Replies

I wonder if a decision was made that this thread was one of diminishing returns?

Sometimes it seems like the ONLY two options are:

BLAME ~~BUSH~~ PROTTYS

they take their toys and go home.

Honest, civil, thoughtful dialogue seems very sparse far too often. Sigh.

You're right -- there's not much of a presence to be felt from the "usual suspects." Where are the non-Protestants, who are usually so busy defending the words of their "Holy Father" from any and all criticism?

The most perceptive comment on this thread was from Mr Roger's post #87:

Yeah...an end to war. Unless he was calling for the second coming to come quickly, he was wasting his breath.

I think this is the heart of the matter, both for this 2010 World Day of Peace Message and the Caritas in Veritate encyclical it is obviously an extension of: where is our our Lord and Master Jesus Christ? Where is the true Master of History"?

HE is hard to find in these papal pronouncements. Instead, we have "integral human development" of all peoples toward some future earthly unity when humanity will somehow have no war, no want, etc. Paradise on earth, and from our own actions!

No mention of a Day of Judgement. No Second Coming. No "new heaven and new earth." What's going on here? Teilhard's spiritual evolution towards the Omega Point? Christ as Process? Yeesh!

I don't sense much of the Gospel; instead, I'm reminded of Ivan's parable of the Grand Inquisitor from the _Brothers Karamazov_.

I think that questions concerning the Vatican's advocacy of a "global controlling authority" are important and should be pursued, but I think that for faithful Christians this issue about what is meant by the "integral" or "authentic" development of humanity is worthy of even more careful scrutiny and criticism.