This is the central question. Who cares of someone lies and says, "Yes, indiscriminate sex and drug use is what makes me truly happy". Who really cares if someone wants to lie to themselves and others like that? I don't. I can't. I can't afford to play such silly games anymore. Not with myself or others.
This is, of course, what I implied in my precious post. It is, of course, implied in my previous post that if one desires Truth over "correctness", then the claim of Christianity will be shown true, by one's own experience, because we are made to love God and serve Him first. In realizing this, in being honest, truly honest with oneself, this becomes self evident. No "clever" string of Bible verses are necessary, if one values Truth over "being right".
If one is honest with oneself the claim I'm making needs no evidence, as the "evidence" is in one's own honest, truly human experience. If one is not so honest, no amount of "evidence" is ever enough.
Even if such "evidence" produces a "Christian faith". "Faith" is nothing if it doesn't acknowledge the needs of the human heart. Such "faith" is just something tacked on to ones life: something added, not central, something circumspect, but not crucial to one's very existence. Which is not real Faith in God or oneself, at all.
Have the precious "last word" everyone seems to covet on discussion fora, blogs, and chat rooms if you want and/or need. I hope it's enough.
Do you think Vicky Gene Robinson is honest with himself? How about Martin Luther?
“Your Holiness, is there is a single vision of the Good? And who decides what it is?
“Each of us has a vision of good and of evil. We have to encourage people to move towards what they think is Good.”
Your Holiness, you wrote that in your letter to me. The conscience is autonomous, you said, and everyone must obey his conscience. I think that’s one of the most courageous steps taken by a Pope.
“And I repeat it here. Everyone has his own idea of good and evil and must choose to follow the good and fight evil as he conceives them. That would be enough to make the world a better place.””
Joh_14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
Guess the Pope has tossed out the Bible entirely now!
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