Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI dies at 95. He was the first Catholic pope to abdicate in 600 years.

[tblue37]

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[3auld6phart]

1. No loss

Pissoff k

[Sky Jewels]

2. Pure evil.

💀

[Shermann]

4. I think he was mostly just misguided

Power, good intentions, and misconceptions make for a dangerous cocktail.

[Sky Jewels]

5. Good intentions? To protect child rapists

and to continue the church’s centuries-long reign of terror against women?

Fuck him.

[Shermann]

8. He inherited those problems

...and failed to reform a legacy institution which is structured in such a way as to resist reforms.

He has many of the same misguided beliefs as some of your fellow Americans. Those misconceptions are often amplified by power and influence.

All of these things are possible without rising to the level of being "evil". That's not the best word in my opinion and should be reserved for those more deserving.

[Act_of_Reparation]

14. I'll defer to Hannah Arendt on this.

In Eichmann in Jerusalem, she wrote at some length on the nature of evil, particularly in the context of individuals acting within a system.

Observing Adolf Eichmann on trial for his orchestration of the Holocaust, she theorized he wasn't a sociopath or a zealous anti-Semite, but rather an ordinary person primarily motivated by mundane career interests. His banality doesn't make what he did any less evil.

In Ratzinger's case, it appears he was more concerned about the Church than he was about protecting children, or making whole those who were hurt in the past. It took widespread public outrage just to get the guy to publicly admit what he already knew: priests were raping kids.

There's room for debate here, sure, but by my reckoning that's evil.

[Sky Jewels]

15. Thank you. You responded much better than I could.

[Shermann]

16. This is essentially a Reductio ad Hitlerum fallacy

The Catholic Church is deeply flawed but is not a homicidal, criminal organization like the Nazi party was. Association with it doesn't impart evilness.

[Act_of_Reparation]

17. It is essentially not.

But yours is essentially a composition fallacy.

[Shermann]

19. In what way?

A composition fallacy is to infer that something is true of the whole from the fact that it is true of some part of the whole. I haven't inferred anything; I've merely refuted your comparison between the Catholic Church and the Nazi Party as fallacious.

[Act_of_Reparation]

21. Simple.

All reductio ad hilterium involve comparisons to Nazis; not all comparisons to Nazis are reductio ad hitlerium.

I'm not attempting to discredit anything by virtue of comparing it to Nazis.

[NoRethugFriends]

7. Wow. Just wow.

[Arazi]

3. The Catholic Church refused to hold him accountable for rape, sexual assault

and the many suicides caused by his evil actions.

They let him “retire” to a luxurious life in a castle with an entire staff waiting on his every whim.

Another monstrous failure by this church specifically and by religion in general that warps and maims people

[gay texan]

6. Good Riddance Ratso

One less nazi in the world.

[3catwoman3]

9. Question arising from ignorance here - "the first Catholic Pope"

Are there popes who are not Catholic?

[tblue37]

11. And are there bears who do not sh*t in the wooods?

[FakeNoose]

12. There have been schisms

The most well-known schism happened in the early Middle Ages. There's more info in this Wikipedia article here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Schism

Long story short: a large group of (mostly French) Catholics broke off from the Church in Rome and started electing their own Popes that are now called the Avignon Popes. The Church in Rome had an Inquisition, put down the rebellion eventually, ugly things happened, almost all forgotten now.

There was an earlier schism around 600 AD when the Eastern Orthodox Church split off from Rome, but they are still considered "Catholic" just not "Roman Catholic."

Happy New Year my friend.

[Volaris]

20. That's not what that phrase means...he's the first pope to quit.

Whoever wrote that, could have left out the word catholic, and it probably wouldn't have mattered to the overall idea of the sentence.

But I get what you're saying; no, there are no popes that are not catholic (as far as I know).

[Aristus]

10. Look at that robe. Liberace would have told him to tone it down a little.

I prefer Francis's plain white simplicity.

[debm55]

13. He was also a member of the Hitler Youth. Never liked him.And the refusal to acknowledge the child

Last edited Sat Dec 31, 2022, 04:45 PM - Edit history (1)

rape and abuse, just triggers me. I hope they are not planning on a big fuss for the funeral.

[lindysalsagal]

18. The guy sat around his popecastle in luxury doing nothing for

Catholics, humans or celestials. Worthless grifter.