Thread Derails... Aids, Popes And Condoms

[MithLuin]

[quote name='philbo' date='13 January 2010 - 05:53 AM' timestamp='1263376419' post='2036035']

So, as I said to Havoc - Would I be right in summarizing your arguments as being: "if you insist on being immoral and having sex outside marriage, then we want you to catch a life-threatening illness so you can join your fellow fornicators in Hell as soon as possible"?
[/quote]

Um...no?

What is being said is that people who are going to ignore the Church's teaching on having sex outside of marriage are [i]also[/i] welcome to ignore the Church's teaching about the use of a condom. The Church is going to continue to insist that both actions are wrong. But just as the Church doesn't post someone outside the brothel to stop people from going in, she isn't exactly going to go around snatching condoms away from fornicators, either.

She is, however, going to continue to say that fornication and adultery are wrong. Because they are.

Why is this so hard to understand?

If other people want to give out condoms in Africa, they're welcome to do so. That's not something the Church is participating in. We focus our efforts elsewhere. The Church looks at the world's problems and takes steps to help people in need. If you analyze the problem and come to the conclusion that there is something else that should be done, that's fine...but the Church is under no obligation to reach the same conclusion.

People criticized Mother Teresa for 'wasting' her time providing simple care for the dying rather than opening a hospital. She was free to use her time and energy as she saw fit. If someone else wants to open a hospital in Calcutta, by all means, raise the money and do so. Same here. You are welcome to send all the condoms to Africa you want, and educate people in how to use them. The pope has no interest in helping you with this task, but no one's stopping you.



I'm sorry the tone of this thread is so...full of ridicule and over the top accusations. It's difficult to just have a discussion like this, but of course people get pretty emotional when we're talking about something as charged as deadly epidemics.

I will say that I think it admirable that you are faithful to your spouse and it is heartening to hear from couples who have been married for a long time and wouldn't even think of cheating. Human nature is not entirely bleak

Edited January 16, 2010 by MithLuin

[Socrates]

[quote name='philbo' date='14 January 2010 - 06:53 PM' timestamp='1263513183' post='2037241']
I agree that charges of "genocide" are ridiculous - his stance doesn't help, but hyperbole like that are a little bit OTT


I'm not thinking "if I commit such an act", because I'm married (for an inordinately long time now) and have never had sex outside that marriage.. not because I consider it a sin, but, well, just "because" I suppose.[/quote]
I didn't mean "you" to refer to you personally, but was referring to people in general.

[quote]But I don't go judging others, and I don't believe in moral absolutes that condemn people for doing exactly the same sorts of things as people in their culture have been doing since before there was a Catholic Church.  To be honest, I find the whole "it's sinful because we say it is" attitude really rather arrogant and repugnant... but then, that's probably because I don't have the underlying acceptance of a godly authority.[/quote]
Exactly - it's because I don't share your moral relativism.
It's asinine to say that we can't judge actions as wrong simply because they've been practiced by a culture for a long time.
And even most of you liberal relativists are unwilling to follow your relativism to its logical conclusions.
If cannibalism, pedophilia, human sacrifice, slavery, racism, or rape have been part of a culture for a long time, does that make it wrong - "arrogant and repugnant" - to condemn such actions as wrong?
People have been committing every kind of sin and evil, including murder, since the fall of man, but that doesn't mean nothing should be opposed as immoral.
You yourself certainly seem to have no trouble condemning the Pope and Catholics such as myself for opposing condom use.
And, must we remind you, regarding fornication and contraceptives as immoral has been part of Catholic moral teaching (and culture) for a good 2000 years, long before there was secularist liberalism.

[quote]You might just as well say "we want all you fornicators to burn in Hell as soon as possible", and at least be honest about it.
[/quote]
For someone so "nonjudgmental," you're awfully quick to (falsely) judge the motives of Catholics for opposing contraceptive sex.
Catholic opposition to condoms and other contraception has absolutely nothing to do with wanting people to burn in hell, and I suspect you know that. The Church opposes immorality because it does not want people to burn in hell, and urges sinners to repent as soon as possible so they can be saved. The Church is actually very quick to forgive the repentant.

But, yeah, keep attacking ridiculous strawmen rather than actual Church teaching, and continue to make an ass of yourself.

Seems you're just interested in trolling, rather than honest debate.


[quote]But if mankind is inherently sinful, and promiscuity is a symptom of that sinful nature, surely the "Christian" thing to do would be to help rather than just preach?[/quote]
The Catholic Church has done more charitable work than any organization in the world. I personally know a number of Catholics who have volunteered to help in Catholic AIDS orphanages in Kenya. (Might want to check out [url="http://www.phatmass.com/phorum/index.php?showtopic=102003"]this thread[/url].)

What have you done other than bi[font="Arial"]tc[/font]h about the Pope not supporting condoms?

Edited January 16, 2010 by Socrates

[havok579257]

[quote name='philbo' date='15 January 2010 - 06:03 AM' timestamp='1263553383' post='2037651']
My word, you are an insecure type, aren't you?

Maybe if you think I'm wrong about what Papal infallibility is, perhaps you would be so kind as to explain why? Being wrong about some esoteric parts of a particular belief system and means all your prejudices about atheists are proved right? Are you *really* that shallow?


If you think I fit every atheist stereotype, please list them and we can tick them off individually.
[/quote]

What's the point. You only want to insult the pope, the catholic church and the world wide catholic family. Your not interested in an actual debate. Your just here to troll, because you obviously have nothing better to do than troll a catholic message board.

[Skinzo]

[quote name='jkaands' date='09 January 2010 - 01:34 PM' timestamp='1263058480' post='2033235']
Please cite the [i]source[/i] of this article.

The countries in Africa with the lowest STD and HIV rates are in Muslim Africa. I, for one, would not like to live in countries with a 14th century moral code, and when the rights of both men and women, but especially women, are severely restricted.
[/quote]

Condom use to prevent AIDS has not worked in countries where it is has been aggressively promoted in Africa. Dr. Edward C. Green notes this in his Washington Post article of last year:
"In 2003, Norman Hearst and Sanny Chen of the University of California conducted a condom effectiveness study for the United Nations' AIDS program and found no evidence of condoms working as a primary HIV-prevention measure in Africa. UNAIDS quietly disowned the study. (The authors eventually managed to publish their findings in the quarterly Studies in Family Planning.) Since then, major articles in other peer-reviewed journals such as the Lancet, Science and BMJ have confirmed that condoms have not worked as a primary intervention in the population-wide epidemics of Africa. In a 2008 article in Science called "Reassessing HIV Prevention" 10 AIDS experts concluded that "consistent condom use has not reached a sufficiently high level, even after many years of widespread and often aggressive promotion, to produce a measurable slowing of new infections in the generalized epidemics of Sub-Saharan Africa."
See: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/27/AR2009032702825.html

If the muslim countries moral code is 14th century, how do you describe the Catholic Church's moral code??


S.

Edited January 17, 2010 by Skinzo

[philbo]

[quote name='MithLuin' date='16 January 2010 - 02:33 AM' timestamp='1263605594' post='2038028']
What is being said is that people who are going to ignore the Church's teaching on having sex outside of marriage are [i]also[/i]welcome to ignore the Church's teaching about the use of a condom. TheChurch is going to continue to insist that both actions are wrong. Butjust as the Church doesn't post someone outside the brothel to stoppeople from going in, she isn't exactly going to go around snatchingcondoms away from fornicators, either.

She is, however, going to continue to say that fornication and adultery are wrong. Because they are.

Why is this so hard to understand?
[/quote]
It's not hard to understand, it's just that it's the first time that it hasbeen stated that people are welcome to ignore the church's teaching on condoms (it's also the first time I've seen someone referring to the Catholic church as "She" - at least, I assume you mean the Catholicchurch.. if you mean the Pope, then there's something else I must have missed)



[quote name='Socrates' date='16 January 2010 - 03:13 AM' timestamp='1263607988' post='2038054']
I didn't mean "you" to refer to you personally, but was referring to people in general.
[/quote]
Most times when arguing in these sorts of forums, it gets suggestedthat people like me are atheist [i]because[/i] we don't want to obeyGod's rules, and that because we're atheist, we are thereforehedonistic, self-serving fornicators because we don't have the Church'smoral guidance to rein us in. Of course, any degree of observationwould dispel these illusions, but seeing the world as it is doesn'tseem to be a very strong trait in some folks.

[quote name='Socrates' date='16 January 2010 - 03:13 AM' timestamp='1263607988' post='2038054']
Exactly - it's because I don't share your moral relativism.
It's asinine to say that we can't judge actions as wrong simply because they've been practiced by a culture for a long time.
And even most of you liberal relativists are unwilling to follow your relativism to its logical conclusions.
Ifcannibalism, pedophilia, human sacrifice, slavery, racism, or rape havebeen part of a culture for a long time, does that make it wrong -"arrogant and repugnant" - to condemn such actions as wrong?
Peoplehave been committing every kind of sin and evil, including murder,since the fall of man, but that doesn't mean nothing should be opposedas immoral.
[/quote]
If you really need me to explain to you why fornication is not the same thing.. not even in the same league as cannibalism, human sacrifice, paedophilia etc., then maybe I should give up now. If two people doing something that hurts neither of them, and both agree to and can gain pleasure from is considered morally the same thing as killing someone(who presumably didn't agree to it, and doesn't really get much out of the action), then it's your moral abolutism that smells of elderberries, IMO.

[quote name='Socrates' date='16 January 2010 - 03:13 AM' timestamp='1263607988' post='2038054']
And, must we remind you, regarding fornication and contraceptives as immoral has been part of Catholic moral teaching (and culture) for agood 2000 years, long before there was secularist liberalism.
[/quote]
er..who was it who just said "It's asinine to say that we can't judge actions as wrong simply because they've been practiced by a culture fora long time." - you seem to think that Catholic morals somehow become more true with age, but this isn't the case for what other people believe or do.

[quote name='Socrates' date='16 January 2010 - 03:13 AM' timestamp='1263607988' post='2038054']
But, yeah, keep attacking ridiculous strawmen rather than actual Church teaching, and continue to make an ass of yourself.
Seems you're just interested in trolling, rather than honest debate.
[/quote]
A bit like "cargo cult science", we've got "cargo cult debating" -you've seen the words "strawman" and "troll", yet using them inappropriately. A strawman is an argument based on misrepresenting an opponent's position - I haven't done that (unless you're suggestingthat the Church really means "use condoms"); and you really have no idea what trolling is if you think that someone who taken the time to answer beaver dam near every point thrown at him is a troll.


[quote name='havok579257' date='16 January 2010 - 08:47 AM' timestamp='1263628061' post='2038359']
What'sthe point. You only want to insult the pope, the catholic church andthe world wide catholic family. Your not interested in an actualdebate. Your just here to troll, because you obviously have nothingbetter to do than troll a catholic message board.
[/quote]
Where's the insult? I think the Pope and the catholic church are wrong, butI'm not insulting anybody. If I were into insults, I'd probably say something like the Pope is responsible for aiding child abusers avoid justice... except that isn't an insult either, because ..er.. he did.

As for being a troll.. I refer you to the answer I gave above.

Incidentally, re one of your previous assertions - Socrates implicitly said that condom non-use *was* part of the moral teaching of the catholic church (in that he was accusing me of attacking the moral stance of the Church for criticizing the position on condom use), and AIUI that is something to which Papal infallibility is supposed to apply, and it was that comment to which I was directly replying when I mentioned it...

[quote name='Skinzo' date='17 January 2010 - 05:42 PM' timestamp='1263746564' post='2039113']
Condom use to prevent AIDS has not worked in countries where it is has been aggressively promoted in Africa. Dr. Edward C. Green notes this in his Washington Post article of last year:
"In 2003, Norman Hearst and Sanny Chen of the University of California conducted a condom effectiveness study for the United Nations' AIDS program and found no evidence of condoms working as a primary HIV-prevention measure in Africa. UNAIDS quietly disowned the study. (The authors eventually managed to publish their findings in the quarterly Studies in Family Planning.) Since then, major articles in other peer-reviewed journals such as the Lancet, Science and BMJ have confirmed that condoms have not worked as a primary intervention in the population-wide epidemics of Africa. In a 2008 article in Science called "Reassessing HIV Prevention" 10 AIDS experts concluded that "[i]consistent condom use has not reached a sufficiently high level[/i], even after many years of widespread and often aggressive promotion, to produce a measurable slowing of new infections in the generalized epidemics of Sub-Saharan Africa."
[/quote]
...to summarize (my italics above): it's not that condoms don't work.. it's that people (especially men) don't want to wear them. However, given that abstinence has an even lower take-up rate, and there doesn't appear to be anything else on the horizon, what other option is there?

[Skinzo]

...to summarize (my italics above): it's not that condoms don't work.. it's that people (especially men) don't want to wear them. However, given that abstinence has an even lower take-up rate, and there doesn't appear to be anything else on the horizon, what other option is there?
[/quote]

If you read Dr.Green's article you will see the point he is trying to make is that people who use condoms tend to engage in riskier sex.

S.

[philbo]

[quote name='Skinzo' date='18 January 2010 - 02:22 PM' timestamp='1263820971' post='2039599']

If you read Dr.Green's article you will see the point he is trying to make is that people who use condoms tend to engage in riskier sex.

S.
[/quote]
..a point, rather than "the" point. He asserts risk compensation, and the "multiple serial relationships" in which condoms aren't generally used.. unfortunately, the article linked to is behind a paywall, so I'm not in a position to judge the analysis.

The one thing that is inarguable is that consistent condom use hasn't reached a sufficiently high level to prevent the spread of AIDS.

[Winchester]

"Reduce" is the [s]more [/s]proper term.

Edited January 18, 2010 by Winchester

[Skinzo]

[quote name='philbo' date='18 January 2010 - 10:48 AM' timestamp='1263826108' post='2039627']
..a point, rather than "the" point. He asserts risk compensation, and the "multiple serial relationships" in which condoms aren't generally used.. unfortunately, the article linked to is behind a paywall, so I'm not in a position to judge the analysis.

The one thing that is inarguable is that consistent condom use hasn't reached a sufficiently high level to prevent the spread of AIDS.
[/quote]

Philbo,
It's actually not behind a paywall. But you may have to sign up for an account (free) to see it. Mebbe, I can copy some of it here:

"When Pope Benedict XVI commented this month that condom distribution isn't helping, and may be worsening, the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa, he set off a firestorm of protest. Most non-Catholic commentary has been highly critical of the pope. A cartoon in the Philadelphia Inquirer, reprinted in The Post, showed the pope somewhat ghoulishly praising a throng of sick and dying Africans: "Blessed are the sick, for they have not used condoms."

Yet, in truth, current empirical evidence supports him.

We liberals who work in the fields of global HIV/AIDS and family planning take terrible professional risks if we side with the pope on a divisive topic such as this. The condom has become a symbol of freedom and -- along with contraception -- female emancipation, so those who question condom orthodoxy are accused of being against these causes. My comments are only about the question of condoms working to stem the spread of AIDS in Africa's generalized epidemics -- nowhere else.

In 2003, Norman Hearst and Sanny Chen of the University of California conducted a condom effectiveness study for the United Nations' AIDS program and found no evidence of condoms working as a primary HIV-prevention measure in Africa. UNAIDS quietly disowned the study. (The authors eventually managed to publish their findings in the quarterly Studies in Family Planning.) Since then, major articles in other peer-reviewed journals such as the Lancet, Science and BMJ have confirmed that condoms have not worked as a primary intervention in the population-wide epidemics of Africa. In a 2008 article in Science called "Reassessing HIV Prevention" 10 AIDS experts concluded that "consistent condom use has not reached a sufficiently high level, even after many years of widespread and often aggressive promotion, to produce a measurable slowing of new infections in the generalized epidemics of Sub-Saharan Africa."



Let me quickly add that condom promotion has worked in countries such as Thailand and Cambodia, where most HIV is transmitted through commercial sex and where it has been possible to enforce a 100 percent condom use policy in brothels (but not outside of them). In theory, condom promotions ought to work everywhere. And intuitively, some condom use ought to be better than no use. But that's not what the research in Africa shows.

Why not?

One reason is "risk compensation." That is, when people think they're made safe by using condoms at least some of the time, they actually engage in riskier sex.

Another factor is that people seldom use condoms in steady relationships because doing so would imply a lack of trust. (And if condom use rates go up, it's possible we are seeing an increase of casual or commercial sex.) However, it's those ongoing relationships that drive Africa's worst epidemics. In these, most HIV infections are found in general populations, not in high-risk groups such as sex workers, gay men or persons who inject drugs. And in significant proportions of African populations, people have two or more regular sex partners who overlap in time. In Botswana, which has one of the world's highest HIV rates, 43 percent of men and 17 percent of women surveyed had two or more regular sex partners in the previous year.

These ongoing multiple concurrent sex partnerships resemble a giant, invisible web of relationships through which HIV/AIDS spreads. A study in Malawi showed that even though the average number of sexual partners was only slightly over two, fully two-thirds of this population was interconnected through such networks of overlapping, ongoing relationships.

So what has worked in Africa? Strategies that break up these multiple and concurrent sexual networks -- or, in plain language, faithful mutual monogamy or at least reduction in numbers of partners, especially concurrent ones. "Closed" or faithful polygamy can work as well.

In Uganda's early, largely home-grown AIDS program, which began in 1986, the focus was on "Sticking to One Partner" or "Zero Grazing" (which meant remaining faithful within a polygamous marriage) and "Loving Faithfully." These simple messages worked. More recently, the two countries with the highest HIV infection rates, Swaziland and Botswana, have both launched campaigns that discourage people from having multiple and concurrent sexual partners.

Don't misunderstand me; I am not anti-condom. All people should have full access to condoms, and condoms should always be a backup strategy for those who will not or cannot remain in a mutually faithful relationship. This was a key point in a 2004 "consensus statement" published and endorsed by some 150 global AIDS experts, including representatives the United Nations, World Health Organization and World Bank. These experts also affirmed that for sexually active adults, the first priority should be to promote mutual fidelity. Moreover, liberals and conservatives agree that condoms cannot address challenges that remain critical in Africa such as cross-generational sex, gender inequality and an end to domestic violence, rape and sexual coercion.

Surely it's time to start providing more evidence-based AIDS prevention in Africa."

The writer is a senior research scientist at the Harvard School of Public Health"

[philbo]

[quote name='Skinzo' date='18 January 2010 - 04:44 PM' timestamp='1263829450' post='2039645']
Philbo,
It's actually not behind a paywall. But you may have to sign up for an account (free) to see it. [/quote]
Sorry, I didn't mean that link.. I meant the article he links to from there (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/320/5877/749?ck=nck)

[Jesus_lol]

i really dont think Uganda is that good of an example to follow on morality based laws, given that just being a homosexual is now punishable by death there.



that said i agree with pretty much all of that article skinzo posted

Edited January 18, 2010 by Jesus_lol

[Socrates]

[quote name='philbo' date='18 January 2010 - 07:48 AM' timestamp='1263818881' post='2039594']
Most times when arguing in these sorts of forums, it gets suggestedthat people like me are atheist [i]because[/i] we don't want to obeyGod's rules, and that because we're atheist, we are thereforehedonistic, self-serving fornicators because we don't have the Church'smoral guidance to rein us in. Of course, any degree of observationwould dispel these illusions, but seeing the world as it is doesn'tseem to be a very strong trait in some folks.[/quote]
This really has nothing to do with anything I've posted.
My point was that if [i]anybody[/i] is engaging in promiscuous fornication, he has already made an immoral choice, and is not heeding what the Church teaches. This applies whether someone is Catholic, atheist, Protestant, Jewish, whatever.
The bottom line is that the Church teaches that to be moral, sexual intercourse must be within marriage and open to the procreation of life. Neither fornication nor contraceptive sex meet these criteria. It has nothing to do with wishing people to go to hell or any such nonsense.


[quote]If you really need me to explain to you why fornication is not the same thing.. not even in the same league as cannibalism, human sacrifice, paedophilia etc., then maybe I should give up now. If two people doing something that hurts neither of them, and both agree to and can gain pleasure from is considered morally the same thing as killing someone(who presumably didn't agree to it, and doesn't really get much out of the action), then it's your moral abolutism that smells of elderberries, IMO.
[/quote]
I never said fornication was just the same as these things. I was simply pointing out the absurdity of stating that it's wrong to condemn any behavior simply because it has been practiced in a culture for a long time. You don't seem to have a problem condemning certain things "absolutely," even though they have in fact been long practiced and accepted by certain cultures.

And I'd disagree that absolutely no one is hurt by promiscuous fornication. The AIDS epidemic and other STDs are an obvious example, but a sexual promiscuity also damages families, and thus society in general.

[quote]er..who was it who just said "It's asinine to say that we can't judge actions as wrong simply because they've been practiced by a culture fora long time." - you seem to think that Catholic morals somehow become more true with age, but this isn't the case for what other people believe or do. [/quote]
Again you miss the point. Moral principles are timeless, and don't become any more or less true with age. I was simply pointing out the hypocrisy of you judging Catholics for teaching what the Church has taught from the beginning.
Like most liberals, your moral relativism and non-judmentalism ends when it comes to passing judgment on those teaching "traditional" Christian morality.

[quote]A bit like "cargo cult science", we've got "cargo cult debating" -you've seen the words "strawman" and "troll", yet using them inappropriately. A strawman is an argument based on misrepresenting an opponent's position - I haven't done that (unless you're suggestingthat the Church really means "use condoms"); and you really have no idea what trolling is if you think that someone who taken the time to answer beaver dam near every point thrown at him is a troll.
[/quote]
Your repeated assertion that Catholics oppose condoms because "we want all you fornicators to burn in Hell as soon as possible" is complete malarkey and has nothing to do with anything the Catholic Church actually teaches, and thus attacking such a nonsensical position is indeed a strawman.
The fact that you keep making such statements shows that you are not interested in real debate but merely "trolling" for reactions by trying to piss people off on a Catholic board. If that's your game, expect no further responses from me.


[quote]Where's the insult? I think the Pope and the catholic church are wrong, butI'm not insulting anybody. If I were into insults, I'd probably say something like the Pope is responsible for aiding child abusers avoid justice... except that isn't an insult either, because ..er.. he did.
[/quote]
Another lie. Case in point.

Edited January 20, 2010 by Socrates

[philbo]

[quote name='Socrates' date='21 January 2010 - 12:08 AM' timestamp='1264028913' post='2041074']
This really has nothing to do with anything I've posted.
My point was that if [i]anybody[/i] is engaging in promiscuous fornication, he has already made an immoral choice, and is not heeding what the Church teaches. This applies whether someone is Catholic, atheist, Protestant, Jewish, whatever.
The bottom line is that the Church teaches that to be moral, sexual intercourse must be within marriage and open to the procreation of life. Neither fornication nor contraceptive sex meet these criteria. It has nothing to do with wishing people to go to hell or any such nonsense.
[/quote]
My point was that if somebody has already made what in your view is an immoral choice, still saying "don't use a condom" is actively wanting to make things worse: if you think they're going to Hell anyway (for fornication), why not let 'em use condoms? It can't do any further damage to their immortal soul, yet it could save lives here in the land of the living. If you're going to forgive them anyway, why not forgive them using a condom, too?

That's what I meant by "burn in hell as soon as possible" - by condemning condoms out of hand, you're encouraging the transmission of disease. Otherwise what's the problem with saying "if you're going to be immoral, at least be immoral with a condom on"?


[quote name='Socrates' date='21 January 2010 - 12:08 AM' timestamp='1264028913' post='2041074']
I never said fornication was just the same as these things. I was simply pointing out the absurdity of stating that it's wrong to condemn any behavior simply because it has been practiced in a culture for a long time. You don't seem to have a problem condemning certain things "absolutely," even though they have in fact been long practiced and accepted by certain cultures.
[/quote]
You were attempting a reductio ad absurdam by trying to compare a reasonable behaviour with something that is completely beyond the pale. I don't think anything is inherently good because it has been practised for generations - you're the one who's asserting that the Church's moral position is somehow more moral because it has been like that for a couple of millennia.

The point I was making was that some johnny-come-lately steps in to tell somebody that their behaviour is sinful and immoral "because we say so" (OK, "because we say that our invisible, intangible, omnipresent yet somehow never, ever there omnipotent yet stangely powerless father figure says so").. Things aren't wrong or immoral because they're written in some book somewhere - they're wrong or immoral because they hurt people.

Morals *are* relative - a look at the consistency of what was considered moral through the history of the Catholic Church itself will tell you this. This pretence that there is an unwavering moral code practised by the church over the millennia is simply bollocks.


[quote name='Socrates' date='21 January 2010 - 12:08 AM' timestamp='1264028913' post='2041074']
And I'd disagree that absolutely no one is hurt by promiscuous fornication. The AIDS epidemic and other STDs are an obvious example, but a sexual promiscuity also damages families, and thus society in general.[/quote]
It's not a guarantee: in some cases, people are hurt by promiscuous fornication; in some, they're not. I'd rather reduce the number hurt, e.g. by reducing transmission of STDs, than lump all fornication together as one.

[quote name='Socrates' date='21 January 2010 - 12:08 AM' timestamp='1264028913' post='2041074']
Again you miss the point. Moral principles are timeless, and don't become any more or less true with age. I was simply pointing out the hypocrisy of you judging Catholics for teaching what the Church has taught from the beginning.
Like most liberals, your moral relativism and non-judmentalism ends when it comes to passing judgment on those teaching "traditional" Christian morality.[/quote]
Moral principles change with societies - always have, and always will. You're deluding yourself if you think otherwise.

Where's the hypocrisy? Please back up your accusations with something a bit more concrete.

[quote name='Socrates' date='21 January 2010 - 12:08 AM' timestamp='1264028913' post='2041074']
Another lie. Case in point.
[/quote]
No lie: the Catholic Church has for decades used intimidation to silence the victims of abuse by priests - this is not my opinion, this is what has been reported by hundreds (or even thousands) of people over the past few years - it's only after a critical mass (so to speak) had the courage to go public that it finally got to point where the Vatican could no longer deny it had happened. Only a few years ago, the then Cardinal Ratzinger sent out a missive that can only be interpreted as saying "keep the lid on it and protect the Church", letting abusers continue to avoid justice.

Continue to bury your head in the sand if you must, but I am not lying.

[Drew-Memphis]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' date='08 January 2010 - 04:04 PM' timestamp='1262984681' post='2032623']
I'm not American, and your evidence has been discredited.
[/quote]

Epic fail.

[cmotherofpirl]

[quote name='philbo' date='25 January 2010 - 11:37 AM' timestamp='1264433826' post='2044155']
No lie: the Catholic Church has for decades used intimidation to silence the victims of abuse by priests - this is not my opinion, this is what has been reported by hundreds (or even thousands) of people over the past few years - it's only after a critical mass (so to speak) had the courage to go public that it finally got to point where the Vatican could no longer deny it had happened. Only a few years ago, the then Cardinal Ratzinger sent out a missive that can only be interpreted as saying "keep the lid on it and protect the Church", letting abusers continue to avoid justice.

Continue to bury your head in the sand if you must, but I am not lying.
[/quote]

You may not think you are lying, you may sincerely believe what you are saying is true, however it is not.