Comments on: Whatever happened to the anti-fascist Left?

By: Fabio P.Barbieri

Fabio P.Barbieri — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 10:49:35 +0000

Ross: you have said in so many words that I am staying in the Catholic Church because of irrational terrors worked up by the priesthood. I do not think I even need answer such a blatant and mindless insult. If you think you can argue with anyone while making such assumptions about them, I do not. You have never in your life met a Catholic, and you have lived and still live in a state of complete ignorance. End of story, and end of my discussion with you – which I never should have started anyway.

By: Ross

Ross — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 13:41:16 +0000

Its mass numbers will not let it go, whatever it does, supports, influences. But that’s with how it presently functions . It is, undeniably, the work of people, and if the hovering deity bit was removed and the pronounced punishment was no longer there for its flock at their ends, then perhaps – then – it will lose numbers and wither.
To be fair to you, Fabio, this is, as you know, applicable to all religions. Once you remove the threats, things will change.
Dave Cameron wrote Boccaccio, didn’t he?

By: Fabio P.Barbieri

Fabio P.Barbieri — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 03:37:36 +0000

No, I don’t agree and I continue not to agree. Evidently you don’t know the most ancient Catholic joke of them all (retailed by Boccaccio and still popular as new in the streets of Rome to this day):

A modestly educated Catholic had a friend who was a brilliant Jew. (Or he might be a Lutheran, a Communist, or whoever was the enemy du jour.) They often discussed religion, and the Jew always managed to outscore the Christian, because of his quicker wits and greater learning. And the Christian would answer: “You know I am not smart enough to answer that. You should be arguing with our great theologians and the cardinals and bishops, they would be able to answer you!”

And he said it so often that one day, his friend, curious about these famous sages, decided to go visit Rome.

He stayed away for several months… and came back baptized.

“So they did convince you, then?” said his friend.

“No, not really. The thing is, I had plenty of time to look at how things were done and how people worked. And I was forced to come to the conclusion that if such an institution lasted more than twenty-four hours, let alone many centuries, it was proof positive that God kept it going! Nothing else could explain it.”
………………………………………………………………

The cleverness, the wisdom, the far-sightedness of the Church are consistently overrated by her enemies. The recent absurd bungle over the Lefebvrites was only strange because commentators could not bring themselves to believe what the Pope freely admitted: that there had been a complete bureaucratic snafu. That sort of thing happens all the time. There is no period in history in which the Church cannot be pointed out to have made every possible mistake, not to mention harboured all kinds of deadly corruption. And yet, it does not die.

By: Ross

Ross — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 15:05:03 +0000

Fabio, repeating the known bad examples of that church would be pointless, you’re an intelligent man and will know of them; If the institution weren’t so powerful it would fail rather than be bailed out by a deity. Do you agree?
I think that’s a more fundamental observation to make than Chesterton’s observation of the disagreement among the flock.

And I do know Catholics. Indeed, I have even been to a Catholic funeral service.

By: Fabio P.Barbieri

Fabio P.Barbieri — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 23:26:03 +0000

Ross: you evidently never met a Catholic in your life. Learn from someone who had, G.K.Chesterton, who said – rightly – that there could never be such a thing as a Catholic party, because Catholics agree on the Church and the Sacraments, but on nothing else. You are speaking from something you heard one man once on the radio. Pardon me if I am not impressed by the depth of your evidence or the penetration of your analysis.

By: Ross

Ross — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 18:39:50 +0000

No, me neither. I suppose Graham Greene and Anthony Burgess would go with your argument in their own ways. No, I wouldn’t say the pope and his cardinals were intellectual tyrants and the many being as you put it, but just the other day, on the radio, a presenter said in surprise ‘oh my god’ and his catholic interviewee sternly said, without humour and with what I thought was a lack of understanding of his tone and his innocent use of this popular figure of speech, that he would not have language used like that.
If something that simple can not be considered, then I do wonder on the larger, more affecting issues and concerns which this church asks of its followers and how accepting the majority of those followers are.

By: Fabio P.Barbieri

Fabio P.Barbieri — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 12:54:31 +0000

No, I cannot. The notions that underlie Mr.Cohen’s statement are two, both totally wrong, and both insulting. The first is that a Catholic gives his/her assent mindlessly to whatever comes out of the Vatican, without exercising his/her intellect and without any room for dissent. The second is that “the Pope and the Cardinals” can state whatever they want and play with doctrine as much as they like, without restraints of previous doctrine and without response. In other words, the Pope and the College of Cardinals are a bunch of irresponsible intellectual tyrants, and the rest of us are post-op brain donors. If that is not insulting to you, it is to me. It is also completely false.

By: Ross

Ross — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 15:38:30 +0000

Fabio, that’s not Catholic bashing. Using the Catholic church for an example, a mighty organisation which commands adeherence to its doctrines, clearly illustrates part of the argument, in which, from the familiarity believers and nonbelievers have with the name will help understanding. Surely you can see that?

By: Fabio P.Barbieri

Fabio P.Barbieri — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 14:36:13 +0000

What a pity that you should have placed a piece of prehistoric Catholic-bashing at the end of what is otherwise one of the most stimulating items you have ever produced. I guess that when everything else fails, anti-Catholicism is still the one prejudice that people feel able to indulge without guilt. And to suggest that Protestantism has anything to do with individualism is to turn history upside down: Protestantism began with the power of rioting mobs and even when it went genteel, it enforced a societal conformity (read what Matthew Arnold had to say about the Noncomformist conscience, and compare it with what can be seen of Baptist and Bible Belt attitudes to this day) that no Catholic would have been seen dead under.