Starve the Catholic Beast.

[johncoby2]

Down here in Houston, two Catholic church priest, identified by church endorsed Tom DeLay with "Catholics for Tom DeLay".

You know if your church is doing this kind of crap, STOP GIVING THEM MONEY! You can still go to church, just let the right wingers pay for everything.

I will never give money to the church again. Fuck em.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

1. It may be time...

For Americans to petition the Vatican for a directive to their priests.

[aquart]

3. Now THAT's sensible.

[Time4Change]

2. I am telling you...

This was not about abortion. It was about Tort Reform. The Catholic Church needs a way out of the sex abuse cases to survive. I think they are going to cap the $$$ the church has to pay.

Bush talks about Tort Reform every five minutes.

The Vatican DID NOT endorse Bush. The American Bishops did.

[Changenow]

5. Next time I'm overseas I'll contribute at mass,

which should be in about 10 years, unless we're able to move.

As things stand now the Catholic Church in America has become a surrogate for the Republican party. It will be a cold day in hell before I give them another dime.

[tigereye]

7. there were wonderful letters

to the editor and some ads from progressive Catholic organizations in our paper here in Pittsburgh this week regarding the Catholic church's position of a "seamless garment" philosophy, i.e., that abortion alone can not be a sole reason for political support, that there is a complex assortment of issues related to life, peace and justice
(wages, poverty, abhorrence of state violence etc.) that belie the simplistic assessment that some Bishops seemed to be pushing. The church I was raised in was much more complex in it's view of the world that it seems to be currently.

[Old and In the Way]

15. Very interesting point.

The Catholic Church has been strangely muted these past 4 years....they were certainly rocked by the pedophilia charges that have plagued their priests and parishes. Democratic issues, like coming out against the Iraq war, have not been served by the Church. On the other hand, Republican issues, primarily abortion, have become a major theme within some of the Dioceses.


The media hammered the Church hard on pedophilia. I think there was a strategy to take down an important institution for Democrats. They were important source of social activism in the 70s against the war and against the RW atrocities in South America. Was this a concerted effort by the RNC, the corporate media, and their evangelical base to nuetralize this institution? I am beginning to believe that this may well have been the underlying motive. The stick of blackmail and the carrot of tort reform would serve this administration quite nicely in the war against Democrats.

[Tesibria]

4. Our $$ is our second strongest power.

(Our first strongest power is our will...to continue the fight)

I'm with you.

And I believe that it's "bibically" justified. We should (in MY humble opinion) be "tithing" - but we can direct our "tithe" to organizations that are IMPROVING the lives of people, rather than destroying them.

I "moved" my money to
(a) ACLU
(b) BBV; and
(c) a small-town library in my hometown, where nary a progressive book or magazine existed (until now ...), as I described in another post (http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=106&topic_id=12205&mesg_id=12205)

We can have a HUGE impact - both in withholding financial support - and in granting it. And -- it is SOO incredibly EMPOWERING to do so !!

------------------
"Rage" store: www.cafepress.com/tesibria.com
blog: www.democracyiscoming.com (explains purpose of rage store)

[blm]

6. Except, the Bush will ply them with faith-based money (our tax dollars)

to offset that loss of dobations, and they will be even more devoted to him.

Pathetic, ain't it?

[Nicholas_J]

8. Yes, I know how you feel

The American Catholic Church has abandoned the central tenets of Catholicism, and have almost completely abandoned the social gospel giving it a distant back seat to the side issues of preventing gay marriages, and its anti abortion focus. Neither of which have any great scriptural support. The bible has actually nothing in it that bans abortion, and only three sentences, less than 100 words condemning homosexuality. The rest of the bible is filled with calls to social justuice and while the church calls for its supporters to support legialtors based on their stands on both homsexuality adn abortion it does not demand the same deotion to social justice or demand that catholic politicians must be required to support government sponsorship of social programs OR threaten exommunication for those who vote to cut programs that are the lifeline of many people, literally. THe pope, in his firast mass to the people of american did not choose to speak of homsexuality or abortion as his main concern for the people of America, but he chose to speak to them of their obligations to the poor. The Catholic church has abandoned the injunctions that Christ held out as the first and foremost obligation of the Christian.

Persononally, as the church has greatly abondoned those values that I hold most importand, so I am at the point of abandoning it.

[Name removed]

9. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[onebigbadwulf]

10. In order to be catholic you need to be against a few things...

Abortion, Euthanasia, and Gay Marriage to name a few.

If these things aren't part of your agenda, you shouldn't be calling yourself a Catholic in the first place.

[TheFarseer]

12. You're supposed to be against birth control too

the rest of those are at least debatable. anti-birth control?!?!?!

[Skidmore]

11. Actually, we should have a movement to remove the tax exempt

status for all churches. Let em get involved in politics, but they will have to pay for it like the average citizen.

[Catt03]

13. I think you can have any movement you want

but in the next four uears, or maybe 12...you, me and 48% of the population are powerless.

Repeat after me: p o w e r l e s s.

[n2mark]

14. Catholic Church

The only reason the Catholic Church was for the shrub ---FAITH BASED MONEY! That is why all churches touted the shrub, they want the faith base money. It is not the issues but $$$$$$$$$'s
Issues are secondary, $$$$$$$$$'s received from the Shrub is number 1. I'll recheck but believe Catholic Charities received money and other social organizations in various churches received $$$$$$'s too. The church receives the bucks and fool their people about issues.

We need to demand accountability of the faith base money.

Maybe I'm way off on this. Just a thought!

Faith base money is the issue with church leaders, don't think they give a ding dong about the issues.