Why are you Catholic bashing?
Yes, the Catholic Church has made mistakes and we are working on the current one. Pope Benedict XVI is making some sweeping changes of which you may not be aware.
Now, please tell me, what other church has stood up for life, against abortion, against euthanasia, against stem cell mutilation the longest? (Even before it was popular to do so!) The Catholic Church, of course.
Give credit where credit is due.
What's unspoken here is that these are the real issues behind the attacks on the Catholic Church. The culture which doesn't know right from wrong, liberty from license, is also the culture which supports abortion, euthanasia, and embryonic stem cell mutilation.
Ridiculing Catholic beliefs with regard to the Virgin Birth, etc. (which is hardly an intellectually honest discussion of why they might be held) is meant to discredit Catholic positions on these "personal freedom" issues as well (conveniently short-circuiting any intellectually honest discussion of the reasoning behind them). In other words, the idea is that the Catholic faith is so loopy, that Catholic moral positions (which have political implications) must be loopy as well.
I noticed, for example, that Reason, the libertarian rag, through a fit when John Paul II, of blessed memory, promulgated Fides et Ratio, since in their view faith is always unreasonable. But the premises of any logical system are always accepted "on faith", making Reason's position quite unreasonable.
Just a clarification lest anyone take this the wrong way, mistakes and horrible crimes and injustices were committed by church men not The Church. The Church is the spotless Bride of Christ.